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It could end up being like how there are three Call of Duty studios. A Skyrim clone every year!
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Crpgaddict is going to like this, he has stated that he'd be happy with Skyrim sequels being released like pokemon games.
Unfortunate from the competition standpoint to see companies being bought out. I wonder how it'll turn out with 3 rpg companies being owned by Microsoft.
When the original xbox only started and wasn't doing great against PS2, MS ported Halo 1-2, Gears of war and Fable on PC. Once they've realized that Xbox 360 is a success, they quickly pulled the plug and PC never saw Fable 2, Gears 2-3-4 or Halo 3-4-etc.the only ones who are upset/concerned about this are sony fans... shit will still come to PC anyways
why so many playstation fanboys on RPGCODEX????
keep losing, snoy
It isn't just xbox it is PC too. They abandoned PC while they focused on building the xbox, and the PC boomed in that time. Now they learned from the mistake and want to grow both together. They are growing an 'ecosystem' of Windows on PC and Xbox, but all running alongside each other. Gamers playing together and chatting together and games developed specifically for xbox or windows. Cheaper and better in terms of development, and the audience will be enormous. How can little Sony compete with every gaming PC in the world combined with every Xbox.I don't see how this is going to be worth it for Microsoft. I can't imagine how TES: VI or the space game will put enough butts on the Xbox whatever to justify 7.5 billion, and I don't see the rest of their games making up the rest.
On their own, Fallout and TES move millions of copies. I'd imagine the rest of the Zenimax studios have decent sales as well. If future Bethesda games become Xbox exclusives, you'll see a huge uptick in Xbox sales as well from console players.I don't see how this is going to be worth it for Microsoft. I can't imagine how TES: VI or the space game will put enough butts on the Xbox whatever to justify 7.5 billion, and I don't see the rest of their games making up the rest.
When you consider that Microsoft is currently holding around $137 billion in cash and looking to expand on gaming as a service, I think they can afford a one-time $7.5 billion adventure. TES and Fallout alone are massive moneymaking franchises, despite their cratering lows lately, and Starfield will likely be the same. This isn't even including the other franchises from id and Arkane. I don't even think Xbox exclusivity was the primary objective because Microsoft has been transitioning Xbox into gaming as a service, meaning the rights to them on PC or any other platform like mobile, and would draw a lot of people and money to their Xbox Game Pass.I don't see how this is going to be worth it for Microsoft. I can't imagine how TES: VI or the space game will put enough butts on the Xbox whatever to justify 7.5 billion, and I don't see the rest of their games making up the rest.
Yes, this is what I'm really against. I even see people on this here site endorsing XGP. I've already said that I'm collecting old physical games so when the inevitable future becomes a reality, I can game until old age.Urgh, looks like a step closer to the pure games-as-a-service hell. I hope Microsoft fumbles like they did in the past when they tried to push a service but i am afraid that they have learned some lessons from the past, doing it more gradually with sweet deals along the way.
Shocked-Lol. They may actually do that, but with Fallout-clones every second year.It could end up being like how there are three Call of Duty studios. A Skyrim clone every year!
I think people are being a bit Fabulously Optimistic and letting their imagination run a bit wild about what might be, but it's usually a similar Song & Dance with Microsoft. At the beginning of a new console generation they usually either go on a purchasing spree or secure a high amount of Exclusivity agreements, but they kind of stop caring and at the end of it they usually end up with so few titles that people are still genuinely enthusiastic about that they have to do the same thing over again. I don't know if people still remember that FASA, Bungie, Digital Anvil, Ensemble, Rare, Lionhead, Twisted Pixel etc. were such acquisitions, or that Microsoft was big in RTS games on PC once, although it has been an uncharacteristic amount of game studio acquisitions for them this time around.I still remember when they acquired Rare, most of their acquisition didn't bore any fruits, and Perfect Dark didn't turn out good. As for their new consoles I don't see many people that cares anymore for the new Halo, and last I heard Gears is a shadow of it's formal self. Fable has sold less with each release with 2 and 3 being bad games with technical problems like framerate drops, bugs, etc.
todd and sawyer are in the same boat.Todd Howard taking over Obsidian and making Josh Sawyer bend the knee is the future I never knew I wanted.
Well said, this is pretty much what I expect from this new acquisition. Rare developers often have gone on rants of how bad management was when MS took over and how everything went to hell when they were under them. I wouldn't be surprised if the same fate were to befall these new studios, although if MS were smart, they let them do what they were doing with some minor changes based on some geek with a graph telling them where to optimize. I see MS going the route of the ecosystem they've often touted and won't care whether you game on a Smartphone or Playstation as long as you're subscribed to their shit.I think people are being a bit Fabulously Optimistic and letting their imagination run a bit wild about what might be, but it's usually a similar Song & Dance with Microsoft. At the beginning of a new console generation they usually either go on a purchasing spree or secure a high amount of Exclusivity agreements, but they kind of stop caring and at the end of it they usually end up with so few titles that people are still genuinely enthusiastic about that they have to do the same thing over again. I don't know if people still remember that FASA, Bungie, Digital Anvil, Ensemble, Rare, Lionhead, Twisted Pixel etc. were such acquisitions, or that Microsoft was big in RTS games on PC once, although it has been an uncharacteristic amount of game studio acquisitions for them this time around.I still remember when they acquired Rare, most of their acquisition didn't bore any fruits, and Perfect Dark didn't turn out good. As for their new consoles I don't see many people that cares anymore for the new Halo, and last I heard Gears is a shadow of it's formal self. Fable has sold less with each release with 2 and 3 being bad games with technical problems like framerate drops, bugs, etc.
Aside from that people should remember that all "Xbox Game Studios" are beholden to a kind of corporate fancy that some higher-up Executive "thinks might be the new thing". This has manifested in temporary occurrences like the "Second Screen" gaming craze or the TVTVTV compilations of earlier last decade, but it can basically be anything. They could suddenly decide that playing games on "Smart watches" is the future for Microsoft or that Coprophilia is the Hot new thing (since gamers like consuming shit so much anyway), or get engrossed in some late trend like "Cloud gaming" or "Game Subscription Services" or whatever and go all-in without their Subsidiaries getting much say in the matter or thought about the long-term consequences of a strategic move.
For the people that wanted Bethesda or specific Bethesda Studios to die or become even more irrelevant, this might be good news. For people that still kind of enjoyed some of Zenimax's latest Output the Sky's The Limit as to what is to come after the release of the current titles they're working on in the coming decade. Zenimax at the end of the day was a gaming company that made money and stayed afloat by producing and selling games (whether you liked them or not), while Microsoft ultimately doesn't need "Gaming" to stay profitable or relevant. They could as much decide it's a diversion from their core business and divest of it entirely in a strategic corporate restructuring 3 years from now.
imagine the economies of scale
unified workflow, toolset, production pipelines, QA, style guide, rapidly shifting developers and content creators from project to project as they are needed, clear definition of roles and hierarchy, every worker – a cog in a well oiled machine, generating shareholder value... new AAA game every year, no, THREE TIMES a year, just like UbiSoft
I consider most of that fabulously optimistic in the context of game making. Especially since Microsoft allegedly leave the studios a lot of independence. And regarding things like toolsets, I've yet to be convinced that EA benefits from developing Frostbyte.
Jeez man, I was shitposting. Even so, this is how suits think.
It's not just Bethesda Studios though.. It's ID, Tango Gameworks (Shinji Mikami,) Arkane and Machine Games (Wolfenstein.)
Also Sony severely underestimated the appeal of cross-play/cross-progression.It isn't just xbox it is PC too. They abandoned PC while they focused on building the xbox, and the PC boomed in that time. Now they learned from the mistake and want to grow both together. They are growing an 'ecosystem' of Windows on PC and Xbox, but all running alongside each other. Gamers playing together and chatting together and games developed specifically for xbox or windows. Cheaper and better in terms of development, and the audience will be enormous. How can little Sony compete with every gaming PC in the world combined with every Xbox.I don't see how this is going to be worth it for Microsoft. I can't imagine how TES: VI or the space game will put enough butts on the Xbox whatever to justify 7.5 billion, and I don't see the rest of their games making up the rest.
The amount they have spent on the new Flight Sim, on Minecraft, and now on Zenimax shows how serious they are about boosting gaming on PC/xbox. If ES6 ends up being exclusive, that likely send the Playstation the way of the Megadrive.
It's not just Bethesda Studios though.. It's ID, Tango Gameworks (Shinji Mikami,) Arkane and Machine Games (Wolfenstein.)
Yeah, I know it's everything. But $7.5 billion is still crazy for all that. Minecraft was probably more valuable than everything ZeniMax has and they bought them for $2 billon something. Disney bought Lucasfilms for $4 billion, (which was kind of a deal for Disney) and that came with stuff like Star Wars and the biggest FX house in the movie industry.
That's a lot of money to fill out Game Pass, get like 3 IPs people care about, and I'm sure whatever they've got going with VR.
Yes, the latter is a close equivalent to the former in terms of ignominy:Perhaps it was unreasonable to want Zenimax/Bethesda to go bankrupt or be annihilated by a meteor, but I'll settle for the criminal Zenimax board of directors cashing out and walking away since this seems to be what's happening.
Obsidian would be worse than Bethesda, at least with Bethesda I would laugh about it like I did with Fallout 4, seeing New Vegas 2 made by the same people who made Outer Worlds would just be depressing.
Also Sony severely underestimated the appeal of cross-play/cross-progression.