White Paper Games Co-founder, Pete Bottomley, talks to MWEB GameZone about platform exclusives and the Microsoft vs Sony choice. His answers do not involve money or processing power. It paints a picture we don't often hear about.
A few days ago, an interview with Seamus Blackley, designer of the original Xbox, sent shockwaves among the community.
***This whole conspiracy theory (because that’s what this is) is basically entirely based on the idea that everyone involved is lying to us. ***
C'mon now. It's an opinion. Just like your opinion here. And it's from an industry professional who does have more knowledge than we do on how these things work and access to people inside the industry.
I'm not saying he's right, but you spend all this time arguing his stance and why his words are illogical, but then you go and make this sort of statement? Hypocritical.
It's from someone who has not worked at Microsoft or anywhere close to Microsoft or even in the gaming industry for over 20 years, and has worked at Microsoft for less than 4 years in total. He doesn't know a single one of the people involed and his experience of the topic is so diluted that he has no more authority than any rando on Reddit.
And almost none of the articles citing this silliness do the bare minimum due diligence to mention that essential context.
When you present a ludicrous hot take from someone who is nowhere near a position to know a thing about what Microsoft is doing today, if you think that readers aren't entitled to be made aware of that, we'll have to agree to disagree.
The truth is that a lot of the media outlets in this industry have chucked the bare minimum of professional reporting ethics into the recycle bin in the name of making a quick buck, and this is a pretty obvious example. This has been going on for years, it sucks, and it's only getting worse.
Misleading information for clicks may not offend you, and that's fine, but as someone who has dedicated the past 25 years of his life to informing people, it certainly offends me, and I see no reason not to express that position. Firmly.
***Misleading information for clicks may not offend you, and that's fine***
You really need to stop with the logical fallacies. There's nothing there that says my opinion on the original matter other than calling out your hypocrisy of doing the same thing you complain they're doing. Not even a part of the conversation.
Also, he didn't do it for clicks, journalists turned it into clicks.
@Christopher: his opinion is not the problem, besides the fact that it's nonsensical and based on nothing.
The problem is that it has been presented as a take from someone with authority by professionally bankrupt media that fills up the fact that they have nothing relevant to say with fluff for clicks, regardless of the fact that such a presentation ends up misinforming people.
Regardless of everyone’s opinion, one thing that’s never good is to be in the comments arguing with people on their opinion, about your opinion, especially in a place where you have no monetization.
@simulation
The way I see it you’re flipping the crumpet and assuming that because he hasn’t been a part of Microsoft for so long he don’t have contacts inside or he is exaggerating what we all can see in Xbox history of lies, deception and half truths since the 360 era.
Its very disingenuous of you to come and complain about his opinion when the patterns has been clear for way over a decade.
Microsoft is a corporation here if they don’t dominate they terminate the product you sound old enough to to remember Zune and windows phones you if not ask bing what happened to them.
'Xbox Is Being Sunsetted' — Seamus Blackley, One of the Creators of Xbox, Thinks Recent Shakeup Spells the End for Microsoft's Gaming Business
It clearly says that Blackley THINKS...has an, OPINION, on the matter.
I think his opinion hurt you enough that you had to create an N4G article to try and discredit his OPNION. The fact that someone that hasn't been in the industry for years, carries more weight than someone that only has one comment on his video, yours. And, has less than 2 thousand subscribers. What makes your opinion better than his? He's someone that actually worked at Microsoft. What's your background besides MS Flight Simulator and FFXIV videos?
Here's the deal, Microsoft spent upwards of 100 Billion or more to try to beat Sony. They tried to buy industry pillars like Nintendo and Sega who said no. They pretty much created a service to devalue games to try and control the market and failed. They never won a generation. Most powerful system in the world or not. They couldn't do it by undercutting Sony with their Achilles heal of Series S. Nothing the 3 Trillion company could do but end up releasing their games on Nintendo and Sony's platforms. Their competitor's systems. The amount of coping in your defense of the current Microsoft heads is just hilarious. It is true that not having a gaming background means nothing if you can turn a business around. But there's nothing to turn. Outside hardened Xbox fans, there's no reason that any gamer needs an Xbox when the games are releasing on competitor's platforms. Nadella isn't stupid to try and go back to exclusives that Xbox fans don't buy enough of to keep the developers they bought afloat. Heads have to roll. Just like the Sega days of heading into a new direction.
Read the writing on the wall. Xbox as you know it is dying and dead. No game sales numbers. No console sales numbers. Nothing. Nothing will change their transition to third party other than an outright ban of Japanese game consoles. But the backlash would be so severe, that any new Xbox would be boycotted everywhere. If any new system is released, it would be in name only or the fans that are left. A PC with Microsoft's name on it like the Ally and the Quest headset. but nothing more than that. A platform that has never been profitable. A game service that has never been profitable. That was once almost canned by Nadella before.
Land that MS Flight Simulator plane and leave the clouds. It's over for them. She's there only to help their transition. No system they sell will bring them back when they never were leaders to begin with in the industry. I came out of N4G retirement just to say this. Your opinion carries no weight and is unsupported by the facts of where Microsoft's position is currently.
@SimulationDaily
He may not be in the xbox loop anymore. But he'd surely have a better idea than any of us random people commenting would.
And how to WE know he doesn't know any single person involved? It's not like we can see the man's contact list or know his life personally. And all he did was give his opinion. He never said it was fact. An opinion is not misleading info. If he tried to pass off his opinion as FACT, then you'd have something. But that didn't happen.
We can't be mad about someone coming to the man for an interview answering a question he was asked
He's not in *any* loop, and he has not been for 2 decades.
How do we know? His responses tell us that. Unless you're unable to read between the lines, you can easily see that he's spitballing without any direct knowledge. The fact that he completely ignores the presence of Matt Booty tells us that he didn't even really read the news, let alone have any real knowledge about it.
Who in the world told you that an opinion can't be misleading information? Of course it can be, when it's wrongly presented as the view of someone with authority on a topic, without being contextualized, which is exactly what happened here.
If you don't know a thing about a situation and someone asks to interview you on it, you can say no.
His response doesn't tell us who he does/ doesn't know regardless of how long he was away from Microsoft. Again, we don't know this man's personal life or professional contacts to speak on such.
And who in the world told me an opinion can't be misleading info, living my life all these years tells me that. If you're presenting an opinion that should tell you it's not fact. No rational thinking person will sit here and misconstrue the two.
And again, he was asked a question. He never presented himself as an authority, he openly admits he hasn't been there in forever. What more context does he need when he already told us he hasn't been there in so long? Nor has he acted like is opinion is fact.
Now can he say "no" or "no comment" when asked a question? Sure he can, but he doesn't HAVE to. He can offer up his opinion the same way we all do here.
And how can you say he's doing this for clicks? He's the interviewee, not the interviewer or site owner. You have to realize with the video you made you can be accused of the same thing you wrongly pointed the finger at him for.
And for the record, since I know how this site is, I'll say this now. No, this isn't an attack on you. I actually like having convos like this that aren't troll based.
His response is incredibly vague and drifts into the factually incorrect, for example, when he says "It would have been shocking if they had somebody in there in a meaningful role who was passionate about games, passionate about the creator-driven business of games."
Matt Booty is the second-in-command, which is definitely a "meaningful role," and he's very obviously passionate about games and the creator-driver business of games. As a matter of fact, much more (and with much more relevance) than Blackley himself, who dropped the industry and went to do something else 25 years ago.
No one said HE did it for clicks, although all these "former X" usually do this kind of stuff to appear somewhat relevant when they have not been relevant for a long, long time.
The site that interviewed him and the sites/influencers who presented his opinion with no context as authoritative did it for clicks, because they had no access to any the people even remotely involved, and scraped the bottom of the barrel for something to fill the quota and generate some clicks, and they absolutely misled a ton of people into believing that what he says has some merit.
The "massive problem" isn't that he has an opinion. Opinions like his are a dime a dozen. Is that today's gaming press will fill the air with white noise with zero merit, disingenuously painting it as relevant, regardless of whether their readers are misled into believing something that does not exist.
First of all I did not watch the video but as far as conspiracy theory goes. Here is my take.
The whole idea for everyone to lie to us is about not owning and be happy. But here is the thing why is it so important for everyone to not own and be happy. What does the elite gain whether we own or not. I understand we not owning cars rather rent is what they want.
But why mess around with video games? I tell you why.
Because they don't want to sell "GPU"
GPU is the main problem. GPU is everything! From 3d printing your house to Mining Bitcoin. Not to mention it's the future that can cripple future government.
Blackley is the father of Xbox if anyone wants to see it's success it's Blackley
Yet he doesn't think it's long for this world simple as that
I'm more inclined to believe we've been lied to because Xbox has a history of lies and half truths
@SimulationDaily its not a good look for the author of an article to go to the comment section to argue commentors.
Look, I understand the indignation about how the media is talking about this interview. I completely agree on that front. That said, personally, I don’t think Blackley is wrong. Not because he’s a former Xbox executive, but because what he described is something we see time and time again in the corporate world.
If you’ve ever worked in this kind of environment, the sequence of a head leaving, obvious substitute leaving, and then a much younger, completely unrelated executive stepping in feels like déjà vu. Every time we see this pattern, it’s usually because the company is looking for a “shake-up” in a business unit, which often just means restructuring. And restructuring usually means layoffs and shutting things down.
That said, I don’t think Xbox as a brand is going to vanish. What I think is more likely is that the division will be significantly reduced and absorbed into another part of the company.
Glad you understand my view on the press. It's good that at least someone here does.
That being said, placing Matt Booty as Sharma's vice conflicts with that view. Hiring a young CEO with a background of success and supporting them with a veteran vice president is a completely different scenario then one you describe.
The sole idea that Microsoft would be willing to throw away circa 8% of its revenue because of AI is pretty ridiculous.
And if you listen to the reports, you'll know that Sarah Bond was far from the obvious substitute for Phil Spencer.
It’s actually the opposite. If they weren’t planning to completely bulldoze the place, then Sharma would be completely alone with an entirely new leadership team, at their mission would be to turn that ship into something else, but keeping the unit itself. The fact that she got Booty as a second hand, instead of a completely new second hand, tells me that they need someone with "experience" to smooth things over while she bulldozes everything.
And honestly, people would be surprised by how often companies choose to “lose” revenue when they realize they can save the same amount or more by simply exiting or reshaping a business line. And that is before AI, that just promise to do anything and it's currently Microsoft focus.
But time will tell. Let’s revisit this in a couple of years and we will see what actually happened. Unfortunately, and I truly mean that, because I don’t want to be right about this, I’ve seen this pattern play out too many times not to believe I’ll end up being right in the end.
Absolutely, let's reconvene in a couple of years. I have absolutely zero doubt about being right. Xbox will still be there, likely bigger than it is now.
"Bulldozing" doesn't fit today's Microsoft's MO at all, nor that of 99% of companies. Companies may choose to lose revenue, but that happens on dead weight businesses, which gaming is not.
And even when they do, they don't park a very successful young executive with a spotless career like Asha Sharma on a business they want to drop. Not only is it massively counterproductive for the company, but she'd likely quit, because she has the resume to get a job anywhere that would give her a business she can lead to success, as she has done with literally everything she has touched in the past decade.
Would I rather see a gamer at the top? Sure, but there's zero doubt that Asha Sharma is an extremely capable exec. Her resume proves it, and you don't waste extremely capable executives doing the palliative care doctor thing.
i mean, the leadership was changed out rather swiftly, with someone who has no odea of the business the former had atleast some know-how.
i think they are slowly trying to find something else they can make money off of, and xbox might just be the thing thats costing them more than they think its worth.
that's business. unfortunately
Leadership was changed to someone who has plenty of ideas (and plenty of success under her belt) about *business*, supported by someone who has one of the most extensive careers in the gaming industry.
You don't waste a very successful young executive (who Asha Sharma is; her career is spotless) to babysit a business you want to spin down. This is how business works.
Question - it's obvious the way the Xbox division hasn't performed well for Microsoft for a long time. The hardware sales has been abysmal compared to their only 2 competitors Sony PlayStation and Nintendo Switch.
I agree with you. You don't put someone like her into a position to babysit a business you want to spin down.
But is sunsetting Xbox hardware really spinning down the business? What if she transforms Microsoft Gaming into the number one game developers/publisher's? Bigger than EA and Ubisoft. Microsoft gaming make plenty games each year for every available console, PC, Handheld PC as well as mobile users via cloud.
Yeah, not worried about it! Microsoft said it's going with PC Architecture next gen! Hopefully Steam ready! Also, hopping it is upgradable, like Sega and Nintendo were 3 decades ago.
No need for a Pro version. Upgrade memory, exchange/add a board. Buying a mid Gen console upgrade last Gen, you could instantly tell the difference. The majority of current gen games optimized for PRO are great, but they certainly don't make me want to Rush out and buy one. I am happy with my PS5.
It brings me to ask, why so many 5 Pro/Vs Switch 2 comparisons? Seems kinda strange.
Gamesbeat caught up with Blackley to extract some wisdom about Microsoft’s journey in games, what he thinks Sharma should do, and where gaming can go next. Part of his message is hopeful, but Blackley sees a lot of peril on the road that Microsoft is following. And it makes him worry about the future of gaming.
"I expect that the new CEO, Asha Sharma, her job is going to be as a palliative care doctor who slides Xbox gently into the night."
LOL
Anyway, let's wait and see maybe Mia Khalifa will surprise us.
I’m on the fence about her. I’ll give her chance, but if she is there to finish things off. Well what can you do.
After seeing the article of the possible sunsetting of Xbox as said by Seamus Blackley I believe, I went onto X because of a post I saw. It was a gif of Vegeta powering up, the poster commented as Vegeta yelling “Don’t take my fiercest competitor away from me.” Standing there in his blue Sayian/Freiza corps outfit. So it got me to thinking, so let me ask a question to N4G.
If Vegeta is PlayStation, who would Xbox and Nintendo be in the Dragon Ball universe?
Who would be Master Roshi?
I have my own opinion of course, I just want to see what others think.
If you read Kotaku even semi-regularly, you already know that Xbox has been in a weird spot for some time now. And with today’s news that both Xbox boss Phil Spencer and President Sarah Bond are leaving and the new head of the brand will be a former Meta exec who previously lead Microsoft’s AI division, I think it’s time to call it. Xbox is dead. Time of death: February 20, 2026
This brand died in the last 2 years of 360 since Kinect announcement.. downfall started all of a sudden until reaching the point of no return with xbox 1 DRM disasters
So ready to defend that you posted it twice.
In any event, I have a more accurate quote: "It's dead, Jim".
Also Mark Twain:
I have never wished death on anyone but I have read some obituaries with great pleasure.
While I normally agree... The future of xbox is on shaky ground. Well, xbox as we know it. Im not sure what they are shooting for but who they put in charge mixed with Phil retiring and bond just flat out leaving. It's not looking good.
Im with you but in western countries I have noticed a trend to put women in control to prevent any kind of critics.
Copilot is running the xbox division now, its first official act was fire Spencer and Bond then sell Xbox for scraps.
Oh come on, Xbox has been dead for at least 10 years now. I think what’s more important right now is Playstation’s death that is very slowly but surely happening through mismanagement and greed.
He's being clowned on by the entire internet but i have been clowning on him way before he became CEO. I hate modern PS so much man. To this day i have no idea how Astro Bot happend in this terrible PS era but that was clearly a miracle.
Every. Time! They compare the closing of a studio (one I liked, mind you, but they know their business better than internet dwellers) to the departure of not one but TWO major figureheads at Xbox. On top of Xbox's other problems, they are also now selling their games everywhere (not just PC).
Sorry diehard Xbox fanatics, we've been down this road before. PlayStation has closed studios. It happens. Maybe they weren't pulling their weight. Maybe they have a restructure in place. What ever the case, it won't come any close to tanking their brand. Xbox isn't in that boat. As a piece of hardware, it is all but irrelevant (hanging on only because of Game Pass at this point). It serves no other purpose because you don't even need that console to play its games. If it was just Xbox/PC, that would be different, but here we are.
So, this isn't the SonyToo that y'all love to hang on. Things are not good for Xbox hardware. At all. It is about time to start accepting that.
Respectfully, This is probably one of my least favorite tactics in making an argument.
I'll give you an example: If I like the color red, it doesn't mean I hate the color blue.
People lamenting the (potential) demise of the xbox brand has nothing to do with sony or playstation. It has everything to do with xbox. Now, for the sake of argument, you could say that Sony and Microsoft are two peas in a pod, and that they've both made absolutely baffling and worryingly stupid decisions in the recent past. But I truly believe that Xbox would be shooting itself in the foot regardless of Sony's presence (I look at you, Xbox One reveal with always online DRM and the inability to share games).
Sony, on the other hand, is making stupid decisions to stay competitive with the market, and like Microsoft, is seemingly forcing by proverbial gunpoint talented developers to try to make the next GAAS experience and never learning their lesson. I believe that Microsoft squandering RARE is the equivalent of Sony squandering Naughty Dog. Neither platform really knows what they want to be, BUT Sony is alot further along in figuring it out before Microsoft pulls out another revolver and takes aim at another of it's own toes.
Xbox died after the Xbox 360. The Xbox One was mediocre, the Series X was game shy. I'm glad Phil is retiring.
Exaggerated projection of xbox problems onto Sony. This is what gave xbox the extra slack all these generations to eventually run themselves into the ground.
This is why the views and comments are low, with lame articles that use divide-and-conquer pretensions.
To be fair "divide and conquer pretensions" have been present in the comment section of this website for years regardless of the articles title, composition or intent. It's therefore unlikely that's what's playing a part in low viewership and commenting.
His reply really surprised me. Microsoft's lack of interest compared to how Sony's chief, Shuhei Yoshida, treated them. Eye opener tbh.
It's very interesting to see how Sony and MS differ in their approach to dev's.
Some nice insight into the exclusives debate for the console platforms in that interview.
It seems to me that Sony have a much more open way with their devs.
It's gonna be hard to beat that caring story. Phil Spencer is alot better for MS than anyone in recent past, but Yoshi is on a whole nother level. If they'd only stop screwing around and get DLNA here already.