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WoodenPints said:
Hmm Anthem at £4.99, I think I have to give it a go at that price.

I picked it up for 10$ this past week and I am enjoying it so far, also looks like the rumors are true that BioWare is going to Overhaul the game possibly next year.



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Ryuu96 said:

Our goal is to be able to bring four or five new big games to the platform every year. (...) We do not have an imposed formula in terms of team size, style of play, ranking or genre. We give our teams a lot of creative freedom on what they want to create. "

http://www.jeuxvideo.com/news/1146197/entretien-avec-phil-spencer-xcloud-est-essentiel-dans-l-expansion-de-notre-marque.htm

So 4-5 AAA IP per year + smaller IP (AA).

Yeah that is what I hope he means by “big games” 4-5 AAA and some AA-Indie games per year.

MS should try to get some 3rd party studios under exclusive 2nd party contracts like they did with Undead Labs, Team Bloober would seem like a good start.



trunkswd said:
EspadaGrim said:

Yeah that is what I hope he means by “big games” 4-5 AAA and some AA-Indie games per year.

MS should try to get some 3rd party studios under exclusive 2nd party contracts like they did with Undead Labs, Team Bloober would seem like a good start.

I'd be all for them getting a deal with Remedy again. Alan Wake and Quantum Break were Xbox exclusives when they released. 

Pretty sure that all depends on Remedy, Who knows if they will ever work with MS again but they might be hurting since Control did not sell very well.



trunkswd said:
EspadaGrim said:

Pretty sure that all depends on Remedy, Who knows if they will ever work with MS again but they might be hurting since Control did not sell very well.

Yeah it is always up to the independent studios to decide if they want to work on a game with MS, Sony or Nintendo. The Epic Games exclusive deal reportedly cost Epic around $10 million (If I am remembering this correctly.) That must have covered a fair amount of the development costs. 

I am still holding out how we get an Alan Wake 2.

Yeah I forgot that Epic paid that much to make it a store exclusive but I believe that a good chunk of that cash went to 505games the publisher.

Alan Wake 2 can happen with or without Microsoft since Remedy own the IP, they also said that they were working on the game but put it on hold. www.pcgamer.com/amp/remedy-still-wants-to-make-alan-wake-2-someday/



Ryuu96 said:

Our goal is to be able to bring four or five new big games to the platform every year. (...) We do not have an imposed formula in terms of team size, style of play, ranking or genre. We give our teams a lot of creative freedom on what they want to create. "

http://www.jeuxvideo.com/news/1146197/entretien-avec-phil-spencer-xcloud-est-essentiel-dans-l-expansion-de-notre-marque.htm

So 4-5 AAA IP per year + smaller IP (AA).

So AAA for next year we have Halo Infinite, and Gears Tactics. I think NT SP game could be AAA and maybe another game or two.



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With Valve doubling down on VR and rumors of Sony making a PSVR 2 do you guys want or expect Microsoft to follow suit for Xbox?



WoodenPints said:
Hmm Anthem at £4.99, I think I have to give it a go at that price.

I started it today. The gameplay is really good but the story is kinda bland so far for a Bioware game and the loading screen are annoying.



Ryuu96 said:

Wildcards/Unknowns.

  • 343 Industries - Unsure on what they plan on doing with spin-offs for Halo, arguably they haven't taken advantage of Halo spin-offs as much as Bungie, who had Reach, ODST and Halo Wars. 343 Industries have only done Halo Wars and some mobile titles, they've had a rougher time satisfying fans with mainline Halo though so it's best for them to get that sorted first, if they decide to take full advantage of Halo they could produce more spin-offs from AA to AAA but for now I'm only going to count them as a single team studio for new titles.
  • The Coalition - There's rumours to suggest that they're working on Perfect Dark, that would almost certainly be an AAA title which could put The Coalition into a 2 AAA team studio, albeit both teams as stated by a Gears leaker over on Era are in very early production, like The Coalition Idk what their plans for spin-offs will be past Gears Tactics.
  • Rare - They are obviously assisting on Battletoads but there could possibly be more titles they're assisting on as hinted by in a recent interview.
  • InXile - I honestly struggle to predict whether InXile will go AAA or remain AA, Brian Fargo has by far been the most enthusiastic among the acquired studios about all the resources and support they're now getting, the question now is whether he used it to go all in on one title or spread it out among multiple teams.
  • Obsidian (Feargus Urquhart) - This is on the basis that he does return to game development as he has stated he wants to, does he start his own team or does he join another, will that be spreading Obsidian too thin or will they just heavily outsource?.
  • XGP - Wildcard, don't have a clue what their investment will be, right now I'd say they have 2 AA's (Ori: WotW, Tell Me Why) and 1 AAA (Flight Simulator).

Personally I would put The Outer Wilds as a game between AA-AAA I would also put We Happy Few in this category. Obsidian will probably have one AAA(Skyrim/Pillars team) one midsized team (Outer Worlds team) and the rest split into smaller projects depending on what type of projects they want to work on like the Grounded team and the other team currently working the CRPG. I hope that Feargus brings back StormLands without the multiplayer aspect and just make it a single player 3rd Person RPG.

Inxile already stated that they have a project that is between AA-AAA and I expect Compulsions next game to be the same.



EspadaGrim said:

Personally I would put The Outer Wilds as a game between AA-AAA I would also put We Happy Few in this category. Obsidian will probably have one AAA(Skyrim/Pillars team) one midsized team (Outer Worlds team) and the rest split into smaller projects depending on what type of projects they want to work on like the Grounded team and the other team currently working the CRPG. I hope that Feargus brings back StormLands without the multiplayer aspect and just make it a single player 3rd Person RPG.

Inxile already stated that they have a project that is between AA-AAA and I expect Compulsions next game to be the same.

We Happy few definitely doesn't fall into that category most of the development was done between 12-20 staff and it wasn't until the last few months they jumped up to 35ish staff to finish off I'd say it's a prime example of a modern day AA game, Their next game though with 50+ staff on it from the start with full Xbox backing will likely fall in that AA-AAA void.



trunkswd said:
I am with everyone else here. I don't see Microsoft developing their own VR headset. I could see them partnering with Oculus or HTC.

Would be great if they partnered again with Oculus. They already partnered up in 2016 with the Oculus Rift CV1 where they included an Microsoft XBO controller.

An "Oculus Quest 2" could be awesome:

  • fast enough on its own for Quest games (and VR porn)
  • connect it with an USB-3.x-cable (more compression) or USB-4-cable (less compression) to PC for Oculus Rift games
  • connect it with an USB-4 cable to Scarlett for Xbox VR games

I expect both PS5 and Xbox Scarlett to use the newest USB-standard with data rates up to 40 GBit/s when they launch next year.

Other partners could be HTC or Samsung.