With both consoles coming under scrutiny for sales performance in recent times, it may come as a surprise that they are virtually neck and neck for weekly sales in Europe. The Xbox One has seen a huge drop off in sales globally, and a territory Microsoft were once strong in is currently shunning them in favor of the PS4.
After laying off almost 2,000 people, Xbox finds itself in a position at odds with the community-first image it has cultivated for itself.
lol I’m not a big MS gamer but Sony and a number of others have laid off ton of people as well. Where are the ridiculous articles about them not being your friend? Gaming news is such a joke and these sites wonder why they have to beg for money/patreons or flood with 5x more ads.
I think the sentiment is corporations are there to make money they are not out friends that are harsh and cutthroat when lt comes to the bottom line so why do we proclaim our love for any gaming company from the rooftops when they wouldn't care about us unless we are buying the next thing.
We need to beore objective with how we view these "teams"
This is the absolute truth. The only part of you these companies, ALL companies, want to be friends with is your bank account. They don't care what they have to say, who's job they have to cut, or what shady underhandedness they must engage in. Bottom line is all that matters.
Because people unfortunately make these companies and products part of their own persona, so when they are scrutinized, they see it as an attack on themselves. There is some neuropsychological research around this phenomenon, but it basically has the same effect as religion. It helps foster a sense of community that humans need to feel comfortable. So that is not happening unless we have a sudden surge of people actually understanding how they work and taking control of themselves.
While it's true Sony isn't a friend either, let's not pretend that they're even in the same ballpark as MS's anti consumer practices. Sony is not a friend but atleast they're not an enemy like MS.
@twopickles, were you not paying attention? Sony was heavily criticized when they laid off people weeks ago, more than Microsoft did with their massive abk layoffs.
That’s Whataboutism. Sony and other game companies didn’t pay more than $80B to buy up publishers. Microsoft said in court that it wasn’t going to have redundancies and fire people. Microsoft told Xbox owners that they would have a AAA on GamePass each quarter. But here we are with Microsoft Game Studios shrinking. Consolidation doesn’t benefit the consumer, and no company has consolidated more than Microsoft.
Exactly. They love their SonyToo instead of looking at everything in its totality. You spend $80B to buy up so many pubs/devs, you damn well should have something to show for it.
That said, this article is old and someone is clearly looking for clicks!
ok here is a reality check. Tech companies have been firing thousands of employees the last couple of years.
I find it odd that the percentage of employees sacked from MS
QUOTE
"Microsoft announced approximately 1,900 job cuts across its gaming division, including Activision Blizzard, ZeniMax, and Xbox. 8.6% of its colossal 22,000-strong global workforce. "
is worth writing an article condemning the company, when Sony Interactive fired 8% of its workforce (900 people approximately).
https://news.crunchbase.com...
Is the writer concerned about the percentage of the workforce fired or the number of employees?
Lets not forget that Unity laid off 25 percent of its workforce (1800 people) and Discord laid off 17 percent of its employees.
You also have to take into account the AI issue reported in the article. MS is heavily invested in A.I. They have invested in Open A.I (chatgpt 4+Dalle 3), in Abu Dhabi’s G42 and in French AI company Mistral.
These LLMs have already replaced thousands of jobs as A.I usage becomes more common
https://www.cbsnews.com/new...
https://www.theverge.com/20...
https://tech.co/news/compan...
This is the new reality. Even nvidia CEO said that games will fully A.I generated.
https://www.pcgamer.com/sof...
Nevertheless, no company should be ever viewed as "your friend". MS had numerous anti consumer practices in place and the same is true for Sony (not only in video game space) and Nintendo (60$ dollar games without permanent discounts, remasters of 10 year old game with full price, no console price cuts, expensive joy cons which are prone to drift, to name but a few).
As part of its plans to cut 1,900 jobs, Microsoft has reportedly shut down operations at Bethesda France, letting go roughly 15 people
They can form a company if they want, they are just as jobless as if "Microsoft had left them as 3rd party".
"MIcrosoft leaves Bethesda do what they know how to do best" ... close! Oh the irony ....
(Citation from a week old article)
I think Microsoft and other game publishers are letting people go because they think ai will replace them. Doesn’t matter how much profit they make. They were always going to be let go.
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
that's a shame for you to say that, i'm sure Elite loves hearing what you just said.
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
It's France too, there's a high likelihood only 1-2 people on the team even had an Xbox.
Tbh Microsoft I think Bethesda being 3rd party same with Activision would probably more competitive than thus scenario imo
I think it would have been better for all parties really especially gamers
The recently purchased Activision French offices might take over all the licensing and marketing for Microsoft in France from now on.
Hanzala from eXputer: "The cruel hammer of Nintendo has fallen. Farewell, 3DS and Wii U, you surely brightened my life and many others; you won't be forgotten."
Ha wow in other words xbox one is selling horrible in Europe and soon to be in Asia when or if it ever even trys over there,15,000 a week is meh
Wow. Worldwide sales have really dropped off for Xbox One, what the heck is going on?
Oh man, seems that Xbox One sales have dropped from the cliff. Maybe Titanfall can boost some sales, but i don't see it happening by a large amount.
Time for 3rd parties to start releasing half-assed ports to Xbox One and then abandon the platform when those ports fail to sell. Oh wait, they can't, because they have nowhere else to make money.
why does xbox one cost more then ps4 is it do to the kinect?