The one thing I will say about the comparisons between Activision's and Square Enix's western IPs is that I do believe that Microsoft needs some 3rd person narrative rich action games to compete with Sony's offerings, and Tomb Raider and Legacy of Kain are both in that genre.
Are they really lacking that much in those areas with all the acquisitions though? Double Fine make one of the most iconic 3rd person narrative focused games out there in Psychonauts and managed to follow that up with a really great Psychonauts 2. They obviously don't wow with the graphics, but there's only so much "bling" you can get out of a deliberate desire to have cartoonish graphics even if the subject matter is not at all cartoonish.
Ninja Theory has an acclaimed 3rd person narrative focused game in Senua's Sacrifice and are working on the follow up.
Obsidian Entertainment are known both for their excellent RPG games but also for their narrative focus within those games. Their next game appears to be a 3rd person game. It could be another 3rd person action-RPG or a pure 3rd person action spectacle (like Sony's narrative focused games). Either way it'll be a 3rd person narrative rich action game.
inXile has thus far mostly focused on top down 3rd person narrative focused RPGs with the notable exception of most recent The Bard's Tale. While the budgets they were working with precluded them from attempting a 3rd person action spectacle prior to the MS acquisition, we do know that their next project is an ambitious project with a larger budget that sounds like it may be unlike anything they've created up to this point. IE - with their excellent narrative focus that they've had in their games, it's entirely within the realm of possibility that they could make a 3rd person narratively focused action game.
Compulsion games with their limited indie budgets have done decent 3rd person action oriented narratively focused games. It's possible that with a larger budget under MS that they could create something more compelling.
And that isn't even touching on the 3rd person narrative games that studios under the Bethesda umbrella have created and will likely continue to create.
I completely understand that from the POV of studios prior to MS acquiring studios that there was a distinct lack of narrative focused 3rd person action games, but that simple is no longer true after all the acquitions.
Phil Spenser doesn't seem to think they need to compete with those types of Sony titles. Might be one of those 'we don't need that thing we can't have anyway' comments.
Continuing from the above, in fact, one of the reasons that Phil Spencer went on the acquisition spree was he wanted to broaden the single player appeal of the games that were created under the Microsoft Game Studios umbrella. In fact, narrative focused single player experiences being one of the key ones he's talked about.
Hence, you see that almost all of the early acquisitions were studios with a heavy focus on narrative storytelling in games. Double Fine, inXile, Ninja Theory, Obsidian Entertainment and to a slightly lesser extent Compulsion Games. 4 of those with experience releasing 3rd person action oriented narratively focused games.
Regards,
SB
