Agreed, i dont think people’s going to hate on Xbox no matter what cause i’ve lived these times sibce early 2005 where Xbox went from a niche option for a few hardcore gamers from the West, to the best console while PS3 was kinda a meme, to again a meh option in 2009-2010 due to bad MS decisions.
I was sure narrative around Xbox could change slowly after E3 and after they release a few big games, but with Sony focusing Hard on GAAS and not showing AAA Single player games on this conference, things could change way faster and not just about MS but about Sony too.
This said, well, MS are quite good at fucking up when they are given the chance, so let’s see what they do, I got faith but ye they need not fail this time
One of the things people for me need to stop worrying about is narrative. The other is sales.
Narrative does not equal sales anyway.
People are way too bothered about what others online think about their console of choice. I mean who really cares? We’ve literally just seen a post from someone so mentally unwell they asked for MS execs to be executed.
When you are enjoying the great games that I believe will hit Xbox this year and onwards why does it matter if it isn’t moving some imaginary needle in narrative or sales?
Enjoy what you have. It doesn’t need to be acclaimed as the ‘best’ and it’s never ever ever going to ‘sell the best’.
Narratives wear you down. We saw just how worn out Phil was in his recent interview.
Granted alot of it was due to MS stepping on every rake they could find, but when everytime you open twitter thered Xbox trending for another bad reason, or at the top of every gaming news website is another story about the doom of xbox, it can set a tone around your console that really hurts it.
Lets be honest, Sony was doing alot of shady shit, like raising console and game prices, cancelling games, shutting down studios, no showcase for nearly 2 years, and on and on. They didnt get enough heat thrown on them because MS and Xbox was doing even worse things
Phil is head of gaming at Microsoft. It’s his job to have a strong brand and bring in success.
So it’s of course something he will care about. But if I like Pepsi more than coke it’s not my worry how well Pepsi is performing or what my peers think of Pepsi. I just drink it.
It’s not so much that narratives per se are the issue. They’re simply the fabric.
What is the issue is valorisation, focus, attention on one bucking, messy, serpentine narrative that permits no past or future, only the present’s ‘feel good/terrible!!!’ message. It’s absolutely daft people put themselves at its mercy, imo.
Everything is terrible [2022 drought] / everything is amazing [Hi-fi Rush] / everything is terrible [Redfall] / everything is amazing [Sony showcase disappointing] etc
That’s what’s exciting to me. Nerve-wracking, yeah, but exciting !
I don’t doubt MS/Xbox will have things aligned in the near future. It’s been a long and painful ride but they’re slowly getting things together with the help of all the studios they acquired. One misfire is not something to worry about.
The medias and many people will change course when they finally see what’s been going on since Jim Ryan took rein.
Narrative will shift in an instant. It’s been going on for a while now. And a generation is a pretty long time, so people can get on brand S console at the beginning of the gen and then get brand X at the end, if the games are there. We saw that before.
Xbox will have the games to back this up. I think we’re going to see a shift in a few years when people will want to catch up on some brand X games.
I agree for the most part but for me personally, im expecting to get at least three Sony first party games in 2024. Stellar Blade, Rise of the Ronin and Marvel’s Wolverine. Can’t speak for anyone else but that’s a great year first party wise for me.
Of course, I don’t get why people believe that Sony won’t have any games in 2024 or beyond. That’s like saying Microsoft won’t have any games either. I mean come on. They both will. The only difference is that Microsoft announced a lot of games at the start of this generation where as Sony only announced the games for the first 2-3 years.
You should wait until Spider-Man 2 actually releases before expecting Wolverine After the crunching required for a Spider-Man holiday release, those guys are going to be burnt out.
I’m pretty certain that Insomniac has two different studios or at the very least, two different teams so im not worried about this. Even if gets delayed to 2025, it would most likely be February/March so a few extra months isn’t going to matter all that much. But we’ll see.
They have the Spiderman team and the Ratchet and Clank team. Insomniac has grown to around 550 devs at this point, which is pver double what it was pre buy out. I mean, why wouldnt you invest in them when they are just work horses.
So Ratchet came out in 2021, which would tend to mean at least 4 years between games you would think? That makes Wolverine a 2025 title in my eyes.
But hey, if anyone can put it out in three years its Insomniac.
Yeah, Insomniac is HUGE and they’re extremely efficient. I can definitely see Wolverine being November 2024 which would see Insomniac release four games in four years.
Sometimes I think that there’s three teams. Spider Man and Spider Man 2 are from the main team as far as I know so that’s four years apart. Ratchet 2016 did Rift Apart but also Miles Morales in 2020 with a third smaller team helping out.
We’ll see but im staying with November 2024 for Marvel’s Wolverine.
Three things that I think will really help switch the narrative into Xbox’s favor if and when they happen:
A solid showcase lineup that has a nice mix of first party coming out within the next 18 months, CG of further out first party fare, and third party Game Pass augments.
Starfield being very good to great.
The ActivisonBlizzardKing purchase closing, which I think it will, since the CMA has spent the past few weeks vomiting all over themselves on social media and court.
Sony had a strong opening salvo at the beginning of this generation, releasing titles greenlit under House and Kodera that were great and even quite a bit diverse in portfolio (Demon’s Souls, Astro’s Playroom, Returnal and Ragnarok, to name a few), but with those games released and the fruits of Jimbo’s labor starting to see the light of day (GaaS Fever baby!), it’s Xbox that has the next barrage.
Now this doesn’t mean Xbox will all of a sudden massively outsell PlayStation or anything, but as I stated in another thread, the PS6/NeXtBox era will be quite interesting if we see each company follow the same path they are now. I think Sony’s in more trouble long term than many think. This generation is sewn up for them, but the next one is a bigger question mark. All the while, Game Pass grows.
After the crunching required for a Spider-Man holiday release, those guys are going to be burnt out.