• Hey everyone, staff have documented a list of banned content and subject matter that we feel are not consistent with site values, and don't make sense to host discussion of on Famiboards. This list (and the relevant reasoning per item) is viewable here.
  • Do you have audio editing experience and want to help out with the Famiboards Discussion Club Podcast? If so, we're looking for help and would love to have you on the team! Just let us know in the Podcast Thread if you are interested!

Discussion Xbox - Where did it all go wrong?

YolkFolk

YolkFolk

Tingle
Just been reading about how Xbox sales are actually falling in some territories, which is insane for a console with such financial backing that hasn’t even been on the market for 3 years yet.

During the 360 era it felt like they made up so much ground on Sony and for many the 360 was the console to own of that generation. People loved the games, the controller got a ton of praise, the online was better than everyone elses, and multi platform games were often the best on 360 as well. They were in an absolutely outstanding position going into the next generation but then the Xbox One happened and all momentum was lost.

Fast forward nearly 10 years and they’ve still not got it back. Personally I thought the Series X looked like an amazing product and I was super sold on the idea of Gamepass, but for me the games just aren’t there. I’m going to get a new console before the end of the year and I’ve decided to go with PS5 because of this. I have absolute no faith that games I might be interested in such as Perfect Dark or Everwild will ever come out. They can’t even manage Halo properly. That’s like Nintendo not being able to manage Mario or Zelda.

Can they turn it round this generation?

 
0
After the always online xbox one fiasco was when things started to go downhill also how the xbox one reveal was all about tv and virtually no games were present at the reveal event. add that to xbox games alos coming to pc that generation while playstation had amazing first party games like bloodborne only playable on ps4. When the series x came out people just upgraded to the ps5 or just stay with pc or switch and they dont see a reason to go back to for people to get a xbox over all those other platforms after all I outlined.
 
For me when I found circular scratches on my Xbox 360 discs. Vowed never to get another Xbox product again.
 
They don’t get games out there regularly enough! Huge swaths of the year go by without anything of note. Not to mention that numerous games that have come up to bat have whiffed pretty hard, most recently Redfall.

Here’s a list I put together a while ago that is still mostly accurate. They have a lot of stuff in the pipeline; hopefully some of it is due soon.

big lantern ghost said:
Here is a maybe not comprehensive but still fairly complete listing of what everyone under Microsoft Game Studios has going on:
  • Arkane — just released Redfall, next project unknown
  • Bethesda — finishing up Starfield and probably there is a napkin in their office with a daedra drawn on it for Elder Scrolls VI
  • The Coalition — current project unknown, rumoured to be a new IP
  • Compulsion Games — finished We Happy Few + DLC pass, current project unannounced
  • Double Fine — released Psychonauts 2 in 2021, current project unannounced
  • The Initiative — developing Perfect Dark with Crystal Dynamics
  • id Software —shipped Doom Eternal in 2020, finished Season Pass, current project unannounced
  • inXile — shipped Wasteland 3 in 2020, currently working on Project Cobalt, a first-person RPG with a Victorian steampunk setting
  • Machine Games — currently making an Indiana Jones game, with perhaps a new Wolfenstein after that (though I hope it’s Quake)
  • Mojang — released Minecraft Legends just last month
  • Ninja Theory — Hellblade II announced at Game Awards 2019, still in development
  • Obsidian — Grounded still being supported, recently released Pentiment, Avowed in development , also Outer Worlds 2
  • Playground Games — released Forza Horizon 5 in 2021, Fable in development
  • Rare — ongoing support for Sea of Thieves, working on Everwild
  • Tango Gameworks — released Hi-Fi Rush in January, next project unannounced
  • Turn 10 — making a new Forza Motorsport, ‘natch
  • Undead Labs — after a CG trailer years ago, still working on State of Decay 3
  • World’s Edge — bringing Age of Empires IV to Xbox this year
  • ZeniMax Online — Elder Scrolls online all day, baby
Even though this list does point out Microsoft's problem with getting content out the door with any regularity, I can't help but feel a little bit hopeful that at least a couple of these could very well show up at their stream next month!

EDIT: Holy crap I forgot to put id in there. Shameful
Click to expand...
 
big lantern ghost said:
They don’t get games out there regularly enough! Huge swaths of the year go by without anything of note. Not to mention that numerous games that have come up to bat have whiffed pretty hard, most recently Redfall.

Here’s a list I put together a while ago that is still mostly accurate. They have a lot of stuff in the pipeline; hopefully some of it is due soon.
Click to expand...

What happened to Gears of War?

Feels like it was a massive franchise for them but it slowly just got less and less popular. They don’t do an actual good job of hyping up their own games.
 
It's disappointing. They looked fine not a long time ago, even i bought a Series S because of Forza and Game Pass. But the games stopped coming out, and of course this will be bad for them and detrimental to their sales to some extent, even if Game Pass is still a good deal. Let's see what effect Starfield will have, but as of right now, they're fumbling it.
 
YolkFolk said:
What happened to Gears of War?

Feels like it was a massive franchise for them but it slowly just got less and less popular. They don’t do an actual good job of hyping up their own games.
Click to expand...
If you look at first party franchises historically, Nintendo's big hitters are mostly the only ones to maintain relevance generation after generation and the others tend to fizzle out. That's the harsh truth (a couple notable exceptions like God of War).

I would imagine it has something to do with the roster of characters they've built up, pick up and play arcade style gameplay, along with them constantly trying to reinvent their gameplay mechanics in most new iterations.

Gears and Halo saw diminishing relevance within two console generations.
 
Kreese said:
If you look at first party franchises historically, Nintendo's big hitters are mostly the only ones to maintain relevance generation after generation and the others tend to fizzle out. That's the harsh truth (a couple notable exceptions like God of War).

I would imagine it has something to do with the roster of characters they've built up, pick up and play arcade style gameplay, along with them constantly trying to reinvent their gameplay mechanics in most new iterations.

Gears and Halo saw diminishing relevance within two console generations.
Click to expand...
Capcom as well series like resident evil, street fighter and monster hunter still selling gangbusters, Also square with dragon quest and final fantasy. But yeah there are a few franchises that stand the test of time and dont diminish
 
carlosfilho said:
It's disappointing. They looked fine not a long time ago, even i bought a Series S because of Forza and Game Pass. But the games stopped coming out, and of course this will be bad for them and detrimental to their sales to some extent, even if Game Pass is still a good deal. Let's see what effect Starfield will have, but as of right now, they're fumbling it.
Click to expand...
I think it's insane that they're pretty much banking everything on GamePass. I mean it's a great service, but I think they're overestimating the importance of subscription services moving forward.

lemonfresh said:
Capcom as well series like resident evil, street fighter and monster hunter still selling gangbusters, Also square with dragon quest and final fantasy. But yeah there are a few franchises that stand the test of time and dont diminish
Click to expand...
Agreed but I specified first party franchises. Some third parties have been able to keep their franchises relevant for ages as well as you mentioned.
 
Last edited:
The thing about Xbox is they've only seen any kind of significant success during a very small period of time, when Sony went crazy and tried to sell a console for 599 US dollars. And as soon as Sony sorted themselves out, they started beating Xbox again.

At no point in its 20+ year history has Xbox shown ANY ability to beat Sony when Sony was not beating themselves. There are numerous reasons for this, but the biggest one is that Xbox has always been a regional brand. It doesn't sell in Asia, it doesn't sell in most of Europe, it doesn't sell in South America, etc. It's a console for America and the UK, and that's not good enough to beat the Sony behemoth.

It also doesn't help that MS has had massive problems getting any kind of killer app for Xbox lately. That obviously was a big reason for them buying Bethesda and Activision, so we'll see if that helps, but it will take a few years for that to have a major effect.
 
For the Series S/X specifically, it was the release of Halo Infinite. The live service came out undercooked and then they didn't have any major releases for over a year. The delay of Starfield into 2023 sent the decline into over drive. With no big titles for 2022, Xbox didn't have anything to go up against Sony 1st party releases.
 
0
KingOnion said:
Don Mattrick and no geams
Click to expand...
In some ways it can even be argued that the success of the Wii sent MS trying to diverge into chasing more mainstream audiences with Kinect coming tethered to the Xbox One... this lead to a host of problems for Mattrick era Xbox when their focus should have been on games.
 
Just a reminder that the only original (not an expansion or expanded release) thing MGS published in 2022 was As Dusk Falls, a game that seemed well received enough but is literally a motion comic.

Pretty bleak stuff
 
Basically the toxically positive feedback loop—between Don Mattrick and unreasonable Xbox die-hards—sent the division towards oblivion.

Many of us were openly anticipating the absolute car crash that was set to hit Xbox, and yet those people were shouted down by an incompetent fanbase who repeatedly went out to bat for Microsoft, despite them making some fatally critical errors. It'd be like reading that Nintendo were gonna sell the Zelda IP to Netflix: despite it being an obviously bad move, you just know people around here would defend the decision, and attack anybody claiming it's a bad idea. The difference here is that, unlike Microsoft, Nintendo, who are inherently competent, tend to quickly realise they're on the wrong track, thank the more competent elements of their fanbase for their insight, and correct their course. Microsoft though? lol, lmfao even.

Bungie were about to leave, leaving Turn 10, a racing simulator developer, as Microsoft's only effective studio, among a vanishingly small list; Rare and Lionhead were forced onto Kinect-based nonsenseware; the Gears of War exclusivity deal was coming to a close; most third-party partnerships from the early 360 generation were coming to a close, and there were no efforts to renew or replace them. It was absolutely astonishing. It was so fucking obvious that the Xbox One was going to be a disaster, that it was actually so fucking funny that anyone would be surprised when it was.

Honestly, it's a bit of a miracle Xbox survived. Halfway through last generation, I was fully expecting them to announce that they were going to bow out of the industry.
 
Last edited:
big lantern ghost said:
Just a reminder that the only original (not an expansion or expanded release) thing MGS published in 2022 was As Dusk Falls, a game that seemed well received enough but is literally a motion comic.

Pretty bleak stuff
Click to expand...
They also published Pentiment and Grounded.

2022 was a bad year for first party releases, but they did still publish some good stuff.
 
Chaos Theory said:
Did you not see the fanbase during the Wii U era? God forbid anyone anyone dared to claim that console was on the wrong trajectory.
Click to expand...
Bro, wii u was a joke even to wii u owners

smoothies said:
Starfield is coming out in like two weeks. They'll be fine.
Click to expand...
That's a problem. One game isn't going to reverse Xbox's fortunes. They need to be more Nintendo since they can't be Sony. Constant barrage of games
 
I'd add that since the One backslash, Microsoft basically turned Xbox into a PlayStation clone without a proper identity.

The very first Xbox identity was "what if a PC sold as a console", 360 one was Xbox Live (which also helped the indie revolution with the Live Arcade brand) and at first One identity was "Power of Cloud!".

After that, One basically turned into PlayStation 4 just with another set of exclusives and some different services (and a weak Japanese support), and Series X followed suit.

GamePass is a step into the right direction, but we shall see how much sustainable will be long term, and it might even overshadows Xbox itself as a brand.
 
Chaos Theory said:
Basically the toxically positive feedback loop—between Don Mattrick and unreasonable Xbox die-hards—sent the division towards oblivion.

Many of us were openly anticipating the absolute car crash that was set to hit Xbox, and yet those people were shouted down by an incompetent fanbase who repeatedly went out to bat for Microsoft, despite them making some fatally critical errors. It'd be like reading that Nintendo were gonna sell the Zelda IP to Netflix: despite it being an obviously bad move, you just know people around here would defend the decision, and attack anybody claiming it's a bad idea. The difference here is that, unlike Microsoft, Nintendo, who are inherently competent, tend to quickly realise they're on the wrong track, thank the more competent elements of their fanbase for their insight, and correct their course. Microsoft though? lol, lmfao even.

Bungie were about to leave, leaving Turn 10, a racing simulator developer, as Microsoft's only effective studio, among a vanishingly small list; Rare and Lionhead were forced onto Kinect-based nonsenseware; the Gears of War exclusivity deal was coming to a close; most third-party partnerships from the early 360 generation were coming to a close, and there were no efforts to renew or replace them. It was absolutely astonishing. It was so fucking obvious that the Xbox One was going to be a disaster, that it was actually so fucking funny that anyone would be surprised when it was.

Honestly, it's a bit of a miracle Xbox survived. Halfway through last generation, I was fully expecting them to announce that they were going to bow out of the industry.
Click to expand...
This is not in any way a rational post, and instead comes across as console warring and picking at imaginary arguments with some Xbox fanbase collective.

There are many many things to criticize the Xbox department for. Yelling that a console is heading to oblivion because the Xbox fanbase didn't see the signs you saw (like Zelda being apparently sold to Netflix or something) isn't productive or conducive to good discussion.
 
JazzPotatoes said:
This is not in any way a rational post, and instead comes across as console warring and picking at imaginary arguments with some Xbox fanbase collective.

There are many many things to criticize the Xbox department for. Yelling that a console is heading to oblivion because the Xbox fanbase didn't see the signs you saw (like Zelda being apparently sold to Netflix or something) isn't productive or conducive to good discussion.
Click to expand...

Console warring against who? I had an Xbox 360, I loved Halo, I was one of the ones making the arguments and this is exactly what happened. All the alarm bells were completely shouted down. In the end, the fanbase didn't criticise Xbox enough for their calamitous decision-making, gave Microsoft the thumbs up that everything was A-Ok, and they ended up paying for it.

I got a Series X on launch day because I felt the company got back on the right track, and offered some incredible value in Game Pass Ultimate, that said, the development output of the two non-Nintendo platform holders hasn't been strong at all this generation.
 
Last edited:
Chaos Theory said:
Did you not see the fanbase during the Wii U era? God forbid anyone anyone dared to claim that console was on the wrong trajectory.
Click to expand...
don’t get me wrong I easily get tired of Opinions on the Internet but like

what is this culture war you’re a veteran of, exactly?

people hated the Wii U from day one. some people said it was still really cool, especially as a response to the hate.

and you know what? I personally still think it’s really cool. I’ve got mine plugged in because I fucking like it. That simple.

but like. you post here more than I do. and you feel soured enough about this whole tiny glob of enthusiast forum that you view it to be be something that would assail you? crucify your Wii U distaste? that you wanna say “you would all shit on me for saying it’s a bad thing for Nintendo to sell an IP to Netflix?”

like… that seems like a silly crucifix to pole vault with, no?

idk, rest of the site: what would you say about Nintendo selling the Legend of Zelda IP to Netflix? go off I guess and let’s see what the fuck happens

or maybe, just maybe, it’s time to take shit less seriously and stop imagining sleights in the wild of your block

everyone’s invited to dunk on the dunkable but idk, shit seems sour
 
I know I can also abstain from participating but I’m just baffled about the architecture of that hostility

like did someone hire escher or
 
I think Phil is right thst they just had too much bad WoM in the generation where everybody bought their digital purchases. They are also worse at promoting their properties-- there aren't more exclusives on PS5 and the ones that are there aren't better quality than the ones on Xbox, but Sony puts Aloy everywhere.

Sony's money hatting went a long way as well-- I bought a PS4 for Street Fighter V even if it ended up not being that good.

That being said, Microsoft is playing a different ball game now and I think they will successfully vanquish Sony in the near future.
 
Chaos Theory said:
Console warring against who? I had an Xbox 360, I loved Halo, I was one of the ones making the arguments, and this is exactly what happened. The fanbase didn't criticise Xbox hard enough for their calamitous decision-making, gave Microsoft the thumbs up that everything was A-Ok, and they ended up paying for it.

I got a Series X on launch day because I felt the company got back on the right track, and offered some incredible value in Game Pass Ultimate, that said, the development output of the two non-Nintendo platform holders hasn't been strong at all this generation.
Click to expand...
The Xbox fanbase is not a borg collective, in the same way the Nintendo fanbase or the PlayStation fanbase is not a borg collective.

If you had arguments with hardcore fans over Xbox, that's one thing. But to state that the Xbox fanbase as a whole disagreed with you is another. And it is blatantly not true, because a significant portion of the Xbox fans who had a 360 were critical of the Xbox One reveal from day one. The backlash was immense. The backlash was so big they had to drop their entire plan of making the console a Kinect TV box.

Where do you think that backlash came from if not in significant part from the Xbox fan community? If the Xbox fanbase were on board with the Xbox One, why did it sell significantly less than the 360?
 
After the Xbox One reveal they just never picked things up.

Most blunders can be saved with consistent and exclusive games, which the PS3 and 3DS showed. Xbox just never got all that at a quick enough pace.

And it doesn't help that many of their exclusives are going multiplatform very quickly, making it even easier not to justify the Xbox purchase.
 
Suswave said:
idk, rest of the site: what would you say about Nintendo selling the Legend of Zelda IP to Netflix? go off I guess and let’s see what the fuck happens
Click to expand...
I think they should give Zelda to Netflix for free and try to figure things out without one of their most lucrative IPs. Always stay grinding.
 
JazzPotatoes said:
The Xbox fanbase is not a borg collective, in the same way the Nintendo fanbase or the PlayStation fanbase is not a borg collective.

If you had arguments with hardcore fans over Xbox, that's one thing. But to state that the Xbox fanbase as a whole disagreed with you is another. And it is blatantly not true, because a significant portion of the Xbox fans who had a 360 were critical of the Xbox One reveal from day one. The backlash was immense. The backlash was so big they had to drop their entire plan of making the console a Kinect TV box.

Where do you think that backlash came from if not in significant part from the Xbox fan community? If the Xbox fanbase were on board with the Xbox One, why did it sell significantly less than the 360?
Click to expand...

It was too late by this point, but fears over the lack of Bungie's renewal, Ensemble being closed, Rare being stuck on Kinect, Molyneux leaving, and a million others were all waved away as 'concern trolling'. The Xbox One was the culmination of an era of disastrous decision-making, not the beginning of it. In fact, the people who viewed the Xbox One as 'the first major red flag' were exactly the problem.
 
Basically a perfect storm of problems

1) Rushing the 360 without addressing the hardware issues lead to millions of faulty 360's being sent out which damaged the brands reputation.

2) The early success of Kinect and Microsoft doubling down on it with the One when most people got little use out of it besides dancing.

3) Having an always online console when the majority of consumers weren't ready for that.

4) Not enough great exclusives to sell people on the hardware.

5) Losing a lot of talent on some of their biggest ip and hurting the series reputation (Halo and Gears).

6) Sony being able to snatch up some key exclusives to hurt the ability for the Xbox to grow in the Asia markets, or companies doing improved versions of Xbox exclusives on PS later.
 
Chaos Theory said:
It was too late by this point, but fears over the lack of Bungie's renewal, Ensemble being closed, Rare being stuck on Kinect, Molyneux leaving, and a million others were all waved away as 'concern trolling'. The Xbox One was the culmination of an era of disastrous decision-making, not the beginning of it. In fact, the people who viewed the Xbox One as 'the first major red flag' were exactly the problem.
Click to expand...
You're right that there will always be someone to defend a company's bad decisions. But i agree witht the comments upthread that on the whole fan bases aren't a collective. It's fair to generalize and say the consensus view of the fanbase at any one time, but given how obviously terrible the Wii U launch/reveal/positioning was and likewise the Xbone reveal/launch was, I am fairly certain most fans didn't really cause both products to fail by sticking to the party line. Some extra hardcore fans might have, but they don't represent the majority.

The Wii U in particular i recall my feelings being quite mixed before launch, and post launch it was cleaer the thing was a mistake.
 
Microsoft is lucky the WiiU launched when it did, it's complete failure made people not realize the struggle the Xbox One was actually in.
 
BassForever said:
Microsoft is lucky the WiiU launched when it did, it's complete failure made people not realize the struggle the Xbox One was actually in.
Click to expand...
Yeah, the only reason we couldn't compare the numbers was because MS stopped reporting Xbox One sales after a while.

What was the final tally again? 40 million?
 
Mer.Saloon said:
What comes after Starfield? One game, no matter how incredible isn't a pillar.

Breath of the Wild alone didn't get the Switch selling consistently. It was backed up by a menagerie of quality stuff through the year.
Click to expand...

Mortal Kombat 1, Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty, Forza Motorsport, Alan Wake 2, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, etc.

The clog in the pipeline is ending. Consistent, big games are going to be coming regularly now.
 
ILikeFeet said:
A lot of shit can be forgiven if you just put out good games regularly. That was their biggest problem
Click to expand...
It’s this. It’s always been this. They suck at getting great exclusives out in a good regularly scheduled beat. Like to the point where I don’t think they could try to be this bad and come up as bad as it is.

I say this despite the current Xbox being my fav place to play games currently. It’s my fav controller of the bunch, and I love Gamepass + quick resume.

They fumble the snap each generation with regards to games though.
 
JazzPotatoes said:
They also published Pentiment and Grounded.

2022 was a bad year for first party releases, but they did still publish some good stuff.
Click to expand...
Oh yeah, that’s right! Grounded I guess I considered earlier since it was out in EA so long. Pentiment 💯 …though I’d say for me personally this leads into the point of their too far apart releases also being not that good 😂
 
0
The reveal of Xbox One is where the decline started, the direction they tried to take that system was bizarre off the back of the super successful X360. Phil Spencer is right when he says it was the worst generation to mess up as this was the real start of the digital marketplace and most people went PlayStation so have built up libraries that have carried onto the current console.

They have almost been fumbling along with first party releases, it's taken so long to get games out and they have gone through huge periods without any exclusives at all. It seems they may finally be getting the pipeline together, good thing they have had GamePass really as I think that's what has kept them going.
 
0
BassForever said:
3) Having an always online console when the majority of consumers weren't ready for that.
Click to expand...
all of your points are killer and true but I have to say:

there should be literally no point where consumers are ready for an always-online console

the internet is not fucking good enough and never will be, not consistently, not most places

do you want to have to stop playing games if your telecom company fucks up for a few days?

I’m not even talking about just the sticks — try Toronto

I hope that lesson stays learned, because otherwise whoever does it would really directly stratify the already loosely-present class warfare of consoles

us broke fuckers could scrounge and save or sell shit we liked to bump up a generation a few years and discounts down the line

but the second it only works with a paid internet bill and a reliable provider… we’re fucked and games are once again truly just for the rich kids

I hope it never happens

not even phones are always online
 
smoothies said:
Mortal Kombat 1, Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty, Forza Motorsport, Alan Wake 2, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, etc.

The clog in the pipeline is ending. Consistent, big games are going to be coming regularly now.
Click to expand...
Whats stopping folks from just getting those (aside from Forza) on Ps5 or PC?

What about the Xbox versions would motivate them to choose Xbox over those?
 
Mer.Saloon said:
Whats stopping folks from just getting those (aside from Forza) on Ps5 or PC?

What about the Xbox versions would motivate them to choose Xbox over those?
Click to expand...

The PS5 will be shooting itself in the foot soon with a strong investment in GaaS games over other game development. As more people become aware of that, they will likely choose XBox over PS5. And I think we'll see that swing in momentum play out over time. Game Pass, I suppose, is still the big present motivator. I will say that Microsoft needs to be cautious about raising prices. They're still in kind of a bad spot for the present, but it looks like things will begin to swing their way.
 
Suswave said:
all of your points are killer and true but I have to say:

there should be literally no point where consumers are ready for an always-online console

the internet is not fucking good enough and never will be, not consistently, not most places

do you want to have to stop playing games if your telecom company fucks up for a few days?

I’m not even talking about just the sticks — try Toronto

I hope that lesson stays learned, because otherwise whoever does it would really directly stratify the already loosely-present class warfare of consoles

us broke fuckers could scrounge and save or sell shit we liked to bump up a generation a few years and discounts down the line

but the second it only works with a paid internet bill and a reliable provider… we’re fucked and games are once again truly just for the rich kids

I hope it never happens

not even phones are always online
Click to expand...
I hear ya, my point was at the launch of the ps4/xb1 physical was still king and how >90% of gamers got >90% of their gaming content on consoles. A decade later and physical has dropped drastically, especially on Playstation and Xbox hence why we have rumors of the extremely successful ps5 going with a new model that is digital only with an optional disc attachment thing. Then you add how many games are affectively online only experiences including titles like Diablo 4 and it's just very sad.
 
smoothies said:
The PS5 will be shooting itself in the foot soon with a strong investment in GaaS games over other game development. As more people become aware of that, they will likely choose XBox over PS5. And I think we'll see that swing in momentum play out over time. Game Pass, I suppose, is still the big present motivator. I will say that Microsoft needs to be cautious about raising prices. They're still in kind of a bad spot for the present, but it looks like things will begin to swing their way.
Click to expand...
What at the present makes the Xbox version better?

How long until Gaas titles actually show up? The effects of this investment may not even come into effect until the end of the PS5's lifetime.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.


Back
Top Bottom