my issue with microsoft mostly has to do with their first party library. Both consoles share like 85% of their library only difference is their first party and 3rd party exclusives. Sony gets all the big and medium sized japanese games already so if you like JRPG’s or Action games you’re pretty much locked in already.
When it comes to Microsoft their vision for gaming seems like its just going for a super casual audience. They are throwing everything at the wall and just seeing what sticks. They pride themselves on diversify but i feel like its a cop-out for not having a real identity. They can claim shooters by default, but then they have been trying to streer their brand away from the bro-shooter crowd that scares off casual gamers. They can claim WRPG’s but the only real big WRPG they have coming out anytime soon is starfield.
I like Obsidian and Inxile but they aren’t known for making big extravagant AAA gaming experiences. They have been making indie CRPGs for the last decade that have all just kind of been ‘good’.
When I think about xbox’ announced games its …
- Hellblade 2 - Didn’t like Hellblade 1 despite having good graphics, its a boring ass game and now i feel like they are trying to make it bigger than it is. Ninja theory have been an average studio since Heavenly Sword, i don’t see that changing.
- Fable 4 -A RPG made by a car game studio, it could be great technically, but we have no idea what their writing or animations teams are gonna be able to do in terms of crafting a big believable world. Also fable has kind of been overthrown since it’s hay day.
- Perfect Dark - It’s pretty much being made by Crystal Dynamics, who put out two average tomb raider games and a terrible avengers game.
- Avowed - its basically gonna be fantasy outer Worlds
- Starfield - who knows, the verdict is still out but i not expecting anything more than Fallout 4 in terms of quality in writing and exploration
- Redfall - looks like a hail Mary from Arkane to not be shut down. This is their studios Babylon Fall pretty much. They make great games but it seems like they were pretty much forced to try and make a game that appealed to casual gamers, like Housemarque was doing before Sony approached them for Returnal.
Long story short, I just feel like their first party games outside of Forza just aren’t there yet and their 3rd party partnerships all feel like nothing burgers. The kojima thing sounds like a side project he’s doing because they are paying him a shit load of money. Most of Bethesdas games just feel like they come and go, and activision is a shitty studio surviving on 3 franchises that will stay multiplatform.
I think its gonna take a while before Microsoft are really making games that shake the industry. Right now all the praise their games get feel forced. Like the way people talk about Halo infinite now vs how they talked about it on release is night and day. It leads me the believe what I originally thought, that it was disingenuous giving it such high scores.
People knock down stuff like Horizon for being “ubi-lite” and same ol’, but its doing 10x’s the amount of stuff in its open world than Halo, has a better written story, and looks an entire generation ahead of it. Just kind of proves where standards lie in the industry for each platform.
Sony would get raked over the coals for only launching two new games since a console launch. They have launched damn near a dozen and people still shrug their shoulders like they are on the same footing