Xbox Boss Congratulates Sony's Insomniac Games On Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart

Hopefully Phil Spencer see's the demand and quality for this game, and sits there looking at Banjo, thinking of what could be...

We needs games like this. This game is truly a next gen exprience

public relations.

Dude is pure class. Everything i hear about him is that he's a genuinely a good person. He doesn't have to congratulate the studio of a competitor on launching a great game...but he does.

<3 Phil. I want this caliber of came on my Xbox. Love Gamepass, but my Xbox isn't getting as much use besides Netflix/Disney+.

Well somebody is a secret PlayStation lover 💙💚😆

Insomniac has always been awesome and in my opinion is Playstation’s MVP. I don’t need to jump on a new Ratchet game by any means, but you call tell it’s a solid, single-player, next-gen focused experience. And that is great.

Xbox could do with one of those! Good that Phil is reacting to this. He must know Xbox needs something similar.

Very excited for E3 but definitely trying to keep expectations in check.

Getting it day one. Would love to see MS do something with the Banjo franchise like @blinx01 mentioned. More of these types of games the better, don't care which console I have to buy to play them on.

As the PS fanboy I truly am, and only a 1 year or less member of the Xbox family I gotta say I love Phil Spencer...he

@Bdbrady You should broaden your horizons... Learn to love all games. There are so many games you could be playing but for some reason are choosing not to and that is sad.

@OliverOwen I'm down to play some games, but nothing is speaking to me. Maybe I'll try Outriders? I'll gladly take suggestions. Loved me some Ori, Wasteland 3, and Bloodstained, but nothing else is speaking to me.

@The_New_Butler I think many in games media and consumers in their 30s remember that jump from 2d to 3d, then the jump from PS1 to PS2/Xbox and the big jump in fidelity. All the previous generational leaps minus PS3-4 felt huge. We are still chasing that.

I assume this generation we will appreciate quick loads, better AI, and 60 fps. All great things but less easy to quantify on a preview.

Phil, needs to start congratulating his own teams on amazing next generation in house exclusive AAA games.
Opps, there aren’t any.

Phil being classy. I like it!
Still no love coming back though (admittedly due to the fact there AREN'T any CURRENT gen experiences published for Series consoles 😕 )

Appreciate how classy Phil is. I think he has a great approach to gaming and is a true gamer himself. While Banjo has a broader audience, I would sure love to finally get a new sequel to Conker. How bout do both? Yeah both is good.

@Dezzy70 Hey, its the other Dezzy, that no one likes, who's just here to troll...

As someone who’s favourite platformer (and game) is Banjo-Tooie, I am fully ready for another Banjo.

@Trmn8r
I’m only having a laugh 😂
I’m looking forward to June 13th E3
And hoping Microsoft Xbox blow me away
And being honest and let’s be honest give me something new AAA to play and my series x.

@Dezzy70 been reading this site for a while and people like this just come here to troll. I made an account to make the mods aware of how petty this type of behaviour is. Why is he not banned already, it looks bad on this site which otherwise has good content and a solid community. Why is dezzy allowed to troll?

@OngyBox1410
What is trolling please?
As I only stated a fact.

@Dezzy70 Yes it is a fact but you seek a reaction which is what you are getting. I understand you may like one platform over the other but there’s no need to let out your inner fanboy and leave bait. You know what you are doing, and hats off to you for being so dedicated to your cause

Wow, check out that dude. Nice move, Philly.

Don't get me wrong I give Phil Spencer credit and respect for him praising the opposing platform but it also frustrates me at the same time. Instead of Microsoft acknowledging and observing these great games that Sony make, why does the thought never occur to them about making games themselves on the same level as Sony?

You would think that they would see these games and think, "hmm, why don't we do this, why don't we makes games to the calibur of this and need games like this, they never seem to have this thought process for some reason? It's made worse with the fact they obviously know about these games, it's not like there in the dark and are unaware of these games.

I respect Phil and it’s really cool that he can praise something that’s good regardless of the platform. I actually agree with a couple of others here though, it’s about time MS get their A game on and start releasing first party games of a similar quality. Ratchet is so obviously a next gen game, you look at it and think wow, I can’t think of anything on Xbox to rival that and that’s a shame.

@Fenbops Yeah and even the only real exclusive on Series X, The Medium is coming to PS5 too. So Xbox has no exclusive at the moment.

@OngyBox1410 trolling or not he does kinda have a point at least right now. That may change in the coming years or maybe MS will announce a couple of surprises at E3 for this year, but they’re lagging behind already in true next gen games. It’s a shame, they have the hardware for it, the series X is a beast, but they need games to show its true potential.

@Snake_V5 let’s just hope that the reason Phil can be so casual about congratulating a good Playstation release is because he knows what is coming soon for Xbox

is cautiously optimistic

Edit: just wanted to add though; that I don’t think Xbox will release any First Party next-gen ONLY games for a good couple of years yet, besides Flight Sim. Maybe they should mix it up like Sony is (so some cross-gen and some not).

See you say I troll, but it has sparked some good conversations from others and some agreement of the fact I made.
I’m a series x owner from day one just like every other Xbox console before.
I have noticed a change even on here that now owners are getting a bit uptight that we have no AAA exclusives from Microsoft studios from launch to 7 months in.
It is dam disappointing and the only real way I get to vent this at Microsoft is on here.
So the comments are not aimed at my fellow gamers. You people are great conversation and great at debating and it’s enjoyable.
It’s just my vent at Microsoft that’s all.

@Royalblues
Thank you that is all I’m wanting on and for Xbox, they have all these developers and a lot before the Bethesda buyout and we have nothing to show for it with our beast of a 12tflop console.
The console is more than capable and an amazing bit of kit, but yes Microsoft need to get their studios to produce and nothing for 7 months is not great at this stage.
Let’s hope for some amazing surprises at E3 for release this year and into next year.

@Royalblues " they not only feel like movies, but they look like movies"

Not all of us consider that a plus. Its the reason some of us buy Xboxes too... I'm a huge R&C fan, and this game is the reason I stayed up preordering PS5 until 4:00AM, but I don't care that it "looks like a movie", I want it because I expected the same great gameplay the series has delivered since it looked "like a movie but a lot less so" on PS2. I'll check the walking simulators at the door no matter how much they look like a movie. Especially if they play like a movie. I want an Xbox for big first party games that don't feel like movies.

@sqxrz Not secretly, he's always very publicly owned and played PlayStation (and Nintendo) for personal use. (And Shu Yoshida owns Nintendos and Xboxes for personal use.) Satoru Iwata owned PlayStations, but I'm not sure if that was personal or "research" use. I doubt Jim Ryan even owns a PlayStation let alone an Xbox though.

...Although I don't believe even Phil has been able to secure a PS5 yet....

@Oval_Griffin Usually, yes, but in this case remember Phil & Ted had an excellent adventure making Sunset Overdrive for X1, so they have a personal working relationship, even if new ownership means it can't continue.

Take some damn notice Phil and deliver some AAA exclusives to Xbox...

@yungGanon
For me this difference between Nintendo, Sony and Microsoft is this, especially with Halo:

Nintendo meeting, go make a 3d Mario game, single player only with a little co-op and just for the switch. Mario Ods.

Sony meeting, go make a new ratchet and clank game, single player, just for PS5 to show it of a bit as well. R&C rift apart.

Microsoft, go build a new engine for Halo, make a halo campaign, make halo multiplayer, make halo with forge etc. Make it work on, Xbox one, series s and x, also PC.
Yes sir and while I’m at I will stick a broom up my bottom and sweep the floor.

Oh Phil, you're such a fanboy.

In all seriousness, we could all learn a thing or two from Phil's positive attitude. A real class act.

@Royalblues Haha, yeah. Though, I think there's demand and expectations from "consumers in the console space" for that content, I think those "consumers" are pretty fixated on PS already, and I"m not sure MS offering the option of being "another PlayStation" is really beneficial in the market. The PS fans will always just compare and declare Sony's games "better" and with Sony itself having pedigree in the film industry, their movie games probably are better than what other companies can do in that genre. Nintendo doesn't make movie games but holds its own (and arguably surpasses PS in sales) by having their own niche (even if, increasingly, their niche fits me even less than Sony's movie games.) MS definitely has the unique position to cement their identity around what has traditionally been gaming. Their franches are much more suited to it, from Bethesda's, to Halo, Gears, & Forza, to the big Obsidian fare, etc. It won't gain that critical hype the movies do, but that doesn't make it a less profitable market.

There's an argument to be made that Matrick trying to go into that "movie game" space is a big part of the negative reception of X1. Sony has a cult surrounding that type of format, but I'm not sure that would work for another company to just copy that.

MS is definitely playing catchup on games releases, but I don't really expect to be "wowed" by any of it. I just expect great games. Similarly R&C doesn't wow, the SSD gimick is cool, but it's the classic game to use the hardware's gimmick. It just looks like a great game, wow factor or no.

The thing is the lack of games is definitely effecting sales in the UK.
Series s sitting on shelves like crisps at a super market, it only 7 months old.
Series x when stock drops can take over a day to sell out and 3 of my local game stores have them on the shelves as well for a few days now.

Now it’s game pass that matters, well if some one buys a series console doesn’t that mean you have potential to sell a game pass subscription, as well as third part games and controllers and dlc etc etc.

Little fact, latest sale analysis, the PS5 is outselling the series s/x by a bigger ratio at seven months since release than the PS4 was against the Xbox one.
Also the the series s/x released in 30% more countries than the Xbox one did, to make matters worse.

If was in charge of the Xbox team and management I would not be happy.

@NEStalgia Thank you.

I was not aware.

@Dezzy70 Hardware consoles sales are only a portion of MS's platform sales, though, while for Sony, it's essentially all of it.

PS5 is also benefiting from FOMO/scarcity right now with people that might not have upgraded doing int when then can just in case they cant when they want. Here in the US, you have a zero % chance of finding an XSX or a PS5 for the most part. Neither is available. It's not too surprising PS5 would outsell XSX in the UK, or Europe in general, in terms of hardware sales, given the cemented "default" status it has an the large number of casual players that just want their sports/CoD fix that know the PS brand. We have to see sub/attach rates, though, as the sales model isn't identical. I.E. You might sell hardware to the average FIFA fan 3:1 PS vs Xbox, but how many of those players are going to buy another game vs the kind of player buying an XSX? If you sell 500PS5s to casual players and sell 2 games, that's worth less than selling 100XSX's to core fans and selling 4 games plus a subscription. Considering the hardware is sold at a loss, the latter is actually SUBSTANTIALLY more profitable up front.

It's not really possible to just look at hardware unit sales and say "this platform won." We'd need a ton of other data to know that. And we're not going to get that data, so we can only speculate.

Very classy and mature. This is how leaders should act.

This is definitely the kind of game that Xbox is lacking. We should have the latest Banjo and Kazooie game for families.

@NEStalgia
I’m not looking for winners or losers at this stage.
Just going on what sort of analysis is round at the moment and what I see in the UK sitting on the shelves, Remembering the UK is normally the best EU territory and the best outside of the USA. I would not be happy if I was in charge at the big M, you don’t have to be smart to see it is going to turn at on the current trend only, exactly like the last generation.
If the big M boss is cool with that then that’s good for the big M boss.
I just would not be, when you consider the money they have had and the time to prepare for a new generation.
Even some hard Xbox fans on here are getting a bit upset with seven months in and nothing.
We need to remember this is a trillion dollar company compared to Sony and Nintendo who released games on release and thought out the first year.
When you think hard it is a joke that a company that rich with all that PR and management have nothing 7 months in.
To me it is either poor management and leadership or they just don’t care, Xbox is a little toy shop to Microsoft overall.

@Bdbrady I have no idea what kind of games you're into but on GPU Ive enjoyed Fallen Jedi, Control, Gears 4, Gears 5, Dragon Quest Xi, The Medium, Call of the Sea, Halo Guardians, Destiny 2, A Plague Tale, Outriders, Yakuza 6, Gears Tactics and Forza Horizon 4.
Other games Im considering are Nier Automata (will be my3rd playthrough) and Code Vein.

All great games imo.

It's about time Xbox gives Sony more chances to reciprocate all those compliments on the quality of their exclusives.

Where I’m right now is I’m waiting to see E3 June the 13th 6pm BST.
If they have knocked the ball out the park with Halo Infinite, both gameplay and looks wise on the series x and we can see some power there, like HZDFW or Ratchet and Clank. Also they have maybe a Forza Horizon 5 again looking amazing, with both releasing this year 2021 and also show two good releases of AAA quality for next year I’m sticking with my series x.
If not I only purchased assassins creed Valhalla on the series x, so I will buy it for my PS5 about £30 now and sell the series x for £450 what I paid for it. And put it towards a new tropical aquarium.

@Dezzy70 But my point is, what trend are you looking for exactly? The total install base size alone? The companies are seeking profit goals, not unit sales. Sony happens to seek to meet its profit goals via a high number of unit sales. Both companies can arrive at the same profit goal via different market penetration strategies. One may seek to cover the broadest possible market for entry via the broadest install base, while one may seek a certain market demographic, namely, players who play many games as opposed to the "average" among the total player population which plays very few games. Thus, the market (of selling the most games/subscriptions) can be reached via a lower total install base coverage by essentially sacrificing all those CoD/FIFA players that aren't contributing heavily into the ecosystem after obtaining the hardware in favor of cherry picking the big spenders that provide more pure profit through repeated software sales and subscription term renewals. Game Pass alone indicates Microsofts strategy is to appeal to a player base interested in playing many games first and foremost.

I'm not saying your view of the market split is necessarily wrong, just that that doesn't actually tell us MS isn't meeting their profit goals, or even exceeding Sonys with their strategy. It's a number without relevant data. Software and subs are where the money is. The hardware loses money for each sale they make. They need to make that back via software sales. We know the "average" gamer buys about 2 games a year via the overall attach rates across systems. And we know the "average" gamer buys a PlayStation as it's the most popular brand and inherently the most popular "casual" device. So we know the average player isn't necessarily particularly a profitable customer, and the not-so profitable customers are more likely to be consuming PS5 stock than XSX stock. It's not just how many units sell that matter, it's who's buying them and how much do they spend into the ecosystem, how often that matters. Yes, MS wants to increase the number of units they sell, and by all accounts they're doing that. But the proportion of units sold compared to PS's sales doesn't translate to direct success if MS is ahead in a demographic that's more profitable per-capita.

We don't know that they are, or that they aren't, and we probably never will. But the point is an example that what it may look like from the outside may not represent the numbers that actually matter to either company. Similarly to how PS3 "outsold" X360 by the end, but at the point it "outsold it" it was still largely a loss generator because little if any profit was left to be squeezed from the market that was actually buying the budget model hardware, and PS was still poised to close down if PS4 didn't take off quickly despite "winning" in raw unit sales with PS3 (Yoshida's own statement.) If X1 had knocked it out of the park, there probably wouldn't be a PlayStation today despite them "winning" the PS360 generation in unit sales. They hemorrhaged cash with the demographic they "won." My point is reality on the inside isn't always what it may look like from the raw data we get on the outside. If MS is happy and spending money hand over fist to reinforce their gaming business....they definitely know something we don't about how successful it is by the only metric that matters: money.

Yes, some people among that core are irritated they don't have big exclusives yet. Lots of us Nintendo fans are irritated at Nintendo's lack of exclusives the past 18 months, too. But will we still be there when they do? Yes. And they know that. It's not like we don't know what they have scheduled and they're playing the radio silence game Sony and Nintendo like to play. We know some of the big games coming, and we know if we're interested in them or not. Impatience and lack of confidence are different problems.

Also, comparing against HZDFW is a pretty low benchmark. It's a PS4 game, conceived as a PS4 game, designed with PS4 as the lead system. It has some pretty gfx enhancements for PS5, but it's a PS4 game to its very core, no exceptions. I'm sure it'll be a fantastic game. A fantastic PS4 game. With some gfx enhancements on new hardware. Exactly like people like complaining about all the enhanced X1 games on XSX see. Nothing against HZDFW, but it's silly for people to complain that Xbox has no games to show off Series and nobody wants X1 games with enhancements, while Sony wins the internet by showcasing.....PS4 games with enhancements.... Halo Infinite....is an X1 game with XSX enhancements.

There's also hypocrisy there. Flight Sim shows off the "next gen" better than even R&C. It's a PC simulator that quite literally would be impossible to run on the old hardware. The CPU simply can't handle the computational load, at all. It's not a game I'm terribly interested in, but people want a tech demo, people get a tech demo, people ignore the tech demo, then people point to Sony's PS4 games and declare them PS5 tech demos. Huh?

We know what many of the big name Xbox games will be in the coming years. We don't have dates, but we know what they are, and we know the studios working on them. We want to see more. We'd love to get dates. But we already know if we want a Series to play those games or not when they arrive. "Lack of games" isn't the long term potential issue it's the unknown that is the quality of said games (EG will Starfield be a buggy mess that we now and expect from Bethesda, etc.)

Yes please Phil, you know, you have Banjo and Kazooie, the best characters ever.

@NEStalgia
Halo is a cross generation game as well so it is a good example to compare with HZDFW.
So my point is Halo should look that good with enhancements for the series x like HZDFW does for the PS5. With the environment buzzing with life, full weather effects and environment interaction, along with the density of foliage and movement and reactions, water that looks the part and the amount enemies on screen that size with that animation and character modelling and lighting effects.
Last time we saw Halo is was a million miles away from that.
They are both cross generation games both been in development for a while. Halo probably 2 more years now over HZDFW 4 years. Both exclusives and made by AAA in house studios.
A perfect comparison.
Let’s see at E3 we will be lucky if Halo looks as good as Far Cry new Dawn. As it didn’t last year.
6 years in development, poor management of a studio or just a poorly organised studio.

@Dezzy70 Perhaps it should. But if the whole point of the PS5 and XSX is to play X1/PS4 games that "render cheek hair and every strand of moss individually" - why did we even bother? Back in the day on PC the running meme was "how does the water look?" It was the measuring stick for the visuals on any game for any video card...how realistic the water brush looked. We could now play Quake 2 with the most realistic looking water ever imagined. But it would still be Quake 2.

But yes, to your point on Halo, I'm not expecting it to visually compare to HFW, because I don't have a ton of confidence in 343 in general. They have a proven track record of messing up in unimaginable ways. So, yeah, as a cross-gen game, it will visually probably fare worse than HFW. I do wish they'd reached out to Bungie for guidance. Not that they don't have some Bungie staffers there still. OTOH, it looked like a true open world game. Horizon 2, if it's not radically different from Horizon 2, still seemed to be remarkably restrictive, bigger than "wide linear" GoW, but not really open world either. Fenyx was a more open environment than Horizon. Halo looks to be as well. HFW, they've talked about the free climbing, but we'll have to see if they really mean free climbing or not.

@NEStalgia
Time will tell and we shall see some action on the 13th.
On the subject the Big N best have something special on the 15th for us, I’m rapidly losing it with them as well 😂.

@NEStalgia I couldn't agree more. PS4 has taught me that I don't like Sony's films, eh, games. Ratchet & Clank remake is fun but I'm not buying a console for a sequel with the extra shine and instant loading times. The PS4 game also looks great and loads fast. Even Knack 2 is fun but most PS4 exclusives aren't fun, in my opinion.

What I love about Xbox is that games are games, like Nintendo's. They are more "gamey", as we always say, than Sony's. To think my favourite PS4 exclusive is a remaster (Wipeout Omega Collection) and that The Last of Us was such a letdown. I also bought and beat the Kingdom Hearts collections but they're on Xbox now. Street Fighter V is great but I haven't played it as much as others, probably because of the console's noise and loading times. SFV has looong loading times on PS4.

Xbox has over 20 studios now so don't really get why people are so worried when E3 is days away and we're getting big games this year.

@NEStalgia

"It's not too surprising PS5 would outsell XSX in the UK, or Europe in general, in terms of hardware sales, given the cemented "default" status it has an the large number of casual players that just want their sports/CoD fix that know the PS brand. We have to see sub/attach rates, though, as the sales model isn't identical. I.E. You might sell hardware to the average FIFA fan 3:1 PS vs Xbox, but how many of those players are going to buy another game vs the kind of player buying an XSX? If you sell 500PS5s to casual players and sell 2 games, that's worth less than selling 100XSX's to core fans and selling 4 games plus a subscription. Considering the hardware is sold at a loss, the latter is actually SUBSTANTIALLY more profitable up front"

It's exactly like that in here. PS is the default console but most people get it for FIFA and/or Call of Duty and/or GTA while Xbox players are usually more engaged.

Also, you hit the nail on the head. Series X is getting the most next-gen game this month and Horizon 2 is literally a PS4 game, just like God of War. They'll get the next-gen visual effects just like Series X-enhanced games and, like most Sony games, they're relatively linear and therefore can't be compared with an open-world game. But people still won't give any credit to Flight Simulator or Halo Infinite because they're not Sony games.

Some of you should try to be more concise. Write a comment, not an essay. 🥱

Same here, while I had owned all PS consoles, I have to say non of their first party exclusives is appealing to me, save for GT2 on PS1 and Kill Zone 3 on PS3. The only attraction of Sony console for me was their third party Japanese games, a thing which Xbox is seriously lacking.

Don't get me wrong: I'm fine with this game being out and doing well, but I honestly don't understand why it is considered to be so much "next gen". Loading worlds in an instant is always brought up, but that's not what's actually happening, is it?

Firstly there is a cleverly disguised loading screen every time this happens (the psychodelic tunnel) and secondly, from what I have seen, it's not loading whole worlds, but limited condensed areas. The presentation is great, but at the same time it's actually nothing new - just an illusion.