Obsidian and inXile acquired by Microsoft

[TheImplodingVoice]

Exactly. After PoE2's sales Obsidian was bound to die in a year to two. While its taking EA DECADES to kill BioWare.

Better to die making something merely mediocre like PoE2 than to be stuck making Andromedas and Anthems.

You ain't seen nothing yet.

100% agree. When big companies buy developers it just sucks all the life out of the developer. Andromeda and Anthem is exactly that.

 

[TheImplodingVoice]

It's time for Chris Avellone to start his own company and save gaming

Problem is whether he can find good programmers. Last thing we want is the bug singularity that is Kingmaker.

I'm with you on that. Too many bug filled shitfest in games lately. But I do think Chris Avellone would be able to make a kick ass company.

 

[Quillon]

It's time for Chris Avellone to start his own company and save gaming

Problem is whether he can find good programmers. Last thing we want is the bug singularity that is Kingmaker.

I'm with you on that. Too many bug filled shitfest in games lately. But I do think Chris Avellone would be able to make a kick ass company.

He just needs to move to europe and start his studio there, cheaper to maintain the studio and probably easier to find programmers. Or he should just join logic artists, he can't go wrong with the lawful evil turkish CEO of theirs :D

 

[Perkel]

I know some of you are scratching your heads now but i know for 100% why they made this choice.
This is all about GamePass.

GamePass is basically Netflix of gaming. You pay 10$ (right now they have 1 month promo for 1$) a month and you get ALL new games from MS and licenses their acquire AT RELEASE DATE OF SOMETIMES EARLIER THAN THAT. Right now they have around 100 games and they included Forza Horizon 4 AT RELEASE same as Gears and their other exclusives.

But why exactly ?
Because with GamePass they need diverse games to catch all kinds of people.
You might be playing RPGs only for example so you get GamePass and not only you will get Pillars of Eternityopamole Edition but also Forza Horzon, Forza, Gears of War 5, Halo5 and shitload of other games.

Gamepass basically forces them to make diverse games instead of doing only shooters.

They have right now promo. For 1$ you can get month subscription (no you don't need to buy 6 months) and play those 100 games as much as you want.

For example right now instead of buying FH4 for 60$ you can just pay 1$promo (10$ proper price) and play it.

https://www.xbox.com/en-US/xbox-game-pass

 

[TheImplodingVoice]

It's time for Chris Avellone to start his own company and save gaming

Problem is whether he can find good programmers. Last thing we want is the bug singularity that is Kingmaker.

I'm with you on that. Too many bug filled shitfest in games lately. But I do think Chris Avellone would be able to make a kick ass company.

He just needs to move to europe and start his studio there, cheaper to maintain the studio and probably easier to find programmers. Or he should just join logic artists, he can't go wrong with the lawful evil turkish CEO of theirs :D

And there is free kebab for everyone at lunch every day

 

[SausageInYourFace]

Someone ask Sawyer what exactly is so exciting for him about 'working with gamepass'.

 

[2house2fly]

Problem is whether he can find good programmers. Last thing we want is the bug singularity that is Kingmaker.

I don't read the Kingmaker thread (fear of spoilers) but based on what i see people say about that game here and elsewhere it sounds like it's very far from the last thing we want

 

[SpaceWizardz]

Phil Spencer is a smug cunt. Xbox owners(not all of them) hype the guy up like he is a messiah. But what people forget is he has cancelled so many projects and while Mattrick took a lot of shit, Spencer was just as responsible. And when Spencer started doing the "diversity" "toxic" etc. it just shows he's a little progressive cuck. The gaming industry is officially fucked

He canceled dragon game that ran at a smooth 13 fps, as well as some 4v1 fable game nobody asked for. My heart bleeds.
Ori and Cuphead were pretty good and I think? he was involved with those so he's okay in my book.

It's time for Chris Avellone to start his own company and save gaming

I dunno man. Feargus did say that Chris sounded like he didn't want to be an owner anymore.

 

[Quillon]

Someone ask Sawyer what exactly is so exciting for him about 'working with gamepass'.

That MS might be ok with Obs making small games for gamepass so he can make TB Pillows and his FYSMD.

 

[Perkel]

Someone ask Sawyer what exactly is so exciting for him about 'working with gamepass'.

- no date to fight with. You don't fight for release spot with other big hitters.
- your game instantly reaches milions of players and those people can further buy your expansions
- since your game is in subscription without additional cost people will try your game either way (additional sales of expansions and revenue from played game) So people could try your game for subscription bu they would never try it for 10$ or 60$

As i see it GamePass like structure is basically future of what big publishers will be doing. EA already has its own, Ubisoft is planning theirs etc.

And frankly it has some benefits. As i said before with such structure they will have to make diverse games because like in Netflix case a lot of people won't be subscribing if you only have Romance movies or Scifi movies. Which means that those studios will have to fund RPGs, RTS games, FPP games, basically whole genres to catch all people. Obviously they will go for heavy hitting genres but soon they will branch out into other genres.

So in weird way this may basically force those megapublishers to do something else than Assasin Creen yearly and 20 similar games like that. Much like Netflix started to fund niche shows when they realized they need diverse content to catch most of public rather than small part.

 

[Grauken]

I know some of you are scratching your heads now but i know for 100% why they made this choice.
This is all about GamePass.

GamePass is basically Netflix of gaming. You pay 10$ (right now they have 1 month promo for 1$) a month and you get ALL new games from MS and licenses their acquire AT RELEASE DATE OF SOMETIMES EARLIER THAN THAT. Right now they have around 100 games and they included Forza Horizon 4 AT RELEASE same as Gears and their other exclusives.

But why exactly ?
Because with GamePass they need diverse games to catch all kinds of people.
You might be playing RPGs only for example so you get GamePass and not only you will get Pillars of Eternityopamole Edition but also Forza Horzon, Forza, Gears of War 5, Halo5 and shitload of other games.

Gamepass basically forces them to make diverse games instead of doing only shooters.

They have right now promo. For 1$ you can get month subscription (no you don't need to buy 6 months) and play those 100 games as much as you want.

For example right now instead of buying FH4 for 60$ you can just pay 1$promo (10$ proper price) and play it.

https://www.xbox.com/en-US/xbox-game-pass

Makes a lot of sense, but I doubt the whole netflix business model works as well in gaming as it did with movie/TV

 

[Cael]

Problem is whether he can find good programmers. Last thing we want is the bug singularity that is Kingmaker.

I don't read the Kingmaker thread (fear of spoilers) but based on what i see people say about that game here and elsewhere it sounds like it's very far from the last thing we want

It is "good" because it is hard. It is hard because lazy stat bloat. You might as well play 1 vs 7 AI AoE2:C on hardest and call it "fun".

 

[Perkel]

Makes a lot of sense, but I doubt the whole netflix business model works as well in gaming as it did with movie/TV

Actually it will work much better for games than movies/shows. Why ? Because you can sell expansion pack for game but not for movie.

 

[Cael]

Makes a lot of sense, but I doubt the whole netflix business model works as well in gaming as it did with movie/TV

Actually it will work much better for games than movies/shows. Why ? Because you can sell expansion pack for game but not for movie.

Also more profitable. I still have games on my computer from back in the 80s. Imagine how much I would need to spend over the decades to keep them alive for the last 30+ years under the Netflix model.

 

[Grauken]

Makes a lot of sense, but I doubt the whole netflix business model works as well in gaming as it did with movie/TV

Actually it will work much better for games than movies/shows. Why ? Because you can sell expansion pack for game but not for movie.

Yeah, maybe, but then they have to limit access to only Microsoft (which they probably will), because if I buy a pass for an expansion that will come out in a year, I rather buy it directly when it comes out

 

[Grauken]

Makes a lot of sense, but I doubt the whole netflix business model works as well in gaming as it did with movie/TV

Actually it will work much better for games than movies/shows. Why ? Because you can sell expansion pack for game but not for movie.

Also more profitable. I still have games on my computer from back in the 80s. Imagine how much I would need to spend over the decades to keep them alive for the last 30+ years under the Netflix model.

That's basically GOG, and with how shit their service is for some older games, I rather have the original disk files and do the rest myself

 

[Jaedar]

Looking forward to PoE3 being a win 10 store exclusive.

 

[FreeKaner]

Hopefully this will mean there are no more sequels to pillows of eternity, that will be the good outcome.

I am looking forward to kind of dumpsterfire the combined power of Obsidian, inXile and Microsoft's failing competition with Sony will result in.

 

[Perkel]

Also worth noting is that MS annouced buyout of Obsidian/Inxile specifically when they were talkingabout Gamepass:

Looking forward to PoE3 being a win 10 store exclusive.

It will be for 100% ms store game.
Downside is obvious but upside is that the store got a lot better.
Right now it is much sleeker than steam though i still lacks bandwidth limiter.
I know because i am forza fan soo...

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

Anyway, for those curious there is a wikipedia list of all the stuff Microsoft owns: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Studios#Owned_franchises_and_properties

So who does have the rights for Myth series then, if Microsoft doesn't have it?

 

[SpaceWizardz]

It's a mythery

 

[Cael]

Makes a lot of sense, but I doubt the whole netflix business model works as well in gaming as it did with movie/TV

Actually it will work much better for games than movies/shows. Why ? Because you can sell expansion pack for game but not for movie.

Also more profitable. I still have games on my computer from back in the 80s. Imagine how much I would need to spend over the decades to keep them alive for the last 30+ years under the Netflix model.

That's basically GOG, and with how shit their service is for some older games, I rather have the original disk files and do the rest myself

Yeah. I have them all installed and cracked so that I can port them easily from system to system. Most of them are backed up on various portable HD as well.

 

[Owlish]

 

[Deleted Member 22431]

Microsoft will remove pseudo-cRPG studios and leave only the genuine ones, like Stygian and ITS. Noice!

 

[Ismaul]

Seems to me like Saywer's the only one who's willing to admit what's up, even in the acquisition video. He seems to recognize that his only hope is Gamepass if he wants to escape Obsidian's decline and make something worthwhile. I'm guessing he's thinking along those lines: if he could get the budget for a small scale niche RPG that would fill a Gamepass hole, or alternatively work on something completely different and fresh for him, he might still be positively interested in his job. Best case scenario. Otherwise, he'd either have to tough it out, or find employment elsewhere. But where would that be?