DF Direct Weekly
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- Опубліковано 29 тра 2024
- There's anger, bafflement and frustration this week as John, Rich and Alex discuss Microsoft's decision to close one studio that created one of the greatest immersive games ever made and another studio that's just delivered a BAFTA-winning, critically acclaimed rhythm action game... so what is going on at Xbox right now? Beyond that, the team discuss the latest Switch 2 revelations, the new Asus ROG - or R.O.G. - Ally, Hellblade 2 PC specs and Sony's massive Helldivers 2 own-goal.
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0:00:00 Introduction
0:01:38 News 01: Microsoft shutters Tango Gameworks, Arkane Austin
0:44:37 News 02: Nintendo confirms Switch sequel, potential components uncovered
1:03:42 News 03: Asus announces new ROG Ally
1:16:13 News 04: Sony backtracks on Helldivers 2 PC PSN requirements
1:25:25 News 05: Ninja Theory reveal Hellblade 2 PC specs
1:36:15 News 06: Sand Land released!
1:44:17 Supporter Q1: Could the Switch 2 connect to a TV wirelessly?
1:46:52 Supporter Q2: How much longevity will video cards with 8-10 GB of VRAM have?
1:53:41 Supporter Q3: Should next gen consoles have much larger RAM allotments?
1:57:40 Supporter Q4: Do you think mouse and keyboard support will become more common on consoles?
2:00:49 Supporter Q5: How feasible is it to update an older UE5 game to UE 5.4?
2:03:50 Supporter Q6: Could Intel beat AMD in discrete GPU sales by 2029?
2:06:40 Supporter Q7: What’s your favourite immersive sim, and why is it Prey (2017)? - Ігри
Microsoft:
>no games
>buy studios
>no games
>close studios
>still no games
What is this strategy called?
Consolidation
If you buy and shut down everyone else, then no one can make games.
Hoping COD can make them back the 70 billion they just wasted 😂
@@ShadyPlatinum777 that and candy crush spendatures from mom’s and grandmas it seems. 😮💨
They have no strategy, plan or vision. They don't have it for 11 or so years. 😅
The trio back together again to discuss some depressing-ass shit
😄
Thankfully there wasn't any depressing ass-shit
@@mechanicalmonk2020don't make assumptions. We can only see torso and up.
AHAHAHAHAH @@XhoowieX
hahaha 😂
Ninja Theory is safe for a while. They have to complete the Hellblade PS5 port before getting fired, just like what happened with Hi Fi and Tango.
Have Panic Button do it.
Ninja Theory would probably need to take yet a 3rd week + long trip to Iceland to “feel the air” when making the PS5 port. Those trips totally were NOT just MS paid vacations 😂😂😂
I wonder whether they'd already told Tango about closure before the PS5 port or if they just waited until afterwards.
@@flannelsykes0 They didn't tell anyone early. They were still working on the Redfall DLC at Arkane four hours before the announcement happened.
@@carpetfluff35 That's pretty damn shiity tbh
Tango was shutdown cause they had no games in their pipeline after hifi. They were in the pre conceptual phase cause they were still pitching ideas
I feel like ninja theory may be in the same boat after hellblade 2 and that scares me
So Phil Spencer's "hands-off" approach was basically "We have no clue what we're doing. Now let's buy more stuff!".
To be fair that has been Microsoft's MO for years before Xbox even came into existence.
"Hands off" also seems like a lie as they forced a major staffing policy that hollowed out every studio of talent (18m non renewable contracts, no rehiring at any MS studio after). This meant the only continuity was from senior leadership and they needed to get a pitch approved which meant they had to lean into xbox strategic goals and no creativity. Who are they hands off with, the design dock has to be approved. There is no creative freedom in that set up, no one is there long enough to have any creative input and snr leaders who are the ones who stay are pitching products not creative work.
Even Matt Booty was like, "we can outspend Sony" to defeat them, and come back from last place. They think they can just buy up everything and win, and now it looks like they gotta deal with Satya now
And the muppets hailed him as some sort of hero for xbox, simply because they were desperate for a hero lol
I think phil Spencer is going to be 'hands off' very soon...gardening leave for the foreseeable.
Microsoft closing Tango Gameworks proves why Spencer's email spinning the idea of Nintendo being acquired by Microsoft as a good thing would be so insanely terrible for Nintendo and gaming in general.
Good thing Nintendo is profitable and also extending into film and theme parks.
Hiroshi Yamauchi laughing in his grave
They tried to buy Nintendo around the launch of the original Xbox. Its not a new thing but yeah Nintendo were like.... ermmmmmmm how about nope?
Microcrap invented the xbox thinking they could beat Nintendo at their own game and they have failed. The original xbox was an Intel PIII with an nvidia geforce 3 graphics. EVERYTHING they've tried to do on their own has failed. DOS and windows were just clones of other products that they didn't even create.
@@michaelcarson8375they were on the cusp of beating Sony down after a few years of the 360 and they fumbled it big time. I highly doubt they'll ever have another chance like that.
It's kinda wild to think that Phil Spencer was talking about trying to buy Nintendo at one point
Valve, too. Good thing they're doing well enough on their own and aren't looking to sell.
He wants anything but creating great games
Good heavens that would've been awful.
Phil Spencer was bragging in that e-mail about buying Nintendo, and how it would be his 'crowning career achievement' was sickening. You really get to see his mindset which is different from what he shows in public.
@SteveJonesOwnsDSP so what you're saying is he's human and exactly like everyone else.
2:04:40 Alex suggesting Rich be found naked in a parking lot. Bookmarking timestamp for posterity.
That was rather on the hoof.
Alex doesn't make me laugh often but that was too good lol
Double Fine, Ninja Theory and inexile must be terrified right now
If they kill Double Fine, I will never forgive them. I still kinda hate MS for depriving us of good Rare games after n64
And MachineGames: they need Indy to be a hit.
They should be, but why are they taking 7 years to make a 10 hour long game? These studios are poorly managed and inefficient.
People work harder when they’re angry.
Bank is closed.
@@guybrush3000 is Microsoft commanding RARE what games to pitch and make?
Richard has a dead pixel on his right shoulder.
dead pixel = black
hot pixel = white
hot subpixel = color
I knew I could rely on someone here to put me straight if something wasn't correct. I should know as my C7 had the same issue. Cheers bro 👍@concinnus
Crazy cause my lg cx is still perfect with crazy hours on it from
Movies to ps5 gaming
@@fabolousjada5070 No burn in?
It's a piece of lint
“Have somewhat stagnated in recent months”? Boy that’s a generous take, John. From the now-redacted FTC leak documents last year, we know they had a combined 34m subscribers across Game Pass and Gold as of April 2022. Just this last February, they proudly announced they had 34M “Game Pass subscribers” which now includes Game Pass Core, formerly known as Gold. Exact same number, they just shuffled the deck chairs. Growth stalled *two years ago*.
A stalling of 24 months
Actually I believe it was something like (made up numbers cause I can't remember the specifics) 24 Mill. Game Pass Subscribers and 12 Mill. XBL Gold Subscribers, then 2 YEARS later they announced (or it was in the FTC thing) they are now at 34 Mill. Game Pass Subs which included Game Pass Core (rebranded XBL Gold) which means in the 2 years they ditched "Gold" to boost their perceived Game Pass numbers but technically they lost 2 Million Subs anyway (the subs added up to less than the combined 2 Sub Services... Should've been AT LEAST at 36 Mill. but it was only 34 Mill. 😂)
Anyone notice how Jon will never really lay into any of these companies, whether it's a big publisher or developer? He's wayy too soft on everyone to the point where I wonder if he lacks integrity as a game journalist. When a company fucks up, notice DF will always say "we've reached out to the developer about this" instead of just reporting on it to us consumers first and letting these companies feel a little pressure for a change. It runs me the wrong way. One of the reasons these gaming studios get away with so much crap is because the gaming media is in bed with them. How many "perks" of the job does Jon and DF get to enjoy? Or the big UA-camrs with early access to code, expensive free collectors editions "for review purposes" etc etc
The problems of this industry go deep and Jon and DF should have a backbone instead dealing with these companies with kiddie gloves.
@@mgxzazfbyjuchrisclarkvpz236 It's just not Digital Foundry's MO to blast companies, without necessarily sugarcoating their criticism either. They seem to maintain cordial relationships with most of their industry contacts and that also gives them insights which they often share, so that's not really a bad thing.
John did seem to pussyfoot around this stuff a little bit; I had expected him to be much angrier about these closures, but questioning his integrity seems a step too far.
@@mgxzazfbyjuchrisclarkvpz236 John was (probably still is) harrassed to hell and back by allergic-to-grass-touching console fanboys because of his takes, so I totally understand why he tries to moderate his comments. I think they're fine anyway, DF is just not the kind of ragebait channel that half of UA-cam is nowadays. Being professional means you can't always say whatever comes to your mind, and it's not like John hasn't made his displeasure with many aspects of the industry clear multiple times.
John got his stubble back on cuz he knows the gravity of the situation.
I paused and zoomed in x5 on the 367th hair strand from the lower right in his beard. The shadowing, ray tracing are pixel perfect. Blur clearly set to zero when in motion.
Nah he's just convinced it makes his testosterone levels rise.
On institutional knowledge: Their internal studios were all on 18 month non-rewable contracts that forbade working at any MS subsidiary for 9 months. They actively sought to crush any institutional knowledge. That policy hollows out all MS studios of any staff below snr management to have any institutional knowledge. They want their staff to be interchangeable and not have anything that relies on specific talent. They have been heavily focused on not having institutional knowledge which might be why their products are fairly generic.
Institutional knowledge
What is the benefit, on their side, of continuing this?
Added problem for XBox is why would anyone want to work for a studio owned by MS.
yeah, they either get people who know their talent is in high demand and will jump ship whenever they feel like, or the get people who are desperate for work and will negotiate a pay cut to get the job (fresh graduates, immigrants, etc). They're far more likely to get a lot of the latter, which could translate into a lot of buggy and unpolished first party games.
Money?
@@alsamuefnot getting any if they keep shutting studios down, people will be jobless in no time
It's not like there are many secure jobs, just look at the rest of the industry @@sebastiangonzales46
Because they got fired from Embracer Group.
I’d have to imagine the industry-wide morale is crushed right now. If you’re bought and think you’re protected with MS/Sony money, you lose your job. If you’re indie and can’t find ways to secure funding, you lose your job/paycheck. If you make failed games, you lose your job. If you make successful games, you also lose your job.
How can people commit to making great games (or even any) when there’s this Sword of Damocles constantly hanging over them? We can’t keep living like this man
It is. All of us know several people who have been laid off despite doing a good job following the exact instructions given by executives who never seem to be on the receiving end of the arbitrary and avoidable staff cuts. Those of us who haven’t lost jobs are generally feeling crushed and that the industry is more volatile than ever, despite improved working conditions and salaries. It’s like the apocalyptic levels of crunch were never actually resolved, but just converted into rampant burnout and powerlessness.
You have it backwards, the industry was vastly OVER invested over the past few years from zero interest rate easy money. We've been living through a glut of content that was unlikely to make money back. Now it's time to reign things in as interest rates enter positive integer territory.
@@Wobbothe3rd I've been in many meetings discussing funding for games as both a developer and a publisher, so I'm pretty confident in my assessment, given everyone else also shares it. Over-investment does not counter anything I've said. This situation has been developing for several years, and it's been the same across all sorts of countries with all sorts of economic conditions.
@MountCydonia the ridiculously low interest rate/ easy money lending has been a well documented WORLDWIDE phenomenon since the GLOBAL financial crash of 2008. The point is that the status quo before the past few years of no interest loans was VERY OBVIOUSLY UNSUSTAINABLE. People who are acting like this is a completely unjustified and unexpected "self inflicted wound" are being disingenuous and virtue signaling, period. Many experts from both the gaming industry and beyond have been pointing this out, I'm not alone saying this.
@@Wobbothe3rd Again, nothing about over-investment with low interest money counters anything I've said. This situation has been happening with and without low interest funding. It's probably been accelerated by it, but the real cause is the paradigm shift of the industry becoming more corporatised, more beholden to shareholders, and therefore needing more and faster growth with more "forever games", sequels, and gigantic games in a similar vein to what Hollywood has experienced the last decade or so.
I actually hope that a lot of the closed studios make their own small companies (NOT publicly traded) and show them big corps what it's actually like long term to get rid of the people creating the actual value.
Divided we beg united we bargain
The problem is where will the money come from. From my understanding it's also very hard for small companies to find funding for their projects these days. The market situation affects the whole industry.
If you don't make money none of that matters
Tango games was a shitmaker of a studio. They haven’t done anything great with tons of money. How would they now with no money at all?)
Not likelly because thats one of the strategies for Microsoft. They absorb the best from their studios and leaves the small fish behind while retain their IPs.
Hi-Fi Rush was shadow dropped after Ghost Wire Toyko flopped. Microsoft probably had every intention to to shut down the studio after that. That's the reason for no marketing for Hi-Fi Rush prerelease.
There’s also barely any marketing for Hellblade i guess that’s a sign
You're possibly right here...
Why on earth would you shadow drop a game like hifi rush? You have to give your game every chance to be seen and give it a bigger chance of success.
That's actually a good point that I didn't consider.
@@afroduccActually, that was something Tango had the idea to shadowdrop the game. Honestly, I think shadowdropping was still the best for the game mostly because of how niche it is.
This is correct, they maybe would have closed the studio down after launch, but because the game was well received in the press they maybe felt that they couldn't do it then, and then the PS5 port opportunity came along where sales also flopped so they see that they had no choice instead of backing the studio for another 4 to 5 years to make an XSX2 and PS6 game
The thing that’s the biggest bummer is Xbox didn’t allow the closed studios to purchase themselves. I could have seen tango doing that and becoming a double aa or indie studio.
Did they not mention tango had like 1500 ppl working on hifi rush? That sounds insane. That game is a critics darling only not a commercial hit. Don't shoot the messenger but anybody who has to make a profit would in this economic situation put his money elsewhere
@@fabnappany source on the 1.5 k? That’s bigger than peak Covid Bungie with about 900 people on Destiny and another 900 on Marathon and their two incubators.
@@ThisIsEssKah I guess if you look up the credits on mobygames there's 1.5k people that are included, but that wouldn't be full time. It includes the cast too.
There is a misconception though that hi fi rush was a smaller game, but it was definitely AAA budget according to the director.
That's assuming they can afford themselves or that anyone there can raise the capital and has any interest to buy the studio.
@@AyoulNow the former employees will have to look for jobs elsewhere (which is perhaps not difficult considering they're based in Japan) but the IPs now stay with macroflop
As soon as John is back in the show, him and Alex become those naughty 10-year-old schoolboys disrupting the classroom in the intro with the graphics cards and the casio calculator , and Rich was having none of that, getting them to focus to the news at hand lol
The most baffling thing about the closure of Arkane Austin and Tango Gameworks is that they get axed while 343 Industries with half a thousand people gets 15 years and counting of creating games, all of which failed to live to their promises.
Technically, they fired a lot of people in high positions at 343 after the Halo 6 flop. So they kinda cleaned house a bit. But yeah, Tango didn’t deserve that at all.
Obviously because 343 is probably making them more money because Halo is a live service game
john is one eyepatch away from a Punished Linneman look.
heartbreaking xbox studio closures, fuck the system.
John's not cool enough to be Snake.
The system? You mean the market, as in people. The people chose. Playstation is unbeatable. Period.
I cancelled Disney plus at that point too.
Hdcp error
Shot in the arm became shot in the leg...
I used to be a games studio until I took a microsoft to the knee
We missed you John, welcome back sir. Good to see Alex has been fully resurrected! :-)
I enjoy rich, Alex and Oliver videos.
John's absence was felt, so glad he's back.
And he brought a beard with him! 😄
@@rbyerlyminus Oliver, add Tom for me, I like Oliver but I keep looking for his bottom teeth behind that mouth of tongue. 😜
@amnril I zoom in at his mouth so it takes up my whole phones screen as his talking, I recommend giving it a try.
A future predicated on subscription services where consumers own nothing is not a future we should aspire to. GamePass would inevitably
Go the same route as every other subscription service, jacking up prices and locking desired content behind paywalls designed to milk you for every dollar. Loss leader pricing was just used to hoodwink gamers into thinking this was somehow in their best interest.
We are fortunate it stalled out so quick before the subscription model became the only model
Don’t forget ads. Tons of ads.
Be hilarious seeing Major Nelson trying to spin this if he was still at Xbox 😅
Bagdad Nelson
Yeah people gave me shit on Twitter when I said his leaving now was a bad sign for Xbox ...no no it's just his time blah blah he knew Satya would bring the hammer down
Johanas, the director of Hi-Fi Rush, said the pre production team of Hi-Fi Rush was him and 2 other people, after one year of that they involved more people for 2 and a half years. Even if all people at Tango were involved afterwards (which I don't think was the case) the significantly shorter development time makes the game significantly cheaper than most AAA and probably even some AAs
I'm just plain depressed with this week's layoffs and shutdowns. Especially when compounded with everything game creators have gone through the last 1.5 years. So sad.
My deep take is wealth inequality is the underlying cause. Firstly people are having less disposable income and luxury goods like gaming get hit with sales on a downward trend. And second, the dwindling number of investors (as a smaller pool of people hoard all the wealth) are interested in putting their money in creative projects when they can put their money in safer bets like property, so small to medium size commercial initiatives takes a hit and gaming is feeling that effect. You can see it in daily life with things like small high street businesses getting boarded up and the only thing that exists are big chains. Similarly, game publishers are only wanting to put their money in more larger recognised IP. It’s the sad reality of late stage capitalism.
@@matsui90 Yeah, the global spread of hyper-capitalism has made every single industry look the same. Mergers and acquisitions, anti-competitive practices, mass layoffs while the capitalists get richer. It all ends up with consumers being charged more while receiving less in return.
@@matsui90 not necessarily saying you’re wrong but what are the numbers behind this?
It’ll be ok.
Rich flexing with the PlayStation Triple PS5 in the background.
Soon to be four 💪
A Chadwarden reference
343 had a decade to fuck up Halo and they are still open. Meanwhile studios who actually do good work get shut down because Phil realises he has to actually pay back the 70 billion. What a bunch of incompetent hacks. Matt Booty couldn't use the correct names for two of the closed studios 😅
Yet, they are worth millions and are making millions while you sit there watching cartoons all day.
@@kenbanks2024'B..but but they make more money than you!' lmao what a moronic thing to say
@@anis6800 Studios that do good work? A good game is one that makes a profit. Ask MS how much money tango has ever made and it should become very obvious why they where shut down. Halo Infinite has undoubtedly made more money that all of Tangos games put together.
Same with The Coalition and Gears of War
@@kenbanks2024 Yet they are worth millions and are making millions while you sit there doing nothing but withering away in the comments. Such an impeccable logic and rebuttal you've made.
0:04 The episode is a bit long for a 160 second edition
On a positive note, Microsoft shouldn’t be allowed to buy anymore studios just to close them
Who’s going to stop them? There is nothing they can do, the studios allowed themselves to be bought. They got their money which is all they care about anyways.
Agreed. The government needs to not only stop them, but to seize their assets.
@@luism8130Actually the government will stop them. They just bought Activision-Blizzard, one of the biggest 3rd party developers out there. It took years before governments approved the buy because of Sony filing a monopoly suit. 100% believe that if Microsoft tried buying another studio, they will be blocked.
@@ewjimlhow did the government “stop” anything. They purchased activision blizzard already and Microsoft is now the biggest publisher in gaming.
@@kaikiske7436what the hell does “seize their assets” mean in this context. You mean the government owns them? that doesn’t make any sense.
Sorry I couldnt hear the discussion of the Asus product over the loud embarrassment that is ASUS Illegal Warranty violations.
Asus isn't getting amby business from me any time soon no matter how good the gear is
I was once hyped about an Asus product. It was the og PadPhone. I really liked the idea of reducing redundancy.
After about a month the cameras stopped focusing. I tried to go through warranty, was refused, tried to get a paid for repair bc I liked the product a lot, was STILL refused bc the device allegedly had an Italian serial number and could only be repaired in Italy, while it was definitely purchased in Germany. I will never buy an Asus product again.
I have to imagine the Microsoft/Xbox comms department is pulling its hair out right now.
The execs can't decide what the messaging is, and they're just speaking directly to media outlets and the public.
Are they though? I mean what's the downside? Public backlash? Doubt it will effect the bottom line and so they've realized they can do what they want with little to no consequences.
@@aggies11 from the perspective of the communications/PR people, it's really just not being able to do their jobs well, which is frustrating. They're just employees like anyone else. They don't get a cut of that Satya Nadella money.
@@postjm9 True. I think rather than be upset that they can't do their jobs well, they might rather be facing an existential crisis of how their old roles might no longer be necessary. This is a text book PR disaster. Except that there are going to be little no no consequences. And at that point, what exactly is disastrous about it?
The upside might be, that they can be a lot less stressed because their job now has way less potential failure, as even if they screw up the messaging, it doesn't seem to make a difference anymore.
I’m pretty sure they don’t have a communications department since none of the clowns at Microsoft know how to communicate. 😂
They were already working overtime in preparation for the June show, and then MS leadership drops this on them.
On Hellblade, it’s weird. Why give the game 5+ years dev time, and what appears to be an expensive game, but not expect it to sell and be a “tent pole” game? It was always a weird route to go.
Because in 2019-20 they were really desperate to counter the “Xbox has no games” claim so threw money on everything they could get a hold of
Hellblades gonna crash and burn. The first game was so bland. I have family members that suffer from psychosis, which the game preached it would help people better understand or learn something about, but it's not. The game was slow and clunky and boring to look at it and the puzzles felt like playing with that wooded plank with the shapes cut out you'd match shapes with and drop them through. The marketing for Hellblade 2 is non-existent compared to the attention Starfield got or Gears of War or Halo would get.
I'm not betting on it. Enslaved wasn't good and neither was Hellblade. Ninja Theory seemed like an odd acquisition for Microsoft, like they really had no clue and no taste for games. Ninja Theory just isn't a good developer. Heavenly Sword was good with a lot of tech crammed into it, but a flawed experience in some areas. It wanted to be a God of War game. It was a good game, but not a great game and everything they've had since has been mediocre. Hellbalde 2 won't sell and, yes, Ninja Theory will meet the same fate. It's possible all the fuss everyone's generating as a threat to Xbox that if they keep this up, gamers won't support Xbox anymore, that kind of strike could be the gamers telling the industry as a whole, gamers won't game if this happens but Xbox works that way, if the people make a big enough fuss, they'll reverse policies but Xbots are so fearful of losing the brand that they'll put up with whatever Xbox does without a strike like a whip labrador
Why not buy the game then. Buy the game
@@GMMXX80 Yeah, the first Hellblade was garbage. Certain people just like to look sophisticated by claiming to like weird garbage that is only appealing because it isn't mainstream. It is like that awful modern art rich people pay over the odds for and hang in their houses.
PSN account was known to be required before the game released. Requirements were on steam page before day 1. Not to mention a notice that popped up when first launching the game.
Yeah but MASTER RACE
@@bdizzle9586and improper communication. They should have just told players that PSN will be a requirement in the future and never should have sold the game in non-PSN countries. They fucked up, not the players.
@@speedforce8970 So the gamers read the notice stating a sign would be required and still went ahead. There’s blame all round
@@bdizzle9586 Yeah and Sony still sold it in countries where PSN accounts can't be made and they didn't properly convey that PSN will be required in the future. Sure, the store page had a notice and first launch of the game asks for PSN but people can forget that easily once they start playing. It's the PR departments job to make things like this absolutely clear. It's like I release a trailer on UA-cam but I don't bother to tell people on other platforms like Twitter and then I get mad at gamers for not watching the trailer they weren't made aware of. A simple tweet at launch detailing this would have been a easy fix. Even the director of Arrowhead said that they didn't properly convey this information and apologized.
Prehaps Phil should go back to college to do a business management course
I think you should take some biz classes.
@@kenbanks2024you mad dude ?
I think people like saying Matt Booty, they barely and reluctantly say Sarah Bond, just Sarah, but every time Matt Booty comes up they punctually fully confidently say Matt Booty!
Cause they like his name
Let's be honest here. It would be criminal to just call him Matt...
Phil and everyone else above-the-line:
Take. A fucking. Pay cut.
Just in case anyone is out of the loop, Phil Swift has an annual salary of an estimated $10,000,000 before stock options.
That’s one guy. I promise you there are tons of people at Xbox getting paid more than they should be, and if they would’ve considered cutting their own pay, I promise you at least one of these studios would still be around.
As much as I want to agree with this just because how incompetent they are. their pay cut wouldn't change a thing. The 70 billion they paid for ABK caused this. Xbox is such a train wreck
Above the line isn't the right phrase, but I know what you mean. "We did everything we could except cut our own comp."
Watch your language
@@DerekHansell I’m just using film terms because it fits the bill relatively well (above the line being directors, actors, producers, screenwriters, etc.)
Not the same, I know, but it’s not a bad substitute.
That wouldn't provide nearly the capital they need to keep things solvent at all these companies. Lmfao. Not even close. It's a cool thing to say to get brownie points with the broke kids, but corporate reality doesn't work like that. Sorry
I cancelled my Game Pass subscription this week. This isn't the way.
That should assist the closure of another small team or two!
That oughta help this situation 😂
no one cares. bye.
@@fred420 do you 420 all day erry day dawggy? Big bong hits all day and doobies all night? 420 makes people so cool!!
It never was. Games arent made to be binged like tv shows.
Crash Bandicoot and Spyro are not in good hands.
They never have been
@@mjc0961that’s a lie
A whole lot of legacy franchises are now in danger under Microsoft.
- Banjo & Kazooie
- Doom
- Prey
- Quake
- Wolfenstein
- The Serpent Rider series (Heretic & Hexen)
- Elder Scrolls
- Fallout
- The Evil Within
- Quite literally everything from Double Fine
- Crash Bandicoot
- Spyro
- Commander Keen
- Dishonored
- Hellblade
- Perfect Dark
And so much more. No franchise is safe now under Microsoft's corporate fuckery.
@@NoExplosionsMcgeeprey and dishonored is dead honey...
@@NoExplosionsMcgee Don't forget everything from the Sierra catalog that Activision didn't really do jack with either. And the RareWare catalog, and Tony Hawk Pro Skater
I've posted on here and other game related YT Channels, for nearly 10 years now that Phil "used car salesman" Spencer was running the Xbox brand into the ground and a few years ago, as soon as they announced publishing to PC that they were slowly exiting the console market towards mega publishing, but no one would listen. Too much emotional buy-in or Stockholm syndrome!!
Reflect on this: Xbox has closed more studios in the last year than released triple A titles, despite owning more studios than Nintendo and PlayStation combined!! That tells you all you need to know about Phil Spencer.
That the studios they bought are now releasing games since they didn’t acquire them until after 2018-2021 but hey let’s forget all the actually information just put out out stupid statements right?
@@TheBean87 they already had over 10+ studios before they spent 70 billion, but let's just forget all those studios and the games they were working on too!!
@@TheDomLouisyou realize those studios have games coming out this year and next right?
@@TheBean87 So you think those studios, that were bought before Bethesda etc, have been working on their respective games for 6-8 years and still haven't released them? They better be game of the year contenders if that were true!
IIRC some of those studios have been shuttered before they released anything!!
There's a pattern here.
@@TheDomLouiswhich studios were shuttered?
6-8 years? Someone is terrible at math haha.
MS: Tango, you guys makes some grrreat games (in Tony the Tiger voice)
Tango: Thanks, Microsoft
MS: btw, you're all fired
Tango: 🤨🤨
What is said at 33:11 sums that up. Can’t get any worse, right?
MS the next day: we need more games like HiFi Rush
The truth is that all game studios struggle under Microsoft. The only exception to this rule is Turn 10 Prosuctions and they may be on their way downhill too.
Xbox might be in a better place if they offered gamers prosuction.
Go check the player count of their recent forza game vs previous titles.
@@WayStedYou a lot of users getting some pro suction in Forza?
@@WayStedYou higher or lower?
I do not believe Nadela ordered these specific studios shuttered. At a town hall with Zenimax employees, Matt booty said managers were spread too thin to provide oversight (perhaps an excuse for why Redfall and Starfield underperformed). But rather than have their budget increased to hire more managers, they were told to make cuts. Someone who knows these studios proposed the closures, and Phil, even if he didn't come up with the idea, signed off on it.
yeah people say it's Nadela to protect their precious execs lol we all know it was Sarah Phil and Matt.
Disagree, its very clear that its downward pressure from Nadella, Amy Hood and tim stuart. Look at interviews, Phil and co have had a certain strategy and long term vision that is clearly abandoned the moment ATVI got acquired. If Phil, Matt and Sarah truly had the mentality of closing studios, even they aren't stupid enough to make constant statements about studio freedom only a year ago. The only failures from Xbox leadership are their belief on the game pass day one model, their insistence on it, and inability to produce great games.
@@Alcatraz760 You assumption kind of ignores Phil's track record. During the ZeniMax acquisition everyone was asking what the future of long term IPs would be and he would only give vague answers. After it was finalized again he would only say that it was a case by case basis. It took Sony fighting against ABK acquisition that the courts where able to pry from his hands that they had no plans to ever allow any squeal to exist outside of their ecosystem.
I mean pretty much everyone already figured this was the case. But we just wanted an offical confirmation of this. And Phil refused to actually give it. It it takes an anti trust court case to get Phil to finally speak plainly and not use corporate PR speak. Then how can you take anything else he ever says seriously?
@@Alcatraz760 Phil has had almost 20 years of failure related to the MS studios. I think he's the problem in that space. From being in charge of the studios, to being xbox CEO. They have a standing policy to only staff with 18month nonrenewable contracts that exclude them from working with MS for 9 months. With 36 avg dev cycles it means no one there at the start will be there at the finish line. They're doing it to make sure everyone is interchangeable which does drive all their games to be generic. Their current set up can only fail. The policy means only the most generic things can be made because all staff are replaced mid development. Only the snr leaders aren't and they seem to pick really shitty snr leaders.
@@gothpunkboy89 He literally said during bethesda roundtable that the acquisition was about "delivering great exclusive games that ship where game pass exist". Sure it's not a direct answer, but it outright says that acquisition was about exclusivity to Xbox and PC.
What if Xbox ditches the requirement of a monthly subscription to play online?
Shareholders would have heads rolling. Thats guaranteed money.
They will when they abandon the console market 😂😂😂
Haha and lose more money ? 😂
Then they would make no money at all
You already don't need one to play free to play games, which is most of them these days anyway.
Totally forgot about the Perfect Dark reboot... Disaster waiting to happen :(
"Can you write dirty words in it?" ... good old school memories :D
Where's Phil during all this chaos?
Hi-Fi Rush is one of my favourite games from last year and one that I would give a 10/10. I also absolutely loved both Evil Within games, and I consider them some of the best the survival horror genre has to offer. The closing of Tango Gameworks is really sad. As for Arkane Austin: they are responsible for my second favourite game of all time, Prey (2017), but as I understand, 70% of the staff (including many of the key members, such as Raphael Colantonio) have already left before or during the development of Redfall, so that studio is/was already a shell of its former self. Still, sad to see that studio go. Now who will make true immersive sims? Not Arkane Lyon, that's for sure, as Deathloop was the epitome of an anti-immersive-sim.
Speaking of handhelds and their battery life. I played Fallout 3 on my LCD Steam Deck for 5 hours straight during a trip on battery and still had 25 % battery left at the end. I don't care about playing new releases on, but the old games that run on low power - that's where Steam Deck is unmatched still, even the LCD one. Windows handhelds consume more power idling than Steam Deck can consume while running a game.
To be fair with the nintendo pricing thing, at least they have the ticket system if you're ok with digital. Which is even more of a deal now with the move to $70
Are we seriously in “Wait for E3” mode again for Xbox? Ugh they are so done and I am so done with them. Cancelled my Game Pass and won’t be an active Xbox Live subscriber for the first time since it launched. The Xbox execs have lost control of their own strategy and higher level execs are destroying their division. Ninja Theory is definitely next, Tameem has already left. Xbox is cooked.
Canceled mine too. They have become a toxic presence in the industry for multiple reasons.
Enjoy, I'm not canceling anything. Love my Series X.
I one upped you, I flat out sold my Xbox this past weekend.
Fucking paperweight.
And Obsidian and other smaller teams like Inxile and Double Fine should be scared.
😂😂😂 on my.
[HARDCORE SPECS IN BIO] had me creased lol. That's gotta be in consideration for a merch line :P
Love how John completely ignored Rich's counter argument and started ranting about Nintendo and physical games. 25:30
Injecting DXVK (async) into Sand Land seems to resolve the stutter on Windows. There's a demo of it here on UA-cam.
Helldivers 2 on steam said a ps sign in was required before it came out, apparently arrowhead had issues with it due to server load so they removed the requirement until they got it sorted.
yeah, incredible how they got this all wrong, totally misinformed dudes
70 billion+ down the drain if they keep going like this
MS has a proven track record of buying studios or attempting to buy them to acquire the IP for their catalogue and then close the studio down once they do.
The Linne-man is back
I'm in my 50s, and have been gaming 40 years. I've no platform loyalty; I respect them all. But at this stage, Microsoft very, very, very, very clearly have *zero* interest in gaming, in gamers, in the XBox.
My XBX has a small fraction of the games that my PS5 or Switch have - each - as Microsoft have just shown a near absolute lack of commitment to the platform.
As an example, here we are, mere days from the release of Hellblade 2 - and where's the marketing push? Where?! None.
I strongly suspect that, not least thanks to MS not doing a damn thing to promote their own platform exclusive, 6 months from now MS will be shuttering the studio, with quarterly earnings calls saying Hellblade 2 "failed to perform".
At this stage, I think I finally give up on Microsoft. After all, Microsoft gave up on me and all other gamers years ago. My XBX - absolutely nowhere near filled to capacity - can just be used to grab some old XB360 games before the store goes dark in a few months, as a legacy console archive, but, Frankly, I see Nothing else to bring me back to MS after HB2 releases.
Nothing.
I’m in a similar spot. I’m my 40s. Have had all consoles since the nes. No brand loyalty and since the “business update” podcast I had the same sense of things your saying. Since then I haven’t turned on my Xbox. It’s been disconnected. My pc has a 3060ti in it so I started playing around with pc gaming for the first time. Made a steam account, been playing games on there along with the free epic monthly games. Game pass ultimate has lapsed. I did just renew Gamepass pc on a monthly basis and will use it when there’s a game on there I want to play. I’ll have it for a month around the release of hellblade 2. But no intention of having it by default like I did in the past.
Same with me. My ps5, switch and Quest 3 get turned on frequently while my series s is unplugged sitting in the bedroom out the way. Tbh atm, it's the switch I'm playing most. I get the same feeling playing that thing as when I used to play the ps1/2. Roll on the switch 2!🤙
Damn, you're right. Hellblade 2 releases in 1 week 🤯
looking forward to you guys discussing your thoughts on the new rumored specs of the switch successor
Sand Land really is a gem! 😁 Don't sleep on it!
The thing is, if these firings were so at odds with their stated strategy right up until then, I wouldn’t particularly expect the top brass at Xbox to have jobs for much longer unless a dramatic and sudden turnaround happens…and let’s be serious, that’s, that’s not possible
Microsoft had the $$$$ in their eyes for Elder Scrolls and Fallout, so they want Zenimax/Bethesda to work quicker on those.
By the looks of starfield. They need to do serious work for ES6
@@Gravy1255exactly
Its probably gonna flop hard, Bethesda will never stop with their jank. They still feel entirely justified in delivering a game all screwed up since people shill the ips very hard still
@@Gravy1255they need to change their engine
ES6 is going to be a buggy mess
why did you put Redfall b-roll over Alex's talk about Tango?
Bethesda
Because arkane also got shut down.
Why is anyone surprised by Microsoft closing studios immediately after buying massive numbers of brands and studios? Do we not remember EA doing this for the last 20 years?
These studio closures do not come as a surprise at all and doesn't really affect my opinion of Microsoft. They've recently acquired several large publishers, it should have been anticipated that they would aim to maximize return on investment. They are taking on considerable operating costs as well as the initial investment they spent just to acquire the publishers, now they are trimming costs and will repurpose studios to maximize profits. I would expect similar closures on the activision side too.
Suddenly the Sony business strategy of not putting new games in ps plus catalogue day 1 seems pretty smart. Sell them first for a full price and then put them in ps plus later for people who would have not bought them anyway. And when people test different kinds of games from ps plus, maybe the next part of a franchise is something they actually buy day 1.
After the latest from Gamers Nexus you'd have to be mental to buy ASUS kit.
An important note re: the Helldivers 2 situation is that the game has been removed from sale through Steam in countries that don't have PSN, as has Ghosts of Tsushima. So even though you don't need to use a PSN login for the singleplayer parts of GoT, it is unavailable to anyone living in a country where PSN logins aren't supported. Helldivers 2 is likewise restricted, even if the PSN login is optional.
@1:30:02 Elden Ring did the same thing. Sometimes the game would glitch out on my 21:9 monitor and the black bars would disappear, giving me full real estate (the hud components would still conform to 16:9), but after a few minutes of gaming, the bars would reappear.
"The scenario which we never thought would happen"
Pretty sure this topic has come up multiple times. Heck some of you were even arguing with people on Twitter. Ain't no way you didn't see this coming.
DF is all smoke and mirrors now. All for the sake of "speculation"
Wow nice they're censoring me hard, super lame
@@StarmenRock what happened?
@@mustang750r idk i wrote 2 times here and yt deleted it
@@StarmenRock is it a link?
I hope Oliver is getting full credit for accurately predicting this Microsoft fallout last week. Glad to have John back, but Oliver's industry insights are great to have!
50:56 game support with the old switch games
Oh shit Linneman grew the beard back. That's how we know shit's serious. Dark Linneman has joined the party.
Many causal CoD players play for the campaign, they used to pay 70 bucks for it and now they will pay 15 and then unsub after they finish it in a weekend.
I honestly think multiplayer in call of duty has been bad for a long time, and they also have warzone, which is a completely free game (no need for Xbox or PlayStation subscription). Multiplayer has basically become a "p2w shortcut" for grinding weapons and upgrades for warzone, and the only reason anyone should pay full price for a call of duty would be for the campaign and other modes, like zombies. Putting call of duty on gamepass would cut a huge hole in activations profit. It'll take away the guaranteed box price sales that they can count on yearly. The fact that they don't go a year without dropping a new game should tell people that day one gamepsss would be terrible for them.
Many casuals play for the entire year unto the new one releases.
@TheMa5cmpb and they used to pay 60 bucks and 12 months lf xbox gold for that.
Now they would just gamepass it which costs microsoft more than a sale and negotiating deals for all those games.
@@TheMa5cmpbThis will be the win for Microsoft, because instead of those gamers spending a one-off £70 they'll pay £15 per month which is £180
Activision wasn't worth $70 billion. That's where they made the biggest mistake and now other better studios are paying the price.
Also EA's strategy with EA Play is much better than Gamepass. Launch first party games normally full price and only put them on EA Play exactly after 1 year post launch. That'll give enough time for serious buyers to buy the games and enough wait for casual gamers to get the game from EA Play after a year.
They were actually valued at MORE than 70 bill, Microsoft swooped in when stocks were at all time low and secured the bag as they do with most companies who are struggling and open to corporate consolidation
Ea play is on gamepass
@@spenny2centslies 😂 they were worth about 35
@@spenny2cents it's already an established fact that MS bought ABK for over its market price. Bobby Kotick and all the other shareholders were paid more for their shares than they would have ever gotten.
@@im2fast4u711 it's just a perk of Gamepass ultimate. EA Play functions completely separate from Gamepass and you don't get Day one releases on EA Play.
13:08 wrong footage bro.
Why would any developer ever work for Microsoft again? If I worked at one of their studios I'd be looking for a new job at this point.
Ironically, it seems like buying Activision-Blizzard killed Xbox. I'm feeling like it's going to be Microsoft gaming now. Their actions don't line up with what Phil Spencer says and it feels like, to give him the benefit of the doubt, Spencer has no power now. I am also really concerned about Double Fine. Two of my favorite games of all time are Psychonauts and Psychonauts 2.
Just compare the relative sizes. Sony and it's studios are 12k people. Nintendo and studios is 7.5k people. Xbox and studios is 30k people. To sustain that they need to act more like a publisher. They can't eat these sorts of losses without a good reason and their reason was gamepass and their target was 100m subs. They got to 30m. The shortfall means Phil is probably on his way out and xbox may exit the business as a platform and become a publisher (the biggest one).
If it becomes Microsoft gaming, Satya’s next 5 years will be in discussions with the eu and congress on how to split up Microsoft.
Never had power they just made you think he did. He’s the face nothing more
Phil Spender 🤑 Glad their buyouts are already backfiring and most of the public hate them for it now, especially after closing down 4 studios with more almost certain to come soon too.
we love some H A R D C O R E S P E C S I N B I O
Glad to see John back! He doesn’t pull any punches.
Richard always my favorite though!
Jon nailed the situation, good to have you back
18:46 John, the talk on Twitter was that only the last year of Hi-Fi Rush's development was fully staffed. The prior years were just prototyping by I think 2 guys. Hence the game releasing only a year after Ghostwire. If it had been hundreds of devs x 5 years MS would not have considered it a success, nor would they have sold it for $30.
😂 2 guys prototyping for 4 years, then 1 year full staff 😂
Absurd. The games’s director himself said it wasn’t a cheap game to make.
@@kaikiske7436 1500 people even if for only a year is enough to make it not cheap. Far more than Palworld, and probably even more than Helldivers 2 at its release.
@@kaikiske7436 Probably a cheap game compared to triple A game such as FF16
@@concinnus 2 people prototyping for 4 years, then 1500 people for 1 year makes no sense.
I used to work in gaming. There are always many many people in the credits that had no involvement. For instance, Phil and Matt are in the games credits.
@@kaikiske7436 Looking at the credits, the non-Tango staff were mostly management who may have been irrelevant, but it still had a lot of external hours. I'd guess the director was saying it just wasn't as cheap as Tango's 65 employees X 1yr, or e.g. KotOR 2 which was
Switch 2 with VR. The specs are there, the form factor is there, the hype is there after the vision pro and quest 3. It would be the perfect selling point and wouldn't cannibalize the switch form factor or price.
VR would be one way to kill it quick.
@johnboylan quest 2 sold 18 million and that was sold when facebooks reputation was at rock bottom and the thing didn't have any good exclusive games. A Nintendo vr console with Nintendo games and Nintendos reputation, and it's also a switch 2, that can monopolize the vr market and shoot up Nintendos stock.
@@danielgrezda3339 How many of that 18 million bought any games after a month of having it?
@johnboylan3832 the reason the software sold so badly was because Facebook is a social media company and couldn't make big games or get other big developers to make big games. But guess who is one of the oldest game companies that can make big games for new tech and has connections to third parties to make games for their console.
@@danielgrezda3339 The reason they didn't sell any games is because people bought into the hype and then realised that hype was all there is. VR games are mostly awful.
Anecdotally, my experience was that GamePass Ultimate for $16.99/month was more expensive annually than buying the games I want to play at discounted prices. I also don’t have to pay $16.99 perpetually to play an old game like Prey, which I got for under $10 recently. I also bought Avatar, Forza Horizon 5, Halo Infinite, and Rage 2, all on sale, and it’ll still cost me less than GamePass will for the year.
Richard brings a lot of class to this show. Alex and John know their stuff, and it is always fun to hear from them, but they do get a bit excited. I think Richard and Oliver have a good sense of decorum.
Denis Dyack was RIGHT??: Could this be the return of the much maligned "One Console Future"? The argument against it was that we needed competition in the hardware to prevent stagnation. However ignoring nintendo (which can be roughly slotted under "handheld"), consoles have converged on similar hardware platforms, with not much difference between them. The limits on tech, process, performance and cost means you aren't going to see one leapfrog the other with huge performance gains. And most importantly, the costs, difficulty and risk of modern big budget game development has lead to a scenario where the games themselves aren't really taking advantage of what differences their are in the separate machines, with one version often taking the focus as lead platform and the other titles actually ending up lagging behind, not better.
Do consumers actually need or benefit from an extra choice of console in the living room at this point? Do we really have a single console right now, in all but name? And with Microsoft's current trajectory is that going to become a formal reality?
Without a decent quantity of very good "can't miss" games, there is no reason to justify a piece of hardware's existence from a gamer's perspective, who just wants to play games.
And to think I just bought the Xbox for Starfield figuring it would be a banger. Oh well, it's not a lot of cash but I'm not feeling confident in the future of this system
I had my suspicions about generic galaxy-setting games featuring a lot of planets from Bethesda. Boy did they deliver. And somehow people who have just released a masterpiece are fired over those who made one of the most derivative and boring AAA games.
The perception of what games are worth. Never have truer words been spoken. Microsoft have devalued our enjoyment.
Thank you for this bespoke podcast!
If Asus is admitting there is a problem by redesigning the ROG Ally, then they need to recall the original units and fix them. Watch Gamers Nexus recent video of their ROG RMA nightmare. Asus is trash.
Honestly, although these news are sad at first, I think developers might open new studios so we can have new IPs. It's terrible for them to lose their job, but at least now they might have freedom to create something new and inspiring.
Yes, I thought the same.
Great episode, Team!
Welcome back, John! You were missed!
My biggest problem is that how did all these Xbox creators not know they were gonna do this?MS has a history of it.
They legit thought Phil and Aaron were their friends lol
They’re all clowns who just wanted free stuff from Microsoft.
@@ShadyPlatinum777 When stuff is free, you are the product
Phil is basically a cult leader one of those types wirh a reality distortion field we see how it affects the fans so I can imagine it’s the same with those working under him that they buy into his demented vision
07734 to all this week!
58008.
Hey guys, just a heads up guys, the original source of the article where MS re-confirms Call of Duty and every other game is still coming to Gamepass on day one is the Sarah Bond interview, Dina Bass asked her about it. That said the reaction from gamers on reddit shows we don't have confidence in this with people theorizing they will either only put it on Ultimate, release it several months delayed, or increase the price of base GP substantially.
There's a chance they might subdivide the service further. Adding a premium tier which includes the day one releases.
Asus could have added a standards conform OCuLink-2 Port (PCIe 4.0 x8) to the Ally, they chose to use the same connector but change the wiring (: