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| ice said: Maybe I'm a bit Jaded now but ehhhh I'm getting tired of the whole "we want all gamers to enjoy the games" narrative, like be real and just say you want a quick return on your investment. You're not doing this out of kindness. Now I still wouldn't care about that but it still remains to be seen how this will effect the consoles in the future because yes MS will still make and support their consoles but will 3rd parties still if sales continue to dwindle? That's my only concern with this whole multiplatform approach |
I think people overestimate how much it will take to get 3rd party support, Xbox Series isn't exactly setting the world on fire but has the best third party support of any Xbox console, multiple publishers now are saying exclusivity is bad, despite Xbox's approach being public these publishers are moving towards increased Xbox support, the barrier to porting will continue to decrease (in costs/complexities) and the length of cross-gen support is increasing and increasing, Xbox One and PS4 are still being supported now, Xbox Series and PS5 will be supported for years into the next gen too, we aren't resetting generations at 0 players anymore.
That and there's numerous ways Xbox could entice developers over; xCloud and Game Pass, are ways which justify Microsoft paying developers to port games to their systems and support their initiatives, a benefit to both parties. Microsoft could lower the store cut even further if they are going to start selling hardware at a profit. I also believe not everyone will abandon Xbox; Factors such as Game Pass, Library, Price, Play Anywhere, etc. Will still encourage some to stick with Xbox, especially those who only play the major titles every year, with cross-play there's no reason to switch console to play with your friends anymore. Of course this won't be a huge number though.
Then the next Xbox looks like it will just be a PC with an Xbox OS overlaid over it, now if such a thing has access to Steam, that settles all 3rd party support complaints (and kills PlayStation exclusives too). If it doesn't have Steam accessible then obviously that doesn't settle all complaints but I think Xbox would triple down on supporting its Store and enticing developers over when they truly merge the Xbox Store and Windows Store together and a Console-PC hybrid likely won't require much effort on the developers part in supporting anyway, a simple port to a different store as it is just a Xbox Overlay that plays PC games. I'm interested in their next hardware more than any other Xbox simply because I'm really curious how they differentiate hardware now without exclusives, I hope it leads to interesting and unique things like Nintendo usually does to differentiate itself from others.
They won't need to sell tens of millions to continue to support either because Xbox hardware powers xCloud and look at SteamDeck, Rog Ally, etc. Those aren't selling tens of millions but are being sold at a profit and a new market is almost being formed, Xbox needs to get into it asap but not rush things, ultimately we do not have enough information about their future plans to make an accurate assessment either way Imho so I'm in the wait and see approach because some people think this, others think that, nobody knows for certain and we're going round in circles.
What I do know is Xbox Series will be supported for at least another 3 years before next gen, and likely years after due to cross-platform support. So I can't be arsed to keep speculating about what happens 6 years from now, worst case scenario I switch to PC and use Windows Store for Game Pass and 3rd Party where it exists to continue my achievements and Steam for anything that isn't on Windows Store, Lol. I just don't want to lose my achievements (Lol) or Game Pass. But ultimately we don't have enough information still and Xbox won't announce their plans anytime soon but keep being asked about this so will give PR answers like this one, Lol.
Looking towards the near future, I'm more interested in the insane 2025 line-up, on paper based on announcements and leaks it looks to be one of the best years for a publisher ever, so that is taking up my mind space right now rather than 6 years from now, even then I'm very curious in what the future of Xbox hardware looks like and cautiously excited for a possible Xbox OS on PC.
Last edited by Ryuu96 - 2 days ago
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