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Microsoft Studios (& Partners) Current and Future Landscape

Johnohno

Member
In the Sea of Thieves mail they send out they mentioned they hope to get him behind a camera and have a video up on Friday. Fingers crossed it goes ahead!
 
I just got two HoloLens' at work, the guy that was originally going to do something with them has bailed on the project.

Anyone working with these or have any idea what people are doing with them? I work in a Uni so I guess I want to develop something that displays stimuli and see how people react to it but I have literally just taken these things out of the box and my only development experience is making psychology experiments in Unreal Engine for use on a Oculus.
 
I just got two HoloLens' at work, the guy that was originally going to do something with them has bailed on the project.

Anyone working with these or have any idea what people are doing with them?

You could check out some of the videos on the Hololens channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCT2rZIAL-zNqeK1OmLLUa6g

Particularly this playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLZCHH_4VqpRhNU8EioE9rvF63L9sNyX0e

Or this one with Volvo: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cvLdbpICVGk

Lots of dev resources on www.hololens.com
 

krang

Member
I just got two HoloLens' at work, the guy that was originally going to do something with them has bailed on the project.

Anyone working with these or have any idea what people are doing with them? I work in a Uni so I guess I want to develop something that displays stimuli and see how people react to it but I have literally just taken these things out of the box and my only development experience is making psychology experiments in Unreal Engine for use on a Oculus.

We show a manufacturing build process on a product, but it actually sits on a table using the Hololens rather than on the screen. We also pin the build sequence information to the wall. It's a bit pointless, but it makes management "ooh" and "aah" during high-level demos.

Regarding tech, we use our own software renderer to produce the images, rather than a game engine. Although we do use UE4 for VR stuff on the Vive.
 
Cheers guys!

Yeah I think the higher ups want it displaying things and wowing people so they can justify buying it. I'm actually the IT support/Server manager though so it's going to be a fun ride figuring this out!
 

Isurus

Member
That was so good and it did nothing for Campaign. I just feel we will get something else related to Halo but not mainline game. Finger crossed for an RPG.

I'd love to see something like Destiny in the Halo universe. Something similar to strikes and raids would be simply amazing. Doubt it will happen, but it could be amazing if so. I'd be fine if that was Halo 6. Weave the continuation of the story into an MMORPG sort of construct (better than how Destiny handled the story).
 

Leyasu

Banned
I'd love to see something like Destiny in the Halo universe. Something similar to strikes and raids would be simply amazing. Doubt it will happen, but it could be amazing if so. I'd be fine if that was Halo 6. Weave the continuation of the story into an MMORPG sort of construct (better than how Destiny handled the story).


This. They could easily do this with blue team and set it in the covenant war. Do it as a spin off and let halo 6 sit for a bit.
 

Calm Killer

In all media, only true fans who consume every book, film, game, or pog collection deserve to know what's going on.
I'd love to see something like Destiny in the Halo universe. Something similar to strikes and raids would be simply amazing. Doubt it will happen, but it could be amazing if so. I'd be fine if that was Halo 6. Weave the continuation of the story into an MMORPG sort of construct (better than how Destiny handled the story).

That sounds terrible to me. The main reason I hate Destiny is the MMO aspect. After playing WOW for years I don't want to touch an MMO ever again. The constant grind for gear, just to replace/repeat is so draining. Raids are also terrible ideas for me, unless you have match making for it. With kids and house work and my job I can't schedule a night or 2 every week just to play. That turns into a job in itself (why I stopped playing wow). I just want to be able to jump in and play when I have free time.
 
LMAO. What happen Steve you use to be so positive?

I like Xbox but some of their decisions over games, IP and studios are very questionable. Now, phil & co have the numbers and the information which I don't but it really will be a short trip.

He will go to uk to see Rare and whatever Lift London are doing on Hololens then he will go home, maybe he will see his beloved Chelsea play Spurs at Wembley idk.

Does he make a special trip to Canada to see Rod, get some poutine etc? Maybe, and he drives to 343 which probably takes like 10 minutes and that's kind of his trip done

I hope they got lots of good stuff to show us at e3 for Scorpio

Not necessarily first party.

Could be a loooooooong trip.

What studios is he gonna go visit? Platinum? Nope.Remedy? Nope. Insomniac? Nope. There's so many studios on Crackdown including their own internal one they're just down the hall from him, what other games they got in development?

Undead Labs (making by far the most exciting game for Xbox right now) are also in Seattle iirc so not far to travel for them either

Ori 2… is he gonna go to Thomas Mahler's house? Maybe. Not sure there's anything else going down we know of
 

krang

Member
What studios is he gonna go visit? Platinum? Nope.Remedy? Nope. Insomniac? Nope. There's so many studios on Crackdown including their own internal one they're just down the hall from him, what other games they got in development?

Ori 2… is he gonna go to Thomas Mahler's house? Maybe. Not sure there's anything else going down we know of

Every developer making a game for Xbox...

I'm not being serious.
 
Here is part 3 of Ryan's interview to Molyneux.
https://youtu.be/Cw-qSDVPygA?t=1008

He says he would accept to reboot Fable if:
- he's allowed to say it going to be a great game
- he's allowed to build the team he wants (names ex-Lionhead/Media Molecule)
- he can be what he curently is (coder)

Then he says it's too late for that.

I would love a fable reboot but designed by Peter.
 

Wedzi

Banned
Will be a short trip then

635852027078792342-1631258952_200.gif
 

blakep267

Member
I like Xbox but some of their decisions over games, IP and studios are very questionable. Now, phil & co have the numbers and the information which I don't but it really will be a short trip.

He will go to uk to see Rare and whatever Lift London are doing on Hololens then he will go home, maybe he will see his beloved Chelsea play Spurs at Wembley idk.

Does he make a special trip to Canada to see Rod, get some poutine etc? Maybe, and he drives to 343 which probably takes like 10 minutes and that's kind of his trip done

I hope they got lots of good stuff to show us at e3 for Scorpio



What studios is he gonna go visit? Platinum? Nope.Remedy? Nope. Insomniac? Nope. There's so many studios on Crackdown including their own internal one they're just down the hall from him, what other games they got in development?

Undead Labs (making by far the most exciting game for Xbox right now) are also in Seattle iirc so not far to travel for them either

Ori 2… is he gonna go to Thomas Mahler's house? Maybe. Not sure there's anything else going down we know of
Yes. There are only 3-4 games in development. Yes, Phil is going to announce he's visiting a not yet announced partner studio to see their unannounced game that they are making. /s
Your a smart one
 
Yes. There are only 3-4 games in development. Yes, Phil is going to announce he's visiting a not yet announced partner studio to see their unannounced game that they are making. /s
Your a smart one

Well last e3 they announced 3 games we could've guessed were coming, there isn't exactly a large group of available devs for them to work with? (Also that they haven't worked with recently and we know they aren't working with)

I didn't ask him to announce anything, my original post was somewhat in jest. I think games currently a rather large issue given since gamescom 2015 they've announced a whole 3 games, they've very few internal studios of which we know what they are doing and options for external partners are somewhat limited as far as I can see.

But enjoy trying to act like a smart ass
 

Wedzi

Banned
I'm honestly kind of shocked Microsoft has never tried to make their own answer to Call of Duty especially after losing the marketing rights. That franchise is so tied to the success of Xbox Live and Xbox's dominance in North America last generation. Just look at the kind of response Black Ops 2 is having now that it's backwards compatible. It's clear how much that franchise means to a ton of Xbox gamers more so than others (even though a large portion of the CoD crowd has already left for PS4 some time ago)

It would make sense to take a page out of Activision's book and have a three year cycle of Halo, Gears, and another franchise. But I doubt Microsoft really wants to invest into anything that costly these days even it's a modern military FPS
 

blakep267

Member
I'm honestly kind of shocked Microsoft has never tried to make their own answer to Call of Duty especially after losing the marketing rights. That franchise is so tied to the success of Xbox Live and Xbox's dominance in North America last generation. Just look at the kind of response Black Ops 2 is having now that it's backwards compatible. It's clear how much that franchise means to a ton of Xbox gamers more so than others (even though a large portion of the CoD crowd has already left for PS4 some time ago)

It would make sense to take a page out of Activision's book and have a three year cycle of Halo, Gears, and another franchise. But I doubt Microsoft really wants to invest into anything that costly these days even it's a modern military FPS
presumable that's what's happening this year. Halo 5 came out in 2015 and will come next in 2018. And Gears probably in 2019. 2017 seems to be a 2 piece combo in State of Decay and Crackdown

Also I wouldn't say a large portion of the COD crowd left at all.
 

BigPapi

Member
I'm honestly kind of shocked Microsoft has never tried to make their own answer to Call of Duty especially after losing the marketing rights. That franchise is so tied to the success of Xbox Live and Xbox's dominance in North America last generation. Just look at the kind of response Black Ops 2 is having now that it's backwards compatible. It's clear how much that franchise means to a ton of Xbox gamers more so than others (even though a large portion of the CoD crowd has already left for PS4 some time ago)

It would make sense to take a page out of Activision's book and have a three year cycle of Halo, Gears, and another franchise. But I doubt Microsoft really wants to invest into anything that costly these days even it's a modern military FPS

The military shooter is a saturated market I think microsoft should continue to look for holes in terms of genre and attempt to fill them military shooter is not one of them.

Halo and gears are on three year cycles already.
 
Making games are so hard on its own and making a "hit" takes more than just making a good game. The chemistry and need for a perfect mix of talent, creative vision, marketing and timing is so, so, so difficult.

I would argue that it it 10x more difficult to create an evergreen game as well. For every Rocket League, Overwatch, etc there are 50 other games that are no less inferior in budget and investment, but simply failed to be an evergreen behemoth and stay on top of charts for only a few weeks tops.

From a financial investment perspective, it would be a far safer investment to take a 100 million dollars that could be funneled into a new FPS IP that has a higher risk of failing than succeeeding...

And instead pump it all into a new Halo on top of its existing budget to create "Halo's CoD4 moment" by being the biggest and boldest Halo ever.

tldr; making games are hard.
 
I like Xbox but some of their decisions over games, IP and studios are very questionable. Now, phil & co have the numbers and the information which I don't but it really will be a short trip.

He will go to uk to see Rare and whatever Lift London are doing on Hololens then he will go home, maybe he will see his beloved Chelsea play Spurs at Wembley idk.

Does he make a special trip to Canada to see Rod, get some poutine etc? Maybe, and he drives to 343 which probably takes like 10 minutes and that's kind of his trip done

I hope they got lots of good stuff to show us at e3 for Scorpio



What studios is he gonna go visit? Platinum? Nope.Remedy? Nope. Insomniac? Nope. There's so many studios on Crackdown including their own internal one they're just down the hall from him, what other games they got in development?

Undead Labs (making by far the most exciting game for Xbox right now) are also in Seattle iirc so not far to travel for them either

Ori 2… is he gonna go to Thomas Mahler's house? Maybe. Not sure there's anything else going down we know of

It's not like you to be so cynical about Xbox Steve. You tend to have realistic expectations about what we can expect from them (and maybe some inside contacts?) so is there anything else we might see from MS' first-party any time soon, obviously aside from the stuff we know is happening like Gears, Forza, Halo & Ori. Maybe Perfect Dark or another Rare IP revival? Maybe another new IP from one of their development partners?
 

Wedzi

Banned
presumable that's what's happening this year. Halo 5 came out in 2015 and will come next in 2018. And Gears probably in 2019. 2017 seems to be a 2 piece combo in State of Decay and Crackdown

Also I wouldn't say a large portion of the COD crowd left at all.

I wouldn't call that a replacement for a Halo or Gears type AAA release at all.
And it's pretty undeniable that a large portion of the casual CoD market left Xbox.

The military shooter is a saturated market I think microsoft should continue to look for holes in terms of genre and attempt to fill them military shooter is not one of them.

Halo and gears are on three year cycles already.

Halo has been on a three year cycle since inception practically. Oh it's way past the point where MS could have made this hypothetical game. There was a window where they could have invested in such a project (like Shangheist RIP) but we're way past that don't mistake me for saying that should do this today lol
 
With all the relationships they've broke off it's gonna be hard to get those type of titles that generate hype and trust based off the pedigrees of those developers. Hopefully they sign some new big stuff but I feel like if they are doing that now we probably won't see them this gen.

I think they should be trying to fill up gaps in their portfolio and they are sitting on some good IPs that they could revive in an AA capacity. I feel that they're gonna ride this gen out like this.
 
I really wish MS would get the coalition to make a 3rd person Perfect Dark game, or have 343 make a 1st person Perfect Dark. That would give either franchise some much needed downtime.

I say Perfect Dark because new IP's don't seem to be landing well with MS. My preference would be a third person stealth game with some RPG elements. Something similar to Deus Ex perhaps. Throw in some heavy co-op and it would fit with their 'games as a service' focus.
 

Zukkoyaki

Member
Bold prediction: State of Decay 2 is going to outsell Gears 4

The first game sold well over a million copies despite being janky to the point of making Bethesda games look polished. It's the sort of open-world co-op game that is absolutely killing it with the mass market these days. And contrary to what GAF may think, people still like zombies.

Everyone is sleeping on it big time.
 
Bold prediction: State of Decay 2 is going to outsell Gears 4

The first game sold well over a million copies despite being janky to the point of making Bethesda games look polished. It's the sort of open-world co-op game that is absolutely killing it with the mass market these days. And contrary to what GAF may think, people still like zombies.

People are sleeping on it big time.

GAF sleeps on zombies in general.
 
Bold prediction: State of Decay 2 is going to outsell Gears 4

The first game sold well over a million copies despite being janky to the point of making Bethesda games look polished. It's the sort of open-world co-op game that is absolutely killing it with the mass market these days. And contrary to what GAF may think, people still like zombies.

Everyone is sleeping on it big time.

That would be great!
 
A few weeks ago I was pretty pessimistic about this upcoming E3 for Xbox, don't know why but now I have a feeling wee might see a few surprising announcements.

The power of Scorpio?
 
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