Microsoft have taken a bashing over the last few weeks, partly because of their flat out refusal to discuss their next console and partly because of the actions of Adam Orth, the Microsoft creative director who took to Twitter in defense of an always online console. The top articles on sites like N4G and Reddit have almost consistently housed articles about why Microsoft are doing things wrong. Why, then, is their stock at almost the highest it's been in six months?
As part of its plans to cut 1,900 jobs, Microsoft has reportedly shut down operations at Bethesda France, letting go roughly 15 people
Bethesda France was made up of roughly 15 people... they couldn't of being doing much
Bethesda France mainly did publishing and marketing within the region
Bethesda France focused on publishing and marketing in the region. And 15 people lost their jobs as part of the closure.
I wonder if this is part of Microsoft's strategy to abandoned physical media or possibly gamepass advertising makes their roles redundant you don't need to market a game as hard when the majority of players get the game as part of a sub which already promoted upcoming games
Tbh Microsoft I think Bethesda being 3rd party same with Activision would probably more competitive than thus scenario imo
The recently purchased Activision French offices might take over all the licensing and marketing for Microsoft in France from now on.
Hanzla from eXputer inquires: "If Xbox can care about preserving its games and legacy, what exactly is wrong with Nintendo, trying to kill game preservation single-handedly?"
Ahh yes the good old game preservation of saving all your games to a removable hhd on the Xbox 360, taking it round your mates house, setting up multiple tvs to
Be met with “save data corrupted, please re download”
Or how about removing 360 games
From the store
, download them now or else, and, better hope to god that save data doesn’t corrupt, or it’s lost for ever
Nice one ☝️
This is just a scammy PR move to distract from the fact they are going digital only and trying to push streaming and subscriptions only.
No gaming company has pushed harder to remove ownership than Microsoft.
Without discs there is no preservation, preservation can't be done by the rights holders it can only be done by the consumers, anything else is a lie.
Nobody wants this. Sales or the lack of it in the case of XBOX is very telling. I wonder how the adorably all digital series X will fare. Adorably dismal perhaps?
Only time will tell, but for from someone like me suspecting that Xbox is trying to gracefully exit the console market, that "forward compatibility" team is trying to get Xbox games playing on Windows PCs. I mean, it's nice that they're not planning on exiting with a "enjoy your games while the hardware still works" message, so that's nice. They still have a brand to protect via Microsoft so probably feel obligated to have a better exit strategy.
Microsoft's future in the video game space is murky right now, so let's break it all down.
Not anytime soon. But they're on that path.
One thing not mentioned in the article is Microsoft's money bags. If Sega had Microsoft's money, they would have still been around as a hardware manufacturer. Xbox as a platform only survives because of the money bags. They can continue making consoles for the core and port to PC.
The multiplatform strategy is only the result of arrogance and misguided leadership that blew up in their face. They thought gamers would jump on Xbox in droves if they knew that many of their favorite games would be only on Xbox. But that's not happening at all. Sales didn't increase. They decreased. Why? Because the dumb asses thought giving away these expensively made games in a cheap service would also turn the tide.
Gamers on other platforms are willing to buy quality. They don't need to be handed nearly free games in a service that aren't even finished and sometimes average in their development. Gamers buy Nintendo games. They buy Sony games. Microsoft groomed their base to not buy games. Even the quality ones. It has always been their plan to go digital. But most gamers still like single player gaming. Still like physical releases.
Microsoft's problem has always been that they don't produce high quality games at the same output as Nintendo and Sony. Actually, they should be producing quite a lot more because they're worth over 2 TRILLION. How they don't have more is ridiculous and no excuse. Buying publishers to take away from competition only backfired. Because it still takes millions of dollars to continue to make those games from the publishers they snatched. Their only choice was to crawl back to their competitors to help sustain those developers because Nintendo and Sony platforms were the ones buying games.
Am I sorry for Microsoft? Hell no! They deserved last place for putting in the least effort. They deserved the fallout for buying up the industry and didn't make a single blip on the radar against their competitors where they now need those same gamers they took away games from to support them. Part of it may have been to cash in on their competition. But the result is the slow death of their platform. They may go 3rd party. They may keep making hardware. I don't give a shit about them to worry about it. I only give a shit about the destructive nature of their industry moves that only negatively affect gamers. They could sell and drop out of the industry and I wouldn't blink. Probably laugh. But not blink. They deserve whatever comes to them. At least Sega put in the effort when it came to games. They just had poor leadership. Microsoft has poor leadership and barely makes memorable games. That's a killer combination. And not in a good way.
Not sure about that. It's been two decades and I still think about Power Stone, Shenmue, Crazy Taxi, Jet Set Radio, Seaman and others, but I'm not sure I'll remember Xbox Series X/S games in a few years from now... Maybe I'll remember about the franchises that the Xbox brand spawned, but I don't believe that the Xbox Series lives up to the late Dreamcast or even to the Xbox name itself. I do have great memories about the 360 with Blue Dragon, Gears 2 and Lost Odyssey though
No, Dreamcast was ahead of it's time and most still have very fond memories of it that had one. It also had some good games on it even in it's short lifespan. Xbox has none of these qualities.
Bad press is only among fanboys on forums. Most people making noise are PS3 fanboys. Devs would love DRM and so would investors. Gamers with no internet would be devastated and would hurt MSFT bad although making devs and investors happy, as long as the install base was healthy because of DRM.
I still think if true in some way, people are confusing some up coming Auto feature needs of the retail console and some sort of pre launch dev kit security protocols both sharing the same needs.
DRM would make xbox the preferred console of choice but would not be worth the lost business from non internet consumers. If any of this was true the xbox wouldn't even come with or need a HDD or disc drive for that matter for games. Why invest in HDD and disc drive driving up the cost if you have a console that won't work without internet? Why not go full DDL? MSFT would be better off releasing a full cloud based system Which isn't practical with load issues and ISP bandwidth caps.
Thats because ONLY PS fanboys are crying and worried about the 720. Everyone else is excited and know whatever MS brings will likely bring them victory once again in the console battle.
Microsoft is too big to fall even if they drop Xbox, and i dont believe Xbox will be as bad as people are saying, i and if you are a true gamer we can only hope that is a great Console so we can buy and have fun.
Remember if Sony is the only ONE making a GREAT Console than none of us will have an alternative, monopoly market is bad for our or anyother industry so i say, make a damn fine Console Microsoft, competition is healthy and the more games the better.
Pretty sure a lot of the world isn't quite so concerned by some RUMOURS, no matter how many articles are bitching about it on N4G.