Gamereactor spoke at length with Head of Xbox Phil Spencer about first-party software, monetisation, and what The Initiative is actually doing.
Former CEO describes lawsuit filed by Swedish pension fund as a "collateral attack" on Activision Blizzard.
Kotick Made $155 million from MS in the buyout, the little b*tch needs to stop whining. Thanks to this Microslop deal and massive industry consolidation thousands upon thousands of devs and other workers lost their livelihoods. This greedy piggie pervert needs shut up and f-off.
Larry writes: "As many of you have been with me during my career in gaming, I'd like to share personal news. Like many in the gaming space recently, I've been laid off from @Unity"
That’s some major layoffs best of luck to him and the rest that got laid off. It always hurt specially more before or during holidays.
Met Larry a couple times. Sucks to hear he got laid off. Real standup guy who just loves gaming and the industry.
Dude finally got laid at 58 years old. Bit of a weird flex but im still happy for the guy!🥂
"We see DRM as something which can make the life of a legal customer more difficult," says Michał Kiciński, "so there is no reason to keep it alive."
"First of all, I would like to say that we haven't acquired ZeniMax. We have announced our intention to acquire ZeniMax. It is going through regulatory approval and we don't see any issues there. We expect early in 2021 the deal will close. But I say that because I want people to know, I'm not sitting down with Todd Howard and Robert Altman and planning their future. Because I'm currently not allowed to do that, that would be illegal. Your question is completely inbound, but I get a lot of questions right now: "is this game exclusive? Is this game exclusive?" And right now, that is not my job in regards to ZeniMax. My job is not to sit down and go through their portfolio and dictate what happens.
In terms of what I want long term. I want those amazing studious to create the best games they ever created. That's when Todd and I sat down and had a discussion. Todd and I have known each other for years and years, and we talked about this partnership. We looked each other in the eyes and we said, 'okay, what are we really gonna do here?' And he said, 'I wanna build the best games that I've ever built and I want the support of Microsoft to be able to do that.' And I say the same thing about the studios at Arkane and id Software and Machine Games. I want them to do the most amazing work and support them in doing that."
It seems like he's bother by this constant question, but he had to know that this was coming. In any case, if I'm reading this correctly, it's up to Zenimax to decide where there titles go and they're just being funded by MS?
I wish he could give a straight forward answer, because he has a history of saying one thing and doing another.
I expect new games to be on GamePass: Xbox, PC, mobile and the rumored streaming stick. That's a potential audience of 300+ million.
GamePass only works if there is content to keep the end user subscribed. Exclusives as the Sony fans say. Netflix struggled in the beginning of the streaming era because they lacked high quality exclusive content. When they finally got that content and began producing their own original content their stock valuation swelled.
"You know if I rewind five years ago, I would say over and over, that we are committed to PC and then get a bunch of eye rolls, and rightfully so for we weren't doing much. But I think now when you look at what our standing is on Steam and Game Pass on PC, we have shown that our commitment over time has paid off. PC customers may or may not love what we do, but they know that when we are shipping things, we're gonna do our best effort on PC as well as on Xbox."
Definitely have to give MS props for *finally* backing PC gaming the past few years. Took too long, but seeing all these Xbox games on Steam is nice to see. As is the Game Pass for PC service.
Business and politics are the same. It's all talk to get you to buy the product and screw you over later once they own the market or just lie to you altogether.
"I'm a voter! Aren't you supposed to lie to me and kiss my butt?" - Peter Vankmann (Bill Murray) Ghostbusters 2