The Xbox Podcast deep dive on E-Day was published on Monday and briefly featured a version of the latest trailer that incorrectly stated that the game was coming to Sony’s console.
The PS5 logo slip-up in the Xbox podcast seems to support claims that the decision to make Gears an Xbox-only game was made at the last minute by its leadership team.
So this is what came of that clearly rigged survey from a few months ago where apparently a whole bunch of people still want exclusives on consoles for some reason? I was wondering why they did that.
Xbox tried to play nice and put their games on PlayStation. Sony didn’t return the favor. Because of this, Sony had more draw for consumers. “On Xbox, I just get multiplat and Xbox games. On PlayStation I get all of that and PlayStation exclusives too.” PlayStation hoarding their games to themselves created an imbalance in exactly the same way Nintendo works.
Sure, it may be less pro-consumer for people that don’t own or buy an Xbox, but it was a problem for people that did buy Xbox. Xbox owners felt “Why did I buy this system when every other system gets the same games we get and more games that we don’t get?”
It was an interesting experiement, but I absolutely believe survey results show people wanting exclusives back.
I don’t, mostly the surveys will always show that consumers want whatever the CEO was thinking about doing.
That aside though even taking this one at face value I have a really hard time believing that people care. Like how petty do you have to be to not want people on a PlayStation to be able to play the same game as you? It doesn’t make any sense to me just from a human perspective.
But even more they’re both just PCs with a fucking logo slapped on them, which was done specifically so that they would be easier to develop for and so companies would put their games on multiple consoles. If Xbox wants to be more exclusive then they should go back to having more exclusive hardware like using Power PC processors again.
Neither of these console companies have made good decisions in the past year.
Sony is fucking up big time with all kinds of stuff they’re doing, like paying 3.6 billion for Bungie and then throwing their weight behind a game that nobody wants and nobody likes instead of the game that made Bungie what it is. Then Sony jacked up the price of PlayStation Plus and announced that they’re no longer supporting PC with single player games. I have zero faith in Sony to make the right decisions anymore.
And now Xbox is pulling their shit with this exclusivity crap. Exclusivity doesn’t make me want to go out and buy your console. It makes me want to avoid the console and everything related to you. There are plenty of games that won’t be wrapped up in this bullshit that I’ll be playing instead.
Then Sony jacked up the price of PlayStation Plus and announced that they’re no longer supporting PC with single player games. I have zero faith in Sony to make the right decisions anymore.
Which is why what they’re doing is so dumb
They think people will rush out and buy ps5s for exclusives, after people just sold theirs. Hell, I gave mine away to my niece. I’m not going to buy another or a ps6 knowing that at any moment exclusives won’t be exclusive again.
The flip flop just showed people it can change. And if they don’t sell enough consoles, they will switch again. And people still won’t buy them at full price.
Ol’ Petey sure got his bag, though. Can buy at least a few more cars with his golden parachute.
I thought I read a year ago or so that Xbox gave up on exclusives?
PS5 went for console exclusives so now Xbox has to select a couple token core IPs to can their PS5 version with so they don’t end up in a spot where PS5 is always clearly the right hardware to own.
They changed strategy with their new Xbox division chief. Gave up on AI and moved forward with Xbox with exclusives.
Some additional developments not captured by this article: Jeff Grubb says a source tells him there is a finished PS5 version of this game sitting on a drive somewhere that will now go unused. And second, an Xbox…sorry, XBOX exec said that (paraphrasing), “No, this decision wasn’t made last minute. We decided this over a month ago but just wanted to keep it secret so it would be a fun surprise for gamers.” So they definitely made this decision last minute.
“Fun surprise for gamers”
iswould be a wild statement to make for something that removes choice from gamers.edit: changed phrasing to respect paraphrase in original comment
It was my paraphrase, which I made somewhat facetiously. I don’t think a lot of replies here know what paraphrasing is.
I know what it is but, NGL my eyes glazed over the word when I read it originally, although I defo could see a major corporation actually saying that so I would believe it regardless.
The full quote is:
Hey Tom [of The Verge], I can confirm this [last minute decision thing] is not true. We just limited the knowledge of this news to a very small internal group. Intention was to share this news first with our players and everyone watching showcase.
A lot has changed since Asha came into role 107 days ago. We are moving fast and it’s frankly pretty energizing inside the hallways here. I was made aware of these exclusives roughly a month in advance. Hope that helps!
“Over a month ago” for a product that took 6+ years to develop basically means “we had 72 opportunities to clarify this and decided to forego 71 of those”.
Also, not a marketing expert, but learning that my console or other players won’t be able to play this game doesn’t seem like a “fun surprise for gamers” to me. But then again, I don’t get paid six figures for a marketing job, so what do I know.
Exactly. When the process takes 6 years, throwing it all out a month before release is essentially last minute - and that’s assuming you take them at their word, which I really don’t.
Its just a shame to know the devs will have poured so much time into the PS5 version just to have the finished product sit on a drive somewhere unreleased (assuming it hasn’t been destroyed instead to prevent it ever being leaked).
Even from a capitalist perspective, this is such a waste.
If they had done this earlier, they could have better allocated the team working more on the Xbox version than wasting their time, money, and passion on something that won’t see the light of day.
It’s a massive failure and waste from every perspective…
a “fun decision”? what’s so fun about gatekeeping a video game smh
Keeps the diehard Xbox fans happy? It’s extremely cringe worthy though.
Is the whole idea really just XBOX people being able to say to PS5 people “I have something you’ll never be able to get”?
I think the execs overestimate how valuable that is. And yeah, that is extremely cringe-worthy.
How is this fun? 🤨
You can’t spell ‘fun’ without ‘eff you’!
A sense of pride and accomplishment
A devkit with that version is absolutely gonna show up on eBay at some point in the next 20 years.
Oh hooray. Let’s go backwards in time.
Sony, Microsoft, you fucking dipshits. The RAMpocalypse is making hardware a premium and you’re going back to the hardware exclusivity nonsense?
Xbox console exclusive? They have the pre order still up on steam…
When they say “console exclusive”, they mean among the consoles it will exclusively arrive on Xbox and nothing else.
Until its eventually done all it can, then it releases on others to get some more money.
better than what sony does. im still waiting for some playstation exclusives to hit XBOX
I wonder if you could make a case for false advertising here.
People are allowed to reasonably make mistakes. This doesn’t reach the threshold for malice
I don’t see how. Lot’s of games get announced and later cancelled and that’s never seen as false advertisement. Even if the game releases, and there’s only a PC/XBox version, you wouldn’t buy that and then sue Microsoft because you can’t play it on PS5 and if you don’t buy it you don’t have a case.
Well, yeah…
But you cheated, you used critical thinking. These days that’s like Shaq bragging to toddlers that he can dunk and they can’t.
