RichiRamjag
Member
Was he really an acting like an insider or just a knucklehead who lucked into playing a game early?
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Phil Spencer: "I know we have to take risks [after Scalebound cancellation],"
- Thread starter Alpha Phoenix
- Start date
Was he really an acting like an insider or just a knucklehead who lucked into playing a game early?
TangoAlphaLima
Member
Good point on DR4, not sure how that jives with what I'm pretty sure Phil said.
Would have been on an IGN Podcast Unlocked interview that he said it. Post-RotTR release, I'm sure. I think before RorTR was released, he had to hype it up.
Console loyalty is a mother. Some people would rather skip good games to show their faith.
daTRUballin
Member
Yeah, I wasn't implying you wanted Rare to be closed down. I'm just saying we should give this new Rare a chance before dismissing them completely. You can't just say they're "dead" or "just a name" when we haven't even seen them release any new games yet. Too many people always dismiss Rare because a huge chunk of their old talent left. And it's always Rare for some reason. Studios like Naughty Dog and Retro never get this despite having a lot of their old talent leave as well.
Xaero Gravity
NEXT LEVEL lame™
In hindsight, all signs pointed to him being full of shit.
Sounds like your typical system warrior.
GoldandBlue
Member
SUPER DISCLAIMER: Not all of these games are X360 exclusives.
These were the first ones on the shelf, Halo and Gears are at the back of the wardrobe.
So many great exclusives.
Man doesn't this sadly prove a point, at least about Japanese games on the Xbox. They took a risk with these games and they did poorly being exclusive to the Xbox in both America and Japan.
Kssio_Aug
Member
Sometimes we become too attached to some stuff and lose the opportunity of discovering better things for ourselves. I agree with onemanasylum in this one. If you don't want another Halo, don't want another Gears, don't care for MP games, that's fine... but honestly, you should give yourself a chance of trying a Nintendo / Sony console this generation, take a look at their libraries of released and announced titles and move on.
XB1 is the 1st Xbox console I ever owned (and still owns). I like it a lot cause thankfully I did enjoy Forza H., Halo and Gears, and they were the reasons why I bought it, and got access to their entire series in one single console. But I also own an PS4, and even though for me particularly (that am new to Xbox world) XB1 has been my favorite platform till 2016, I can't deny PS4 is way more promising this year with so many great titles for those who enjoys single player games... there's gonna be a huge variety.
If I were you would get one, try the classics (such as TLoU Remastered and Uncharted Collection) get the top PS4 games released this gen and give it a second thought. Since you're burnt from MS franchises you may lose nothing chaging the hardware.
SenjutsuSage
Banned
Sunset Overdrive, Ryse, Quantum Break, Scalebound (didn't release, but Microsoft greenlighted it and was supporting it for like 3 or 4 years) are all examples of them taking risks imo. None of those are ordinary titles. Of the ones that released they all represent something special and a fantastic foundation from which to build from.
Risk, is random. Risk is betting on an outcome which may not go your way. Sticking with a game that may never eventually be any good, like the Last Guardian, is a risk.
Giving up, throwing in your cards, and cutting your losses is absolutely risk-free.
Microsoft risked nothing by cancelling Scalebound. It's bad for Platinum and anyone ever interested in seeing the Scalebound, that's just how it goes.
Safe bet:
-Sea Of Thieves
-State Of Decay 2
-Forza Motorsport 7
-Crackdown 3 (maybe)
-Halo 3 Anniversary (probably, it's been 10 years, falls in line with the last two anniversary releases)
-Halo 6 teaser trailer (with Halo 3 Anniversary likely having extra content that ties in with it like the last two Anniversary games have had for Halo 4 & 5)
-Assassin's Creed (if the next one is coming this year)
-a couple of other third party games, one of them possibly a timed exclusive
-a few indies
-Scorpio reveal if it isn't going to be done separately, heck the whole conference could be featuring Scorpio and all footage for the big games will have text saying "footage captured from Scorpio."
SenjutsuSage
Banned
Greenlight a sequel to Quantum Break and sign Sakaguchi to a contract for a new major title. Sakaguchi does fantastic work, and what I think should matter a great deal in setting up deals is that he's a developer who genuinely respects Microsoft and Xbox. I don't get the sense that this same level of respect actually exists for Microsoft in the rest of the Japanese game development community. So it's extra important, I feel, to support talented creators that actually want to work with you.
why would they do either of those things when they likely couldn't implement some type of games as a service hook stuff in there? It's clear those things are priorities for Microsoft
Reagan's BR
Banned
There is a big difference between taking risks and avoiding the sunk cost fallacy. The idea is to take risks that could pay off but not to bankrupt yourself in the process. Scalebound was obviously a risk and after 4 years the development costs to finish the game outweighed the possible sales-rather than continuing to dump money into the project MS cut their losses and moved on. Good business leaders avoid the sunk cost fallacy.
MS and Phil know that they need to take risks and invest in new IP and expanding their current lineup-the sheer size and capital devoted the Coalition and 343 speak to that. Seriously-putting that much manpower and capital behind two waning properties like Halo and Gears is a huge investment. Scorpio is a risk, UWA, backwards compatibility, and play anywhere is a risk. After the PR disaster that was the Xbox One announcement MS is still trying to get their foundation in order before they try to rebuild their house and a lot of that has to do with making sure they are culturally prepared as a company to chase the new vision. You have to remember just because Don Mattrick left doesn't mean the Xbox One unveil mentality is completely gone-many of the people work at MS with that mentality for a while. Big companies like MS don't change over night. It took Sony nearly the entire PS3 generation to change for the PS4.
Now do not get me wrong - MS is in MAJOR need of IP management but I doubt that has been the focus when they have been so focused on console power, the ui, and building features to improve the broken foundation the console launched on.
MS and Phil know that they need to take risks and invest in new IP and expanding their current lineup-the sheer size and capital devoted the Coalition and 343 speak to that. Seriously-putting that much manpower and capital behind two waning properties like Halo and Gears is a huge investment. Scorpio is a risk, UWA, backwards compatibility, and play anywhere is a risk. After the PR disaster that was the Xbox One announcement MS is still trying to get their foundation in order before they try to rebuild their house and a lot of that has to do with making sure they are culturally prepared as a company to chase the new vision. You have to remember just because Don Mattrick left doesn't mean the Xbox One unveil mentality is completely gone-many of the people work at MS with that mentality for a while. Big companies like MS don't change over night. It took Sony nearly the entire PS3 generation to change for the PS4.
Now do not get me wrong - MS is in MAJOR need of IP management but I doubt that has been the focus when they have been so focused on console power, the ui, and building features to improve the broken foundation the console launched on.
Stumpokapow
listen to the mad man
http://www.remedygames.com/remedy-goes-multiplayer/
Doubt they have workers to spare.
Okay, so Sakaguchi designs the game--who actually makes it? Mistwalker isn't a development team, it's just Sakaguchi and some close aides.
Then allowing development to continue on Scalebound would have been a risk.
The kind of risk which Microsoft was completely unwilling to take, it turns out.
Those aren't risks. Those are what they could get without a deep first party investment or oversight. Quantum Break is the exception, only because they tied so much of their tv venture into it, they had to invest. That content was supposed to be dual purpose, and not all game exclusive. Kind of like Defiance.
I think Recore has a chance of getting a sequel. I mean what else is Armature working on right now? Also Sunset Overdrive (even if it didn't sell well) was still well received and the relationship between MS and Insomniac still seems good so ya never know.
Phil actually did an interview with Game Informer last fall where he talked about the possibility of making sequels to some of their games like Recore.
An excerpt from that article:
"The reason I say all this is, on Xbox One, I look at ReCore and Im having a really good time with it. I wish the review scores were higher, but I love the lead character and I love the gameplay. And you can see that, some years from now, people will want to play another version of it because the memories that they have even though it wasnt a 95-rated game stick with them and they mean something over time."
Full link is here: http://www.gameinformer.com/b/featu...il-spencer-talks-xbox-scorpio-and-beyond.aspx
True but how many of the ones you just listed are actually getting a sequel?
It's the lack of faith and support in future investments like these that is part of the problem because it doesn't align with the company philosophy going forth. Because these specific types of games and their initial performance in the market don't align with internal MS philosophy going forth. The diversity and library depth seems to be shirking even more going forth and this is incredibly troubling. Especially for the actual Xbox fanbase, people like yourself who buy and play xbox games like these.
What exactly was risky about Ryse?
JesseEwiak
Member
I'll put it this way - I'm willing to take the risk on skydiving. I'm not willing to skydive without a parachute, which is what some people want Microsoft to do.
I'm in agreement with you. Unfortunately, I think there are a number of folks who do not believe that his job is to sell them Microsoft-branded product. As a result of this disbelief, they will fail to recognize a long-running pattern of dishonesty from the Xbox leadership and Xbox operations.
I didn't expect Scalebound to be canceled. In fact, I expected the game to release to not-so-great performance at retail and in reviews. However, I'm not shocked that the game isn't going to release, because Microsoft have traded in smoke and mirrors this gen. Their commitment to their announced products and development partners is, in one word, questionable.
Goose_Se7en
Banned
Crytek
Out of those 4, I would only consider Quantum Break and Scalebound small risks. The other two are pretty safe.
Wrong. Mistwalker made Terra Battle. An amazing game from the father of Final Fantasy. Mistwalker and Sakaguchi can develop a killer title for the Xbox One's browser. I believe in them.
True but how many of the ones you just listed are actually getting a sequel?
It's the lack of faith and support in future investments like these that is part of the problem because it doesn't align with the company philosophy going forth. Because these specific types of games and their initial performance in the market don't align with internal MS philosophy going forth. The diversity and library depth seems to be shirking even more going forth and this is incredibly troubling. Especially for the actual Xbox fanbase, people like yourself who buy and play xbox games like these.
They're not getting sequels because they didn't sell well. It doesn't make sense to keep pouring money into making games that aren't profitable, something that's becoming extremely hard to do these days.
The entire industry is seeing this, the Gears of War revenue thread is a prime example of that. Games are becoming more expensive to make and there is more competition than before for consumer wallets, so you have to make a stellar game (like Overwatch) in order to stick around.
It comes down to different philosophies. Microsoft probably doesn't feel that it's worth lighting money on fire for some small chance at success in the future vs. Sony who does. Remember, Microsoft has lost a lot of money with the Xbox division so far, funding games that have tanked.
Because games are what people want. Everything else is nice to have...but we come for the games. Style points are cool...but you are judged on much more.
The Crysis games sold well and were generally well received. There are obviously a lot of problems that we associate with that company now (you know, things like not paying employees), but I don't remember those being factors when Ryse was in development.
VlaudTheImpaler
tl;dr
You know, I will admit that my first kneejerk reaction was anger towards MS. I still think it's justified and think that they should have stuck to their guns, put their pride behind them and worked things out with PG somehow and deliver something since they showed the game off a crapload, got people hyped and people bought into the ecosystem because of it which is what they wanted...
However, I read this comment from Sydle the other day in the other thread in response to someone asking if Spencer was "mad" for saying that he thought that canceling Scalebound was better for gamers and it kind of put things into perspective a bit.
Sydle,
The way I interpreted that, especially after some of the insider posts here saying the belt is getting tighter on the Xbox division and there's more pressure to deliver, is there are some high stakes involved.
In a way it reminds me of one of my prior jobs. I had just joined a company on their marketing team managing their largest advertising program and it was awesome for about 3 months because I was managing to a metric that my superior assigned me and was blowing it out of the water. What happened in month 3 is the CFO changed the metric and all of sudden my program was drastically underperforming. The CFO's guidelines were harsh, he was cutting my budget by half and there would be more cuts if I didn't reduce the budget and keep it performing at a certain level. If I didn't reach those expectations he'd cut it more. There was no possible way I could reach his expectations, so about 2 months later he says he's cutting my budget again and the next time I can't meet the goals it's going to be shut down for the foreseeable future.
I gutted the whole program, everything I built for several months, and went down to a fraction of my original spend. I had to build it back from the ground up and earn back every penny of my budget little by little, checking in with the CFO every 3 months on the health of the program. It took me about 1.5 years to build it back up to the spend I had originally, but through it I ended up tripling ROI and making the best performing advertising program they had, and got to build out a whole team to keep it growing.
My point is that there may be more at stake such as more budget cuts or downsizing if Spencer can't get things meeting a certain level of expectations, so he might be doing what's necessary just to keep the team going.
I think it would be wise to try to withhold our anger until we have more details on who to direct them at. Projects from even huge studios and prolific devs fail all the time due to life, overconfidence and other unforeseen issues. Thing is, and like I said above why I am/was angry, we usually don't hear about them because they generally aren't advertised like Scalebound was. Phil even admits this and that it is a lesson learnt that he should be careful how soon they show projects so good on him for owning up to that.
However, I read this comment from Sydle the other day in the other thread in response to someone asking if Spencer was "mad" for saying that he thought that canceling Scalebound was better for gamers and it kind of put things into perspective a bit.
Sydle,
The way I interpreted that, especially after some of the insider posts here saying the belt is getting tighter on the Xbox division and there's more pressure to deliver, is there are some high stakes involved.
In a way it reminds me of one of my prior jobs. I had just joined a company on their marketing team managing their largest advertising program and it was awesome for about 3 months because I was managing to a metric that my superior assigned me and was blowing it out of the water. What happened in month 3 is the CFO changed the metric and all of sudden my program was drastically underperforming. The CFO's guidelines were harsh, he was cutting my budget by half and there would be more cuts if I didn't reduce the budget and keep it performing at a certain level. If I didn't reach those expectations he'd cut it more. There was no possible way I could reach his expectations, so about 2 months later he says he's cutting my budget again and the next time I can't meet the goals it's going to be shut down for the foreseeable future.
I gutted the whole program, everything I built for several months, and went down to a fraction of my original spend. I had to build it back from the ground up and earn back every penny of my budget little by little, checking in with the CFO every 3 months on the health of the program. It took me about 1.5 years to build it back up to the spend I had originally, but through it I ended up tripling ROI and making the best performing advertising program they had, and got to build out a whole team to keep it growing.
My point is that there may be more at stake such as more budget cuts or downsizing if Spencer can't get things meeting a certain level of expectations, so he might be doing what's necessary just to keep the team going.
I think it would be wise to try to withhold our anger until we have more details on who to direct them at. Projects from even huge studios and prolific devs fail all the time due to life, overconfidence and other unforeseen issues. Thing is, and like I said above why I am/was angry, we usually don't hear about them because they generally aren't advertised like Scalebound was. Phil even admits this and that it is a lesson learnt that he should be careful how soon they show projects so good on him for owning up to that.
Papacheeks
Banned
Google.
So sorry I messed up when the first uncharted came out which was within a year of PS3's actual US release.
But my whole point was the first entry did not do well, and critically didn't set the world on fire either. But they gave it second chance and struck gold. I said first uncharted in my first post you went off on uncharted 2. Over 2 million is good , but taking it almost 2 years to get to that amount is not great. Uncharted 1 cost a decent amount to make they basically broke even on that game. It's not the giant success they wanted. But it showed promise. MS didn't treat sunset over drive like they did titanfall because it's not a competitive shooter franchise. It could have been their next Dead rising with punk flair. They should have bought Ryse as an IP because a roman.gladiator type story could have been a good franchise.
Goose_Se7en
Banned
I, uh was being sarcastic about Crytek precisely because of their issues now. It wasn't meant to get a full blown response back, but I hear you.
anothertech
Member
It seems both Nintendo and Sony are willing to invest in and release games that they know won't have much commercial success.
I feel it is the duty of the platform holder to release these games to not only attract a certain audience but to gain goodwill from their current customers. There are groups of people who really appreciate the effort that platform holders go to make these games happen. Microsoft doesn't seem interested in doing anything like that at all.
I feel it is the duty of the platform holder to release these games to not only attract a certain audience but to gain goodwill from their current customers. There are groups of people who really appreciate the effort that platform holders go to make these games happen. Microsoft doesn't seem interested in doing anything like that at all.
TheUnsunghero26
Member
I'm not expecting too many surprises. Here are my predictions:
First Party:
-Scorpio reveal
-Showcase of old games updated for Scorpio
-Crackdown 3
-Halo 6
-Sea of Thieves
-State of Decay 2
-Forza 7
-Ori 2
-Small scale game published by MS
-Port of original Xbox game
Third Party:
Just guesses here, I honestly have no idea. I imagine Sony will have a lot of the bigger ones.
-Assasins Creed?
-BioWare's new DestinY styLe gAme thiNg (Or whatever that new IP was they showed off years ago)
-Cyberpunk 2077? (I'm being optimistic)
-Something from Square Enix? Hitman season 2 would fit with MS's "games as service" thing, but Sony had an exclusive mission for season 1, and I'm not sure if this will be launching before E3 (The sooner the better!0
-Something from Bethesda
I wonder if this is implying that the Xbox Division could be downsized, or maybe that Spencer could be replaced as well?
Must be difficult.
I would love a Halo 3 Anniversary but Frankie was pretty adamant in another thread that there's going to be no such thing
I doubt we'll get another super early Halo beta like Halo 5 had this year but you never know.
Last Assassin's Creed was a lined with PlayStation so there's a chance it appears over at their conference but there's past precedence so you could be right.
Hell what are the odds MS pads the line up by getting Telltale to do a Halo season? They seem to be accepting all offers these days.
godhandiscen
There are millions of whiny 5-year olds on Earth, and I AM THEIR KING.
How are those not things that generate more games?
The mods allow people playing games such as Fallout/Skyrim have a better experience on X1 than on their PS4 counterparts.
The preview games program has made it so that titles such as The Long Dark, Elite Dangerous, Everspace and Astroneer make it to the X1 as the only console.
The BC games... no need to explain.
How are these NOT risks with clear game rewards for consumers?
The narrative of these past few weeks chooses to ignore a lot of the great things that keep me on the X1 platform.
Mr Reasonable
Completely Unreasonable
What about 360? Did they drop that immediately after Xbox One launched? Oh, no they didn't.
What's the best thing to do here? Judge them on ten years ago with a different head or three years ago with the current leadership team?
omg, I did not go off on uncharted 2. Everything I said and linked you was on uncharted 1. Go read it again. Here, I'll help you, http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=228124444&postcount=804
It sold 2 mil by summer of 2009. Sony themselves said it was a success. They said all of this during that e3 conference.
http://www.gamespot.com/articles/ps...led-god-of-war-iii-due-in-march/1100-6210509/
also this, the exact timestamp in video form https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JOxXLBsw4ao&t=1m1s
And again, I have google searched for the budget of drakes fortune, can't find any. Since you're amazing with it, go ahead and show the 20-30m cost.
Mr Reasonable
Completely Unreasonable
Phantom Dust hasn't been cancelled.
Erm...they dropped the 360 about a year BEFORE the Xbox one launched. That last year on the 360 was awful compared to the PS3.
The remake has been cancelled. The port that was briefly mentioned at E3 is still on. I am not even sure if that was officially announced though tbh. Wasn't it just mentioned in an interview and then forgot about?
tiredheadcrab
Member
Replacing him would be stupid for MS. He has done a decent job of turning around the Xbox one reveal and tried to salvage its reputation. If Scorpio does worse than the Xbox one or if hardware sales aren't as high as they should be with 2 models on the market, its a possibility. But I doubt thats what Satya would do a little under a year from a major hardware launch.
Papacheeks
Banned
Yea I read it wrong, my bad. It's 11:55pm here I'm tired. Sue me.
But here's where I was getting the numbers Eurogamer
Uncharted 1 and 2 around 20 Million each to make not including PR campaigns.
Also they link to Joystiq's interview about Uncharted 2 and they talk about budget and uncharted 1 comes up.
Didn't Halo 4 come out that year?
The one from the 2014 conference most certainly has since it went from being a new game / remake to just a remaster of the Xbox title along with the developer being closed.
Laugh My Ass Off.
anothertech
Member
It absolutely was cancelled. A quick n dirty bc version will be put in its place. Utter bullsht too.
Stumpokapow
listen to the mad man
To be clear:
- Phantom Dust, the game revealed a few E3s ago, a brand new game, has been cancelled
- Phantom Dust, the original Xbox OG game, is getting a port that may or may not have any new features or remastering.
Better get your facts straight. Microsoft didn't halt production of the Xbox 360 until last summer.