Lol. A Windows Central piece written by ("Contributions from" is their hint) none other than Jez Corden.

Probably the dumbest XBox astroturfer MS pays/has paid.

^This. I would buy $100 in eShop money for $90 from Costco. Then put it on their 4% back credit card. Then I "lived" in Oregon and waited for sales. Got a ton of digital-only games for under half price. 

Unlike Sony and Nintendo, a large amount of 1st party Xbox games aren't even complete on the disc. Doom 3 and Indiana Jones were both glorified coasters that needed an internet connection to download 99.9% of the game. Doesitplay.org has documented this extensively. People will claim that PS5 games need to download too but that's because Sony's UI lies by calling disc installs downloads. Roughly 90% of Switch and 69% of PS5 games will play just fine off the disc with no major bugs or issues. Xbox on the other hand overwhelmingly needs an internet connection. Games labeled as XB1/Series only have the XB1 version on the disc. The Series version requires a significant update to be downloaded. 

It's so surreal watching Xbox take 2-3 console generations to implode and disappear, when other systems managed to do it in a single gen. Xbox fans just keep holding on after 13 years of almost nothing but bad news and a slow decline. They hit their peak with 360 and have been getting worse ever since. I imagine they will take another 7 years to fully dissolve into cloud/streaming. Big companies like MS, Amazon, Google, and Facebook all need to be broken up. Someone else could have entered the console space by now and done better. Or Sony could have been broken up too and we would have Playstation vs Playstation's spinoff company. Instead we have these Zombie corporations that are just placeholders and tie up enough of the market to make entering impossible for newcomers, while encouraging their competition to do less and less. It's like watching a two man footrace where one competitor just wants to walk. And the other competitor just walks slightly faster because he knows that he doesn't need to try to win. So you wind up with this boring non-competitive duopoly that we have now. Like trying to vote Republican or Democrat when both parties fully support raising rent, lowering wages, and bombing Gaza. 

The tricky thing with a new console competitor entering the market is that you need deep pockets in order to get anywhere (e.g. selling powerful tech at a loss, securing third-party agreements, building a powerful catalogue of games, marketing, etc.). At this point, I’m not sure if it is possible for a new console to emerge TBH.

Though maybe a cool idea for a system would be one with very low specs, which has strong backing from the indie scene. Selling an affordable console with very strong flow of indie releases (the number of indie games to hit >85OC in any given year is genuinely shocking) would make for a potentially attractive buy. Especially if this indie support is also accompanied by solid first-party support, maybe some third-party companies jumping in, and if the system was specifically designed to be THE way to play indie (e.g. having exclusive DLC sold on the system, allowing for features which really can only be done of this system over NS2/PS5, etc.).

I think Gamepass meant there was not much software selling for retailers and with Microsoft Windows actually performing worse for many games compared to Steam OS its ended up with Microsoft in a tricky situation. The Windows activation system is completely open now. Anyone can use a simple script to activate a copy of windows and Microsoft is now forcing people in later Windows builds to have a Microsoft account so they can sell their data so that their operating systems generate some income. We even get ridiculous situations where a simple office application is sold on a subscription basis. It feels like Microsoft's products aimed at commercial businesses are doing very well but more consumer led products are struggling to generate income like they used to.

I think there announcement of new Xbox consoles is really just to stop the abandonment of the platform and in reality we won't see new proprietary hardware from them based around Xbox games but what we may get is a PC based system that can run xbox titles from older xbox platforms. I think such hardware will be expensive and less cost effective to building your own rig or getting a pre-built rig from a more value orientated brand. Microsoft doesn't have its own factories they buy from OEM factories and this adds to their costs compared to PCs sold directly by the manufacturer itself.

I'm not going to lie I personally see little point in buying a PS5 or Xbox. They are proprietary hardware with expensive games, a subscription for online use and lack the software range and software pricing of PCs. Both consoles have struggled to produce decent exclusive games and really for me personally I have no interest in a console without exclusive games, yes there are a few but nothing I personally care about. We may lose Xbox consoles soon but it wouldn't surprise me if Playstation goes the same way in a few years unless they bring back amazing exclusive games. PS1, PS2, PS3 and PS4 all had amazing exclusive games same as Original Xbox and Xbox 360. I don't remember much in the way of exclusive Xbox One games but that might just be my memory failing me.

I don't know who is cheering for it. To me, it's just frustrating and baffling they have been since towards the end of the 360 era. People think it began with XBO but it began around 2008-2009 when Matrick took over. Then Phil, over the long term, did more damage than Matrick. It just amazes me that Xbox makes 90s SEGA look competent in management. DC was a beloved console, but SEGA just ran out of money to keep it going. No Xbox console since the 360 has been beloved. Just bad leadership. Ruining franchises. Lies and deception. Greed like EA. I wanted to see them turn it around. I think the Series X is a great piece of hardware, and they make the best controller. Just what has happened to this brand is sad and frustrating.

Oh I wasn't referring to you, just generally all over the internet their downfall's being met with cheers.

And they do kinda deserve it for how horrendous their management has been for so long, but the less competition Sony/Nintendo have, the less incentive they'll have to be customer-friendly; we're already seeing Sony tighten their grip now that they don't have to worry about Xbox.

This is exactly what will happen to both Xbox and Playstation. While I disagree about PS5 having worth while exclusives, I agree with the rest. And take my opinion with a grain of salt because I'm into some pretty deep cuts in the PS5 library. To your average consumer you are right and neither system is really worth it anymore unless you desperately like physical media, in which case you go with PS5. 

But yeah. Next gen Xbox will be an overpriced PC. Playstation will slowly lose marketshare to PC gaming as a consequence of porting their games to PC. People will slowly transition from playing on PS consoles to building their own rigs. After all whats to stop them once PS5 has no more exclusives? What's to stop them when PS5 (and PS6) goes up in price instead of down? What's to stop them when physical games that are complete on disk slowly become harder and harder to obtain? Right now 69% of all PS5 games are complete on disk and play fine without an internet connection. But it used to be 72% with PS4 and 89% with PS3. Also this 69% number doesn't include games that never get a physical version or only get a limited run games version that requires a 2 year pre-order. 

Anyway, yeah you are absolutely right with your predictions. Xbox will be just a shitty pre-build. Playstation will slowly die to PC gaming. 

I got a late model 360 last year to pair with my multiformat monitor. It's crazy how many good and underrated Xbox 360 exclusives there were. So much of what they made like Halo Wars and Viva Pinata flew under the radar. If they just went back to that level of creativity I would be happy to buy Xbox games again.