Godot25

This is just irrelevant fluff.

Do you think that sentiment around Concord wasn't positive? I mean. Sony bought entire studio for that game. Of course they evaluated that game and I'm sure they have positive sentiment around it.
And how it ended up? Game that was taken offline in less than 2 weeks.

What a catastrophic failure
Hundreds of millions down the drain (from studio purchase + development cost)

I couldn't find a Rivalry match on PS5 (with crossplay on) during peak EU time on weekend.

Game is almost dead...

PS5 Pro probably won't be less than 699$, right?

@kuu_nousee No. Because you are blabbing about blanket statement. Fact that Schreier wants one doesn't mean that Microsoft should provide one.

I will repeat. It's dumb as hell giving public blanket statements about "where you can play our games" when even Xbox currently isn't sure how extensive their port work will be.

I'm sure it would be perceived nicely if Spencer said that "every game will eventually come to PS5" and then he just pivoted away from that strategy. We saw how PlayStation peeps took nicely Starfield's exclusivity.

And mainly, general public doesn't care about any of this *****. College Football 25 came out with huge surge of new Xbox consoles sold despite fact that Microsoft started porting their games on competing platforms. So, what exactly would be the point addressing fact that Schreier and some other journos are confused?

@kuu_nousee "But it could very much be true internally at Xbox and more dire than we know" - that's just your assumption to fit your "statement"

People who predicted PS5/Switch ports of Xbox games (NateTheHate, Tom Warren etc.) are specifically talking about "some" games, not "all" games. So if I had to choose if I want to believe your assumption or guys who proved that they know more than regular Joe, you know what I would choose.

They are not in financial hole, lol. It's Microsoft for God's sake. They have more money than God. Reason why they are porting games is simple as stated by CFO of Microsoft - they want to increase profitability of Xbox division to the range of other Microsoft's division. Which is 20+%. Just to illustrate, PlayStation division had under 10% profit margins last two quarters. And since they can't grow console userbase (which also Sony can't do because console audience is stagnating for last two generations), their only options was to bet on cloud (which is currently not growing as much as they would like), or increase sales of software on other platforms. Which they are doing.

"We are continuing to learn" is pretty obvious statement. They are figuring out a way how to keep Xbox console userbase stable, while also extracting as much money as possible from other sources (like PlayStation sales). And they are currently happy, because as Phil said, they have most monthly console users in history of Xbox. But if they will find negative trends as a direct result of porting games, they can pivot their strategy. Which they can't do if they states that every game will eventually come to PlayStation. It's the reason why you will never hear blanket statement. Same as you never see blanket statements from Sony regarding porting of their games on PC. Because strategy is shifting thanks to data you receive by every game you port.

@kuu_nousee But that's just ***** statement. Because it's just plainly not true. Even people who knows (like Tom Warren from The Verge) and who informed public about Project Latitude (program to port games to other consoles) are saying that it still be "select games" going to other consoles and not "all games"

Of course, that can change in future, but currently statement you created "for Spencer" is just lies.

And that's primary reason why statements like this can't be provided in a first place. Because it's highly dynamic situation that can change in a whim. Promising "all games will eventually come" is a dumb way to put yourself in a corner.

And mainly. Why on earth would they do such a thing. They have no obligation towards PlayStation users. They are just throwing them a bone after their main audience (PC a Xbox players) are done with those games to increase margins of Xbox division. Nothing more, nothing less.

@pyrrhic_victory But author of article is also talking about Xbox Game Studios. And majority of them never released their game on PlayStation. So your argument is kinda...invalid?

Also, it literally doesn't matter if they previously released their games on PlayStation. They are currently owned by Microsoft. They decide what strategy is best for Xbox as a platform. And what's best today, doesn't need to be best tomorrow. So giving some kind of blanket policy is pretty dumb.

So for example, if releasing Indy and Doom on PlayStation will give them some kind of undesirable metric, they can pivot The Elder Scrolls VI to be only on Xbox and PC. But if they already announced TES VI as multiplat game, they kinda backed themselves into the corner. If they don't announce platform unless it's absolutely necessary, it gives them freedom to do whatever they want, whenever they want.

It's pretty simple. You know that every XGS/Bethesda/Activision game will be on Xbox and PC. Case-by-case basis on other consoles. So if you are unwilling to invest into Xbox console, then you can portbeg and hope that game you want will be ported.

It's same as if you are PC player and want to play Demon's Souls remake and other PS Studios game. You can beg that Sony will finally port DS remake to PC. But if you want to be 100% certain that you will be able to play it, you need to buy PS5.

Project Latitude (program for creating ports of Xbox games to other platforms) currently for example doesn't include games like Fable, Gears of War E-Day, South of Midnight, Perfect Dark and Hellblade 2. But Microsoft can tomorrow decide, that Hellblade II has been squeezed up and PS5 port work can begin. So how exactly you want to cover every game with blanket policy announced to the public?

But why?

I mean. Sony knows that they are porting all their games to PC. Are they telling PC players which and when during announcement of said game? Nope. They are pretending that no PC port will be made and then 2 years later, they will announce it.

Also, this thing can change at a whim. They could notice dip in number of console users and decide to make some changes.

Silver lining is. If you want to be sure that you will be able to play all Xbox/Bethesda/ABK games, just buy and Xbox. Or PC. Or subscribe to GPU and play through cloud. If you are not willing to do that, then wait. And pray that this "particular game" that you want to play will be ported.

@Frmknst I mean, that hero shooter genre is currently flooded with games that even have huge advantages over Concord.
They are either established (Overwatch 2)
free-to-play (Overwatch 2, Valorant, Apex Legends and Marvel Rivals in december)
based on popular IP (Marvel Rivals in december)

And on PC, Deadlock from Valve is coming (but that's PC specific)

Not to mention ***** of other hero shooter games that were born and died during 8 long years of Concord's development.

Honestly, it feels like it.

I genuinely feels like game that was created in time when Overwatch and GotG started to become huge. Problem is that by the time Firewalk was done with development, this genre became so crowded...

@jrt87 I would not be so dramatic around "Concord is releasing same day as Black Myth"

Especially since 90% of Black Myth players are from China. Country, where Concord isn't even available...

Concord on PC is DoA with or without Black Myth. Game has pathetic 35 reviews after almost one day on the market. It would be happy if it can break 5k concurrent on Steam during regular release.

Lol. Game is built on CryEngine...

@PuppetMaster "Turning Factions 2 from normal MP into live service"

Of course they tried to turn it into live service. Because that's only viable path in 2024. People just refuse to accept fact that because of how expensive AAA game currently is, times of "tacked-on" multiplayer modes as a supplement to a SP campaign are over.

You either have to commit to SP only game, or MP live service game. There is no in-between.

And please, don't argue with games like Space Marine 2. Because bulk of Saber staff lives in eastern Europe, where development costs are probably 1/5 of what they are in California.

@MrMagic If you are talking about this slide https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GUxgwXhWwAAUBVp?format=jpg&name=medium

There is nowhere where it says that they acquired GhostWire and The Evil Within IP's. It's just summary of their previous work.

Also, PR statement from Krafton only mention rights to Hi-Fi Rush.

https://www.gamespress.com/en-US/KRAFTON-Strengthens-Global-Presence-Through-Strategic-Integration-of-T

But if you want to deny official company statement, then be my guest

@CrashBandicoat From wording it seems like that Microsoft kept paying Tango staff until they got this deal through

@naruball Devs said to Game File that Final Shape could never bring as much money as was needed to avoid layoffs. Which probably tells you everything you need to know.

Also, expansion is already 33% off just two months after release on Steam. Which is unusually soon for Destiny expansion.

@naruball Yeah. I mean...it's not that hard to understand
Bungie was loosing money, because they employed 1,3k employees, while only having D2 as moneymaker. They were loosing money month after month. Also, employees told Bloomberg that sales of expansions were dropping every year. So it's not like The Final Shape somehow rescued Bungie.

But if you shed 30% of your studio wages, it will obviously get you out of the "loosing spree" hole.

But it's not like this will get Bungie out of troubles. Playerbase already dropped significantly since release of The Final Shape. Marathon is reportedly in rough shape and Bungie will no longer make big expansions for Destiny 2, because they finally realised that without good onboarding experience for new players, Destiny 2 is doomed long term.

@Type_Trubbish Microsoft kept GhostWire and The Evil Within IP's. They only gave Hi-Fi Rush to Krafton

@naruball Ehh. Pete Parsons said that Bungie was loosing money. That's main reason for deep cuts. So yeah. It's pretty obvious.

@Leechmonger_DeS Yeah. Because success of Bethesda merger was surely on Tango Gameworks. /s

Look. I loved The Evil Within 2 and Hi-Fi Rush. But can we stop pretending that Tango was main moneymaker in Zenimax? Hi-Fi Rush came onto PS5 this year and didn't even fit in TOP 20 in month of release. The Evil Within 2 was a commercial flop. GhosWire wasn't that great and wasn't selling that well.

Microsoft bought Zenimax for huge IPs like Doom (new Doom game is coming out next year if you didn't notice), The Elder Scrolls (which is in production), Fallout (Fallout 76 still makes huge amount of money), TESO (which still makes huge amount of money) and next MMO game from ZOS. Not to mention Arkane which is working on Blade. And Indy is coming out this year. Also, Starfield is so unsuccessful, that BGS is not only releasing new expansion this year, but also planning new expansion for 2025

It's like pretending that Microsoft bought ABK for Toys for Bob and Crash Bandicoot. No, they did not. They bought ABK for Call of Duty, Diablo, Overwatch and Candy Crush. Toys for Bob and Crash Bandicoot just happened to be in same package. And TfB isn't even in ABK anymore.

Trying to even compare it to Bungie is honestly hilarious, especially after recent report that Marathon is not looking that great and fact that Bungie was loosing money.

And somehow many people still think that PS5 will match or even surpass PS4 in terms of sales...

Well. It was Sony's due diligence to find out if they are overpromising...

@twitchtvpat I'm talking about his decisions when he was CEO, not years before that

Jimbo's decisions are looking worse and worse
His main prize - Bungie, who was supposed to spearhead live service charge is gutted. And probably is not independent anymore
Half of live service project delayed or outright canceled
Years of dev time spent on live service games that will never see light of day (TLOU Factions for example)
Concord seems like DoA

Basically, only success from this whole Jimbo's charade is Helldivers 2. Which is pretty bad if you ask me.

@Batesy125s That's why I said "you can count number of them on one hand for last two years"

BG3
Elden Ring
TOTK

And even TOTK was more "highly iterative" then genre defining. Same for God of War Ragnarok.

I love how almost every company claims to be making "genre defining" game. Meanwhile number of "genre defining games" in last two years can be counted on one hand.

I wouldn't call Concord's characters "fresh"
They are so derivative, that they are just outright boring and uninteresting.

Which is pretty huge problem when one of your selling point is weekly story cutscenes.

@WhiteRabbit by that logic Party Animals also isn't Xbox exclusive, since it was released day one on PC

It's nice to not being treated like second class citizen with this beta...

Gotta love the attitude that everybody who is pointing out flaws of this game is "hater"

It's just plain uninteresting.

Movement of players is sluggish for my taste. I don't know where comparisons with Destiny are coming from since Destiny 2 in it's current state (not during launch of Vanilla game) is pretty fast paced.

I can't imagine having long term interest in this game. I'm not playing MP game for weekly cutscenes. And in terms of content this game is just blandest of the bland. And visual style is not interesting in the slightest and some characters are downright ugly looking.

I think that Concord is DoA unless Sony is willing to put it into PS Plus day one. This game is competing with Overwatch 2, which is free-to-play.

40$ payment worked for Helldivers 2, because Helldivers 2 was very unique. I don't think that's the case for Concord.

Fact that they are opening beta without need of preorder speaks volume about state of preorders for that game.

On Steam, game has 1400 followers and is 1700th most wishlisted game on platform. Despite it being only one month before release.

???
Ultimate with new price is 1€ per month more expensive then PS Plus Premium. While having first-party games there day one, which Premium don't have and EA Play included, which Premium don't have.

So I don't understand point of this article tbh.

What Microsoft is doing is not admitting that "it was wrong move" but basically creating "terrible" Game Pass Standard (which is equivalent of PS Plus Extra btw), so they can upsell you on Ultimate, since it's only 3€ per month more expensive than Standard. Because when you hit peak subscriber count (which they have on consoles), only way to increase your revenue is to upsell your customer to higher tier or to jack up the price.

Admission of "wrong strategy" would be removing day one first-party games from PC Game Pass and Game Pass Ultimate too...

Considering Microsoft still owns publishing rights for first game, they can't make a PS version even if they wanted. Not unless Microsoft permits that.

Also, I doubt that it's high on their priority list. They are Marvel IP game factory after all.

@get2sammyb moneyhatting without Sony being publisher is also nothing uncommon for Sony. See Silent Hill 2, Kena: Bridge of Spirits, FF games and many many more.

But i don't think Black Myth was moneyhatted tbh. But it would be nice if devs were just straight with their customers for once. Larian clearly stated "no, we haven't recieved money from Sony, problem is splitscreen on Series S"

It's almost like it never happened (ehm. Stellar Blade), right?

I'm not implying that this is what happened. I'm just pointing out that it would be no surprise to me if that was the case. Because it would not be the first time...

@gaston Yeah. I can see how many people are interested in playing GT7, RE4 and RE Village on VR

I'm baffled that Sony didn't saw it way before release.
You are trying to sell 600$ piece of VR that needs 500$ console to work with. And has no PC support (at release)
Meanwhile your competition is selling 600$ VR headset that can work on it's own. And can be plugged to PC.

Even PSVR1 didn't sold gangbusters. I don't know what lead Sony to produce another generation. But I'm 99% sure there won't be any PSVR3.

@UltimateOtaku91 PlayStation gamers don't have problem with, PC gamers do. It's not that hard concept to understand.

Also, primary problem with Helldivers 2 was that Sony wanted to force PSN requirement 3 months after release. Because as you can saw there wasn't so much fuss about PSN requirement for Ghost of Tsushima Legends, Ragnarok and Concord outside of fact that PSN is not supported in 100s of countries.

It's hilarious honestly.
PlayStation guys were always talking about how Xbox have no games. And if they had games they were actually bad and nobody wants to play them
Xbox guys are always talking about how every PlayStation game is "sad dad simulator" and about "PlayStation template"

Meanwhile actual truth is that people are talking in that way because they can't play those games and it's easier to talk themselves into hating those games.

@WhiteRabbit No, because there is no debate that Helldivers 2 is a good game. I was just baffled that someone would brag about "Midblade 2" and then actually praise Stellar Blade and Rise of the Ronin in same sentence.

But I get it. Hellblade 2 is "Midblade 2" until it will come on PS5. Same as Sea of Thieves was bad, until it hit PS5

Also, Indiana Jones will be bad, but when it will get PS5 port it will be second coming of Jesus.

As usual.

Also, it's hilarious to claim "people thought that Hellblade 2 is worse then critics says" when 87% of Steam reviews for the game are positive. So players are actually praising the game even more than critics.

@WhiteRabbit
If Hellblade 2 is "as mid as it gets" then I don't know what is even the point of mentioning Stellar Blade and Rise of the Ronin. Since Stellar Blade has similar scores as Hellblade 2 (82 vs. 81 on OpenCritic) and Rise of the Ronin is even worse.

@PurvisP Well. It clearly works. So many comments, so many clicks...

Shawn is hilarious.
Especially when he was talking about dangers of industry consolidation while being on payroll of Tencent.

Keep it going...

@AdolBannings-Laylee Are you sure about that? Because only repeated games from last year's showcase were South of Midnight, Avowed, Fable and Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024. Not counting GaaS updates of course.

Call of Duty, Doom, State of Decay 3, Age of Mythology, Perfect Dark, Gears and Indiana Jones were not at last year's showcase(and that's just first-party stuff). Not to mention third-party stuff where the only repeated game that I can remember was Flintlock.

But I guess that when you change up 90% of games in your showcase it is almost same showcase than last year /s

@OM1993 Rofl. People are really claiming that?