I’d be more excited about Death Stranding 2, if it weren’t exclusive to PS5. What we really need is more weird games that can be played on as many platforms as possible for that game.

Yeah, that’s the reality…Big Business People making choices that will make the line go up. To be fair, it is a savvy move to make software readily available if the hardware isn’t moving; especially in the case of Microsoft’s first party games. Sony, being the consumer hostile and shoddy PSN holder, wouldn’t be my first pick for victor in the console space. Strange things happen when you got a few good exclusives, and pricey consoles, I guess.

It’s good that Microsoft is contemplating how to move forward, but, I disdain the news of more layoffs. They really should keep their core staff and cut pay for CEOs and C-Suites of Xbox instead. Since they are the ones who actually failed Microsoft. The neXtbox (essentially a prebuilt PC) and handheld might be a way for them to reach audiences again. Even though Valve is killing it in the Handheld Market with SteamOS and their Steam Deck; Microsoft better not recoil in fear due to this, as staying the course and making better choices will help.

Wow, if they want to turn Xbox around, they are going to need people. Cut Phil’s pay instead! He likely already gets far more compensation than he needs.

Indie Stone did have a rough start, but, I do feel they are doing quite well. Despite the many setbacks, they’ve created a great game. I don’t play a lot of it, due to the desire to play a 1.0…However, I appreciate the small slices that I allow myself.

Yeah, I agree, this is purely due to poor project management decisions. They’re scope seemed to grow into an unmanageable thing, this is likely a first time project… So this team didn’t have the knowledge to make a solid plan of action.

As for Project Zomboid, as a person who paid for an early access version when it first landed…That game wouldn’t be where its at without early and steady funding.

Yeah, its a shame that the Hytale team didn’t think to do this, instead they wasted hype by doing an engine switch mid production.

I’m not surprised, the opportunity that Hytale devs were given had been squandered thoughtlessly. I believe the game’s fate would’ve been different with a playable EA version. One that generated sales while building hype with major patches. With a game that has good bones, this style of development works rather well.

With Microsoft as it is, yeah, I doubt they’d try to get Xbox/PC parity going…It’s just a flight of fancy that most gamers would love to see. However, Corporate America has mostly lost sight of their end users and only care about the numbers going up. They aren’t willing to invest more effort into creating an ecosystem that attracts new users; they want it cheap, fast, and constantly. I do agree that it would be a badass thing, to be able to seamlessly switch between PC and Xbox, with the expectation of being able to play any game in your library or in Microsoft’s Gaming Library. I do use Linux, so I wouldn’t necessarily benefit from that type of parity. It would be beneficial to those invested in either ecosystem, regardless.

PC Parity would be a hard approach for Xbox, possible if they had been working on it for years to get this parity nailed way before launch of physical hardware…

If they truly believed in Xbox Anywhere, that would be their move; however, I doubt their ability to manifest such an integrated back and frontend. Making it so devs can easily optimize their games for available Xbox hardware. So that games wouldn’t need lengthy dev times on ports, and release riddled with performance problems.

On Multiplayer, I can’t foresee a world where Microsoft gives up on the income generated from this player base anytime soon. They don’t care about PR enough to cease receiving those injections of cash. Microsoft is certainly playing a short term game in most cases, so the lure of profit will get ahead of them and mess up any efforts to realistically succeed at first try. Their engineers likely understand why Valve is so successful, but the bigwigs can’t possibly understand it. As they likely don’t have any connection to the gaming scene. I can see Valve dominating in the handheld space because of their focus on user experience first and knowing that profits will follow after.

Microsoft might get lucky and have someone on that handheld OS team who is passionate and can translate their passion into terms those dollars seeking C-Suites can understand. I won’t hold my breath though, only seeing what happens next will and a postmortem assessment will tell us how successful or how big a fail this effort will be!

In the console space, with luck, they’ll do better as there is a body of experience to draw from in this space at Xbox. Hopefully, they’ll reduce the ads which currently plague Xbox’s home screen and get in the way of players reaching their games (if that is their style of interacting with Xbox). Backward Compatibility will be prioritized so that libraries across console gens are still highly accessible, making Xbox a strong contender for playing older games on modern hardware. It’s not exactly a game preservation dream, but making these older games accessible is a good move.

Microsoft is already doing that with AI, something they are actively hemorrhaging money on…I doubt they’d try doing something too extreme and risk alienating end users again! The reason why Sony has such a leg-up currently is due to Microsoft dropping the ball with that online library BS which seemed legit bad (despite how much they said it would be convenient). I feel like they are going to stay dedicated to providing a better experience than Sony with backwards compatibility and offering other form factors to engage with their ecosystem. In an effort to capture handheld and console enjoyers. Microsoft has seen the success of Steam Deck and SteamOS, I doubt they’ll get it right initially, though. As ironically, they couldn’t get Windows Phone right despite part of their core business being a major OS (I blame bad leadership and poor decision-making lower down the chain).

Their subscription service Game Pass won’t go away, but, they’d probably keep it the same as now. Only Multiplayer and being able to play games that are on the service without additional charge.

His team was also burnt out after working on BG3 after such a long time, Sven respected the wishes of his team over the lure of making more money. It’s important to remember, Sven actually cares about the team he’s assembled over short term profit. Screw Hasbro any day of the week is such a mood, but, not an inciting incident that lead to Sven making his choice.

I’m curious about what Xbox will be doing in order to keep the people who use their stuff and improve the hardware/software situation enough that more people will become interested in Xbox again.

While I respect Larian’s right to turn down another time intensive game like Baldur’s Gate…I do worry about the same thing you are concerned about: A shitty executive that only cares about cash and not art! A love for art and appreciating great storytelling is what made Baldur’s Gate 3 the breakout hit. The AAA industry is too shortsighted to be capable of creating such a marvel like BG3, though they occasionally stumble into success without understanding why. They won’t let their teams cook and, it’s very likely, their creatives have either moved on to another studio or became a stress casualty (Bioware’s own term).

I did, and my worries were confirmed! I haven’t updated my comment.

Ah, so basically Nexus Mods is dead to me now. Whenever venture capital is injected to anything, it’s a bad sign. Ugh, great these particular Capitalists are from the crypto community…

They’ve been souring a lot of potentially cool projects with blockchain/web3 nonsense, like Playtron, for example. Lutris is now dead in the water and hasn’t been updated for months now; the former dev is working on Playtron. There is a huge issue log that doesn’t seem to be addressed at the moment.

Seamless docking is what I am after, I will look into the Legion Go S and see if the docking in seamless for the SteamOS version. If so, that would be a huge selling point for me! To be fair the Legion Go S seems to have a better layout spread than the current Steam Deck (Valve made sure to make a Steam Deck Dock at least). The Steam OS version is also cheaper than my iPhone 15 Plus, so it also has that going for it and I can pick it up from Best Buy. Even if there is no docking, I might still pick it up for a better gaming in my apartment or out and about.

Eh, ditching a dedicated console is a bad idea, as I love the staying power and gaming power inherent in that form factor! Perhaps, if they have a docking method for this hardware, I’d potentially be interested in it. However, I’d still get a Steam Deck or Legion Go S before an Xbox Handheld. Edit: Not at the proposed price point, I would certainly not get this handheld…They are forgetting the reason why handhelds can be appealing, they’re lower price points but decently powerful systems.

In a way, I hope it scares enough gamers away that it sends a message. I want there to be repercussions, Nintendo might get away with it (due to fanbase), but other companies need to be curtailed and fast!

I won’t buy this at full price, when Outer World’s two goes on sale at 50% or more off, that is when I will buy it! By then, all the major bugs should be resolved, and new content will be making this game even better. I blame Obsidian Games from not trying to shout down Microsoft and fight them in a Waffle House parking lot over this price.