Microsoft Xbox digital events [E3 2020 Replacements]

[manux]

MS didn't get the same buzz as sony but sony is coming off a more successful console.

The gap in youtube views is crazy big. If I remember right spiderman alone got 5M+ views on first day for the trailer video. This is close to 9:1 views in favor of sony. I would have expected halo to be contender but looks like it's not a big deal anymore. I could find the exact numbers from sony thread but if I remember right there was some other game going 2-3M views and multiple games above or around 1M views in the morning after the sony event.

If the gap in views stays similar it will be interesting to see if games drive sales during first year. It's also interesting to see games versus hw and how they affect perception and sales.

 

[iroboto]

The gap in youtube views is crazy big. If I remember right spiderman alone got 5M+ views on first day for the trailer video. This is close to 9:1 views in favor of sony. I would have expected halo to be contender but looks like it's not a big deal anymore. I could find the exact numbers from sony thread but if I remember right there was some other game going 2-3M views and multiple games above or around 1M views in the morning after the sony event.

If the gap in views stays similar it will be interesting to see if games drive sales during first year. It's also interesting to see games versus hw and how they affect perception and sales.

Its not so bad.

this video has 2.3M views

 

[AzBat]

Its not so bad.

this video has 2.3M views

I got 10.6million views for all Xbox channel videos & Halo channel videos. Will look for other channel videos, but I think that's respectable even if it's Halo front-loaded. But then again it was the only game that was confirmed before the event went live.

Tommy McClain

 

[Mskx]

Now that i have had some time to rewatch it and digest it here are some thoughts:

1. They need to learn how to manage expectations.

Why did they talk about how they learned from the feedback to the May event, making it seem like we were going to see a bunch of gameplay from different games?

Why did they hype Halo up so much? Surely they must have known that demo would not blow people away.

And yes of course the pandemic has affected game development in various ways but that sort of thing is something you need to communicate IN ADVANCE, not AFTER as a reaction to backlash like Aaron Greenberg did.


And why did they use alot of money to get slick, nice looking CGI made to use as teasers on social media and as an intro for the demo when they knew the Demo looked like that? It just made it look even worse by comparison.

Speaking of...

2. They need to stop wasting money on CGI trailers.

Sony studios almost always show "gameplay", "in-engine", or at least something that they pass of as such, even years before release and usually what they show ends up not too far from the final product.

Having Xbox studios always rely on corny CGI trailers sometimes just months before the release of the game(like Gears 5 last year) is just baffling, especially as "gameplay" trailers like Sony make them actually give fans a sense of what the game might be like in parts.

Speaking of...

3. They need to be more specific about the footage they DO show.

"In-engine" without specifying if it is in real-time or what hardware it is running on is practically meaningless.

I would really, really have liked seeing things like "Running in Real-Time on Xbox Series X" pop up a couple of times since they are supposedly going to sell that console in just a handful of months and compared to the other hardware vendors it's extra important for Xbox since all their games also show up on PC.

"In-engine" footage that is just b-roll of disconnected cool things happening, like the Forza Motorsport trailer, don't actually give fans a sense of what the games will be like when they get them.

Speaking of...

4. They need to give fans a better sense of what the games are actually like earlier.

It will drive excitement and passion for the games since they "feel more real" when it's more than just a CG mood piece trailer that has no bearing on actual gameplay.
This might also help the devs themselves focus.

Of course this will need to be done with point "1." in mind but also makes point "1." much, much easier in the long run if done correctly.

__________________________________________________________________________________________

Sorry for the overlong post but Xbox has been annoying me for years with how they can't seem to get this stuff right and i just needed to vent.

 

[Bickle2]

Spiderman is a poor comparison as he has very large cross media interest. It’s the same reason why, as Pat the NES punk pointed out, that some idiot bought a sealed Atari 2600 Spiderman for an obscene amount of money, because they thought anything to do with Spiderman is going to make them lots of cash. So a franchise like halo which is pretty much only known by gamers versus Spiderman which crosses movies, books, clothing, toys, everything, cannot be expected to generate the same kind of traffic from casual viewers. Why not compare it to God of War or Horizon?

 

[Bickle2]

Now that i have had some time to rewatch it and digest it here are some thoughts:

1. They need to learn how to manage expectations.

Why did they talk about how they learned from the feedback to the May event, making it seem like we were going to see a bunch of gameplay from different games?

Why did they hype Halo up so much? Surely they must have known that demo would not blow people away.

And yes of course the pandemic has affected game development in various ways but that sort of thing is something you need to communicate IN ADVANCE, not AFTER as a reaction to backlash like Aaron Greenberg did.


And why did they use alot of money to get slick, nice looking CGI made to use as teasers on social media and as an intro for the demo when they knew the Demo looked like that? It just made it look even worse by comparison.

Speaking of...

2. They need to stop wasting money on CGI trailers.

Sony studios almost always show "gameplay", "in-engine", or at least something that they pass of as such, even years before release and usually what they show ends up not too far from the final product.

Having Xbox studios always rely on corny CGI trailers sometimes just months before the release of the game(like Gears 5 last year) is just baffling, especially as "gameplay" trailers like Sony make them actually give fans a sense of what the game might be like in parts.

Speaking of...

3. They need to be more specific about the footage they DO show.

"In-engine" without specifying if it is in real-time or what hardware it is running on is practically meaningless.

I would really, really have liked seeing things like "Running in Real-Time on Xbox Series X" pop up a couple of times since they are supposedly going to sell that console in just a handful of months and compared to the other hardware vendors it's extra important for Xbox since all their games also show up on PC.

"In-engine" footage that is just b-roll of disconnected cool things happening, like the Forza Motorsport trailer, don't actually give fans a sense of what the games will be like when they get them.

Speaking of...

4. They need to give fans a better sense of what the games are actually like earlier.

It will drive excitement and passion for the games since they "feel more real" when it's more than just a CG mood piece trailer that has no bearing on actual gameplay.
This might also help the devs themselves focus.

Of course this will need to be done with point "1." in mind but also makes point "1." much, much easier in the long run if done correctly.

__________________________________________________________________________________________

Sorry for the overlong post but Xbox has been annoying me for years with how they can't seem to get this stuff right and i just needed to vent.

The short answer is it cinematic trailers are what draw attention, only people who are already planning on buying the game care about gameplay. The average consumer doesn’t remember the cinematic trailer when they buy it. All of these presentations are designed for E3, the one place where the mass media pays attention to the game industry every year. You need to have flashy things that non-gamers that don’t care, and are just there to do their job For CBS news or whoever will latch onto, take interest in, and include in their story.

I brought a famous rock band in to do a show Add a media event, but because they weren’t famous in the United States, despite the fact that the producer and camera guy literally ate their performance up That they did just for the camera during their sound check, worked with them, and had nothing but amazing things to say. To say that they brought it, is a gross understatement, they played that camera like they were live on HBO. You can teach classes on that performance, and that’s not hyperbole

The person who actually edited the story only included the part where they did a shout out to the TV stations call letters. E3 is not for the gamers, it’s for the casual audience to notice these games exist. Sony and Nintendo have cults, and therefore cater to them more. Microsoft does not.

 

[manux]

Spiderman is a poor comparison as he has very large cross media interest. It’s the same reason why, as Pat the NES punk pointed out, that some idiot bought a sealed Atari 2600 Spiderman for an obscene amount of money, because they thought anything to do with Spiderman is going to make them lots of cash. So a franchise like halo which is pretty much only known by gamers versus Spiderman which crosses movies, books, clothing, toys, everything, cannot be expected to generate the same kind of traffic from casual viewers. Why not compare it to God of War or Horizon?

I have been trying to track something like 5 to 10 top viewed titles for both consoles. I missed the halo video with more views because it wasn't on official xbox channel. My use for this is to gauge general interest gamers have towards launch titles. If you go dig up the ps5 thread you can see the links to the trailers and their view counts. Sony had pretty significantly more views across the board.

One could say maybe microsoft event wasn't well advertized so people didn't yet find the videos, will be interesting to see how views count up after longer time. Perhaps sony benefitted from the unreal demo hype and people tuned in. Could be many kinds of reasons behind the difference in views.

 

[Mskx]

The short answer is it cinematic trailers are what draw attention, only people who are already planning on buying the game care about gameplay. The average consumer doesn’t remember the cinematic trailer when they buy it. All of these presentations are designed for E3, the one place where the mass media pays attention to the game industry every year. You need to have flashy things that non-gamers that don’t care, and are just there to do their job For CBS news or whoever will latch onto, take interest in, and include in their story.

No. It's not 2009, it's time to stop thinking like this.

Sony and Nintendo have cults, and therefore cater to them more. Microsoft does not.

No, i'ts the other way around; Xbox doesn't have a cult like that because they can't get this stuff right.

 

[PSman1700]

This is a fairly bad hot take here.

MS and Sony make dramatically different 1P games. I'm not interested in TPS adventure titles that get drawn out over 40 hours of gameplay that is trying to be movie art and providing thought provoking commentary. I respect it sure. But it's not what I want in games. If that's all everyone wanted, then the most played games today would be Sony games and they aren't the most played.

Thanks another good post, there's no reason to 'hate' on other consoles, they cater to different people. I use to have PS+PC, it's a killer combo. PS for those hand full of great exclusives you dont want to miss out on release, PC for everything else.

 

[Riddlewire]

Does Youtube allow you to track views by region?
I wonder what the numbers are like if you remove all the views from Japan from Sony's videos.

 

[Jay]

I think that is extremely unlikely, because people are underwhelmed about what was shown now the messaging is "oh boy, you've seen nothing. That show we overhyped for weeks? that's nothing, in two months we'll show the real games". Maybe some 3rd party stuff but nothing huge. We know both lineups already, yes maybe Sony has their COD reveal in august but I'm not expecting much more unless Silent Hill shows up.

Even at the end of the show they say that they have more studios with more to show later in the year.
Maybe not the August show, but that seems like the most likely place to me.

• More games
• Lockhart reveal
• Prices
• Pre orders open

Sounds like a reasonable show to me. So does make sense to hold some back for that reason.

 

[Megadrive1988]

I was pretty disappointed with everything that showed actual gameplay, with maybe the exception for Forza.

Halo Infinite was a huge letdown, but it's understandable since it's an Xbox One game.

 

[manux]

Does Youtube allow you to track views by region?
I wonder what the numbers are like if you remove all the views from Japan from Sony's videos.

Last time I asked that question the answer was that only owner of the channel can get that type of information.

 

[Bickle2]

No. It's not 2009, it's time to stop thinking like this.



No, i'ts the other way around; Xbox doesn't have a cult like that because they can't get this stuff right.

It’s 2020, people still think like this, and will likely do so in 2220. If you’re not a fan, you don’t seek out information, and need to be given a reason to look. Pretty pictures does that

They don’t have a cult because they didn’t have consoles out at the time when they were forming, and have never done things to court that sort of behavior. If Nintendo didn’t they’d be the same as Sega today.

 

[eastmen]

The gap in youtube views is crazy big. If I remember right spiderman alone got 5M+ views on first day for the trailer video. This is close to 9:1 views in favor of sony. I would have expected halo to be contender but looks like it's not a big deal anymore. I could find the exact numbers from sony thread but if I remember right there was some other game going 2-3M views and multiple games above or around 1M views in the morning after the sony event.

If the gap in views stays similar it will be interesting to see if games drive sales during first year. It's also interesting to see games versus hw and how they affect perception and sales.

Spiderman was coming off a sucessfull game and the largest movie ever released plus a strong follow up and a hit animated movie.

 

[disco_]

Does Youtube allow you to track views by region?
I wonder what the numbers are like if you remove all the views from Japan from Sony's videos.

PS Japan has its own channel and if hardware/software sales are any indication, not much would change.

 

[eastmen]

Its not so bad.

this video has 2.3M views

its at 2.54m in the few hours since you posted it. Its still growing quickly

 

[eastmen]

LTTP but yeah, State of Decay 3 and STALKER 2 pipped my post-apocalyptic game radar. I really hope SoD3 returns to a heavy single player focus, or is at least equally balanced for single/co-op. Grounded is looking better and better every time I see it. A good diverse selection of games shown, good job Microsoft.

There is a grounded multiplayer test going on now and its a fun game with other people.

 

[manux]

Spiderman was coming off a sucessfull game and the largest movie ever released plus a strong follow up and a hit animated movie.

These are the numbers I saw for ps5 trailers morning after sony event. It's going to be interesting to see if the youtube views on any platform translate to sales or not.

Spiderman is clear #1 with 4.8M views
Horizon is clear #2 with 2.9M views
Collective #3 with views between 1-1.5M is gtav, gt7, r&c, demon souls, nba2k21, project athia

https://forum.beyond3d.com/posts/2132266/

 

[eastmen]

These are the numbers I saw for ps5 trailers morning after sony event. It's going to be interesting to see if the youtube views on any platform translate to sales or not.



https://forum.beyond3d.com/posts/2132266/

who knows. Like i said however Spiderman is its own force with a gigantic IP that transcends all media and has done so for decades.

We will have to see what happens this fall and beyond.