What's Next, Microsoft? - News
by VGChartz Staff , posted on 23 September 2011 / 13,270 Views
The last year has been a bit a strange one. While Sony has announced quite a few first party PlayStation 3 exclusives for the next year or so, Microsoft has been pretty lax on creating any content that doesn't have you flailing about in front of a camera. Many 360 gamers have been left twiddling their thumbs waiting for Microsoft to talk. After its lengthy delay from April to September, Gears of War 3 is finally out on the market. As many of you may have expected, it worth the wait, at least according to our review. Now that Microsoft's big title for 2011 has hit, we have to ask Microsoft, what's next?
The wait for Gears of War 3 was certainly a long one. Specifically because the last core retail titles we saw Microsoft launch over the last year was Halo: Reach in September of last year and Fable III the month after. That's a full year of no AAA retail content from Microsoft. Their 2011 line-up was almost as bad, if not as bad, as Nintendo's situation on Wii where gamers have essentially been sitting around and waiting for The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword since Donkey Kong Country Returns launched in November last year. The advantage Microsoft has is that their platform actually has third party support, making their lack of content much more bearable.
We do have a small outline of what Micorosft will be doing this holiday season, which essentially kicked off starting with Gears of War 3 followed by Forza Motorsport 4 in October. Then, after Forza, we'll have Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary which is a remake. Excluding Kinect titles, that's not just your holiday season for 2011, that's the entire line-up currently announced between now and Halo 4, which is set for holiday season 2012. The rest of the line-up between now and then are Kinect titles. That's not to say they can't be good Kinect titles, Dance Central 2 is bound to be a hit. Microsoft does have a line-up aimed at more traditional gamers with Kinect, but I don't think these titles replace games that control via the traditional Xbox 360 controller, something I've discussed in the past. Microsoft is also competitive in the downloadable sphere with quite a few, at the very least, timed exclusives. I wonder how much longer that will last though, as it feels like Sony has also been closing in on the home console downloadable market.
Microsoft could have some content up their sleeves. As of right now, I'm not too sure when or where they would reveal that unless they held their own event. Maybe at the Game Developers Confrence or PAX East, but I wouldn't be surprised if we're waiting for E3. Even then, based off the last couple of years, it could just be another Kinect-athon.
Does Microsoft really need to do anything? I'm not sure. Up until recently, Xbox 360 was moving at basically the same pace as the PlayStation 3 world wide, and Gears of War 3 will probably have at least some positive impact on console sales. While not exclusive, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3's flagship platform will be Xbox 360 once again with timed exclusivity on DLC, which is bound to move plenty of hardware units as is. But as the platform continues into 2012, I'm wondering what will differentiate the Xbox 360 outside of its online community and Kinect titles. That's something Microsoft has yet to answer.
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I guess a large part of their sales this year are due to kinect which they have been advertising like crazy. They may be building up to a Xbox720 reveal next year but that still doesnt explain the lack of exclusives till that time. I dont think the lack of exclusives will affect them for a while with MW3 coming otu with xbox as its go-to platform. Eventually, i suspect it will affect sales but clearly not now.
Frankly the continued success of the PS3 and Xbox 360 doesn't really warrant a new console right now, depending on the success of WiiU Sony and Mircosoft could potnetially hold off till 2013 for a reveal for a 2014 launch
MS has never really been about 1st party content. Xbox succeeds through online, timed exclusivity of 3rd party games, or bonus dlc, more than it does through its 1st party lineup.
@scottie
Oh, so Xbox succeeds through Call of Duty you mean? Funny how PS3 owners can play it whenever they want and enjoy the wealth of exclusive content that's out/coming out as well. It's funny the things 360 fanboys say trying to justify it's lack of games coming out. Face the facts, 360 owners are getting screwed.
They don't need to do much more, I'm not Microsoft's biggest fan...in fact their one of my least favourite companies of the last decade when it comes to gaming, but seriously. Gears of War 3 will sell 5-7 million easy over it's lifetime, maybe more with the new level of hype for the game. The original Halo's remake will fly by 5 million and Forza will likely top 4 million. Sony on the other hand this year may have had a lot more exclusives, but so far none have gone past 2 million I believe, though I imagine a fair few will this holiday season that still doesn't put the sales near Mirosoft's exclusives. Uncharted 3 may sell past 5 million in it's life, but likely 3 million by the end of the year, microsoft really doesn't need to do much as a company as they'll get their money's worth, their consumers will get their's too from the online of these games and as this article has mentioned, there's a lot of 3rd party support for the 360. Consumers to my mind have no real reason to worry or be unhappy with Microsoft's line up, on Sony's side of things, I'm still playing uncharted 2 from 2009 let alone all the exclusives from this year. Online gaming...the way to keep most gamers happy without doing much lol
talk about enough said.
I still preffer to have options... better for me to buy 10 exclusives that sould 2M, than 3 that sold 5M and by the way most Xbox exlusives aren't my type of game
MS has the advantage that most of it's audience is American, and generally has similar tastes. Yes there are less exclusives, but the people who care about exclusives will likely get all or most of them.
I mean for PS3, I passed on half the exclusives this year, and the few exclusives I plan to get for my 360 I prefer significantly over the PS3 exclusives I bought/rented.
yes we are mostly america, which means we want good shooters and RPGs. the witcher might be a huge seller on 360 but since there has been no real advertising on it no one really knows about it
Uncharted 2 - 4.8 million
GT 5 - 6.5 million
God of War 3 - 4.01 million
Killzone 2 - 2.68 million
Metal Gear Solid 4 - 5.27 million
Little Big Planet - 4.48 million
Uncharted 1 - 3.7 million
Resistance 2 - 2.16 million
GOW Collection - 2.28 milliion
GT5 Prologue - 4.4 million
Resistance 1 - 3.84 million
Sports Champions - 2.57 million
Motorstorm - 3.59 million
I'm sure there are more that passed 2 mil ,but i really don't care enough to look.
MS only needs 1st party exclusives to get people to buy their console. Kinect does that in the Americas, and they only need a few non-Kinect exclusives per year to get people who are not interested in Kinect to choose 360 over Wii and PS3. There are more than enough popular 3rd party games to keep current 360 owners occupied in between the exclusives. So probably largely a non-issue at this point in time.
@kain_kusanagi
Sure 1st party titles don't mean as much this late but what apparently Sony is trying to do is to create franchises people care about. Like they did with God of War on the PS2. Something that will make people thing twice when buying their next console, just like Nintendo has with Mario and Zelda.
They can not release a damn thing and still outsell the PS3...in America only though
Xbox saves you money. Why buy tons of games waste money and time. With the Xbox 360 I can have a life and not waste too much time on the virtual world. Xbox is more balanced. It makes money on software sales and on Xbox live. It has more downloadable content. Microsoft's business plan is better. Also it is a good way to chat with people video and voice.
Finally caught on have you
I started noticing over a year ago that Microsofts first party/exsclusive game lineup was suffering
and with the Kinectathon E3 shows they have been doing for the last couple of years I realised that as a gaming system the 360 is heavily dependant on its 3rd party games now
which isnt all that bad considering titles like Call of duty seem to be more dominant on xbox
a new xbox system announcment next year could be a possibilty now that the Wii U is due for a next year launch and now that Nintendo are going to join the Hardcore market and look to steal customers from Microsoft and sony so knowing microsfot they wont want to fall behind like sony did when the 360 came out and get a nice head start
its perfectly clear now that Microsoft are far more interested in making a home entertainment system more than a games console
probably some way of ensuring that the 360 continues to sell after its successor hits the market
although with ps3 due for a ton of first party AAA exsclusive games and pretty much all the big 3rd party titles coming out on the 360 will also be avialable on the ps3 then there is a big possibility for ps3 to catch up that 3 million sale gap in the next couple of years
If Microsoft want to stay ahead of its competition they should invest in a few more exsclusive games but thats just my opinion
Retiring from console business? Some ppl wish!
1 Halo game has sold more than either Uncharted or Killzone series combined. When you have excellent sales like that, they may not be a push to create games as often instead focusing on hardware or Kinect titles. Reach is still in the top 3 games being played on Xbox Live. I don't know where Killzone 3 or Uncharted 2 stand on their PSN chart (since it isn't published), but the sales and smaller community may force Sony to publish more games.
Ur statement is so WRONG in so many levels, lol, so you think because a game sold more than Uncharted and Killzone is better, actually, according to reviews and experts, Uncharted just beats the crap out of Halo, even KZ is better in the eyes of experts, I'm might just throw in there that Angrybirds is better than ANY francise the 360 has alll together, if you know what I'm talking about, is just a game..right!
APkenna, did you read what he wrote? Your answer is pure BS.
@MARCUSDJACKSON
That's funny. Anyone with a PS# or a 360 can play MW3, what's your point? Face it, 360 owners are getting screwed. Go buy a PS3 and stop your pathetic, non-sensical arguments.
Xbots all scrambling to get arguments in about MS not needing to release exclusives. Of course they don't need to, but that doesn't make it a good thing. PS3 is the console to have now, just look at the quality of exclusives they have on the way. Who cares about a Halo 1 remake if that's all you get for a whole year. PS# is only 3 million units fewer than 360 world wide, and that's with a full year of being available before the PS3. 360 is a dinosaur now, and the lack of games coming out is proof. PS3 FTW!
whats next? same stuff Halo,CODE and more kinect shovel wares and americas will blindly NOD and buy it.
"I'm wondering what will differentiate the Xbox 360 outside of its online community and Kinect titles. That's something Microsoft has yet to answer."
There is NOTHING innovative about Kinect titles. Kill me, but that had to be said.
If you don't know Nintendo, don't you use it in your articles, the last game was Kirby Epic Yarn, see the score on this site, it was after DKCR...
@SxyxS, I could not have said that any better, people in the Americas like to get ripped off...do remakes of the same games with JUST a few tweaks and they sell by the millions, hence GoW 1,2,3, Halo Francise, CoD, etc...I haven't seen nothing original or fresh come to the 360, while the PS3 gets a VARIETY of exclusives that are innovative and Fresh, do I really have to mention them?? But I guess you guys care who sells the most, really!!! I will take quality over quantity any day, and last I checked when you sell at least a million that is a success and 2+ million just a bonus. And now that the PS3 is 249, people in the US still hesitate to buy it, Sony has put everything in a Gold platter to them and they still don't get it, I guess PRIDE blinds people quite effectively. I have lots of friends who are hardcore 360 fans and they kept telling me that they WILL buy a PS3 when it comes down in price and they haven't done so, I asked them why they haven't and they just sit mute....well that really tells me a lot, sad!
@APKenna, It's true. Everywhere else in the world except for the Americas, PS3 outsells. I think it's because of the 1 year advance on the 360's release. 360 owners can't admit that PS3 is better because they're stuck with it now. On comparison, if I owned a 360 only, I'd be furious with the lack of exclusives. Luckily, I waited until November 17, 2006, and bought the better console. XD
I am sensing a "Microsoft is lazy" article soon. This article should have been written last year. The PS3 has been crushing the 360 in exclusive titles for a while and thats why you will never see one "big" PS3 title outsell a "big" 360 title. PS3 owners have so much more to choose from.
I am sensing a "Microsoft is lazy" article soon. This article should have been written last year. The PS3 has been crushing the 360 in exclusive titles for a while and thats why you will never see one "big" PS3 title outsell a "big" 360 title. PS3 owners have so much more to choose from.
This is the same question I have been asking since last year. Who the hell is still buying 360's? Microsoft has all but abandoned the hardcore and are now solely cashing in on casual garbage and regurgitated halo and cod games. I dont know why ppl arent getting sick of the same games every year. Let me just eat the same steak everyday for the rest of my life. Even steak gets old, you feel me. My xbox is a huge dust magnet now.
This is the same question I have been asking since last year. Who the hell is still buying 360's? Microsoft has all but abandoned the hardcore and are now solely cashing in on casual garbage and regurgitated halo and cod games. I dont know why ppl arent getting sick of the same games every year. Let me just eat the same steak everyday for the rest of my life. Even steak gets old, you feel me. My xbox is a huge dust magnet now.
This is the same question I have been asking since last year. Who the hell is still buying 360's? Microsoft has all but abandoned the hardcore and are now solely cashing in on casual garbage and regurgitated halo and cod games. I dont know why ppl arent getting sick of the same games every year. Let me just eat the same steak everyday for the rest of my life. Even steak gets old, you feel me. My xbox is a huge dust magnet now.
Micrsosoft's strateg simply has been the most effective at maximizing it's successful franchises, while injecting growth in the install base. It's easy to criticize the releases thus far, without putting everything into its true context. Microsoft hit the ground runningafter E3 launching Slim, Halo Reach, and Fable. But, people forget that they capped the year with the release of Slim with a huge multi-million dollar campaign and 15 launch games. The first half Microsoft sat back and watched all of their hard work pay off. People forget that Gears was originally slated for the first quarter. But, pushing it back into the vaunted Halo slot gave it the most exposure the game has ever had. Halo, Gears, Fable, and Forza are M$ top 4 franchises. Reach and Fable 3 led last year, while Gears 3, Forza 4, and Halo Anniversay takes them home. Rounded out by Kinect releasing it's two top selling franchises in Kinect Sports 2 and Dance Central 2 w/ a slew of kid games. Whats not to like about that strategy going into the holidays. Especially when you have the COD vs. Battlefield battle, Skyrim, and some major heavy hitters competing for consumer dollars on your console as well.
Next year, you already see Mass Effect 3, Bioshock, Ghost Recon, etc. about to do big things. The 360 is already slated for Witcher 2, Fable, and Ryse. But, nothing comes close to the importance of Halo 4, which will be the swan song of the 360 before 720 arrives...Evil
This lack of exclusive content makes me not want the nextbox!!
I dont know what the hell Ms is doing
What"s next?-The same procedure as every year.
This year GOW3,next Year Halo,in two Years GOW4(or a new GOW-Trilogy) and so on and on,
and in between a little bit Forza,another Halo Remake and the next Boring Molyneux Million Seller for the PC refugees and a some independent Games to pretend some culture.-MS doesn"t need to do more because a lot of 360 only users are typical US-stereotypes who only want more of the same -gimme a shooter,let me save the world and pleaes impress me with a hype(that"s why the 360 is only selling well in english speaking countries)-and that"s what they get from MS.
That"s the most comfortable situation for a company.
Now MS is trying to create a game for Kinect with the hype and the quality of GOW or Halo and that"s it.
Hmm... a Fable I "Anniversary" HD redo enhanced version, with multiplayer?
Microsoft doesn't have to worry about the lack of exclusive AAA titles between now and next holiday season, because it knows that most of the big multiplatform releases like Call of Duty sell better on 360 than on PS3 anyway.
And next year some of the biggest upcoming releases like Max Payne 3, Bioshock Infinite, and Mass Effect 3 (which for a time was exclusive to 360 and PC before being ported to PS3) will continue that trend of selling more on Xbox 360.
In short, Microsoft doesn't have to rely on exclusive 1st party content nearly as much as Sony and Nintendo do in order to be successful... nobody buys those systems solely for their 3rd party offerings. But when GTA5 is inevitably revealed sometime next year, which system do you think it's going to sell best on eventually? Not the PS3 or PC!
To bad american sales can't make up for their lackluster performance in europe and japan...by the way nice avatar :)
that depends entirely on which xbox system GTA 5 will come onto
GTA 4 had to have a major dub down in order to fit onto a 360 disk and rockstar have said that GTA 5 is going to be much bigger than 4
if GTA 5 is relesed on 360 it will either have to have a again a massive dub down or it will have to be on multiple disks which could cause alot of unnecesary aggro going from island to island
I think we probably wont see GTA 5 on the 360
it'll most likely appiear on the next xbox system
if ps3 gets it as a temporary exslcusive though is completely unknown
its probably more likely that GTA 5 wont come out till the next xbox
....yeah i'd actually bet money it sells better on playstation than it will on xbox. always has been that way, always will.
My Xobx is almost Wii like, sits there gathering dust. I bought it for its exclusives and there really havnt been any (PS3 is my go to console for everything else) and I have no interest in Kinect titles. Thank god for GOW 3.
blind def and dum. keep the consumer busy and they'll have nothing to worry about and thats wht MW3 will do. everybodies covered for more then a yr. the exclusives plight is always a Sony argument because without them Sony has a bad yr.
Killer Instinct 3.
no.
More 1st party Xbox 360 exclusives would be great, but this late in the generation they aren't really needed all that much. Microsoft likes to keep a tight lid on their exclusives so I'm sure they have stuff in development that we don't know about. Frankly I'm surprised Sony is spending so much on 1st party developers when it's 3rd party games like MW 3 that sell record numbers.
I hear this "microsoft is secretly developing 1st party and you'll see at next games fair" for almost 1 year and no game appeared.
the only hope for MS keeping the hardcore gamers is to reveal that the reason so many exclusives haven;t been released is because they are launch titles for the nextbox.
if the nextbox has a fail launch or is all about kinect then PS4 will get a huge boost in sales.
Ryse and The Withcer 2, although not first party, are 360 exclusive titles coming out between the two Halo's.
However that isn't much, but what does the competition offer for 2012? MS has Halo 4, and The Witcher 2, Nintendo has Dragon Quest X, and Sony has The Last Guardian (unless it's delayed anohter year for the third time), and Twisted Metal.
Everyone is preparing for the next gen of gaming. MS just made a big risk pushing Kinect so hard, and it's helping them understand what they want their next gen console to look like, but it's making the 360 a mess. That and the high price tag.
Yet the 360 is still keeping up with the PS3, and outselling the Wii, so MS must be taking a calculated risk.
Define keeping up from what i can tell despite a year lead in america/japan and a 18 month lead in europe sony has come back to win both those markets and continues to put out more titles and sell more hardware the longer this gen goes even nintendo cant keep up anymore.
Define keeping up from what i can tell despite a year lead in america/japan and a 18 month lead in europe sony has come back to win both those markets and continues to put out more titles and sell more hardware the longer this gen goes even nintendo cant keep up anymore.
Define keeping up from what i can tell despite a year lead in america/japan and a 18 month lead in europe sony has come back to win both those markets and continues to put out more titles and sell more hardware the longer this gen goes even nintendo cant keep up anymore.
Define keeping up from what i can tell despite a year lead in america/japan and a 18 month lead in europe sony has come back to win both those markets and continues to put out more titles and sell more hardware the longer this gen goes even nintendo cant keep up anymore.
Untill the PS3 price cut, 360 was selling 90-95% as well as PS3 essentially without the aid of the Japanese market. In Americas/EMEAA 360 does sell better then PS3, and will continue to do so during the holiday season even with PS3 priced $50 cheaper. Hence it's still keeping up.
Also Starhawk, wow, how big was Warhark? I didn't count bigger games like Mario Party 9, or Kirby, but you bring in Starhawk. lol.
you realize warhawk has sold well over 1 million copies.
and starhawk will be one of the biggest playstation games of next year. and will likely go one to sell around 2 million.
yet you lol at it. why? you include some kinect game, and a year old port of a PC game.. yet dont count starhawk, and dismissively include. ps3 already has confirmed next year starhawk, the last guardian, and twisted metal, as well as Dust, and Star trek
Con la aparente salida al mercado de la ultima entrega de la saga gears, microsoft ya ha de estar pensando en una nueva IP, tambien a fines de este año saldrán, halo ce hd, forza 4, y varios juegos kinect.
Tambien se ha hablado de la posibilidad de una nueva entrega de alan wake.
Microsoft sabe bien ke tiene ke ponerse las pilas para vender.
Para fines de este año, seguramente la xbox 360 llegue a las 60 millones de consolas vendidas.
@SxyxS, I could not have said that any better, people in the Americas like to get ripped off...do remakes of the same games with JUST a few tweaks and they sell by the millions, hence GoW 1,2,3, Halo Francise, CoD, etc...I haven't seen nothing original or fresh come to the 360, while the PS3 gets a VARIETY of exclusives that are innovative and Fresh, do I really have to mention them?? But I guess you guys care who sells the most, really!!! I will take quality over quantity any day, and last I checked when you sell at least a million that is a success and 2+ million just a bonus. And now that the PS3 is 249, people in the US still hesitate to buy it, Sony has put everything in a Gold platter to them and they still don't get it, I guess PRIDE blinds people quite effectively. I have lots of friends who are hardcore 360 fans and they kept telling me that they WILL buy a PS3 when it comes down in price and they haven't done so, I asked them why they haven't and they just sit mute....well that really tells me a lot, sad!
Wait Sony brings in fresh games and MS doesn't? PS3's major 2011 lineup is ALL sequels. Uncharted 3, Killzone 3, LBP 2, InFamous 2, etc. It was the same last year too, and the year before though.
MS brought in Kinect recently, that's pretty damn different. Sony brought Move, but what unique titles does that have yet? A Wii Sports rip off?
I know what you mean, and I'm in the same boat, especially with the friends who said they would get a PS3 but always hesitate.
@ Michael-5
I'm disappointed in you. I don't really like Move all that much but you can't talk shit about it and then start praising Kinect. As for ripping off Wii casual titles, Kinect is the real culprit, not Move.
Hahahaha...as soon as I read those first few lines and came across "Microsoft has been pretty lax on creating any content that doesn't have you flailing about in front of a camera" I immediately thought, "is this a Benjamin Yoder article?" and scrolled up to find out that yup, it is! I guess he's just a generally cynical guy who has very negative opinions of things when they aren't done exactly how he likes it. Can't just say "meh, it's just not for me", huh? Ok, now to read the rest of the story...
I mean, I've seen he's generally upset with Nintendo in his posts, although he seems like he's logged plenty of time with Ninty consoles (based on his profile). So I don't think he just hates things, but I suspect he likes stuff a certain way and then is particularly outspoken in a negative fashion when it isn't how he likes it. But it can help your writing if you tone that negativity back just a little bit, because readers don't like to feel like the author is using his position on the website to troll them. (although, as I said, I don't think he's intentionally trolling I just think he lacks a filter between how he feels and what comes out)
It ain't about the number of exclusives one has, but the quality of exclusives one has.
As for the Call of Duty series and any serious multiplayer FPS, shouldn't we just call it right now? The way FPS sell on the Xbox 360 this generation, you might as well just refer to them as Xbox 360 exclusives because at any given time there are twice as many players playing Black Ops multiplayer on the 360 than there are on the PS3.
Sony may have the big names (Metal Gear, God of War, Final Fantasy and Gran Turismo), but they don't have the FPS genre. Microsoft has it.
Yeah we should call it for the 360 the last cod sold 13 million to date on the xbox and a measly 10.60 million on the ps3 despite a 4 million hardware lead on sony, and im sure that all the people that bought it on the ps3 just played the campaign mode odd i never had trouble finding people to play with online i must be popular.
Yeah we should call it for the 360 the last cod sold 13 million to date on the xbox and a measly 10.60 million on the ps3 despite a 4 million hardware lead on sony, and im sure that all the people that bought it on the ps3 just played the campaign mode odd i never had trouble finding people to play with online i must be popular.
What comes to PS3 after Uncharted 3? There is also nothing on the horizon for PS3 Games. At least we all know that there is coming Halo 4 as a big AAA exclusive Game next year for Xbox 360, but on the Ps3 side there is nothing Sony announced nthing at E3 and also nothing at TGS for 2012.
