Riky
$MSFT
Are you genuinely citing "Tier 2 Variable Rate Shading" as a reason a game would take 6 years to develop?
They literally haven't released a game since before the Xbox One X released (Being a support studio to Playground doesn't count).
You are right though, they were consistently releasing games up to Forza 7. Which is why this level of a delay is so puzzling, there had to have been something that went terribly wrong behind the scenes. As a side note I personally think pushing Ray Traced Reflections in game is a complete waste of time and a waste of resources, and I'll be surprised if it looks better than Forza Horizon 5.
I didn't say it took six years because of Tier 2 VRS, I said that is one example of the overhaul. Nothing has gone "terribly wrong" they have rewrote their engine for next gen to include new physics and ray tracing etc. Real next gen games take time to make not just doubling the framerate of last gen games as we've seen so often this gen.