Topic: Official Push Square Xbox Thread

@Kidfried From my perspective, I thought I'd just give it a go when the Series X launched. Having just spent a LOT on a 'bundle' (the first option I managed to secure when pre-orders went live) and wanting a PS5 too, I thought I'd try Game Pass Ultimate to save money - and as a 'collector', I didn't think it would be a 'long' term thing. I still had 7months of Gold, which became 7months of Game Pass Ultimate for my '£1' promotion.

I had every expectation that I'd use it to play the games I had missed out on, play a couple of 'indies' that I would 'never' buy but still looked somewhat interesting enough to try and give me a 'few' months of 'new' games every month without any additional expenditure. Then when I got an email offering mea chance to pre-order my PS5 bundle, I had saved money from my 'gaming' budget to be able to 'pre-order' and as the time approached when my Game Pass Subscription (that 7 months of Gold converted) was coming close to ending, that was around the time of Flight Sim, the Ascent, Psychonauts 2 were releasing and games like B4B, FH5, H:I etc were on the 'horizon' and the 'positive' experience of the previous months made it a no brainer for me to continue.

Another 'benefit' from my perspective is that my Son (who primarily games on PC these days) also has Game Pass so we could play games like B4B on day 1 together and having a 'shared' Game Pass Library makes it easy to find something we 'both' have. Neither of us would buy 'It Takes Two' for example but could play it together...

Anyway, good luck with your New Years Resolution, I hope you have a great 2022

Huge Xbox and Xbox 360 sale going on now: https://www.purexbox.com/news/2022/01/deals-xbox-is-having-a-...

I'm genuinely surprised at how many games that are on sale here that I actually want to get. Usually when there's a normal sale, whether on Xbox, PlayStation or Nintendo, nothing really excites me because I've already bought most of the games that I want to have. However, there are plenty of titles from the PS3/360/Wii era and even before that that I've completely missed out on. I'm definitely getting the Timesplitters games and Nights into Dreams, and I'm contemplating on getting Midnight Club Los Angeles and XCOM Enemy Within. Might even buy more games since it's not often we see games from the PS3/360 era go on sale nowadays (at least on consoles that is). I guess that's one of the advantages of having backwards compatibility!

@themcnoisy Tagging you here since you seem to like BC on your Series X.

EDIT: While I'm at it, I thought it's worth mentioning that Danganronpa 1 is now on Game Pass, and also Nobody Saves The World, the next game by the Guacamelee developer.

So... uhm... like... wtf

Well, I definitely wasn't expecting them to acquire Activision next. I thought the next acquisition would be a Japanese company like Square Enix in order to bolster their Japanese offerings on Game Pass. But this is just insane. It doesn't matter if you don't like these franchises, Call of Duty being exclusive to Xbox is HUGE.

But the thing Microsoft is aiming for right now is to add as many past Activision titles on Game Pass as possible. Crash N-Sane Trilogy, Crash Team Racing, Crash 4, Spyro trilogy, Tony Hawk 1 and 2, all the Call of Duty games, Diablo 2 and 3, and so on. This is going to add so much more value to Game Pass. Spencer has said in the past that he wants more family-friendly games on Xbox and now they have both Crash and Spyro. It's absolutely insane.

Luckily, I personally care about AB games even less than Bethesda (from whom I enjoy the likes of Doom Eternal and such). Don't get me wrong, I think CoD are solid games but I can easily live without them and I never enjoyed Diablo's loot craziness myself.
I just hope this doesn't put the competition in actual trouble.

Also this has huge "rich kid gets whatever they want" energy (even though this is obviously good for Xbox and MS). Nobody likes that kid.

@Kidfried What's worse is the revelations surrounding the culture of harassment and misogynistic abuse hit Activision's share prices, in turn (potentially) benefitting Microsoft. Given the length of time these deals are in the works, there is no way Phil Spencer was unaware when he wrote his hollow and disingenuous tweets. Bobby Kotick's days may be turn out to be numbered, but the payday he will get from this deal will be astronomical, as will any future severance package. Capitalism rewards exactly who it's meant to. And it still doesn't change the deeply rooted problems with Blizzard's studio culture or the lives ruined by it.

It’s genuinely sickening. So much for speaking out about ActiBlizz. Extreme benefit of the doubt, they could clean up the company but that’s not really how capitalism works.

@Kidfried Well that’s horrifying. It’s indefensible. I genuinely do not see how anybody could be happy about this.

@Kidfried Ah. Never mind. “Once the deal closes, the Activision Blizzard business will report to Phil Spencer, CEO, Microsoft Gaming." So basically Bobby’s being booted once they’re acquired? Awful but if that happens then it’s something.

Apparently the only thing morally wrong is to turn down a big stack of money!

@Kidfried It’s not good at all. I genuinely don’t think Kotick is long for the company though, Microsoft’s image matters more than him when it comes to these massive deals. They should really just outright make an example of him as soon as the deal goes through. I’d assume that they need him on board in order to get the deal through but he’ll end up going off with a ridiculous severance package anyway. All this deal shows is that those who abuse get away with it richer than before.

Greed, which exists in all economic systems, is the problem.

@LtSarge just picked up an 8-bit do Xbox controller and what a boss piece of equipment. £30??? Like what??? Amazing. The d-pad is fantastic, warmed up on Tetris Effect and it's so so good. Best 3rd party controller I've ever used, only day 1 so wear and tear could be an issue but I am extremely impressed. 8 bit do are well and truly on my radar now

@Kidfried LMAO, those quotes can't be real. Any sane human being wouldn't write something like that with the knowledge of what's happening at Activision/Blizzard.

@themcnoisy awesome purchase, the wired one? I paid like £36 for it. I was waiting for it to go down in price for a few weeks but I bit at 36 in the end!

@LtSarge The problem is how much they give him in severance. Someone like Kotick doesn’t deserve to just walk away with millions. The victims need justice.

@nessisonett I agree, but on the other hand, what would've happened to Activision if Microsoft hadn't acquired it? Would Bobby have left eventually, would the company culture improve on its own after several years more of his leadership, and so on.

I remember last week when Spencer stated that Xbox has changed how they do things with Activision: https://www.purexbox.com/news/2022/01/xbox-boss-weve-changed-...

I think this is what he meant; they're removing Bobby and improving the company culture by integrating it with their own. It makes sense to me, Microsoft cares about its image a lot so of course they wouldn't want to damage it by acquiring a publisher with an awful reputation. It will take time but ultimately I think Microsoft will be able to improve the situation at Activision, even if Bobby gets away with a lot of money. It's definitely not a perfect solution but I don't see how things would've changed without an outside force.

What this means moving forward - CoD will release a Free to Play MP Game that releases on PS5 whilst also supporting Warzone. Maybe even expand warzone to include MP to support fans on that platform. That is still keeping CoD and their MP fanbase on PS5 happy.

That frees up Treyarch, High Moon, Raven, Infinity Ward etc to make 'New' games - maybe a CoD story, maybe not bit whatever they are free to make, they will all be on game pass.

This is all about GAME PASS and yes as Xbox owners, that's fantastic news as the Xbox is a Game Pass Platform. If you want to play Ratchet & Clank, Demon Souls, etc, on Day 1 you have to buy a Sony PS5. They may come to PC later but day 1, PS5. With Xbox, you can play ALL those games ANYWHERE Game Pass exists - PC, Mobile/Tablet or 'currently' Series S/X

Until Sony allows Game Pass, ANY NEW game, once all contractual obligations are fulfilled, those studio's and any non MP focussed community will miss out. I'm sure CoD will still have a presence, because they'll keep Warzone (and/or include some F2P MP) so keeping their MP fans happy, but 'new' games inc CoD based single player stories on Game Pass - Same with Bethesda and any other Xbox deal.