Topic: Getting friends to cross the divide

Was discussing this on the CoD article about PS getting early access to the alpha, and started to think about reasons why getting friends to join us with a Series console can seem to be so difficult.

The best reason I could come up with is that with online play becoming such a big thing last generation (many multitudes over the 360/PS3 generation) it became the one generation you couldn't afford to lose heavily - and unfortunately Xbox did.

They've made massive strides turning things around, but with so many PS4 players having their online friends all on PSN it seems likely many will go PS5 to avoid being "frozen out" except on cross-play games.

So with that in mind, what's your best approach for getting friends to take the risk? I've been trying to convince a few to get an XSS as a "second system" for Game Pass, while others I'm hoping Halo Infinite will be amazing and convince them to get one for Christmas so we can go back to our Halo 3 glory days of MP...

What does it matter anymore what console people play on. In the end we are all gamers and that's what we should be celebrating. If you can't get your friends to play on MS ecosystem then why don't you go to PS. Or better yet why don't you get a PS to go with your Series X? That way you have the best of both worlds.

My point is more about how does Xbox (and us players) encourage others to give it a go.

I gave in last generation and had both despite not actually liking any of the PS exclusives except Spider Man which was decent.

But this generation my friends will admit Sony are charging an arm and a leg for everything and the console isn't really ready with VRR, expandable storage and other bits not really finished and it being huge and ugly.

But they won't even consider getting an XSS let alone an XSX even as a second system, despite playing many of the games that have come day one to Game Pass and liking some of the exclusives - one wouldn't even take a free Series S from their parents.

Yes I can play with them on cross play (now Sony are at least playing ball on it a little) but I'm just exasperated when people won't even accept a free Xbox (!) and won't even consider it as a second machine...

@Widey85 I think you just need to wait. We're still in the beginning of this generation and Microsoft still hasn't repaired its reputation to the level it had before the Xbox One fiasco. Once the heavy-hitters start coming out, people are going to realise that Xbox is a great platform to be on, whether you want single-player games or online games. This year we'll see titles like Back 4 Blood coming out day one on Game Pass and Forza Horizon 5 as well as Halo Infinite are going to be absolutely huge. Next year we'll get Redfall, another promising co-op shooter, and most likely the biggest game of 2022, Starfield. I don't know about you, but when Skyrim came out in 2011, it was like a national holiday. Everyone I knew was playing that game. Just imagine then when Starfield comes out exclusively on the Xbox ecosystem.

At the end of the day, it's all about the games and right now your friends will simply not see many reasons to invest in an Xbox. After some time though, they will realise that Xbox is going to have tons of phenomenal games that they'll be missing out on. At that point they'll have more reasons to get one. But it'll be tough to convince them now. There's just nothing you can do but wait.

@LtSarge

Yep think you're right - I thought the value might sway them (particularly the one offered one for free) as I was playing all these great indie games of the sort they like for free, and some big hitters like Outriders etc.

But it more seems a few of them actively think the amount they spend on gaming makes them gamers (thankfully not my close friends) while others just won't give Xbox a chance despite being 360 gamers back in the day.

Some have PC and one has got a One so I'm hoping to play Infinite with them (giving it seems to scale well) and see if that starts to change minds - and yes patience is going to be needed, you're right.

Fingers crossed we get there as this playing out among many groups of friends (which the PS4 stats would suggest it will) might make the generation less competitive than hoped which isn't good for any of us...

Again I don't understand why any has to give it a go. If they are happy with Sony what does it matter. Maybe I am just missing something here.

@Tasuki

Think I've worded the original post badly, but it's basically just asking what will it take for people to give Xbox a chance again.

I suspect the answer is some great exclusive games over the next few years, as value doesn't seem to do it for many.

My friends group is an example here - if very few people are willing to cross over then it's bad for gaming in general as Sony needs some proper competition...

@Widey85 Ah OK yeah that makes sense now. I feel that anyone who's hasn't come back to Xbox now isn't going to no matter what they try unless Sony does something to the degree MS did with the Xbox One launch.

For me I didn't have an original Xbox mainly cause all games my friends and I played were avaible on both PS2 and Xbox stuff like GTA we weren't big on Halo then so owning an Xbox didn't matter to us. The 360 Era was a bit different for me again it was because of games like GTA 4 and other multiplatform games that made me want a console that Gen and the 360 was the cheaper of the two.

As for the Xbox One, I will admit the launch did delay me getting one no way was I going to pay an extra $100 for a device I wasn't going to use, but I still planned to get one.

I guess what I name saying is if people don't want an Xbox nothing that MS does is going to make a person get one. Whatever they do, those people are just going to scoff at the idea even if it's the same thing Sony does.

@Tasuki also I think the OP would like to play the occasional online game with friends. And when there's no cross-play, this becomes difficult if someone doesn't want to cross the divide.

But it does kinda cut both ways so idk.

@Widey85 I do know if someone won't take a free console that kind of poor judgement would make me question my friendship with that person lol. Kinda only half joking there.

Also yeah if Bethesda starts hitting it out of the park (though doubtful) I'm sure you'd get some PS players to "defect" at that point.

@zupertramp That makes sense as well, but why do you expect others if your not willing to do the same?

@Tasuki Well if you're the broke friend then you have an excuse but otherwise I tend to agree with your sentiment.

@zupertramp Still that's not.an excuse maybe the people who own a PS4 are "broke" too. Maybe they only have room for one console as well etc. etc.

Point I am making is we shouldn't be making anyone cross the divide as long as they are playing something. This my system is better then yours argument is so old now just be glad that we are all gamers.

I mean if they don't want to come over to Xbox then why don't you go over to PS? Or just have both machines so you can group with everyone.

@Tasuki yeah that was just kind of a joke. I was imagining some scenario where someone is the known "broke friend" while everyone else has money to burn. In that situation, sure, it's permissible to pester your friends to get the system you have but again, it was a playful imagining.

Obviously it's nice when things line up and you both agree beforehand to buy whichever console but I know my son was in this situation early part of last gen where his friend had an Xbox and we had a PS, and yeah, it was mighty inconvenient for them both. So I'm just saying I see where OP is coming from in that regard. Luckily the amount of cross play games has grown considerably since and game pass + Xbox S made having a second system too hard to pass up this gen.

But for the record, I'm not stumping for any particular console. Play whatever you like. But it definitely does help to play the one your friends have.

@Beagle That's just it though they are hard-core which probably means more then likely othing will convince them to come over. But yeah it can be a pain in the butt when you have hardcore friends of the opposite console and you are a major online player.

@zupertramp I was in the same boat last Gen, I went with PS4 first because of the Kinect feature Xbox One had at launch, however most of my friends went Xbox. To be fair a couple of them got them as Christmas gifts so they had no say on what system the got. I think one their father got it because he's a big PC enthusiast so he went with Microsoft and the other one his brother got him an Xbox One because that's what they had in stock at the store he went to. So yeah at the beginning of the Gen I couldn't play games with them like Call of Duty and such but I can understand wanting to get friends to cross over. But still eventually I got an Xbox One so I could play with them. Funny enough one of them got a PS4 Pro eventually so it all worked out in the end.

@zupertramp !!! You've crossed the divide!! Or maybe I just never noticed you posting here before. Either way, welcome to the green side 😈

@ralphdibny I don't post here much (and it's usually only on articles) but I only crossed the divide some months back. March, I think. Kind of a reluctant Xbox owner not gonna lie but that's really just because I dislike a lot of the things Microsoft as a whole has done over the years, not so much anything against the Xbox itself.

@zupertramp ahh cool I didn't even know you actually had an Xbox! Yeah I agree, I soured on them after the 360 RROD fiasco and my console was one month out of warranty so I couldn't get it fixed without paying, so I didn't bother. Then of course the always online, DRM, restricted second hand sales thing at the Xbox one launch was laughable.

I only ended up getting an Xbox One because I wanted to try a few exclusives that I sort of knew I wouldn't find amazing but are kind of "must plays" anyway like Gears and Halo. However I ended up finding some genuinely amazing games like Forza Horizon and Ori and the Blind Forest which are probably 2 of my favourite games now!

@ralphdibny lol I always looked longingly at Forza, seeing as Gran Turismo games are a bit like Halley's comet, but not much else has tempted me. So in the absence of exclusives, the Game Pass strategy is probably a winning one. That and the Bethesda acquisition has to win more than a few people over.

Still there's always going to be your die-hards who are probably just going to become all the more recalcitrant the more you try to persuade them. Probably best to just let them be.

@zupertramp I've literally never heard the word recalcitrant 😅. But it describes me to a T. Will definitely be using that one in future!!

Have you tried Forza Horizon then? Does Ori interest you at all? If I was to assign arbitrary review scores, they would be my only 10s in terms of "exclusives". I know you can get them on PC and Switch too in the case of Ori but yeah.

I'd say Battletoads was a 8 or 9 for me and Tell Me Why and Alan Wake were sort of solid 7s. If future iterations of like Doom and Hellblade were/are to be Xbox exclusive then I'd give their initial multiplat iterations a 9 and 10 in terms of Doom and Doom Eternal and Hellblade a solid 7.

I'd give most of the Gears series a 5 or 6 with some lulls down into a 4 territory and I think most Halos are a 5 with some lulls down into 4 territory.

Obviously I think all of these games are pretty decent but that's kind of the tiers I'd have them in, in terms of my own preference toward them. I'd also say there are vast expanse between the scores. I think that FH4/3, Ori, Doom Eternal are miles better than Doom and Battletoads which are miles better than Tell Me Why, Hellblade and Alan Wake. And those top 3-4 tiers are infinitely better than Gears and Halo which were good but didn't blow me away.

I just thought I'd explain that a bit better because I don't want to people to think I'm judging Gears or Halo too harshly but in my opinion they are far away from being the best Xbox exclusives and not on par with the other games I mentioned.

To be fair though, I do 90% of my gaming on Xbox now, partially because of game pass but mainly because i have the One X whereas I only have the base PS4 so I normally buy multiplats on Xbox if I can. Unless I need a decent D-Pad for things like crash bandicoot and tony Hawks in which case I'll buy it on PlayStation

@ralphdibny yeah, I love English and do try to have fun with it. Like why use a simple word when you can use a big pretentious one? Lol my wife hates when I do that though, especially in arguments. Actually being on this site and Push Square has honestly been a delight because of the slight differences in language. Like "chuffed"... lol, great word. Anyway...

Nice to get a sense of your gaming preferences on Xbox. I haven't really delved into any exclusives (that I know of) as I've just been playing stuff on Game Pass that I would have otherwise played on the PlayStation. Honestly didn't know where to start on the Forzas. There are so many.

Actually never even heard of Ori or Tell Me Why so I'll look into those.