Phil Spencer talks with Polygon about the future of living games, Xbox, AI, and more.
Right before the full reveal of Warframe 1999 at TennoCon, we chatted with Ben Starr about the responsibility of stepping into such a huge franchise.
TNS: "We're shining a light on a bunch of "bad" games that may've been left wanting when it comes to their critical or audience reception."
Good list I've had similar reactions to some games even ones on the list like the order and Callisto
Also I recently grabbed forspoken for, 5 dollars at a eb games Clarence sale and I am actually enjoying it more than I thought I would
Sometimes you just need to give critically panned games a chance
Oh gosh, good shout on Forspoken! Genuinely forgot about that one, and haven't got around to playing it. It's on my to-buy-in-a-sale list!
Knack was great ! Had a blast with the first one. Haven’t tried the second one though due to backlog
The Fight: Lights Out was also a game i enjoyed very much and highly detailed with great motion control when you understand how they work, which is what pushed people away from this game..
Both The Order and Calisto were harshly treated in my view. I am not saying they are perfect, but the were both really solid games. I personally really liked them despite acknowledging their flaws and coincidentally, got the platinum trophy for both games.
Evil West is another really fun game that's worth checking out for sure.
Forspoken was great. Never really understood all the criticism. 2nd best traversal in a game after Spiderman
Yeah gameplay wise I get huge infamous vibes with its combat starting out as low level eventually becoming a unstoppable power spewing killing machine with a wide variety of powers infamous is one of my favourite franchises obviously it's not the same but I love the combat of it so far.
I feel like we’re finally starting to see a sea change in how we treat our favorite games. Sure, we all acknowledge that a game can suck and we can still enjoy it. Hopefully this results in meaningful review scores. Personally, I find a lot of bad games are better if you blast through them on the easiest difficulty. Callisto protocol on the image is a good example of this.
I really liked Calisto, harshly treated for sure and I don't necessarily think it needs to be played on easy to enjoy it. It's not perfect, but it's not the car crash the media portrayed it as either.
I have said it before, but part of the issue is that there is a mind share going on in games coverage, with all the main outfits being personal friends and talking too each other. As such, there is a risk that everyone ends up sharing in the same opinion rather than thinking from themselves. I reckon that's why some games get a universal bashing when consumers actually like the game and equally, games get great reviews across the board and the game doesnt land with consumers.
Actually, I started liking FO76 after the wastelanders DLC ... it has been my guilty pleasure
other games I can think of Order 1886, Driveclub, Resident Evil 6 (only the Leon part), Alpha Protocol (pretty unique, needs a remake), XIII Remake (after patches), Medal of Honor 2010, Medal of Honor Warfighter, Homefront The Revolution, Enemy Front, Legendary The Box, Faces of War, Conflict: Vietnam, Conflict: Global Storm & Codename: Panzers – Cold War
Driveclub was genuinely a good game with a poor launch. Alpha Protocol is superb, just a few archaic design choices for the time.
I want past games with interesting setups/mechanics but having some flaws (due to crunch or budget) to be remade so that the gaming community can appreciate and enjoy them as was envisioned and intended by the developers. In contrast to a successful game being remade again just with prettier coat of paint.
Alpha Protocol tops that and I'll include FO:NV as well as an exception (it is popular but features were cut due to limited dev time). And also Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines I, Singularity, KOTOR II and maybe Daikatana.
There might be others which I can't recall atm.
I loved Enemy Front. I pre ordered it months prior and remember calling the store to check if it came out that day. The guy never heard of it but confirmed my copy was ready to pick up. Game was simple and basic in a good way. Didn’t have any tacked on extras. A simple mission and objectives in each level. Kind of reminded me of the first Crysis in a way
I loved The Order, ridiculous graphics for it's time and a very interesting setting, it was linear but not as bad as people say. Similar thing with Callisto Protocol, i admit that i played it a long time after release so maybe issues were fixed by then, but it was a fantastic Dead Space-like horror game with some of the best graphics i've seen in my life.
Yup, I am afraid to say I waited on Calisto and picked it up for around 30 quid. Once I played it on felt really badly for the devs because the game was really decent.
Thanks to the Starfield Creation Kit, the "Earth Restored" mod has transformed the Earth into a Pine Forest and filled the sea with life.
“My strategy isn’t to steal their customers,” Spencer said of his longtime rivals. “We’re really looking at new customers, new creators, and that being kind of a real critical component of our strategy.”
Continues to buy the worlds largest 3rd party publisher and give the Sony 10 years to come up with a CoD alternative or else buy a Xbox to play CoD.
"But as you know, video games have a very different financial model than video. A lot of the video games that are out there are kind of a financial engine unto themselves. So for us, when we think about Game Pass, it’s as much about curation and distribution as it is value."
Straight from his mouth. Gamepass exists to turn every game into a storefront.
“My strategy isn’t to steal their customers,” Close your legs Phillip, your breath stinks.
Only the true MS sycophants that lap up the feculent splatter of little phil will believe this bs. If it wasn't to steal customers then why not leave multiplatform publishers multiplatform?
The way Microsoft is positioning themselves, I really think that they will try & buy Netflix further down the line. Gamepass & Netflix as one thing would be one hell of a marketing advantage, Netflix could be the first of the Film streaming services to have all the big games.
It would be huge.
Every Bethesda and Activation/Blizzard games were releasing on both platforms, they didn't have to spend a penny there. And then they spent and trying to spend a total of 76 billions... 19 YEARS of current Gamepass revenue (not even profit), just so millions of gamers won't have access to them, and XBox gamers gained ZERO games.
And people compare this to a single studio purchase Insomniac, a studio has always been releasing games on PS exclusively, and then released an amazing game on XBox but Xbox gamers didn't give an F, so they went back to Sony, and now became first party.