As long as Bethesda keeps self-publishing games, it doesn't matter whose pocket the money for that game ends up in... it will still be multiplatform. MS was smart to take this approach, much like they did with Minecraft.
Microsoft is positioning themselves to be a competent third party games publisher. I wouldn't be shocked to see Sony start doing this too (Horizon, for instance), acquiring new studios or entire publishers and then letting them keep releasing games ...
We're not seeing "preorders everywhere sold out" like we did with PS5... which could be a stock thing, we'll see when more PS5 pre-orders become available.
I thought the same when they bought Rare, and we all know how that turned out.
PS4 games got the same assets, and they still filled up my 500gb drive way too fast.
Or buy a fully specced PS5 digital model for $60 less.
I'd call the ability to create brighter whites that can take advantage of beyond-10bit levels (OLED can't even do HDR10's 1000 nits, it maxes out at around 730 nits, and if you run it too much at that brightness level, you get burn in), and zero burn-in whatsoever makes MicroLED the better choice than OLED any day, once it becomes affordable. I already have burn-in on my $1500 55C7P OLED, and have already had to have the entire panel replaced once.
Also, MicroLE...
There would be no after... Doom Guy would rip MC's intestines out and use them as a clothesline.
Save your money for a MicroLED TV... better than OLED, though it'll be 4-5 years before they're affordable. Perfect blacks and whites brighter than the brightest QLED on the market.
That isn't necessarily required by a console, which can automate that task in firmware.
Wal Mart doing in-person pre-orders only will help a lot. More brick-and-mortars should do this sort of thing, it gets people into their stores, and it ensures bots are eliminated and scalpers have to try a lot harder to get in on it.
FUD always circulates around the gaming media around the time of console launches. I remember the PS3 launch, it was ridiculous how bad it got. Almost politics bad.
I used to pay as much as $90 for Genesis cartridges (Virtua Racer, for one), and these were simple games I could make in a couple months max by myself today.
They don't want to pay those royalties... and we all know how much bigger the PS game library is than Xbox's, those royalties are likely astronomical.
I saw this coming and called it back when PS4 was announced to be x86, the next generation would feature much better games at launch because they'd be able to be cross generation games and therefore developers would be able to take bigger risks on funding their development, knowing there's a huge install base that can play the base version. This is nothing but a good thing, and admit it... none of you saw Horizon or Miles Morales when they were first revealed and thought to yourselves...
Nobody cared and nobody said anything but "omfg!!!" when they saw these games, now they wanna throw out fake outrage about the games being held back by being cross gen, with no evidence to back it.
Some folks are just desperate for something to whine about. Here's a pacifier.
No one noticed, or no one cared?
This is easily one of the most puzzling decisions made in gaming history... I don't see this working out well for them.
PS4 Pro often hits higher resolutions, and it likely too will soon be in the same price range, and it has a much better game library to boot. Xbox One X hits higher resolutions. This was a dumb choice that is going to hold back multiplatform next gen games.
It'll be next gen before many of these parts end up getting utilized for more than just better resolution or framerates. There will be a lot of untapped potential in PC games this gen due to the consoles having lower performing parts, especially the Series S. The multiplats will have to cater to that lowest common denominator.
Not to mention, the Bethesda deal is Microsoft trying to match Sony.