It was a great show, moving at a brisk clip, unburdened with cringeworthy banter, peppered with noteworthy announcements and premieres, and positively stuffed with games: 50 of the things, a lot of them looking rather good. Just as significantly, it felt addressed to Xbox gamers directly, rather than pundits, analysts and stakeholders.
But perhaps more importantly, Microsoft's E3 2018 media briefing was straight-talking - almost shockingly so for an E3 presser. It didn't pretend that Xbox doesn't have a weakness in exclusive games, and it had a long-term solution to propose. It talked about the future and it addressed the elephant in the room - the distant but quite clearly audible rumblings of an approaching new console generation - with candour and confidence, and without seeking to pull the wool of the eyes of the console-buying audience, or to use the information, or lack of it, as a strategic chip in the battle with its rival, PlayStation.
2013 seems like a long time ago. This was a presentation by a player untroubled by hubris, humbled by past mistakes, but determined to stay in the game and willing to show enough of its hand to convince gamers of its serious intent. Job done.
Microsoft announced its financial results for Q3 of fiscal year 2026, including an update on its gaming Xbox business and more.
Not looking good. Hopefully Asha Sharma is able to turn Phil’s disaster around.
To me it's still quite remarkable how they can cash-in 5.3bn in revenue in a single quarter, since their hardware is basically dead.
The stock mark is what makes Microsoft remarkable, They have convinced every institutional and retail investor to just keep piling money into them. Like many big tech giants they are just a big growing pyramid scheme. As long as people keep dropping money into ETF's that cover the market Microsoft will always be liquid. At the same time it is completely stifling innovation and competition. People need to start being more discreet in how they invest their money as it's killing the system.
Riiiiight because people will just flock back to them for one or two games per year.
15+ years of bad performance is what they call irreparable in business. It is time for them to sell off the assets and get out of entertainment.
These declines are on the back of extra revenue received from releasing games like Forza horizon 5 on PlayStation. So I’m being sarcastic here when I said they should go back to exclusives. Killing off a revenue stream from Ps5 sales will only make things worse
TG writes: If you’ve ever wanted that chaotic, large-scale modern warfare feeling from Battlefield but in full VR immersion, Forefront delivers it better than anything else currently available on Quest.
Good now next year continue to build on this momentum you've started on.
"Xbox has been bloodied in this round of the console war, no doubt, and Spencer has so far only been able to raise it halfway back off the mat where his predecessors left it."
Spot on.
"The games industry would be much poorer without everything Xbox has done for it in the last 15-plus years, and now we can feel confident it's in it for the long haul."
Absolutely. That for me was the big point. I've now seen Xbox at its very lows, throughout this whole gen. This E3 surprised me and really proved that MS is in it to win it. Obviously winning against the behemoth that is Sony is going to be absolutely difficult but the seeds are sown for a great battle next gen which means great games all round.
I'm legit excited
As someone that's been curious about the XBO platform MS conference did absolutely nothing to sway me to buy an XBO. My focus was to see what new unique interesting AAA exclusives they were going to show & it was the same 3 predictable known XB titles & that's Halo,Gears & Forza titles I'm not interested in though Gears looks like a fun game.Most of their show was plenty of multi-plats that I'll play on my Pro.Maybe next gen they'll finally have a portfolio of new unique exclusives that may sway me to finally buy an XB console.
Honesty?