What is the deal with Phil Spencer?

[Sircaw]

Sure, I'm exaggerating, I just wanted people to show up with the list so that we could all look at how sad it is.

It's easy for me to see a pattern in the types of games Nintendo and Sony fans like but when I look at the hardcore Xbox fanbase I just don't get where they are coming from and it just doesn't fit together, to me they are clearly lying to themselves because they at some point made the bad decision of buying an Xbox and got too attached to it.

i hear ya m8, there has definitely been a lack of huge quality blockbusters on their side.

I hope this changes in the future for them, but at present i would find it seriously hard to recommend the xbox console to a friend.

 

[PropellerEar]

Revenue is not profit, it's easy too increase the revenue of anything by simply dumping money on it.

Using 8B on Zenimax bump the revenue with ~2B?

 

[nominedomine]

Using 8B on Zenimax bump the revenue with ~2B?

Well the money Zenimax makes by selling their games is now counted as Xbox revenue. All the cost of keeping those studios running and producing games is also on Xbox now.

There is a reason Xbox never talks about profit and hasn't talked about it in years, the same reason why they don't talk about sales.

You seem to assume that the difference between Xbox, PS and Nintendo is Gamepass, when it's clearly spending $7B to buy one of the biggest publishers out there. How is a significant increase in revenue not expected? If anything it seems to have gone unnoticed as you didn't even realized it and attributed it to Gamepass growth. We know what the gamepass growth is and it isn't that impressive at all, still way behind what Sony is making with game subscription btw, specially now with the restructure.

 

[PropellerEar]

Well the money Zenimax makes by selling their games is now counted as Xbox revenue. All the cost of keeping those studios running and producing games is also on Xbox now.

There is a reason Xbox never talks about profit and hasn't talked about it in years, the same reason why they don't talk about sales.

You seem to assume that the difference between Xbox, PS and Nintendo is Gamepass, when it's clearly spending $7B to buy one of the biggest publishers out there. How is a significant increase in revenue not expected? If anything it seems to have gone unnoticed as you didn't even realized it and attributed it to Gamepass growth. We know what the gamepass growth is and it isn't that impressive at all, still way behind what Sony is making with game subscription btw, specially now with the restructure.

No I agree, that was exactly also my point.

 

[thicc_girls_are_teh_best]

And I think your estimates are off. "That much is for sure"? Really? "The average ARPU was".... so you have access to their numbers? WTF? lol

I think people on the internet way underestimate how many are paying the $10/15.

Eh, not really. I mean, again, that Axios subscription services and industry revenue thread got pretty in-depth with some numbers between @Heisenberg007 and myself. The report itself was kind of sloppy (some percentages were higher than what they should've been, for example), and some subsets weren't clearly defined, but there was just "enough" to actually work some things out with.

When you have reports mentioning sub services (including PS+, NSO and those types) account for 4% of industry revenue in a given year, then a service like GamePass accounting for 60% of a given subset of the services market, and we already get subscription service revenue reports from Sony and Nintendo, and market reports breaking down global revenue by territory...

That doesn't mean the numbers we can calculate on our own are perfect, but it does help immensely, and means whatever range can be reached is generally somewhere in the ballpark. We both took a lot of things into consideration, and gave some leniencies, but even while we took some different approaches we settled around $750 - $775 million as total likely revenue of GamePass. If it's notably higher than that, it's going to be at the expense of XBL Gold subs that have switched over to GPU (or GP, but most likely GPU). If it's even less, then it's probably because even more people are either only playing a couple months or so a year, or are using things like MS Reward points to cover costs, or doing free trails (apparently you can do trails an unlimited amount of times just as long as you use different accounts? Kind of wild to me if true but, for some people it's definitely convenient).

You also have to consider, in certain markets the cost for GamePass is MUCH less by default than in America. India for example, I think their cost is much lower, just like it is with Netflix over there. So things like that are going to affect overall revenue too, you gotta think about it globally. Figuring out things like the average likely ARPU is just taking products of certain numbers and accounting for some margins of error, I mean you might be surprised that even PS+ and NSO have a notably lower ARPU than the amount you'd get just multiplying their flat annual rate by the number of noted subscribers, and there's no reason GamePass's would be different or higher than those services.

But either way their revenue has ballooned.. whether it's from Gamepass or not isn't THAT relevant as Spencer is in charge of all of it.. he's also the one who championed the move to day one PC too... it's a combo of things obviously, but Gamepass/Cloud are what Satya and other exec's mention when they talk about how well Xbox is doing.

But to your point, Xbox is also selling a lot of games. The thing is, Gamepass is still likely at the core of that, as it's a huge attractor for XBox as well as why a lot of people are sticking around... it's really at the core of their marketing, you can't look up Xbox w/o having it shoved in your face.

Personally the constant push for GamePass in MS's marketing is grating on me at this point; I don't think they do nearly enough focusing on the individual games themselves. And some of the adverts are just completely cheesy.

But, it's true Xbox revenue has increased a lot. I just don't think GamePass is the reason why. I agree with other people saying it's down to increased digital software sales, MTX sales, and MS being able to roll in Zenimax revenue as Xbox revenue nowadays. Also don't forget the money train things like Minecraft are, even all this time later. I wouldn't even be surprised if Halo Infinite is getting some decent MTX sales, in spite of other flaws with that game.

Not saying GamePass doesn't play a role but it's probably not as big as some think. Because if it were, IMO with game streaming supposedly the future, and companies like MS wanting to clearly indicate that to potential 3P publishers to maybe curry favor with their games into their service or even acquire them, they would want to publish GamePass revenue numbers separately for a change. It's the next big thing supposedly, well money talks and others would have doubts shut down for good if specific revenue figures for something like GamePass were put out there. It'd also be a strong showing of leadership in the subscriptions space.

At the very least, you'd think shareholders would be provided those numbers, but even they don't receive them.

And you have the numbers to refute ours? lol. At least, our data was based on various reports that analysts and 3P companies conducted on gaming subscription and their revenue.

The main reason why Xbox's revenue has gone up is because of increased digital add-ons and MTX from live-service games, 3P software sales, and aggressive acquisition that combines revenue of the new studios under the XGS umbrella. Where does all the revenue that Elder Scrolls Online and Fallout 76 go now? It has been now added under the XGS revenue, and XGS revenue "continues to grow."

Yep, exactly. Again, I'm sure GamePass accounts for some of it, but it's by no means accounting for the majority of Xbox revenue growth. Even PS+, with way more subs, only accounts for a tiny fraction of PlayStation's entire yearly revenue.

 

[IntentionalPun]

Yep, exactly. Again, I'm sure GamePass accounts for some of it, but it's by no means accounting for the majority of Xbox revenue growth.

Well I never said it was directly responsible for revenue growth. I mean that's pretty impossible considering even if everone paid full price it's only a few billion dollars. But I think it's a very significant portion of that growth, and subs are almost certainly the fastest growing "category" percentage wise.. it's just that other digital sales are the biggest category by far.

I still think you guy's estimates are low.. but as I said, I meant Gamepass more generally. I've made it REALLY clear elsewhere that MS's bread and butter is still selling games and MTX. But their product differentiator was Gamepass.

And they are going to have to start releasing more big 1st party games day one on Gamepass for them to keep it that way, if they ever can gain.

 

[peter42O]

We really gotta get off the MC stuff, they aren't the end-all be-all in deciding what's quality. There's not even any consistency for how reviews are conducted, I think some of the tomfoolery earlier this year with some reviews (mainly, Elden Ring, Horizon Forbidden West, and Sifu) showed as such. Some outlets clearly scoring very specific games lower than the trending average while other games in the same IP family they were scoring at or above the trending average, the only deviation being said other games happened to be multiplat.

Then you have to ask how lenient some reviews were for certain games versus others and why some haven't been updated to reflect the actual state of games. All things considered, Halo Infinite did not deserve an 87 MC; solid gunplay alone doesn't cut it for a modern FPS, and with the rampant problems that game has had since launch you'd think a few outlets would've revised their scores to reflect the actual reality the game's shaped up to be. But it's almost like they're sitting on those scores under the impression the game will just magically get better but what if it never does?

On the flip side of that, HFW got dogged pretty hard in some reviews at launch for the state of some of its bugs (tho oddly, Elden Ring wasn't hit in scores for framepacing issues or technical issues on some platforms like PC at launch), but virtually all of those issues have been resolved by now. Why haven't some of the reviewers taken time to go back and reevaluate their scores? In fact, I remember reviewers, or at least one reviewer (maybe it was IGN) did do that for a semi-recent game; given how so many games these days get patches you'd think semi-regular review re-evaluations would be a common practice.

I agree that some outlets are more varying than last generation but is it the same reviewer as last generation and second, I do believe some games especially if they're sequels will get criticized more this gen than last gen. Halo Infinite was a 9.5/10 and my 2021 game of the year. Granted, 2021 was a weak year in my opinion but I loved the campaign. For me, visuals and gameplay/combat were a 9.0/10 each with audio and story being a 10/10 each so overall, a 9.5/10. I absolutely loved the campaign. Of course, in fairness it was the first Halo game I ever played so I had no attachment and can't compare it to the previous games.

Is Halo Infinite missing stuff? Absolutely. No co-op until I think yesterday and no forge but for me personally, I have zero interest in either so they don't affect me personally. The MP has excellent combat and gameplay but the content is non-existent. Of course, 343 is a disaster. Who knows when im getting the first campaign expansion. SMH.

Critics very rarely go back and review games, especially live service games because what's the point? You would have to review it every year minimum. Just not worth the time. Sea of Thieves for example was a 68 at launch but if you review it today, it's at least an 8.0/10 if not higher but at launch deserved it's score. Live service games is more about future content and word of mouth than anything. FFXIV was a disaster early on and now, is one of the biggest MMORPG's out there. Rainbow Six Siege was literally dead on arrival but grew into one of the best live service games.

For me personally, I believe that games should be rated for what they are at launch but at the same time, it's going to come down to the reviewer. Those who reviewed Elden Ring for example were souls fans and it's basically a souls BOTW game. No icons, no way points, etc. where as with HFW (which I completed and rated it a 9.0/10 compared to ZD which was a 9.5 and my 2017 goty) it needed a few more months because I had a few crashes, that horrible shimmer effect on the 60 fps mode, a story quest in which I lost over an hour of progress because the button prompt wouldn't appear at the end of the quest, getting stuck in the environment while trying to open up a car door or enemies falling through the world to where I couldn't advance a side quest.

There's simply too many new games for reviewers and sites to waste money, time and resources re-reviewing games especially if it's just minimal improvements. Even HFW, it's an 88. Re-reviewing it now would make it maybe a 90 if that. Outside of the technical issues, everything remains the same so why even bother?

Here's my rub: it's not about exclusives even, it's about industry-leading 1P content. Games that are moving some or multiple aspects of game design forward, setting new standards and raising the bar, the way I'd expect at least some releases from a platform holder to regularly do. Microsoft is not successful here, in the past decade they have failed in this aspect IMO (in terms of games built in-house) outside of the Forza Horizon series. Before that, they had a best-in-class, massive IP with leadership quality in Halo but that has basically turned into a dying brand.

I can point to any number of Sony or Nintendo games over the past decade (and longer, obviously) meeting those requirements. I could point to any number of Sega games from the mid-80s up until they stopped making consoles that meet those requirements. I can't point to any Microsoft games that meet them, that they built from start to finish in-house, outside of Halo and Forza Horizon (and arguably Flight Sim but I don't know a lot about the history of that genre on PC. I know there were definitely rival flight sims back in the day however).

I want to see Microsoft's 1P output elevate itself to start hitting those standards more consistently, it's about more than just having some good games every now and again IMO. I acknowledge other things they're doing well but that doesn't have to mean them sacrificing to push where I feel they have a responsibility to as a platform holder in this industry, when it comes to creating leading, standard-setting 1P content. Which means, yes, in some ways they need to cater to the hardcore and core gaming tastes, those are the types who will recognize best what new bars are being set and appreciate them. It's not just about quantity, it's not just about sales.

I agree with you completely, however, before they can get to leading in anything, they first need to release great games and before that, the studios need to be great and managed correctly in order to release great games. Once they can do that on a consistent basis, then they can look to achieve industry leading first party content. But in all honesty, I just want them to release higher quality games than they've done the last decade plus because I can't want them to lead in anything if they don't give me high quality and high rated games first.

 

[Darth Vader]

I agree that some outlets are more varying than last generation but is it the same reviewer as last generation and second, I do believe some games especially if they're sequels will get criticized more this gen than last gen. Halo Infinite was a 9.5/10 and my 2021 game of the year. Granted, 2021 was a weak year in my opinion but I loved the campaign. For me, visuals and gameplay/combat were a 9.0/10 each with audio and story being a 10/10 each so overall, a 9.5/10. I absolutely loved the campaign. Of course, in fairness it was the first Halo game I ever played so I had no attachment and can't compare it to the previous games.

While I respect your opinion, I have to hard disagree on Halo Infinite being a 9.5/10, even if the campaign is fun. Graphically the game is a mess of styles and brings nothing new (it looks like an Xbox One game for the most part). The sound design is not good, just serviceable, the gameplay is the same standard Halo gameplay with a grappling hook, which in itself is nothing new. Objectively speaking, it could never be a 9.5/10 if a reviewer was being honest. It's an 8/10 at most, because while it's a competent FPS, it's nothing more than that.

Critics very rarely go back and review games, especially live service games because what's the point? You would have to review it every year minimum. Just not worth the time. Sea of Thieves for example was a 68 at launch but if you review it today, it's at least an 8.0/10 if not higher but at launch deserved it's score. Live service games is more about future content and word of mouth than anything. FFXIV was a disaster early on and now, is one of the biggest MMORPG's out there. Rainbow Six Siege was literally dead on arrival but grew into one of the best live service games.

A review is a snapshot in time. Some games may warrant a new one, sure, but overall the original review should capture the gist of what a game is.

For me personally, I believe that games should be rated for what they are at launch but at the same time, it's going to come down to the reviewer. Those who reviewed Elden Ring for example were souls fans and it's basically a souls BOTW game. No icons, no way points, etc. where as with HFW (which I completed and rated it a 9.0/10 compared to ZD which was a 9.5 and my 2017 goty) it needed a few more months because I had a few crashes, that horrible shimmer effect on the 60 fps mode, a story quest in which I lost over an hour of progress because the button prompt wouldn't appear at the end of the quest, getting stuck in the environment while trying to open up a car door or enemies falling through the world to where I couldn't advance a side quest.

Had some of the same issues with Horizon, and if I had to be honest, anything between an 8.5 to 9.0 would be more than fair. However, if one is objectively reviewing Halo as an average of 8.7/10, Horizon deserved more, way more. And I will maintain what I always said: Sony games are reviewed to a higher standard than Xbox games.

 

[Compsiox]

I think he did a good job reshaping Xbox. Everything is in place for Xbox to be successful, but they really do need to get these games out. They've had a few of the newer studios for a few years now, we should definitely be seeing more.

 

[Papacheeks]

While I respect your opinion, I have to hard disagree on Halo Infinite being a 9.5/10, even if the campaign is fun. Graphically the game is a mess of styles and brings nothing new (it looks like an Xbox One game for the most part). The sound design is not good, just serviceable, the gameplay is the same standard Halo gameplay with a grappling hook, which in itself is nothing new. Objectively speaking, it could never be a 9.5/10 if a reviewer was being honest. It's an 8/10 at most, because while it's a competent FPS, it's nothing more than that.



A review is a snapshot in time. Some games may warrant a new one, sure, but overall the original review should capture the gist of what a game is.



Had some of the same issues with Horizon, and if I had to be honest, anything between an 8.5 to 9.0 would be more than fair. However, if one is objectively reviewing Halo as an average of 8.7/10, Horizon deserved more, way more. And I will maintain what I always said: Sony games are reviewed to a higher standard than Xbox games.

HAVE 100% disagree on almost everything. I have played a lot of halo. And I believe though you are right on sound design being week. Minute to minute gameplay is fantastic, the best halo gameplay in a long ass time.

And this is coming from someone who played original Halo 1 and 2 and sucked on xbox back in the day. Graphically it has its issues and short comings but its not a bad looking game. Just a game thats help back by the engine limitations more than the actual hardware its on besides Xbox one.
The issue literally is this game was a development mess and the things we and many nit pick are results of that. Besides the post content updates being anemic.

The reason there's such a divide is most people who either are halo fans or shooter fans wanted this game to be their next shooter last year into this year. Because lets face it last years Call of Duty Vanguard though a complete package was just uninspired. BATTLIEFIELD was even in worse shape than halo and its core gameplay missed the mark almost completely.
Halo Infininte I hate to say it, nailed what the essence of a good shooter is. I felt similar to Doom/Eternal. That game when it clicks is fucking amaze balls. This game when it clicks is fucking addictive as fuck.

All of my buddies who are not even Halo fans just shooter fans were enjoying this game. But the anemic updates, desync melee and PC/Console balancing just killed its momentum.
If they have a new team with Joe and ex Bungie guys now running halo, there might be hope. But I feel that hope has come way too late as MW2 is literally out in a couple months.
Though Nickmerc said some choice things that definite could have been said better about the devs who obviously all have talent, what cant be denied is the wasted opportunity they were given. And honestly to me as I'm sitting here thinking about this, if Microsoft like @David Jaffe said had a better grip on software management they would have intervened a long ass time ago when lead directors were having issues which was 2019.
I mean the other issue is Microsoft using contract work. Sony does it too for certain titles or certain milestones of a games development. From what I here, LAst of us part 2 heavily used contract work to complete the game for 2020.

But since then I believe they now have support studios they own, that help facilitate a lot of things to relieve internal full time development. Microsoft on the other hand has a long history of this because of their other products from enterprise.
Look at their call centers, office development support, server support are all over the world. Third party partners they pay to help support their products.

Though Sony as an entertainment company has their fair share for camera repair, and shit like that. When it comes to Entertainment TV/FILM/GAMES most is done within Sony or Sony owned subsidiaries.
I am hoping Joe staten's directing and them using certain affinity to make the BR mode, really does help them get back on track. But I feel at this rate there has been too many times 343/Microsoft has dropped the ball for this franchise.

And if they are not careful same could happen to GEARS.

 

[peter42O]

While I respect your opinion, I have to hard disagree on Halo Infinite being a 9.5/10, even if the campaign is fun. Graphically the game is a mess of styles and brings nothing new (it looks like an Xbox One game for the most part). The sound design is not good, just serviceable, the gameplay is the same standard Halo gameplay with a grappling hook, which in itself is nothing new. Objectively speaking, it could never be a 9.5/10 if a reviewer was being honest. It's an 8/10 at most, because while it's a competent FPS, it's nothing more than that.

When I say 9.5/10, I said for me personally. Critic wise, mid to high 80's score seems about right to me. You must take into consideration that I never played a Halo game so overall, I loved the campaign for what it is. I can't compare previous games. The audio design was excellent. Voice acting is top tier for the most part. Sound effects are good for the most part and the music soundtrack is excellent. Combat/gameplay wise, the shooting is top tier, grappling hook is a lot of fun and very useful. Visuals were the weak spot for me. I do think the choice of trees were a mistake because it makes the world especially when flying look empty and dull but on foot, I still enjoyed the art style and visuals of the game. Definitely far from the best but I wasn't playing Halo for the visuals.

A review is a snapshot in time. Some games may warrant a new one, sure, but overall the original review should capture the gist of what a game is.

Agreed.

Had some of the same issues with Horizon, and if I had to be honest, anything between an 8.5 to 9.0 would be more than fair. However, if one is objectively reviewing Halo as an average of 8.7/10, Horizon deserved more, way more. And I will maintain what I always said: Sony games are reviewed to a higher standard than Xbox games.

First, Sony is coming off an excellent generation and like Nintendo, have been dominant for the most part so their games should be reviewed to a higher standard because they've been #1 three out of four generations while Microsoft has been 3rd in all three of theirs. And coming off Xbox One, expectations are nowhere as high for Microsoft and their studios compared to Sony and their studios in which they're coming off their best generation game wise.

Second, HFW is an excellent game but at the same time, like Halo, it does nothing new or nothing I haven't already done in other games. For the most part, it's a Ubisoft style checklist game. In a lot of ways, the game went backwards. Subtract the visuals and the game is maybe a 7 at best because what does it really do better than ZD? There's underwater but no combat and you have to hide in seaweed which was in Black Flag over 8 years ago. That's a step back. Climbing is worse and if it's not AC style where it's completely free, it's better off being like ZD where there's just climbing spots instead. The grapple hook adds nothing to game either. What does it really do? You use it to pull out metal rods from barricaded or to get a chest to come to you if you can't reach it. Also, the grapple hook seems like an extra in regards to climbing and whatnot instead of implementing free climbing which if it existed in FW, the grapple hook no longer becomes necessary.

Third, there's no air combat so what's the point in overriding a stormbird and flying? So I can get that meaningless reward at the top of the mountain or more tree branches to collect? The game is also way too big. The game is also very slow and doesn't pick up until you go through the Embassy quest where things finally get going. Next, there's the hand glider which I love in games but without free climbing, I barely used it. Only when I was high up and didn't want to climb back down.

Next, the side content is clear out this camp or collect this or that for an NPC that simply doesn't matter. There's way too much focus on all the visuals which in all honesty, at times is just too much. It's overdone. I don't need every spot to be filled with foliage to where I can barely see what im doing. Combat feels off at times. The valor surges add nothing and why you can only choose one out of 12 if I remember correctly defeats the entire purpose. You also feel underpowered for the majority of the game. You don't get the better equipment until 75%+ through the story and you don't get all the story equipment until a few quests before the game ends which is horrible design in my opinion. There's all this underwater areas but I can't do them until im like 90% through the story?

Also, when it comes to reviews, it all depends on who's reviewing the game. If those who reviewed Halo aren't the same people who reviewed Horizon, you can't look at both games as being a 1 to 1 comparison because the reviewers are different and thus, their opinions are going to be different and when it comes to open world games, unless it's a BOTW, RDR 2 or ER, most are just Ubisoft games that are too freaking big for no apparent reason except to prolong the damn game.

Halo Infinite had 15 story missions. HFW which is a massive open world and an action RPG was only 17. I expected way more story quests in HFW than what there was. ZD had 23. Forbidden West takes one step forward with visuals but two steps back with nearly everything else.

And I actually like HFW a lot and wanted to give it a 9.5/10 but I just couldn't because in some ways, it doesn't surpass Zero Dawn and I simply expected more so yeah, you can definitely say that Sony's games are held up to a higher standard but in all fairness, they should be because they've delivered in the past and it's the normal expectation. Outside of a game here and there, when has Microsoft ever delivered games to where they should be reviewed and held up to a higher standard?

Microsoft still needs to get to Sony's level during the PS4 generation and this is simply all a wait and see. Halo Infinite won me over like FF7R did but I have nothing to compare them to as I never played or completed any other Halo game and after seeing the visuals in 2020 reveal, my expectations outside of the shooting mechanics/gunplay and combat was low where as with Forbidden West, my expectations were high because Zero Dawn was a 9.5/10, my 2017 goty and my #4 game of the PS4/XBO generation so I can fully understand why Sony's games are held to a higher standard compared to Microsoft where outside of Forza and Flight Sim, they haven't hit a 90 rated game since Xbox 360.

While Xbox Series X is my primary gaming console for various reasons, im not blind. I know Microsoft has a ways to go before they can even match Sony/Nintendo let alone surpass them so for me to put them to the same standard just wouldn't make any sense. At this point, I just want them to release at least one or two exclusives a year that I actually want to play and at the very least hit my own personal 8.0/10 rating or higher. Until they can do this with more than one game in two years for me and on a consistent basis, there's no valid reason for me to compare Microsoft's first party games to Sony's.

Once I made the decision to go with Series X as my primary gaming console for this generation, I also made the decision to give Spencer and Microsoft the entire generation to impress me and win me over. They've done a horrible job thus far even including my 2021 goty in Halo Infinite but at the same time, PS4 is my #1 all time gaming console and in all honesty, Sony didn't give me greatness until 2017 and beyond so the first half of the PS4 generation was either non-existent, mediocre or disappointing and yet, the second half was dominant for me to where PS4 became #1 surpassing Xbox 360 and Super Nintendo.

Microsoft has nothing until 2023 for me and even then, who knows??? All I can do is wait and see how the next 6 years of this generation plays out. Regardless of that, Sony has dominated this generation with their exclusives and after this year, are leading 5 to 1 for me and 7 to 1 if I include third party exclusives Kena and FFVIIR. At this point, like Microsoft, Xbox fans including myself just have to ride out 2022 and hope that they finally hit in 2023.

 

[nominedomine]

And if they are not careful same could happen to GEARS.

Come on, Gears today doesn't have a fraction of the relevance it had when it was developed by Epic in the 360 days. It has long happened to Gears already, the only difference is that The Coalition is not as blatantly incompetent as 343i so it went mostly unnoticed.

Halo Infinite reviewed better than any recent Gears and I doubt Halo's multiplayer numbers are that far behind.

The Coalition is to Gears what 343 is to Halo, it's the same failed strategy playing out, Halo was just a bigger IP so it's more noticeable.

 

[Papacheeks]

Come on, Gears today doesn't have a fraction of the relevance it had when it was developed by Epic in the 360 days. It has long happened to Gears already, the only difference is that The Coalition is not as blatantly incompetent as 343i so it went mostly unnoticed.

Halo Infinite reviewed better than any recent Gears and I doubt Halo's multiplayer numbers are that far behind.

The Coalition is to Gears what 343 is to Halo, it's the same failed strategy playing out, Halo was just a bigger IP so it's more noticeable.

Here's where you have no clue what you are talking about in terms of what Coalition does besides make gears. They also are a support studio who work closely with Epic Engine people for Unreal. They are very efficient.

They have way more value than 343 and are like a third of the size. They have multiple projects and support multiple studios when needed for engine help.

Gears story wise isn't in a great place, gameplay wise its fine, but the grind also is not good in terms of MP.

So I think they are going to have to think very hard how they do Gears 6 now that Rod is gone.

 

[nominedomine]

Here's where you have no clue what you are talking about in terms of what Coalition does besides make gears. They also are a support studio who work closely with Epic Engine people for Unreal. They are very efficient.

They have way more value than 343 and are like a third of the size. They have multiple projects and support multiple studios when needed for engine help.

Gears story wise isn't in a great place, gameplay wise its fine, but the grind also is not good in terms of MP.

So I think they are going to have to think very hard how they do Gears 6 now that Rod is gone.

They are working for free for Epic? What does that have to do with Gears losing relevance? We giving credit for what studios do behind the scenes besides making good games now?

 

[Papacheeks]

They are working for free for Epic? What does that have to do with Gears losing relevance? We giving credit for what studios do behind the scenes besides making good games now?

They use Unreal and are one of the most proficient because they took all tools, that were built by Epic people when Microsoft bought Gears from Epic. So they have a lot of engine customizations and experience. Some of the people at Coalition use to work for Epic. SO they have a close parnetship in terms of engine advancement.

They do other stuff for Xbox. Similar to Gureilla Games and their Decima engine which is being used by other studios.
You are right gears is slowly losing relevance, but it does not make the studio irrelevant if they have other things they work on and do within the company.

Microsoft knows that these guys help other studios out. ANd thats why even if gears is in a funk, that they are not irrelevant.
343 is becoming irrelevant because they constantly have issues project by project. Their engine sucks, and they were given time to make a new one, and it still sucks.

They are not used in any capacity for support on other IP's because they are not that good at managing themselves. But that falls on MS in how that place has operated.

 

[Swolf712]

I think he did a good job reshaping Xbox. Everything is in place for Xbox to be successful, but they really do need to get these games out. They've had a few of the newer studios for a few years now, we should definitely be seeing more.

OK that's the thing. I'll concede I can sort of see why they like him on the corporate side of things, maybe. Sure. But why on Earth do people expect gamers to worship the guy when he's really done nothing but ship mostly subpar games, buy some studios, and give them two dry years and an underwhelming Halo game thus far?

I mean the first two games to ship from Bethesda after they bought them were timed exclusive for their main competition. CoD may not even be able to go Day 1 into Game Pass until 2026. And given how he's managing studio output for their existing teams, why do people have such faith that suddenly ActiBliz and Bethesda are gonna ship nonstop 10/10 titles?

There's just some weird sway he holds over people for no real reason. At least Reggie and Iwata were delivering games consistently (even if the Wii U was a mess) to merit the celebrity status they had with fans. Phil I just don't get. It's like people just decided he was the messiah of Xbox and refuse to have it questioned by anyone.

 

[BigMclargeHuge]

I prefer Jimbo. He's upfront about being an asshole who doesn't care. Can't stand the whole fake Mr nice guy thing Phil does.

 

[mansoor1980]

i call him RUTHLESS RYAN

 

[nominedomine]

I prefer Jimbo. He's upfront about being an asshole who doesn't care. Can't stand the whole fake Mr nice guy thing Phil does.

He is not upfront on purpose, he just fails miserably at hiding it.

Phil is like a con artist that figured out people liked Shuhei Yoshida so he came up with a Silicon Valley version tailored for Xbox fans but he failed to copy the most important part, actually being good at managing studios and producing good games.

 

[Darth Vader]

When I say 9.5/10, I said for me personally. Critic wise, mid to high 80's score seems about right to me. You must take into consideration that I never played a Halo game so overall, I loved the campaign for what it is. I can't compare previous games. The audio design was excellent. Voice acting is top tier for the most part. Sound effects are good for the most part and the music soundtrack is excellent. Combat/gameplay wise, the shooting is top tier, grappling hook is a lot of fun and very useful. Visuals were the weak spot for me. I do think the choice of trees were a mistake because it makes the world especially when flying look empty and dull but on foot, I still enjoyed the art style and visuals of the game. Definitely far from the best but I wasn't playing Halo for the visuals.

1) personally, some people may enjoy Big Rigs, or whatever that game is called. It's still one of the worst games of all time, but all that matters is that some people may enjoy it. Same for Halo Infinite and your experience.

2) Can't agree mid to high 80's is fair for this game, nor that any of your assessments are accurate. However, I respect your personal opinion.

First, Sony is coming off an excellent generation and like Nintendo, have been dominant for the most part so their games should be reviewed to a higher standard because they've been #1 three out of four generations while Microsoft has been 3rd in all three of theirs. And coming off Xbox One, expectations are nowhere as high for Microsoft and their studios compared to Sony and their studios in which they're coming off their best generation game wise.

Hard disagree. Games should be reviewed for what they are, as objectively as possible. Halo should have been reviewed what it's worth, same with Horizon or GOW. What you claim there is that Microsoft should get a free pass for worse quality and production value simply because they were not as successful. IMO, a perfect example of this is something like Days Gone, which IMO is an 8/10 at release, and got mid to low 70's. I maintain to this day that if it was released as an Xbox game it would have reviewed high 80s.

Second, HFW is an excellent game but at the same time, like Halo, it does nothing new or nothing I haven't already done in other games. For the most part, it's a Ubisoft style checklist game. In a lot of ways, the game went backwards.

I cannot agree with any of this assessment. First and foremost, it is not a Ubisoft style game, unless you consider all open world experiences to be ubisoft style games. The production value around side quests and their impact on the main story, voice acting, mocap, etc, are all of higher standard for one, and the game doesn't even play like any Ubisoft game.

There's underwater but no combat and you have to hide in seaweed which was in Black Flag over 8 years ago. That's a step back. Climbing is worse and if it's not AC style where it's completely free, it's better off being like ZD where there's just climbing spots instead. The grapple hook adds nothing to game either. What does it really do? You use it to pull out metal rods from barricaded or to get a chest to come to you if you can't reach it. Also, the grapple hook seems like an extra in regards to climbing and whatnot instead of implementing free climbing which if it existed in FW, the grapple hook no longer becomes necessary.

The original game had no underwater combat, so how can it be a step back? Same with climbing, it's much improved. As for the grappling hook, I used it plenty while in combat to evade enemies.

Third, there's no air combat so what's the point in overriding a stormbird and flying? So I can get that meaningless reward at the top of the mountain or more tree branches to collect? The game is also way too big. The game is also very slow and doesn't pick up until you go through the Embassy quest where things finally get going. Next, there's the hand glider which I love in games but without free climbing, I barely used it. Only when I was high up and didn't want to climb back down.

The point is to travel faster. I agree air combat would have been fun, but its another transversal mechanic. More options, especially well designed ones, are never a negative. As for size, I found it just the right size and engaging from the beginning. The hand glider was fun as hell and again, very handy when travelling from higher spots to lower spots. Saved me substantial amounts of time and allowed me to take a breather.

Next, the side content is clear out this camp or collect this or that for an NPC that simply doesn't matter. There's way too much focus on all the visuals which in all honesty, at times is just too much. It's overdone. I don't need every spot to be filled with foliage to where I can barely see what im doing. Combat feels off at times. The valor surges add nothing and why you can only choose one out of 12 if I remember correctly defeats the entire purpose. You also feel underpowered for the majority of the game. You don't get the better equipment until 75%+ through the story and you don't get all the story equipment until a few quests before the game ends which is horrible design in my opinion. There's all this underwater areas but I can't do them until im like 90% through the story?

Side content is optional, you can avoid it. I never consider side content a negative because it's optiona. As for visuals, you just praised Halo for its visuals but somehow HFW having incredible ones is a negative?

For combat, I never felt underpowered.

I will not dissect the rest of your comment, but it's pretty much a hard disagree. The missions are way more meaningful, side missions have a story purpose and contribute to your main missions, optional content is plenty and optional... And it seems a lot of your criticism stems from just not being good at the game, which is fine. I suck at souls games, but I would absolutely not say they are not good. You are also holding FW to a different standard to Halo. By objective measures, everything technical you listed as "amazing" in Halo is better in Forbidden West - Graphics, Audio, Soundtrack, Mocap, voice acting. Every single item is superior many times over.