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[Eddie-Griffin]

Many people believe that Microsofts developed/published first party game output had dropped after a peak from 2009 to late 2010 because of Kinect. But that isn't really true and may be due to people mixing in third party exclusives with first party output. You will see below that Microsofts FP output in development and publishing hasn't really changed much over time and arguably improved in the 2nd half of the 360's life cycle.

end 2010-2011

• Fable III
• Gears of War 3
• Forza 4
• Halo Combat Evolved Remake

2012

• Forza Horizon
• Halo 4

2013

• Gears of War Judgement
• Zoo Tycoon

2014

• Fable Anniversary
• Max: Curse of brotherhood
• Forza Horizon 2

2015

• Screamride

(360 discontinued in 2016)

Now compare to the last 2 years from before just for comparison, considered to be the peak years of the 360 before the "fall" as they say.

Before late 2010

• Halo Reach
• Crackdown2
• Lips: Party Classic

2009

• Forza 3
• Lips: Number one hits
• Halo 3: ODST
• Ninja Blade
• Halo Wars

So as you can see, there's really not much of a difference between the "peak" as people say of the 360 and the "post-kinect decline" people claim, but the claim is hyperbole.

If you remove Lips, which can easily be replaced with a Kinect game and isn't what hardcore gamers are after, nor is the poor reception of N3II, You end up with one year 2009, with two Halo games and a Forza and an experimental Ninja Blade title that didn't work out. In rest of 2010 before the Kinect hype started, you have Alan Wake and Crackdown 2.

Post-Kinect you have Fable 3, one halo, one forza, and one gears within a year. Can't get more hardcore than that.

In 2012 you have a new take on Forza just using the brand name that would end up being successful called Horizon, and halo Reach.

in 2013, You get Gears and a newer game Zoo Tycoon.

In 2014, you have a Fable remake, a new IP, and the sequel to the new experimental and successful open racing game using the Forza brand, called Horizon 2.

in 2015 you also get a new IP as a send off before discontinuation.

So when people say that Microsofts "first party" game development and publishing fell after Kinect, it's simply just not true. It actually improved in quality, with more new IPS than the "peak" years that people site of the 360, being 2009 and 2010 before Kinect, as the time the 360 "took off", but as you can see people are getting confused with games not made or published by Microsoft game studios (now Xbox game studios) but likely by third parties, when you think about the 360's peak, and even many of those were still on the 360 after kinect.

So unless you're a major fan of Lips, the 360 has been pretty consistent with its first party output during the peak of the console until discontinuation. Microsofts FP has had similar output pretty much from the start. Even early favorites published like Mass Effect were not even MS IP, heck, even on this list during "peak" years, Alan Wake isn't even an MS IP. But Lips and Ninja Blade are.

I think if anything this shows Microsoft relied too much on 3rd party exclusives on the 360 like Sony with the PS2, although Sony did fix that problem with the PS3 (by force arguably) but Microsoft hasn't yet fixed that, though the recent acquisitions should put an end to that trend as soon as they release some games.

Putting in short, Microsofts FP output of their actual IP, developed or published, has been the same even post-Kinect, I believe people are just confusing third party non-MS ips with first party when they are remembering the 360, and are claiming the second half had a "drop" that didn't happen, as you can see with the lists above.

 

[jigglet]

tldr: the bar was already set really damn low

 

[jigglet]

Reminds me of Nintendo's output actually. They have the resources to make so many great games yet it always seems like a small trickle.

Sony seems to have the healthiest output but unfortunately none of them really interest me.

Ah to be a gamer. The struggle!

 

[quest]

This is why I laugh at the disingenuous people who say Microsoft shouldn't be buying studios but buying 3rd party exclusives instead. This illustration is exactly what i said before they wasted to much on 3rd parties and should of spent that buying and building up its own studios. The first couple of years i can understand Sony had a lock on 3rd parties and Microsoft had ro bribe to break that lock. After that the budget needed yo be used to build its first party studios like they are doing now. Its just going to take time.

 

[Power Pro]

Reminds me of Nintendo's output actually. They have the resources to make so many great games yet it always seems like a small trickle.

Sony seems to have the healthiest output but unfortunately none of them really interest me.

Ah to be a gamer. The struggle!

Seems like a lot of that is intentional also. Nintendo doesn't only sit on IPs, but finished games in some cases. Their excuse for not releasing Advance Wars 1+2 is stupid, because there are much more gritty war games that would feel a lot more insensitive that are still getting released in times of war than some cartoony strategy game.

Never going to forgive them for not finding a way to bring Mother 3 to the west also. Fuck them.

 

[feynoob]

Since people would keep bringing this nonstop. Here is all their list (Bethesda not included)

343 Industries	Redmond, Washington	2007	—	Established by Microsoft to oversee the development of Halo following the departure of Bungie Studios.
The Coalition	Vancouver	2010	—	Formerly named Microsoft Studios Vancouver and Black Tusk Studios. Oversees development of the Gears of War series.
Compulsion Games	Montreal	2009	2018	Founded by ex-Arkane Studios developer Guillaume Provost. Developers of Contrast and We Happy Few.
Double Fine Productions	San Francisco	2000	2019	Founded by Tim Schafer after his departure from LucasArts. Developers of Psychonauts and Brütal Legend.
The Initiative	Santa Monica, California	2018	—	Established to act as a first-party developer similar in role to Santa Monica Studio. Led by Crystal Dynamics veteran Darrell Gallagher.[101][102]
inXile Entertainment	Tustin, California	2002	2018	Founded by Brian Fargo and specializing in role-playing games. Developers of The Bard's Tale series and the Wasteland series.
Mojang Studios	Stockholm	2009	2014	Developers of Minecraft and Crown and Council.
Ninja Theory	Cambridge	2000	2018	Developers of several projects including Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice.
Obsidian Entertainment	Irvine, California	2003	2018	Development team that specializes in open-world role-playing games. Developers of Pillars of Eternity, The Outer Worlds, Avowed and Grounded.
Playground Games	Leamington Spa	2010	2018	Developers that work with Turn 10 Studios on the Forza Horizon series.[103]
Rare	Twycross	1985	2002	Developers of numerous popular games since the Nintendo 64 era. Modern releases include Sea of Thieves and Everwild.
Turn 10 Studios	Redmond, Washington	2001	—	Established by Microsoft to develop the Forza Motorsport series and associated Forza Tech engine.
Undead Labs	Seattle	2009	2018	Developers of the State of Decay series.
World's Edge	Redmond, Washington	2019	—	Created internally to oversee the Age of Empires franchise.[104]
Xbox Game Studios Publishing	Redmond, Washington	2000	—	Xbox Game Studios' first-party publishing arm.

Former[edit]​

Sold or spun off

• Access Software/Salt Lake Games Studio/Indie Games — Links series — Sold to Take-Two Interactive
• Bungie — Halo series — Became independent
• Lift London — Removed from Microsoft's games business[105]
• Twisted Pixel Games — The Gunstringer, LocoCycle, The Maw, 'Splosion Man series — Became independent
• Wingnut Interactive — Peter Jackson's joint venture game studio — Sold to WingNut Films[106][107]

Closed or consolidated

• Aces Game Studio — Microsoft Flight Simulator series — Closed
• BigPark — Kinect Joy Ride, Joy Ride Turbo — Consolidated
• Carbonated Games — Closed
• Digital Anvil — Brute Force, Freelancer — Consolidated[108]
• Ensemble Studios — Age of Empires series, Age of Mythology series, Halo Wars — Closed
• FASA Studio — MechWarrior series, Shadowrun, Crimson Skies series — Closed
• Good Science Studio — Kinect Adventures, Kinect Fun Labs, Kinect Star Wars — Consolidated
• Hired Gun — Halo 2 PC port — Consolidated[109]
• Lionhead Studios — Fable series, Black & White series — Closed
• Microsoft Studios Japan — Phantom Dust — Closed
• Microsoft Studios Victoria — Closed
• Press Play — Max: The Curse of Brotherhood, Kalimba — Closed
• Team Dakota — Project Spark — Consolidated
• Xbox Entertainment Studios — Closed (TV and movie studio)
• Xbox Live Productions — Consolidated (Publishing arm)

 

[Eddie-Griffin]

This is why I laugh at the disingenuous people who say Microsoft shouldn't be buying studios but buying 3rd party exclusives instead. This illustration is exactly what i said before they wasted to much on 3rd parties and should of spent that buying and building up its own studios. The first couple of years i can understand Sony had a lock on 3rd parties and Microsoft had ro bribe to break that lock. After that the budget needed yo be used to build its first party studios like they are doing now. Its just going to take time.

Sony was in this same situation before the PS3 debacle and were forced to build their own studios to make up for games skipping their platform and to save the consoles, and we saw the results of that at the end of the gen and the fruits through the PS4. During the Xbox One gen Microsoft was still using the 360 strategy though Mattrick did reconvert some studios before going but phil crashed them all, so he had to buy studios in order to have a bigger in-house.

So starting possibly in 2023, Xbox may finally be out of that cycle, and this gen will have them finally putting out significant in-house output.

On the 360 they had 2nd parties and third-party deals for exclusives out the wazoo, and several of those 2nd parties were not real second parties because it wasn't even MS own IP. Gears wasn't even Microsofts own IP until they brought the franchise later.

The list above is low during the peaking years already but when you remove the games that aren't actually MS ips for the time then you can objectively argue their FP actually improved in the later half of the 360 lifecycle for ips they actually owned.

360 was a great console, and many FP stuff they owned the IP of was good too, but there was never really that many of them outside possibly the launch years with all the experimental stuff many of which didn't do too hot, other than Ironically games like Perfect Dark Zero.

Since people would keep bringing this nonstop. Here is all their list (Bethesda not included)

This is about the 360, so this isn't very relevant. Just shows what Phil had to do later with the Xbox One. But this is just showing the 360 didn't really have massive FP output before kinect and there was a drop in post- it was mostly the similar, especially for AAA, and even worse than post-kinect for owned IP during the "peak" years.

 

[feynoob]

The problem is forum people have narrowed mind, and live in hive minded community. It's hard for them to accept other narratives, other than the ones that agree with their view point.
Instead of actually doing some research, and finding out the issue themselves, they rely on circle jerking and me vs them narrative.

I wish people can step out of it, and do themselves a favor. A quick Google research isn't going to hurt them.

 

[feynoob]

This is about the 360, so this isn't very relevant. Just shows what Phil had to do later with the Xbox One. But this is just showing the 360 didn't really have massive FP output before kinect and there was a drop in post- it was mostly the similar, especially for AAA, and even worse than post-kinect for owned IP during the "peak" years.

It does, as lower studios means less output. Which is why Xbox one suffered massively.

X360 as you stated had tons of 3rd party exclusives. That covered the lack of 1st party studios. Xbox one showed how bad the issue was, once there was less 3rd party exclusives.

If they had some of these studios early, Xbox one would have been different. Obsidian and ninja theory would have made them some extra games.

Imagine 4-6 games from these 2 studios.

 

[Monad]

But... but... Monopoly!

 

[ChorizoPicozo]

Forza, Gears, Halo, forza, gears, halo, forza, gears,halo

 

[Eddie-Griffin]

X360 as you stated had tons of 3rd party exclusives. That covered the lack of 1st party studios. Xbox one showed how bad the issue was, once there was less 3rd party exclusives.

Xbox One had plenty of TP exclusives until Phil cut up the studios and ran on fumes from 2015 until the acquisitions started in 2017 because he focused on hardware and services. It also had a higher FP and TO presence early on.

Xbox's FP dev/pub output was pretty much the same until then as it was during 2009+, which was the point of the thread.

Forza, Gears, Halo, forza, gears, halo, forza, gears,halo

And this popular meme was always suspect. What's funny is 2011 which had a game from all 3 of them in the same year, was NOT considered the year of the fall and no one was using this at that time. It really shows the mindset at the time.

People just overhated Kinect, and what's funny is even with that MS themselves did not dev/pub as many games s people thought. In fact third parties is like 98% of the Kinect library if not more.

 

[DavJay]

For me, 360 was just the console to get because everything was jump shipping from PS to Xbox. From DMC, Resident Evil, Tekken to Final Fantasy. Personally I just knew I had games I wanted to play.

 

[feynoob]

Xbox One had plenty of TP exclusives until Phil cut up the studios and ran on fumes from 2015 until the acquisitions started in 2017 because he focused on hardware and services. It also had a higher FP and TO presence early on

Do you know how long it takes to make games, and what games did those supposed studios made, or what happened to them?
The only major closer was lionshead studio.
The rest were small doing smaller project.

3rd party I can agree with that. It was super weak during his era.

 

[Eddie-Griffin]

Do you know how long it takes to make games,

Which is why cancelling and killing all those studios was a dumb move that made it so he had to work overtime on acquisitions.

This was already listed elsewhere, Microsoft has a crap ton of studios before Phil started chomping them down to a few. In the Don vs. Phil games thread, the one no one could defend Phil on games and defended him on everything except games.

But again this thread is about the 360 output from peak to the often cited "bad" second half, yet the FP output isn't much different and arguably worse.

As I said I believe the issue in this case is people mixing up TP and non-MS owned Ips and misremembering them as proper FP.

 

[ChorizoPicozo]

And this popular meme was always suspect. What's funny is 2011 which had a game from all 3 of them in the same year, was NOT considered the year of the fall and no one was using this at that time. It really shows the mindset at the time.

People just overhated Kinect, and what's funny is even with that MS themselves did not dev/pub as many games s people thought. In fact third parties are like 98% of the Kinect library if not more.

And they (MS) double down on it for Xbone.

 

[quest]

Do you know how long it takes to make games, and what games did those supposed studios made, or what happened to them?
The only major closer was lionshead studio.
The rest were small doing smaller project.

3rd party I can agree with that. It was super weak during his era.

Phil had shit for budgets until 2018 and he got some money to buy some small studios and playground. Then got serious money for zenimax. But it takes cash to fix years of neglect buy the parent company.

Xbox can play the long game with its exclusive titles, but not forever

A bit of a meme has been developing around Xbox's first-party lineup, which frankly hasn't been as grand as its competition as of late.

www.windowscentral.com

I've been told that the budget for exclusive publishing deals, which previously led to games like Quantum Break and Ryse, has been low, and Xbox has been using the budget it does have to place an emphasis on other areas.

 

[Woopah]

The difference in number so games wasn't that drastic. But I think Rare and Lionhead being moved to Kinect games at roughly the same period of time as Ensemble being closed down and Bungie and Epic not working with MS anymore definitely impacted people's perception.

Reminds me of Nintendo's output actually. They have the resources to make so many great games yet it always seems like a small trickle.

Sony seems to have the healthiest output but unfortunately none of them really interest me.

Ah to be a gamer. The struggle!

Nintendo published 11 games this year, they are one of the most prolific publishers in the industry.

 

[feynoob]

Phil had shit for budgets until 2018 and he got some money to buy some small studios and playground. Then got serious money for zenimax. But it takes cash to fix years of neglect buy the parent company.

http://[URL]https://www.windowscent...long-game-its-exclusive-line-time-running-out

[/URL]

I've been told that the budget for exclusive publishing deals, which previously led to games like Quantum Break and Ryse, has been low, and Xbox has been using the budget it does have to place an emphasis on other areas.

If Xbox didn't have any budget issues, they wouldn't have been in this situation at all.

MS is basically giving them 75b at this moment. They should have done that during Xbox one. They would have gotten Activision and blizzard for cheap.

 

[TGO]

 

[Imtjnotu]

Damage controlling 2013?

 

[bender]

Damage controlling 2013?

2013 was amazing.

 

[Kilau]

So the “golden age” of Xbox was when they secured a ton of 3rd party exclusives.

 

[feynoob]

Which is why cancelling and killing all those studios was a dumb move that made it so he had to work overtime on acquisitions.

Only 2 big canceled was lionshead and Xbox Japan studios.
Most other studios were shut down before Xbox one, and the ones after that were small 2d , or arcade games.
The rest was consolidated with other studios.

So in fact, Phil didn't really trim down their studios aside of these 2.

This was already listed elsewhere, Microsoft has a crap ton of studios before Phil started chomping them down to a few. In the Don vs. Phil games thread, the one no one could defend Phil on games and defended him on everything except games.

Look at the list I showed you to see how much shit it was.

 

[nial]

Late 2005-2006:

Project Gotham Racing 3
Kameo: Elements of Power
Perfect Dark Zero
N3: Ninety-Nine Nights
Gears of War
Viva Piñata

2007:

Fuzion Frenzy 2
Crackdown
Forza Motorsport 2
Shadowrun
Tenchu Z
Blue Dragon
Halo 3
Project Gotham Racing 4
Viva Piñata: Party Animals
Mass Effect

2008:

Kingdom Under Fire: Circle of Doom
Lost Odyssey
Too Human
Viva Piñata: Trouble in Paradise
Fable II
Gears of War 2
Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts

2009:

Halo Wars
Ninja Blade
Halo 3: ODST
Forza Motorsport 3

January-October 2010:

Alan Wake
Crackdown 2
Halo: Reach
Fable III (released right before Kinect)

It wasn't perfect by any means, but it was much better than the post-Kinect era.

 

[bentanchorbolt]

MS no longer was seeking third party exclusives and the studios they did have were focused on the Halo, Gears, Forza rotation, and took other studios coming off Kinect to get going, like Rare. Scalebound and Fable Legends getting cancelled were blows as well. 2023 needs to be a banger after all the money being thrown around to make up for lost time.

 

[ProtoByte]

So what you're saying is that Microsoft has always leaned mostly on moneyhats, and has never really been willing or able to spend the time, money and effort to build their game-making infrastructure internally?

I mean, yeah. They even bought Gears.

 

[Jubenhimer]

It was more so the criticism was most of Microsoft's output was going towards Kinect games and features, and less towards more traditional "core" games, where all we were getting was yearly Halo/Forza/Gears. Meanwhile, Sony put a lot of time, money and effort into ensuring the PlayStation 3 had a large and robust library of first party games for different audiences. Even if you didn't want or own PlayStation Move, there were still games like Uncharted 2 & 3, InFamous 2, The Last of Us, Heavy Rain, etc. still coming out.

 

[Eddie-Griffin]

Phil had shit for budgets until 2018

Myth that was busted long ago, he didn't have the money he has now but he spend a great sum on odd deals, a heavy relaunch marketing campaign for Xbox One, and research and release for the One S and the One X, along with the money spend on the BC and the GP service along with other features. None of that were games however.

Late 2005-2006:

2007:

2008:

2009:

January-October 2010:

It wasn't perfect by any means, but it was much better than the post-Kinect era.

If you have to go below 2008 (which still isn't that hot and includes game IP not owned by MS) that kind of proves my point that the 360 at it's "peak" wasn't filled with FP game output compared to post-Kinect.

Only 2 big canceled was lionshead and Xbox Japan studios.

You're being dishonest and know exact what I am saying, you are purposefully skipping ahead because you can't actually defend Phil.

Your list has nothing to do with Phil closing down 20 studios and only have around 5 left. Those came after he had put himself in a position where he had to buy studios. Which was my entire point, there was still FP output and TP exclusive output through deals, during the early part of the Xbox One just like the 360, that only ended when Phil halted games developed by some of those studios, closed most of them, and had the others move to support teams, some of which were closed later.

Phil did not "inherit" 5 game studios he created only 5 major game studios.

 

[Eddie-Griffin]

It was more so the criticism was most of Microsoft's output was going towards Kinect games and features,

Except this isn't true, as just shown from the high-end of the 360 people cite to the end of the 360 the actual first party game output was pretty much on par. There were also a decent amount of TP exclusives during those times as well not listed.

Microsoft actually barely supported kinect directly through first party. Fable the Journey, Rare with Kinect Sports, and Fable the Journey were the only major titles along with the launch game Kinect Adventures, to really be done on Kinect by Microsoft directly. The other 20 games was MS just slapping their logo on a bunch of TP games, they barely contributed to the funding themselves.

That's opposite for games like the original Mass Effect, Saints Row, or Alan Wake where they were more involved with the games. Microsoft never really took Kinect that seriously in terms of being hand-on. Even Kinect was mainly a third-party affair, in fact, more so than the 360 was outside of Kinect.

 

[feynoob]

You're being dishonest and know exact what I am saying, you are purposefully skipping ahead because you can't actually defend Phil.

Your list has nothing to do with Phil closing down 20 studios and only have around 5 left. Those came after he had put himself in a position where he had to buy studios. Which was my entire point, there was still FP output and TP exclusive output through deals, during the early part of the Xbox One just like the 360, that only ended when Phil halted games developed by some of those studios, closed most of them, and had the others move to support teams, some of which were closed later.

Phil did not "inherit" 5 game studios he created only 5 major game studios.

If you cant see the issue here, then its not worth arguing with you on that hill.

 

[bentanchorbolt]

The outcome of this thread will truly enrich the lives of those invested here.

 

[nial]

If you have to go below 2008

Man what is your point, what do you think people mean with "first half of its lifecycle"?

The outcome of this thread will truly enrich the lives of those invested here.

says in a gaming forum, although I agree that this topic is pretty dumb

 

[ZehDon]

* Makes post trying to show Xbox 360 didn't have a drop off in exclusives in the second half of its life *
* Excludes most of the first half of its life *
* Complains when people point this out *

Maybe Sony are right to try and kill video game forums...

 

[Warablo]

So the “golden age” of Xbox was when they secured a ton of 3rd party exclusives.

Also had the best online experience. They were never in business owning and creating the IP's, but let Bungie go for the Halo IP. Then later bought Gears IP.


I don't think Phil Spencer really closed any studios that were making anything good. Think they were all mobile, tv, and Kinect stuff.

 

[Eddie-Griffin]

Also had the best online experience. They were never in business owning and creating the IP's, but let Bungie go for the Halo IP. Then later bought Gears IP.


I don't think Phil Spencer really closed any studios that were making anything good. Think they were all mobile, tv, and Kinect stuff.

Except they weren't, it takes little time to research, Kinect studios were already mostly dead aside from 3 when Xbox One was launched. He had 30 studios until 2015 when Phil started cutting them down and ended up with 5 on the low end. Two were newer, Phil had no replacement plan he just cut them off in the middle of whatever they were working on.

Man what is your point,

Reading the thread may help with that.

Also no one said "first half of the life cycle" they say "2nd half of the life cycle" you know that's what the thread is about.

If you cant see the issue here, then its not worth arguing with you on that hill.

No, this is you not able to support your other poor argument based on the list. You presented the list without reason because you weren't paying attention to defend Phil Between the "peak" of the 360 and post-Kinect Xbox's FP barely changed, that is the point of the thread, and that includes the first couple years of the Xbox One as well, where as Phil after that not only destroyed several studios in the middle of making games and cancelling them, but he also cut the amount of TP exclusive deals Xbox was having as well.

As said in the Donv vs. Phil thread no Phil defender here can defend him on games, will complain about him in regards to games even, until Don or late 60 is brought up and then people will suddenly defend him instead of complain about him, except, they won't ever defend him on games they will always dodge the topic, or in your case, skip ahead of the time frame of the conversation.

Make up your minds. Has Phil been bad with games so far or not? It should be obvious based on many recent reactions here to news and a certain event that just passed by the answer is yes.

20FP to 5, a bunch of TP exclusives deals to few, then suddenly he starts buying studios? This is not a very hard puzzle to put together.

 

[feynoob]

No, this is you not able to support your other poor argument based on the list. You presented the list without reason because you weren't paying attention to defend Phil Between the "peak" of the 360 and post-Kinect Xbox's FP barely changed, that is the point of the thread, and that includes the first couple years of the Xbox One as well, where as Phil after that not only destroyed several studios in the middle of making games and cancelling them, but he also cut the amount of TP exclusive deals Xbox was having as well.

As said in the Donv vs. Phil thread no Phil defender here can defend him on games, will complain about him in regards to games even, until Don or late 60 is brought up and then people will suddenly defend him instead of complain about him, except, they won't ever defend him on games they will always dodge the topic, or in your case, skip ahead of the time frame of the conversation.

Make up your minds. Has Phil been bad with games so far or not? It should be obvious based on many recent reactions here to news and a certain event that just passed by the answer is yes.

20FP to 5, a bunch of TP exclusives deals to few, then suddenly he starts buying studios? This is not a very hard puzzle to put together.

The entire point is MS should have bought the studios during xbox 360, which would have helped xbox one.
By the time Phil took the helm, Xbox studios division was a mess.

https://news.xbox.com/en-us/2014/01/27/games-microsoft-studios-gears-of-war/

Plyground becomes a first party studios
https://news.xbox.com/en-us/2018/06/10/e3-2018-playground-games-joins-microsoft-studios/

Undead labs becomes a first party studios.
https://www.seattletimes.com/busine...ining-microsoft-but-stays-focused-on-zombies/

These are the studios and franchices which made games during xbox 360. Other studios could have bought these guys.

We are not even counting other studios MS turned down early.

https://www.mcvuk.com/business-news...ed-enough-muscle-to-be-acquired-by-microsoft/

Microsoft had tons of chances to strengthen their 1st party studios, yet they ignored time and time.

 

[Eddie-Griffin]

The entire point is MS should have bought the studios during xbox 360, which would have helped xbox one.

They didn't need to, they could have just built the peak of 20 they ended up with, perhaps organized them and streamlined them to be more efficient as well, without having to deal with additional costs. The Xbox One got in trouble because Phil changed that, I don't know how good your memory is but last I checked, Xbox One had games from launch across to the end of 2014, and people were complaining about PS4's games.

The problem with the Xbox One is Phil did not buy any studios as he took the helms, he did not replace what games he cancelled, he did not replace what studios he closed or deconverted, he did did not go after studios that ended up being let go, he had to go to Nadella after switching to services and hardware (One S, and One X, BC, and GP) to be able to "quickly" reverse the mistake he made which is why they went on a studio buying spree. Xbox One end of 2013 didn't need any new studios to be brought, they would be great sure, but it wasn't a "have to do" situation. Few of those studios were actually brought as well, that's the irony about this whole thing.

People say Xbox should have build studios during the 360 era and they missed out, they are right. BUT they did build up their FP by the launch of the Xbox One, and all of that was turned to dust. Then they had to buy studios to make up for it.

 

[nial]

Reading the thread may help with that.

Also no one said "first half of the life cycle" they say "2nd half of the life cycle" you know that's what the thread is about.

The consensus is that the second half is bad compared to the first. You say people get confused about what IPs MS actually owns from the games they published in the first half, however apart from just Tenchu, Mass Effect and Alan Wake, everything else is first-party.

 

[Eddie-Griffin]

The consensus is that the second half is bad compared to the first.

No, the consensus is that the post-kinect is when FP fell and the peak was before Kinect, as shown the FP output really wasn't much different, especially for core gamers.

That doesn't improve that much regardless though. People are thinking of a lot more games than there actually was were FP. People still say Gears now but until after Gears 3 MS didn't even own the IP.

 

[nial]

No, the consensus is that the post-kinect is when FP fell and the peak was before Kinect, as shown the FP output really wasn't much different, especially for core gamers.

You may be taking that too literally. What people really mean is that Microsoft's peak as a publisher comes from the first few years in the Xbox 360 era, before the release of Kinect. From what I know, I'm pretty sure 2007 is considered their best year.

 

[ungalo]

Well to be fair your comparison shows a decline after 2011.

It's just that the peak of the 360 is not 2009, it's even before. 2007-2008 are the years where 360 just obliterates PS3. It's just that for sales the peak was later than that.

But it's one thing to have a weaker year. But we see that after 2011 it was consistently very poor. It's highly probable Kinect had a role in that, even if it was already out by the end of 2010.

Still the beginning of Xbox One showed they were still into games at that time.

 

[feynoob]

They didn't need to, they could have just built the peak of 20 they ended up with, perhaps organized them and streamlined them to be more efficient as well, without having to deal with additional costs. The Xbox One got in trouble because Phil changed that, I don't know how good your memory is but last I checked, Xbox One had games from launch across to the end of 2014, and people were complaining about PS4's games.

????

The problem with the Xbox One is Phil did not buy any studios as he took the helms, he did not replace what games he cancelled, he did not replace what studios he closed or deconverted, he did did not go after studios that ended up being let go, he had to go to Nadella after switching to services and hardware (One S, and One X, BC, and GP) to be able to "quickly" reverse the mistake he made which is why they went on a studio buying spree. Xbox One end of 2013 didn't need any new studios to be brought, they would be great sure, but it wasn't a "have to do" situation. Few of those studios were actually brought as well, that's the irony about this whole thing.

????

People say Xbox should have build studios during the 360 era and they missed out, they are right. BUT they did build up their FP by the launch of the Xbox One, and all of that was turned to dust. Then they had to buy studios to make up for it.

???

My god, you do really hate Phil. It's best for me to give up.

 

[ChorizoPicozo]

Tonight I will touch myself while reading this thread.

 

[feynoob]

Tonight I will touch myself while reading this thread.

Don't forget about Deadpool. He doesn't like to be left alone.

 

[diffusionx]

Even MS referred to the Kinect as a new launch for the system. They acknowledged changing the strategy and audience of the hardware. They shut down several internal studios especially on PC side. And they promoted Mattrick who only cared about Kinect.

 

[Fahdis]

Reminds me of Nintendo's output actually. They have the resources to make so many great games yet it always seems like a small trickle.

Sony seems to have the healthiest output but unfortunately none of them really interest me.

Ah to be a gamer. The struggle!

That's how I feel about Nintendo. Can't play their games.

 

[Redneckerz]

Many people believe that Microsofts developed/published first party game output had dropped after a peak from 2009 to late 2010 because of Kinect.

Who? Your thread ain't starting well if the first thing required for your argument is an ad populum.

But that isn't really true and may be due to people mixing in third party exclusives with first party output.

So basically you don't know and are juat making some subjective conjecture.

Cool thread. I love the baselessness here. And no, listing games per year isn't evidence for what you are suggesting here.

Putting in short, Microsofts FP output of their actual IP, developed or published, has been the same even post-Kinect, I believe people are just confusing third party non-MS ips with first party when they are remembering the 360, and are claiming the second half had a "drop" that didn't happen, as you can see with the lists above.

The question that arises to me is why you seem to care a great deal about this and/or what other people thought of it back in the day. Feels like a filler thread, reads like one.

 

[Godot25]

Sorry, but you absolutely need to count games like Bioshock, Mass Effect etc. Yeah, I know that they were later ported to PS3, but at the time of release they were directly tied to X360 and if you had PS3, you were shit out of luck. But later Microsoft stopped doing deals like that. That's why there was "drop-of" of "exclusives" on the platform. Even in 360 era Microsoft did not have plenty of first-party studios, but they compensated well with partnerships like Epic (Gears), BioWare (Mass Effect) etc. Once they stopped doing that it was pretty clear they have big "exclusives" problem which manifested mainly after first year of Xbox One gen and it haunts them to this day.

They started to remedy that in 2018 when they finally got proper budget and Myerson was out of Microsoft. Which was "too late" for start of this gen, but I'm not planning to complain that they have 23 studios rn. Even if I prefer for them to start investing sooner.

So no, there IS significant drop-of in exclusive content on X360 post-kinect era. But mainly because Microsoft stopped doing exclusivity deals.

 

[jroc74]

I always thought this image was accurate, maybe I'm wrong. If I am, so be it. I will stand corrected if I'm wrong.

Damage controlling 2013?

What a time to be alive.

So the “golden age” of Xbox was when they secured a ton of 3rd party exclusives.

So what you're saying is that Microsoft has always leaned mostly on moneyhats, and has never really been willing or able to spend the time, money and effort to build their game-making infrastructure internally?

I mean, yeah. They even bought Gears.

Whew...

Oh, but that was different.