Every game that Microsoft buys for the Xbox One is one that won't appear on PS4, at least until its usefulness has mostly come to an end. MS's strategy in buying games has never been about building up its own brand so much as at it has been at cock-blocking its competitors.

similar situation to this for Sony/Square and the FF series I would assume

but there is a key difference. Sony didn't pay these 3rd parties diddly squat for their exclusivity(thats why it was so easy for them to break). If Sony didn't pay for GTA exclusivity, which we know they didn't because that is why Rockstar were allowed to break contract with GTAIV, I highly doubt they ever payed for any others before last gen.These deals were done with just skilled manuevering on Sony's part. Sony was already crushing competition and being aligned with one of the big companies(especially the one in the lead) comes with bigger benefits than money itself.

Publicity is very valuable, and often doesn't cost a dime. Games like Heavy Rain, Killzone, or even Gears would have easily been overlooked had they not been exclusives.Single console owners often look for titles that make their system stand out, ones that utilize their console to the best  of it's ability. These games get put into a special spotlight that you just can't get as a Multiplat(as a new IP). Its kind of like Symbiosis, I'm Popular, you hang with me and my crew so that logically makes you popular.

Which is basically their strategy that won them the OS market once upon a time. They purchased the exclusivity of pretty much all important 3rd party devices and applications, suffocating all other OS.

They didn't deserve to own that market(and subsequently ruined it for years) and they shouldn't own the gaming market with this attitude either.

It benefits MS.  This game will move SOME systems.  How many vs. how much they paid is what determines if it is worth it or not.

this sums up why MS is not into this for gaming, gaming is just a means to an end:

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=125163689&postcount=7090

Like to see someone refute this, MS after 10 years have done ZERO to foster first party creativity or studios. Throwing money at it in desperation doesn;t work.

Sure you don't build a first party stable overnight, but in MS' case when they hell are they going to start?

Lets recap:
Started Turn 10, who went on to make Forza, the one truly original IP from Microsoft to ever succeed.

Bought Bungie when Halo was months from release, had them port it to Xbox, cancelling a much hyped PC version which did later arrive, not to mention the Mac version Bungie had been promising.

Purchased FASA as part of another acquisition in 1999. After doing very little with the Shadowrun and MechWarrior IPs on the Xbox family of consoles closes FASA in 2007, licences out all their worthwhile IPs to small studios.

Bought Rare in 2002, since they have mined the Perfect Dark, Banjo, and Conker IPs with zero success, made one new mascot IP for Xbox 360's launch that never got a follow up despite being a pretty solid (kid friendly) game (Kameo, FYI). Have since been largely relegated to Kinect titles, weren't even the ones who made the Killer Instinct reboot.

Purchased Lionhead in 2006. Proceeded to have them make nothing but Fable games, including a crappy Kinect Fable game. Stopped making PC versions entirely, games progressively got further and further away from the original concept for Fable. A large number of staff has been laid off over the past two years, another large group up and left with Molyneaux, which if it was anything like his departure from Bullfrog to found Lionhead constituted his core staff he's had everywhere (i.e. the real talent in the studio). Making yet another Fable game that is even further removed from the original premise.

Started up 343 studios as a replacement for Bungie when Bungie wanted out as opposed to eternally making nothing but Halo. Now 343 makes nothing but Halo, only not as well as Bungie. The game they wouldn't let Bungie make, Destiny, is now the most pre-ordered game yet. Winning?

Disbanded Ensemble Studios, Aces Studio, MS Flight Team, MS Victoria Studio (never released anything) and Carbonated Games. Have in the last several years purchased BigPark (absorbed into MS Game Studios), Twisted Pixel (who's next game was a full blown stinker), Press Play (nothing of note, so basically shuffling deck chairs with this and closing Carbonated).

Also, Black Tusk isn't new. It's Microsoft Vancouver. They just cleaned house and renamed it after Vancouver went years without finishing anything. Black Tusk is doing an admirable job keeping that history alive.

This is just a quick sample of how MS has handled their first parties. Forza is the only new IP they've generated and maintained worth a shit in their entire time as a console first party. Everything else was bought, mismanaged, and typically shuttered.

Buying their way into the industry with the Xbox with Bungie, Lionhead, etc. is one thing. Sure, you need meaningful exclusives and that was the fastest way to get them. They've been in the console business for nearly 13 years now though. The proof is in the pudding. Microsoft has never shown a commitment to developing their own legitimate first party stable. They closed much of what they did start with the Xbox during the X360 generation because Sony's failure to deliver with PS3 allowed them to pick off former exclusives and have a comparable 3rd party library at a lower price, so they weren't needed. The only significant reinvestment they've ever shown in software development was for Kinect, which they've now pulled back on nearly completely as well.

Microsoft brings nothing to this industry other than dump trucks of money. They're in the video game industry for all the wrong reasons. Making and selling video games is a secondary part of the business model and that has been the case from day one. Originally it was a Sony denial tactic. As Sony fell on hard times and the X360 emerged as a successful product they used XBL to turn it into a marketing push where their real customers were advertisers and games were just the gateway to get people in the door looking at all the ads. The XB1's original concept took this to the next level planning to have Kinect effectively mining data from within our homes while we lived around the system. Obviously the blow back was too great to continue that little project, but that was the original intent and Microsoft stated as much during a conference for their advertising partners.

Instead of this (which probably cost them $50M or better), Titanfall (which also likely cost them $50M or better) the stated NFL deal at $400M, and buying the Gears IP from Epic (likely a solid $50-$100M price tag) Microsoft could have funded over a half dozen of the biggest, most expensive AAA exclusives EVER. They gave the NFL more money for a fantasy football app than Take 2/Rockstar spent on Grand Theft Auto 5. Let that sink into your head when you excuse their lack of first party studios as "taking time".

A game they were getting anyway benefits xbox??? LOL at t timed mid tier game selling x1's. It doesn't benefit anyone.

It was pretty well know news back then, even BBC reported it by then:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/32939.stm

2) TR was pretty popular by then, probably the COD of that generation and hated at the end for releasing every year with the same engine..

3) Sales maybe were not good for the saturn version but weird that in 2000 TR would release again on sega platforms..; 

So how would people feel If MS decided instead to buy up studios instead of courting third party companies to make games for them or to release them as timed exclusives? There by ending all debates about games being timed, to: The ONLY place to play these (insert IP, after IP)?

I do agree that they need to create more original IP's.

first part true second part I disagree,  all three are struggeling with their first party...We feel that studios have been closed and a PS launch with no wipeout is still  awkward for me;....

GTA was also on the Xbox...   It was just coincidence that GTA was always around 6 months only for PS2 and then for other platforms;.  The deal with sony was probably only for PS2..