I mean, it really isn’t that surprising honestly. I have pondered a few times about MS releasing one game every month for the first year or two simply because of the crazy amount of studios and teams they have. They have 14 studios with at least 23 teams as well as a publishing arm with what’s rumored to be 5 or 6 unannounced games.
And I mean hell, even if their 15 studios all had one team each and assuming all games had a 3 year dev cycle they could have 5 games a year. Releasing at least 6 games in a year isn’t totally unsurprising, but when you look at the logistics having those be AAA doesn’t look good:
343 - at least 1 team AAA
The Coalition - at least 1 team AAA
Rare - will likely have AAA budgets from now on if Everwild is successful if that’s not already AAA
Turn 10 - 1 AAA team
Playground games - 2 AAA teams
Ninja Theory - 1 AAA team (Hellblade 2 team)
Undead Labs - has desire to be AAA
The initiative - AAA studio. Possibly “AAAA” which is a BS term
InXile - 1 AAA team.
Obsidian - 2 AAA teams
So not even including Global Publishing, there are at least 11 AAA teams. So definitely not enough for 6 AAA games a year outside of them having a shit ton of AAA games though global publishing which likely wouldn’t even work for them that well.
Agreed. My issue isn't with the teams, its with MS themselves. Having a team means nothing if you are also not even funding them to even put out some big AAA titles. MS have yet to really make any new IP with the budget of a Halo.
Yet Sony can do Uncharted after Jak, The Last Of Us after that, InFamous after Sly, Ghost Of Tsushima after that, HZD after Killzone etc.
They are not scared to move on and put a massive budget behind a new IP that revivals or even surpasses their support of other AAA IP they make. MS acts like they'll die if any other game gets more support, funding, marketing outside of Halo and Gears.
Then act shocked when they are not getting new consumers.