Microsoft has always been clueless about Gaming

[@BlazeMakesGames]

Something that I wish in retrospect I had made a little more clear in the video about Halo and the original Xbox: Yeah I realize that there are plenty of other games on the original Xbox other than Halo. After all the Xbox outsold Halo by a factor of 3 or so so obviously plenty of people bought the console without even touching Halo. However, I think many people trying to refute this point are just looking at the numbers and not the context. Halo not existing doesn't mean that the console would have still sold at least 60% as well as it would have otherwise. (Although even still that would be a huge hit) My point is that Halo was a launch title for the platform. Launch titles are incredibly important and how a console launch performs can have a dramatic effect on the rest of the console's lifespan. To use a more recent example just look at the Switch: The Switch launched with Zelda and Zelda was *the* reason why people got a switch for a pretty long time. And that led to a massive boost in sales that really got the console off to a good running start. But now Zelda isn't even the best selling Switch Game, it's actually the 4th best selling from what I can find. However, I don't think that games like Mario Kart and Animal Crossing and whatnot could have sold as well as they did, if it wasn't for Zelda helping get the ball rolling at launch to get the console as a whole into the public eye. The more popular a console's launch is, the more that people as a whole start to see it as a viable option, and the more that developers want to make games for it, which in turn keeps drawing more people to the console and so on and so forth. After all just look at the WiiU by comparison. That console launched to no major Nintendo releases and it basically flopped right out the gate. So despite the fact that Mario Kart 8 was originally on the WiiU, and would eventually go on to become one of the best selling games of all time, MK8 wasn't able to sell nearly as well as it could have on the WiiU due to that poor console launch. Sure obviously there are some other factors here like how poor the WiiU marketing was as a whole but my point is that the WiiU launched terribly and as a result great games that might have sold really well in another context ended up flopping and weren't able to get nearly as many consoles into people's homes. So going back to the Xbox, that's why I think it's kind of insane that Microsoft just so happened to buy the right studio at the right time when they were already making what would end up becoming one of the most influential shooters of the 2000's. If they hadn't done that or if they had bought a different studio instead and never had that insanely influential game as a launch title for their console, then chances are that the Original Xbox could have flopped right out of the gate just like the WiiU. And without that big influential launch, then the console gets less media press, word of mouth doesn't spread nearly as far, and with fewer initial sales then developers have fewer reasons to develop for the console or even port games to it. And as such even if games like Fable still existed on the hardware, it probably wouldn't have reached nearly as many people as it would have off the back of Halo. On top of that, this was also the *first* Xbox to hit the market, making it even more important to the brand that it had a good launch, seeing as they had zero built up knowledge or trust from the consumers to work off of. That's why Halo was so important and critical to the Xbox's success, even if 60% of Xbox Owners never ended up buying it. Without it, that other 60% would still likely be significantly lower.

[@The80Kat]

There is no way anyone read this

[@crazedlunatic43]

It’s worth mentioning that the original Xbox was barely a success outside of America, as Microsoft completely ignored the Japanese market and they didn’t do much for the European market either. The exterior design of the first system was flat out unattractive compared to its competitors, due to how large and heavy it was in comparison, and it’s library did little to help garner sales outside of America.

[@StayFractalesque]

They didnt even develop Halo.. they bought Bungie out, just like their same strategy today, buying BGS, and absorbing Starfield, which was supposed to be multi-plat.. dont let these Xbot Apologists get to you, they are NPCs who couldnt see the forest for the trees ever since the 360 gen, where 55% of their consoles failed! .. eff MS and eff Xbox

[@BruceStephan]

Microsoft really weren't that successful . Some of the Xboxes were replacements . I do know a lot of the 360 sales were MIXED with the replacements to make it appear as sales growth . Microsoft never fixed the redring problem . When I got the HALO 3 bundle , my 360 redringed in 3 weeks . And I take care of my consoles .

[@ActionGamerAaron]

"The Switch launched with Zelda and Zelda was the reason why people got a switch for a pretty long time." While Nintendo nails the most important part by having good games, I think this is still a bit short-sighted. Some things to consider is that it's a considerable more 'normal' console than the Wii U, which by the way got Breath of the Wild as well. The Switch was not only more 'normal' in regards to how you play it, arguably novel in it's ability to be both portable and easily dockable.

[@AlteredNova04]

I realized that Microsoft had no idea how to actually manage game studios when they forced Lionhead, a studio famous for its single-player strategy and RPG games, to switch development focus to live service bullshit. I was not surprised at all when Fable Legends was eventually canceled and the studio was shut down.

[@commando0110]

microsofts first victim was galo 1. after tgat came halo 2, galo 3, even halo wars. even after bungie left, they replaced bungie with 343. a studeo made of people that do not like halo

[@StayFractalesque]

Honestly, what they did to Arkane was way worse..

[@Diggi1027]

@@StayFractalesque They both were just as horrible. Not one more than the other.

[@michaelmarlow6610]

I was in the testing pool for Fable Legends, it’s a good thing they never released it cause it was insane.

[@Surosevic92]

Man i loved Fable games made by Lionhad studios When they shut them down i was seriously disappointed as xbox fan :( Future of Xbox consoles is grim like Ms will be fine but Xbox hardware eh they are going to shut them down probably and stop production and just focus on publishing games there’s money there.

[@FTChomp9980]

Remember when Xbox Fans said that buying stuidos would help the Industry well that didn't age well at all.

[@baki484]

I remember the following and I quote. "Microsoft playing 4D chess" "Daddy Phil should buy everything" "What's daddy Phil buying next" "Take that Playstation fanboys" ironic since they were no different "Playstation makes deal Microsoft will buy everything" "PC gets everything so I'm not affected" "Game pass is the future" Going off all of this gamers are apathetic when all the acquisitions where taking place (PC gamers). Xbox was pushing for this because their plastic box gets to hog everything. Playstation gamers were hiding how salty they were under guise of being worried about consolidation while pushing for Sony to buy publishers as well. Those who were genuinely worried were disregarded as Playstation fanboys. Tango gameworks has closed down and everyone lost in the end

[@KnowToChill]

I rember if they aktet like " Sony is dead yet without CoD...Thats Sonys End !" 😂Now they are all so quiet..and tell Peopel they screwe theyr PS Accounts becouse that " CensorShip" in Stellablade 😂

[@laurenedney7]

That's one Also have people noticed that they released the s and x before the standard? Very risky, but they seemed to think they'd be the best at that decision.

[@masterpainter78]

No, I dont remember. Play on PC, and man did those studio's just slide off into oblivion.

[@FTChomp9980]

@@masterpainter78 I only play Nintendo but i do want to join PC.

[@zombee38]

Someone said in another video "Microsoft can buy the companies but can't buy the people working inside...they just leave"

[@moister3727]

Microsoft can't retain their talent basically

[@todesziege]

@@moister3727 And also can't incubate new talent.

[@ErnestPWorrell1984]

@@moister3727 I bet a lot of the talent wants to work for anyone other than Microsoft.

[@FR4M3Sharma]

Rare

[@PetrusEksteen]

My favorite event was the "locking your game to a specific Xbox One unit" debacle, and Sony brilliantly countered with that ad where the guy goes "this is how you share games on PS4" and he just hands the game to the other guy, and the ad ends

[@ilari90]

And then they tried to do this stuff to Helldivers, luckily the fans were vocal.

[@applehazeva2739]

Thing is. Everything those two are at glory, they can't help themselfs and need to f up so bad. As someone with every console, let me say: DON'T BUY AN 10th GEN CONSOLE. WE LIVE IN TIMES WHERE STEAM DECK AND ASUS ROG ALLY's EXIST Buying anything other than a PC nowadays is just stupid.

[@PetrusEksteen]

@@applehazeva2739 Agreed, and now even that is getting cracked down on with Microsoft's draconian ToS, too bad so many games don't support Linux

[@Nomans1971]

So much hatred for Microsoft, but the love in when Sony do the same shit is embarrassing.

[@PetrusEksteen]

I don't have a Sony phone, TV, game console or speaker but I don't think they are really any better than Microsoft (or vice versa)

[@romakryvytsky8018]

Microsoft don't have long term plan and clear strategy. They are saying one year "we need a lot of new experimental games, revive franchises to boost Gamepass", and now they're trying to milk TES6, Fallout, Call of Duty.

[@BlazeMakesGames]

all the news coming out about them the last few days has been absolutely embarrassing. I like how Knowledge Husk put it: "We can conclude that the future of Xbox is to make Mega-Blockbuster Indie Niche Prestige Slop Award Winning Mega-Hits that don't cost any money to make"

[@Dairunt1]

I do think Xbox has a long term plan, the Xbox console titanic is sinking and Game Pass is their lifeboat. That's why they've been doing these big acquisitions. To add value to their service and reduce their licensing fees for Game Pass to zero. Unfortunately having a subscription and no quality content to sustain it kinda defeats the purpose, does it not?

[@Zelorp]

I wish they were trying to milk elder scrolls. They just started ES6 development a year ago or something, right? We haven’t seen a new ES game in a decade, but we get a new fallout something or other every few months. I’d kill for ES to be that prioritized.

[@Digger-Nick]

Everyone wishes they were milking elder scrolls and fallout, the problem is that they aren't lol

[@Jkend199]

They never understood... What makes a game studio valuable? 1. The talented people who work there 2. The Awesome IP's those people create If the core members of the team that developed The Elder Scrolls leave, what you have is the IP. So... what can you do with it without the creative people who created that IP... Turns out what you can do with it is license it to other studios and hope they are able to make good games with the IP for you... Bethesda themselves did this with Fallout when they leased it to Black Isle... but Microsoft doesn't do this. They sat on the Mech Warrior IP FOR 20 FUCKING YEARS. Microsoft has lots of Intellectual properties that fans would love to see brought back from the dead, and there are tons of studios who would love to be given a chance to work on those IP's and Microsoft just sits on them, doing nothing with IP's that could make their gaming division competitive...

[@brandonengle07]

Microsoft's problem is Microsoft. Their general forte is business and enterprise software with some consumer products on the side, not video games. They really only care as far as having a consumer-level device in living rooms to compete with Sony. At least, that was part of the impetus to even get into the console market to begin with.

[@iluvmusicqwe]

They've always been parasites

[@elhazthorn918]

It's insane to think Microsoft will change, too. The higher ups there are either evil, grossly incompetent, or both. Not to say the suits at the other companies aren't evil, but remember when that Nintendo head took a pay cut so he wouldn't have to lay anyone off?

[@crazedlunatic43]

Even then, Microsoft half-assed the original Xbox to get on with Sony. Their first success was undeniably the Xbox 360, which was able able to correct most of the short comings that affected the original console and in turn secured console exclusivity which helped the 360 outdo the PS3 during the Xbox 360’s prime.

[@StayFractalesque]

MS has always been stealing hacks ever since stealing the graphical interface from Apple.. now Gaytes has moved on to bigger and better things, like GMO crops and Booster Shots..

[@BlueEyedVibeChecker]

@StayFractalesque Steve Jobs stole the Graphical User Interface from Xerox, he was just as bad, if not worse because he claimed it was his first. Also claimed that touchscreen interfaces were his idea for iPhone in 2009 when Nintendo did it for the DS in 2004 with LG doing it first in 2006 with the LG Prada smartphone. Using that as your reason tells me you're either too young to even know why you hate Bill Gates and co, or just don't know how to do your own research.

[@LiveSportsOdds-uo5xu]

Halo infinite should have been the nail in the coffin for anyone who believed in Microsoft. Halo is the “Mario” of Xbox and they treat it with such disdain. Microsoft has unlimited time, money, and resources and still can’t make a decent game.

[@laurenedney7]

Literally, that's why they suck.

[@BlazeMakesGames]

yeah I think the trajectory of Halo has kinda been the biggest Red Flag. If there's one Franchise that you'd expect Microsoft to want to invest as much money as possible into managing it properly, it'd be the franchise that is the mascot for their entire gaming division. And yet they keep mucking it up with bad business practices that just show that they clearly don't know much about developing games or managing game development.

[@lizrengaming5133]

That is sadly true.

[@StayFractalesque]

Halo, supposed to be their launch title for SeriesX, didnt come out until a year after launch.. they launched their next gen console, with No Launch Title.. i mean, come on! ..who can defend that?

[@cdot.8492]

Not only that, Flight Simulator is Microsoft branded??? No special accessories for that game. Forza Horizon 5 and Motorsport were disappointing too. Needed more RPGs for years and didn't invest in keeping HALO consistent.

[@markvicferrer]

There's the story that after Microsoft bought Rare from Nintendo, they were touring their offices & noticed a Donkey Kong standee and said, "We own Donkey Kong now?" Ever since the beginning, there's been more corporate businessman than gamers running the Xbox division. But as time has gone by, the ratio of corporate vs gamers has gotten worse. Tango was gearing up to make a new game, which means they'll only incurring expenses until that game comes out. Microsoft only sees the short term loss as a bad thing & fires everybody, not seeing the money that would come in when that game releases.

[@lahuk1194]

Microsoft entered the gaming industry because they feared consoles could replace PCs in the home. It was a ploy for market dominance, not for a love of gaming. Hence the attempt at always online, GamePass, buying up all these studios, being an all-in-one entertainment box, trying to kill off physical media, etc. Xbox was at its best with the OG Xbox and most of the 360's life, When they largely stayed hands off, and had a ton of great games coming out.

[@MasterGamer-jz4ro]

Nowadays xbox: buys studios, shut down studios, repeat.

[@elhazthorn918]

That's literally Microsoft over the past few decades.

[@BlueEyedVibeChecker]

@@elhazthorn918 That's Microsoft and Sony, not just Microsoft. Choosing between Microsoft or Sony is honestly like choosing between drowning or dying of thirst. We lose either way.

[@homiej8163]

@@BlueEyedVibeCheckerit’s still much worse with Microsoft. They have been doing this since the beginning.

[@BlueEyedVibeChecker]

@homiej8163 So have Sony, they bought entire publishers off of the Saturn and Nintendo 64, like Eidos who were the publisher for the Tomb Raider and Legacy of Kain series', hence why Tomb Raider was PlayStation only from TR2 until 4. This feels like a very "pick and choose"y kind of fight to be honest.

[@soyunbonus]

Yup, at least Sony has Concord. I think this is a problem of most big companies nowadays, they have to attract shareholders.

[@Wintersoldier73]

Game Pass is definitely not sustainable. A recent example is Persona 3 Reload. That game was day and date onto the service. Additionally, the P3R DLC pack, a $30 value, is free to all GPU subscribers. While I don't have access to the number of subscribers who downloaded P3R, I can tell you that less than half of the people that downloaded the game have even played a single minute of it. So Xbox is paying Atlus big money for DLC that no one will play, they paid for the base game to be put on the service day and date and they have paid Atlus/Sega big money to have the marketing rights to those Atlus properties. Even the physical collector's edition of P3R didn't sell. I recently saw it for $169.99, while the PS5 version sold out in most places at $199.99. Xbox has to be paying big money for games that don't sell on their platform because they've taught their user base not to buy games. That business is not sustainable when the subscriber count isn't growing. That just one mistake of many.

[@BlazeMakesGames]

yeah I heard that just downloading the game and not even opening it a single time is still enough for Xbox to pay devs their cut and that's like cool for those developers sure, but how is that sustainable for microsoft. I mean could I drain Microsoft's wallets by just repeatedly downloading and uninstalling tons of different games? If Devs are making the same money that they would make on any other platform then Xbox would be paying out like 30 bucks a pop at least per game you download. I just really don't see how this works long term once you get past that initial growth phase

[@elizabethflowers749]

it really would be unsustainable, if they weren't microsoft, they can afford to basically throw money away because of windows and other services like office, they don't even make money with the xbox brand

[@GigaChad_169]

The Xbox DVD playback kit was about licensing. You can’t just “play” DVDs, you need a license from the DVD consortium and you have to pay a licensing fee per unit sold. Usually the hardware manufacturers pass that fee on to the consumer in the end price. Microsoft opted not to since not everyone will use DVD playback and they’re trying to lower the cost of the console as much as possible. The DVD playback kit covered the licensing fee and cost of the remote to unlock playback. Sony was part of the DVD consortium and didn’t have to charge themselves a fee to use their own intellectual property…

[@gejamugamlatsoomanam7716]

Microsoft is a 3 trillion dollar company, they could have easily absorbed that cost

[@Coreisus]

The more you know

[@TH3P0PS]

@@gejamugamlatsoomanam7716not in 2005 they weren’t

[@gejamugamlatsoomanam7716]

@@TH3P0PS they were still one of the most richest companies in the world in 2005

[@minhduong1484]

There are a lot of basic factual errors with this post. First of all it was a HD-DVD kit. This was the format that lost to Blu-ray eventually in the format wars. Microsoft was a member of the HD-DVD forum so I do not believe they charged themselves. While DVD players need licensing, by the time of Xbox 360, DVDs and players were so common that Netflix expanded into streaming a year later. Netflix started out as a DVD by mail rental company. I think it was not uncommon to be able to get a DVD player for like $25. So this notion that DVD licensing fees kept Microsoft from including a player are somewhat ludicrous. The problem is Microsoft bet on HD-DVD and lost. The next generation of optical disc players was expensive and Microsoft wanted to cut costs everywhere in the 360 development. Ironically this decision would help doom their own format as Sony choosing to lose money on each PS3 to include a Blu-ray player helped them win the format wars. In hindsight the cost saving moves made by Microsoft would come to bite them in another way. In designing components of the 360, Microsoft opted not to pay for their hardware partners to design critical parts of the machine. This was Microsoft's second console and they thought they could do it themselves. This was the cause of the red ring of death issues. A billion dollars in repairs later, Microsoft learned that what the decision to cut costs meant.

[@blazehawkins2759]

The bigger issue for me isn't that GamePass isn't profitable. In fact, I'm going to guess it's the exact opposite. Microsoft's entire business model now is subscription based products, whether that be Office, Azure, or GamePass. The issue is that Microsoft is sitting on so much cash that it cannot use in any meaningful way, it can put an offer for $69 Billion for Activision/Blizzard, and no other competitor on the market could even compete with them. And with that being the case, every time Microsoft wants to goose it's stock price, it now has a proper whipping boy: buy a game company, sit on it for 5 years, and then when your stock is in a slump, announce you are shuttering a studio, laying off 300 people, and boom, your stock goes up 5% overnight. What it says to me is that any studio in the AA space or above is basically fucked. It costs too much to make a game, which means being acquired by a larger publisher is a net good thing, only to then have all your internal projects cancelled, your studio flounders for a few years producing nothing of quality, and then you get shut down because capitalism. In a real way, we could be seeing the end of the video game industry because of a death by a thousand cuts

[@BlazeMakesGames]

The other problem is that Microsoft is I think spending way way too much on companies that they can't possibly hope to get a return on anytime soon. ActiBlizz cost them nearly twice as much money as the entire console market made in a year, put together. They can't possibly hope to recoup those costs before the next decade or so. But CEOs are so hyper focused on short-term gains so instead of waiting it out and trying to let all the studios they buy work on great games, they go "okay what can we cut *now* so that we make our money back asap!" And like I suspect that Gamepass makes money yeah, but the problem is that while Gamepass is making money, games released on gamepass often don't look like they're making money because regardless of how many people play them, what matters is how many *new* subs they get. And if everyone already subscribed to gamepass, then the new sub counts are only going to get lower and lower no matter how much they wanna chase infinite growth. So as a result you get games like Hi Fi Rush who clearly did well and reviewed great, but I guess it didn't generate enough new subs so it gets axed even though it probably would have still sold millions if it wasn't on gamepass.

[@smhsophie]

this comment is right on the money.

[@iluvmusicqwe]

There's magic beans accounting going on with gamepass. There's no way its profitable if development costs were part of the equation.

[@ConcasicoWoodworks]

This has to be one of the scariest takes I have read and mostly because it is totally real.

[@JagaimoNeko]

Windows is still no subscription-based but... give 'em a couple 'o years

[@SourRobo8364]

All that money they spent could have been put towards a new franchise or revive an old one. Where is: -Banjo-Threeie -Crimson Skies 2 -Recore 2 -Conker 2 -Blast Corps 2 -Kameo 2 -Brute Force 2 -Fuzion Frenzy 3 -Blinx 3

[@BlazeMakesGames]

The most upsetting statistic I've heard is that the payout that Bobby Kotick got from Microsoft from them buying Actiblizz, is by itself enough to pay the wages of ALL the employees of Arkane Austin and Tango, for the next 17 years. One man was paid enough to fund like 3 more dishonored games and 3 more Hi Fi Rushes, combined

[@user-vi4xy1jw7e]

​@@BlazeMakesGamesKotick got away with so much, even before Microsoft.

[@user-vi4xy1jw7e]

I'd rather we get new IPs like Hi Fi Rush instead. People always complain about the countless sequels, prequels, reboots, and not enough new ideas.

[@danialyousaf6456]

All of these games you mentioned could've been made with less than half of what they paid bobby cocktick.

[@CarbyGuuGuu]

Viva Piñata 3, we need a new one so badly.

[@BrunodeSouzaLino]

I immediately knew they were clueless when Rare wasn't allowed to have a character called "Bill Gate" on Conker Live and Reloaded according to Chris Seavor.

[@urbielatenightgamingadvent567]

Phil's statement, 'Making good games doesn't help! We don't believe in exclusives!' raises concerns. If the top executive doesn't believe in the value of exclusive IPs and quality games, how can they effectively lead the in-house game development team? That's the core of the problem.

[@BlazeMakesGames]

yeah it's very much clearly a statement made because they know they have a huge problem with actually putting out games despite owning dozens and dozens of studios and they're trying to spin it like that's somehow a good thing.

[@urbielatenightgamingadvent567]

​@@BlazeMakesGames The spin doctor believes in his own spin! 'Exclusives are an anti-consumer practice,' he said. Exclusive games are NOT anti-consumer; they bring innovation and differentiation. A good console company has to think of new hardware and games at the right price to outcompete their competitors. That's what has pushed gaming to new heights for the past 40 years.

[@Stoffinator]

The 360 gen was also not run by MS. It was Peter Moore, and J Allard. Guys who understood what gamers wanted. Moore said he'd only take on the task if Microsoft stayed out of it. And they agreed. Once those guys left and more suit guys came in (Matrik) and started to focus on Nintendo. There is where they switched to gamers, to casuals. Since, it has been MS suits running the division. Yes Phil is a gamer himself, but he is a suit. He wants to please the shareholders; which he should. Moore and company had more freedom.

[@NFSBeast2365]

Interesting

[@BlueEyedVibeChecker]

Moore did wonders for them, he tried his best to fix SEGA of America's many blunders, and did wonders for Xbox. Legit should've fought to keep that guy on, but they didn't.

[@StayFractalesque]

360 was still the worst console in existence, with a 55% failure rate..

[@Stoffinator]

@@StayFractalesque From a hardware design yes.

[@horacevu]

@@StayFractalesque The later slim design improved it and no more red rings, but it is not the worse console, it beat the ps3 for that gen of gaming.

[@DevicCypher]

The only reason Microsoft created the Xbox was because they were scared of the ps2. That’s the only reason why it exists. They said so in their Xbox documentary

[@gravemind76]

Why would a computer/software company be scared of the ps2? Probably the dumbest thing I heard. Xbox was something experimental and took off that's all.

[@DevicCypher]

@@gravemind76 no what you said shows you know nothing. Watch the documentary of the original Xbox. They were afraid of the ps2 taking away pc players. Especially because their disc based games were a direct threat to pc, including the fact that the ps2 was capable of utilizing a hard drive. So they made the Xbox to compete with the ps2 and to keep as many gamers as they could while bringing in new ones. How about you actually learn before opening your mouth?

[@gravemind76]

@DevicCypher link? Sounds dumb but I have no problem admitting I'm wrong. I think you comment since we aren't using our mouths.

[@DevicCypher]

@@gravemind76 lmao you need to learn proper English too apparently. And I don’t need to send you the link. The documentary has been on KZbin for a very long time

[@Manic_Panic]

@@gravemind76 Microsoft didn't want Sony dominating the games market because at the time, they pushed SEGA to the grave and Nintendo was holding on for dear life. The idea infact was more of a Dreamcast 2 that was backwards compatible since SEGA was going to help them but Microsoft kinda went ahead anyway and did its own thing. Though they still got plenty of SEGA exclusives that didn't release on the PS2 or Gamecube like Gunvalkyrie, Panzer Dragoon Orta, Jet Set Radio Future, Otogi 1, Otogi 2, Crazy Taxi 3, Toe Jam & Earl 3, Spikeout Battle Street, Shenmue 2 and Outrun 2. SEGA was almost like a first party studio to be honest, without them the original Xbox would have been much poorer in terms of content. This is why some people considered the original Xbox as the Dreamcast 2, because it kinda was.

[@SharpsBox]

Halo LAN parties were a real thing. I don’t think people nowadays can understand that.

[@AdmiralBison]

The Xbox is a sinking ship. The quicker more people see the writing on the wall, Microsoft finally admits wanting to go third party and Xbox wishfully, though unlikely, breaks away from Microsoft to be its own 100% independent separate company the better.

[@user-vi4xy1jw7e]

Xbox breaks away with what exactly? Would Xbox take all of the studios that Microsoft spent billions on?

[@lutherheggs451]

Xbox really isn't a sinking ship. They are doing exactly what they've planned on doing. Buy massive publishers, fire the studios, strip mine the IPs and then publish as either Xbox Games Studio or Microsoft Games Studio. Maybe and its a maybe at best they put out a Microsoft streaming box but they're no longer wasting billions on a console after that. Phildo Sphincter knew how bad Redfall was but needed a game for WelfarePass. Same with Halo Infinite, same with Starfield. When Hellblade 2 doesn't do well because Xbox people don't buy games Ninja Theory is next, Tameem has already left the studio. IF Avowed doesn't do well Obsidian is after that, IF they're lucky they might be kept around to work on Fallout games so its not 15 years between games. They've had their eye on publishing for everything since last gen but needed to own IPs first

[@ManiacMayhem7256]

Home consoles in general are sinking compared to their old successes and vs mobile games

[@KevinMcAlistairJr]

The DVD remote issue was Microsoft apparently not wanting to pass thee DVD licence fee onto those customers that didn't want it, the remote and IR sensor were essentially you paying the licence fee for the DVD name and functionality.

[@conchobar]

They do the same today with Dolby Atmos.

[@nixielee]

You are correct sir, without Halo there wouldn't be an Xbox today. A fluke. For some reason, they cannot develop games, or even buy them. If Elder Scrolls 6 ends up like Starfield, it won't be pretty

[@5persondude]

TV, TV, TV- TV- TV- Sports- Sports- Sports Callodoodie- Callodoodie, Callodoodie- Callodoodie Xbox, go home That video still lives rent free in my head 😂

[@davidaitken8503]

I knew Microsoft had no clue what they were doing when all of Rare's games under their ownership failed to capture the magic that the company was known for under Nintendo. The importance of Nintendo's legendary Q & A playtesting resources to help refine a game from something good to something truly special can not be underestimated.

[@ZachaRicO]

I didn't pay attention while it was happening, but reading up on it years later, I was in disbelief at how ANYONE at Microsoft thought the planned restrictions for the Xbox One were a good idea. My disbelief doubled when I read that Don Mattrick responded to the backlash by telling people to just buy a 360 if they didn't like what the new console was doing. That douchebag thankfully got booted out a couple months later, but I guess Microsoft never fully learned their lesson. What a pity.

[@boubayaga_]

The original xbox needed the remote control for DVDs bc Microsoft didn't want to pay for licencing the DVD format for every console, so they slipped the cost onto the customer who wants it with the remote

[@keanuxu5435]

You’ve made a compelling that Microsoft got lucky for its first two console generations. Subscribed

[@adambester3673]

Not only is game pass probably not sustainable, I think its a really bad deal for subscribers in the long run. if you spent the same amount of money every year on older but still great games on steam sales or good old games or humble bundle during sales you would slowly build a really good collection of games that you do not need to spend any additional money to keep. If Microsoft suddenly raises the price of game pass to the point where you would rather not subscribe you are then left with nothing the moment you stop paying them.

[@BlazeMakesGames]

yeah that is a fair point. It's great in the short term or if you're playing games you just wanna play a single time. But if there's anything you wanna keep, then you'll want to buy it anywhere else to keep it. I do think Gamepass still has some value as basically a demo service. Like for example I didn't have to pay 60 bucks to play Starfield and that saved me a lot of money by using gamepass instead. But at the same time I just touted a major benefit of the service as a way to avoid paying for bad games *on* that service so that's not really glowing praise now is it...

[@doltBmB]

I looked very simply at the price of the games I was interested in playing initially, they added up to 36 months subscription. even after playing many more games than those the 36 months still have not passed. It is a fantastic value deal, you're just bad at math.

[@adambester3673]

@@doltBmB so wait the games you were interested in playing added up to a 36 moth subscription so you are saying you could have bought them for the price of the subscription and then got to actually keep them instead of losing them after 36 months? is that really a great deal?

[@intrance96]

@@adambester3673 Dont bother, he can barely understand words.

[@bestintheworld4850]

Remember when ps3 online was free? And Microsoft invented charging for basically nothing?

[@wadewilson6628]

I also remover it being complete garbage. Laggy, dropped you out of nowhere and no such thing as party chat.

[@RelaxingNostalgia]

​@@wadewilson6628you cant even type correctly,and expect anyone to believe your claim?

[@turtleanton6539]

I do

[@bibby3027]

yeah i also remember when ps3 servers were trash, constant hackers in cod, millions of people’s credit card info getting leaked. definitely aren’t paying for nothing

[@Wolfstanus]

MS didn't invent that though. Subscription gaming was a thing long before xbox. Subscription gaming existed since 1988.

[@SleepingDragon3]

I consider the og Xbox the most underrated console since it actually had a very diverse range of exclusives which could appeal to many different audiences. The problem was that Microsoft only knew how to market to pc gamers and frat boys who don’t buy most of the exclusives. Hence the og Xbox became the halo and western rpg machine leading the brand to struggle building exclusive franchises ever since.

[@ruvanefriebus-cv6td]

It took off with the 360 and died with the 360

[@NexusKin]

At least it kept it up for about eight entire years, from 2005-2013, so it was a good run while it lasted.

[@turtleanton6539]

With the red ring of death😅😅😅

[@turtleanton6539]

​@@NexusKinit sure was😅

[@BlueEyedVibeChecker]

@turtleanton6539 pretending Sony didn't do the same with the yellow light of death AFTER watching Microsoft do it with the Red Ring. Sony straight up did the thing they mocked Microsoft for, knowing how bad the CPU supply chain was. Nintendo is the only one who didn't screw up the hardware.

[@smhsophie]

actually i’ve been thinking about this a lot lately. something else interesting i think about is their plans with cloud gaming, and how it fits in with even having a physical xbox in general. it seems that they’re slowly trying to shift towards that but i think their transition strategy isn’t clear and in the meantime their console seems to just be in free fall. i think it’s really costing them. but, they deserve it honestly

[@BlazeMakesGames]

yeah they seem to just want to be a part of everything, console, live service, subscriptions, cloud, etc. With no clear focused plan in mind. I know that every corporation is about making money of course, but Microsoft seems to forget that running a games company is also about, like, making video games at some point along the way. I think they don't care about game production, they just want to own games that are profitable. And are far too willing to cut entire companies loose, not for making bad games or even for being unprofitable, but rather because they weren't profitable *enough*

[@iluvmusicqwe]

The stupid thing is that cloud gaming is a long long way away from being viable

[@Tuntira]

Will xbox even be a thing by the time this becomes a possibility...

[@Dairunt1]

I don't blame them for wanting to move over to the cloud; they have failed to beat Sony at the home console market and Nintendo has the handheld market locked down with the Switch. Having their games on PC and cloud is the next logical thing; the problems they're having are actually very similar to Disney+. Disney have been acquiring studios, adding them to their two subscription services, yet their movies are not making bank at the box office and they've been losing money because of it. Disney has also been doing massive layoffs and I don't see their situation improving anytime soon; the rise of indie animation is also taking money from them (which I hope also happens with the gaming industry; it's a tough time to be an indie developer but I hope they can maintain gaming aive).

[@jmcclain8237]

The O.G. Xbox and the 360 were both awesome. The Series X is a great machine. We all know that m.s. is going to 3rd party at some point but things change. 15 years from now, no one is really going to care.

[@KongGig]

Microsoft could have continued the gaming train that they had kick started in 2005 until 2010 but they wanted the easy money that motion gaming gave. Heck, studios such as Rare turned into a kinect studio.

[@jebe4563]

Make a list of what you consider noteworthy games on the Xbox 360. I can pretty much guarantee almost everything on your list was produced by a 3rd Party group, was on PC, and after ~2010 was on PS3. In that time period proper First Party games basically amounted to Halo 3, with Bungie not so quietly looking to get away from Microsoft.

[@TheNameIsSR]

​​@@jebe4563The problem you've just described is also affecting the PS5 this generation. Sales are dwindling and Sony's excuse is that the PS5 is old now. No Sony, the problem is that the PS5 has nothing to call its own. People are catching on and will just choose to play their games on PC instead

[@beedrillbot121]

To be fair to the 360, Sony also had a fatal flaw in the original model PS3 with the yellow light of death. The only reason the red ring of death is so widely known about, is because nobody in their right mind was going to spend $499.99 on the PS3 when both the Wii and 360 were significantly cheaper. Of the 7th generation of consoles, the Wii is the only one without a crippling design flaw. Probably because they weren’t trying to make an HD console with 2005 technology.

[@Ashitaka0815]

The only reason the RRoD is more known than the YLoD is simply Microsoft coming out first with their system, I had both launch machines and both failed over time. Missing experience with lead free soldering caused many electronics to fail during that era, especially when they got really hot like consoles and graphic cards.

[@spiral1407]

Early Wiis would cook themselves if wiiconnect24 was left on. They all had issues

[@spiral1407]

​@@Ashitaka0815it's also because the PS3s fan curves were better, which caused less systems to fail

[@VikingRobotNinja]

It's disheartening to see so many of these conversations descend into console warriors missing the point and taking cheap shots. You make a lot of good observations here, thanks for cutting through all that noise

[@ManiacMayhem7256]

Exactly.

[@jeezycreezy4220]

I'm surprised you skipped over the whole "forced pairity with the Series S" thing that kept Baldur's Gate III off of the Xbox platform for a while, something that basicly holds all 3rd party games back into the last generation.

[@Gabriel-ly3yn]

About the red ring of death, the real cause as specified by microsoft themselves in their documentary is the fact that laws at the time forbid companies to use "lead" in their soldering. Lot of companies had trouble finding better alternatives and so the repeated heat and cool down of the console just de-soldered the chip. Trying to get your console cool down did not affected this and all model of 360 up until mid 2008 are defective. Same thing happened for the PS3 to a lesser extent but yellow light of death is pretty much the same thing.

[@Ashitaka0815]

Launch PS3s and graphics cards were also failing left and right during that era, Microsoft just got the short stick by launching first.

[@willwidrick8039]

“Why pay $60 to be disappointed by Star field when I can pay $10 instead?” Hilarious 🤣 But being serious here, Game pass does feel way too good to be true, I can’t see how they are profitable with it

[@BlazeMakesGames]

for real I wouldn't have played starfield at all nor made my most popular videos to date if it wasn't for gamepass, so thanks Xbox? I guess? lol

[@VenomKeenerYT]

Microsoft deserves to go back to media streaming and scrap gaming entirely…

[@ELIZABETHMARLONE2005]

Ok Sony Pony cry cause COD is coming to Gamepass its gonna ruin PS

[@Azuris190]

When i was looking for a Console at the Time, Dead or Alive 3, all the Sega Stuff and Ninja Gaiden were System Sellers in my Eyes. (Got a PS2, still have it)

[@Alex-in8jy]

Absolutely. People love to cherry pick the missteps associated with the Xbox and overlook the great games library that it has. The PS2 library is second to none but the Xbox carved its own niche and was very good in its own right. Dead or Alive 3, PGR 1 & 2, Jet Set Radio Future, Gunvalkyrie, Panzer Dragoon Orta, Ninja Gaiden Black, Crimson Skies, Rallisport Challenge 1 & 2, console exclusivity of Bioware games (KOTOR 1 & 2, Jade Empire), Otogi 1 & 2 (FromSoft games before Dark Souls), lots more. Not to mention being the superior choice for multiplatform games. Most people who trash the original Xbox come across as misinformed and pretty closed minded.

[@TheAwsomeSawse]

I was beginning to wonder if I had hallucinated Blinx the time sweeper

[@BlazeMakesGames]

I swear I remember seeing one of my friends play it back in the day and I thought it was so cool and then I guess it wasn't interesting enough for me to keep it in my brain any longer than that one interaction and I never followed up on trying to play it myself lol

[@BlueEyedVibeChecker]

@@BlazeMakesGames Blinx always felt super arcadey, like if it were a Dreamcast and arcade title it would've thrived and had more than a single sequel. (also the sequel likely wouldn't have flopped.) Dropping the series was a huge L on Microsoft's part if you ask me. The series dared to be different unlike what we have now on Xbox and PlayStation where everything is either a buggy fps title or a hyper realistic action adventure with basically the same gameplay and a different skin. Microsoft should bring Blinx back and Sony shouldn't reduce Ratchet and Clank to a hardware showcase and let it be more like it used to be, these series' were amazing.

[@theozziepotato]

Streaming services have always sounded way too good to be true, and GamePass takes it to the extreme. How is it profitable?

[@BlueEyedVibeChecker]

Because people pay over time, and when you take something like 9.99 a month, it doesn't sound viable, but when you multiply that 9.99 by the millions of users of the service, it quickly adds up. It works in their favour that Gamepass happens to be better than the alternatives like Geforce No- I mean, Google Stadi-, no wait, OUYA, that was a goo- no? Well PlayStation Now is a solid streaming service for 10fps 360P gaming I suppose? I hate streaming services cause I think they suck, but it's hard to deny how good Xbox GP is compared to the rest of them.

[@Ashitaka0815]

It isn't. It's just how capitalism works, going in with plenty of money resources, undercutting competition prices and taking the losses until you are the market leader, then raising again when all competition died and people have no alternatives left.

[@BlueEyedVibeChecker]

Because it costs more to run a server when less people use it. One person paying 9.99 a month is chump change, 25 million people paying 9.99 a month is a gold mine. It costs less to run a server than it does to manufacture hardware, and monthly payments means you don't just get paid once and that's it. That is why it's profitable.

[@thelemetric]

@Ashitaka0815 this is exactly how it works, 100%. this is exactly how things go to shit. one of my life missions is to avoid giving microsoft a single cent. the absolute cancer of a company.

[@Lucky_9705]

Microsoft rushed the 360’s launch, and the Red Ring of Death came back to bite them in the ass

[@NostraSamus]

It was the nail in the coffin that would cause me to never spend money on one. I wouldn’t even buy it as a gift to a loved one that wants one because it’s garbage.

[@ELIZABETHMARLONE2005]

​@@NostraSamusPS3 had the yellow light of death so what exactly is your point

[@NostraSamus]

@@ELIZABETHMARLONE2005 Something that happened only 11% of the time on PS3. Only met 1 person that went thought it, as opposed to every 360 owner I knew experienced RROD at least once.

[@ELIZABETHMARLONE2005]

@@NostraSamus the ylod is why people can't get backwards compat ps3s anymore

[@NostraSamus]

@@ELIZABETHMARLONE2005 Well, at least the revisions fixed the main issue, which is the ability to play PS3 games. Backwards compatibility is an afterthought and not a priority. PS2 was also still selling. And still, it was still a very low percentage of failure in those PS3 models. Something I can’t say for Xbox 360 when over half their units failed, Microsoft knew about this flaw and released the 360 anyway.

[@GoufinAround_]

Speaking about the ps3 again though, people forget that by the time the ps4 and xbox one were coming out, the ps3 had caught up in sales

[@BlazeMakesGames]

yeah that's a really big deal that kind of says a lot about that generation on its own. The Xbox 360 had every advantage it could hope for. A full year long head start, a price that was cheaper than its most direct competition, while its other competition was too weak for most multiplatform titles, it was the easiest to develop on, and it was still riding high on some breakout hits from the OG Xbox. And yet despite all of those advantages, and all the problems the PS3 had at launch, by the end of the generation they were basically neck and neck with the PS3 even pulling ahead a bit in the end. That implies a lot of really bad mismanagement on Microsoft's part while Sony really got their act together. And I think it's backed up when you consider that the 360 era also had a lot of their mainstay franchises start to drop off in quality. Bungie left and Microsoft tried to keep Halo going but the series started going on a decline. Fable basically ended until very recently, and as people got more familiar with the PS3's arcane architecture, the 360 lost its dominant spot as the default choice for multiplatform titles.

[@Valkron11]

Xbox was great, back in the OG and 360 days. Almost everything after that paled in comparison. I got the OG at launch with Halo, Project Gothem, Munches Odyssey, DoA 3 and Fusion Frenzy. That was a better than any lineup they had since then

[@wadedewell]

That is a great launch lineup of games to get. I really do miss the original Xbox.

[@gjergjaurelius9798]

I got a xbox in 2002. 1st system I bought with my own money. I was 16 about at the time.. and let me say if Halo didn't sell me on xbox jet set radio future would have , phantasy star online, splinter cell, mech assault, and my favorite NINJA GAIDEN wouldbhave sold me on Xbox.

[@BlazeMakesGames]

yeah something I should have maybe clarified is that yeah I'm sure tons of people bought an Xbox for games other than Halo. I don't mean to deny that. And like I said in the video even if you did buy the console for halo, you still had plenty of other games to play. But like, Halo was in just another entire league. Halo and Halo 2 sold as much as the rest of the top 10 selling Xbox Games combined. There's a reason why Master Chief was *the* mascot for all of Xbox. And it's just kinda wild that the only reason that happened was because Microsoft just happened to buy the right developer at the right time, just like what they're trying to do in the modern era. It's hard to imagine a world of Xbox without Halo, but it so easily could have happened if just a single deal went a different way.

[@gjergjaurelius9798]

@@BlazeMakesGames completely agree. Halo was the 1st game I got myself followed by jet set radio future and dead or alive 3.

[@conchobar]

If Xbox paying Sega to port over games from the recently defuct Dreamcast isn't pro gamer, I don't know what is.

[@vladv5126]

Watching this on my PS.

[@BlueEyedVibeChecker]

Watching on my Samsung Smart Fridge.

[@jimfcarroll]

I'm crushed. Duke is my favorite controller.

[@Ashitaka0815]

It's not bad and does the job, but it's an acquired taste and almost unusable for smaller hands. Personally I actually think Halo 1 is best played with the Duke😂

[@hamsterwolf]

That guy probably has tiny Sony child hands. The Duke is basically a deluxe Dreamcast controller the ms switched to the s type design which is still being used to this very day the PS5 controller is actually closer in comfort to the s type than it is to the PS2 it just keeps the symmetrical sticks.

[@OutwardLyric]

The fact that you really think Fable, Kotor 1 & 2 (games you forgot btw for the original Xbox btw) Morrowind, Panzer Dragoon, Forza, Gotham Racing, Jade Empire, Crimson Skies, MechAssault couldn't sell the original Xbox without halo is insane because that is a huge lineup of exclusive games for the original Xbox, especially morrowind which sold over 4 million copies. The fact you really think the 360 and original Xbox only were successful because of luck and forgot to include any other sorts of information for how Xbox ramped up their exclusives that came out on the 360 as well is downright disingenuous. Not to mention how the 360 started backwards compatibility for future Xbox consoles going forward. Did you really even do any proper research when making this video man?

[@Hely_from_de_mainframe]

Finally some facts

[@thechili444]

Your first mistake was expecting honesty from a Snoy.

[@Alex-in8jy]

Couldn't agree more. Pretty much everyone who trashes the OG Xbox (and to some degree the 360 as well) comes across sounding totally ignorant. The Xbox of 2001-2012 was nothing like the Xbox of today.

[@Cruxics]

So you're pretty spot on with the Xbox. Halo was the key to it's "success", even if the system was a complete and total failure from a sales perspective. the millions lost on the system just so Microsoft could "Learn about the console business". It was a dice roll, absolute chance. Though I think had halo released, it might have remained on mac until 2003 or later. Anyone's guess if it would ever make it to console. I doubt Halo 2 would have been the phenomenon it was that helped launch the x360 in anticipation of Halo 3. Finish the Fight was what kept X360 going after its issues. Sticking to Xbox here, they spent a lot of money on securing exclusives, from Panzer Dragoon Orta to Shinmue (mostly sega) thinking they could win that audience over. Sega just wasn't having it as a newly budding 3rd party pub and collection of studios. None of the games locked to the system are what I'd call reasons to own the thing. Don't get me wrong I love Panzer Dragoon Orta and I hope to see it freed of its xbox shackles one day, but even Jade Empire and Knights of the Old Republic were enough to sway me over. The system was a beast hardware wise, but it wasn't doing too much more than PlayStation, becuase of how it was designed, it was damn well near impossible to get the price down, which is another reason sony just clobbered them. PS2 was in their domain to refactor as much as they want, they owned all the parts, took part in its manufacturing and its standards. Mass Storage even 10 gigs was expensive back then to the extent that it was best left as an optional accessory. Evenutally those parts would come down in price, before the lower capacities going back up in price again as they became antiquated and out of date. So they didn't think of resizing the storage capacity at all since they couldn't even move product off the shelf. Contrast with Sony which had formed partnerships with studios that it would acquire at some point, like Naughty Dog, Insomniac (most recently, not during PS2), Guerilla Games, Santa Monica Studios, and more, which over the last 20 years have returned on that investment 10 times over. Even their partnerships with 3rd parties were just really hard to break. Like with Square Soft, which would become Square Enix that generation. Relationship with Namco continued to be strong. It wasn't easy getting these relationships to break with Xbox 360. Xbox 360 had a mountain of issues, I agree it was dumb luck that made that console successful even if it was in 3rd place by time the dust settled. They rushed that machine out the door fully knowing their was a design flaw that would cause the RRoD. They had to get out the door earlier than Sony, so they took a chance that it wasn't as bad as they were seeing. Atari Jaguar anyone.... Then there was their CPU design. Sony didn't lock down exclusivity for the PPC core it used on the Cell to manage the other SPU's on the chip and handle General purpose work loads. Microsoft jacked that for themselves through IBM and that became their Tri-Core CPU, using 3 PPC's. Which still difficult to work with as Multi-Core programming and proper thread managers were still undiscovered country for most developers at the time. That first year resulted in developers doing the same thing to the PlayStation they did to the Jaguar, piling code onto the one core and part of the architecture they understood to get it out the door, but not utilizing the rest of the machine to make it work. PS3's CPU is still a beast and when utilized it produced games like Uncharted 2 and Uncharted 3. Games that were difficult to produce on PS4 in remasters. Because the Cell was still more powerful than the PS4 and Xbox One's CPU. Microsoft during all of this threw more money at exclusivity deals for 1year with stipulations of not telling anyone about it. This resulted in a lot of falsely percieved notions that these games were locked into xbox 360 and never releasing anywhere else. Little did MS know the games were exclusive to begin with, because those developers were struggling to understand the PS3, resulting in the Sega Saturn problem. So titles would come to xbox 360, the dev got free money, while it tried to figure out how to port the game if it was a success. This lead to some policy shifts and requirements from sony to combat this problem (good on them for recognizing it), while microsoft continued to beat them over the head with XBL money to buy exclusives not just in gaming, but in video streaming. I think had sony released first (even though the PS3 clearly needed another year), things would have been different. Xbox 360 for one probably would have had a bluray drive and not had the dreaded RRoD. I also think the folly of the prior generation would have followed xbox. They didn't understand the nature of the exclusive or the in house 1st party exclusive taht sony and nintendo flourished on. I don't think the PS3's price tag would have mattered as much, had it delivered on the games it promised in the first year. Speaking as 1st year early adopter myself. I love my 60 gig 599 US PS3, still used it today. Those games and the quality of them hurt sony. If we had more Uncharted/killzone 2/R&C/Resistance and less Lair/Heavenly Sword/Folklore, things would have been very different. Hell I'd even say Xbox 360 with its year lead wouldn't have mattered. As those 4 games looked better than anything X360 was dishing out in its first year. Mostly upgraded PS2 ports. Even Bioshock would have worked against microsoft had they delivered that performance earlier on. The rest as they say is history, but there were a lot of little underlying circumstances that just hurt xbox. Including the fact that Microsoft was never in it for the games, to develop actual experiences for gamers, to make money while doing that. They saw dollar signs, which every company does, but for them it was about the living room. it was about subscriptions. They wanted you locked into the Microsoft brand. This all stemed from a fear of the PS2 disrupting their hold over the living room with the Home Theater PC's that no one remembers from the late 90's and early 2000's. MS had enough forsight to see where all that was going after MP3 and the rise of streaming technologies, most would fail, but you could see a path to the living room in 10 years. Windows machines were expensive, especially when compared to the PS2. Which was also expensive. As a result of MS's desire to manipulate instead of participate, they've always lost their leads, becuase they never truly understood how they got there. They didn't understand the importance of IP's like Mass Effect even though they owned the rigths to the first game. Good on them for selling that back to EA and other such deals to reunite franchises, but had they stuck to it and believed in it, took the sony approach. Bioware might have been an Xbox Studio right now and Andromeda would have never had happened. PlayStation gamers would have been SOL for one of that gnerations penacle titles. Microsoft did try to innovate, in defense of their always on DRM strategy and those discs being one user locked. The idea was to install the disc and not need it after that point. Bridging the benefits of Digital vs Physical. Downside is Physical should maintain its value, not be locked to a certification system that would turn it into a coaster the minute servers go offline or the generation is over. So MS wasn't thinking ahead and their lack of interest in Backward Compatibility harmed this strategy further. Had MS just stuck to the original vision of Xbox, I think things would ahve been different, but before it reached market in 2001, it had been corrupted by Microsoft enough that Xbox never had a chance. That's why they've always been in last place. Only acts of god give them any kind of leading position in the industry.

[@BlazeMakesGames]

Yeah I think it says a lot that the 360 is considered the king of all that is Xbox and the peak of gaming for many people... and it still sold 3rd (just barely tbf) out of the big 3 consoles of the time. They had just about every possible advantage that any company could *dream* for and by the end of that leg of the race they were barely limping along behind their most direct competition who practically shot themselves in the foot at the start of the race. But where Sony learned from their mistakes and healed in time to pick up the slack, it felt like Microsoft was resting on their Laurels and just let everyone run past them. And I think you're spot on. Microsoft has pretty much never been in it for the games. Nintendo and Sony clearly, on at least some level, care about putting out good titles. They at the very least understand that the foundation of a successful console is to have a big library of games people want to play. Even if not every game is a mega blockbuster best seller 10/10 GotY winner, it is still important to build a library of both big budget and niche games to bring a wider variety of people to your platform. But Microsoft only seems to see numbers, they don't see value in long-term talent or understand that building a strong library can take multiple entries in niche genres sometimes. That's why Halo is developed by tons of temporary contract workers that constantly cycle out every 18 months and completely mess up their development timelines. Simply because it's cheaper to do that. Never mind that it wastes tons of time and there's zero long-term talent being fostered that becomes familiar with the game and the ecosystem. Just throw out the current batch of devs for the next one because it saves money on the spreadsheets. What? The new Halo is a barely cobbled together mess with tons of issues? Gee I wonder why. And just like that they've squandered what was at one time one of the biggest video game franchises ever, because they clearly just don't understand what actually matters in game development.

[@ummerfarooq5383]

Spending 10 billion to buy companies but afraid to spend 1 billion to run those companies...

[@FlamespeedyAMV]

Bungie saved the 360 era

[@paperluigi6132]

Reminder that before the original Xbox launched, Microsoft tried to buy Nintendo, with them saying that Nintendo did not understand what is necessary to make a game console succeed. Nintendo then proceeded to laugh their asses off.

[@enjoylife6374]

i dont know just how Game Pass is being shelved into GAMING conversation. It has nothing to do with games, playing games, good games. Its just a muscle of microsoft that has all this money from not gaming businesses

[@Dairunt1]

It has EVERYTHING to do with Game Pass because if you put exclusives in an unsustainable service, not only they end up being not exclusive anymore but you shut down those studios because you lose money over them.

[@robdabanks]

I managed a video game store for most of the years you covered and it was fun to go back to those memories. You do amazing content. Keep it up 👏

[@TremelJackson]

Imagine being an xbox fan up till this point man that's gotta suck

[@upwaveflash8429]

It's beyond suck It's embarrassing at this point I was a xbox fan until i see such trashy move they pulling of from a few years ago (2-3 years ago) Now I am the fan of no-one I just a vivid fan of emulation which give me all the best thing of the history that dev/pub never bring em back

[@laurenedney7]

They should've seen it coming

[@NostraSamus]

I never bought any of their consoles. The 360 almost got a sale from me, but a 54% failure rate made me cringe. But people kept buying it!

[@upwaveflash8429]

@@NostraSamus to be frank I years on still kinda not planning to get one Until i have a chance to gacha it full parts just for a cheap 50 bucks One hella thing is It even been chipped with fully functional hacked slim models Goddamn i was lucky until i have to move to another country Hope my bro enjoy it

[@user-vi4xy1jw7e]

​@@NostraSamusYou got your console repaired for free, so it was a no lose situation.

[@ryanvacation7319]

Exactly. What's the point of owning numerous game studios if you discard the talent that forms the heart and soul of those studios? It's a typical corporate mindset where everyone is considered dispensable.

[@RippahRooJizah]

As far as gamepass go... I have never used it as I don't have an MS console. But I do think the issues with Gamepass is tied to the fact that gaming is perceived to have less worth in general. One one hand, yes, I get that people won't care for paying full price for a game they don't like, but on the other hand I think trying to say a game isn't worth it's price for being too short and not much else is not great. On top of that, games often go on sale or can be attained from key resellers or, hell, just pirate a game (despite what some people will say, there *is* a number of pirates who will pirate a game purely because it is a free option, or will pirate a game at the slightest inconvenience). I don't really think many people really care about the cost of game development, just how much they would have to pay to get said game. Said game could be trash or could be something the player doesn't understand, though. Ultimately, there are issues at the top, but a lot of people make the mistake that none of the issues is where they stand either.

[@Rycerz49]

For very brief moments they had an idea.. that’s the best I can give them.

[@godzilla4189]

The Xbox One ended up being the Sega Saturn for Microsoft, and nwo the Series X/S is the Dreamcast. I honestly don't see a new console afterwards.

[@notnooryno]

Microsoft started going tone-deaf during the Xbox 360 era as evidenced by their decisions to start using ultra cheap game cases and discontinue manuals.

[@dancarter5775]

Xbox has two main issues : lack of compelling software(ie the main reason to buy a console), and too much push for Gamepass. Sony has it better with ps plus. Yes, it's pricey, but there's so many older or less new games on ps plus, that stay for a while, that can reinvigorate interest for sequels like with Horizon Zero West, Spider-Man 2, the last of us, and so forth. So they can hype up future interest for current franchises, generate greater sales for current and new games, and give people the chance to see or experience great games after their "peak".

[@MegaNancyLover]

This video provides a stark reminder that Xbox leadership has indeed always been pretty clueless. In fact, even their "documentary" on their official Xbox channel called The Story of Xbox is full of admissions to critical errors they have made throughout the years.

[@RetroClubXYZ1]

I've always appreciated how quiet and well built the Xbox One is compaired to the PS4.

[@LukeLunn]

I bought OG xbox for Ninja Gaiden

[@agt_pendergast8899]

I definitely want to see a vid ranting on the kinect. In my eyes, that's when they lost whatever tenuous grasp they had on the plot.

[@littleabigail4328]

Microsoft absolutely bungling the XBone was literally the worst generation to flop on. That was the generation where people started to build up digital game libraries and thus would be far less inclined to switch console makers once the next generation came around and be required to buy all their shit again. So the majority of people were locked into Sony consoles meaning the PS5 had a massive advantage from the get go. That’s not even getting into the Series X being more powerful then the PS5 but the demanded game feature parity with the Series S from Microsoft absolutely gimping the X.

[@thelemetric]

great comment, absolutely true. Mattrick destroyed xbox.

[@drentzios88]

Man the OG xbox and the 360 were incredible systems especially for the mod scene

[@bibby3027]

calling them “luck” is insane

[@Ashitaka0815]

I think bundling Kinect back then was much more relatable than today. Contrary to popular believe nowadays, Kinect actually sold well when it started (unlike PlayStation Move), but lost it's momentum over time. This initial success might give Microsoft the impression it's worth including it, plus their always online plans.

[@CB-py1xh]

The first Xbox was something really special in its time. I was in my teens when it was released and I got it not long after its launch. Its technical superiority in comparison to the PS2 and everything else that came before was mind boggling at the time! Its library set insane new standarts for what was possible on a console and I will never forget being able to explore games like TES 3 Morrowind or Doom 3 or Dead or Alive 3(= the latter 2 THE very definition of revolutionary next gen graphics at the time) out of my bed, controller in hand. It was not at all the same generation as the PS2, but a generation inbetween.

[@courier6640]

As an Xbox Fanboy... **hugs Mario doll** I believe... **boots up Bloodborne** that these mistakes aren't Phil's mistakes. Haven't you heard? He saved Xbox, like, a decade ago, and I can play all my favorite games! Th- the ones that haven't been made lackluster, I mean. Gears 5 was just... fine. Dead Rising 4... hey, did you hear about Flight Simulator?

[@592Johno]

Watching this after the showcase ☠️

[@TheRandomGuyTheFarNoGameCat]

Jet Set Radio Future is superior to the first game and still stuck on the OG Xbox 😭

[@halodrag0n]

We need a disappointment per Dollar chart 😂 19:40

[@Highlaw]

2 important things not mentioned about the 360: It launched a ~year earlier than the competition, even then it ended up being outsold by both despite all the other advantages you talked about. Also, half-way through its lifecycle MS HYPERfocused on Kinect in detriment of real games, another reason 360 sales tanked so hard toward the end, MS was 100% relying on multiplatform sales (mostly CoD/FIFA) doing better on their platform and completely dropped the ball on 1st party studios, and then never picked the ball back up again.

[@FinnSwede906]

Microsoft understood gaming and gamers with the first Xbox and they did well for the first half of the 360s lifespan... Among my friends in high school almost everyone ended up getting Xbox's rather than ps2 or GameCube and we played countless hours of halo, even online matches through GameSpy with my router and modem before Xbox live was a thing.

[@FinnSwede906]

@Zalkova That's not why the 360 was successful. PS3's were $600 and didn't start getting good games until close to the 2010s and most 3rd party games were made for and ran better on 360. Edit: And the original Xbox outsold the GameCube by a few million units, there wasn't luck involved. Idk how old you were in 2001-2002 but I was a freshman in high school at that time and the coolest console with the must have game amongst my peer group was the original Xbox with Halo.

[@ManiacMayhem7256]

​@@FinnSwede906 Exactly

[@mountainmgtow5421]

I am not a fan boy of Microsoft or its consoles, but I disagree with a lot of what you mentioned. Their controllers are great, and the Duke is awesome. I love it.

[@73rmin8r]

The Duke was great. Most comfortable controller ever made.

[@BlazeMakesGames]

looking up people's old comments about it from back in the day it seems like it was either the worst thing ever or incredibly comfortable. I guess it just depends from person to person lol

[@kgjung2310]

That whole presentation of Xbox One was utterly disastrous. It really showed to everyone how the Xbox One was exclusively designed to benefit MS at the expense of their customers. It focused on everything but games because MS wanted to make the Xbox One the home media center that replaced everything much like Sony wanted with PS3. When Sony presented how gamers would share their games (just handing off a disk to someone else like it's always been done), Sony not only got applause but also got a standing ovation just for that. Every mistake Sony made with PS3 MS decided to repeat. They were completely deaf, blind, and dumb. Any trust that existed evaporated outside of the hardest of shills. One thing about the Kinect most people may not have heard about was how finicky it could be. You had to stand a certain distance away from it in order for it to work. That's a problem for someone in Japan, for example, when you live in a cramped apartment and don't have the space. The Kinect also had problems detecting darker skinned people in lower lighting settings which is about as bad a look as you can get. MS claimed that the Kinect was absolutely vital and totally integrated into Xbox One and couldn't be separated. This was a common MS ploy that they used to argue for Internet Explorer and Media Player monopolies on Windows. However, the Kinect was so unpopular MS did get rid of it and you could buy the One without it. By then most people decided not to bother.

[@levi22es]

As an Xbox fan, you’re not wrong haha. I love my series s and gamepass, but i definitely think they should release new AAA games later on to the service. It absolutely does cannibalize sales no matter what they state.

[@MagicSteel1]

Dear fellow gamers. Getting fired is NOT paying the price for the failed sales. They still got paid for the time you spent making the game. I know finding a new job may seem difficult, but they still got a lot of paychecks and valuable experiences they can add on their resume. Do you know who actually paid? Investors. They're getting the haircut. And you know what? That's the risk they signed up for the hope of profit.

[@BigBadBalrog]

I assumed you were a much bigger channel than you are, but I think that's just a matter of time. Insanely high quality to sub count ratio.

[@BlazeMakesGames]

I swear that I am nearly as clueless about how to get my sub count to go up as Microsoft is at managing games studios

[@davidv4018]

2013 presentation was so huge; that even i, who wasn't into newer consoles, was following it closely. Ps4 gave it presentation some time before xbox one, and it was the usual stuff (new games, better graphics, etc) and so called experts were saying "i already know what micrsoft is preparing, when xbox one makes it presentation is already over fo ps4". So, everybody was waiting for the presentation and what kind of revolution to gaming xbox one was going to bring (because it is true that ps4 didn't bringanything new to the table) And the revolution was: you can watch tv through your console, watch sports, nfl, nba... and here is a better kinect that you have to buy (a geek like me was offended) And physical games are already over, you wont own anything (they read this correctly, but it's not a feature, its a bug). And internet connection is mandatory (where i live, internet is not bad, but it cuts off every once in a while).

[@BlazeMakesGames]

the PS4 presentation was after the Xbox One's, that's why they were able to include the famous "How to share games on Playstation" clip as a direct response to Microsoft's poor decisions lol. But yeah the PS4 really didn't break a lot of new ground, but because of just how terrible the Xbox One was turning out to be, Sony literally got applauded for just doing the bare minimum and not actively screwing over their consumers, which I think says a lot.

[@davidv4018]

​ Ps4 made its reveal on february 20. Xbox revealed the console on may 23. THe "how to sare games on playstation" Was after both reveals, in 2013 E3. Just looked it up

[@highlord2841]

Microsoft is fine with simultaneous release on PC and Xbox because they make the pc’s software that it needs to work

[@BlazeMakesGames]

the problem is that they don't get a cut of every piece of software released on windows. Like if I put a game out on Steam, a portion of the money I make goes to Valve, not Microsoft. That's why Consoles are so valuable to these companies. Even if they don't develop a game, if it gets released for their platform, they get a cut of all the profits. So Microsoft should be a lot more concerned with getting people to buy games on their console. And that's why multiplatform titles are so important to console makers as well. Not to mention that they get to overcharge for online services for their console as well. So by no longer focusing on their console, they lose out on a huge potential pool of profits that everyone else is getting to rake in practically for free. After all if consoles didn't make money like that, then everyone would just release their games everywhere to try and have as wide a reach as possible.

[@highlord2841]

@@BlazeMakesGames they might not get money from the games, but they get much more money from people getting PCs and windows alone than from getting a part of a games sales on Steam. So it benefits them if people buy PCs and windows thanks to people buying games on Xbox.

[@jasonnchuleft894]

You're right, let's also not forget that as far as developers goes Microsoft had solid gold on their hands during the time they developed the original XBox and just well .. let them go. What am I talking about? Remember Ensemble Studios? The original creators of Age of Empires, perhaps the most influential RTS? Once upon a time that was a Microsoft Studio. And you know that Kickstarter project that sells ships for 20k in a game that might never be finished "Star Citizen"? The founder Chris Roberts used to lead a Microsoft Studio called Digital Anvil that made very successful space games for Windows until Microsoft axed funding for the sequel to Freelancer out of nowhere. Funny how bad decisions always have a habit of coming back around, huh? And that's just a few of the many examples 🙄

[@D34d1y1]

You were close but missed a huge selling point of the OG Xbox (that isn't halo). It was for Sega fans. The Duke controller was based on the Dreamcast controller and Sega themselves saw the Xbox as the Dreamcast 2. So yeah without halo being a smash success, the console would have still catered to the Sega fan base along with a bunch of other exclusive deals (bioware, Bethesda, team ninja)

[@NFSBeast2365]

Interesting. Sega saw the OG Xbox as a Dreamcast 2?

[@D34d1y1]

@@NFSBeast2365 Yeah Microsoft helped Sega make the Dreamcast and took a lot of lessons from them on the Xbox. Sega put a lot of their best exclusives on the OG Xbox as well, but despite doing ok in the west, Xbox did poorly in Japan so eventually Sega had to start putting later games on the other systems when their plan failed.

[@user-vi4xy1jw7e]

​@@D34d1y1Sega was putting their games on PS2 and GameCube from the start though....

[@D34d1y1]

@@user-vi4xy1jw7e That is just wrong. At the start they had the Dreamcast, then when they stopped supporting Dreamcast they planned to primarily support Xbox and even had plans for the Xbox to play Dreamcast games. In 2003 they switched to a full multiplatform strategy.

[@conchobar]

Dreamcast ran on Windows CE. I too remember the rumors that the Xbox would natively play DC game discs, but it was just a rumor. The individual game licensing for 3rd party DC games would have been a nightmare. That said, when Dreamcast games started being ported to Xbox, the Xbox became a clear choice for former Dreamcast owners.

[@Coverpage2568]

They need to shorten the Game pass library. Remove most of the AAA Games from Game pass library. Don't Give day one AAA games on Game Pass. Release PC version of exclusives at least after a year. Increase or keep the Game pass pricing same but lessen the library so that the user don't get overwhelmed or regret after a month when they don't play many games. Cancel PC Game Pass Plan immediately. In short Microsoft could have done this from start but they had a short term goal and didn't thought about the longevity this spontaneous actions are now crippling Xbox.

[@blakedmc1989RaveHD]

yea as much as Microsoft had no clue about gaming, but i'd rather them managing game studios over Disney.... just let dat sink in for a bit

[@steel5897]

Good summary. You did skip over a bit of the late seventh generation, because the 360 only dominated the first half of it. Famously, Sony got their shit together, and the PS3 slim was a big success. By the tail end of the generation, the PS3 was outselling the 360 considerably, they caught up and then some, with Sony's array of great exclusives mounting up and the multiplatform disaprity seen in third party games getting smaller and smaller as devs learned how to work the architecture. Also, like you briefly touched on, the seeds for the Xbox One were planted before the generation started, their hard pivot to the Kinect started around 2010 on the Xbox 360. Don Mattrick was doing his thing way back in 2009-2010 and setting course for fail way before the generation ended. Anyways, yeah Microsoft was never really successful at gaming except for, I'd say, HALF a generation, I won't even give them the entire seventh generation for the reasons I stated.

[@GusherManX]

Honestly, the Duke grew on me. I ended up preferring it to the redesign

[@milcmaster]

That first part is partially true. From what remember from an old article, the reason why games ran better was because the contract agreements Mircrosft had with these developers was if a game ran better or looked better on any other platform, Microsoft had the ability to sue, and since it didn't really matter to Sony or Nintendo no one cared, and the other thing is Microsoft internet service was an excellent service that made them king for a long run..

[@applehazeva2739]

Got an used xbox one with 2 Controllers, kinect and headset for 35€ If that doesn't speak for itself

[@aBeerFromHere7994]

20:10 Gamepass is a data graveyard for games, like the streaming services are for movies. You can put older theather movies on streaming, but newer titles mustn't go there for at least 1 year. Otherwise noone will buy any tickets or a copies. You are losing money on the traditional route by undercutting yourself. Even Disney is taking the same wrong way.

[@quajay187]

Game Pass to me at least... seems to also give the titles a cheap 'great value' feel. Like, they aren't confidant enough in the game to just sell on its own. But yes, M$ three biggest mistakes for the Xbox brand... 1. Play Anywhere. 2. Over reliance on Game Pass. 3. Buying every studio known to man just on pure impulse.

[@Treblaine]

The 360 was not accidentally easier to develop for, it was purposefully very well designed to be very easy to develop for. Not only was the hardware very carefully selected to be very accommodating to developers but Microsoft also provided excellent support to developers in documentation, dev kits, licensing of middleware and just streamlining publishing. The decision to stick with a DVD drive wasn't lazy or cheap, it exploited a strength that DVD had over Bluray of much faster read speed. Combined with 360 having much better decompression tech this allowed Xbox to beat PS3 in textures. For PS3 to beat 360 in shaders, particles and effects, a lot of effort was needed on an engine by engine basis. 360 also had unified memory, PS3 didn't. All these advantages were thrown away with the Xbox One.

[@ummerfarooq5383]

Why on earth did they do that?

[@Treblaine]

​@@ummerfarooq5383 Why did they throw away these advantages with Xbox One? Hmm, maybe I misspoke, the Xbone and PS4 do BOTH have unified memory and also both have a blu-ray drive with a fast read speed. It's more that Xbox allowed Playstation to catch up and even overtake. PS4 and Xbone have pretty much identical internal hardware, but PS4 had a newer and faster generation of memory. I think they did this because Don Mattrick was a notoriously stupid man who had no idea what he had. He did not know nor care what the Xbox audience wanted, he felt entitled to their loyalty and also felt entitled to a wider audience valuing Xbox just by association. Like he thought that routing TV through an Xbox would make people think the Xbox provided the TV service. There was no value add. Don Mattrick should have been sued by Microsoft for gross negligence. It should have destroyed his career because he certainly cost a lot of jobs at Microsoft with his mismanagement. Microsoft really needed to do something smart to outcompete Sony who was going to have an edge from its first party studios. The most important thing was getting people to invest in building a digital library on this generation to lock them into the next generation where "just buy the next gen to upgrade your library to 4k/120fps" If they were going to take a risk they should have undercut PS4 in price, sold it at launch for $299 but without a blu-ray drive. This would be a tough sell but a hundred dollars is a hundred dollars and PC gaming had already undergone this change. By 2013 physical released on PC were done. And that is effectively what the Switch did as the cartridge option was not how most games were sold, so many games never got a physical release. This was an opportunity to differentiate from the competition. And it would supercharge the accumulation of a digital library.

[@billythetroller]

i've always been an xbox "fanboy" since the day i remember myself. that was due to the fact relatives of mine didnt need their consoles anymore so i always had the newest generation at least 2 to 3 years later. i remember having problems with the consoles but i never really paid attention to them. recently i picked up my xbox one for uni so i can play and chill whenever i dont have anything going on in my day. i noticed a huge decline in the xbox community and that made me kind of sad. i stumbled upon this video and i listened to it word by word. i couldnt agree more with what blaze said. it's a shame they had such a rough road so far. i honestly thought that xbox had the potential if microsoft wanted to get its act together. i still believe it. but yes, i agree that microsoft didnt understand what's going on for quite some time now. thanks blaze for bringing up the issues with the console and the management of it.

[@BlazeMakesGames]

Honestly that's really interesting to hear your perspective like that. I do agree Xbox has always had a lot of potential. I mean like I said their hardware was actually pretty forward thinking at times and they had one of the most influential IPs of all time with Halo for a solid decade, among plenty of other advantages. So it's not like I'm saying that people are 'wrong' in some way for being Xbox fans, especially during those early eras. But it just feels like they have done nothing but squander opportunities almost since their conception, and that has just lead to a lot of long term problems that they still haven't really solved to this day.

[@kevinthunder3375]

This was great! Well researched and well thought-out. I want to see that Kinect video too!