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Asha - We are Xbox



Only relevant sentence in that whole article

Sounds more that they will re-evaluate what games to actually produce to lure in more players and what games are better suited for actual Xbox success as multiplatform publisher (for example small games by Double Fine or South of Midnight might be not worth it on PS5/NSW2 porting costs considered).
 
Jesus fucking Christ this is the most vomit-inducing corporate bullshit imaginable. Any company in the world could have posted this. Which AI did she use to write it?
You know how they say people kind of act like their pet if they have had it long enough?


Seth Meyers Lol GIF by Late Night with Seth Meyers
 
Prove it!

But, this makes me think of something. Xbox must be doing something right on the books for Microsoft because I can't believe they are having another go, to this level.
 
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Dear team,

Xbox has always been different.

We started with a simple idea. Games should bring people together through shared experiences. That led to the first Xbox in 2001, Xbox Live in 2002, and new ways to connect, from friends lists and achievements to parties and play across devices. Today, Xbox reaches over 500 million players around the world, with some of the most important franchises in entertainment.

From the beginning, Xbox was built by people willing to try things that others wouldn't. We placed a consumer bet inside an enterprise company because we believed gaming would define the living room, and we were at risk of missing it.

That spirit has carried us through the last 25 years, and it is required to carry us forward.

We have work to do

Players are frustrated.

New feature drops on console have been less frequent. Our presence on PC isn't strong enough. Pricing is getting harder for people to keep up with. And core experiences like search, discovery, social, and personalization still feel too fragmented. Developers and publishers are asking for more, too: better tools, better insights, and a platform that helps them grow faster.

At the same time, a new generation of players is coming online with different expectations. Their time is split across games, media, and everything else competing for attention. They expect more content in familiar places, want to shape the worlds they play in, and want to create and socialize together, not just play together.

These changes are happening as the industry reshapes around us.

Console remains large and stable. Windows now represents more players and more hours and is increasingly where competition is most intense. Players have access to more games than ever, even as the cost and time to build blockbuster titles continues to rise, putting pressure on what gets made and how risk is taken. Some of the biggest recent hits are coming from small teams or even single creators, and places like Roblox are producing experiences that rival major franchises in scale. More players are also choosing subscriptions and services as their primary way to play, with expectations set around instant access, ongoing value, and libraries that evolve continuously.

The industry is becoming global and competitive. More than half of the market's revenue, players, and growth are happening outside of our core markets. But the rest of the world is not just a large market. Developers there are increasingly competing with the most established Western studios, combining scale, speed, and a willingness to reinvent genres many once considered mature.

The model that got us here won't be the one that takes us forward.

Xbox will be where the world plays

What does Xbox become in this next era?

Xbox will be where the world plays and creates. We will build a global platform that connects players and creators everywhere. Console is at the foundation, delivering a premium experience, and cloud brings that experience to any device. You can play where you want, and your games, progress, friends, and identity stay with you across console, PC, mobile, and cloud.

Xbox will be built to be affordable, personal, and open. We will offer flexible pricing so it's easy to get started and keep playing. The experience will adapt to you, letting you customize how you play, helping you find what you'll love, and connecting you with the right people. And we will be open to all creators, from individuals to the largest studios, giving anyone the tools to reach a global audience and keep their games growing over time.

Our new north star will be daily active players.

We will execute this through four priorities: hardware, content, experience, and services.

Hardware

  • Stabilize Gen9 as a healthy and high-quality base
  • Deliver Project Helix to lead in performance and play your console and PC games
  • Lead in comfortable, personal, high-performance accessories
  • Build a strong ecosystem that expands choice and reach
Content

  • Grow and extend an enduring portfolio of franchises players love
  • Evolve our 3P partnerships and strengthen our 5-year slate
  • Expand into China, emerging markets, and mobile-first audiences
  • Maintain and grow in live games and long-term stewardship
  • Elevate creator-centric platforms like Minecraft, The Elder Scrolls, and Sea of Thieves
Experience

  • Fix the fundamentals for players and partners
  • Make Xbox the best place for developers and creators to build and grow
  • Overhaul discovery, customization, social and personalization to connect the community
Services

  • Fortify Game Pass with clear differentiation and sustainable economics
  • Return the business to durable growth with strong cost discipline
  • Make cloud play feel native, fast, and reliable across TVs and low-cost devices
  • Use M&A deliberately to accelerate growth where organic paths are too slow
Along the way, we will reevaluate our approach to exclusivity, windowing, and AI, and share more as we learn and decide.

We are Xbox

To achieve our master plan, the way we work must transform.

Our best work happens when the full stack moves together. "Microsoft Gaming" describes our structure but it does not describe our ambition. So, we are going back to where we started and changing our team's name.

We are Xbox.

We are a high agency culture where wild and wonderful ideas thrive. Our job is not to smooth over our differences, but to connect everyone into something greater than any one studio or product.

We have to be honest about where we are. We're a challenger, and meeting this moment will require pace, energy, and a level of self-critique that should feel uncomfortable. At our best we:

  1. Earn every player
  2. Protect our art
  3. Stay rebellious
  4. Progress over perfection
  5. Signal over ceremony
  6. Core before more
  7. Outwork the problem
  8. Speed is learning
  9. Makers over managers
  10. Clarity is kindness
Over the last five years, Xbox and the industry have been through an unimaginable amount of change, and this team has continued to deliver through it for our community. Thank you for staying focused on what matters. 62 days in, we're proud of how we've honored our commitments of great games, return of Xbox, and future of play. We're here to do the most creative and courageous work of our lives, and that's what we'll do together.

With gratitude,

Matt & Asha

Man and I thought just Phil talked too much on MS. Fuck me.
 
Where was the subcategory in her statement mentioning, "Yes, quarterly layoffs are still very much XBox, we don't want to mess with a proven formula"?
 
She's already talked more than anyone at PS or Nintendo ever have combined! Why do Microsoft do stuff like this? What does it achieve? They sent phil Spencer out to constantly talk talk talk aswell but for what purpose? If anything, it has a negative effect.
 
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We can laugh at this but I find it an honest admission of their current situation and I especially appreciate their acknowledgement of issues we have that are platform agnostic as well as platform specific.

The first step to recovery is admitting you've got a problem.
 
Read Opening the Xbox. It's one of the best game related books. The making of the original really was powered by a rebellious attitude and a group of misfits. Because Xbox is in such a dire state right now, it's honestly the best time to get back to that rebellious spirit and just scrap their way back.

And importantly, Sony is on 100% cruise control right now. They don't give a shit. Now's the time to strike.
 
Everyone hates competition until Sony Playstation fucks people in the ass. I love Playstation but I am rooting for Xbox here. I'd even want to grab one again. I think life is better with the 3 console platforms.
 
She's ticking all the right boxes with the gamepass price cut, but should have left the Wire article out and just claimed back "Xbox" instead of the MS Gaming branding.

The last thing they want is negative PR (which they're known for) and getting meme'd on the internet.

Just lay low and let your actions speak louder than words.
 
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The problem with Xbox is that there's no clear vision and that they don't stand out in any of the core things in which they need to.
  • They have no strong core market and the balls to stick to their own guns and vision like Nintendo
  • They have no strong single player polished games and well organized studios with people with actual expertise like Playstation
  • They have no strong platform with an immense library and great UX and discovery like Steam

The only thing Xbox has done better than anyone else is continuously speaking without delivering.
This has led them to not only not being the best at the following things, but even worse than the general norm within the industry.
  • They have no business model with strong economics
  • Their branding is incredibly convoluted with no sense of vision nor identity
  • Due to weak internal communication/company culture they have on the one hand just yes nodding people and on the other hand highly entitled devs and leadership within the studios, such as Bethesda and Todd Howard
  • Due to constantly promising without delivering they've lost trust with their community and instead just get clowned on by them
  • Due to weak sales, no community and no reason for purchasing a console, the developers recognize that Xbox is all the way down on their priority list if at all
  • Due to all the above things, retailers have given up on Xbox entirely

For Xbox to truly succeed, the following needs to happen (which it won't FYI).
  • Focus on the slow grind instead of trying to flip reality
  • Xbox needs to untether itself from Microsoft so it can make its own decisions, fund and be responsible for their own financials and free itself from the expectations of Microsoft and their policies
  • Establish a strong core vision with a focused market and company culture. No more yes man, no more people on their high horses when they don't perform such as Todd Howard, axe them if needed
  • Make and sell consoles which uses proprietary hardware, no more glorified PC's
  • Keep tiny groups of visionaries to come up with new ideas and playtest those small concepts to hell and back
  • Redistribute manpower into smaller studios focused on creating smaller single-player or couch co-op 10-30 hour games but with AAA quality
  • Keep your head down, be as quiet as possible and do a showcase every year with mostly gameplay instead of CGI trailers
  • Keep only one single tier of Gamepass priced at 9.99 where you can sub for its whole current library and games get added to that library 1,5 years after release
  • Very little focus on PC market, but keep a small team to research and develop its own platform without releasing it yet. Organize internal events for other divisions to test this platform once every 1-2 months
  • Keep doing the above for 5-7 years straight
  • Add a public communication presentation a few days to a week prior to yearly showcase with a clear vision, roadmap and prior successes
  • Hold internal competitions where the bigger and more ambitious projects get to be chosen to be made once every 1-2 years
  • Invite influencers to test out its own PC focused platform and do this for 2-3 years before launching the platform to the public
 
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The exclusivity part is absolutely hilarious....

They are going to sell a fucking PC like 1000 others that will have 3rd party models as well from Asus, MSI and 100 other brands

Do they know what exclusive actually means???

LOL
 
They ain't gonna do shit to fix Xbox because corporate culture won't allow them to, can't just make games for gamers anymore, everything has to cater to as broad an audience as possible.

All Xbox would have to do is lean into nostalgia for it's 2000s edgy, Mountain Dew, "bro" era but that isn't going to happen because in today's world that's considered synonymous with being a Nazi.
 
You can't have it both. You are 3rd party publisher or exclusive only. Hence, their platform is selling like crap and exclusives for low installbase won't cut it ( i know @Welfare is hoping)








Well I guess we can mark this case as closed.
 
What a load of slop... Also the biggest red flag

  • Use M&A deliberately to accelerate growth where organic paths are too slow

Hopefully regulators will know better than to fall for their bullshit in future.
 
Just read the "We Are Xbox" memo, and honestly, I don't see this as a pivot or a "return to roots" in terms of exclusivity. If anything, it's a formal confirmation that the strategy started under Phil Spencer is here to stay.


The core pillars remain exactly where they were:


• Focus on DAP (Daily Active Players): Shifting the "North Star" to active users instead of hardware units is the clearest sign that they still intend to put their games on as many screens as possible.


• "Re-evaluating Exclusivity": Far from closing doors, the text explicitly mentions re-evaluating exclusivity and "windowing." It reads like a continuation of the pilot program we've seen with recent ports to other consoles.


• Platform Agnostic: The emphasis on being "where the world plays" and "Project Helix" just reinforces the idea that Xbox is now a service and a publisher first, and a hardware manufacturer second.


To me, the rebranding back to "Xbox" feels like a marketing move to simplify their identity, but the actual business logic hasn't changed: they are doubling down on the multiplatform, ecosystem-heavy approach we've seen over the last year.
 
What a load of bloody waffle. I don't think the general public should be privy to such corporate nonsense. Full of key words and bullet points. Meaningless crap to your average joe.

Frustrated Dragons Den GIF by CBC
 
The exclusivity part is absolutely hilarious....

They are going to sell a fucking PC like 1000 others that will have 3rd party models as well from Asus, MSI and 100 other brands

Do they know what exclusive actually means???

LOL
it's co-pilot's idea of what their broken console war veterans want to hear.
she probably heard the word first time a month ago or so.
if they actually go exclusive, they'll be going with the pace of studio closure per month, lol
 
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Well I guess we can mark this case as closed.
Reaching Joe Biden GIF by GIPHY News
 






Well I guess we can mark this case as closed.

Death Stranding isn't a Sony IP, Lego approached Sony for idea of Horizon Lego, Helldivers 2 is a.... GAAS game. So, question.... how many Sony's SP games are on Xbox or Nintendo? You aren't so smart, Xslop. Better ask Ahas's AI for help since Spencer's balls are gone

And i don't feel sorry for anyone that falls for this PR shit. You deserved it
 
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