Topic: Official Push Square Xbox Thread

@dodgykebaab I can’t see the business sense in them releasing any type of new console in the current climate tbh. All of the various theories doing the rounds are flawed imho (the handheld, the Xbox that offers steam, the reference-design for third party manufacturers etc.). In all honestly, your idea seems the most realistic out of all of them for me but it’s just Phil’s recent statement on the matter that makes me think it’s a no-go.

With Microsoft seemingly becoming more third-party by the day, together with the direction that the industry is going… I honestly can’t see any reason why they should make any type of hardware passed the series’.

Wow Xbox is really killing it with Game Pass so far this year. South of Midnight is such a creative experience and Oblivion is an absolute blast. I haven't even checked out Avowed or Atomfall yet and Clair Obscur is coming out later this week. Not to mention the new DOOM game that's coming out in a couple of weeks. I might just stay subbed for the next couple of months just to play through these games.

Going back to Oblivion, I'm really glad I never played the original as the remake looks and runs so well. I played it for two hours and had no idea so much time had passed! This game might become my new open world addiction.

I guess it’s finally arrived…
When I turned on my LG TV yesterday it showed a pop-up message that I now have access to play Xbox games directly on my TV by subscribing to GamePass Ultimate.

The grand vision of Xbox is finally crystallizing. No console necessary, no game purchases necessary, just stream directly to the TV by logging into the app with your GamePass login.

As someone who has had almost zero interest in most of what Xbox has been doing the last 15 years, I have to admit I’m slightly curious now. First, like Sarge mentioned, there’s finally a number of games stacked up on the service that I actually have interest in. I was perfectly content to just buy these games (Clair Obscur, Indiana Jones, etc) but now I’m realizing that I basically have an Xbox in my house for the first time in my life (virtually speaking, through the app on my TV) and so I have to at least consider whether it’s something worth subscribing to and trying out. Honestly, I can’t see myself doing it — I have a lifetime of games to play already in my PlayStation library, but there is this tiny temptation to consider dipping my toe into the Xbox ecosystem since the obstacle of dropping $500 for a console is now gone.

The PlayStation cloud streaming has worked quite well for me when I’ve used it (primarily on my Portal), so I suspect the Xbox cloud streaming likewise works well. My TV is only a couple years old so I guess it has the horsepower needed to run the app well. What I don’t know is how the controller issue works. If I have to buy an Xbox controller then forget it. That’s enough of a hurdle to just forget about it. I doubt the DualSense or DualShock 4 controllers work with this TV streaming stuff.

Has anyone actually tried gaming through the Xbox app on their TV?

@Th3solution Gamepass has been on my TV since I bought it about 18 months ago. It allowed me to pair a DualSense, but I did have pair it back with the ps5 when I next wanted to use it with the console.

I've not actually used the controller with anything with the TV, so can't comment on if there was any latency issues etc.

I've enough games to keep entertained without adding another subscription service into the mix.

@JohnnyShoulder Ah, I guess LG are late to the party.

I’m in agreement — I’m flush with gaming options already on just my PS5. The advantage would be just to get select titles that I don’t already have and want to try. It might be a good way to demo some games to decide whether to buy them for my proper game library. Also, there’s still a few games that have yet to port over that I do want to play, namely Hellblade 2 and maybe Gears of War. Still, I don’t think it’s worth the effort and the $20 for one month of access. It’s good to hear that I could just sync my DualSense or DS4 though, instead of buying a controller. I’ve also had access to Netflix gaming for many months and have never felt inclined to try it either. And I almost never play any games on my phone. The dedicated TV app thing seems the closest to an actual console experience though, so I do wonder how it feels to play.

@Th3solution I also have an LG TV, so I decided to try out the Xbox app. Like @JohnnyShoulder mentioned, you can use a DualSense but you can also pair a DualShock 4 or Switch Pro controller.

I tried out four games on there: South of Midnight, Forza Horizon 5, Oblivion and Halo Infinite. All games felt responsive and there wasn't any noticeable input latency. South of Midnight didn't look as good as on my Xbox, while Forza looked great and ran smooth. Oblivion on the other hand felt really choppy to play, while Halo both looked and ran great.

I wanted to test it out just to see if cloud streaming is better on the TV compared to on my Xbox, which it is. For some reason, my internet speed constantly fluctuates on my Xbox. I have 500 mbps download speed and a lot of times it's 200 mbps when I download a game and sometimes it's 100 mbps. It rarely gets close to 500 mbps. However, the tradeoffs in visuals and performance are not something I'm willing to accept, even if I have to wait to download games.

But I do have to say that the Xbox app is highly accessible for people who don't own an Xbox. You can use existing controllers that you own and the streaming quality is good. The only thing you need is a Game Pass Ultimate subscription.

The main advantages of using the Xbox app and subscribing to GPU is that you get to play first-party titles and select third-party titles (like Clair Obscur) on day one as well as not needing to pay full price for these games. Instead of paying for one Xbox first-party game on PlayStation (such as Indiana Jones), you can play 3-4 first-party games on Xbox. Granted, you probably won't have time to play 3-4 of these games in one month, but you can definitely play two of them in one month (for example Indiana Jones and South of Midnight). Even playing four games during two months is cheaper than buying one full-priced game. So if you're genuinely interested in these games, I really don't see why you wouldn't want to give it a shot at €20. Variety is the spice of life after all. I've been playing so much on my PS5 these past few months that I've missed playing Xbox games.

Take this how you will, but I'm really grateful Gamepass let me experience Expedition 33, rather than having to pay the box price (even if the box price isn't a full triple A entry fee, regardless). I say this, because I think the combat in Expedition 33... has some problems, let us say. I wouldn't have stuck around with this if my money was on the line, I would have just got a refund. That is how negative I felt about the combat on my first tastes. But because it is on GP, I keep going just that little bit extra.

In doing so, I think this game really raises wider questions around what a game needs to get "right" to be considered a great game to you personally, to the industry at wide, whatever. At around 6ish hours in, the presentation, the performances, the music, the writing, like every element in that regard is basically all a 10 / 10 for me. I want to love this game so badly.

But then I die to a random set of trash enemies on the world map, because for some reason they decided to include these real time Souls elements in an otherwise turn based JRPG, with absolutely zero accessibility considerations like audio or visual cues, settings to make the windows more forgiving, whatever. Whenever I am on a high with this game, combat crashes me back down to Earth. Every time.

I want to keep playing, because I love everything else about the game. But can you really tell people you are loving a game, if playing it is the worst part about it?

So, what are the chances MS tries to force Fable out in 2025 after all? Even if it means the game is badly optimised/half borked?

It will be worth keeping an eye on games in general suddenly becoming available well before May next year, too. Devs vs Suits arguing about how ready games have to be to warrant a release could be messy.

When were the rumours of a new Xbox something or other type console releasing, too? Doubt it's related, and GTA will span eons of consoles regardless. But I bet they'd want it out at that time, if possible

What should I do with my Xbox? I don't think it's been turned on since KCDII came out 😅 and now the Pro is the main console of choice.

Game Pass expired a while ago, and it seems if I do ever want to play anything that is on there I can just play it on the Pro instead 😬

The turn around from last summer's showcase, with all these cool games finally set to come to Xbox convincing me to try it out, to the state of things now is pretty extreme.

One last run with all my free points for one or two more games on Game Pass. Or fling it over the moon? I'd say maybe I will look to donate it somewhere, but they might refuse it at this point 😂

@Ravix I’d keep it for when Microsoft eventually pull this 4D Trojan-horse chess-move that all the incredibly perceptive Xbox players keep telling me is the plan /s

Fingers crossed for a good show ...
... and may I be the first to say “World Premiere”.

@CaptD 100% chance of it being a good show. Feels like they might have nicked a good chunk of overall quality from Game Fest and they will have PS and Nintendo users watching with interest too, you'd think.

Weird time for the show though, imo

@Ravix
Yes I’m sure the viewer count will be much higher than in years bygone, unfortunately I’m unable to watch due to the time otherwise I would be tuning in whereas in the past I wouldn’t bother (despite owning a Xbox One S).
As for the quality, I actually thought Game fest was ntb (game awards show is normally better imo). Next year is certainly stacked.

In before ‘Xbox better’ 😏

Well that was a pretty disappointing showcase overall, but at least Persona 4 remake has been confirmed now. Genuinely cannot wait to experience my favourite JRPG of all time again!

I've watched "Future Games Showcase", "Summer Game Fest" and I must say that the Xbox showcase contained the most games that seems to align with my interests (even taking the recent SoP into account, actually). Has been a while since that was the case, so that was a nice little surprise.
The winner of Not-E3 2025 in my book.

One of those weird shows where it felt like it was wall to wall bangers on paper, but a lot of the games didn't come with a lot of real gameplay, so I sorta wanna hold my excitement until I see how almost all of these actually play in a non curated set of clips. Game Pass is having its best ever year this year, and I feel like years earlier the Xbox promise was Game Pass would deliver you at least one big game a month, and it feels like that release cadence has finally been hit.

Certainly was better than Summer Games Fest, that is for sure. Dunno why I even bother watching it every year when I know its gonna be rubbish.

This was similar to Sony's Stat of Play for me in that I recognise there were some quality games shown but not much if anything that actually excited me.
I was quite intrigued by the closer all way up until it revealed it was CoD at which point it lost all interest.

Playing the 'World Premier' or 'Play Anywhere' drinking game would have to come with a health warning.

Is Remedy making the next Call of Duty? 🙃

That really threw me, I was thinking it was a proper new and interesting game based on the trailer, and then it turned out to be CoD 😭

I'm struggling to remember anything else now, it felt like a good show, but nothing has stuck in my mind. Although I'm probably going to play High on Life some time soon, as that's been in the back catalogue.

I thought the Xbox showcase was pretty okay. The ending was a real damp squib. You can't do "and one more thing" and then announce Call of Duty. You just can't. It goes against the entire premise of the one more thing.

Some good stuff was shown, good cadence, very little Phil Spencer trying to put a brave face on the state of Xbox, good variety, clarity on what was exclusive and what wasn't. Felt like it needed a big finish.