Reaction: Xbox Just Had Its Best E3 Showcase In Years, And Game Pass Was The Star

It was a really solid show I did mark it a b.. I think just due to the lil at the end with Forza (I get you are show casing that game for this.holiday)

Also is dusk falls dead it's not on any graph they show of upcoming releases

There's no denying game Pass in on fire. As we progress it's only going to get better and better. For instance in 2023 the heavy Hitters will be there like Fable, Perfect Dark, Everwild, Elders Scroll 6. This year we are already getting Halo Infinite, Flight Simulator, Twelve Minutes, Forza Horizon 5 and next year is packed with Starfield, RedFall. These are of course only exclusive games to the xbox. I haven't even mentioned additional indies, or the multi platform games.

Honestly, the E3 show was more of a Gampass show than the traditional console show. What was interesting was not the so-called exclusives (their quantity or quality), but the quantity of "day one" AAA gampass titles, regardless of their status in other consoles.

I didn't get the things I "wanted" (starfield gameplay) but man it gave just so much.

Let me put it this way.
I have a Series X and a PS5.

With Series X, I can pay the full price of £131.88 for 12 months of Game Pass Ultimate (Gold, EA Play, PC, Cloud).

With PS5, if I buy two exclusives at full price, that's £139.98. Add in PS+ for £49.99 for 12 months and if you want to include EA Play, another £19.99 for a grand total of £209.96.

We could argue the whole "I'd rather own my games" debate, but if you are after pure value for your money, you can't even compare the value Series X/S offers versus my PS5 right now.

Despite Stronger Exclusive Games On PS5, It’s Getting Hard To Recommend Sony’s Console Over Xbox
https://www.thegamer.com/xbox-game-pass-vs-ps5-exclusives/

Game Pass is amazing. I love playing all genres from one creator to AAA games. GP gives me the ability to play so many games I wouldn't have because of price barriers and not knowing what will stick or what's just 15 minutes of play time.

The one key takeaway from this year's show is that Microsoft isn't messing around and that it's a force to be reckoned with. Even if you're against their acquisitions and that Game Pass is a rental service, there's just no denying that they will have objectively more games to offer you than other platforms. Droughts is a thing of the past now, there will be a steady stream of first-party games releasing every year from here on out. More acquisitions are coming, meaning more exclusives on Game Pass are coming. At the end of the day, if you want a lot of games for a cheap price point, then Game Pass is the best service for that. What's the point of paying €80 for Horizon Forbidden West or God of War 2 that you'll only play for a couple of weeks when you can get eight months of Game Pass and numerous first-party as well as third-party titles for the exact same price. The numbers speak for themselves, this is not my opinion.

This showcase has solidified one thing for me and that is that Xbox will be my main platform this generation. There's just no reason for me to spend more money on games than I need to. And this will be the case for plenty of other people who value their money as well.

I bought each console this gen for their individual exclusives and based on that show last night it wasn't very good, excellent for gamepass though. But if it wasn't for gamepass their would be no reason for me to keep my series s at the moment

Also what is it with all the co op games lately

@Axlroselm they are by all accounts selling you gamepass and the console is just one way of playing it. Gamepass IS the product they are looking to ship.

@UltimateOtaku91 Xbox has always been big on multiplayer so it's nothing new. I personally like my single player games so I'm looking forward to Halo Infinite campaign.

@UltimateOtaku91
As someone who also owns both consoles, what exactly do you think PS5 has better for the rest of the year to make that statement?

@UltimateOtaku91 not every game has to be played in co-op. For most it’s an “option”. Kinda like the borderlands series has been for a while.

We don’t know specifics yet but I only know of one game that “requires” 2 players and that’s It Takes Two.

Co-op as an option is fantastic, can’t count the number of times I been playing a single player game and wish I could have a friend just hop on and enjoy this game with me.

Co-op in a way that forces the game to be always online, and it’s either always MP (and sometimes replaces players with dumb bots for single player, but still online, play) annoy the heck out of me.

This is why I can be very skeptic when a game is promoted as co-op out of the gate, always feels like we talking about an always online vermintide kinda game.

I felt like that was the first MS conference where I was genuinely excited for what's coming only to Xbox in the next few years.

In other words, MS did a great job this E3.

I like games. I like gamepass

@The_New_Butler And those are not even the biggest releases XGS has for this year.

Where's the poll option for "MS is conspiring to take away our games for a streaming only future, GamePass isn't sustainable, I don't see any excluuuuusives?"

A pretty good show, fantastic if you already are into Xbox, but with a a relatively thin list of tentpoles you can't get anywhere else (short of Halo/Horizon which is a punchline if you're not already into them), I don't think it's a presentation that will swing someone already in PS territory to come to Xbox too. It's really hard to deny the value of Game Pass, it's pretty incredible what you get for the money, though, the catch is that obviously subscription prices have to go up in t he future, and there's a fine line between how much they can charge and have it remain a great value versus moving that money into buying games directly. We saw what they tried to do to Gold, so the risk is always there that the great value can become a poor value at some point if someone at MS decides to go the PS route and get greedy. Fortunately, Amazon will probably offer price pressure with Luna streaming. They haven't thrown their full weight into marketing that yet, but when they do that'll offer stiff price pressure considering some part of it will certainly be "free" with Prime.

For now, though, it's a heck of a ride.

@UltimateOtaku91 It's funny how marketing really shapes perceptions. When we look at what exclusives we know from MS we have Starfield 2022, Halo 2021, Horizon 5 2021, Flight Sim 2021, RedFall 2022, Outer Worlds 2 TBD, Contraband TBD, Fable TBD, Avowed TBD, TES6 TBD, Motorsport 8 TBD (Shocked it wasn't at this show and H5 was.), Something Gears certainly TBD. A lot of TBD still but a big list. And that doesn't include things we don't know about and doesn't encompass all studios.

OTOH when we look at Sony's exclusives list we know about: Ratchet (we'll include it it just came out Friday), HZD2 2021 maybe or 2022, GoW2 2022, GT7 2022, Something Spiderman TBD, Unknown ND new IP TBD, Ghostwire Tokyo 2021 (timed? MS owns it, so I can't imagine it won't end up crossing over), FFXVI (timed? Square's cagey but considering their new Team Ninja FF spinoff is coming to XB they're still dedicated to keeping FF brand multiplat), Athia or whatever the new name is (timed? Buying total exclusivity from Squeenix can't be that valuable) TBD. Plus the smaller games like Stray, Kena, Oddworld, etc.

But when we compare the actual lists, Sony's list isn't really a standout list of big exclusives compared to MS. We definitely don't know what a lot of their studios are up to so there's surprises coming at some point, but they're in a tough spot because a lot of their studios just released at the end of PS4 with a few more still releasing PS4 games with PS5 modes, so hype aside, a lot of their big stuff will be launching at the end of this gen, too. It's going to be a weird, gen all the way around for everyone with most of the gen starting at the end. Sony's filling the gap for now with timed or bought exclusives from Square, though we don't know how much of that is timed, and with Xbox certain to close the install base gap somewhat, the price of moneyhatting is going to get more expensive as they have to offset lost potential sales. It was cheaper with no competition, no doubt. And if we get down to a war of just buying exclusivity of other company's games, MS pockets are still much deeper. I'm sure in the coming months Sony will tease new surprises that may also be years away, but then we're even, big future TBD games from MS, big future TBD games from Sony. If we look backward, we had Miles (stand alone DLC, but ok...), a PS3 remake, Deathloop (timed? MS owns it, so....), Returnal (Sony, stop trying to make Returnal happen. Returnal's not going to happen. Not at that price.) But there's not this big exclusives gap the hype of the PS4 rolling forward makes it feel like. If anything MS needs more smaller games bought up and brought into the system like Stray, to fill out the list a little more. But neither company still has a huge list of near-term exclusives. It just feels like Sony does due to inertia.

After rewatching it some of it again, it's a B+ for me. Gamepass is a Aplus but this just makes more appealing. To thinks next year the show will be even better with the staff returning to their studios to put that real work in. Xbox is future is quite bright and loaded.

@NEStalgia don't get me wrong I'm not saying xbox don't have any exclusives coming but the ones I'm interested in are years away, and in terms of that show last night they didn't really wow me in terms of exclusives, yeah horizon looked good but I'm not into racing games and halo they just showed multiplayer and starfield and red fall were just cgi trailers, so in terms of getting pumped for exclusives that show did nothing (for me). The majority of the games coming this year from last nights show were third party games and indies all of which are also coming to playstation. This is what I meant by my original comment.

I thought it was good but nothing blew me away. All of the big hitters were mostly just CGI trailers.

This did showcase the value of Gamepass though, there were some great looking indie and smaller games shown like The Ascent and Replaced and everything else coming to Gamepass day one.

I’d like to see something absolutely incredible from some of MS studios themselves, but this was a solid show and so far, heads above any other E3 showing.

Anyone know it that sea of thieves jack sparrow thing is a single player campaign?

Game Pass was already phenomenal value for money and it keeps getting better. Top quality games that mean those on tighter budgets can play the very best games without fear of being skint.
And it will only get better, Xbox is THE place to play games. Incredible.

I purchased a Series X on Friday using the All Access service and 48hrs later, no regrets!
Will use my PS5 for the first parties and my Series X as a Game Pass machine (and any 3rd parties that don't end up in it lol)

It's such a fantastic product, BUT I must admit I usually just get a little anxious when I see a game appear, because I've no clear idea when it's going to leave
That's why I usually don't start playing the game in case I don't get finishing it (despite e.g. discount)
Because I have a PlayStation 5 as well as the XSX, I'm only really going to be using PS5 for exclusives, the Xbox is definitely my place for anything that's released on both consoles.
But I have put off getting game pass for the minute until I've cleared a little of the backlog I have

This will be far the best Xbox generation ever, Even better than the 360.. Future is very bright for Xbox..

@UltimateOtaku91 can't you use gamepass on mobiles & PC's rendering the console essentially pointless

@Would_you_kindly the console is a part of the GamePass ecosystem... MS has moved beyond the console wars.

Not everyone has a gaming PC... so having options is fantastic. I look forward to the family plan... when my wife can stream to her Mac and I can play on the Series X and we can play together with only having one Xbox... maybe the kids will join in on their Macs... not to mention being able to play on my iPad whenever I want.

@Hexamex-Tex I just don't get why you'd need a next gen console to stream games through games pass it's not like the hardware really matters when it's being steamed

@BBB I got the Series S for the same reason. All my friends with a ps5 has played perhaps 5-6 games max on it while Ive been playing 30-40 games through game pass. Now Im at a place where Ill get a ps5 when a pro is released, maybe.

@Krzzystuff I really hope so!

Lets look at this from a Financial perspective.

For £21 a month, you can get a Series S and 2 years of GPU (which includes Gold and EA Play too) and ALL those games - as well as access to hundreds of games already on Game Pass - £504 over 2yrs - that's about the cost of 1 'Indie' game a month. A Series X is an extra £192 (£8 extra a month).

A Discless PS5 costs £350 and it seems their PS5 Exclusives are £70 each so to get R&C, H:FW and GoW is already £560 - add another £100 for PS+ for 2yrs and its 'nearly' the same Price as the All Access Series X bundle.

Just this year alone, if you are on PS5 and wanting to play Outriders, Hades, MLB21, Aragami 2, Psychonauts 2 and Back 4 Blood (as well as any other multi-platform releases) that's going to cost more than a year of Game Pass too.

I think its only going to get Easier for people to jump onboard the Game Pass ecosystem. If they can bring the Game Pass App to a Dongle or built into a Smart TV (like the Firestick or Netflix), then I think GP will explode. Its already growing fast and that would make it even cheaper for people to get onboard - every PS5 gamer has a 'Display' that they could plug a Dongle into and use their DS controller to play.

@Would_you_kindly Game Pass isn't just streaming - you can stream games to 'try' before deciding to download and play locally. Series S/X games would probably need to be downloaded to SSD to work properly too. PC, Console and Mobile are all part of the Game Pass Ecosystem. A Mobile doesn't have the hardware capabilities to play these games locally so do rely more on Streaming. PC, mobile and Xbox have different GP lists too - not ALL of the games will come to mobile, PC or Console Day and Date. Age of Empires 4 is PC only so that's not coming to Console on 28th October. Outriders was a Console only Game Pass game. Of course the majority will come to PC/Console day 1...

GPU gives you Gold, EA Play and 'Mobile' streaming on any GP enabled Platform. Game Pass just gives you either PC OR Console access - no Gold, no EA Play.

You 'need' Hardware at the moment to play certain games and to get the 'best' experiences. Playing Locally on a Console or PC gives the best image quality, Audio quality and lowest input lag too. I know MS will improve the servers so could run and stream the Series S/X 'games' to Mobiles.

All my Game Pass games are installed on my Series X and I have played everyone locally.

@UltimateOtaku91 FWIW, if you've never played Horizon (and now that you have GP you can with no risk) it's worth trying if you're not a racing fan. I'm not a racing fan either, but Horizon is a blast just as a video game, not even as a racing game. Calling it a "racing game" is probably like calling Gravity Rush a "platformer." It is....kind of....but it's also not. It's kind of its own thing themed like a racing game without necessarily being one, fully. The actual race events can make up a surprisingly small amount of play time with things like barn finds (cramming a car through forests searching for a building with a hidden collectible car that should be easy to find and somehow never is), stunt ramps, random other crazy activities where you happen to use a vehicle to do video game things that are normally not done in a vehicle. There's a few other games that escape me at the moment where it masquerades as being one genre while actually being a totally different genre. The original (Mike Tyson's) Punch Out!!! for NES is such a game. It presents itself as a sports game about boxing. But it's actually not, it's more or less a puzzle game dressed in a sports game skin.

Maybe a better way to describe it is "imagine a Halo game with no guns played entirely in the Warthog."

Ok, bad metaphors all the way around. Point is, despite not being a racing fan, especially since there's no risk with GP, I'd definitely recommend giving the Horizon games a solid try. There's a lot more "video game" and a lot less "racing game" to it than it looks, and it's easily quite engaging. It's not remotely similar beyond some aspects being shared to the Motorsport/Gran Turismo type of serious racing game. It's pure arcade gameplay, lots of just crazy stuff with a handful of racing challenges too. But for people who are really into racing, you can get a lot of arcade racer out of it too, of course. In a way it could be better compared to Steep/Riders Republic, except...you know....good...and more varied

@UltimateOtaku91 Starfield was a cutscene, but they claimed it was in engine footage (alpha engine at that.)

Choosing to believe they lied is a different story.

@Would_you_kindly Well in my case it would be because I live out in the country and my internet could not possibly sustain a 4k gaming stream.

@NEStalgia so are you saying I could play the whole game without ever having to race? I will definitely give the creative mode a go though and try everyone's creations, I like that arcady side to car games but when it comes to actual races Im absolutely awful.

I tried Onrush and enjoyed that to an extent and I've got mario kart 8 which I got crushed in online races Continuously so now I only play the battle mode online lol

@UltimateOtaku91 You'll have to do SOME race events, at least to introduce all the activity types or to unlock new tiers, but once it opens up the types, you pick and choose the activity types you engage in in the open world. The more you do of a type, the more you unlock of that type, and the ones you don't do don't expand further. To raise the events there's sort of "boss battles." It varies by game, but the last one had, for example, a "race" against a train. Before that, a "choreographed stunt race" with jet fighters. It's more of a "scripted battle that involves a time challenge" more than "place in the top 3 of this race." Those are just examples, each game tries different things, so we don't know what 5 will have, obviously. 4 had a series of stunt events where you were the stunt driver for a movie tasked with increasingly crazy stunt challenges. Obviously, everything has to involve cars, but from "smash through the billboards" to the stunts, etc, there's probably more that doesn't involve a "starting grid" than does in the game. Definitely worth trying. I went into it at first thinking "meh. Racing" but came away loving the franchise. You won't engage with it the way you'd dig into a Gears or Uncharted game, but it's arcade fun in the purest sense and lots of variety to mess around with. If you saw the piniata thing, that's "normal" for Horizon.

@UltimateOtaku91 @NEStalgia If a car game could be an open world action adventure game, you get Forza Horizon. Really no other way to say it.

The series is a solid franchise and has been a pillar for MS during the dark times. I know it’s another Forza Game, but Horizon isn’t just a racing games. Didn’t the piñata game kinda tempt you? I mean and you can create a racing bowling track.

I've not owned an xbox since the early last gen, but gamepass is just too good to ignore now. I'll be picking up a series X as soon as I can get a hold of one.

@mousieone not going to lie yes it did lol

@UltimateOtaku91 @mousieone LOL, yeah, that's the best description of a game that can't really be described I've ever heard

On the cover, and due to the "Forza" name, it looks like another racing game. But it's really not cleanly any genre. It's a big fun sandbox open world game with structured activities and scores, "missions" whatnot. The only thing it has in common with the more serious original "Forza (Motorsport)" games is that it involves real cars licensed from real companies, and has a lot of (optional) customization of said cars if you want to tune the kits. It's otherwise a big giant open world game with tons of activities except instead of being a space marine or a retired god, you're a car. Technically you're officially the driver of the car. But let's be honest: We all play as the car.

Edit: Also the craziest stuff isn't on Game Pass, but it's good to know it exists. FH3 had the Hot Wheels expansion pack. It's literally a 3d simulated world all within the orange track Hot Wheels loop sets. Yes, complete with the upside-down loops, booster launchers, etc. And FH4 has the Lego pack which is you guessed it, all kinds of car stuff inside a Lego set. Like Lego City roads, only not terribly handling. But yeah, if you like arcade games, crazy activities, or open world action, it's absolutely worth giving it a download. And giving it some real time to open up, rather than playing the opening that's a race or two and saying "see, it IS racing!" Sure, it's racing at first, but when the intros are done and the map opens up is when you can just do all kinds of different stuff.

It's about as serious about "racing" as Death Stranding is about...well...any genre-archetype in gameplay

@Would_you_kindly not everyone plays on PC. So consoles are far from being pointless.

@The_New_Butler Haha, yeah, that was a fun mission

It might be best described as "an open world action game based on abusing physics."

Or "Mirror's Edge with wheels"?

@mousieone only just seen your message on xbox lol 😅

@UltimateOtaku91 ahhh no worries.

Obviously the best presentation so far, but it didn't do much for me. No substantive reveals I actually care about (not into racing games, and Halo looks as... Halo-y as ever) on the Microsoft exclusives front.

GamePass is a great value, but as someone with a backlog a mile long, I'm not sure I'll ever have the time to properly take advantage of it.

Yakuza 7 on GamePass is pretty cool, though. After the long dry season the Xbox One went through with Japanese stuff, it's nice that games like Yakuza, Octopath, Dragon Quest, etc. are finally hitting Xbox consoles. Ideally, Microsoft could work with Japanese developers for some exciting exclusive stuff like they had on the 360.

Nothing really screams "buy an Xbox!" thus far, although if Microsoft ever releases a Series S with a disc drive, I might just jump in, since I have a ton of 360 games I'd love to revisit.

It was a great show for Game Pass owners. But for AAA-Exclusives it was the same old story. Halo and Forza out this year, anything new is nowhere to be seen.

@blinx01 @LtSarge while gamepass as a whole is probly sure worth its money it just does not have the games that I want to play. It could even be 1 dollar but it still wont get me a pc or an xbox. Not to bash Microsoft or anything I just have a limited time to game and I rather play exclusives games on my switch or ps5 because I love series like Mario, Ratchet & Clank and more.

If Nintendo and/or Sony had something like gamepass i’d probly already had a sub on them.

But more power to those who enjoy it!

I really enjoyed the presentation and partly due to that and some other factors I'm looking to get the Series X, overall over the next few years they have more exclusives I want to play then PlayStation do. As for Gamepass I'll likely keep the subscription as my stepson uses it too and it'll be good to play some games in between the big releases that I'll still be buying

I am not convinced Gamepass is financially sustainable. There are currently 23million subscribers which equates to around £230million a month. Now a game like The Last of Us 2 and Red Dead Redemption cost in excess of £300million to produce and market. You have to question how much of the Gamepass money goes to developers? I feel it will eventually affect the quality of the games if this model became standard. You can bet that the cost is going to increase by a huge amount if the XSX becomes a succesfull machine.

Why no story on the fact that Microsoft/Bethesda won best presentation and Forza Horizon 5 won most anticipated overall game at the E3 Awards?