Questionable_Duck

The thing that people keep forgetting when it comes to the next Xbox is that it is going to natively play Xbox games, unlike the Steam Machine or any other gaming PC out there.

It seems that the next Xbox isn't only going to be a run-of-the-mill gaming rig that runs Windows, it's also going to be an actual console, given that it will be able to play titles that a regular PC can't.

It will cost a lot more than the Steam Machine, but that will be the next Xbox's biggest differentiator.

@outswimmingtheflood The next Xbox is only going to be for Xbox users who have already invested heavily into the ecosystem, like you and me. It's not going attract many new people into the Xbox platform, and I don't think Microsoft cares. They're likely positioning this as an enthusiast device, not something for casual gamers.

Either way, I think "the device that plays more games than any other platform in existence" may be a good-enough selling point for some people.

@IOI Depending on the region you live in, Xbox can, by far, be the cheapest storefront to buy games from, even compared to Steam. If you live in a place like Argentina, most games that you can get for $10-30 on Steam, you can get for literal pennies on Xbox. Some developers also keep making pricing errors when selling their games on the Xbox Store, which they never do on Steam or PlayStation. This means that you can occasionally get brand-new $60-70 titles for like $5 on Xbox.

Personally speaking, I have no interest in buying a Valve device that can't play my current library of games, since I have so many titles on Xbox. Since games are way cheaper on Xbox compared to Steam, I'd rather spend the extra $500 on the next Xbox than buy a Steam Machine. Which is less powerful than a Series X, by the way.

@outswimmingtheflood The Steam Machine doesn't play Xbox games. The next Xbox will, however. Microsoft already confirmed that the next Xbox will be fully backwards compatible with the Series X, meaning it will natively play games from every generation of Xbox consoles.

This also means it will run titles that are not available on PC, like Unicorn Overlord, Lost Odyssey, EA College Football, or GTA 6.

That's the biggest advantage that the next Xbox will have over the Steam Machine.

@IOI Not really, it can't play my Xbox games, unlike the next Xbox supposedly will

Since it will apparently be able to play games that aren't available on PC, in addition to PC games, the next Xbox will support more games than any Valve device ever will

Looking forward to playing this at some point, but man, that $70 price tag is too much for me personally. I've never played an Inazuma Eleven game before, so I'm not willing to pay that much for a game I'm not sure I'll like.

I'll have to get it on sale on Xbox.

@Balaam_ Sadly, no. A shame, because I want Tokyo Extreme Racer on Xbox.

@ILuvGames No, no it wasn't.

@TheGameThrifter What are you even talking about? The trailers are the exact same on both the PlayStation and Xbox channels, I just checked myself.

In these three trailers on the Xbox channel, you can very clearly see women from the game:

https://youtu.be/FJkQLo_-RCk?si=6Ur8xqupI243g7qA

https://youtu.be/zYXpUYjGltI?si=gP-rm9AwhfdVdEYM

https://youtu.be/GA70JV2dCMM?si=v25I4zOMj0RoOV93

And, yes, it seems you have fallen for grifter bait. Microsoft never had a "mandate" for unattractive women in games, they simply suggested that devs don't put sexualized women in their games. You can disagree with that, of course, but it was never a mandate or a requirement of any kind.

You would have to be crazy to think Microsoft is actively forbidding developers from putting attractive women in their games, when there are so many recent games on Xbox that objectively debunk this claim. Like the ones I mentioned.

@TheGameThrifter Have you ever played Ninja Gaiden 4 (a Microsoft-published game) and seen Seori/Ayane, or looked at the Xbox store where there are countless games with attractive girls in them? Or do you think Stellar Blade is the first game ever made with curvy anime women in it?

I mean, just take a look at the Beautiful Sakura games, for example. It's a series of AI-generated shovelware games that release on Xbox regularly, and have anime girls in swimsuits front-and-center.

Or how about the newly-released Kamikaze Lassplanes? It's a visual novel game with anime girls that arguably shows more skin than Stellar Blade ever did.

The whole "Xbox doesn't allow games with attractive girls on their platform" thing is just overblown nonsense that grifters on YouTube spread online.

@wildcat_kickz I know this is an old post, but I do want to bring up one other thing. Apparently, Microsoft was planning to go multiplatform from the beginning. In 2010, during the height of the Xbox 360 generation, Microsoft made an internal document outlining its plans to bring Xbox to as many screens as possible thru cloud gaming.

I don't think they were necessarily planning to put games on PlayStation at the time (though Peter Moore did say Microsoft was considering bringing Halo to PS3 back then), but ever since Don Mattrick took over, the fate of Xbox was sealed. Microsoft was never going to follow PlayStation's business model; they were always going to try weird stuff and make it so that you don't need an Xbox to play Xbox games. In fact, it seems that they were planning for the Xbox 720 to be the last Xbox console, since they thought that gamers would never need to upgrade their hardware ever again.

Ironically, though, they were expecting to sell 100+ million units of the Xbox 720 (aka the Xbox One), and they planned to charge $299 for it. That would have made it $100 cheaper than the PS4. Maybe in a world where that happened, most Xbox 360 gamers would have stuck with Xbox, despite the commotion around the Xbox One's launch. But we'll never know for sure.

Source: https://www.businessinsider.com/microsoft-xbox-720-presentation-2012-6#-8

Thanks for covering my suggestion!

The Stellar Blade IP isn't owned by PlayStation, but I wonder, if this game does come to Xbox/Switch 2, will it still be published by PlayStation? Or will Shift Up publish it themselves?

@dskatter Forza Horizon 5 would definitely sell well on Switch 2, simply because of how mainstream it is. But as for the other games, like Halo: CE Remake and Gears Reloaded, maybe not.

Like you said, Microsoft would still make money, so they'll still do it, but they aren't going to sell insanely well imo. Could be wrong of course.

@You-come-to-me Definitely, the game should have cost like $25 at best

@dskatter Considering how poorly it sold on PS5, I don't think Gears of War would do that well on Switch 2.

First-person shooters and third-person shooters in general do not sell that well on Nintendo consoles. If you look at the lists of best-selling games on Nintendo consoles, you'll notice that very few of them are FPS titles, aside from exclusives like Goldeneye.

The Nintendo audience has specific interests, and most of Microsoft's games don't fit those interests. So I don't think their games will sell as well on Switch 2 as most people think they will. They'll still be profitable, of course, they just won't do insane numbers.

@FraserG Awesome, thanks!

Hopefully this means we'll get more PlayStation games on Xbox.

@Kezelpaso On a related note, have you guys seen the recent news about Shift Up considering ports of Stellar Blade for other platforms? Would be great if Pure Xbox could cover it.

https://tech4gamers.com/stellar-blade-expansion-other-platforms/

@Balaam_ Starfield has its flaws, but it isn't even close to being irredeemable broken garbage imo, I had very few bugs when playing it at launch and I enjoyed my time with it. If you think the game is that bad, then maybe you need to play more legitimately bad games, like Mindseye, to get an idea of what irredeemable broken garbage looks like.

@Nintendo4Sonic What level of difficulty are you playing it on? Hard mode? Because if you're struggling you can switch to Normal mode at any time during the game.

@Gabrie There's no way Rockstar was gonna give away a copy of GTA 6 for free by selling it in a $299 Series S bundle

@GameOverScreen Microsoft isn't signing a contract with Konami to bring Silent Hill 2 to Xbox, Konami is doing this completely on their own. If Konami doesn't want to release it in Halloween, likely because the port wasn't finished by then, then they won't release it. Nothing Microsoft can do about it, because it's not their game.

@GameOverScreen You think Xbox is the one who decides when to release Silent Hill 2 on Xbox, and not Konami, the actual publisher of the game?

Voidtrain actually isn't available on PlayStation yet, it has launched first on Xbox and PC. The PS5 port will come at a later date.

@Gabrie Rockstar doesn't want to do that because they would rather people double dip and buy the game twice on different platforms. They'd actually make less money in the long term by doing a simultaneous PC release.

@Elbow This was the most popular Ouya exclusive lol

Lost Planet, Catherine, Deadly Premonition, etc. aren't delisted, but they're only available in a few regions around the world on the Xbox store. These games aren't available for purchase in Portugal or Brazil, to my knowledge.

@Fiendish-Beaver I wish they brought the Sanctum games to Xbox. I think the sequel was on Xbox 360, but it wasn't made back compat. Who knows for what reason, they're still selling the game on Steam.

@Romans12 Correct me if I'm wrong, but are you saying that games Microsoft launches on Game Pass are mediocre titles that no one will remember? Because if so, I suggest giving Keeper and Ninja Gaiden 4 a shot, they're very good IMO.

@Titntin You can blame Sony for that, Konami must have been desperate to get some funding to revive their AAA gaming business, and Sony understandably took advantage of the opportunity they had

@FrenchVaniIIuxe For someone who says they love gaming, you tend to be pretty negative about everything.

Decent enough for the type of showcase it was, I'd give it a C+ or B-. Really wish we got Dave the Diver announced for Xbox here, though, even though it's technically not an indie game.

Really glad to see Routine finally get a release date.

@Fiendish-Beaver Yes, that's why removing paid online from the next Xbox really wouldn't be as detrimental to Microsoft's bottom line as people think it'll be. Heck, by the time the next Xbox is released in 2027, I assure you there will still be millions of people playing Fortnite and CoD or whatever on Xbox One.

@themightyant Game Pass and many of the things associated with Xbox are already complicated in their current state, so I don't think Microsoft has any worries about complicating things even further. Besides, free multiplayer would be an incentive for Series X/S owners to upgrade to the next Xbox

I really hope they announce Silent Hill 2 remake for Xbox here

@themightyant There will still be a lot of Game Pass Essential subscribers on Xbox Series X/S. Just because a new Xbox is coming out doesn't mean most current Xbox console owners will make the jump to next-gen, or that Microsoft is gonna get rid of paying for online on the current Xbox. In fact, I would imagine the majority won't.

@Fiendish-Beaver They will most likely get rid of PC Game Pass by the time the next Xbox comes out.

@Neither_scene The effect that social media has had on attention spans is devastating, and it's a big reason as to why singleplayer video games aren't as popular as they should be. There's a lot of gamers out there, but only a tiny portion of the human population actually plays singleplayer video games regularly. I legit think that there would be way more people who would enjoy video games, but they can't, either because they have short attention spans or they can't afford doing so. Gaming is for sure the most expensive form of traditional entertainment, at least when excluding free-to-play titles and mobile games. Which is like 75% of the industry lol.

@BossBE To be fair, that "we are in a unique position to be able to go spend Sony out of business" quote was kinda taken out of context. The email itself was from 2019, and in it, Matt Booty was basically arguing that it would be a bad idea for Microsoft to reverse course on their day-and-date Game Pass promise. He tossed around the "spend Sony out of business" argument as something that was a "different view to the general view below. Basically, he was saying "we could do this if we wanted to," but it wasn't something that was Microsoft's actual plan.

In that same email, Matt Booty went on to say that Sony was the only one who could compete with Game Pass. He also hilariously said that Google was 3-4 years away from building a game studio of their own lol. He really thought that Google was gonna be a massive threat to their gaming division. Same with Amazon.

@shiningpikablu252 Actually, since it's a live service game, it wouldn't be that surprising if Gran Turismo came to Xbox, Switch 2, and PC in the future

@Balaam_ To be fair, SEGA is killing it nowadays, and you could argue their current output rivals that of a first-party publisher. I know I myself am much more interested in SEGA's game lineup at the moment than most of the stuff Nintendo has recently released.

@MrStark Hmm... I'd say Indiana Jones and Ninja Gaiden 4 are GOTY contenders, but you do have a point that they've generally struggled to release GOTY-worthy games in the last decade.

@FuzzieGinge88 That's complete nonsense, these franchises would continue to exist with or without PlayStation, just like they have for two decades. Besides, they are also available on PC, something that people conveniently ignore when considering the sales potential of Xbox exclusives.

@Vaako007 Well, Sony already hired a multiplatform manager in order to bring games to Xbox and Nintendo consoles, so it's clear that they are doing this. I'm sure the PlayStation division has some infinite growth goals to reach as well, which is why they are doing this.

The question is, as I said before, will they bring the flagship singleplayer titles to Xbox? Because, as of right now, we don't know.

@DesertRanger @RBRTMNZ I would much rather buy and download God of War from the Microsoft Store rather than have to go through hoops to play it on Steam.

Either way, that wasn't really the point I was trying to make with my first comment. Playing tentpole PlayStation games through Steam on the next Xbox is cool and all, but that isn't hell freezing over. In order for hell to freeze over, you need PlayStation games like God of War, The Last of Us, Ghost of Yotei, etc. on the Xbox store, and preferably with native Xbox ports. That would be the real shock, not playing Steam games.

Basically they have to all be like Helldivers 2's Xbox port in order to count as a "hell freezing over" moment.

It's clear that Sony does have plans to bring more games to Xbox (including the Xbox Series X/S), but the question is, will they bring their tentpole titles over, such as the singleplayer ones? Only time will tell.

@BacklogBrad It's because they're making a Fortnite-like Halo multiplayer game. If Halo: Campaign Evolved had multiplayer as well, it would discourage people from checking out the other game.

@RBRTMNZ Yeah, no.... Not until we see Xbox store listings for God of War, The Last of Us, Uncharted, etc. It doesn't even need to be an Xbox Series X/S port, it just needs to be on the Xbox Store, not thru Steam. You can't really say that it's on Xbox if it isn't available on any Microsoft-owned storefronts.

@dskatter Hell will freeze over when God of War, The Last of Us, Horizon Zero Dawn, Spider-Man, or Uncharted, etc. come to Xbox

This game was originally supposed to be an Xbox exclusive, so it's not surprising that the PS5 version is half-baked. Probably would have been better if they pulled an Indiana Jones or a Forza Horizon 6 and released the PS5 port at a later date.

Phil can think that, but that doesn't really matter. The media should ask what Amy Hood and Satya think on AI in game development. I'm sure, if it was up to them, they'd lay off all of the game developers and make games entirely with AI if they could to get 100% profit margins or something.

@Titntin Pacific Drive is on Game Pass Premium as well, at least, not just Ultimate. So you can technically save $15 if you can finish the game in a month.