Gabrie

I don't think this is a result of any deal, I think the consoles are simply in their final stages, I don't think there will be a new Xbox after the next Xbox, nor do I think there will be a PS7. These companies know this and are going to try to position their IPs as best they can for whatever comes next.

I guess it could make sense, if the platform is going to be under the Windows umbrella, it already has its own team.

But honestly, whether it makes sense or not, it gives the feeling that every day they have a different plan and make a sudden move in one direction or another.

I think with all the noise we are going to see these days “rumors” are going to come out looking for easy clickbait, so I wouldn't believe this at the moment.

However I don't think it's crazy either, I think Phil was really good for Xbox, but since the purchase of Activision it seems that he no longer has the ability to make decisions.

@NishimuraX I think that one way or another consoles should have no more than 10-15 years of existence left. In a couple of decades I would find it odd that we will still be using a device next to the TV for gaming.

I don't think Microsoft sees this as a gift to Sony, but as something they have to comply with in order to transition to whatever comes next without losing the audience.

I don't think Sony sees it as a gift either, they must also know that outside of their console they have it complicated and must extend outside in the coming years to continue to exist in the long term.

I don't think Phil Spencer really runs Xbox anymore, I think one of the things that triggered the Activision acquisition is that Xbox stopped being a small business and became one of the main columns of Microsoft.

Now Nadella, the execs and the shareholder board are getting their paws into Xbox, and Phil is just another employee who has to please his board bosses.

There are none that particularly stand out to me, but objectively, I think it's been a decent month.

@ZeD I too have invested in Xbox since Xbox 360, and I do see reason to be worried.

The first thing is to define what is today the Xbox platform, because it is no longer a game console, it is an ecosystem, a "digital site" that wants to allow you to bring your games to any device, in the end the little that is already defining Xbox is a profile, an achievement system, and a store.

So far so good for me, but there is a question to be asked.

Is the Xbox ecosystem competitive with the rest (Steam, Playstation...)? My answer is NO, many games do not come to Xbox, or they do it later, this is serious at the moment that there are no other incentives to be in it (aka exclusives).

How can Microsoft fix this situation? For that you have to look at how we got here.

Microsoft's strategy has completely destroyed the sales of its core user base: the game console. Xbox Series is a disaster, and I think expectations with the next one are sadly low.

Has it grown on PC? It must have grown, but I don't have numbers, and I'd venture to say Xbox is anecdotal relative to Steam.

On mobile? As of today the Xbox ecosystem does not exist on mobile beyond a few casual games that integrate Xbox profile and achievements.

The cloud? I don't think it's working very well either...

We're already at this point, where Xbox is everywhere but doesn't end up performing particularly well anywhere.

And now comes the painful question: Will we continue to see games from other publishers on Xbox (meaning Xbox not the console, but the ecosystem)? Well, it's hard to think about it if there is no bulk of users willing to play them on Xbox, and without exclusives and without all the catalog that does reach Steam and Playstation, Xbox is not competitive: less users means less developers, less developers means less games, less games means less users...

Will Xbox be able to get out of this loop? I don't know, but Microsoft acts like it doesn't care, and that worries me a lot.

@ZeD It's little more difficult than that, the industry has evolved to a scenario in which gamers invest in a platform, almost our entire life as a gamer is anchored to a profile, an account in which we drag hours played, achievements earned and digital library.

This investment makes you have to rely on the platform in the long term, it is not as simple as living the present. And in this the current Xbox is failing dramatically, which is especially painful for those of us who are already stuck here and started investing in Xbox years ago.

The brand is at an enviable point, in 20 years I'm sure it will still be there, and Playstation may not even exist anymore.

However it is undeniable that the platform is going through its worst moment, not only the hardware, but also the Xbox store, which right now represents what Xbox is after diluting so much what "an Xbox" means.

The opening to Steam, far from being a good thing as some believe, I think it will put extreme pressure on the platform, I'm not sure that developers will continue to support the Xbox ecosystem when Steam is present.

News about the ecosystem and clarify details about the future of the platform, which is more tense, confusing and complicated than ever.

It makes sense, after RE4 and RE6 Leon has become an action hero, it's hard to imagine him in any other role anymore.

I think it's a great game, with a difficulty too hard for someone like me, which prevented me from fully enjoying it.

I live in Spain, southern Europe, and here Xbox is as if it did not exist, the investment is null, there are no Xbox consoles for sale in any store, no marketing, no physical games, nothing, it's a shame how they are managing the Xbox brand here.

Right now Xbox has a serious problem, many games do not arrive to the Xbox/Windows store or they do it very late, I think this can make this situation even worse.

"Microsoft uses their own emulation to provide backwards compatibility"

I think that's not strictly true, Microsoft doesn't have its own emulator for Xbox 360, these games are recompiled and run natively on Xbox One and Xbox Series (that's why they work so well) taking advantage of the compatibility between the old Xbox 360 libraries and the latest versions of DirectX customized on the new consoles. The only thing emulated is the X360 OS.

I think there are still too many unknowns for me to get my hopes up for Xbox, for me the ecosystem, the profile and the achievement system is something quite important and I still don't know how all the pieces are going to fit together.

On the other hand I think they are doing what is necessary to face the evolution of the industry, I think that in 15-20 years there are much more probabilities that Xbox will still be there, than Playstation.

Actually one thing does not contradict the other, Xbox may be pushing these changes because they have no choice, but they are very harmful changes for Sony's business model, which has been characterized by being very traditional and static: closed platform and commission per published game.

As long as they can avoid it to Xbox they are not going to bring any project, the cost of games will be increasingly difficult to assimilate, they will bring their games to more and more places but not to the Xbox/Windows store, if Microsoft's bundle of bets works and they end up consolidating as the new direction of the industry (Gamepass, cloud, multi-store OS...) they are potentially screwed.

@DennisReynolds Microsoft has bought Activison Blizzard and Bethesda, it has a scary amount of business. Xbox publishes 10-12 games a year, Playstation publishes 2 with luck.

The industry is in a time of disruption, technologies like the cloud could change the way we play games in a few years. Sony doesn't have the infrastructure for this change, Xbox does.

Gamepass, or the path of making the industry a Netflix-like model, is something Xbox has pushed for and continues to do. And it has become clear that Sony doesn't want to, or can, go that way.

Xbox is pushing to open up platforms to multiple stores, this while various laws and lawsuits are unfolding in multiple countries against ecosystems closed to single digital stores. Sony has not prepared for such a change.

Another major change to come could be consoles and devices with a common OS, maybe in a few years Windows and Steam OS will be the Android and IOS of video games. Sony is not ready for this.

I think in general Sony is afraid of change, and Xbox is unleashed changing and experimenting with everything that is put in front of them.

I think Sony is too afraid of Xbox to release anything on this platform.

From the last I've read the data is false, they are estimates made based on the number of reviews on the Xbox Store, which is absolutely irrelevant to even estimate sales.

It is not known if it will have sold well or badly, but surely it will have nothing to do with that number. We must be careful with the fantasies of many users on twitter.

No surprise, this game should have been released on Xbox a long time ago, Square has treated Xbox users like second rate users, they are not going to go out and buy it like crazy at this point.

And Microsoft doesn't help either, the platform is in the worst moment of its history, they practically don't even sell consoles anymore, I don't think there are many users left with enough confidence to keep increasing their Xbox library until they start detailing what the future holds for the platform.

I guess they were running out of money and couldn't wait any longer to launch it.

I remember in the past enjoying Cyberpunk immensely, before any patches came out, while everyone was laughing at it I enjoyed it flawlessly on the Xbox One X, a platform on which it performed well, it even became one of my favorite games.

I don't think it's the same case, this game does seem to have serious problems, on all platforms, but if I see it discounted I might give it a chance.

Honestly, I think Microsoft abandoned Xbox Series two years ago, the state of health and sales of the platform since then is disastrous. It seems that games are still being released more out of inertia than a real support to the system.

It's just a PC, so you can play PC games.

I don't know how we, the users, have allowed the industry to end up being this crappy

I would buy it if I had confidence that there was going to be industry-wide support to bring their games to the Windows/Xbox Store with Xbox functionality, but as of today there is still a lot of work to be done.

-Many games are never released on the store, games like God of War or Spiderman are not on the Xbox Store, and now that there are no exclusives on Xbox it is unacceptable (I don't care if they are on the Steam store, those are Steam games, NOT Xbox games).

-Many games arrive without even Xbox achievements, games from EA or Ubisoft for example, this inconsistency is also unacceptable.

-As of today there is no guarantee that the current Xbox library (Xbox Series, Xbox One, Xbox 360 and Xbox OG) will be playable on this device, and that should already be an immovable basis for selling any Xbox device.

In my opinion, and until this changes, this device is currently an expensive and pointless luxury, especially if you dress it up and sell it under the Xbox name.

It was a remarkable event, at least compared to the weak events we have seen this summer.

However I think there is still a lot of doubt about the roadmap of the Xbox platform, the future feels “weird”.

It's a ROG Ally with a skin, they can say what they want, this is NOT an Xbox.

It's a PC, and on PC, unless they change things, most gamers use Steam, and Steam games don't have Xbox achievements, they don't use the Xbox profile... they are NOT Xbox games.

B.

A great parade of games, the best event so far this year.

But I still have many doubts about the future of the platform.

C.

F if not counting RE9.

My expectations are low, but I hope to see big news about the new consoles, the achievement system, the store... things that will make us trust in the future of Xbox again.

This game used real vehicle models? if so then it is difficult to see it, I think there are usually a lot of problems with licensing in these games

Honestly, no.

I think Xbox is at the worst point in its history, it's very hard to trust new Xbox devices after the disaster of the last few years.

They should communicate better what the plan is with Xbox, if the platform really has any future, and if not come to some agreement with Steam or Playstation to export our profiles and not lose our game hours and unlocked achievements.