Xbox Developer_Direct on the 25th of January

[RubberJohnny]

4 games, 10 minutes+ each, like I guessed, the dropping out of the Game Awards and switching to a different format was by necessity as they still don't have a lot to show.

[bear]

The German announcement of the show mentions that Forza and Redfall are getting release dates at this thing. 

[layten]

8 minutes ago, Sarlaccfood said:

Alright chill out Bill Gates I meant all the people that have left who are key people, not all the key people.

Hah, fair enough. For a minute I thought we were all boarding the hyperbole train.

[Boozy The Clown]

"The latest info for xbox games launching in the next few months, including blah, Forza Motorsport, blah deh blah."

 

...Launching in the next few months, Forza Motorsport....

Forza Motorsport launching in the next few (3) months.

Forza Motorsport

Next few months

 

February, March, April....

 

So Forza might be out by end of April ?

[JPL]

51 minutes ago, RubberJohnny said:

4 games, 10 minutes+ each, like I guessed, the dropping out of the Game Awards and switching to a different format was by necessity as they still don't have a lot to show.

4 games is a pretty decent haul, isn't it? Especially if they're all going to be releasing quite soon. How many were you expecting them to show?

[Calashnikov]

Nintendo Directs show like 20 games man

[Sarlaccfood]

 

[Jackson]

18 minutes ago, Calashnikov said:

Nintendo Directs show like 20 games man

Take out the role playing farming simulators and it's about the same isn't it

[JPL]

21 minutes ago, Calashnikov said:

Nintendo Directs show like 20 games man

That are all due out within the next few months following the direct? I didn’t even know there were 20 first party games for the Switch. I haven’t bothered with it since Breath of The Wild and Odyssey.

 

I’m pretty sure MS have said they’re stopping showing games that are years off launch, so maybe that’s part of it too. I would like to know what happening with Perfect Dark, Senua’s Saga, etc though.

[Calashnikov]

1 minute ago, JPL said:

That are all due out within the next few months following the direct? 

Yes.

[Calashnikov]

2 minutes ago, JPL said:

I’m pretty sure MS have said they’re stopping showing games that are years off launch,

Microsoft trying to Nintendo what Nintendo, or something like that 🙃

[JPL]

1 minute ago, Calashnikov said:

Yes.

So Nintendo are pumping out over 20 first party titles a year? Maybe I should pick my Switch back up.

[Calashnikov]

If you’ve not touched it since BotW and Odyssey then, yeah, damn right.

[Haribokart]

7 minutes ago, Calashnikov said:

If you’ve not touched it since BotW and Odyssey then, yeah, damn right.

 

[RubberJohnny]

8 minutes ago, JPL said:

That are all due out within the next few months following the direct? I didn’t even know there were 20 first party games for the Switch. I haven’t bothered with it since Breath of The Wild and Odyssey.

 

Sony too show about a dozen coming soon, including new announcements, third party AAA games, etc.

 

Ultimately all you need is one title you're interested in, but this is below even that low bar for me. God knows how they're going to wring ten minutes out of the latest ESO expansion or Minecraft spinoff.

[JPL]

3 minutes ago, Haribokart said:

 

What’s this supposed to mean? I haven’t played it since then, as there’s nothing I’ve been interested in. I’m waiting for the new Zelda, but I’ll have to get a new Switch seeing as my boys broke mine and I don’t fancy playing it handheld on one of theirs.

[JPL]

3 minutes ago, RubberJohnny said:

 

Sony too show about a dozen coming soon, including new announcements, third party AAA games, etc.

 

Ultimately all you need is one title you're interested in, but this is below even that low bar for me. God knows how they're going to wring ten minutes out of the latest ESO expansion or Minecraft spinoff.

Isn’t this for first party titles though?

 

I know ideally we should be seeing more, but shifting the competition’s goalposts isn’t helping your argument.

[Wiper]

In case anybody doesn't actually know, Cal is happily tiptoeing around the fact that those ~20 game Directs are primarily (or solely, in the case of Indie Directs) filled with third-party, generally multi-plat games. Most Directs include a much smaller number of Nintendo games (or none, in the case of the *spits* Mario Movie direct), with a single headline Nintendo title (often, specifically, an update of expansion for an existing one) as primary focus.

 

That's not a criticism of Nintendo's output, mind; there are a lot of Directs over the course of a year, and there have been an awful lot of great games since Breath of the Wild, so plenty to catch up on if you've been away from the system since then!

[Kevvy Metal]

4 minutes ago, JPL said:

What’s this supposed to mean? I haven’t played it since then, as there’s nothing I’ve been interested in. I’m waiting for the new Zelda, but I’ll have to get a new Switch seeing as my boys broke mine and I don’t fancy playing it handheld on one of theirs.

[JPL]

4 minutes ago, Kevvy Metal said:

Explain it to me then please! I’ve no idea what he’s going on about! 😂
 

I assumed he was saying I was lying about playing my Switch. Fuck knows what else it could mean.

[Kevvy Metal]

5 minutes ago, JPL said:

Explain it to me then please! I’ve no idea what he’s going on about! 😂

Surely nothing would go over your head? You would catch it! 

[layten]

6 minutes ago, Wiper said:

In case anybody doesn't actually know, Cal is happily tiptoeing around the fact that those ~20 game Directs are primarily filled with Fire Emblem Smash DLC announcements.

 

[JPL]

1 minute ago, Kevvy Metal said:

Surely nothing would go over your head? You would catch it! 

Ok, I’m Drax. Very good. Can you please explain what he meant now?

[Kevvy Metal]

10 minutes ago, JPL said:

Ok, I’m Drax. Very good. Can you please explain what he meant now?

You are also John G. 

[JPL]

5 minutes ago, Kevvy Metal said:

You are also John G. 

Who the fuck is John G? What’s this all about mate?

[Sarlaccfood]

Regardless of what fills the Nintendo or Sony directs (be they 1st or 3rd party games) the point is you basically get a “hey here’s what to look forward to as a [company] console owner over the next few months”

 

I’m hoping we get an updated version of that sheet that shows what games are coming to gamepass over the next year, like we got the last couple of summers.

[JPL]

7 minutes ago, Sarlaccfood said:

Regardless of what fills the Nintendo or Sony directs (be they 1st or 3rd party games) the point is you basically get a “hey here’s what to look forward to as a [company] console owner over the next few months”

 

I’m hoping we get an updated version of that sheet that shows what games are coming to gamepass over the next year, like we got the last couple of summers.

I’d love to know as well to be honest. I’ve been saying it for the past couple of years, but they really need to start getting some big hitting games out. It just never seems to happen though.

 

Saying that I’m interested in Forza and I think Redfall could be decent, plus my son will be all over Minecraft, so as long as these 4 games and Starfield all come soon, then hopefully it’s the start of a steady stream.

 

I’m probably being too optimistic.

[thesnwmn]

25 minutes ago, Sarlaccfood said:

Regardless of what fills the Nintendo or Sony directs (be they 1st or 3rd party games) the point is you basically get a “hey here’s what to look forward to as a [company] console owner over the next few months”

 

I’m hoping we get an updated version of that sheet that shows what games are coming to gamepass over the next year, like we got the last couple of summers.

 

Thing is, Microsoft do it monthly. They just drop stuff to Game Pass all the time. Some of it is day one releases we didn't know was coming to GP, others are older releases getting added.

 

But I accept it's not quite the same as being able to sit here and see a roadmap of at least some of it some months out. Which I suspect for third party stuff represents the fact much of the GP content is quite late breaking.

 

I also think they do a much poorer job of wrapping their branding around third party titles. You see a lot more of PS adverts or trailers for cross platform games that are all PlayStation branded even though they're not exclusive.

 

[footle]

1 hour ago, thesnwmn said:

 

 

I also think they do a much poorer job of wrapping their branding around third party titles. You see a lot more of PS adverts or trailers for cross platform games that are all PlayStation branded even though they're not exclusive.

 

 

I suspect that's because they're putting the money into game pass releases on their current consoles, instead of filling the service with games from the Xbox one era.

[Broker]

17 hours ago, JPL said:

So nothing concrete then really. I suppose all these rumours do add up to something, but let's see how this year pans out. Although I feel like I've been saying that for the past 10 years.

The nature of the industry is that you never really hear very much until years later. Given that Spencer is prone to doing things like going on about how important multi platform is and then buying Bethesda and making Stargell exclusive, I’m really not as sold on his “your mate Phil in a Battletoads shirt” image as a lot of fans seem to be. I think that his biggest success since taking over has been a very successful marketing campaign of himself and the Xbox brand. Really, since he’s taken over the rate of game releases has cratered and the big ones that have come out have had a very mixed reception.

 

Again, this could be because he’s giving the studios way more freedom and they’re crafting amazing games that are taking a bit longer and not getting cancelled, or it could be that Microsoft are mismanaging the studios. We’ve certainly had less high profile cancellations in recent years. But I suppose what I’m suggesting is that the kind of management that tanked Fable Legends, Scalebound, Knoxville and others might not be as gone as Xbox PR wants us all to think it is. Whatever has changed under Spencer, it certainly hasn’t resulted in a lot of great triple A games that are making the Xbox a must buy.