They're missing info like how many people sought out the previous games or such, but I think they do at least show factual evidence that old IPs can be an exclusive draw for a platform and you don't just need new IP.
Sony and Microsoft first party strategy
- Thread starter chris1515
- Start date
That's what I mentioned above in reponse to Recop...
"This thread should be looking at the importance of (first party) exclusives and what a company should be doing to maximise ROI in where they target their investments. Lots of studios churning out lots of titles? A few landmark titles with longevity? Not even bother and accept the losses from those interested in exclusives because investing elsewhere (price, performance, features, etc.) has better returns?"
Identifying what's different and discussing the merits of different strategies. But to get there, we do need a groundwork of consensus on whether exclusives matter at all and whether the platform's have a different exclusives library.
Which is why previously I said that Backwards Compatibility can even turn 3rd Party Games into, technically, platform exclusives. But then some dismissed that with general question of who plays old games.
BC is a special class of exclusive though, and can't be compared like-for-like with platform-specific current-gen exclusives. It adds to the library, definitely, but needs to be considered as a separate part of the value proposition. So we have price, performance, exclusives, BC, features, cross-device play, etc., as purchasing decisions, in no particular order. This thread is about wielding the exclusives to sell the consoles. We have an epic "importance of BC" thread asking where BC fits into the platform value proposition.
Says who? You?
If I'm Joe Gamer & go to the store & see Xbox 360 games that are backward compatible with Xbox One that are also being marketed as Xbox One games, it doesn't matter to me if they are backward compatible or not, they're just games it can play. Sometimes they are games not available on the other guy's system too.
;)
Tommy McClain
Yes. I consider it self evident by the fact that previous BC consoles have seen sales of current-gen games dominate, not BC games. PS3 had PS1 BC, but how important was that BC? How many PS3 gaming hours were spent playing PS1 games?
Old games aren't the same as new games. That's why we have new consoles and generational advances. If people want to dispute that and group BC titles under the same banner as current-gen exclusives, it'll just muddy the arguments. We even have plenty of people in the Importance of BC thread saying they don't care for BC - it's a separate part of the value proposition. The whole purpose of this thread is to discuss the policies of the companies in creating new games.
You still passed up the part about when Joe Gamer goes into the store to buy games & find some available on Xbox One that are not available on the other guy's system. He doesn't know(or probably care if he did know) that they are backward compatible games. One could even say they don't know or care if they're old either. This the first generation where a system is marketing last gen titles as current gen titles. The reason why they're being overlooked here is because it goes against the narrative here that Xbox has no exclusives or BC doesn't matter. This is part of Microsoft's first party strategy. Just because it doesn't match the other guy, doesn't mean it's wrong.
Tommy McClain
Yes of course. But 3P games barely exist on Nintendo consoles because people barely buy a Nintendo console for the 3P games to begin with. Hence one of the many reasons why 3P games are few on the platform.
Even if it had all of the multiplatform 3P games on it, people would still not prefer the console over the competition for those.
Why bother anyways when the console never had the power to run those games in the same quality as its competition?
Its exclusives are what keep interest on a Nintendo console.
The XBOX also suffered from a similar situation. At the same price as competition (and at some point even higher) it did not provide the same quality as the PS. Only, unlike Nintendo, it didn't have enough exclusives and those that came, most of the time fell below expectations. Why pay the same as a PS4 for inferior experience?
It needs exclusive games that differentiate the console. But at this point I think that whatever MS does is futile. Too little and too late
Sure, that might be one possible aspect.
I'm out of touch with their current pricing model, are they're still charging by the hour or multi-hour blocks? What limits does it have? Can the games be owned? Can you play them without PS Network subscription? Can you play them offline? Do they offer non Sony First Party titles, like from third parties like RockStar or the various COD Studios or EA *Sports or UbiSoft? What does PSL bring to the table?
I've never seen repackaged 360 games before, I'm kind of appalled. It seems a bit dishonest to be frank. They should explicitly say they are 360 games which are compatible with the XB1.
I think both Sony and MS will be fully BC next gen, just a by product of the x86/GDDR architecture.
Hahahaha. I expected as much from the other side. We've talked about it for over a year. They say Xbox 360 & Xbox One in big letters at the top of the case.
Games are games right?
Tommy McClain
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Yea for sure I don't disagree with this sentiment. My only issue with it is putting a 100% weighting behind it as being the sole reason to purchase any console.
I mean looking at Nintendo in isolation, the same exclusives has existed on it for some time now, Wii to WiiU to Switch. But WiiU is largely considered a failure where Wii and Switch were not. Despite having the same exclusives it didn't take off for some reason.
And on Xbox One, we see a general lack of exclusives, but they aren't exactly considered the failure that WiiU was. Far from actually.
So I'm okay with the exclusives move platforms argument, I just don't think it's anywhere weighted as high as most of these exclusives discussions tend to be.
On the topic of exclusives, you look at Nintendo ones, and they are heavily about game design. Sony pushes for that cinematic experience. And MS seems to try to focus on MP.
the nice thing for both Sony and Nintendo is that they are major players in those categories, whereas the MP space is significantly crowded by comparison.
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You can use it to play old games.
Details. Please share.
EDIT:
It's called PlayStation Now, at least in the US, and here's a website on it: https://www.playstation.com/en-us/explore/playstationnow/ and their list of games is here: https://www.playstation.com/en-us/explore/psnow/games/ and they offer it for $10 for the first month then $20 for the next months or a discounted price of $100 for 1 year.
Yeah the major MP shooters are third parties and it's not easy to compete against them. The 360 managed to dominate the MP shooter genre because of a combination of advanced network features at launch (for a console) and the first party games to go with it. If you loved online shooter the 360 was a no brainer.
I think Sony placed themselves in a similar position with story-driven games, because they invested a lot in that area for years/decades.
At PSX, the first party interviews were making it clear sony continues to put a lot of efforts into high budget story-driven games despite the recent statements from the industry (mainly MS and third parties) moving towards MP and microtransaction games. They offered this to sony on a silver platter.
The danger is that single player experiences are more risky and less profitable, but it works because they are dominating the playfield and have the existing gamers tastes to support those productions, we see most of these titles in both critics and gamers top 10 lists. A bad game in that field is probably a huge loss of money.
I think this is a difficult chicken-and-egg situation: if a genre is neglected for too long, the players who would buy that game are gone to other platforms. The platforms end up with gamers that predominantly love a specific genre. How can they reverse this? Make games that lose money until they come back? And alienate the current user base with games they don't want?
Thank you. I was searching the wrong name and didn’t find accurate details.
No, the reason I'm ignoring it is because it doesn't make sense in regards the discussion. But I concede I'm completely wrong, you guys are completely right, and if Sony has any sense they'll ditch their first party studios, make PS5 only play BC titles, and release with an exclusives library in the tens of thousands playing PS1 and PS2 and PS3 games (and no PS5 titles, saving loads of money) and have the most desirable console ever.
Glad we had this little discussion and managed to come to a really insightful answer to how these companies should approach platform exclusivity.
Well it's not the subject of the thread, but i agree it's not the sole reason. Any feature that may distinguish a console from the concurrence can be a purchase reason (good online service, good controller, etc.).
Sony pushes for both but i would say that MS has better arguments for online competitive gaming with Halo5.
You dummy, of course there will be PS5 titles. They can rebrand the old games as PS4 & PS5 in big letters at the top of the case. It’ll be brilliant!
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