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Microsoft Aiming for a First-Party Xbox Game About Every Three Months - E3 2019

Xbox Game Pass is the "main driver" for this timeframe.

Matt Booty, head of Microsoft's Xbox Game Studios, has said that his team is aiming to release a first-party Xbox game about every three months.

Speaking to IGN's Ryan McCaffrey, Booty was asked if there was any goal or cadence at which Microsoft wished to release its first-party games.

Booty responded that Xbox Game Pass is "the main driver" for a release schedule as Microsoft wants to ensure there is a "steady stream of games" coming into the subscription service for both PC and console.

For Booty and Microsoft, "every three months feels about right."

"I think about like how long you spend with a game and just sort of the cadence of discovery there," Booty explained. "So if you can do a game every three months, and if a game takes somewhere between two years and four years, I mean, just think about things that have come out recently, you know, things like Red Dead and God of War need to be getting into five, six years. Right? But let's just say for the sorts of studios, like a Ninja theory or a double fine that two, three years starts to be the cadence, right?

"So, then if you've got a game a quarter and you're taking two to three years." Booty continued. "You can kind of back into the math and say, well wow, you probably need somewhere between 10 and 12 studios. But... making games is not yet a perfect science, right? There's no creative endeavor that is. So there's going to be things that take longer. There's going to be some things that we start and say, hey, great idea, but it just isn't, you know, the Jello doesn't want to set. Right. Um, and so I think we need some, some buffer in there, right? So the first, that's kind of my basic answers. We'd love to be feeding a high quality game into game pass about every three months."

Microsoft Aiming for a First-Party Xbox Game About Every Three Months - E3 2019 - IGN

Matt Booty, head of Microsoft's Xbox Game Studios, has said that his team is aiming to release a first-party Xbox game about every three months.

au.ign.com

 

[Gamernyc78]

With those AA indie type games they showed in their conference its doable.

I knew gamepass subscription would have a negative effect smh. Being that gamepass is basically cannabalizing stand alone software sales their focus is on AA low budget games to just put on the service overall. I'm not liking this focus at all.

 

[MiyazakiHatesKojima]

Releasing first-party titles quicker in order to keep the gamepass fresh/valuable doesn't sound like a good idea in the long-term.

 

[DanielsM]

Crackdown 4 2020?

 

[quest]

With those AA indie type games they showed in their conference its doable.

I knew gamepass subscription would have a negative effect smh. Being that gamepass is basically cannabalizing stand alone software sales their focus is on AA low budget games to just put on the service overall. I'm not liking this focus at all.

4 first party a year games out of 10 plus studios is AA shovelware now. So if Sony puts out 3 other games outside the show it is crap shovelware lol. This is hardly excessive from 12 studios especially with 2 on biyearly games forza franchise. Basically forza and or halo,gears plus 2 other games hardly excessive output.

 

[Vawn]

Quantity over quality. With GamePass, you don't need to worry about the games selling, just enough to keep them subscribed.

It seems the industry as a whole is moving this direction with EA, Ubisoft and Bethesda following suit.

 

[Riven326]

What a wonderful advertisement for PlayStation 5.

 

[DanielsM]

4 first party a year games out of 12 plus studios is AA shovelware now. So if Sony puts out 3 other games outside the show it is crap shovelware lol. This is hardly excessive from 12 studios especially with 2 on biyearly games forza franchise. Basically forza and or halo,gears plus 2 other games hardly excessive output.

Not all studios are of the same size, quality, or have the ability produce. And why did Sony come into this discussion.

 

[Vasto]

Thats how its supposed to be done.

" Like A Boss "

 

[mejin]

sony will be a lonely wolf next gen....till they decide to be one more of the pack it seems.

 

[brap]

Quantity over quality. Does microsoft ever learn?

 

[Nikana]

The hyperbole is getting ridiculous here. Jesus.

 

[Hendrick's]

The whole conference was a Game Pass infomercial, so this doesn't surprise me. MS embracing quantity over substance.

 

[quest]

Not all studios are of the same size, quality, or have the ability produce. And why did Sony come into this discussion.

Of course but are you saying really 3 first party games a year is excessive and thread worthy. That is what it is forza and 3 other games. I think that is hardly crazy. Now if it was 6 a year sure there would be a point. If each of the other 10 studios get 30 months on average they can do 3 other games a year with forza. Also some studios have multiple teams playground is adding a second team. People are just trolling now.

 

[Nikana]

The whole conference was a Game Pass infomercial, so this doesn't surprise me. MS embracing quantity over substance.

But I thought Microsoft has no games?

 

[NahaNago]

As long as the games are good to great then this is good news.

 

[DanielsM]

Of course but are you saying really 3 first party games a year is excessive and thread worthy. That is what it is forza and 3 other games. I think that is hardly crazy. Now if it was 6 a year sure there would be a point. If each of the other 10 studios get 30 months on average they can do 3 other games a year with forza. Also some studios have multiple teams playground is adding a second team. People are just trolling now.

You are missing the point, if they could release 3 high quality games a year cool, the problem is they are having a hard time delivering 1 a year.

No people aren't trolling, it's an easy observation.

 

[PuppetMaster]

Gamepass does nothing for me. It is my time that is valuable. And I am happy to pay full price to the developers I want to support for quality games.

 

[Lilseb93]

This sounds good on the surface, but I'd rather have quality over quantity. Just take your time and make badass exclusives (that are on PC too) that rival Sony. That's all you need. They can't even do that yet. Everything else will take care of itself. People prefer PS over Xbox because they have quality exclusives. You can make 100 Gamepass multiplayer service games a year... it won't matter if Sony is releasing God of War quality games.

 

[12Dannu123]

sony will be a lonely wolf next gen....till they decide to be one more of the pack it seems.

It depends if the consumer habits change to Subs impact them. It most certainly will have an impact to an extent. But it's clear that Single Player One-off games are on the chopping block for the industry.

 

[Gamernyc78]

It depends if the consumer habits change to Subs impact them. It most certainly will have an impact to an extent. But it's clear that Single Player One-off games are on the chopping block for the industry.

They been on the chopping block for years now and Sony doubled down on them and guess what? New ips like Horizon have sold more than 10 million!! Sony's exclusives are literally selling more than they ever have.

 

[12Dannu123]

They been on the chopping block for years now and Sony doubled down on them and guess what? New ips like Horizon have sold more than 10 million!! Sony's exclusives are literally selling more than they ever have.

That depends on whether the consumer habit change that is happening right now will affect Sony. It will certainly affect Publishers, studios outside of Sony FP games.

 

[bitbydeath]

Of course but are you saying really 3 first party games a year

4 games isn't it?
3 games would be 9 months worth.

 

[quest]

4 games isn't it?
3 games would be 9 months worth.

Plus yearly forza game that makes 4.

 

[12Dannu123]

This sounds good on the surface, but I'd rather have quality over quantity. Just take your time and make badass exclusives (that are on PC too) that rival Sony. That's all you need. They can't even do that yet. Everything else will take care of itself. People prefer PS over Xbox because they have quality exclusives. You can make 100 Gamepass multiplayer service games a year... it won't matter if Sony is releasing God of War quality games.

The model of not releasing a game for years to come is a very risky business model and that no company outside of Publishers can sustain. You can wonder why Indies these days are small experiences,

 

[DunDunDunpachi]

Four first-party games a year is not a good pace. This would be considered a "drought" if we were talking about the Wii U, for instance.

 

[DanielsM]

This is where Phil sold Nadella down the river and was able to squeeze more money out of him. Let's say they are aiming for a new release 4 times a year to keep people hooked on the service. The issue is you need probably double that, and those games have to be what people want to play. So, let's say they shoot for 4 releases a year, but I only want to play 1 out of ever 5-8 games, its not worth it to subscribe full-time, you just cherry pick.

The only game I see that Microsoft has that I would have wanted to play in the last 4-7 years is maybe GoW4. Just throwing a bunch of mud at the wall isn't going to get their numbers up. The output from their acquisitions are not going to do it, imo, but its not my money.

Should be fun to watch, I mean they haven't really had a big game for years really other than maybe Forza.

 

[Lukin1978]

With those AA indie type games they showed in their conference its doable.

I knew gamepass subscription would have a negative effect smh. Being that gamepass is basically cannabalizing stand alone software sales their focus is on AA low budget games to just put on the service overall. I'm not liking this focus at all.

Since I got gamepass I've bought zero games I can't see how this model is sustainable going forward. Go on gamepass download more games than you can play why would you buy them?

 

[DanielsM]

Since I got gamepass I've bought zero games I can't see how this model is sustainable going forward. Go on gamepass download more games than you can play why would you buy them?

Even if we pretend it is sustainable its not sustainable for single player games, meaning they are on a service on day one. And most of those indie games will eventually stop flowing after Microsoft (or whoever) stops subsidizing them.

Lots of indie devs have already spoken out how this really isn't going to work.

 

[meirl]

Gamepass does nothing for me. It is my time that is valuable. And I am happy to pay full price to the developers I want to support for quality games.

My backlog is so huge, by the time I have the time to play a game, the game is already on gamepass.

 

[DunDunDunpachi]

My backlog is so huge, by the time I have the time to play a game, the game is already on gamepass.

I'm confused. You're paying a monthly subscription for a supply of more games when you already have a huge backlog?

 

[DanielsM]

I'm confused. You're paying a monthly subscription for a supply of more games when you already have a huge backlog?

Shopping compulsion is a real thing, I have an Aunt that has been buying shit off of QVC for 20+ years. I guess her house is just full of junk nobody will ever use, just stacked up. I have a huge backlog of games as well, but no reason to subscribe to a service when they keep giving me games with the subscriptions I already have/had (XBLG/PS+), I literally have so many games from those services that it would probably take me a 50 years to play them all.

 

[Riven326]

Since I got gamepass I've bought zero games I can't see how this model is sustainable going forward. Go on gamepass download more games than you can play why would you buy them?

There's also the fact that you can get Gamepass for one or two dollars, play all the newly released games in a month, and then cancel. How is that not a loss for Microsoft?

 

[DunDunDunpachi]

Shopping compulsion is a real thing, I have an Aunt that has been buying shit off of QVC for 20+ years. I guess her house is just full of junk nobody will ever use, just stacked up. I have a huge backlog of games as well, but no reason to subscribe to a service when they keep giving me games with the subscriptions I already have/had (XBLG/PS+), I literally have so many games from those services that it would probably take me a 50 years to play them all.

You should join us next year.

 

[ResilientBanana]

It's all about scope and scale. Some of these developers are small and work on small projects, others are large and work on large scale projects. 4 Exclusives a year isn't terrible considering each studio will most likely have 2-3 teams working on different projects at once. With 15 or so studios, they could literally have 15-30 games being developed at once. 4 a year doesn't sound all that bad.

 

[Lukin1978]

There's also the fact that you can get Gamepass for one or two dollars, play all the newly released games in a month, and then cancel. How is that not a loss for Microsoft?

I have no idea I checked my xbox one the other day my kid has over 40 games on the xbox + plus portable hard drive. I've only bought one of those I can't imagine what all those would have cost me retail.

 

[Honey Bunny]

This is not how you make great games lads

 

[MilkyJoe]

that's 4 a year, 15 studios

15/4 = nearly 4 years per studio to work on their games. The average AAA takes about 3 years to make. So yeah, most comments above have not really thought before they've commented, as per usual.

 

[Deputy Moonman]

There's also the fact that you can get Gamepass for one or two dollars, play all the newly released games in a month, and then cancel. How is that not a loss for Microsoft?

The problem is that your looking at it from the perspective that everyone just wants to play all the games they can in a short amount of time and then quit to save money. It is also assuming everyone has time to play and finish a bunch of games in a short amount of time, when in reality that is likely a small percentage of game pass subscribers. Matchmaking is another hook. People don't stop playing multiplayer games they like after a month. I imagine there are also a lot of parents that will subscribe to the service simply so they don't have to go out and buy games all the time for their kids. There are also people where money isn't an issue, so paying a monthly subscription isn't that big deal.

 

[ethomaz]

Gamepass model indeed beneficiares quantity over quality.

 

[DunDunDunpachi]

that's 4 a year, 15 studios

15/4 = nearly 4 years per studio to work on their games. The average AAA takes about 3 years to make. So yeah, most comments above have not really thought before they've commented, as per usual.

If you think all four will be full-blown AAA games, that's bound to throw off your math.

 

[pr0cs]

Sounds good to me, I noticed that they added another 10+ games at the start of e3, most I was aware of and a number were on wish lists on steam, gog, epic store. I'm more than happy to sub to a store that lets me save money.
I don't give a shit if it's sustainable or not, I play for my interests (and wallet) not theirs

 

[MilkyJoe]

If you think all four will be full-blown AAA games, that's bound to throw off your math.

I dont for a second think they will be, but the mathS is crystal clear. They have to potential to be.

 

[DunDunDunpachi]

I dont for a second think they will be, but the mathS is crystal clear. They have to potential to be.

Meanwhile, the math is clear that Sony and Nintendo's yearly output is higher. When it isn't, it is considered a "drought".

I don't see why anyone would cheer for a drought-level release of first-party games. I guess when Stockholm Syndrome-fueled expectations are already so low...

It's Xbox One all over again: the fans say "look how far Microsoft has come! Wow, such an improvement from before!"

 

[Discusguy]

Just as long as MS keeps theirs first party games diversified I have no problem with the games being released. Pretty confident MS will keep their main IPs AAA.

I'm liking this subscription future more than the DLC future. If I'm on Game Pass I better have access to those DLCs.

 

[MilkyJoe]

Meanwhile, the math is clear that Sony and Nintendo's yearly output is higher. When it isn't, it is considered a "drought".

I don't see why anyone would cheer for a drought-level release of first-party games. I guess when Stockholm Syndrome-fueled expectations are already so low...

It's Xbox One all over again: the fans say "look how far Microsoft has come! Wow, such an improvement from before!"

There it is.

So now we've moved the conversation off topic so you can show the nice ladies and gentlemen how upsetting this all is for you.

 

[DunDunDunpachi]

There it is.

So now we've moved the conversation off topic so you can show the nice ladies and gentlemen how upsetting this all is for you.

Upset? I'm just saying that 4 games a year isn't impressive.

And I provided context using mathS. Should I have supported my opinion differently somehow?

 

[Mattyp]

Meanwhile, the math is clear that Sony and Nintendo's yearly output is higher. When it isn't, it is considered a "drought".

I don't see why anyone would cheer for a drought-level release of first-party games. I guess when Stockholm Syndrome-fueled expectations are already so low...

It's Xbox One all over again: the fans say "look how far Microsoft has come! Wow, such an improvement from before!"

Honestly what are you going on about? Microsoft now has 15 studios with more to come, if they where all to produce AAA titles (WE KNOW THEY AREN'T) 4 games a year is more than possible, so what's it mean when they aren't all doing AAA titles? A & AA titles obviously like the bulk of the titles in the lists you just listed. What does this mean? A higher rate than 4 games per year!

Sony AAA titles from your list that are not remasters. (MLB is a yearly title and AA)

2015 -
BloodBorne

2016 -
Uncharted 4

2017 -
Gran Turismo Sport
Horizon Zero Dawn

2018 -
God of War
Spider-Man

2019 -
Days Gone
TLoU2? (When's this coming again?)


As you can see 1-2 AAA titles per year is all you need. The rest will be made up in AA & more indie titles. 15 studios is more than enough to reach a much higher output then this generation not every game is going to be a blockbuster, then you throw in companies like Moon Studios and MDHR (Surprised the number hasn't been right for these companies yet) and you start to look even better.

 

[MilkyJoe]

Upset? I'm just saying that 4 games a year isn't impressive.

And I provided context using mathS. Should I have supported my opinion differently somehow?

You moved the conversation , and went off on a paddy, it's literally right there

 

[DunDunDunpachi]

Honestly what are you going on about? Microsoft now has 15 studios with more to come, if they where all to produce AAA titles (WE KNOW THEY AREN'T) 4 games a year is more than possible, so what's it mean when they aren't all doing AAA titles? A & AA titles obviously like the bulk of the titles in the lists you just listed. What does this mean? A higher rate than 4 games per year!

Sony AAA titles from your list that are not remasters. (MLB is a yearly title and AA)

2015 -
BloodBorne

2016 -
Uncharted 4

2017 -
Gran Turismo Sport
Horizon Zero Dawn

2018 -
God of War
Spider-Man

2019 -
Days Gone
TLoU2? (When's this coming again?)


As you can see 1-2 AAA titles per year is all you need. The rest will be made up in AA & more indie titles. 15 studios is more than enough to reach a much higher output then this generation not every game is going to be a blockbuster, then you throw in companies like Moon Studios and MDHR (Surprised the number hasn't been right for these companies yet) and you start to look even better.

Don't tell me "what I need". It's absurd. Microsoft is doing the same. "Four games is a lot, right?" No, it isn't.

I ignored most first-party stuff anyway, and this goes for Sony and Nintendo. The reason why I stick with them is because -- in spite of them publishing a ton of first-party games that I'm not interested in -- they still publish a handful of what I do like. And when you are only pumping out four games a year, the likelihood of me (or anyone) finding something they like is lower.

This isn't hard to figure out, but for some reasons Xbox fans are bringing back list-wars and "true exclusives" and "only non-remasters allowed" rules to artificially frame the conversation.

You moved the conversation , and went off on a paddy, it's literally right there

A game every three months is a drought. Repeating "you moved the conversation" to dismiss my point doesn't actually do anything to add to the conversation.

Do you agree that four games a year is impressive? I don't, and I've stated as such.