SenkiDala
Member
You mistake Ralph Constantino and Raphaël Colantonio, French dev that worked for Arkane. They're not the same persons at all, and it seems that you mix their careers also ? Weird !
[GameSpot] Xbox Is An Increasingly Unstable Platform For Anyone To Invest In
- Thread starter Topher
- Start date
Dr.Morris79
Gold Member
Pretty muchI thought so, I guessDr.Morris79 is implying he is leaving the UK or gaming all together then
If anything wants my photo ID, I won't be using it. It's pretty simple and I can live without it.
I haven't had to upload any photo ID as of yet, and that's fine by me.
If everything ends up wanting 'photo ID' in the UK, then I guess I won't be using a lot of things
You either take a stand, or you don't. Makes no difference to me. As for gaming, I've enough to last a few lifetimes.
So having the line of 'Leaving gaming' seems quite ironic and that I'll somehow miss out if I don't bend over..
Never going to happen.
Microsoft just seems more cutthroat than ever. They have their eyes on the AI race and will sacrifice whatever is needed to compete in it.
As far as a business, that's probably way more important but as someone who's into gaming, it sucks. But games just dont matter to them, not like they do for Sony, Nintendo, and other devs.
Trusting them to prioritize anything in gaming just isn't smart.
As far as a business, that's probably way more important but as someone who's into gaming, it sucks. But games just dont matter to them, not like they do for Sony, Nintendo, and other devs.
Trusting them to prioritize anything in gaming just isn't smart.
CosmicComet
Member
Xbox's death can't come soon enough.
They did far more harm to the industry than contributed good.
They did far more harm to the industry than contributed good.
HeisenbergFX4
Member
I follow youPretty much
If anything wants my photo ID, I won't be using it. It's pretty simple and I can live without it.
I haven't had to upload any photo ID as of yet, and that's fine by me.
If everything ends up wanting 'photo ID' in the UK, then I guess I won't be using a lot of things
You either take a stand, or you don't. Makes no difference to me. As for gaming, I've enough to last a few lifetimes.
So having the line of 'Leaving gaming' seems quite ironic and that I'll somehow miss out if I don't bend over..
Never going to happen.
jm89
Member
One of the biggest cancer they inflicted was paid multiplayer.
Sony decided to be greedy and follow them, but without xbox I think we would have had free multiplayer on consoles.
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Topher
Identifies as young
This is about the gaming division at Xbox. You think that because the company overall is worth $4 trillion that no part of it can be criticized?
Whose post are you saying is written with an LLM? Or are you talking about the GameSpot article?
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marquimvfs
Member
Don't worry. Some chinese hacker will develop some adapter for you to use it with your Dreamcast
spookyfish
Gold Member
I have really enjoyed their hardware -- not One, but One X was nice -- since the beginning. Series X is a beast.
But, if I'm being honest, I don't know if I'll buy another Xbox.
But, if I'm being honest, I don't know if I'll buy another Xbox.
Dr.Morris79
Gold Member
They'll never take me!!!
What an absolute joke it's all become though
I honestly believe though that if this crap carries on to such a degree, I have a strong suspicion that pen and paper is going to make a tremendous come back..
Well given their next effort is apparently a 3do, its off to a great start.
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Mr.ODST
Member
Someones hurt about PS going multiplatform.
While some of MS's decisions hurt the industry they also helped revolutionise it especially with the Xbox and 360, alto of the systems we have these days wouldnt of happened without their contribution
One area I hated was when they made private party chats, ruined social gaming completely for me
Giallo Corsa
Member
...party chats (private or not) which were locked behind the Xbox live paywall.
Netflix too - imagine having to subscribe to a sub just to be able to...watch another subscription service, granted, they lifted that requirement in 2014 but...
Also : Horse armor
CosmicComet
Member
Swing and a miss. I don't give two fucks about Sony first party. I dog on them all the time on this forum.
And no, they didn't revolutionize a damn thing.
Dreamcast already had fully functioning online gaming ecosystem and anything MS did after that was basic common sense iteration.
I would gladly give up Xbox's 'contributions' to gaming by wishing they never entered the space in the first place. Overall it would be a big net positive.
ChorizoPicozo
Member
The most successful Third Party Publisher, they say
GriffinCorp
Member
I love Xbox but GamePass has become the only talking point the executives care about. I feel like they should just go 3rd party and can the hardware team a few years early. Everyone one can see it coming...
There was nothing wrong with the substance of my posts and no double standard. I could say the exact same thing to you. why did you have a problem with my innocuous post saying somebody is working overtime spamming the thread and not to say yourself complaining about users leaving emojis?OK, he had more posts than you. My mistake, I only paid attention to the pile of posts you have in the thread...
The fact is that the "same number of posts" is secondary; the main thing was the substance. And yes, the substance is the surprise I get when someone who also has a ton of posts in the same thread, responding to every comment or reaction that doesn't fit with what he likes, mocks and points the finger at someone else for posting a ton of posts defending his opinion or approving of someone else's opinion. And if your problem with him was that he used GIFs of baskets and dunks... dude, you get that kind of reaction every day, every minute. All the posts with mockery, insults, jokes, and contempt you can imagine in every thread on this forum, and you have people with 15, 20, or more posts almost in a row in other threads, and, "Surprise!" I don't see you with the need to make the same mockery or discredit? Indeed, is that in those cases, the narrative being defended is another one more to your liking, and you don't have the same eagerness and impetus to discredit or mock the subject in question??. It is what look like
In short, why am I going to lie to you? I said "I'm surprised" sarcastically... I wasn't surprised, honestly. It was just amused and disappoint even more so when the double standard come from someone who, I could think, intends to bring some seriousness to the discussions on this forum with tons of examples of console wars every moments.
Wow, look where the lazy robot is doing something other than mining withemoji every PS comment that is not "PS save me my life and my dog's lifetons"
Congratulations, it's a big step
Yet you're here talking about "double standards"?
His working overtime was related to the substance of his posts not to the count, his posts looked like this:
He was leaving reaction emojis everywhere then spamming with reaction gifs on top. I wonder why you picked on drganon but have no problem with Rickmasters behaviour here? Instead you have a problem with me pointing out that he is working overtime spamming this stuff. You decide instead to have a problem with the number of times I've directly responded to people? So were you the problem when you did the same to drganon? I'm not surprised at what you're doing here either, it's pretty obvious.
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LOL. You're seriouly trying to compare my reaction to a specific person who had a whole thread harassing and insulting me, and whose forum participation is limited to console wars and harassing anyone who doesn't point out what he want VS my quote to you here....... Then everything explains itself and it's proof of my suspicions with you.
If you didn't have double standards, you'd probably be pointing out and mocking the behavior of idiots like demigod equal or more frequently than you would people like Rickmaster instead of whitewashing and ignoring their behavior, but...
. No surprise here "it's pretty obvios"For the rest, you have many people doing the same attitude or even worse in every thread of the forum and add insults and mockery to those who do not share equal opinion and preferences..... Rickmasters participation in this thread is not even close to the most dangerous that you can see in this forum.
From here, I think the situation is obvious, but it wasn't necessary to get so upset over a simple joke on my part? Perhaps you felt there was some truth on it? The fact that you saw fit to search my history for any comments (not very well selected on your part) that served as a "and you too" to try to hide some regret and feel better about yourself? That's what it seems.
I don't need to search your history. I know your history on here.
You're suggesting I'm somehow upset and taking this seriously and you're out here calling posts "dangerous"?
Nobody is upset but it doesn't mean I can't see and point out your own double standard when you're accusing me of the same thing. It's not that serious, nobody is in danger, not even Rickmaster. You don't need to come to his defense.
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MacReady13
Member
That's because Xbox is fucked. Maybe it's smart marketing to shift the focus of the Xbox brand from consoles to games and services, yet no matter how hard they try, the vast majority of us know and will ALWAYS associate Xbox as consoles. That's what it started as and that is what I know and refer Xbox as.
And yet that hasn't stopped you from having to go through that history of my posts to find something to use and makes you feel better about yourself....
At the end, everyone here know the track record of the others.
You're suggesting I'm somehow upset and taking this seriously and you're out here calling posts "dangerous"?
Nobody is upset but it doesn't mean I can't see and point out your own double standard when you're accusing me of the same thing. It's not that serious, nobody is in danger, not even Rickmaster. You don't need to come to his defense.
By "dangerous," I meant posts that include insults, mockery, and personal attacks, which are common on this forum. Rickmaster's posts are certainly not on that scale, unlike others users you see fit to whitewash for an obvious reason.
And well, of course you get upset; just look where we are for a small joke or trivial thing.
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-That there will be a line of Xbox console-style hardware where you can continue playing games with the same experience as today?
- That BC will exist (in this new hardware) with the old catalog acquired via hardware and other means, and surely with free upgrades and patches? (Also the rumored/possibility of Xbox console BC on PCs)
- That with PlayAnywhere you will be able to enjoy many of the games you acquired on these new hardware and multiple other platforms and devices while maintaining your progress and saved games?
In other words, you could tell them that in past generations, it wouldn't have been safer, more secure, and with more options to be able to access your acquired back catalog as the next one.
Not to mention that the vast majority of users usually buy games with the idea of playing them and, once finished, looking elsewhere. So I don't think it's a concern for inmense mayority when it comes to buying games on the platform they chose, and that it will still be there.
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It's a copy paste of the actual article, Topher (OP) didn't type all that out.
mckmas8808
Mckmaster uses MasterCard to buy Slave drives
There's some enjoyment from me watching them fail. I mean......they spent over $80 Billion to try to run their main competition out of business. How is that good for the overall industry?
CosmicComet
Member
Yes, agreed.
There is definitely some schadenfreude seeing a multi trillion dollar company failing in a market they dumped tons of money into (Xbox has never really been profitable) for over 20 years.
Especially when their effect on the industry has been to detriment of consumers.
Is Halo and Forza alone enough for Microsoft's good contributions outweigh the bad? Hell no.
I'd delete those two IPs in a HEARTBEAT if it meant paid online and all the predatory online monetization practices that were trojan horse'd to us afterward was gone forever.
Xbox is a gaming cancer. Even if the cancer is killed, they've effectively made the host (the gaming industry) weaker.
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MacReady13
Member
100% this and I fail to see how others cannot fathom this- gamepass was made to ruin Playstation! If it succeeded and Sony went down that same path, it would've ruined the Playstation brand and Xbox would be the last man standing (notwithstanding Nintendo in their own little corner).
The 80 billion spent to buy ABK was seen as the last attempt to make gamepass the winner and kill off Playstation. It failed and I am SO happy gamers, by and large, didn't fall for this subscription bullshit that ultimately devalues games and is just a money sinkhole. Subscription services NEED to die a quick, painful death.
mckmas8808
Mckmaster uses MasterCard to buy Slave drives
And I fail to understand why us feeling this way should be viewed as bad. The same way some people were happy to see Concord fail. If a person believes a company's success may be a cancer to the industry they love, you have no choice but to want it to fail.
MacReady13
Member
I honestly do believe that if Gamepass was a massive success, this industry we do love would be completely fucked. Subscription is not where we want this industry heading. And I'm sick of being told that we can still buy games... for how long will that be available to us once subscriptions take over? Look at movies. TV shows. Music! These things are getting taken away from retail and subscription, lots of the time, is the ONLY way to watch things or listen to things!
Jaguar Victory
Member
I've been gaming on XBOX since the OG with the Duke. I still don't see anything wrong with the platform. Things may be different outside the US I guess, but it's still all good here.
Gameplay Gods Bless
Member
I don't think investors care, Microsoft stock is doing great as always.Xbox is going through an identity crisis. The most recent wave of layoffs at Microsoft, which cut about 9,000 jobs including numerous positions at studios under the Xbox banner, suggests as much. These cost-cutting measures are said to be in the service of some realignment or reorganization that's always purported to set up these companies for greater success. And yet they keep happening, further eroding any trust and goodwill the brand may have built up from previous successes. After several waves of job cuts, restructurings, pivots in strategy, and any other corporate jargon I've neglected to mention, I'm beginning to suspect that Xbox's growing instability deserves more scrutiny and concern from its developers and consumers alike.
Let's be direct: The journey that Xbox has been on over the last decade appears to be a failure. Its famous spree of purchases and the subsequent management of its studios has churned out about as many blemished games as it has delays, cancellations, and studio closures. That isn't to say Xbox hasn't produced hits and gems, but along the way there, Xbox has also built up quite the track record of critically panned games, cancelled projects, and defunct teams.
No matter the aspect that you place under the microscope, Xbox is clearly bleeding through the bandages it keeps applying. Take a glimpse at the stable of teams at Xbox Game Studios, Microsoft's internal publishing division. Its most recent layoff resulted in the closure of at least one team under the banner, The Initiative, and the cancellation of its game Perfect Dark. Turn 10, one of its stalwart developers on the Forza franchise, has been reportedly cut to the bone. Rare, which was working on Everwild while maintaining the live-service title Sea of Thieves, is invariably in a worse position on the other side of the layoffs than it was before.
The brunt of the damage from moves like these falls on the affected teams and their workers, and it's a disappointingly common move for Xbox, which has done this at least once before when a similar reorganizing shuttered four teams in May 2024, including Arkane Austin and Tango Gameworks. These closures came within a few short years of Microsoft's acquisition of Bethesda.
Another layoff followed shortly after the completed purchase of Activision Blizzard, cutting several jobs across its teams and leading to the cancellation of a survival game at Blizzard. The fact remains that bringing Bethesda's tremendous portfolio of megaton hits like Fallout and The Elder Scrolls in-house, as well as Activision Blizzard (and mobile developer King), should've stemmed the bloodloss, but Xbox's hemorrhaging and proclivity for retail therapy only seemed to worsen with each purchase. Anything else suggests the reckless endangerment of an entire industry.
These moves should've uniformly led to greater stability for developers under the Xbox banner and a greater deal of games on the platforms. They didn't. Some studios, like Obsidian, have miraculously flourished under these conditions, producing new franchises and hits in existing ones, solidifying its place in Xbox's crumbling hierarchy of studios. Others, like Arkane Austin, haven't been as lucky. And gamers and developers alike suffer when that's the case. If everyone's going through it, who exactly is benefitting from Xbox's continued vision--or lack thereof?
The motivation behind many of these purchases is an obvious one: Game Pass. Since its launch in 2017, the subscription service has been Xbox's biggest talking point, and as the years have passed, it has grown into the single biggest driver for engagement with the gaming division. Following the Xbox One's opening fumbles and hurdles, Microsoft devised a silver bullet that could rebuild its ecosystem and assure its biggest and smallest games had an audience. The service has even paid for the development of independent and third-party titles, making it a lifeline to some.
But Game Pass has been a pain to grow despite its occasional surges, and its continued upkeep remains costly despite Xbox's claims that the service is profitable, with some major caveats. As a result, Xbox has even transformed Game Pass for the worse, introducing tiers that sell greater benefits for high-paying subscribers, all the while stripping access to portions of the expansive game library from members at the lowest levels. This move is a sharp reversal of Game Pass' earliest promises to connect gamers to the breadth of the console's titles. What once was often touted as the best deal in gaming has now become so diluted that it is now more anti-consumer than its original incarnation. Another line crossed.
And though Game Pass funds the development of a number of projects, and still does, many developers have spoken up about how Game Pass has actually hurt their teams and titles. Mike Rose of the indie publisher No More Robots has been pretty open in the past about how Game Pass can assure a huge launch audience, which is great for teams struggling to find players, but also noted how the team's games would see little change in sales after being on the service. Instead, it typically got spikes just as it was entering the subscription service. Raphael Colantonio, founder of Arkane and later Wolfeye Studios, has become one of the service's biggest critics, recently opining that it is an "unsustainable model that has been increasingly damaging the industry for a decade, subsidized by [Microsoft's] 'infinite money.'" An isolated incident would be one thing, but grievances like Colantonio's have continually cropped up over the years, even if there are other stories that cite Game Pass as instrumental to a game's success.
The evidence points to a concerning trend in the Xbox camp that doesn't appear to be going anywhere, and the more it's left as-is, the more likely it seems that developers will have to make a tough decision about their futures in Microsoft's ecosystem.
Of course, it's hard to prove either side is wrong or right due to the fact that Microsoft obscures any numbers that could illuminate or disprove these arguments--numbers that Bloomberg's Jason Schreier refers to as "squishy metrics" subject to the whims of "dark accounting wizardry." This means that teams looking for a publishing deal with Xbox simply need to take the company at its word when evaluating whether Game Pass is the right move for their game and their business. But what good is that word with the uncertainty that has persistently hung over Xbox's motivations and decisions for much of the last decade? Is it worth it to take that opportunity and fund that game if the near-future of your team continues to hang in the balance? Doesn't Xbox owe its developers more than false promises of stability once they join the Game Pass service considering how impactfully it can hurt a team's bottom line? Doesn't it owe the same kind of dependability to its subscribers?
I feel that answering these questions requires more foresight than I've observed from the brand. After all, this is the gaming giant that settled on the multimedia-heavy approach to the Xbox One that crippled the console out of the gate, and then took away Xbox users' ability to purchase and own digital movies and TV shows recently. It's also the company that settled on an "Everything is an Xbox" marketing campaign that deemphasized the system itself after giving up so much ground to its contemporaries. The campaign isn't an affront itself, but when paired with the worsening Game Pass service, which is how the company can afford to turn smart TVs, Amazon Fire Sticks, and even your PC into an Xbox, the rottenness of the tactic becomes more apparent. Xbox's direction seems to pivot with the wind, and it means that the consumers who buy into its products, as well as the engineers who make them, and the developers that then work to give them value, constantly feel like they're sold up the river for the next big thing that the company does.
I don't feel answers coming any time soon. If the latest layoffs are any indication, Xbox's path forward is set in stone, and whatever may come of it has already been deemed worthy of the sacrifice it took to to be realized. As Christopher Dring of The Game Business succinctly puts it, the Xbox we knew is dead. And with it is any semblance of faith this industry and culture can muster for it.
Xbox Is An Increasingly Unstable Platform For Anyone To Invest In
Constantly shifting motivations and tumultuous overhauls have poisoned the well of Xbox's ecosystem.www.gamespot.com
As for gamers, buy a PC so if Xbox wins you win and if they lose its no skin off your back because you have PC, Sony, Xbox and Switch 1(emu) games to play regardless.
bighugeguns
Member
I don't know how they're fucking up at that company, my Series X gets more mileage than a cross country semitruck. I physically couldn't use this thing more.
This thing got so much action I had to change out the thermal paste.
This thing got so much action I had to change out the thermal paste.
The Mad Draklor
Member
Plus another $8.1 billion to acquire Zenimax/Bethesda.
Ever since the 360 days, there was the ongoing claim from fanboys that because of Microsoft's sheer market cap and liquidity, it could easily spend Playstation out of business. And then, what used to be a silly thought experiment went into motion IRL. Spoiler alert: The end result was just as silly.
playbignbox
Member
Most people aren't "investing" to be honest, the GamePass subscription model doesn't retain users, it's very easy to cancel and switch platforms, as you would lose access anyway at the end of the subscription.
bighugeguns
Member
COD is on Gamepass, breh.
mckmas8808
Mckmaster uses MasterCard to buy Slave drives
And how many times have we heard MS never cared for the Xbox business, but once they do (by spending $80+ Billion) take it serious......everybody needs to watch out!
Mobilemofo
Member
Last gen of hardware from ms probably. Then, after a bit of time, I'll be able to play Xbox games on my smart watch with a ps5 controller. Good times.
Durin
Member
Xbox news is getting kind of repetitive, regardless of how much I agree with the failings.
I feel like most of this is simply a waiting game to see how Microsoft handles their pivot to their PC hybrid approach. If they can deliver a good interface that keeps the simplicity to do all the basic things like a console with a gamepad, make sure their xbox has basic graphic presets that work as easy as the Steam Deck, fix the background bloat + shader stuttering of Windows...they could turn things around to their benefit.
I just worry they won't pull it off, or that Valve will solve the remaining issues of Linux before they do (and I already don't mind dual-booting linux).
I feel like most of this is simply a waiting game to see how Microsoft handles their pivot to their PC hybrid approach. If they can deliver a good interface that keeps the simplicity to do all the basic things like a console with a gamepad, make sure their xbox has basic graphic presets that work as easy as the Steam Deck, fix the background bloat + shader stuttering of Windows...they could turn things around to their benefit.
I just worry they won't pull it off, or that Valve will solve the remaining issues of Linux before they do (and I already don't mind dual-booting linux).
Dr. Wilkinson
Member
Clickbait nonsense.
HeisenbergFX4
Member
This gen coming up could very well be their last round of consoles
It's just a matter of time Sony follows suit.
reinking
Gold Member
If they do they are fools. Sony would be moving to a position of weakness. Microsoft, at their core, is software and services. Sony, is hardware and devices. It's possible in the future that traditional consoles will become obsolete but I would expect Sony to evolve their hardware instead of becoming a third-party publisher.
awwr999999
Member
PlayStation's in a unique position where they can land on the right side of American history and easily force MS to bail on Activision.Yes because those billions they invested in Activision Blizard shows how they're ready to bail on gaming
1. In a voluntary move to protect American kids, PlayStation allows AO-rated AAA games on the American PSN.
2. In a voluntary move to protect American kids, Rockstar ships an AO-rated GTA via American PSN.
3. The American AAA standard for violent games shifts from the deceptive, inaccurate M-rating to the objective, accurate AO-rating.
4. COD being locked to the kid-friendly M-rating kills COD sales in America, weakening COD sales worldwide.
5. AO rated games are exempt from the ongoing American discussion surrounding youth violence and mass shootings.
6. PlayStation goes down in history as the platform that put kids safety before profits.
drganon
Member
Says the alt.
EverydayBeast
ChatGPT 0.001
Too many people want Xbox to lose, they fought giants the first time against Sega, Nintendo and Sony, 360 was fine, Xbox one legitimately bad, fan series x have a breath? You know the new reliable console.