Xbox Mega FTC leak catastrophe mega thread

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The Demon Pimp of Razgriz said:
Your assuming we get to that point. There are reports that if Game Pass doesn't take off by 2027, Microsoft will have to leave the game industry, direct from Phil Spencer himself. The fact that this is only a year before Xbox is supposed to release a new console is not a coincidence.
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If it reaches that point, what of MS's exclusives? Would they pull a SEGA and sell them to the highest bidder or have them multiplatform? Or, and this scares me, have their exclusives segregated through a platform a la Epic Games? MS's mistake is utilizing Game Pass as a live service, rather than being complimentary to the Xbox experience. Their games are a result of that mentality. Nothing but monetization and shallow experiences.

It's less telling of MS per se, but how out of touch the gaming industry is with its consumers.
 
The Last Stand said:
If it reaches that point, what of MS's exclusives? Would they pull a SEGA and sell them to the highest bidder or have them multiplatform? Or, and this scares me, have their exclusives segregated through a platform a la Epic Games?
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That is uncertain, but considering how little value a lot of their IPs are at this point, I could see them selling off most or all of it. I doubt Microsoft would be interested in continuing to maintain their video game studios if they pull out of the industry entirely.
 
The Demon Pimp of Razgriz said:
Your assuming we get to that point. There are reports that if Game Pass doesn't take off by 2027, Microsoft will have to leave the game industry, direct from Phil Spencer himself. The fact that this is only a year before Xbox is supposed to release a new console is not a coincidence.
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If this is true, it'd help explain why so many new releases are being put on GamePass day 1. They want it to take off and are doing everything they can to get people to jump on.
 
What does Microsoft actually gain from gamepass instead of regular game sales that they are trying to make everyone use it? Are the subscriptions expensive enough that they would make more money that its costing them to pay for games to be on gamepass? I doubt it. Now they got rid of Xbox Gold and replaced it with 'Gamepass Core', but what does that actually achieve? Wouldn't they be making less than they were when people were buying games full priced and then paying 20 bucks a month or whatever it was for xbox gold to play online? Can someone explain this or are suits just stupid?
 
Epoch said:
What does Microsoft actually gain from gamepass instead of regular game sales that they are trying to make everyone use it?
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With game sales, the distributor gets a cut of whatever game is on their platform. The Xbox consoles are sold at a loss for MS. The subscriptions is where MS makes its money back. I'm not a business/marketing expert, but to MS, it's more sustainable long term to push subscriptions to its userbase.
 
The Last Stand said:
With game sales, the distributor gets a cut of whatever game is on their platform. The Xbox consoles are sold at a loss for MS. The subscriptions is where MS makes its money back. I'm not a business/marketing expert, but to MS, it's more sustainable long term to push subscriptions to its userbase.
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But Microsoft bought up a dozen studios, they would make the full cut from their games, or did they just buy them to put them on gamepass without having to pay a fee? Perhaps I am too innocent to the ways of corporate scumbags
 
Epoch said:
or did they just buy them to put them on gamepass without having to pay a fee?
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Correct. It's a good business strategy if you think about it. Subscribe to our service, get instant access to our IPs at a monthly fee. If the initial spreadsheet is any understanding, MS pays a fee to developers to have their titles on the service, whether within a six month period or indefinitely.

I'm not sure how much MS paid Ubisoft for THEIR titles to appear on their service.
 
Epoch said:
What does Microsoft actually gain from gamepass instead of regular game sales that they are trying to make everyone use it? Are the subscriptions expensive enough that they would make more money that its costing them to pay for games to be on gamepass? I doubt it. Now they got rid of Xbox Gold and replaced it with 'Gamepass Core', but what does that actually achieve? Wouldn't they be making less than they were when people were buying games full priced and then paying 20 bucks a month or whatever it was for xbox gold to play online? Can someone explain this or are suits just stupid?
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They are trying to lock people in to an ecosystem that they can completely control. Right now, Game Pass subscriptions are really cheap. This is a common onboarding tactic for subscription services. When the service is just starting out, they make it really cheap to get people invested in the service. Then, they slowly jack up the price. However, now they've got you locked into the service, so they are counting on you being so invested in it, that you will continue to renew your subscription even as the price goes up. Netflix and Hulu both worked the same way. When Netflix finally cracked down on account sharing, they counted on people who already had accounts to continue to maintain them, while those who were sharing accounts would just bite the bullet and get subscription to continue watching whatever it was they were watching. And Netflix were largely right. Its less about individual game sales and more about locking people into the service and making them dependent on it. Eventually people will simply keep renewing their subscription due to simple inertia.
 
Epoch said:
What does Microsoft actually gain from gamepass instead of regular game sales that they are trying to make everyone use it? Are the subscriptions expensive enough that they would make more money that its costing them to pay for games to be on gamepass? I doubt it. Now they got rid of Xbox Gold and replaced it with 'Gamepass Core', but what does that actually achieve? Wouldn't they be making less than they were when people were buying games full priced and then paying 20 bucks a month or whatever it was for xbox gold to play online? Can someone explain this or are suits just stupid?
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you could get 3 years of game pass for under $100 using various easy tricks, and it was so well known that microsoft's social media basically endorsed it. You're right about it making them so much less money in the long run but they're treating game pass like its an internet company. Think about Groupon, Uber, Hello Fresh or other tech companies. its about selling at a loss in order to rack up enough subscribers to the point where you can turn a switch and fuck them all. its been the plan for tech companies since the 2000s. You operate at a massive loss and practically be too good to be true and then either sell yourself off to a bigger fish like Moviepass tried or just rise the price with the knowledge that its much harder to leave once someone has been a subscriber for so long like Netflix has done. plus with such a huge userbase you can monopolize the entire industry and be much safer from competitors vs doing things the normal way. like google/youtube.

The problem is that the prices are so hugely different. Someone got starfield on launch day plus 3 years of game pass for the exact same price as just buying starfield at a store. even if you pretend that Microsoft's cut of the deal is more, there's no way in hell it would make up for providing 3 years of service for basically free.

Also because of the way this whole ordeal works with gamepass it hugely disincentiveizes making games for these studios or at least big games. Because instead of getting a cut of $70 for a game that sells, microsoft is instead getting in theory $10 a month regardless of what is put out. Phil doesn't seem to realize either this will be the only way to have good exclusives more than once a year. The problem is i don't think a studio like Bethesda would be able to compete if forced to make a new indie game every couple months and this lack of output is probably the biggest reason microsoft is buying activision. They get a guarantee of yearly releases.

Seriously though, as much as you'd think gamepass is a good deal, its all older shit, none of those "same day access" games they hyped up were worth it and almost all the games they have on gamepass that are good are shit from the 360/ps3 era or indie crap.
 
UCT said:
Hey I bought a Steam Machine :(…

Seriously though that fucking thing was a lifesaver, when my actual pc crapped out on me during one of my college classes. I dug through my closet found the little thing and it was decent enough to run most of the shit I needed and got me through the class while I saved up the money for a new hard drive. So I have a soft spot for the little box, though never really played many games off of it haha.

With how successful the Steam Deck has been I mean it wouldn’t be the craziest thing if they tried it again. But maybe they should actually put some effort into this time lol.
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Steam Machines were one of Valve's big failures when they first attempted to enter the hardware market, alongside Steam Link and Steam Controller. But now they've learned enough that I think they'd be capable of developing something way more decent.

I'd like to see them try making a new Steam Controller with what they've learned from Steam Deck, since the first one looked like it had a lot of potential to be a great controller for PC games but they fell short on the execution.

Now, about 8 years after their first endeavors, I think they're ready to make a more mature product, and I wish them good luck in doing so.
 
The Demon Pimp of Razgriz said:
There is a middle ground between machine translation and "completely rewrite the fucking script so that its unrecognizable to the original and add my own politics to it". When people say they want more accurate translations, they are saying they want people to stop doing the latter.
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Pretty much. Valkyrie Profile is one I'd file as great (specially with the undub, though I will admit it's one of the better dubs I've seen, specially for it's day) yet Star Ocean 2 was an overly literal piece of shit of a translation where I noticed every single instance of "sokka" that just got translated to "I see". I avoid fagottry but I remember all the hubbub of Fire Emblem Conquest and Birthright which singlehandedly made me pass on the game, which was quite the achievement since I loved Awakening as my first FE

More Valkyrie Profile, less of the other two is my point.
 
The Demon Pimp of Razgriz said:
Your assuming we get to that point. There are reports that if Game Pass doesn't take off by 2027, Microsoft will have to leave the game industry, direct from Phil Spencer himself. The fact that this is only a year before Xbox is supposed to release a new console is not a coincidence.
Click to expand...
The Last Stand said:
If it reaches that point, what of MS's exclusives? Would they pull a SEGA and sell them to the highest bidder or have them multiplatform? Or, and this scares me, have their exclusives segregated through a platform a la Epic Games?
Click to expand...
The Demon Pimp of Razgriz said:
That is uncertain, but considering how little value a lot of their IPs are at this point, I could see them selling off most or all of it. I doubt Microsoft would be interested in continuing to maintain their video game studios if they pull out of the industry entirely.
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Can't wait for 2027 when Microsoft sells Rare back to Nintendo and we get Diddy Kong Racing 2.
 
ShitLurker said:
Pretty much. Valkyrie Profile is one I'd file as great (specially with the undub, though I will admit it's one of the better dubs I've seen, specially for it's day) yet Star Ocean 2 was an overly literal piece of shit of a translation where I noticed every single instance of "sokka" that just got translated to "I see". I avoid fagottry but I remember all the hubbub of Fire Emblem Conquest and Birthright which singlehandedly made me pass on the game, which was quite the achievement since I loved Awakening as my first FE

More Valkyrie Profile, less of the other two is my point.
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I'm a simple sperg; I see Valkyrie Profile, I fall in love and want to have a family.

Real Talk though, with how closely those two were released to each other (on top of both being Tri-Ace games); you have to ask what the fuck happened with the voice acting and everything involved with them, and how you got two drastically different levels of quality... and that's without addressing Star Ocean's script rewriting several of the enemy names to not be Angelic/Biblical.
 
augment said:
I'm quite certain the Japanese government would intervene to stop microsoft from buying nintendo. In the euphemistically laughable chance that both parties lawyers would come to an agreement that is.
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Maybe to stop Microsoft specifically, because of antitrust issues, but they'd probably allow other buyouts to happen if Nintendo agreed to it.
 
Epoch said:
What does Microsoft actually gain from gamepass instead of regular game sales that they are trying to make everyone use it? Are the subscriptions expensive enough that they would make more money that its costing them to pay for games to be on gamepass? I doubt it. Now they got rid of Xbox Gold and replaced it with 'Gamepass Core', but what does that actually achieve? Wouldn't they be making less than they were when people were buying games full priced and then paying 20 bucks a month or whatever it was for xbox gold to play online? Can someone explain this or are suits just stupid?
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Subscription revenue makes VCs excited. Nobody has ever forgotten to cancel and wound up with a new Xbox they didn't even want, but it happens all the times with subscriptions.
 
augment said:
I'm quite certain the Japanese government would intervene to stop microsoft from buying nintendo. In the euphemistically laughable chance that both parties lawyers would come to an agreement that is.
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The Japanese already still laugh and get confused as to why the original FAT XBOX console was and still is a thing, so I would not be shocked as to the amount of laughing that would inevitably take place.

That is, if it did happen.
 
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