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Phil Spencer gets honest about Redfall

ShaiKhulud1989

Gold Member
Not a fan of Phil but it takes so fucking balls to go on a podcast and talk about this shit the week it happens. I don't see the heads of Sony or Nintendo ever doing something like this. So props there at the very least.
Thing is, neither Sony nor Nintendo (globally, I mean) were never about leadership personalities. PlayStation changed 3 CEOs during PS4 days and it is still doing strong.

Microsoft decided to build an image around Good Guy™ Phil Spencer® and now he's taking all the Ls because of it. He's doing his job as a carefully constructed Good Guy™ mascot, there's nothing 'brave' about it.
 
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H-I-M

Member
Did you guys notice at 37:00 the way he admitted that the gen is already lost "even if Starfield got a 11/10" ? That was almost sad.
 

Thebonehead

Banned
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Punished Miku

Gold Member
Phil basically saying they've lost the console war and there is no way to win, even with great games. Sony and Nintendo have won and there is no beating them.

That has to be CMA fodder because Jesus Christ, wtf is his plan? PC and cloud? lol.
I mean that's what I argued during the whole acquisition debate. Sony raises prices and the demand just goes up. Xbox cuts prices and the demand still drops. Seemed super obvious we're on the edge of Sony completely dominating the "high end console" market, but I got gaslit about it on here for a year. Then as soon as the deal is blocked, same people proudly proclaim that Xbox is dead. He's just saying what has been obvious for a while. Call of Duty being on GP is not something I'm even interested in. But it had potential to get casual gamers' attention in a big way.
 

saintjules

Member
He’s right about risk aversion for new IP but I’d counter with a single question: What, exactly, is “new” or “innovative” about Redfall?

It might be a new name but it’s treading nearly 10 year old ground and doesn’t bring a single new concept or new execution of the concept to the table. New title name but 10 year old game design.

I'm with you on that for sure...So yea, nothing innovative about Redfall. It took me 5 seconds to see that it's nothing special and something I knew I wasn't playing at launch (or ever for that matter).

It's really like trying to make a hit record. I write dance music and each time I try to think of what can be different about what I'm writing that hasn't been done before? It's why I give Kudos to Kojima for Death Stranding because while it wasn't 100% received with open arms by everyone, he did something different, to which I haven't really played before (at least for me).

I don't know if we'll ever see a constant stream of innovative ideas with each release. So as long as developers are doing their due diligence with the story telling, mechanics, etc. and making sure that those bits are executed collectively, then they should have a decent launch and favorable reviews thereafter. That should be the bare minimum for any game quite honestly.

What I struggle to understand sometimes is, what is happening behind the scenes to where a game is delayed with a new date, only for that to not help in the final retail build of a title? Delaying is fine, but don't provide a release date until x, y and z are spot on. Are investors really saying they don't give a fuck and say push the game out right now despite it being broken? I want to know what's happening there. Maybe the budget to pay Employees gets exhausted well before release? It's happening too often across multiple studios, so it's interesting to me.

Coming up with something unique or 'game' changing isn't easy at all, which is why most people keep doing the same thing. And most won't take the risk specifically because their budget, investors, resources etc. simply don't allow it.
 
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Interfectum

Member
Not the attitude a senior leader at Microsoft should have that's for sure.
I've never seen anything like this. He's admitting they've lost and will just co-exist with Steam on PC and maybe have a leg up on cloud if it ever takes off.

One thing is for sure, he's actually proving the CMA right. He doesn't give a fuck about consoles, he wants to dominate cloud and Acti is an accelerant for that. So where was the CMA wrong?
 

Elog

Member
That was a good interview. And surprisingly honest and straight answers from Phil.

The last section can be read as 'we do not see consoles as our market' though i.e., we develop games, integrate it into our business model centered around GP and our PC OS - to what extent a PC based hardware solution is part of that or not is not a given.

Maybe I read too much into it but that is how I interpreted it.
 

night13x

Member
So I ran his interview through google translate and it popped out as "We really don't have any quality games coming out. You might as well get a playstation dude"
 

Snake29

RSI Employee of the Year
Good that he does these interviews unlike Jimmy R. Phil seems pretty open and showing uncertainty which is refreshing. Knowing that he's smart with what he share without seeming dishonest.

Maybe because their is no mess at Sony? I knew this would happen after this interview "Ow look how Phil is so open and honest. Jim would never bla bla bla". Jim has nothing to do with this, it's Xbox their mess, not Sony.

Just deal with it.
 

hyperbertha

Member
Oh, fuck off, you silly cunt.

You looked at the obviously terrible state the game was in, and you were still happy for it to be released to consumers.

Actions always speak louder than words.
The only explanation I can think of is their hand was forced. They needed a game to come out in this window. Probably too much internal pressure.
 
I really don't get how or why they didn't just delay the game again until it was 60 FPS. They could of just launched in August which is an empty month to not compete with the titles in June
 

skit_data

Member
I’m a little bit perplexed he pretty much says its just ”not true” that good games would lead to a shift in market share. Although I can sort of agree that the PS4/XB1 gen was really a bad gen to lose I think Xbox would’ve been in a very different place if they’d at least had some good games out the gate.
 

FunkMiller

Member
The only explanation I can think of is their hand was forced. They needed a game to come out in this window. Probably too much internal pressure.

He’s the head of Xbox. He’s where the pressure would be coming from… and if it’s his superiors outside XBox, then the whole thing is truly fucked, as they don’t know or understand games development.
 

Kurotri

Member
The end part of the interview took me my surprise. I'm not gonna go awwww because results are all that matter and I'm still of the opinion that he needs to step down. Still, to hear the "leader" of a platform say publicly that there's no saving the Xbox brand regarding the console race,(be it because of the ABK deal or not) is pretty shocking. I feel like everyone who is on the fence with his Xbawks needs to listen to this segment. Around 34 minutes in.
 

Three

Member
Got to love how he throws out the $70 cost line. It's genius really to make people feel bad for buying games instead of concentrating on what he's selling.

What about those who bought a $500 console and are paying $180 per year for stuff like this? It's coming up to two years since they had a big quality release.
 
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