Why are you only focused on this year? Covid has been around for 2.5 years and yet ms had a fantastic 2021. They won publisher of the year!
Yes, Sony is having a much better year in 2022, but 2021 was not kind to them. And Nintendo has really floundered imo. They've released some low content crap over the last two years (switch sports, mario tennis, Mario golf, etc). Only now are they starting to hit their stride with xenoblade 3 and Bayonetta 3 and splatoon 3, assuming the latter two don't get delayed.
I’m not only focused on this year , I was just giving an example. The series consoles launched without any significant software with an already pretty big gap since Gears 5 launched on X1 and the narrative at launch was that it played your older games superbly. Which to me said a lot.
Yes you are correct , they got publisher of the year with Halo , psychonauts, Flight Simulator and Forza. That’s a positive. I want to see them bring the next Gears, not Gears 6, a game with that impact it had for 360, those wow moments you know? New stuff.
This is likely more to do with my personal tastes, I want them to be more like PlayStation has been, multiple projects at studios, new IPs with impact and I’m misguided in that thinking perhaps.