IMO it’s nothing to really do with multiplat strategy, I don’t think that has effected the casual/mass market in any way yet.
What I see is 2 out of the top 3 didn’t launch on Xbox (Helldivers, FFVII) and Xbox let another drought happen again (Forza, or Starfield → Hellblade), and last Feb had Hogwarts Legacy as well.
Casuals/most people do not care who publishes a game. The “first party drought” shit is stupid. As long as big games are coming out that’s it, it’s an industry powered by 3rd party and mostly by f2p.
I think this is referring to the UK monthly results which I think makes sense. content is what sells. It just so happens that there is new content on the other platforms which is why they have a bigger boost.
Starfield would have won GOTY if it was a PS exclusive like Sony wanted it to be
Yeah, the disillusionment with Bethesda had already started with Fallout 4 and reached its peak with Fallout 76. Starfield was going to catch it one way or the other.
No, but I think it wouldn’t be under that heavy of a microscope. I am unsure if it changes its fate in getting nominated for GOTY due to how strong the lineup was that year.
No?..No??? Lol
Bruh…HiFi Rush just released on PlayStation with a higher metacritic score than Xbox. Are you serious right now?? Holy shit…
If Starfield releases on PlayStation in the future, please believe that most of the hate will die for the game and the rhetoric that’s been surrounding it for months will change.
I think Pentiment also has higher critics rating on other systems than Xbox, although it has less reviews as well so that could have impacted the scores as well, but I do somewhat agree it has an impact.
I mean 76 is pretty amazing right now.
The disalusion is Starfield is by nature the exploration is too different from past Beth games and is mostly surface level.
They took a big swing and I still love Starfield, but it doesn’t have the ‘what’s over that hill’ magic of their past games.
It’s because there was 8x more reviews on xbox, so it would of course take a hit on the MC score. I know PC version held up to a 90 MC score, but the xbox version still had 2x more reviews, so you’ll of course get some reviews that will take a hit on the score.
I don’t think Starfield releasing on PS5 would make it GOTY. However, I do agree that the microscope the game was under would lift if it releases on Playstation. I feel a lot of the stuff the game was getting hated on is currently happening in a game like FF7R , but that’s none of my business
Guess you guys weren’t listening when Phil said they couldn’t “out console” Sony. And no, you advertising gurus (
) no amount of paid ads would really impact those EU sales numbers.
We actually have a critic literally say they where giving Hifi Rush a low score because it was an Xbox game that came out after a drought.
I’m not going to say Starfield would have been game of the years at the Keighlies, but getting a lower score because it’s an Xbox game is an actual thing.
Yeah, there is def bias and I asusme score would be a bit better, but unsure if it would change GOTY nomination. Personally, there’s a game that was nominated where I felt Starfield was better than. However, Starfield was in a weird spot where Bethesda hate train was happening after Fallout 4 release, so I felt it was always in trouble. I just don’t think it would get nitpicked this bad if it was a multiplatform game
I think interesting thing about preception is you would think Halo Infinite is the worst game ever, but if you look at MC its sitting at a 87 MC. It’ just interesting how narrative of games can flip. The game scored similary to the Halo "Bangers’ and even better than some, but perception is everything and people found a couple of little things to nitpick and now its considered one of the worst campaigns, but at the time people were enjoying it a lot.
To be fair, Palworld was one of the biggest games in the world at the beginning of February and that was Xbox/Pc only, it was talked about in the press a lot - Google it if you’ve forgotten, but it sold 15m copies on Steam in it’s first month. A game with that much momentum exclusive to Xbox (and included on Gamepass) would surely be worth a mention.
https://x.com/aarongreenberg/status/1752755977584279783?s=20
At least some people are checking gaming news when they buy a console, and this 3rd party talk (and complete lack of reassurance that all first party titles won’t go to other platforms) must have an effect on some level.
Console sales being down almost 50% should be an alarming sign, imo. If it’s not, how much lower can they go before it is?
#ThisIsFine
Honestly, it’s better the situation becomes rapidly a disaster and they see a significant drop in engagement, it’s the only way to force them (another) course correcting, maybe also some new faces in the decision room won’t do harm imo. With this management, things won’t get better, the strategy about hw has always been poor (or at least US only) and execution about games also has never been the promised one.
If we’re talking about what Xbox should do better (& to be honest I no longer care enough to even trouble myself with any sort of in-depth analysis, i.e. I’m quite happy with my Xbox right now so that’s good enough for me), I’ll say just take a look at the top sellers on PlayStation, look at what Xbox was originally successful at (& what made it popular) & draw some conclusions.
Xbox needs more shooters, more multiplayer hits & bigger pop culture impact (footprint?) on the industry at large.
I’m on the French PS Store right now looking at the top games in the country: EA Sports FC 24, Fortnite, Call of Duty, Helldivers 2, GTA 5 (lol!), Rainbow Six Siege, Genshin Impact, UFC 5, NBA 2K24 & Apex Legends.
Point being: Hellblade 2, Indiana Jones & Avowed will make absolutely zero impact on anything. Starfield was not it either. Even if it had gotten a 90+ metacritic average, it still wouldn’t have made a single dent on the market here. Fable? Hell no. No one cares. It’ll (at best) sell a few million & be a critical hit, just like the originals. But it won’t shift more Xboxes.
That’s why MS bought Call of Duty. But they need to do better with Halo (Infinite was an interesting GAAS idea but the actual execution wasn’t quite done properly) & they need to do better with the GAAS fans & shooter crowd.
I always felt like the leadership was (to their credit) very open to new types of experiences & diversifying the portfolio of Xbox games… but most of these games over the past ten years simply don’t resonate with the people who engage with the aforementioned most popular titles on PlayStation.
And some of the people playing those games probably had a 360 back in the day as well, no doubt.
There’s also too much said about PlayStation’s vaunted exclusives. They don’t matter either. I mean FF7 Rebirth if flopping right now but PS5 sales remain strong. Go figure.
Well, it’ll be interesting to see how it plays out, I guess. I don’t see how this policy can be anything but a series of gunshots to their own feet, one that makes people not need an Xbox.
To some degree Microsoft have been saying “you don’t need an Xbox” for years. Initially by putting games on pc, then pushing streaming, and now making their games available for Playstation.
…so it’s not surprising that hardware sales might have finally been pushed over a cliff as they now finally start hitting their core market - console gamers.
I could buy that pc and console are different markets. The cost of entry alone makes a big difference. I could buy that streaming is different to consoles. What I cannot understand is them thinking they can make another platform more desirable - practically making people think PlayStation is the only platform with exclusive games - without impacting their existing console business.
At this point they’d need to make a declaration that no first party games* will go to playstation to start to turn this around, which I don’t think they would be prepared to do.
*Or have a method that would clearly signal that a game is definitely exclusive to Xbox.
Hi Fi Rush had a year of patches including new gameplay content, it SHOULD review higher on Playstation.
I think some folks need to come to terms and be at peace with knowing Xbox is simply not a desirable product to people outside of USA.
It’s not that Europe or Japan hate Xbox, they just don’t care about it nor do they care to even know about it.
You can’t fix that with marketing, that’s entrenched word of mouth and consumer behaviour. There’s simply not enough room for 3 platform hardwares to all do really great at the same time anymore, especially with PC booming. There’s always going to the runt of the litter and that is clearly Xbox.
Phil and them knew that, hence them making an affordable/companion console with the Series S but unfortunately it probably did more damage than good in those said regions. This is why multiple revenue streams is more important than ever for Xbox.