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[benny_a]

See for example the evolution between last E3s :

2013
MS : "thanks to the power of the cloud..."
Internet feedback : "booh, bullshit, impossible, do they think we're stupid ?..."

2014
MS : "thanks to our many dedicated servers..."
Internet feedback : "finally, way to go, they listened..."

Same thing, different words, people are happy. Magic.

It's not the same thing.

They talked about how the Xbone was 4x as powerful when it was connected to the cloud. That was called bullshit.

 

[AmyS]

Phil Spencer is a class act. Great dude who you can tell really has a vision and is sticking to it.

I totally agree. I think Xbox One has a good future ahead of it and Phil Spencer is confident about the brand going forward.

The most important thing is, this is healthy for the industry as a whole.

 

[Alx]

It's not the same thing.

They talked about how the Xbone was 4x as powerful when it was connected to the cloud. That was called bullshit.

That's semantics again. In the end it's all about the amount of resources available on their servers, which I don't doubt can be 4 times the equivalent of the sum of all Xbox..

 

[Raist]

Well that's his answer anyway. Actually I agree with what someone else posted earlier, Phil Spencer has a tendency to tell people what they want to hear. Which is probably a quality for his position, and one of the reasons most people like him (me included). He's good at communication, and being in tune with others to find the right words, even when the meaning is the same.

See for example the evolution between last E3s :

2013
MS : "thanks to the power of the cloud..."
Internet feedback : "booh, bullshit, impossible, do they think we're stupid ?..."

2014
MS : "thanks to our many dedicated servers..."
Internet feedback : "finally, way to go, they listened..."

Same thing, different words, people are happy. Magic.

Yeah... it would have been the "same thing" if in 2013 they went for what would be the main application of their servers network, instead of going for "improve graphics left and right" and "make your console 4x more powerful".

That's semantics again. In the end it's all about the amount of resources available on their servers, which I don't doubt can be 4 times the equivalent of the sum of all Xbox..

No, it really can't. At the last count Azure had 300,000 servers (unclear if it's physical or virtual) which are also used for many things other than the Xbox platform. There's around 5M XB1 out there now. Do the maths.

 

[Acheteedo]

Love these interviews, Ryan and Phil should start their own podcast

 

[DryvBy]

That's semantics again. In the end it's all about the amount of resources available on their servers, which I don't doubt can be 4 times the equivalent of the sum of all Xbox..

Yeah, no. The idea that your console would be 4x faster is not just semantics. It's a flat out lie.

 

[Xando]

Seems weird that he doesn't want to have a MCC bundle, would probably sell a lot more than a SO bundle.

 

[GHG]

Seems weird that he doesn't want to have a MCC bundle, would probably sell a lot more than a SO bundle.

They could even have one of each. I don't see why not.

 

[Alx]

Yeah, no. The idea that your console would be 4x faster is not just semantics. It's a flat out lie.

Four times the resources doesn't mean four times faster. That's precisely because of such misunderstandings that it is important to have someone listening to feedback and adapt the delivery. Something Spencer seems to be good at.

No, it really can't. At the last count Azure had 300,000 servers (unclear if it's physical or virtual) which are also used for many things other than the Xbox platform. There's around 5M XB1 out there now. Do the maths.

You don't have 5 million console running at the same time, or requesting those resources at once. If they can provide those when needed, then the number of physical servers doing it is irrelevant. Power of the cloud.

 

[Chobel]

That's semantics again. In the end it's all about the amount of resources available on their servers, which I don't doubt can be 4 times the equivalent of the sum of all Xbox..

I'm actually surprised you believe that given your technical knowledge. "Xbone with internet is X time more powerful" is misleading BS and not marketing/PR.

 

[benny_a]

Four times the resources doesn't mean four times faster. That's precisely because of such misunderstandings that it is important to have someone listening to feedback and adapt the delivery. Something Spencer seems to be good at.

Actual quote:

“It’s also been stated that the Xbox One is ten times more powerful than the Xbox 360, so we’re effectively 40 times greater than the Xbox 360 in terms of processing capabilities [using the cloud]. If you look to the cloud as something that is no doubt going to evolve and grow over time, it really spells out that there’s no limit to where the processing power of Xbox One can go."

In addition to using the phrase "infinite power of the cloud" in several posts on xbox.com and such. The four times the resources seems more like something you're just now creating to make past statements seem more reasonable than they were. (Although I don't know what four times the resources means in this context.)

 

[Raist]

Four times the resources doesn't mean four times faster. That's precisely because of such misunderstandings that it is important to have someone listening to feedback and adapt the delivery. Something Spencer seems to be good at.



You don't have 5 million console running at the same time, or requesting those resources at once. If they can provide those when needed, then the number of physical servers doing it is irrelevant. Power of the cloud.

What do "resources" mean.
Amazon recently hit 1.21petaflops on their cloud network. That's the equivalent of ~10,000 XB1 CPUs. Let alone the GPU.

I think you don't realize that there's orders of magnitude differences between the resources they have in the cloud and the amount of processing power that would be required to have that "4x more powerful" quote make any sort of sense.

edit: and Amazon's cloud was recetly evaluated to basically have 5x more computing power than the other top 15 providers (which includes MS), combined.

 

[Marvel]

15 minutes into the interview, I like Phil.

 

[Alx]

I'm actually surprised you believe that given your technical knowledge. "Xbone with internet is X time more powerful" is misleading BS and not marketing/PR.

(Although I don't know what four times the resources means in this context.)

That's the whole point : because it's vague and almost meaningless it can be true and open to interpretation. What does it mean for a console to be powerful ? If a console can have access to a server with 1000 whateverflops capacity, it has access to more power so is it more powerful ? Logically yes. Does it mean it can run programs requiring 1000 whateverflops all the time ? Certainly not.
So yes it is a PR trick. But in the end it's all about how you tell the same story to have your consumers react the right way. It's not deception or lies, it's communication (subtle difference though ).

 

[peely]

No, it really can't. At the last count Azure had 300,000 servers (unclear if it's physical or virtual) which are also used for many things other than the Xbox platform. There's around 5M XB1 out there now. Do the maths.

At work, so can't look too much at this, but I'd be surprised if the server numbers were virtual, and one server != one xbox in terms of # of cores and clock speeds. So the maths isn't that simple but since I'm not a Hyper-V guy I can't begin to estimate what efficiencies they could get out of xbox workloads.

On topic, I enjoyed the podcast, could listen to more

 

[benny_a]

That's the whole point : because it's vague and almost meaningless it can be true and open to interpretation.

I meant what you mean by that, as you're the first person to use that word, instead of using the terminology that was used in the unveiling and post-unveiling PR.
The context of your post was that you said it's the same thing that Microsoft can say 4x as powerful connected to the cloud than otherwise is the same as talking about dedicated servers.

What is meant to be powerful when put into terms of the old console vs. the new console should not really require a doctorate.

 

[Alx]

I meant what you mean by that, as you're the first person to use that word..

I used it as a shortcut for whatever they said. Resources, power, whatever, it's basically the same thing. "Our servers have some juice that can be used by your Xbox, so that's good ! Up to four times the juice !". It's probably true in a way, I don't know what it really translates to because it's too vague and could mean anything, and that's precisely why you can't say it's a lie.

What is meant to be powerful when put into terms of the old console vs. the new console should not really require a doctorate.

The more you're skilled and the less you'll be able to answer the "how powerful is it ?" question, because it has no answer. If console power was measurable, we would have a metric for it (by definition). But that doesn't exist.

 

[Balb]

Rare is still pitching a new game?

No offense to Phil but that just sounds like lip service to me. I doubt MS would let them make the games they really want to make at this point.

 

[Miles X]

"Phil talks about him being the one in charge of Fable and BC and how MS first party could never ship a game in time. He said the first party team are on the cusp on some announcements"

I don't think thier first party will be announcing new games, as they're pretty much all accounted for.

So what could this mean?

New studios being announced, or another acquisition?

What about all the new studios? LXP, SOTA, N+, FUNction ect?

Ruffian? Lift London? Lionheads new IP (working alongside Fable Legends) Twisted Pixels rumoured new IP. Press Play have a new game in the works and unknown external studios.

Plenty of stuff to be announced I'm sure.

 

[DagnastyEp]

Wow, great interview. A definite list for all, regardless of console preferences. Really refreshing how straight forward Phil is with many of his responses to the questions.

It will be interesting to see where Xbox goes in the next year.

 

[p3tran]

Who is making the new Crackdown game anyway? I don't even know.

thats easy.

Kampfheld , and the company he works for.

 

[Doffen]

No offense to Phil but that just sounds like lip service to me. I doubt MS would let them make the games they really want to make at this point.

We don't really know what Rare of today wants to make.
What if they want to make Fable: The Journey 2 for iOS?

 

[Nightengale]

Studios don't just get bags of money and get to make whatever the hell they want to make without any sort of publisher approval.

Concepts need to get passed first, because that concept approval is two plus years worth of investment into a team of hundreds weighing in multi-million dollars.

 

[JaggedSac]

No, it really can't. At the last count Azure had 300,000 servers (unclear if it's physical or virtual) which are also used for many things other than the Xbox platform. There's around 5M XB1 out there now. Do the maths.

At last count, Azure has 11.4 million physical servers.

http://live.arstechnica.com/microsoft-cloud-briefing/

11.4 million servers.
by Peter 14:25

Or, more usefully, 600,000 servers per region.
by Peter 14:25

16 buildings per region. That's 32 jumbo jets!
by Peter 14:24

Each datacenter building is about as big as a football field. Big enough to park two 747s.
by Peter 14:24

This lets Azure deploy close to their customers.
by Peter 14:24

That's twice as many as AWS, 6 times more than Google.
by Peter 14:24

Next week: 2 new Australian regions, for 19 regions total around the world.
by Peter 14:23

They also announced this quite large VM, lol. A game dev would never use it though.

Announced today were a new series of virtual machine types that offered not just the scale out that cloud is known for, but also scale up. The G-series instances offer up to 32 Xeon cores, 450 GB of RAM, and 6.5 TB of local SSD storage. Azure also has a new premium storage facility, offering up to 32 TB of storage per virtual machine, capable of sustaining more than 50,000 IOPS, with a sub-1 ms read latency.

 

[BeforeU]

Hai guyz.

Great questions. And it was a good interview overall. Good job.

 

[sangreal]

No, it really can't. At the last count Azure had 300,000 servers (unclear if it's physical or virtual) which are also used for many things other than the Xbox platform. There's around 5M XB1 out there now. Do the maths.

Azure has 11 million servers. 300,000 (probably virtual) was for xbox

 

[gaming_noob]

Rare having the freedom to design their own game just made my day, even though it's not approved by Phil yet.

 

[Ol No Bones]

the interview guy saying phantom dust of all things PFFT you'll see how good that game is buddy! lol

but yeah that was a pretty interesting interview

also it sounds like the studios have tons of freedom to do whatever they want and he'll see what rare has slim their choices down too

Nobody on podcast unlocked knows what phantom dust is.

 

[Two Words]

Does Mccaffrey only give him soft-ball questions? I don't want to listen if it's just Phil getting a clear runway for his PR message.

 

[Dabanton]

Why do I get the feeling that the new Crackdown game is closer than we think?

 

[Ol No Bones]

Why do I get the feeling that the new Crackdown game is closer than we think?

Shinobi mentioned an announced game coming sooner than anyone thought. I assumed phantom dust because they are remaking an already developed game but It may be crackdown.

 

[FonkyByNature]

-Universal game preferences coming soon
-didn't have a MCC Xbox One bundle because they wanted to push Sunset
-Phil wasn't satisfied with Crackdown 2, thought it was rushed
-Phil says the announcement of Xbox One took a huge toll on team,i.e. bad response
-Ryan asks Phil how he would have handled Xbox One if he was in charge from the beginning, Phil says that he would've wanted the fan's feedback more, would have made it more gaming focused
-Xbox One hardware failure rate is significantly better than 360
-HDD size will probably increase in future
-Phil wants darker tone for Gears 4, more akin to Gears 1.
-Gonna see more classic games brought back like Killer Instinct and Phantom Dust
-Rare is making something, pitching to Phil in a couple of weeks
-Wants Minecraft to be more connected, with pc,mobile and console
-Xbox team wants to make install/download times faster.They have done several tests with Xbone and PS4 with 3rd party software

That's pretty much the big things in the podcast.

I like what i read.

Darker Gears of War, Rare... good stuff !

 

[semiconscious]

I totally agree. I think Xbox One has a good future ahead of it and Phil Spencer is confident about the brand going forward.

The most important thing is, this is healthy for the industry as a whole.

enough, already! if you, personally, want to buy one of everything in order to keep the industry 'healthy', go right ahead. me, i'll simply continue supporting whatever i prefer, & passing on the rest...

 

[flkraven]

Haven't had a chance to listen, but I guess I will on my way back home. Bullet points look exciting but I'm a little underwhelmed. Been anticipating Spencer on Unlocked for a bit now, and I guess I expected a few bombs. Didn't even get any firecrackers.

 

[Nightengale]

Haven't had a chance to listen, but I guess I will on my way back home. Bullet points look exciting but I'm a little underwhelmed. Been anticipating Spencer on Unlocked for a bit now, and I guess I expected a few bombs. Didn't even get any firecrackers.

It's a podcast.

Not a conference.

Not even a Game Informer/EDGE/IGN First kind of deal.

 

[EagleEyes]

Hai guyz.

Great interview Ryan.

 

[flkraven]

It's a podcast.

Not a conference.

Not even a Game Informer/EDGE/IGN First kind of deal.

Oh I know. I wasn't expecting anything E3 conference worthy, but every Unlocked episode for the past 2 months has mentioned Spencer coming in October. Ultimately,

 

[Vinc]

"Chomping at the bit", eh?

 

[chubigans]

I find it hard to ever respect Phil as long as the parity clause is at play.

 

[Steverulez]

I was disappointed in the interview, the one last year was great but this one was just easy questions that I dont think a lot of people really cared about. I mean, they spent all that time discussing Halo MCC sales projections, and they didnt get a number (not that I expected one)

There are plenty of questions to ask, like about first party studios etc (as a broad subject) that wasnt really touched on at all, and then when Ryan did ask about new IPs coming internally or however he worded it he didnt build on it at all

 

[Zukkoyaki]

Hai guyz.

Ryan! Pull strings and try to get Ken Lobb in for an interview

 

[Rymuth]

Made the Sean Hannity interview with Sarah Palin look like Frost vs. Nixon. You want a real journalist, send David Jenkins from Metro GameCentral.

Phil Spencer: That’s right. I’ve been proud of our first party line-up on Xbox One. We might differ on opinion on some of the games, but I think about Forza Motorsport 5 at launch – I think it was a beautiful game, 1080p and 60 frames per second. Ryse didn’t have the best review scores, but actually has sold really well and the feedback from people has been positive…

GC: [dubious look]

Phil Spencer: [hesitates]

GC: [dubious look intensifies] I didn’t say anything!

Now that was an interview.

 

[JaggedSac]

I was disappointed in the interview, the one last year was great but this one was just easy questions that I dont think a lot of people really cared about. I mean, they spent all that time discussing Halo MCC sales projections, and they didnt get a number (not that I expected one)

There are plenty of questions to ask, like about first party studios etc (as a broad subject) that wasnt really touched on at all, and then when Ryan did ask about new IPs coming internally or however he worded it he didnt build on it at all

Ryan has been around a while. He knows that anything but easy questions will likely not get an answer so why bother. Just the nature of the game.

 

[NickFire]

They should reverse course and offer a Halo bundle.

 

[blakep267]

doesn't phil have people under him like the id@xbox guy and mike Ybarra that are more hands on with the developers? so I'm guessing one of the underlings has been working with rare. but I doubt it's a completely unapproved game idea.


as for the halo bundle. there is no point. if people would buy a console at 399 and halo at 60, why offer the same thing for cheaper.

also if there was a halo bundle nobody would buy any of the other bundles

 

[Banjo-Kazooie]

"Phil talks about him being the one in charge of Fable and BC and how MS first party could never ship a game in time. He said the first party team are on the cusp on some announcements"

I don't think thier first party will be announcing new games, as they're pretty much all accounted for.

So what could this mean?

New studios being announced, or another acquisition?

Twisted Pixel has been silent since LocoCycle released a year ago.

Press Play have had another game besides Totem in dev, even did voice work for it earlier in the year

Lots of studios we don't really know anything about (Good Science, [FUN]ction, LXP, ect)

Rare has to have SOMETHING in the works besides a new IP...the team is too big to have been doing nothing but Kinect Sports

 

[Final Verdict]

Sorry if I made a mistake on anything

Install Times: talks about having the team testing installing 3rd party games this summer on PS4 compared to XB1 and why it takes so long. Phil says XDK is helping the publishers improve how the game installs

Screenshots: Phil said about 2 weeks ago the team found something that would make sense for screenshots but the are going to slow down on the updates for holidays because they don't want to break anything.

Universal Profile Settings- It's coming

Halo:MCC Special Edition Console: Talked about there was discussions about White Xbox One with Halo MCC. Talks about the difference between SE consoles and Bundles and says Bundles are easy to do. The decision to give White Console to Sunset Overdrive was because it's a new IP so it could stand out. Also to show Insomniac that they were behind them and believed in them.

Halo: MCC Special Edition Game: The reason why they didn't do a bigger package because he didn't want to milk the fans to buy an expensive set. They are pushing the value and how much care they took into making the collection

Phil also talked about MS cranking up Crackdown 2 too quickly. He said that the fans noticed that and he doesn't want that happen again. Taking a long term view on things instead of a quick cash in.

Halo:MCC Sales Projections- Codename for the collection was Ace. Phil says he thinks it will beat their internal sales projections.

Talks about the job: Phil loves the job. The team is his motivation. Said last year at E3 (2013) took a big toll on some of the internal team. Says after E3 2014 the team feels rejuvenated.

Phil talks about him being the one in charge of Fable and BC and how MS first party could never ship a game in time. He said the first party team are on the cusp on some announcements.

Talks about him being part of the team when designing the original vision of Xbox One. Says he doesn't want to make it seem that he is washing his hands of those decisions because he was there. He said he would lose credibility if he tried to deny that. He said the misstep was that they tried to push entertainment before the games and that was wrong. He said he believes in the entertainment but games should come first.

Ryan asks about console specs and if Phil would of pushed more for a stronger box. Phil said it would be easy to say yes but he really doesn't know because he doesn't know what was the trade off the hardware team.

seems like there might be more 1TB skus next year.

Talks about Inside. Phil says it's up to their developer if they want to show something.

Talks about the next Gears. Apologizes for that RT last week says it was an accident The code name for the first Gears was named Warfare. Wants to see a darker game like the first Gears.

First Party (Internal and External) are working on new IPs. Ryan talks about how the 360 at the end had a cycle with Gears, Halo and Forza. Also Phil says he doesn't need another space military shooter or racing game (first party).

Talks about Rare. Phil is going to see them in a couple of weeks to take a pitch on their new game. Says doesn't want Rare to be seen as the Kinect Sports team and even mentions other studios could make Kinect Sports. Says he wants Rare to do a new IP.

Mojang was a Xbox team deal. Talks about trying to unify the different versions of Minecraft (PC, Mobile and Console).

Love all these decisions he is making. Xbox fans are truly lucky to have him at the helm for Xbox.

Also, more on Minecraft:
He talked about how they want to meet the community's needs first before they try to just go out an make a Minecraft 2 or push it in other forms of entertainment such as TV.

He also talked about how the deal was 100% the idea of the Xbox team, and centered around things they wanted to do with it rather than the decision being made by a Microsoft Exec.

 

[Dragonborn]

Personally, I thought that was a great interview. Although, I'm not understanding the hate for Ryan. Seems silly.

I'm personally not a fan because he's a bit too biased for my taste. With that said, he's a good host and the podcast is Xbox only so his bias doesn't affect this much. Found the content interesting and the conversation engaging.

 

[flkraven]

I'm personally not a fan because he's a bit too biased for my taste. With that said, he's a good host and the podcast is Xbox only so his bias doesn't affect this much. Found the content interesting and the conversation engaging.

I actually enjoy Ryan, and find his love for Xbox endearing. However, it does suck when bigger/more interesting questions aren't asked. It's more than likely a byproduct of not wanting to ask something Phil won't answer or rocking the boat and impacting their future relationship.

 

[Banjo-Kazooie]

Sigh, still not on Youtube.