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[JohnnyFootball]

It maybe didn't drastically get new users, but I think it drastically got older users to resub and kept people going longer than usual. Long term it will just kill the brand of call of duty. Though when game prices are all 80-100 on consoles, gamepass will be looking still worth the value and not diminishing user numbers is a win too.

That's cute. You think Gamepass will keep its current price.

 

[Mibu no ookami]

It was simple. Buy activision and make EVERYTHING exclusive to Xbox. But no, they werent long gamers and wanted to make all that money back as quick as possible. Now the Xbox brand doesn't even have an identity.

Activision doesn't make system sellers. You can't form an exclusive identity around Activision because their games sell because they're multiplatform and largely generic. To take their massive operating costs and cut out their primary revenue streams on the off chance it'll sell consoles is pure fantasy.

Starfield didn't move the needle at all... and it was far more oriented to selling consoles than Activision's pipeline.

Rise of the Tomb Raider was all the evidence Microsoft needed to realize the position they were in. It's why they largely stopped doing big AAA exclusives (and also why publishers stopped wanting to do them with Microsoft). Totally derailed Tomb Raider as a franchise after the successful reboot.

Xbox hasn't had an identity since Xbox 360.

Their big exclusive titles all hover around 80ish or below on user scores on metacritic

Let's look at the last 4 major titles

Title	Metacritic	User Rating
Hellblade 2	81	7.4
Indiana Jones	86	8.3
Avowed	81	6.9
South of Midnight	77	6.1

When your best AAA game in years is an 86, you're not going to sell consoles. The fact that the user ratings are consistently lower across the board also confirms what many say is inflated scores by xbox related sites.

Microsoft has to change tact but in a way that is a net positive for their business like Nintendo did with the Wii and the Switch as opposed to what it looks like they might do with Steam integration.

 

[Syphon Filter]

As good as call of duty is it's not even the best shooter.

COD isn't good anymore.