Forgive the crudeness of the above expression, but there simply isn't any better way to say it, is there?
The fact is Sony's E3 conference was good, not great, and everyone seems to agree more or less on that. Some people were less than charitable when it came to appraising Microsoft's Press conference and Nintendo's was almost unanimously lauded as the "best E3 presentation in years" [citation needed]. Everybody seems very interested in who's presentation "won" at E3, and the answer appears to be this: Nintendo. Coming in a somewhat distant second was Sony and later on was Microsoft. Anyways, it's unimportant whether or not you agree with this, because I want to talk about an alternate universe.
I feel like things could have wound up quite differently for Sony in particular if they could have held out just... a bit... longer. Why exactly did Sony announce many of their AAA titles before E3? Yes, Portal 2 and Twisted Metal were saved for the press conference itself, and they were far from small announcements, and yes, Little Big Planet 2 and Killzone 3 are far from surprise announcements, but that doesn't really justify spreading around the goodness so thinly. E3 gets more press than any other gaming event during the year, and the object of the game is to impress, so why is it that the extra bang and wow effect Sony could have gotten by revealing KZ3 in 3D, LBP2 and Infamous 2 at E3 was sacrificed so willingly just to get some buzz on the net early on?
I've had the thought that maybe Sony was concerned with the possibility of overloading the press with juicy news, perhaps worrying that announcements (for example) like LBP2 might overshadow the Portal 2 announcement (or vice versa, depending on who you're talking to). I think if one were to consider Sony's presentation "great" they would be hard pressed to account for all that greatness with one aspect of the conference, so perhaps this strategy was not so ill-conceived. What gave Sony presence was the laundry list of big titles, with Move being a feature rather than the feature... unlike the 3DS, for example, which was essentially THE story for Nintendo (add in a Zelda game and bam, "best in years").
If Sony was more concerned with the media's metabolism and they were correct to employ the strategy they did, then bravo for being clever, but otherwise, if they were wrong and saving everything for E3 would have both wowed the audiences and set the internet ablaze, then shame on them. I'm kind of divided between congratulating and condemning Sony's marketing think-tank.
Thoughts, people?
Shaz from Pixel Swish: "The ROG Xbox Ally is another step towards Team Xbox’s 'Play Anywhere' strategy, and perfectly embodies the company’s future and how we’re all going to be playing an 'Xbox' in the future."
The funny thing about Xbox going more PC-like is that I’ve been saying this for over a decade and finally seeing it come to fruition. People use to hate the idea, but now are embracing it, and all I want is to be put on the payroll lol.
On a serious note, I think this is the best route going forward for MS. They don’t have to get out of the hardware game altogether. They can make their home console $300 entry & $600 premium home consoles and from there partner with other hardware makers for anything beyond that. Focus on being a publisher and creating a strong OS / Cloud option for other devices like desktop, handheld PCs, streaming devices, etc…
I honestly think they should also look into NVIDIA as well, with NVIDIA starting to make their own CPUs. Their CPU is already on par with AMDs best laptop CPUs of the previous/current generation which is more than enough, and a RTX 5000 / 6000 laptop GPU hybrid (DLSS 4 / DLSS5) could do wonders for them, and bring some much needed diversity back to console hardware.
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I don't know why you'd expect them to still develop new consoles at this point. Ditching all exclusives and putting the Xbox logo on a ROG Windows device is a pretty clear message.
This isn't a good thing for Xbox. It's a long winded goodbye.
I saw this years ago. I don't see how it took this long for people actually close to the industry.
I said this years ago, mind you I know nothing about computers, but I always thought Xbox would go more PC-like.
As I said, and always said, I know squat about PCs, so I thought Xbox would become modular. I don’t know if that’s the right word, but I thought they would build a basic frame/shell and gamers would be able to configure their Xbox how they wish, similar to PC and buy motherboards, sound cards and graphic cards. I don’t know if that’s practical or even possible though.
This was when they first entered the gaming space.
I think consoles are so cheap and punch above their weight is because everything is so tightly designed around each component. Opening up to multiple permutations with modules would probably make it more expensive to build, develop for, and manage. It's not impossible, but probably gets in that gray area where it's not much different than a garden variety PC.
"First-person roguelikes like Gunfire Reborn and Roboquest can be quite fun when done well. Another such game is MythForce, which comes from Beamdog, the developer that brought Baldur's Gate 1 and 2 to modern platforms (while mostly ditching the co-op). MythForce features cartoon-like visuals and a fantasy theme, making it quite different from most of its peers. It will soon reach its "final form" via the upcoming Version 1.2 update," says Co-Optimus.
Today, SCS Software officially announced Project Coaches, the next evolution for Euro Truck Simulator 2, adding buses to the game.
E3 isn't all that special outside of the gaming industry. Sony did a good job by keeping their name in the mainstream for several weeks on end, rather than announcing a whole load of stuff at once that would have had trouble matching the 3DS anyway.
It's only strange that they didn't choose to follow up on Agent and Last Guardian, which it seems they should have been able to.. at least with LG.
Yeah, I agree. Totally. Sony could of won E3 if they didn't show everything everywhere else, but on the other hand, it made the spotlight on them and perhaps that's what they wanted.
I just wanted to let the writer know how much that picture cracked me up...I literally laughed out loud. Nice job.