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M! Games Teaser: "Xbox 360 on fire: The four biggest exclusive franchises return"

Really?

You font think there'd be at least a small handful of people excited for the possibility of:

Perfect Dark?
Killer instinct?
Crimson Skies?
MechAssault?
Project Gotham?
Viva Piñata?
Amped?

Mind you Microsoft is sitting on a whole heap of other IPs they haven't touched in years. Rallisport, Blinx, Azurik, Brute Force, Conker, fusion frenzy, phantom dust plus a few others.

Will any of these be resurrected? Probably not. But that doesn't mean the possible return of some of these wouldn't get some people excited. You're covering a decent amount of genres there and I think all of them could make good games if handled appropriately. IF being a key word here.
I should have put an "I" in there my bad. I thought about Perfect Dark, but I don't know how likely that is.
 

Aostia

El Capitan Todd
I was selling my 360, I hope they can announce within few days (GDC? or the Xday?) so I can take a final decision...
 

Satchel

Banned
I should have put an "I" in there my bad. I thought about Perfect Dark, but I don't know how likely that is.

The likelyhood is another discussion entirely.

At this point of the 360s life, I doubt they'd be resurrecting too many old IPs. That's more a new launch kind of thing.

But the way people think, you'd think Microsoft only had 4 or 5 IPs. When they actually have tonnes.

They're just mostly dormant.
 

eso76

Member
Forza has to be one of those.
there have been rumors lately about big and very big news regarding the game/series.
It's either a Forza 4.5 with a few meaningful additions (rally, weather..) or some kind of spin off like Forza World.
 

Kjellson

Member
WhackedXbox.jpg


WHACKED SEQUEL
 
It's not gonna be Gears. 3 was only last year.

Bored of Forza now. Pretty bored of Fable, too.

New PGR, Perfect Dark, Kameo... now those would be franchises I'd be happy to see them revisit.
 

Combichristoffersen

Combovers don't work when there is no hair
RPGs like Blue Dragon or Tales of Vesperia sold 200k and the console itself has already tripled what Xbox sold. It's not like they weren't making inroads, even if it was tough going.

I don't know, I don't think selling only three 360s in Japan is all that impressive.

Jokes aside, the 360 is a niche console in Japan, and the general audience doesn't care about it or want it, so why should they waste time and money on courting an audience that doesn't really care? Japan is a lost cause for them.
 
I don't know, I don't think selling only three 360s in Japan is all that impressive.

Jokes aside, the 360 is a niche console in Japan, and the general audience doesn't care about it or want it, so why should they waste time and money on courting an audience that doesn't really care? Japan is a lost cause for them.
Japan is still a significantly important region for development, even if it's market is only 3rd to the USA and Europe. 360's still going to get multiplatorm games from the big guys and some choice niche digital stuff, but support's already fallen off to some degree in favor of PS3. Wii U will probably only make that worse, and MS may find themselves in a tough spot next gen with JP devs after allowing 360 to drop off so badly in the tail end.
 
hasn't Epic expressed interest in taking it multi-platform though?

Microsoft doesn't own the IP so if Epic wants the next Gears game on PS3 there's nothing to stop them
I expect MS to hold on to Gears this gen, but next gen Epic will take it multi. I think Gears 1-3 will be locked up tight though still, don't expect a Trilogy release on Wii U or PS4. Or even Steam.
 

Combichristoffersen

Combovers don't work when there is no hair
Japan is still a significantly important region for development, even if it's market is only 3rd to the USA and Europe. 360's still going to get multiplatorm games from the big guys and some choice niche digital stuff, but support's already fallen off to some degree in favor of PS3. Wii U will probably only make that worse, and MS may find themselves in a tough spot next gen with JP devs after allowing 360 to drop off so badly in the tail end.

Japan is definitely important for game development, but Microsoft can afford to ignore the domestic Japanese console market since it doesn't really care for the Xbox brand anyway, while Japanese developers can't really afford to ignore the Western Xbox market due to its size.

As for Gears, I'm sure MS would rather pay through the nose than ever let it go multiplat. The Gears IP has defined the 360 as much as Halo this gen, so it's an important franchise for MS.
 

Stumpokapow

listen to the mad man
360 Exclusives, sorted by US NPD sales descending, by sales of top instalment--data is not 100% complete but it's fairly complete so I'm pretty confident in the order:

1. Halo (Halo 4 already announced)
2. Gears
3. Left 4 Dead (not exclusive, PC/360, but magazines frequently refer to stuff like that as exclusive)
4. Kinect Sports
5. Fable (The Journey already announced)
6. Dance Central
7. Crackdown
8. Splinter Cell (* not exclusive as a franchise, but Conviction was PC/360, see Left 4 Dead)
9. Forza
10. Perfect Dark

Worldwide shipments and including pack-ins and not including PC/360, I'm reasonably certain it's Halo > Gears > Fable > Forza.
 

Roland

Member
I completely forgot about Fable Kinect and it was probably better that way. I do hope it's Dance Central 3. Maybe a few more modes, full voice control, dancer customization... and being able to pick my background dancers.
 
Japan is definitely important for game development, but Microsoft can afford to ignore the domestic Japanese console market since it doesn't really care for the Xbox brand anyway, while Japanese developers can't really afford to ignore the Western Xbox market due to its size.
This is fine for now, yes, but it may bite them in the ass during the next transition. If PS3/WiiU/PS4 provide enough market coverage overseas, I can see even the larger Japanese pubs scaling down their Xbox commitments.
 

DamSea

Member
This is find for now, yes, but it may bite them in the ass during the next transition. If PS3/WiiU/PS4 provide enough market coverage overseas, I can see even the larger Japanese pubs scaling down their Xbox commitments.

And why would they do this if Microsoft's market share is even remotely close to what it is currently?
 
360 Exclusives, sorted by US NPD sales descending, by sales of top instalment--data is not 100% complete but it's fairly complete so I'm pretty confident in the order:

1. Halo (Halo 4 already announced)
2. Gears
3. Left 4 Dead (not exclusive, PC/360, but magazines frequently refer to stuff like that as exclusive)
4. Kinect Sports
5. Fable (The Journey already announced)
6. Dance Central
7. Crackdown
8. Splinter Cell (* not exclusive as a franchise, but Conviction was PC/360, see Left 4 Dead)
9. Forza
10. Perfect Dark

Worldwide shipments and including pack-ins and not including PC/360, I'm reasonably certain it's Halo > Gears > Fable > Forza.
Perfect Dark top 10? Nice! The XBLA port sold pretty well. A bit over 400,000 units last I read.
 

Brashnir

Member
The use of the word "return" definitely makes me think that it must be something that hasn't had an installment in a while. It could simply be a misunderstanding based on translation, but it would definitely seem odd to call a Forza, Gears, Fable or Halo announcement a "return."

Of their big franchises, Here's the list sorted by most recent installment. I'll limit this to games that have had at least one installment on 360, avoiding titles that have had sequels release on other platforms, like Dead Rising and Full Auto.

Dance Central - Oct 2011
Kinect Sports - Oct 2011
Forza - Oct 2011
Gears - Sep 2011
Fable - Oct 2010
Halo - Sep 2010 (counting Reach and not the HD remake of Halo 1)
Crackdown - July 2010
Banjo-Kazooie - Nov 2008
Viva Pinata - Sep 2008
Lost Odyssey - Feb 2008
PGR - Oct 2007
Blue Dragon - Aug 2007
Shadowrun - May 2007
Chromehounds - July 2006
Perfect Dark - Nov 2005
Kameo - Nov 2005
Amped - Nov 2005

Of course, there are other franchises that haven't shown up since the OG Xbox. One of them is the already-announced Steel Battalion. That's definitely a candidate, though I'd hardly call it one of their "biggest" exclusives, unless we're talking about the size of the box they originally came in.

Now that I've written all this, it occurs to me that this could also include XBLA titles, but I don't have the desire or inclination to make that list...
 
And why would they do this if Microsoft's market share is even remotely close to what it is currently?

The reason 360 got the great JP support it enjoys to this day is thanks to some heavy overtures and pitch perfect timing on Microsoft's part back in 2005/2006/2007. That really helped establish 360 early on, breaking PlayStation's near complete monopoly on big JP exclusives was hugely significant upfront.

And basically Microsoft's coasted on that hard work ever since. There's no telling if 360's successor is going to be a repeat performance in the west, and even supposing it is there's still no guarantee Jdevs will bother without some incentives and with the added possibilty of Nintendo/PlayStation alternatives that could be relevant both at home and overseas.

Essentially I just think Microsoft taking a 1990s Nintendo approach here (they'd need us, why bother?) isn't a sound long term strategy.
 

Conor 419

Banned
Pretty tired of these franchises now.

That's the thing. I want a Rare IP, or Crackdown, Splinter Cell or PGR to get some time in the spotlight. The Halo/Gears/Forza/Fable combo is getting really really stale, and Microsoft need to add some variety to really spice up their lineups.
 

boingball

Member
Halo, Halo 2, Halo 3 and Halo Reach Remakes?
Those are the four biggest exclusives, right? (Note: They did not talk about franchises)
 

Superfrog

Member
Not sure what to think of this teaser. M! Games/Man!ac has been a well-respected magazine for a long time, but they rarely have any important exclusive content, let alone world exclusive reveals. They neither have the money to buy exclusive content nor is the magazine's circulation wide enough to attract important 'free' exclusives.

That leads me to believe that IF they knew anything about unannounced 360 exclusives, other magazines knew of them too. In that case, we would have had other teasers and more concrete rumors by now.

Also, they clearly say 'THE big four exclusive 360 franchises return.' Kinect Sports and Dance Central probably wouldn't fall into that category for M! Games.

Therefore, I think the games are going to be Halo 4, Fable: The Journey (not 4), Gears Something (probably with optional Kinect integration, maybe done by People Can Fly), and Forza World.

There is a reason Microsoft abandoned all those great Xbox 1 and 360 franchises like PGR, Links, Crimson Skies, RSC, the classic Rare stuff and Quantum Redshift: sales. :/
 
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