That statement by Phil in that Letter to the fans from Bethesda to me says, heads are rolling within Enterprise side of the company and this reflects bad on Phil. Who probably is talking to Nadella more now that these issues with studios have been non-stop.
I want to play devi's advocate though as I disagree with Jaffe's Assessment that this is a Microsoft issue.
- Bethesda has a history of similarly announcing games too early, Fall out 4 was the only game that I can remember that was shown/announced close to its launch. Doom/Eternal is another one.
- They actually showed the game off at their event and it launched the next year.(Doom/eTERNAL)
- Bethesda is ran by Zenimax, it's business as usual. I don't associate Redfall and Starfield's delay with Microsoft management because Bethesda game studios is managed by itself and zenimax where Microsoft is the parent owner.
- Where this is Microsoft's fuck up and has been is the fact there's nothing else in their slate from any of their newly owned/internally ran studios?
I remember saying this a while back that if Redfall or starfield were to slip, Microsoft would be in a bad spot as its another year where games that were promised and poised to launch didn't.
Microsoft's issue isn't a project by project case issue, it's systemic one thats deep rooted in how the division is ran, and I think it shows that this systemic issue has been passed on from gen to gen.
Microsoft needed to do soul searching, like Matty mentioned from Defining Duke podcast. First party titles helps give you your identity. Playstation's identity is great story/character themed games. Nintendo's is iconic classic characters and innovative gameplay mechanics.(though its been more about IP brands like Pokemon, Monster hunter IMHO).
Xbox's identity for a while was "Play together", or the place to play with friends. Issue is once the rest of the industry caught up online wise, what are you left with? Halo, forza, gears?
It's like once that happened during 360 era they kind of scratched their heads?
Then doubled down on online/services and integrated TV because enterprise wanted this since the very first xbox with cable.
Honestly would not be surprised if we see more new positions for management at Xbox very soon being announced.
The fact people like ColtEastwood are literally pissed off at Microsoft and fed up I think is the straw that broke the camel's back.
And even with everything being pushed to 2023, I feel the wait is going to not be a good look, on top of if any of their games are not stellar, then I think its going to be what Microsoft doesn't want, which is Gamepass will look devalued because the Ether will be thats its not Synonymous with quality and Consistent content.
If any heads are going to roll I think the main one is going to be Matt Booty. He's the one in charge of Xbox Game Studios, he's supposed to be the one regularly checking in on the XGS teams and ensuring things are going smoothly, including providing some type of input where needed. It's pretty evident now between 343i, The Initiative, Rare and potentially even some of the other internal teams (including the 2018 acquisitions) that he is simply not doing all that he can within his job's capacity.
Matt Booty's expertise is with live-service GaaS titles, he comes from Minecraft. So I'm not surprised Sea of Thieves was able to be salvaged and turned into something successful, and I'm also not surprised Halo Infinite turned into a live-service GaaS. However, not every game is a good fit for that model and I kind of think they messed up in turning Halo into a live-service GaaS title.
Also yeah, I saw some of those podcasts and videos yesterday including his and you can definitely see the frustration mounting, as it should. A lot of people, especially diehards, have been waiting for years for major new games that aren't yet more Halo/Gears/Forza, that can go toe-to-toe if not beat games like Uncharted, Horizon, Elden Ring, Zelda, Mario, Assassin's Creed, TLOU etc. in terms of leading the industry in some way creatively, being unmitigated critical & commercial successes, being riveting experiences transcending what a lot of people think the medium is capable of in terms of storytelling etc. In that regard, Microsoft still haven't delivered.
This year seemed like the first time where they might've (well, mostly; Starfield was clearly in development prior to MS acquiring Zenimax but it's likely the past 2-3 years of dev have focused primarily on Xbox Series and not PS5 for that game) had something along those lines, and now it's delayed. And that's on top of the known issues with Perfect Dark, Everwild, Halo Infinite,
potentially Fable, etc.
The fact MS's 2022 ultimately hinged on two games from a developer they only happened to acquire a few months after this current generation launched (meaning if for whatever reason the acquisition fell through, those games would've still remained multiplatform at the very least), says a lot. If anything we should've been expecting Hellblade II and Avowed for this year, not Starfield and RedFall. But as you said, upper management issues at the gaming division are most likely to blame.
Thanks for the info but I haven't owned a Saturn in like 15 years. I'm not a collector so once im done with a console especially if im moving on the next generation, the older consoles get sold/traded in. I did enjoy the few games I played. Guardian Heroes, Dark Savior and Resident Evil. I did own Shining Force 3 and Shining the Holy Ark but I don't remember even playing them.
Man, you gotta play the Shining games sometime. I'm playing Shining Force III currently, it's really good. Especially if you're new to SRPGs, it's a good introduction to the genre with a nice balance of challenge and easy pick-up-and-play but still a lot of depth in the Friendship system and things like that.
Plus the story's really great as well
I agree completely. I judge Spencer/Xbox based on the start of 2018. Phil became "the man" in Fall 2017 and im like, okay, a few months to settle in, Holidays, etc. So for me, I start with 2018. FoxyGames UK had a tweet listing the Xbox One exclusives for the first 18 months and missed a few and while almost all of them didn't interest me, the lineup was better quantity wise and equal if not better quality wise.
I believe that Phil/Booty need to be more strict. They need to be more hands on. They should be checking in with all of their studios at least once every three months if not more. Basically, they need to start cracking the whip.
It's almost like they're too scared to be more hands-on out of fears they'll do too much and tons of projects get cancelled again, when really all they need to do is be more even-handed. Find a good balance; Sony and Nintendo don't have an issue with this, generally speaking, I don't understand why it's any more difficult for Microsoft to accomplish that.
Though, I also feel Matt Booty himself is part of the problem, it might be time to find a replacement.
Ark 2 looks bad to me but yeah, it could be a game that fills the massive gap but I would definitely go after Gotham Knights and I would probably overpay for Avatar from Ubisoft. As you know, im not a fan of timed console exclusives at all as I see it as a waste of money but desperate times call for desperate measures. I know they won't do it but if it was me, I would be like, how much money would it take to get Avatar and Gotham Knights as one year timed exclusives? Because they need something.
Only positive is that 2023 looks fucking stacked - ON PAPER. I truly believe that 2023 games will get pushed to 2024. You can already see it coming. But whatever, it is what it is.
Yeah, at this point they're probably going to need some big timed exclusives. Whether or not they can get something like Avatar on GamePass, I doubt it, but even just locking that down for the console, you like how they used to, would be enough and also give a boost to GamePass by relation that most GP subs are coming from the console sales, anyway. MS need to remember that they don't need to lead with GamePass all the time to think they're adding value to Xbox; not every gaming move (especially those where Xbox is involved) has to hinge on whether it fits GamePass or not.
Like, if getting Avatar as a timed exclusive for a year would cost them $100 million on its own for just the console, or $200 million if going into GamePass but that also reducing timed exclusivity to 3 months, that's ultimately MS's decision to make. I personally would pick the former, all things considered. But something else to consider is if any of these other games are even up for them to try nabbing, as Sony might already have deals worked out for a lot of them, wouldn't be surprised if the Avatar game were among them.
And these are all deals that were likely set in place in late 2019 or in 2020 before the consoles even launched.