Alright
Banned
A contract for multiplatform games?
Interesting to see your analogy for manufacturing industry
Is this the next goal post?
Why would there be any contract for TES 6 or even Starfield? Why would Bethesda sign a contract for games with platform holders if they are not exclusive?
Sony has a contract for a game that was previously multiplatform, to stay multiplatform? For a game thats years away from being completed and not even in a playable state? I doubt they even have 25% of this game completed.
I very much doubt it mate. Still in the denial stage.
Thirsting for XGS games. Times really have changed huh.
Biff, how do you imagine that Xbox games will be playable on 'PS5 Gamepass'? All MS games would have to be ported specifically to run on the PS5, pretty sure Halo won't run on PS5 natively.
What your fevered mind is imagining is just Xcloud, not Gamepass at all. Game streaming and Gamepass are very different beasts.
That said, none of those games are coming to PS5, whether they be on Gamepass, Xcloud or the, no doubt incredible, Biffimagine.
I'm surprised that the contract angle has surprised people. Sorry in advance for doing this in baby steps, but it helps me to explain.
Skyrim ships. The devs start discussing TES 6
A road map and strategy is formed of what resources are needed to make the game.
Some of, if not all of, these projections will be based on Skyrim sales and the direction of the industry
TES 6 is in production and probably has been for a while. To know the scale of the game, you need to know the budget.
The budget is based on sales, which gives you the realistic scope of the game. Will it be 10 hours or 10000 hours?
Of course, you don't spend £100 million on a 4 hour indy game, to be sold to a possible player base of 100,000 people.
Likewise, you wouldnt spend £10 on a 100000 game aimed at millions of customers.
Where does all that get us? Well, TES 6 projections will have been made, created and budgeted for, before Zenimax went up for sale. So, Sony, Microsoft, Valve et al, will (going from experience in the manufacturing industry) will have been approached to enter in to a contract to have TES 6 on Playstation, Xbox, Steam, Egs etc etc.
Nobody in their right mind would now re-enter contract negotiations for a game that has already started production, with a projected timeline, budget, scale etc. It would cost the host company (Microsoft) way too much hassle and headache and ultimately may reduce the quality of the game (if stuff has to be chopped to meet the new budget projection, based on selling to LESS customers).
TL;DR TES 6 started production too long ago for it to be exclusive and there is no benefit to Microsoft for taking that huge risk. Doubly so after the slip-up of Halo.
And before the old "Sony Pony" accusations come flying out; 1) I'm a bigger Xbox fan than anyone on this board, which isn't bad to say i don't get paid for being a fan. 2) Maybe the fan boys not being able to accept the outcome of the Zenimax deal, aren't Sony Ponys, but are bitter Xbox fans, desperately trying to get one over on fans of their competitors plastic box.
Biff, how do you imagine that Xbox games will be playable on 'PS5 Gamepass'? All MS games would have to be ported specifically to run on the PS5, pretty sure Halo won't run on PS5 natively.
What your fevered mind is imagining is just Xcloud, not Gamepass at all. Game streaming and Gamepass are very different beasts.
That said, none of those games are coming to PS5, whether they be on Gamepass, Xcloud or the, no doubt incredible, Biffimagine.
That's the whole point of Xcloud Microsoft can't have Gamepass as the netflix if gaming, if it's tied to equipment that needs to be expensive/powerful in order to run it. That's what killed the CD-I format.
As for the name, it doesn't matter. When you "google" something, you don't have to use Google search engine. Gamepass is going to be an all-in-one entertainment centre. Games, Music, Movies, TV. We've seen the start of it with Disney+ and LOTR making their way to 'Gamepass'.
This also plays in to the larger corporate strategy of Microsoft; Get people using Azure servers, have as many subscriptions as possible, be they in the home or in the office, or, how about in the Home/Office?
As a quick hypothetical. Imagine is Microsoft launched a 'Hub' that allowed you to use all of the Office suite software; Skype, Powerpoint, Word, Excel, but also allowed you to stream gamepass games to it, either from local hardware (The XSX downstairs) or from servers. Now imagine that item cost £99/$99. Who wouldn't buy one? and of those owners, who wouldn't subscribe to Gamepass + ultimate Professional 365 edition for £19.99/$19.99 a month?
Microsoft is the hammer and the Xbox division is the nail.