If Bethesda would've made Elder Scrolls VI instead of Starfield and Microsoft still bought them, Elder Scrolls VI would probably move a few million more Xbox units at least. Especially if it got good word of mouth. 

By time we eventually get Elder Scrolls VI (looking like late 2020s to 2030), I don't think it will help Xbox much.

Microsoft would also be doing major damage to those franchises. They'd spend all that money on franchises only to significantly weaken them and only slightly increase their hardware sales. If it had happened before the generation fully got started it could of maybe made a big shift. But 3 years down the line the wheels are already in motion

Does Xbox even have a coherent strategy this gen?

Software sells hardware and there's no point buying a console with no exclusives.

Unless you like the ecosystem (your library, friends, etc.) and want better performance than last-gen (including Quick Resume which PS5 doesn't have). But given the sales numbers for Xbox Series, that's not enough for most. 

Well... to be fair..., I prefer the second list. I could even give you Starfield as a present XD

Also, you forget Forspoken and Babylon's Fall for PS5. Great vintage flops.

Look... Forza Horizon 5 alone... is better than all those PS5 games. And one single minute playing with GT7... is PAIN: It hurts your soul with atomic fallout of boredom (and your wallet, with "micro??" transations).

Game Pass wins the Sony exclusives by far, sorry. Yes, PS5 games are so propagandized as great games in the media, but many of them are remastars (Souls), continuist DLC-like sequels (God of War: The same game but the boy now has 4 more years) or Spider-man games (and I DO NOT GIVE A FUCK about Spider-man. Sorry. More than 22 years of Spider-man everywhere, constantly, since Toby McGuire films: I am FUCKING TIRED of Spider-man, I never liked that much before, stop, STOP, STOOOOOP PLEASE).

Ratchet and Clank is a fine platformer... but not that long, and Horizon games are just "Dinousaurs and Cadil... and chistmas lights". I prefer to play the beat 'em up of Capcom. Or any other Beat 'em Up of the 90s. And not only because are more amusing: Even their retarded stories are better than "Horizon and the wild mecha-dinosaurs with shiny brighty lights". Also, the tough girls in those games are more... pleasing to the eye than "White rastafari chick in the mecha-disonaurs world". Perhaps if Aloy was black? That franchise is a huge nonsense.

And Return... what?

Is this post supposed to be satire? 

I don't know why you complain about God of War being the same but somehow prefer Forza Horizon 5 lol. Or complain about SpiderMan being around for a couple of decades but its alright for Microsoft to pump out Forza games. A lot of this is just silly criticism that can be applied to games like Halo and Microsoft Flight Simulator. I mean, really, who really cares about driving around in cars? I've been driving cars in video games since the PS1. 

I mostly use my Xbox Series to access my Xbox/Xbox 360/Xbox One collection and to play Sea of Thieves with faster load times :D

For me personally, they just devalued owning one.

No point in owning one if I can get their games on other platforms. Additionally, I felt the political adds on the home screen to be extremely wrong to do. There’s just no point in having an Xbox. I don’t use Gamepass and wouldn’t utilize the “value” of it, so yeah.

Short and to the point: Exclusives. Or lack thereof.

In terms of the system itself, the Xbox Series is great. Better than the Xbox One in just about every way, and it certainly has the PS5 beat in price/entry point.
But at the end of the day, it's all about the games and especially the exclusives, which the Xbox Series has no real substance of.

If every game on the system can also be purchased on PC, and now PlayStation and Nintendo, and if those systems and their hardware are just as good/serviceable or even better, then what's the point of owning an Xbox Series?