My argument with Mr Puggsly initially started because he thinks that Microsoft's main problem right now is that they should focus on expanding their studios and games portfolio and think about selling them to bigger crowd. (That's why I asked him "why don't bring them to playstation then"). I disagreed with him because IMO, the bigger problem for Microsoft is awful potential market penetration worldwide and provided an example for that. It doesn't matter how many awesome games you make, if your brand and services like GamePass (which is MS main focus right now) become irrelevant outside of US and EU West. Because you won't have the ability to sell your games and services to the huge part of the world.

Of course exclusives matter. It's not even a question. My argument with Mr Puggsly initially started because he thinks that Microsoft's main problem right now is that they should focus on expanding their studios and games portfolio and think about selling them to bigger crowd. (That's why I asked him "why don't bring them to playstation then"). I disagreed with him because IMO, the bigger problem for Microsoft is awful potential market penetration worldwide and provided an example for that. It doesn't matter how many awesome games you make, if your brand and services like GamePass (which is MS main focus right now) become irrelevant outside of US and EU West. Because you won't have the ability to sell your games and services to the huge part of the world. So, to sum up, I think that MS should prioritize fixing international appeal issue first, and then go after exclusives. (Or in a better case, do both at the same time)

Not entirely what I meant, the next box may not have hardware based RT. That only leaves a software based solution.

There could be many reasons why GamePass ain't on PlayStation. Sony probably ain't allowing it, they also didn't allow EA Access for many years.

Selling Xbox games on PSN would also help the direct competitor and give them a lot of royalties.

And why is the GamePass irrelevant outside of the US and Western EU?

GamePass is currently available in Argentina, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Czech Rep, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hong Kong, Hungary, India, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Slovakia, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan, Turkey, United Arab Emirates, UK, US.

The underlined countries aren't US or Western Europe. Russia is one of the biggest PC markets, so PC GamePass should do quite well there. India as the country with the second biggest population has a lot of potential.

The problem is not GamePass availability but the promotion. Of course it is available in lots of countries. But the general public of gamers in the majority of these countries probably don't even know that it exists.

And how do you know that the GamePass promotion in these countries is bad? Is it just a hunch?

Are we certain GTS is at 6 million sales? Maybe it is. As a user of both platforms, GTS hit $20 faster than Forza games generally do as well.

By the numbers Sony have provided, track of physical sales in VGC and estimative of physical/digital yes GTS is around 6M. And we don't have the sales number for recent FM for a long time from MS mouth.

You dont need to feed me all the sales data of GT. I simply pointed out Forza did significantly better this gen because of more frequent releases and the success of Forza Horizon. We agree.

I was not aware GTS had GT5 assets. That just makes it more surprising it took almost a generation to develop.

The reason GT5 took a long time to release was that they were future proofing their models (I don't have sources now and may be wrong but I have reasons to believe a lot of assets - don't mean full car, would need to compare if same model is in GT5 or 6), but yes GTS took a long time to release (but wasn't really a full gen, more like a little over half a gen that meant a single GT in a gen because GT6 released by the time PS4 launched).

Persona had side games on Nintendo portables I believe. Persona 5 is the first mainline game moving to another platform outside of Sony, but I could be wrong.

Yes Persona had spin-offs on Nintendo. Switch won't really receive P5, they will get another spin-off.

There were some old Yakuza games on Wii U. Newer Yakuza games were already coming to PC, but Xbox support was surprising. Coming to Game Pass is a bonus as well.

Wasn't aware of Yakuza on WiiU (even PS3 didn't receive Y4 on the west until much later and that was digital only). Yes Yakuza is finally showing on Xbox and PC, let's see if it will receive the sales it deserve.

Yakuza was a series that stayed exclusive to Japan for a period, maybe even years for some titles. So it made sense to keep it on Playstation while Nintendo platforms were generally too weak for proper ports.

Yakuza 4 and 5 didn't arrive here because sales were continuously diminishing in the west, but the port to PS4 sold great in the west so they gone full throttle with it.

Hasn't PS4 sold less than PS3 in Japan? I fail to see how PS4 is reviving console gaming there. It has seemingly declined, meanwhile Switch took Japan easily.

PS4 outsold PS3 (or is near that), you may fail as much as you want, those were the words of some devs over there not mine. Switch certainly outsell PS4 (that phrase was on the first couple years in Japan, Switch didn't exist at the time), and I haven't analysed that besides Nintendo SW in Japan if they have sold many classic genres of consoles on it for 3rd party.

Is Sony making content or big deals to combat Switch in Japan? Nope. Seems to me they are just hoping for the best... or maybe they dont really care about that market. Both can be true at the same time.

They are likely selling what they project and know is possible over there. Are they combating Switch in the West? Nope, so are they hoping for the best over here?

I am not sure why you took at jab at MS, I am just looking at the facts we have.

The jab is at the supposition that Sony is hoping for the best when we look at their historic and they done fine. If hoping for the best was a valid explanation for the success of PS4 then hoping for the worst would be an explanation for X1 doing much worse than PS4 wouldn't it?

Both companies do what they think will work best, and a large market like Japan isn't a place where you hope for the best. MS done almost nothing there because they knew they wouldn't sell much this gen there after couple months passed and Sony saw they wouldn't need to change what they had in Japan (defacto monopoly) to keep winning. That isn't hoping for the best, it's knowing the market and what to do to win there.

Because I live in Russia. No Xbox promotion at all. Sony has PS4 banners on central square of Saint Petersburg during holiday season as well as ads on TV. Nintendo has Switch ads in cinemas. Xbox? Nothing.

Sony hasnt given GTS sales numbers. Forza sales numbers are unknown. They only show player numbers. Doesent really matter though. We agree Forza was more successful this gen due to Forza Horizon's success and Polyphony being slow.

I thought Person 5 on Switch was a port, my mistake. But Japanese studios are moving some ports to Switch given its success and capabilities.

Yes some titles are showing in Switch. Still Switch won't rob the AAA games.

The gen is almost over and PS4 is still behind PS3. Just check the numbers on this site. I suppose PS4 may catch up, but the Sony userbase is pretty stagnant there.

Console gaming in Japan is diminishing since PS2, that is a well know fact. Still I gave you the word from dev, and if you want to validate just see that Yakuza returned strong to the west, Monster Hunter got big here, Nioh and Nier made a good success, etc. During PS3 time the japanese devs had lost a lot of their limelight, they recovered it. The devs weren't talking about PS4 outselling PS3, they were talking about the industry recovering, and if you look for a lot of examples the japanese developed games have done much better this gen than the previous.

Sony makes games the west wants, thats a great way to combat Switch. Are they doing that in Japan? Nope. They just rely on 3rd parties there and hope for the best.

Sony was already making the games the west want much before Switch was even in project so they haven't done anything to combat Switch in any country in the world, they didn't cut price, changed plans, developed games or partnerships looking to combat Switch. You just don't want to admit that.

Part of PS4's success was making good decisions, like launching for $399. Meanwhile the 360 thrived on poor decisions made with PS3.

Sony gets great 3rd party support in Japan therefore people naturally flock to Playstation. MS would literally have to moneyhat every notable Japanese game to swing Japan to Xbox. Its not worthehile obviously. Japan doesent really care about Sony's games either.

A lot of games since start of gen that were multiplat outside of Japan didn't got a Xbox release there, because that market was lost, that had nothing to do with either MS or Sony hoping for the best.

You saw what happen when Sony portables lost Monster Hunter. Sony and other companies were unable to fill that void. Nor did they make portable content people really cared about.

I see Playstation as a default option for Japanese gamers. If more exclusive content starts moving to Switch, Playstation sales would dwindle.

And you think that Sony receives those game and won't lose good games to Switch by hoping for the best? I'll tell you again, no sane company make strategy based on hope for the best.