Microsoft Rumored to buy yet another Studio or Seven [2018-12, 2019-01, 2019-05]
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Too big and from resetera thread not them. Ready At Dawn, Supermassive (but CEO told they prepare playstation exclusive), Quantic Dreams(job offer with rendering engine working on PC), Housemarque, Sanzaru, Bluepoint are more credible.
djskribbles
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Unlikely. My guess is Ready at Dawn.
wonder if this thread should be merged to the IO thread? (or actually IO rumor thread be merged here?) It's the same type of thread, just a different rumoured studio name.
I don't want to take anything away from the guessing, but they seem very similar in topic and I can imagine the discussion going in the same direction.
I don't want to take anything away from the guessing, but they seem very similar in topic and I can imagine the discussion going in the same direction.
Uh... oups....
I would bet on Ready at Dawn and Supermassive.
Ready at Dawn is (or was) a AAA.
Their last big title released almost 4 years ago and it was not a big hit.
Deformers was a disaster and I don't think that an Oculus Rift title can make so much money.
It feels like a company that needs money, but they have just announced a new satellite studio in Portland so I don't know.
Supermassive Games
Until Dawn is more than 3 years old and they haven't released a big title since.
Their upcoming title is their first Xbox title and it doesn't look like is going to sell well.
It feels like a company that needs money, but they have 11 positions open on their website so I don't know either.
Who else?
I don't think MS is looking to invest in a small team or a developer that is not well known by the public.
Ready at Dawn is (or was) a AAA.
Their last big title released almost 4 years ago and it was not a big hit.
Deformers was a disaster and I don't think that an Oculus Rift title can make so much money.
It feels like a company that needs money, but they have just announced a new satellite studio in Portland so I don't know.
Supermassive Games
Until Dawn is more than 3 years old and they haven't released a big title since.
Their upcoming title is their first Xbox title and it doesn't look like is going to sell well.
It feels like a company that needs money, but they have 11 positions open on their website so I don't know either.
Who else?
I don't think MS is looking to invest in a small team or a developer that is not well known by the public.
This following tweet thread is not related to gamepass/video games. In fact the topic is about why Marvel shows all got cancelled on Netflix, the assumption was because Disney streaming was spooling up, but that's not why it was cancelled.
There is a very long thread on this by this author and sources to Netflix Originals etc. and I think some of what he's written here, may apply to Game Pass (if we treat MS 1P games as 'Netflix Originals'
It's worth just reading for the sake of know what happened to Marvel shows on netflix all being cancelled, and Dare Devil S3 was brilliant. But I think some of the concepts may be applicable here as well and serves a lot more utility than some of the standard arguments we see around studio/content creation.
Here are some articles he references in his threads:
https://redef.com/original/how-the-...video-industry-netflix-misunderstandings-pt-4
This particular one sort of applies to the concept of what happens when there are no exclusives at all. This probably links back well to our OG thread of: Are exclusives important?
This one talks about brand Fatigue:
https://redef.com/original/star-war...sneys-mistakes-were-real-costly-and-avoidable
And this is probably where this affects MS more than Sony. Brand Fatigue is a myth, but mistakes are costly. And I think that wraps up what happened with MS major franchises where Sony 1P titles were not subject to the same criticism. A choice quote here:
https://redef.com/original/netflix-misunderstandings-pt-2-netflix-is-a-product-technology-company
This one for me summed up the challenges of being a tech company and needing to build content. If we looked at what MS tried to do with Xbox One (content creation) they failed miserably with their series and ended up cancelling a lot of that entire plan. One could look at video games as also content creation, and thus their first party line up. Worth reading as well
These all sort of come together into a big picture here for what the strategy is for library building, in this case, it's interesting to look at MS do all of this because we've never seen this accelerated purchasing in this way. As such, I think the information here can provide some guidance and enlightenment on what we may be seeing. Perhaps even help us predict the moves of MS and Sony going forward.
This particular tweet:
The math here could probably be applied to 'timed' exclusivity of some sort. Or the cost of engaging in 3P exclusives.
There is a very long thread on this by this author and sources to Netflix Originals etc. and I think some of what he's written here, may apply to Game Pass (if we treat MS 1P games as 'Netflix Originals'
It's worth just reading for the sake of know what happened to Marvel shows on netflix all being cancelled, and Dare Devil S3 was brilliant. But I think some of the concepts may be applicable here as well and serves a lot more utility than some of the standard arguments we see around studio/content creation.
Here are some articles he references in his threads:
https://redef.com/original/how-the-...video-industry-netflix-misunderstandings-pt-4
This particular one sort of applies to the concept of what happens when there are no exclusives at all. This probably links back well to our OG thread of: Are exclusives important?
This one talks about brand Fatigue:
https://redef.com/original/star-war...sneys-mistakes-were-real-costly-and-avoidable
And this is probably where this affects MS more than Sony. Brand Fatigue is a myth, but mistakes are costly. And I think that wraps up what happened with MS major franchises where Sony 1P titles were not subject to the same criticism. A choice quote here:
The need for a diverse library provides a strong contingency against this issue. But reading through it explains fairly well why 343i has failed to produce a good Halo in the same vein that the new Star Wars are suffering but the Marvel Studios are exploding and there's no fatigue there, we could probably go as far back at looking at how the original Halo 1-3 meshed. The criticism of why Solo failed was so obvious, yet simultaneously not obvious. Once again, in the same vein, for new people playing Xbox, Halo, very much has a problem because if you didn't play Halo 1-4 you don't care about Cortana. And if you didn't play Halo 1-4 the main character to you is not actually the Chief, but someone else entirely. This article really took it home for me for some reason, but it really points out of the failures of story telling here.
https://redef.com/original/netflix-misunderstandings-pt-2-netflix-is-a-product-technology-company
This one for me summed up the challenges of being a tech company and needing to build content. If we looked at what MS tried to do with Xbox One (content creation) they failed miserably with their series and ended up cancelling a lot of that entire plan. One could look at video games as also content creation, and thus their first party line up. Worth reading as well
These all sort of come together into a big picture here for what the strategy is for library building, in this case, it's interesting to look at MS do all of this because we've never seen this accelerated purchasing in this way. As such, I think the information here can provide some guidance and enlightenment on what we may be seeing. Perhaps even help us predict the moves of MS and Sony going forward.
This particular tweet:
The math here could probably be applied to 'timed' exclusivity of some sort. Or the cost of engaging in 3P exclusives.
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Thanks, not read the articles, but your musings and bringing them into the thread was pretty interesting
I disagree. 40 Spider Man games released in one year would definitely result in a lack of interest for later games due to brand fatigue. That article is talking about SW brand fatigue, and SW is such a large, diverse IP you can definitely do lots with it without people getting tired, but like all IPs, you have to produce quality material and not overdo it. Fatigue means exhausting something through over-exertion, rather than a finite natural lifespan. Brands don't necessarily burn out after a time-limit, but they can all be over-worked and subsequently devalued.
There are certainly limits, but as the author writes, the IP was vast enough to support 1 movie per year. In the same vein the number of Gears and Halos, their universes are large enough to hold their current release schedule of 2 per gen, just as written, the quality has not been there.
Which circling around to the original point, even though MS is buying up all these studios the focus today might be to bolster their library as per the Netflix article, but they will need to eventually just focus on quality at a certain point in time.
MS has really suffered with the perceived quality of the exclusives they have released in last couple years (apart from Forza).
If they had released the same amount of exclusives, but they was all rated 80+ they would have been ok.
So I think more so than quantity then quality, they need to go quality then quantity to bulk it out.
A few more average games will not convince many more.
If they had released the same amount of exclusives, but they was all rated 80+ they would have been ok.
So I think more so than quantity then quality, they need to go quality then quantity to bulk it out.
A few more average games will not convince many more.
If you have time please read this article on Netflix and Engagement being their largest metric:
https://redef.com/original/netflix-misunderstandings-pt-2-netflix-is-a-product-technology-company
I found the 4 part series really put some light on what MS could be doing with Game Pass. When you look at this quote above, you see that MS has largely been purchasing AA studios. They go deep into the fact that Netflix spends more creating content then revenues from the service. They go on to explain how they can take massive risks and spend more money than other companies to achieve their goals because the risk is reduced on such a service.
Very much worth a read, and I feel fairly applicable behaviour to what we are seeing here.
That ties in exactly with what plenty of us said in the 'importance of exclusives' discussion. You don't need exclusives to be multimillion sellers, but to appeal and attract your audience. That's where PlayStation has been traditionally stronger than XB and Nintendo, having a hugely broad library with something for everyone including bizarro quirk stuff.
You don't get Life of Black Tiger on Switch or XB1!
You don't get Life of Black Tiger on Switch or XB1!
We all know Brit will bring that up so I may as well beat him to the punch 
I think this with more first parties the release from each studio can be less frequent and therefore focus on quality more. Too often you see the console list wars of exclusive holiday exclusives.
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