I agree with you. I appreciate that it might have gotten lost in all I wrote, but my greater point was that there’s a wide variety of factors at play here, including what you’ve said. Zoro and I touched earlier on how the smaller userbase of the Xbox One generation was one such factor, for example. I also think that it’s essential to emphasize, as you have, that absolute objectivity is impossible, from journalists to consumers. I expressed this earlier when I mentioned what a big Spider-Man mark I am 
The press, such as it is, is by no means perfect and I certainly didn’t mean to imply that. The only thing I believe I concretely stated about them was that dismissing them as only being into a particular type of game was reductive. It’s obviously not true as they aren’t a monolith and it suffocates any attempt at a more comprehensive examination.
To your point about the mechanism of influence towards journalists: I can’t say for certain: I don’t engage in social media at all outside of seeing some tweets here and there, and I try to only use video games forums and news sites for news. It’s entirely possible that you’re right about this. Unconscious bias is real and pervasive, and it can seep into even the most impartial person and color their view.
In the end, I think it’s important to remember that these personalities et alia are just doing a job. The sinster cabal you jokingly alluded to is plainly not real but I sometimes see people act though it is. I understand that it must be frustrating to see a dearth of frank impartial coverage, but in the end, it really all is about money. I don’t doubt many of the journalists are passionate about the subject matter, but when your livelihood depends on attention, you write what’s more likely to keep you fed (and/or what your boss says).
I genuinely think that this conversation is an interesting one, but I do think that it’s largely rooted in that frustration. I love hearing about how things work behind the scenes in this industry, but at the end of the day, it doesn’t affect me directly if MS is getting fair coverage or not. You could make an argument that they base some of their decisions based on how they’re depicted. To that, I would just say that it’s all entirely outside of my control. Why waste the energy getting mad about it? Life’s too short to throw a hissy fit about what so and so from IGN said or the fact that some shmuck fanboy influencer made a video about how Xbox has no games or whatever.
Really, I just want to play good games comfortably and cheaply. Xbox is a fantastic place for me to do that. That’s pretty much where my investment ends.
Edit: Want to make it clear that I’m not talking about anyone specific when I talk about hissy fits and whatnot.
