Negotiator101
Member
What in the Sam Hill is this?
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Sarah Bond has been promoted to President of Xbox. Matt Booty promoted to President of Xbox Game Content and Studios
- Thread starter analog_future
- Start date
adamsapple
Or is it just one of Phil's balls in my throat?
BacklashWave534
Member
How many people on the list actually give a shit or even understand the product they are selling besides Phil?
Dr. Wilkinson
Member
How is he incompetent? Do you know what he does all day every day? Do tell.
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James Sawyer Ford
Member
He delays games and then releases them in a terrible state
He’s like the miyamoto meme, but only a delayed game will be forever bad
Guy is terrible at his job and seems to get paid a lot for thought experiments
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Dr. Wilkinson
Member
Well that’s certainly a gross over simplification, to be sure. Not sure you can blame all the bad things just on him. Xbox is fairly hands off with acquired studios.
And you’re of course already aware many of the games that “he’s in charge of” we’ve never publicly been shown yet.
If we get through the entire Xbox Series console generation and things are exactly what they are now, you’ll have a point.
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Ozzy Onya A2Z
Member
Time to green light a new James Bond campaign game by Rare, go ahead and make it happen. She even has the name for it. Bring coop and multiplayer too.
TheThreadsThatBindUs
Member
She looks like someone perpetually forced to do what she's doing against her will. It's like you can see the screams from behind her dead eyes and fake mechanical smile.
Her face looks so weird in this picture. It's like she's been photoshopped onto someone else's body.
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YukiOnna
Member
I'm confused why they wouldn't want to integrate Zenimax more after Redfall and how keeping it this way helps quality control through the billions of executives in the company. Also, this has to be Matt Booty's last chance, he's not displayed any bright future about the first party content...
People gush over a 60-year-old British GaaS man, they're all weird
Taur007
Member
"It's not like death of Xbox or anything but if you like the way Xbox games are now you'll be pissed"
Alan Wake
Member
Oh well. I would've thought they wanted fresh blood after the less than stellar results from their acquired studios so far. Now they're much, much bigger and the same people are left in charge. Not saying it can't work but I just wonder why Spencer didn't make bigger adjustments.
And to think you people slam MS for ‘poor management’ yet you’ve just typed up a litany of shitty management decisions.
Yeah, we know what the consensus is among many of you about where the blame lies. But there’s no telling what the true situation is. And ‘delays games and then releases them in a terrible state’ doesn’t describe the majority of MS first party releases since 2018.
The key complaint used to be that MS was too hands off with their studios. Now they’re addressing that by having all their studios (ABK aside) report to Matt, giving him increased oversight responsibilities. And you folks are still complaining. Go figure.
Dick Jones
Gold Member
It looks like she had court ordered community service in the picture with free Xbox photoshop man.She looks like someone perpetually forced to do what she's doing against her will. It's like you can see the screams from behind her dead eyes and fake mechanical smile.
Her face looks so weird in this picture. It's like she's been photoshopped onto someone else's body.
EDMIX
Writes a lot, says very little
Soon
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Dirk Benedict
Member
Bobby T is giving absolutely NO FUCKS. I am a little jealous of him. He's about to retire and live his best, curly headed life.
YOU PC BRO?!
Gold Member
I just read through Sarah Bond's LinkedIn comment history to find out more about her. Super disappointed. She is just another one of the diversity, inclusivity and female empowerment types. That's almost exclusively what she talks about. From what I can see she seems obsessed with identity politics. I doubt anyone in the room would ever look to her for actual leadership, for an actual vision. I wonder if she could even articulate the problems with Xbox.
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BbMajor7th
Member
It isn't about the degree of micro-management involved. Strong management gives guidance from above with strategy and resource management and ensures synergy across the whole. It helps set realistic objectives, targets and deadlines that are consistent with the broader business strategy and represents the importance of that work at a more senior level. It uses its authority to help redress obstacles beyond the scope of those it manages.
Look at a project like Everwild and ask if that has been properly managed to meet these criteria. Look at Halo Infinite or Hellblade 2. Look further back at Crackdown 3 or Recore. What you see is a pattern of projects that struggle to meet deadlines or deliver against the broader business strategy. Self-disciplined studios like Playground and The Coalition do great, but the work is wasted as it doesn't ladder up to a broader business strategy. PG kicking out five Forza Horizon titles in a decade and The Coalition doing its best on a franchise way past its prime.
This is not good and the results speak deafeningly for themselves. Jobs like Booty's are extraordinarily well-paid, they should be held to the very highest standards.
I'm no fan of EA or Activision, but when was the last time you saw a blog that said 'In order to deliver the very best game, this year's Call of Duty will be delayed until the spring."
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JohnnyFootball
GerAlt-Right. Ciriously.
I never thought I’d see someone ballwashing and making excuses for Matt Booty, yet we did get someone. It’s all excuses for them. They’re favorite excuse is the pandemic, yet somehow that didn’t stop Sony or Nintendo from getting their exclusives back on track.
Snake29
Banned
She looks like someone perpetually forced to do what she's doing against her will. It's like you can see the screams from behind her dead eyes and fake mechanical smile.
Her face looks so weird in this picture. It's like she's been photoshopped onto someone else's body.
That guy...
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Im confused as to how it ended up looking like that. That only seems to happen with OCR of if you convert a PDF back into a Word document using OpenOffice.
I don't see Colt Eastwood on the promotions list, he was robbed. He's done more work for XBOX this year than anyone.
On A serious note, I wonder if XBOX is finally going to bring it and push for the next generastion. By bring it, I mean some good games and a steady flow. It's time, no more excuses.
On A serious note, I wonder if XBOX is finally going to bring it and push for the next generastion. By bring it, I mean some good games and a steady flow. It's time, no more excuses.
What deadlines were set or announced for Everwild? Things can change or get rebooted during development without it being mooted as a sign of significant dysfunction. And there’s zero basis for claims that Hellblade 2 has had development or management issues.
Recore wasn’t made my a Microsoft first party studio. And you’re certainly scraping the bottom of the barrel by going back to 2017 for Crackdown.
This is cherry picking. The ones that work well can’t be credited to good management, but the ones that struggle are absolutely to be blamed on mismanagement.
Citing EA when they’ve had Anthem and BF2042? Leading to significant changes and reshuffles?
Activision has had their fair share of challenges too. This year’s COD almost didn’t happen. Blizzard’s been hit with significant departures and have had significant fan backlash on some of their last few projects.
Don’t get me wrong. Microsoft has had some issues which they absolutely need to work on…some of which certainly have to do with management. I just think there’s a lot of hyperbole being applied here
Melon Husk
Member
I wish my last name was Bond. Or Booty.
Stare-Bear
Banned
Amazing you've got comments about her while there's a whole ass Fallout 3 mutant next to her...She looks like someone perpetually forced to do what she's doing against her will. It's like you can see the screams from behind her dead eyes and fake mechanical smile.
Her face looks so weird in this picture. It's like she's been photoshopped onto someone else's body.
BbMajor7th
Member
I'm not talking about announced release dates - I'm talking about internal deadlines that keep a project moving. The super early announcement of Hellblade 2 and Everwild, the year-long delays for Halo: Infinity and Starfield, the unfinished state of many releases shows that internal teams consistently miss deadlines, either because the deadlines are unrealistic, resources are lacking or executive and marketing are not aligned with production. That's mismanagement.
Mibu no ookami
Banned
And to think you people slam MS for ‘poor management’ yet you’ve just typed up a litany of shitty management decisions.
See how you've stated an opinion, but not actually illustrated it.
Is shutting down 343 a bad decision? What would you say if the next Halo is a failure and a large percentage of the revenue has to go to Epic because it has used UE? Let's say you drop 150-200 million dollars on the game and it sells. You're going to pay 5% royalty to Epic, and then you're going to pay 20-25% royalties to Valve for Steam sales. Then you're going to eat the rest on GamePass. It's a pretty disastrous situation and the only possibility that they come out on top is that they create a better game than they have ever paid before while the Halo franchise is at the lowest its ever been before. Yeah, again, I'd close the studio rather than go down that path. I would give Halo to Infinity Ward or id Software instead.
Rare has largely been mismanaged under Microsoft. They have on success with Sea of Thieves in the last 20 years under Microsoft. Having them explore Crash Bandicoot and Spyro gives those IP a chance to live as well as gives Rare an opportunity to shine on other IP.
Again, what other IP does Microsoft have? Nothing that moves the needle.
Arkane just released a game that has a 56 on metacritic. It's going to be very difficult for that studio to come back from that. They have no more good will left over. The user reviews for what they're worth are even worse.
What is Tango without Shinji Mikami... again you're going to see a talent exodus and there's little you can do about it.
How about you try to actually counter an argument rather than the lazy shit response you gave.
How does a long period between announcement and release for Hellblade 2 translate to ‘mismanagement’?
Where’s the sense in blaming a delay for Starfield on Matt Booty, when the vast majority of AAA titles suffered a pandemic related delay? Was it also mismanagement when GOW Ragnarok moved from an announced 2021 release period to late 2022?
adamsapple
Or is it just one of Phil's balls in my throat?
Snake29
Banned
Imo, i think that Hellblade 2 after all these years and the gameplay what we saw wont be some big game. The gameplay looked pretty bad and on rails and so far it's more a graphics showcase with limited gameplay. I personally dare say myself that Hellblade 2 should not expect too high marks. I feel that in terms of gameplay, it really won't be anything interesting.
Tams
Member
I fucking knew it.
I bet she doesn't even really play computer games.
Some people you can tell what type of person they are just from looking at them.
Topher
Identifies as young
Booty Bond would be a great name
Actually sounds like a 007 parody porn movie, doesn’t it?
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Interfectum
Member
Klob looks straight out of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre.She looks like someone perpetually forced to do what she's doing against her will. It's like you can see the screams from behind her dead eyes and fake mechanical smile.
Her face looks so weird in this picture. It's like she's been photoshopped onto someone else's body.
DaleinCalgary
Member
Microsoft would be better off with zero upper mgmt at xbox and the studios just ran themselves and answered to Charles Barkley once a year.
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adamsapple
Or is it just one of Phil's balls in my throat?
Agent Booty reporting for Dooty.
SenkiDala
Member
She looks perfectly normal and fine... Can we stop judgement by the appearance ? Especially with that weird looking dude on the right, it seems weird that the one being judged on this picture is the normal woman.She looks like someone perpetually forced to do what she's doing against her will. It's like you can see the screams from behind her dead eyes and fake mechanical smile.
Her face looks so weird in this picture. It's like she's been photoshopped onto someone else's body.
analog_future
Resident Crybaby
She looks like someone perpetually forced to do what she's doing against her will. It's like you can see the screams from behind her dead eyes and fake mechanical smile.
Her face looks so weird in this picture. It's like she's been photoshopped onto someone else's body.
God you're fucking weird
King Dazzar
Member
Bond's Booty tickled me more.
Toots
Gold Member
Im amazed to learn that i use the same tools and methods as the elite communication experts at Xbox. i should send them a CV, i could at least triple my civil servant pay doing the same shitty page layout job
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Action Jackson
Member
Bu..but.. in her introduction promo video she claimed that she was playing King‘s Quest with her father when she grew up, so you see she is a real gamer afterall, right?
It has long since been announced that Bobby is leaving by end year, and until then he’ll report to Spencer to smoothen the transition.
Don’t be so averse to reading
BbMajor7th
Member
Because announcing projects years out suggests that management expects that the games will release far sooner than they actually will. The announcement also puts external pressure on the studio, particularly when you use unrepresentative target renders for the announcement, against which the final product will inevitably compared. This is lousy management.
The time scales aren't the problem, it's that management didn't have a clear idea of the situation before announcing a hard release. A well-managed company factors in disruptions, monitors the ongoing situation, and gets a clear idea of deadlines and project progress before they make they commit to a release. That way you properly manage consumer expectations and maximize impact for the final release.
To a degree sure, but it's not a pattern with other publishers like it is with Microsoft; GOWR actually justified its delay by being well polished and very well received, ditto with Tears of the Kingdom.
Banjo64
cumsessed
That guy...
As if Klobrille’s confidence means anything
what credentials does he have to make that judgement? A graphic design qualification?
digoutyoursoul
Member
There will be people who will still defend them regardless of any mediocre offerings. It’s more about the social aspect and building followings to placate the more zealot like element of the community for their own benefit than being honest whatever that view may be.
Regardless of that sort of behaviour the products are there to be played for everyone to have an opinion on and the critical and commercial end results speak for themselves. No amount of fake sycophantic behaviour, posing for photos or getting a favourable response on social media from one of theses execs is going to change that.
I’m not surprised at these changes, it’s all a bit too predictable, I was hoping to be wrong and we would see a substantial overhaul with better people in those roles and more importantly better and more consistent in a positive sense end results in the products. Not to be I guess.
Regardless of that sort of behaviour the products are there to be played for everyone to have an opinion on and the critical and commercial end results speak for themselves. No amount of fake sycophantic behaviour, posing for photos or getting a favourable response on social media from one of theses execs is going to change that.
I’m not surprised at these changes, it’s all a bit too predictable, I was hoping to be wrong and we would see a substantial overhaul with better people in those roles and more importantly better and more consistent in a positive sense end results in the products. Not to be I guess.
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TheThreadsThatBindUs
Member
Thankfully, said mutant wasn't promoted to President of Xbox.
TheThreadsThatBindUs
Member
And you're a fucking snowflake.
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