Adam Tyner

Redfall, Forza, Minecraft Legends, and Starfield are all slated for the first half of 2023, per the most recent showcase. Wouldn’t surprise me if at least one or two of those are delayed again — I feel pretty good about Redfall and Minecraft Legends hitting their targets— but I guess that’s the last we’ve been told.

It sounds like some sort of Xbox showcase is semi-imminent. Presumably January or February if it’s of any size/interest, since otherwise they’d be pushing too close to E3 season.

K&AJones

Well...some reports and rumors suggest the lack of showing off new games and all was due to the deal going on with FTC suing over M.S acquisition of Activison...but most aren't buying it. Blizzard is part of it and they had a huge presentation for Diablo 4 with a awesome CGI Trailer and release date.....and still, where are all these Studios that M.S was buying up left and right? I really did think if anything Bethesda would've came out with known and future stuff: Starfield, Redfall and maybe even some Indian Jones stuff...i'm a big fan of all the games and not so much a peep from them which was a bigger shock....

stingermck

This chatter has made me realize I have not bought an Xbox game this year. Took me awhile to beat Halo, and I forgot it came out later year.

Music

Decker

Remember back when I said Xbox isn't even trying with Games with Gold anymore? Yeah, that's still the case.

Twitter

mhg83

How to set up a console for someone else? I bought my niece a series S in anticipation for Hogwarts Legacy. Is it possible to make a live account and she can change her gamertag later? That way I can pre load H.L. and put gamepass on it with some games downloaded ready to go.

Adam Tyner

Xbox and Bethesda to Present Developer_Direct Livestream on January 25

RichC2

I've had this system for a couple months now. I'm generally very impressed with the tech that went into it - the quick resumes, the load times, the backwards compatibility, even the Cloud Streaming is pretty fantastic.

But man does Microsoft need to get some first party and/or exclusives out there. At least High on Life has been fun.

K&AJones

With a lot of games getting "Nex Gen Upgrades" or like the next Dead Space getting a complete Remastered...this story caught my eye. I can think of no better series than Gears of War getting a Remastered Edition. I got a Xbox 360 for GoW and halo which were the cornerstones of XBox...and to this day I never had so much co-op fun as in GoW especially Horde Mode.I really hope they do come out with one. It looked and played great. And I still say the Cover System and the Crouch & Run was the best ever.

Gears of War Remastered Collection is Still Happening – Rumor
Though rumored last year to no announcement, the compilation is still very much in development, as per XboxEra's Nick Baker.

Gears of War Remastered Collection is Still Happening – Rumor (gamingbolt.com)

RichC2

You can, it'd involve setting up an account and then changing the associated email address and potentially paying to change the gamertag -- but it's do-able. There are potential snags to that process though. Unless she just has super slow internet, It'd be easiest to just set it up when she's in possession of it.

Dan

Definitely not good news...
Microsoft Cuts Include Gaming Divisions Behind Halo, Starfield
By Jason Schreier
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/artic...halo-starfield

Good luck to those that now have to go looking for work.

RichC2

Maybe blowing $69 billion on Activision wasn't the smartest decision.

Rival11

I'm loving the series X - even games that are compatible with both the xbox one and series X look amazing - I wasn't expecting that.

I bit the bullet and bought the 1tb expansion card for stroage as well - ugh, 200 bucks but oh well, going to need it. I'm full on ready for the new generation of games now.

K&AJones

The Tech industry has been warning for months about the dreaded 'R-Word" and layoffs has been happening and/or planned. But as big as MS is, no telling what the extent, the where, the who will be known for awhile. But one has to wonder....this might have had a role on the lack of showing at the Video Game Awards, the delays with Redfall and now Starfield which many has said is a MUST for MS and XBox. And past year no really wow 1st party exclusives, Halo had a rough launch, several key games pushed back.....But it's a known fact that PC Sales are way down and that with Software could also be a attributing factor....we'll have to wait and see I guess...supposedly the Xbox Show is still on at end of month?

OldBoy

Welcome to the club!!

Adam Tyner

I doubt there’s any connection. It’s the same story for virtually every large tech company under the sun. Amazon is in the middle of laying off 18,000 people, for instance.

And don’t forget King when listing Activision’s biggest assets. Those mobile games are an enormous part of Activison’s profits.

Decker

And are we even sure that the deal is going forward?

RichC2

Yes, though the FTC or EU can still tell them no at this point.

fujishig

Yeah it would be really dumb of them to do layoffs in anticipation of the acquisition before the acquisition is even finalized. But if you look at how much staff they hired/acquired since COVID, this seems more like cutting back to what they had before, mainly because of some of the insane amount of hiring they and other companies did when they were flush with money. You'd have to think they're all in on something like Starfield though.

RichC2

Yeah that seems to be true of all of these tech companies. They stocked up in 2020 and now have to undo those changes.

Decker

I still don't see how developering a huge exclusive AAA game and then letting everyone with Game Pass play it at launch for no additional cost makes financial sense for the company. God of War Ragnarok sold 5.1 million copies in its first week. Those sorts of sales and the revenue influx that comes with it can keep a studio going and justify a long development cycle.

I know it's the cornerstone of their business model but I just don't see how giving away use of their top exclusive games as part of a subscription service is sustainable or even smart.

fujishig

shhh....

Adam Tyner

When you have zero high-end AAA first-party exclusives like Xbox had in 2022, probably pretty easily!

I know on the A/AA side of things, Game Pass has a considerable lift on sales, even on other platforms, since "my friend said this game is really great"-style buzz is such a huge driver. I'm not sure to what extent that translates to AAA. And Microsoft is still selling a good number of games directly. Halo Infinite was the #2 best-selling game across all platforms when it came out in Dec. '21, and it was the top-selling title on both the Xbox ecosystem and among the PC titles that NPD tracks, despite being available for "free" with a subscription. Forza Horizon 5 had the Forza franchise's biggest launch ever in terms of sales, again despite being available on Game Pass, and it was the 4th best selling game of Nov. '21, behind CoD: Vanguard (across all platforms), Battlefield 2024 (across all platforms), and Pokémon: Brilliant Diamond/Shining Pearl. (And those rankings are from NPD, who are sales/revenue-oriented and not, like, "20 million players!" marketing fluff and don't have eyes into Game Pass revenue.)

FWIW:

Dan

That's a flawed argument.
MS isn't "giving away" anything. Folks are paying anywhere from $5/month (assuming they got the best possible deal converting XBL Gold to GPU) to $15/month (full retail value of GPU). With 25 million subs, that's $60 to $180 per year, or the price of 1-3 "AAA" games.

Lumping in their exclusive AAA games gets enough attention to bring in extra subs, even if that number is leveling off, and there's still more than enough people willing to just buy some GP games anyway, even some people that have a subscription (see Oldboy )

Plus, more importantly, if we're being honest... What AAA games? It's tumbleweeds over here! (edit: beat by Adam. )
With barely a couple (or less!) major exclusive titles each calendar year thus far, I find it hard to believe that GP is the source of the company's current financial woes and cutbacks.
They're making cuts to their big studios, which is not a good sign for sure. But there could be all sorts of more direct reasons for that, especially if they're not canceling (more...) games outright.

RichC2

I don't think anyone is claiming it's the cause of their woes, it was forward looking speculation for stuff like CoD.

Forza Horizon 5 and Halo Infinite made sense to me as enticements for Game Pass Ultimate and early Xbox One Series X sales, plus they already owned those franchises.