TheLastHarbinger

@DarkCvrle Xbox is a billionaire money-maker. It won't die because 4 IPs are selling millions on the competition.

Sounds like shovelware crap tbh.

@Balaam_ Plenty of games release finished, and you can still buy & own them. Game Pass did not influence unfinished games nor became mandatory, what a weird Facebook-y comment.

>At first glance though, PS5 Pro Game Boost definitely sounds an awful lot like FPS Boost on Xbox Series X and S.

Somehow Microsoft's FPS Boost program - which has zero access to a game's source code - could work only on a few dozen games due to performance/licensing issues, but this ps5 thing works on 8500 games?!

Either Microsoft shat the bed or Sony is outright lying, with the "up to 8500 games" carrying a heavy load.

@IOI When Spencer said that about Indy and Starfield he was clearly talking about the 4 games that were ported back in February...

1) When I open the Store, I often want to go first to my Wishlist. But if I open the left side tab right after the Store opens, the tab auto-closes. Happens 100% of the time.

2) There is currently no filter in search to look at BC games alone.

3) There is no filter to find FPS Boost/X Enhanced games either, or at least I can't find one.

Bethesda made the massive mod Enderal: The Shards of Order an official Steam app freely accessible to anyone with a Steam Skyrim copy, complete with its own Achievements.

If they cooperated like that on PC before, hope they do the same now for Xbox.

@themightyant >I did say Xbox would have wanted more considering Bethesda's status and pedigree.

Dude it's the most played Bethesda game ever and the only singleplayer game and new franchise to crack into 2023's Top 10 Most Played Games.

It is a roaring success for Bethesda on every level.

@themightyant Nah 14 million is excellent for a non-live service game that got zero expansions/major additions to draw in more people and, as mentioned above, is a brand new one-game franchise merely 9 months-old.

@FraserG Could you please confirm whether these Hyperkin articles are paid advertisements or not?

I ask because the website only covers Hyperkin and ignores the superb launches 8BitDo and GameSir put out for Xbox every other month. If you got that Hyperkin exclusivity bag I won't fault you for that but some transparency would be nice.

You know, for journalism's sake.

@Kooky_Geezer These loading screens last less than 5 seconds in both games, hardly a dealbreaker.

@StonyKL Bethesda gotta have a QA department given how Starfield became one of 2023's most polished AAA releases.

Want more info on Shadows of Doubt!

@Gollum There is no "drip-feeding" when they released literally one game in 7 months. More like intentional starvation.

@trev666 Bethesda effectively made it. Fallout only became a global juggernaut thanks to Fallout 3 and Fallout 4.

Without Bethesda, Fallout would have been another Wasteland.

Is this an ad? 8BitDo out there releasing Xbox controllers with hall effect sticks immune to drift for 45 bucks and you guys have been silent in it for months now.

So far, nothing. Been years since X360 games like Deus Ex HR or Catherine or Plants vs Zombies or Dragon Age Awakening went on sale... shame, would have thrown money at Microsoft otherwise.

>we've had a few updates since then, with Microsoft adding a few titles to the service every six months or so.

"Every six months"? That's just bad math.

Anyway, really strong catalog that is lightyears better than Games with Gold's last 3 years combined. Plenty of awesome online games there.

@GuyinPA75 Struggles with what? Series S is for quick/cheap access into console gaming.

Nobody buys a Series S for 4K/60. Getting the option between Quality and Performance is proof of how versatile it is. It can still offer a lot and the fact it outsold the Series X is proof of its success.

Personally, I would have picked a digital Series X but I cannot fault Microsoft's plan, it is perfectly valid.

Manor Lords was supposed to arrive on Xbox "very soon" after the April release on PC...

Screw Warhorse. Their petty contempt for console players is disgusting.

PC got tons of official extra fixes, new official language packs (like Portuguese), a lockpicking minigame that actually works as designed... consoles got a big middle finger. Oh, did I mention we are still locked to 30 FPS when enabling 60 as an option would take them 5 minutes?

>Firstly, Fallout 76 is being given away free with Amazon Prime Gaming right now

Which on Xbox at least isn't much since playing FO76 is paywalled by Game Pass Core, which includes FO76 anyway.

The Zelda game deserved at least 5 other awards but for *****'s sake, Best Technical Achievement? Game ran like crap.

"Ah but at they made it run on Switch". Brother freaking Hogwarts Legacy runs on Switch, that's hardly noteworthy.

If they are adding older games to more platforms then please, make GUN backward compatible ASAP.

This is what like: reciprocal deals. Launching Call of Duty on Sony's box or Pentiment on Nintendo's gives me nothing as an Xbox user.

@BBB Hope the next-gen update shadowdrops tonight or tomorrow at most.

And of course that it includes actually good content for free, unlike the cash grab that was Skyrim's Anniversary Edition (only good freebie was literally just the Fishing DLC and even then, it's not that great).

This week, Sarah Bond made a team dedicated to preserving our digital libraries on Xbox and ensuring game preservation, so what we buy now can be enjoyed in future consoles.

This is their first big test. Will they just stand and watch the X360 store die? Probably so.

@Grumblevolcano Looks like the point is precisely to stop this sort of shutdown happening again in the first place.

@ShadowofTwilight You are joking, right? Microsoft owns Call of Duty, Sony's cloud servers run on Microsoft Azure, Sony/Nintendo games could release on the MS Store...

Microsoft simply hasn't used any of that as trump cards.

@Grumblevolcano Only digital games get truly preserved. Physical games, especially the uncrackeable post-XB1/pS4 ones, are subject to wither, break apart or rust off.

I am all for Xbox sharing every last exclusive with Sony and Nintendo. More games for more people = win.

BUT for hell's sake Microsoft give your loyal Xbox customers something worth in equal measure. Use your bloody leverage to get their exclusives to Xbox, or make Xbox games as cheap and frequently-discounted as Steam.

Just give us something, because at this point many rightfully feel like Microsoft's efforts are mainly to please the Sony/Nintendo userbase while we are in a drought.

33 items on Wishlist, 12 on sale. Damn.

@nickevans2210 Starfield, Hellblade, and... that's it? Hardly enough games to moan about.

@TheGameThrifter

>Spent billions on Nokia

Microsoft also spent billions on Azure. By your logic (or lack thereof) Azure is about to bust as well? Lmao.

Also, Nokia /=/ Windows Phone.

>then laid off workers

Every Microsoft division got workers laid off. As a matter of fact, every major tech company laid plenty of workers off post-pandemic but at least on Xbox's case we understand why: lots of redundancy in roles after ABK got acquired, like marketing or PR wings.

>started putting all the exclusive Windows Phone games and apps on iOS and Android

Four old niche games aren't "all exclusives", stop with this petty dooming & glooming already, please?

@TheGameThrifter Xbox is Microsoft's 3rd biggest division by revenue, losing only to Azure and Office. Windows Phone was 11th - or last. It is pure intellectual dishonesty to imply the cases are even remotely similar.

Microsoft Support helped me several times. Whenever my country's Support was slow or useless or unavailable, I seamlessly try the Irish or Australian versions and eventually my problem gets solved.

These bots are just an excuse to fire more people and make the system drastically worse. Bots never solve anything.

Would anyone actually believe Microsoft could sell its 3rd most profitable division, behind only Azure/Office and ahead of Windows?

Expecting a PureXbox article on how Xbox runs Pentiment's 120 FPS more consistently than pS5.

Dies of waiting

Infinite is great. Firefight in particular is the best multiplayer experience I have had since Mass Effect 3's multiplayer.

Game looks great and the naval combat is top-notch. It's just really grindy with very little content.

It should have been F2P.

Clearly directed at Series S users wanting to upgrade.

@Feffster Nah mate, they hit the nail on the head: "Xbox consoles will continue, keep buying digital games" (paraphrasing). That's a clear-cut promise and doesn't get more direct than that.

But yeah, at the same time they send confusing messages such as this Polygon interview. Up to you to decide on what to believe: Xbox's express February promise or the doomsday scenario we can interpret out of this weird-ass Spencer corpospeak.

@Feffster

>All I want to know is that my hard earned £s are not being wasted by spending them on the Xbox store - i.e. Xbox is going to exist going forward and I'm not suddenly going to find the rug has been pulled (from beneath my digital library).

Xbox addressed this in the February podcast. They explicitly said people can "feel confident" in building a "digital library" because they commit to "game preservation" and a "multi-year hardware roadmap".

Up to you to believe in it or not, but they already tackled the matter head-on.

@ShadowofTwilight Nintendo hasn't made premium consoles since the GameCube 20+ years ago. It's in a different league.

Sony has 80% of the entire market share in Europe, Xbox has 20%. Is it really surprising Xbox's sales are growing so slow? Monopolies tend to snowball.

It's up to Microsoft to take steps to market its brand in Europe. Sony shows the pS log on every UEFA Champions League game, capturing millions of teens and young adults. Xbox had ads on London bus stops about how Call of Duty would be more accessible. Can't even compare.

Loved Starfield and pretty much everything they made since Morrowind... kinda sad the next game will take years to arrive.

@TheSimulator lol no Xbox is already huge in the US. They should focus on sports that Europe, Asia and Latin America care about, like football.

@rustyduck DD1 is sometimes stupidly difficult depending on which vocation you chose.

Here's the sorted list based on the number of times each company won (updated for 2024):

1. Microsoft: 3 wins (2012, 2018, 2022)
2. Sega: 2 wins (2016, 2021)
3. Electronic Arts: 2 wins (2013, 2017)
4. Take-Two Interactive: 2 wins (2011, 2014)
5. Capcom: 2 wins (2019, 2024)
6. Nintendo: 1 win (2015)
7. 505 Games: 1 win (2020)
8. Sony: 1 win (2023)