Microsoft Xbox news and discussion thread

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DomsBeard
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Re: Microsoft Xbox news and discussion thread

Post by DomsBeard »

Scrustle wrote: July 23rd, 2020, 7:16 pm So apparently Halo Infinite is going to be a "platform", and they're not expecting to be making any full sequel for the foreseeable future. The article did also say this doesn't mean it's a service game, but come on, what else is that word supposed to mean? Not doing a lot to instill confidence...

https://www.ign.com/articles/halo-infin ... industries

(Also it turns out it wasn't the Arbiter mentioned in the trailer, but the "Harbinger", whatever that is)
Harbinger was the bad guy in Mass Effect 2............

Imagine that cross over
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Angry_Kurt
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Re: Microsoft Xbox news and discussion thread

Post by Angry_Kurt »

Agree with you Scrustle, was underwhelmed by it all. The gameplay of Halo looked good but graphically, even in 4K I thought even current gen open world games looked better
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Re: Microsoft Xbox news and discussion thread

Post by Angry_Kurt »

My highlight though was The Gunk, looked interesting and graphically nice. It's also by the Steamworld game devs so is likely to be very good too.
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Sinclair Gregstrum
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Re: Microsoft Xbox news and discussion thread

Post by Sinclair Gregstrum »

To be honest I've been really surprised that people are so negative/apathetic about that show.

For me that was a diverse line-up of 25 really interesting looking games. Halo, Forza, Fable, Hellblade, Avowed, Everwild, State of Decay, Psychonauts.....from some of the reaction online so many people seem to be claiming there is nothing that interests them in the entire line-up they showed. If that's honestly the case then people are entitled their opinion, but personally I like FPSs, racers, RPGs, platformers, narrative-driven adventures, MMOs, puzzle games...

The bigger thing than even the games themselves though - every single title in that showcase comes day and date to Game Pass. Every single one!

In a world where a typical new release video game costs, give-or-take, £50 (and is probably going to cost more pretty soon), and where many games are being designed to extract even more money out of you after that first purchase with microtransactions, the fact people aren't falling over themselves with delight and praise for this is a bit nuts to me. Particularly when there is nothing that even comes close to this proposition on any other platform.

There are obviously happy people out there so I'm not tarring everyone with the same brush, and again everyone is entitled to their own opinion. But there is a significant volume of people on the internet who are basically talking about nothing but graphics and shrugging their shoulders after what they've just seen, and all that makes me feel is, "blimey, have they missed they point!".

Alanah Pearce has put up an interesting video with a similar sentiment if you find yourself with 10 minutes spare (so at least I'm not the only one with this view  :roll: ):

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Angry_Kurt
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Re: Microsoft Xbox news and discussion thread

Post by Angry_Kurt »

I agree that they did have a wide variety of games and at lot I was interested in, but I think I was expecting more gameplay to be shown. For example with Hellblade 2, all they pretty much said was that the game is set in Iceland, all the footage they showed was from the previous trailer. From what I remember only Halo from the first party studios shows a gameplay demo.
Someone on Twitter put it well when they said it was a great advert for Game Pass, rather than a great advert for upgrading to a new console.
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Re: Microsoft Xbox news and discussion thread

Post by Flabyo »

The most striking thing for me was how grimdark a lot of it was. There’s great stuff in there, but so *much* overlap of theme and general aesthetic vibe.

The sony presentation mixed it up a lot more I felt, there was a lot less of the ‘dudes with guns’ in their one.

Also, very little gameplay was shown, a lot of the titles were given little more than a ‘this exists’ short cg trailer. If we’re going to give Nintendo grief when they do that, it’s only fair to do so here.

Halo will be good I’m sure, and I’ll enjoy it. Same for Hellblade, and whatever Obsidians thing turns out to be.

I guess my problem with it wasn’t what they announced, but how they did it. It lacked ‘oomph’.
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Sinclair Gregstrum
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Re: Microsoft Xbox news and discussion thread

Post by Sinclair Gregstrum »

Angry_Kurt wrote: July 24th, 2020, 10:33 am I agree that they did have a wide variety of games and at lot I was interested in, but I think I was expecting more gameplay to be shown. For example with Hellblade 2, all they pretty much said was that the game is set in Iceland, all the footage they showed was from the previous trailer. From what I remember only Halo from the first party studios shows a gameplay demo.
Someone on Twitter put it well when they said it was a great advert for Game Pass, rather than a great advert for upgrading to a new console.
I think that's all fair comment, and I think that's essentially what it was - not an advert for Game Pass exactly, but an advert for Xbox as a platform, as an ecosystem.

Series X is part of that, but is not the be-all end-all of it, and I think that is counter to what we traditionally expect when a new console launches. For decades a new console generation brings with it a start-from-scratch mentality that we're all essentially conditioned to at this point, and that is to a large extent what the market leader - Sony - is still doing with PS5.

What we're getting from Microsoft now is very different. They are still bringing a very powerful new box to the table, but it is being positioned as the vehicle by which you access a service.

It seems from reaction online though that people don't seem to be getting it. Understanding it and not liking it as an approach is one thing. To each their own and all that. But to me it's the seeming lack of comprehension about what is being offered which I found confusing. Now maybe that's Microsoft's fault by not making it clear enough. Personally I find it pretty clear, but that doesn't mean everyone else does of course.

It’s almost like Microsoft are doing a Nintendo - going off on a tangent in search of success on their own terms, and actually not directly competing with anyone. But instead of doing that through hardware differentiation like Nintendo, they’re doing it through software and services. Other than the baseline boxes themselves, really Playstation and Xbox are now offering completely different propositions in how you buy and play video games. It’ll be really interesting to see how it all pans out!
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Sinclair Gregstrum
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Re: Microsoft Xbox news and discussion thread

Post by Sinclair Gregstrum »

Flabyo wrote: July 24th, 2020, 11:05 am The most striking thing for me was how grimdark a lot of it was. There’s great stuff in there, but so *much* overlap of theme and general aesthetic vibe.

The sony presentation mixed it up a lot more I felt, there was a lot less of the ‘dudes with guns’ in their one.

Also, very little gameplay was shown, a lot of the titles were given little more than a ‘this exists’ short cg trailer. If we’re going to give Nintendo grief when they do that, it’s only fair to do so here.

Halo will be good I’m sure, and I’ll enjoy it. Same for Hellblade, and whatever Obsidians thing turns out to be.

I guess my problem with it wasn’t what they announced, but how they did it. It lacked ‘oomph’.
Yeah I do agree with a lot of this. I didn't find it quite as samey is you Flabyo, but I was surprised that we didn't get more straight-up gameplay, particularly after the fair criticism they got after the last event.

In terms of 'oomph', I think if Fable had been a surprise it would have felt very different, but then Microsoft knew that was the worst kept secret in gaming beforehand so it's on them I guess that they didn't bring anything else to the table to counter that.
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Scrustle
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Re: Microsoft Xbox news and discussion thread

Post by Scrustle »

Yeah I agree with Kurt. I can't get interested when they didn't really show anything of the games themselves. I can see it very much being the case that a lot of the games they announced or had trailers for might be something I would be really happy with. But what they actually showed got most of these games told us nothing except a name and a general visual tone. No idea how they play, how they are structured, etc. Like this could be the big comeback for Forza and Fable that I've hoped for for years. But at this point I have no idea what either are like. Hellblade is a game I bang on about as being one of the best in recent years, but like Kurt said, all we know about the sequel is that it's set in Iceland now. What is that supposed to tell me? I can see Avowed and Everwild being something that could be right up my alley. But what are they? No clue.

I think Psychonauts and The Gunk do deserve some credit though. The former actually got a decent trailer, and the latter was a new announcement (as far as I'm aware) and has an interesting art style. Although I thought the tone of the trailer was pretty unfitting for what it looked like the game was going for. But those were small consolations for something that should have been pulling out the biggest guns MS has to really sell us on their new console. Especially when Psychonauts is multiplatform.
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Re: Microsoft Xbox news and discussion thread

Post by Angry_Kurt »

Sinclair Gregstrum wrote: July 24th, 2020, 11:08 am

It’s almost like Microsoft are doing a Nintendo - going off on a tangent in search of success on their own terms, and actually not directly competing with anyone. But instead of doing that through hardware differentiation like Nintendo, they’re doing it through software and services. Other than the baseline boxes themselves, really Playstation and Xbox are now offering completely different propositions in how you buy and play video games. It’ll be really interesting to see how it all pans out!
[/quote]

Yeah this is a really good point, Xbox basically doing there own thing now like Nintendo do
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Re: Microsoft Xbox news and discussion thread

Post by Stanshall »

It does seem like there are three separate approaches these days, and I really like that.

Sony - Buy our box, buy our games.

MS - Sub to GP, choose a device to suit your needs.

Nintendo - Buy our unique device, buy our unique games (sometimes again).

My wishlist for each would be:

MS - Some more first-party, single-player big-budget adventures that really push the tech, a la TLOU2/Ghost. Most of their big games don't interest me but I otherwise can't complain about the service provided.

Nintendo - More frequent communication, improved online infrastructure, backwards compatibility/increased availability of legacy stuff. I don't think any of this will happen.

Sony - I genuinely couldn't ask for anything more from them this gen. I haven't especially enjoyed some of their big hitters (GoW, Death Stranding, Spider-Man, PSVR) but there has been far more than enough with TLOU2, FF7R, GT Sport, Tetris Effect and of course Bloodborne.

I think next gen is shaping up to be fantastic and for someone like me who will upgrade both (all three?) consoles, the choice will be amazing. I particularly like the fact that 4k/60 seems to be the standard on the XSX with current gen games getting upgraded. That's a real bonus.
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Angry_Kurt
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Re: Microsoft Xbox news and discussion thread

Post by Angry_Kurt »

I agree with you with what MS and Nintendo can improve, with Sony I would just like to see a wider variety of exclusives as even though they are tonally different, they are mostly third person action games with a narrative focus. Personally I'd like them to do a new IP FPS.
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Re: Microsoft Xbox news and discussion thread

Post by Sinclair Gregstrum »

Agree with most of what Stanshall says there (although you didn't like Spider-Man?? Dude...). Especially agree that we're going to get absolutely none of the things on that Nintendo wishlist!

Also agree with Angry K's point and it's something I've felt for a while. The quality of what Sony's first party studios puts out is not in question, and after a relatively slow start this gen they have delivered some truly fantastic games on PS4. In light of that it seems churlish to criticise at all, but I do agree there is a lack of variety there. They've got third person action/adventures of various flavours nailed to the point of masterpiece status, but they are light in pretty much any other genre. Even Gran Turismo has gone a bit stale as their racer vs for example how Forza has been freshened up with the Horizon games.

I'm sure it's something they're looking at, but I do think they need to expand the variety on offer within the next couple of years. This is a big if, but if the likes of the new Fable, Everwild, Avowed etc really hit big to become AAA Xbox franchises along with the usual Xbox tentpoles, Sony could find themselves looking a bit one-note. But then as long as they keep releasing awesome third person action/adventures that sell millions of copies do they really care :roll:
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Re: Microsoft Xbox news and discussion thread

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Angry_Kurt wrote: July 23rd, 2020, 10:46 pm Agree with you Scrustle, was underwhelmed by it all. The gameplay of Halo looked good but graphically, even in 4K I thought even current gen open world games looked better
Literally so hyped for Halo Infinite. I haven't been excited about a game in years and the gameplay looked so fun (in terms of grappling on to enemies and all of the cool new enemies). The best thing about it was that it looked like Halo Infinite was in the same style as the first game - semi-open world.

Graphically, it didn't blow me away, but looked nice and crispy.
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Re: Microsoft Xbox news and discussion thread

Post by Angry_Kurt »

Read an interesting theory just now. It was that MS might not release any future Minecraft updates on other platforms. At first I thought why would they do that, but the theory was that they could use minecraft as leverage to getting Nintendo and Sony to agree to allowing Game Pass/xcloud on their platforms. I don’t think it’ll happen but interesting nonetheless
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Re: Microsoft Xbox news and discussion thread

Post by HaloFandango »

Angry_Kurt wrote: August 2nd, 2020, 1:50 pm Read an interesting theory just now. It was that MS might not release any future Minecraft updates on other platforms. At first I thought why would they do that, but the theory was that they could use minecraft as leverage to getting Nintendo and Sony to agree to allowing Game Pass/xcloud on their platforms. I don’t think it’ll happen but interesting nonetheless
That's an interesting theory indeed, I can't imagine Microsoft would do such a thing, as they would probably have legal ramifications/mass refunds if they stop supporting particular versions of Minecraft on rival platforms.
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Re: Microsoft Xbox news and discussion thread

Post by HaloFandango »

Halo Infinite has now been delayed until next year. What does everyone think of the delay?

For me, with all the recent news that has come out of 343 Industries regarding the work environment, hiring and firing of independent contractors and the effect the corona situation has had, it isn't surprising they are delaying the game. Plus the lukewarm reception of its graphics during the gameplay reveal trailer didn't help (for me, the graphics looked nice, but I was more focused on the gameplay).

I'm totally fine with the delay - it just makes a more polished and fun experience for everyone, so take as long as you like 343.

With Microsoft's strategy, it seems that they aren't focusing on the Xbox Series X, instead providing choice of platform, for example, you can play Halo Infinite on the Xbox One, Series X or Windows PCs. I feel they aren't focused on selling hardware as such, just getting their games to as many people as possible.
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Re: Microsoft Xbox news and discussion thread

Post by Flabyo »

I think a lot of big games that were announced for fourth quarter will slip. Those that were past content lock and were just into bug fixing probably won’t be overly affected by Covid, but anything that was further out than that will suffer (and the amount to which they do will depend on how good the company is about adjusting to a 100% work from home setup)
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Re: Microsoft Xbox news and discussion thread

Post by dezm0nd »

Microsoft have just revealed their look and price for the Series S.

$299!

Bold move to price the S first and makes Sony think.

This whole game of chicken is ridiculous, really, but when news drops the anticipation for the retort is quite exciting
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Re: Microsoft Xbox news and discussion thread

Post by Alex79 »

So...is the series S less powerful than the current Xbox One X? Is it more powerful than the current Xbox One S, or the same? I'm confused by MS at the moment to be honest.
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