You know what would increase profit margins better than releasing games on PC? Not wasting 3.6 billion buying Bungie. A dev that has made one good game in the last decade. Not wasting Naughty Dogs time on multiplayer game and endless remasters would help too.
But no. Let's just increase the cost of PSN and release more games to PC. Our core playerbase will happily pay to correct our boneheaded decisions.
Nintendo is the only one that does consoles right anymore. Both Xbox and Sony refuse to support their own consoles with true exclusives. This is because making games with ludicrous levels of detail just costs too much money. So they stab their core playerbase in the back by releasing on PC. Then they continue to stab their playerbase in the back by shoving microtransactions for things that should have been included for free.
I buy a Nintendo game and I have the entire game minus a dlc pack that comes out a year later.
They need to stop focusing on making AAAA level games and go back to making AA and AAA games. Nintendo has proven time and time again that a game can be a blast and look amazing without cutting edge graphics.
I feel like we are seeing the complete and utter death of competition among console manufacturers here. Microsoft gave up around 2012 and has been slowly dragging the world into a bland all digital all multiplatform world ever since. Less and less good first party titles were made by MS and in turn Sony has really slowed down the releases of 1st party content on PS5.
I'm also amazed at how many people walking around with $1000 phones, driving $500 a month SUVs, and buying $2000 flatscreens somehow think a game being exclusive to a $500 console "keeps them from playing it". The only thing keeping you from playing it is your own idiotic budgeting.
Nobody needs a $1000 phone or a $70 a month phone bill. The average car payment is $500 a month but that's only because way too many people drive an SUV and an F150 for 70k each. You can get a brand new Sedan for as little as 24k. A 40 inch flatscreen from five feet away looks better than a 65 inch that you mounted above your fireplace. Reddit.com/r/TVtoohigh.
Yep. Fanboys show their hypocrisy the moment their own platform of choice does something. "Why don't you want people to have access to games?" is a stupid argument considering that people build $1500 rigs and buy $1000 phones. Remember when Xbox fans used to decry making a home grown 1st party game exclusive to a single platform? Now they defend 3rd party aquisitions as if that's not a thousand times worse.
I think whether or not PS5 is the best option depends on whether or not you game online. It also depends on what sort of a PC you would want, and the PC market. Keep in mind that many CPUs, towers, PSUs, monitors, etc. can last ten to fifteen years. If I weren't a physical snob, I'd go PC, but I can't stand Denuvo in my games or digital copies of anything other than an Indie game.
Microsoft has yet to prove on paper that Gamepass is profitable. I think they are hiding a lot of server hosting expenses by putting them on the non-Xbox balance sheet. I mean gamepass takes in 2.4 billion in yearly revenue but they just spent over 80 million in aquisitions. Not to mention many gamepass users get it for $1 and whatnot.
I think Microsoft is heavily pushing gamepass because they know they can't survive in a traditional console market so they are pushing as hard as they can to take the market to a subscription and microtransaction service. That and microtransactions pretty much print money. So they will be profitable eventually. Whether that is in two years or ten years remains to be seen. At any rate the consumer is going to get ripped off in the long run. If you want complete games released physically it looks like Nintendo is your best bet.
Yeah, as far as Sony undercutting their own brand goes, I definitely feel like Jim Ryan and co are the 80's guy with Boneitis from Futurama. They are out to make as much money now as possible. Company's future be damned.
Sony is both selling out and falling for Microsoft's anti-exclusive propaganda here.
Porting Playstation games to PC makes a PS5 not worth owning and betrays fans' investment. People bought a PS5 with the understandable expectation that they would need it to play certain games. It's like selling a week-long ticket to the amusement park and then making the park free to everyone all summer.
Microsoft didn't port their games to PC because they are pro-consumer. They ported their games to PC because they happen to be a massive PC company 1st and a console owner 2nd. MS porting their games to PC is as expected as Sony porting Vita games to PS4. Microsoft recently bought several 3rd party studios for the explicit purpose of keeping those games off Playstation. So any idea that MS is somehow all "kumbayah my lord" is BS.
Thank God Nintendo actually supports and believes in their own platform. Both Sony and MS are running from the hardware market right now.
I agree that the PS6 generation will be pretty much DOA due to streaming taking over. I think once that happens I'll step away from modern gaming. Why? Because in an all streaming world games that rely heavily on microtransactions and GaaS will be pretty much all there is. Complete single player games won't be able to get their revenue in an all streaming world. After all, when I buy a game myself, 100% of that money goes to the developer. If I subscribe to Gamepass to play a game my $10 gets split up between however many games were added to Gamepass that month.
Right now, this works, because Gamepass is supplemental to game sales. Developers often release their games onto Gamepass six months after launch. So they get their initial sales, and then gamepass money on top of it. That scenario is a win-win for players and devs.
But in the future when nobody buys their games anymore, it's going to become a serious problem. Just look at Spotify. Instead of players getting to decide the value of a complete single player game, it will be the massive companies deciding. The only solution for a game developer is to add Microtransactions to their game. But I absolutely hate that. A game should come complete for $60 and maybe have a $30 DLC expansion. It shouldn't cost hundreds of dollars to get the complete version of a game.
Games like Super Mario Odyssey, Ghost of Tsushima, and The Outer Worlds are what I want. You pay once, and get the whole package. You're done. I hate games that force you to choose between playing for hundreds of hours to grind for cosmetics, paying extortionist rates for said cosmetics, or just going without them. GIVE ME MY GAMES, AND GIVE THEM TO ME COMPLETE FOR A FLAT PRICE DAMNIT!
Hypothetically what would happen if I made a game with a budget of 100 million, asked for $180 per copy and only sold 10,000 copies? My average consumer spend would be $180, but I'd still be far short of my overall revenue goal. After all, I just spent $100 million to make a total sales revenue of 1.8 million.
I'm sorry, but I don't think per customer spending is really relevant. What is relevant is whether or not the money Xbox is investing into gamepass is being replaced by it's current pool of subscribers. Last I heard Gamepass had 23 million subscribers, and buying Bethesda alone cost 7.5 billion. That means Gamepass revenue should be at 2.7 billion per year ($120 per year per subscriber). At this rate it would take them over two years of subscribers just to pay for the Bethesda acquisition. And sure there's going to be retail sales beyond Gamepass revenue, but there's also going to be ongoing development budgets for all those Bethesda games. When you add in all the other games MS is putting onto gamepass at launch, I just don't see this being profitable. At least not right now.
I agree that Gamepass doesn't have to completely replace all revenue streams. But who the heck wouldn't stop buying games outright and just sign up for it? It's just too good of a deal! Sure, people will still buy Nintendo and Sony games on those platforms, but if you have an Xbox + Gamepass why even bother buying Xbox games? I mean, it doesn't necessarily have to replace all revenue streams, but it looks inevitable that it will. At least in the next ten to fifteen years.
Edit: I would like to add in that Fallout 4 sold 8 million units on PS4, 5 million on Xbox, and 6 million on PC. Revenue that Starfield brings in from gamepass will need to replace the lost 8 million sales that won't happen on PS5 thanks to console exclusivity. It will also need to replace the lost sales from Xbox and PC users who opt to subscribe to Gamepass instead of purchase the game outright. So, Gamepass revenue from Starfield alone would need to replace around 10 to 12 million units in lost sales revenue. Again, sorry, but I just don't see that as possible. Not when you take that $10 a month and divide it between hundreds of games per person.
Total revenue for all games and subscription services in 2018 was 35.8 billion. I'm sure that number has grown since then, but to even get half that revenue Gamepass would need around 150 million subscribers paying $10 a month. I think that would be the point at which MS' gamepass would start turning a healthy profit. Either that or somewhere close to the 100 million subscribers mark, since that would net them about 1/3rd of the industry's revenue. Until then, I really do think they are engaging in a massive loss leader campaign.
You're absolutely right. The value is pretty much unbeatable. It's really annoying, because neither Nintendo or Sony could afford to put this many games onto a streaming service day 1. Microsoft is out here selling pies for $3, when they cost $7 to make. Even if Sony decided to respond to gamepass by throwing all their 1st party exclusives onto PS Now at launch, they would go bankrupt from the lost sales.
Because that path includes both putting their games on PC and a heavy focus on GaaS. Ideally Sony should either keep all PS5 games as exclusive until the PS6 launches, or put all their games onto PC day 1. I'm happy either way. If they put all their games on PC day 1 then I get to play all their games day 1. If they keep all their games on PS5 for the entire generation, then I'm happy buying a PS5. It's this halfstep where they release their games 2-3 years after launch onto PC that annoys me. If you buy a PS5 your purchase is soon undermined by games going to PC. If you stick to PC you have to wait. Damned if you do, damned if you don't.
Edit: I made a thread on this a week ago. Check that thread out.
"PS exclusives going to PC dates back to PS1." You are confusing 3rd party exclusives going to PC with 1st party exclusives going to PC.
Horizon launched on PC 2 years and 9 months after launching on PS4. Days Gone launched on PC 2 Years and 2 months after launching on PS4. Clearly Sony is moving the PC release dates closer and closer.
MLB the Show 2021 sold well? Do you have exact sales numbers for that? Or are you just referencing all the money they made in MTX?
Lament it? I WANT Sony to move to Day 1 PC ports! I hate the idea of buying a PS5 only to have the exclusives moved to PC two to three years later. Why? Because I own a kickass PC and would rather buy those games on PC. I'm not going to spend $500 on a PS5 just to be able to play inferior versions of games that will eventually come to PC. That's a waste of money.
I already have a PC that beats or matches PS5. I'll be able to play Ratchet and Clank in 2024. Possibly sooner, because Sony is rapidly changing the way they do business. I wouldn't be surprised at all if Sony just up and started releasing their games to PC on the exact same day that they release them to Sony consoles.
Sony is going down the same terrible path as Xbox. No longer having exclusives. Games focusing on GaaS and Microtransactions.
What do you even get for buying a PS5 anymore? A controller that drifts, and the ability to play a few games 2-3 years before they inevitably come to PC?
Anybody that is thinking about getting a PS5 or a Series should just wait until GPU prices come down and build a PC. Series won't get Sony games. PS5 won't get Xbox games. PC will get both PS5 and Xbox games. You won't have to pay for online. A good PSU and Case will last you 10 years. Sure your GPU&CPU might die in 7 years, but you were going to upgrade to a PS5 Pro or an Xbox Series XX by then anyway.
The digital version of any AAA game should be $45/€37 on launch day, not including taxes. There's so little overhead when it comes to digital games. There's no brick and mortar store to take a cut. There's no cost to ship the game to a store. That alone saves Sony $20 per game.
I think the difference here is that MS tends to buy up entire companies out of the blue, while Sony and Nintendo spend decades fostering relationships with companies before acquiring them. Nobody would be surprised if Nintendo bought Gamefreak tomorrow. But if MS were to suddenly buy Ubisoft that would surprise and upset many. The Bethesda acquisition is a lot like that, because both Bethesda and Ubisoft have been long term 3rd party multiplat developers. You can't say the same for Insomniac, Naughty Dog, or NextLevelGames.
Also, I too have noticed the "Sour Grapes" narrative here. IMO Bethesda still makes great games. Doom, Wolfenstein, and Dishonored 2 were all great last gen. Same goes for Fallout 4. As long as Bethesda focuses on making their games like those, and less like Fallout 76, they should have another hit on their hands with Starfield.
Well The Coalition, 343, and World's Edge just continued series that were started by someone else.
I love that Xbox is building the Initiative studio, and I hope their Perfect Dark reboot turns out really well. But let's not count our chickens before they hatch eh?
As for Turn 10, I had no idea that they were founded back in 2001. Damn.
I know that MS bought Bungie for Halo, but is there any evidence that MS wanted Bungie to make it a shooter? I always thought Bungie made that decision on their own.
Yeah, I've been a multiplatform gamer for over 15 years. It always makes me laugh watching single console owners cry that they can't play game X on console X.
That being said, what MS did by buying out Bethesda was dirty pool. There's a huge difference between Sony buying up companies that they've worked with to make PS exclusives for decades, and MS buying up a multiplatform developer. There's also a huge difference between Sony buying up Guerilla games back when it was nothing and turning it into a quality developer. But then again, maybe MS will be able to whip the "We Happy Few" devs into shape?
I'd like to see MS making it's own home grown content rather than go on an acquisition spree. Nintendo and Sony both have their own home grown internal studios that make quality content. MS has never had that. They have to resort to the monopolistic tactic of buying up 3rd parties to even begin to compete with either Nintendo or Sony.
You hit the nail on the head with that one. The $10 a month that Gamepass brings in for hundreds of games can't replace people buying games for $60. Eventually publishers will be forced to make live service games to survive like you said.
Haha, well of course I'm not buying one. IMO PC is the best choice this gen. Last gen it was definitely PS4. 7th gen was more of an even split. 6th gen it was PS2. 5th gen was once again more of an even split.
"And let's face it, if brand identity just meant nothing at all, then what would be the downside to Sony also releasing their games on Xbox and Switch?"
^This! In reality games getting ported to PC has nothing to do with "more people being able to play games". If a company really wanted to make their games more accessible they'd release them on PC/PS5/Series all day and date.
Sony and Microsoft want to use their "Console Exclusives" to lure console gamers over to their platforms, while also being able to sell to PC users. If either company was truly interested in making their games more accessible they'd release their games on both PS5 and Series on the same day.
In reality it's about getting that little bit of extra revenue from PC users, while at the same time disallowing half the console gamers from being able to play on their platform of choice.
Also, Sony and Insomniac worked together making PS exclusives for decades before being bought out. Bethesda on the other hand was a multiplat studio up until being bought.
What country do you live in? Some countries require that Sony replace your console if it breaks. I live in the USA, and Sony won't give you anything past a 1 year warranty. My console had its Wifi antennae desolder, and Sony wanted to charge me $99 to repair it. Nevermind that it's a $5 fix. The funny thing is that same PS4 controller could communicate with windows via a USB plug, but couldn't on PS4. So once your wifi breaks on a PS4 you can't use the controller at all.
Switch OS has youtube if you choose to install it, a news section, system settings, saved gameplay videos/pictures and that's about it. The only thing Switch is missing that I care about is a section for streaming TV shows.
I own a PS2, PS3, and PS4 Pro. I think the PS5 is pretty terrible. Why?
1. The controller is poorly built, and prone to drifting. A product should be built to last at least 5 years. This thing already breaks, just like Nintendo and Xbox's controllers.
2. No exclusive games. Sony is porting their games over to PC. I already have a PC, so getting a PS5 is pointless. Sure, they may wait 2-3 years after release, but I have enough of a backlog that I can wait to play the better versions of their games.
3. $70 games. Why the heck do games cost $70 on PS and not on Xbox or PC?
5. No Bethesda games. This one isn't Sony's fault, but it's still a problem.
6. Not enough harddrive space. The usable HDD space in PS5 is under 700 GB. Why does the OS take up so much of the harddrive? Why is the OS so bloated? Why are there ads in the OS? I shouldn't have ads built into a device that I already paid $500 for. The OS should be simple, and clean like that of the Nintendo Switch. I buy game consoles to play games, and maybe watch TV. All those other features in the OS are just useless bloat. Take them out and slim the OS down please. Come out with a version that has at least 1TB before you install any games.
Eh, I thought it was okay. The world is really bland once you get past all the fart jokes. Like GTA you can only go into a select few buildings. Like Skyrim dungeons are lazily thrown together. Every enemy looks and feels the same, except the Animals gang. AI is dumb as rocks. I'll be shooting people with a shotgun in one room, and an enemy NPC in another room will be like "I'm gonna find you, you coward!" Dude... just follow the screams of your fellow gangmembers.
Yeah a Gamepass-like service on PS5 and PS4 would do wonders for them. So long as you could download the games to your harddrive you'd be good to go. It wouldn't take that much to implement either. Just expand on what's already being offered via the PS+ collection.
Besides. Most PS 1st party titles are $20 a year after release anyway. Not that hard to throw them onto PS+ for free.
It's definitely the future of gaming. It really makes me worried because if people stop buying games, and developers have to rely on whatever money MS gives them for Gamepass, then I see a lot of developers forced into monetizing their games. And for me, that is pretty much the end of gaming. If a game is free on Gamepass, but comes with a monetization model, I'm not playing it. I don't want every game to become like Fortnite or Fall Guys with an in game store. I'd much rather pay $60 to $70 and have the entire game like with Spider-Man, Mario Odyssey, or GoW. Sure, maybe there's $30 DLC added on later, but that's no big deal, compared to the hundreds of dollars you can spend on other games' monetization models.
Microsoft regularly offers gamepass for $1 a month to new users. If you buy a new graphics card it will likely come with 3 months of Gamepass for free. So we can't even assume that all 18 million Gamepass users are paying the full price. That 2 billion a year is cut down by the cost to run servers.
Now keep in mind that big AAA games regularly cost well over $100 million to make. For one extreme example, Halo Infinite has a budget of over $500 million.
Gamepass is not profitable, and won't be for ten years, if ever.
Edit: I forgot to multiply gamepass' $9.99 by 12 months. This caused me to say that Gamepass brought in 179 million a year. That's what I get for commenting on no sleep.
The problem here is that Sony is being outspent. MS is determined to buy up every 3rd party studio that they can get their hands on. Gamepass is not profitable, or sustainable. MS wants to crush Sony so that they can transform the game industry into a Live Services model, that charges gamers out the wazoo. The best thing for Sony to do is focus on staying in business so they can offer a counter for when MS goes back to it's old anti-consumer ways.
MS will continue to purchase whatever 3rd party studios that they can get their hands on. All so that they can slap their name on that dev's games, while keeping them off PS consoles. If MS were to buy Capcom, Square Enix, and Sega, then PS consoles would be reduced to nothing. They would be like Nintendo, lacking many great 3rd party games.
Gamepass subscriptions alone are not enough to cover the costs of game development. If you don't believe me, just take a look at the Anime industry. Anime costs much less to develop than games, yet that industry is slowly dying. Why? Because subs don't pay nearly as much money as selling physical media. Hardly anybody buys Anime on physical discs anymore. We all stream it. MS is pulling the age old trick of selling items under cost in the hopes of putting a competitor out of business. They don't care if Gamepass loses them billions per year, so long as they can get the majority of gamers playing exclusively on their platforms in the next decade. Whether you stream games to your phone, buy an Xbox, or play on PC MS wants you to play their games and sub to their services. And yes, they want you to do that instead of getting a Playstation or Nintendo console.
The ultimate goal of MS is to get rid of the competition, in ten years, so that they are free to charge up the wazoo for everything. Gamepass will double or even triple in price. Microtransactions will become the norm on Gamepass, as MS rakes the money in. Gamers will wind up spending three to four times as much per game as they do now. But most Gamers won't even mind. They will be like a frog in a pot of water as it slowly comes to a boil.
Sony's best strategy is to do their best to stay in business long term. The strategy of outspending your competition only works if you drive them out of business, so you can be the only game in town, and then jack prices up to recoup your losses.
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Re: Sony Plans to Improve Profit Margins with 'Aggressive' PC Release Strategy
You know what would increase profit margins better than releasing games on PC? Not wasting 3.6 billion buying Bungie. A dev that has made one good game in the last decade. Not wasting Naughty Dogs time on multiplayer game and endless remasters would help too.
But no. Let's just increase the cost of PSN and release more games to PC. Our core playerbase will happily pay to correct our boneheaded decisions.
Re: Sony Plans to Improve Profit Margins with 'Aggressive' PC Release Strategy
Nintendo is the only one that does consoles right anymore. Both Xbox and Sony refuse to support their own consoles with true exclusives. This is because making games with ludicrous levels of detail just costs too much money. So they stab their core playerbase in the back by releasing on PC. Then they continue to stab their playerbase in the back by shoving microtransactions for things that should have been included for free.
I buy a Nintendo game and I have the entire game minus a dlc pack that comes out a year later.
They need to stop focusing on making AAAA level games and go back to making AA and AAA games. Nintendo has proven time and time again that a game can be a blast and look amazing without cutting edge graphics.
I feel like we are seeing the complete and utter death of competition among console manufacturers here. Microsoft gave up around 2012 and has been slowly dragging the world into a bland all digital all multiplatform world ever since. Less and less good first party titles were made by MS and in turn Sony has really slowed down the releases of 1st party content on PS5.
I'm also amazed at how many people walking around with $1000 phones, driving $500 a month SUVs, and buying $2000 flatscreens somehow think a game being exclusive to a $500 console "keeps them from playing it". The only thing keeping you from playing it is your own idiotic budgeting.
Nobody needs a $1000 phone or a $70 a month phone bill. The average car payment is $500 a month but that's only because way too many people drive an SUV and an F150 for 70k each. You can get a brand new Sedan for as little as 24k. A 40 inch flatscreen from five feet away looks better than a 65 inch that you mounted above your fireplace. Reddit.com/r/TVtoohigh.
Re: Sony Expands PlayStation Homepage for PC Games
@Ralizah
Yep. Fanboys show their hypocrisy the moment their own platform of choice does something. "Why don't you want people to have access to games?" is a stupid argument considering that people build $1500 rigs and buy $1000 phones. Remember when Xbox fans used to decry making a home grown 1st party game exclusive to a single platform? Now they defend 3rd party aquisitions as if that's not a thousand times worse.
I think whether or not PS5 is the best option depends on whether or not you game online. It also depends on what sort of a PC you would want, and the PC market. Keep in mind that many CPUs, towers, PSUs, monitors, etc. can last ten to fifteen years. If I weren't a physical snob, I'd go PC, but I can't stand Denuvo in my games or digital copies of anything other than an Indie game.
Microsoft has yet to prove on paper that Gamepass is profitable. I think they are hiding a lot of server hosting expenses by putting them on the non-Xbox balance sheet. I mean gamepass takes in 2.4 billion in yearly revenue but they just spent over 80 million in aquisitions. Not to mention many gamepass users get it for $1 and whatnot.
I think Microsoft is heavily pushing gamepass because they know they can't survive in a traditional console market so they are pushing as hard as they can to take the market to a subscription and microtransaction service. That and microtransactions pretty much print money. So they will be profitable eventually. Whether that is in two years or ten years remains to be seen. At any rate the consumer is going to get ripped off in the long run. If you want complete games released physically it looks like Nintendo is your best bet.
Yeah, as far as Sony undercutting their own brand goes, I definitely feel like Jim Ryan and co are the 80's guy with Boneitis from Futurama. They are out to make as much money now as possible. Company's future be damned.
Re: Sony Expands PlayStation Homepage for PC Games
Sony is both selling out and falling for Microsoft's anti-exclusive propaganda here.
Porting Playstation games to PC makes a PS5 not worth owning and betrays fans' investment. People bought a PS5 with the understandable expectation that they would need it to play certain games. It's like selling a week-long ticket to the amusement park and then making the park free to everyone all summer.
Microsoft didn't port their games to PC because they are pro-consumer. They ported their games to PC because they happen to be a massive PC company 1st and a console owner 2nd. MS porting their games to PC is as expected as Sony porting Vita games to PS4. Microsoft recently bought several 3rd party studios for the explicit purpose of keeping those games off Playstation. So any idea that MS is somehow all "kumbayah my lord" is BS.
Thank God Nintendo actually supports and believes in their own platform. Both Sony and MS are running from the hardware market right now.
Re: Reaction: Xbox Game Pass Is the Thorn in PS5's Side
@NEStalgia
I agree that the PS6 generation will be pretty much DOA due to streaming taking over. I think once that happens I'll step away from modern gaming. Why? Because in an all streaming world games that rely heavily on microtransactions and GaaS will be pretty much all there is. Complete single player games won't be able to get their revenue in an all streaming world. After all, when I buy a game myself, 100% of that money goes to the developer. If I subscribe to Gamepass to play a game my $10 gets split up between however many games were added to Gamepass that month.
Right now, this works, because Gamepass is supplemental to game sales. Developers often release their games onto Gamepass six months after launch. So they get their initial sales, and then gamepass money on top of it. That scenario is a win-win for players and devs.
But in the future when nobody buys their games anymore, it's going to become a serious problem. Just look at Spotify. Instead of players getting to decide the value of a complete single player game, it will be the massive companies deciding. The only solution for a game developer is to add Microtransactions to their game. But I absolutely hate that. A game should come complete for $60 and maybe have a $30 DLC expansion. It shouldn't cost hundreds of dollars to get the complete version of a game.
Games like Super Mario Odyssey, Ghost of Tsushima, and The Outer Worlds are what I want. You pay once, and get the whole package. You're done. I hate games that force you to choose between playing for hundreds of hours to grind for cosmetics, paying extortionist rates for said cosmetics, or just going without them. GIVE ME MY GAMES, AND GIVE THEM TO ME COMPLETE FOR A FLAT PRICE DAMNIT!
Re: Reaction: Xbox Game Pass Is the Thorn in PS5's Side
@NEStalgia
Hypothetically what would happen if I made a game with a budget of 100 million, asked for $180 per copy and only sold 10,000 copies? My average consumer spend would be $180, but I'd still be far short of my overall revenue goal. After all, I just spent $100 million to make a total sales revenue of 1.8 million.
I'm sorry, but I don't think per customer spending is really relevant. What is relevant is whether or not the money Xbox is investing into gamepass is being replaced by it's current pool of subscribers. Last I heard Gamepass had 23 million subscribers, and buying Bethesda alone cost 7.5 billion. That means Gamepass revenue should be at 2.7 billion per year ($120 per year per subscriber). At this rate it would take them over two years of subscribers just to pay for the Bethesda acquisition. And sure there's going to be retail sales beyond Gamepass revenue, but there's also going to be ongoing development budgets for all those Bethesda games. When you add in all the other games MS is putting onto gamepass at launch, I just don't see this being profitable. At least not right now.
I agree that Gamepass doesn't have to completely replace all revenue streams. But who the heck wouldn't stop buying games outright and just sign up for it? It's just too good of a deal! Sure, people will still buy Nintendo and Sony games on those platforms, but if you have an Xbox + Gamepass why even bother buying Xbox games? I mean, it doesn't necessarily have to replace all revenue streams, but it looks inevitable that it will. At least in the next ten to fifteen years.
Edit: I would like to add in that Fallout 4 sold 8 million units on PS4, 5 million on Xbox, and 6 million on PC. Revenue that Starfield brings in from gamepass will need to replace the lost 8 million sales that won't happen on PS5 thanks to console exclusivity. It will also need to replace the lost sales from Xbox and PC users who opt to subscribe to Gamepass instead of purchase the game outright. So, Gamepass revenue from Starfield alone would need to replace around 10 to 12 million units in lost sales revenue. Again, sorry, but I just don't see that as possible. Not when you take that $10 a month and divide it between hundreds of games per person.
Re: Reaction: Xbox Game Pass Is the Thorn in PS5's Side
@NEStalgia
Total revenue for all games and subscription services in 2018 was 35.8 billion. I'm sure that number has grown since then, but to even get half that revenue Gamepass would need around 150 million subscribers paying $10 a month. I think that would be the point at which MS' gamepass would start turning a healthy profit. Either that or somewhere close to the 100 million subscribers mark, since that would net them about 1/3rd of the industry's revenue. Until then, I really do think they are engaging in a massive loss leader campaign.
Re: Reaction: Xbox Game Pass Is the Thorn in PS5's Side
@themightyant
You're absolutely right. The value is pretty much unbeatable. It's really annoying, because neither Nintendo or Sony could afford to put this many games onto a streaming service day 1. Microsoft is out here selling pies for $3, when they cost $7 to make. Even if Sony decided to respond to gamepass by throwing all their 1st party exclusives onto PS Now at launch, they would go bankrupt from the lost sales.
Re: Uncharted 4 Heading to PC, Investor Presentation Claims
@AhmadSumadi
Because that path includes both putting their games on PC and a heavy focus on GaaS. Ideally Sony should either keep all PS5 games as exclusive until the PS6 launches, or put all their games onto PC day 1. I'm happy either way. If they put all their games on PC day 1 then I get to play all their games day 1. If they keep all their games on PS5 for the entire generation, then I'm happy buying a PS5. It's this halfstep where they release their games 2-3 years after launch onto PC that annoys me. If you buy a PS5 your purchase is soon undermined by games going to PC. If you stick to PC you have to wait. Damned if you do, damned if you don't.
Edit: I made a thread on this a week ago. Check that thread out.
Re: Uncharted 4 Heading to PC, Investor Presentation Claims
@AhmadSumadi
"PS exclusives going to PC dates back to PS1."
You are confusing 3rd party exclusives going to PC with 1st party exclusives going to PC.
Horizon launched on PC 2 years and 9 months after launching on PS4. Days Gone launched on PC 2 Years and 2 months after launching on PS4. Clearly Sony is moving the PC release dates closer and closer.
MLB the Show 2021 sold well? Do you have exact sales numbers for that? Or are you just referencing all the money they made in MTX?
Lament it? I WANT Sony to move to Day 1 PC ports! I hate the idea of buying a PS5 only to have the exclusives moved to PC two to three years later. Why? Because I own a kickass PC and would rather buy those games on PC. I'm not going to spend $500 on a PS5 just to be able to play inferior versions of games that will eventually come to PC. That's a waste of money.
Re: Uncharted 4 Heading to PC, Investor Presentation Claims
@AhmadSumadi
I already have a PC that beats or matches PS5. I'll be able to play Ratchet and Clank in 2024. Possibly sooner, because Sony is rapidly changing the way they do business. I wouldn't be surprised at all if Sony just up and started releasing their games to PC on the exact same day that they release them to Sony consoles.
Re: Uncharted 4 Heading to PC, Investor Presentation Claims
Sony is going down the same terrible path as Xbox. No longer having exclusives. Games focusing on GaaS and Microtransactions.
What do you even get for buying a PS5 anymore? A controller that drifts, and the ability to play a few games 2-3 years before they inevitably come to PC?
Anybody that is thinking about getting a PS5 or a Series should just wait until GPU prices come down and build a PC. Series won't get Sony games. PS5 won't get Xbox games. PC will get both PS5 and Xbox games. You won't have to pay for online. A good PSU and Case will last you 10 years. Sure your GPU&CPU might die in 7 years, but you were going to upgrade to a PS5 Pro or an Xbox Series XX by then anyway.
Re: Sony Discounting Demon's Souls, Spider-Man: Miles Morales, and More PS5 Games in Days of Play Sale
The digital version of any AAA game should be $45/€37 on launch day, not including taxes. There's so little overhead when it comes to digital games. There's no brick and mortar store to take a cut. There's no cost to ship the game to a store. That alone saves Sony $20 per game.
Re: Warner Bros' Gaming Division Will Be Broken Up As Part of Merger
WB games can go under for all I care. MK 11 is a joke with hundreds of dollars in microtransactions and DLC schemes.
Re: Don't Hold Your Breath for Bethesda's Starfield on PS5, PS4
@MaikonCSGarcia
Jason Jones (Co-Founder of Bungie) decided to turn Halo into an FPS. Prior to that decision Halo was going to be a 3rd person shooter.
Microsoft did bail Bungie out though (they were in dire straights after Myth II had serious financial difficulties).
Source: https://www.vice.com/en/article/xwqjg3/the-complete-untold-history-of-halo-an-oral-history
Re: Don't Hold Your Breath for Bethesda's Starfield on PS5, PS4
@Steel76
I think the difference here is that MS tends to buy up entire companies out of the blue, while Sony and Nintendo spend decades fostering relationships with companies before acquiring them. Nobody would be surprised if Nintendo bought Gamefreak tomorrow. But if MS were to suddenly buy Ubisoft that would surprise and upset many. The Bethesda acquisition is a lot like that, because both Bethesda and Ubisoft have been long term 3rd party multiplat developers. You can't say the same for Insomniac, Naughty Dog, or NextLevelGames.
Also, I too have noticed the "Sour Grapes" narrative here. IMO Bethesda still makes great games. Doom, Wolfenstein, and Dishonored 2 were all great last gen. Same goes for Fallout 4. As long as Bethesda focuses on making their games like those, and less like Fallout 76, they should have another hit on their hands with Starfield.
Re: Don't Hold Your Breath for Bethesda's Starfield on PS5, PS4
@MaikonCSGarcia
Well The Coalition, 343, and World's Edge just continued series that were started by someone else.
I love that Xbox is building the Initiative studio, and I hope their Perfect Dark reboot turns out really well. But let's not count our chickens before they hatch eh?
As for Turn 10, I had no idea that they were founded back in 2001. Damn.
I know that MS bought Bungie for Halo, but is there any evidence that MS wanted Bungie to make it a shooter? I always thought Bungie made that decision on their own.
Re: Don't Hold Your Breath for Bethesda's Starfield on PS5, PS4
@blinx01
Yeah, I've been a multiplatform gamer for over 15 years. It always makes me laugh watching single console owners cry that they can't play game X on console X.
That being said, what MS did by buying out Bethesda was dirty pool. There's a huge difference between Sony buying up companies that they've worked with to make PS exclusives for decades, and MS buying up a multiplatform developer. There's also a huge difference between Sony buying up Guerilla games back when it was nothing and turning it into a quality developer. But then again, maybe MS will be able to whip the "We Happy Few" devs into shape?
I'd like to see MS making it's own home grown content rather than go on an acquisition spree. Nintendo and Sony both have their own home grown internal studios that make quality content. MS has never had that. They have to resort to the monopolistic tactic of buying up 3rd parties to even begin to compete with either Nintendo or Sony.
Re: Don't Hold Your Breath for Bethesda's Starfield on PS5, PS4
@Col_McCafferty
You hit the nail on the head with that one. The $10 a month that Gamepass brings in for hundreds of games can't replace people buying games for $60. Eventually publishers will be forced to make live service games to survive like you said.
Re: Sony on Upcoming PS5 Games: Wait Until You See What's Coming from Our Third-Party Partners
@nessisonett
Yeah, 3rd party moneyhatting is the dumbest thing in this industry.
Re: PlayStation Studios' Creator Page Is Live on Steam, And Teasing More PC Ports
@nessisonett
Haha, well of course I'm not buying one. IMO PC is the best choice this gen. Last gen it was definitely PS4. 7th gen was more of an even split. 6th gen it was PS2. 5th gen was once again more of an even split.
Re: PlayStation Studios' Creator Page Is Live on Steam, And Teasing More PC Ports
@art_of_the_kill
"And let's face it, if brand identity just meant nothing at all, then what would be the downside to Sony also releasing their games on Xbox and Switch?"
^This! In reality games getting ported to PC has nothing to do with "more people being able to play games". If a company really wanted to make their games more accessible they'd release them on PC/PS5/Series all day and date.
Sony and Microsoft want to use their "Console Exclusives" to lure console gamers over to their platforms, while also being able to sell to PC users. If either company was truly interested in making their games more accessible they'd release their games on both PS5 and Series on the same day.
In reality it's about getting that little bit of extra revenue from PC users, while at the same time disallowing half the console gamers from being able to play on their platform of choice.
Re: PlayStation Studios' Creator Page Is Live on Steam, And Teasing More PC Ports
@nessisonett
Yeah, and then two years later both of Returnal and R&C get ported as well. Might as well not even buy a PS5 if you have a PC.
Re: Don't Hold Your Breath for Bethesda's Starfield on PS5, PS4
@TheArt
Also, Sony and Insomniac worked together making PS exclusives for decades before being bought out. Bethesda on the other hand was a multiplat studio up until being bought.
Re: PS5 Review: Is It Good?
@Flaming_Kaiser
What country do you live in? Some countries require that Sony replace your console if it breaks. I live in the USA, and Sony won't give you anything past a 1 year warranty. My console had its Wifi antennae desolder, and Sony wanted to charge me $99 to repair it. Nevermind that it's a $5 fix. The funny thing is that same PS4 controller could communicate with windows via a USB plug, but couldn't on PS4. So once your wifi breaks on a PS4 you can't use the controller at all.
Switch OS has youtube if you choose to install it, a news section, system settings, saved gameplay videos/pictures and that's about it. The only thing Switch is missing that I care about is a section for streaming TV shows.
Re: PS5 Review: Is It Good?
I own a PS2, PS3, and PS4 Pro. I think the PS5 is pretty terrible. Why?
1. The controller is poorly built, and prone to drifting. A product should be built to last at least 5 years. This thing already breaks, just like Nintendo and Xbox's controllers.
2. No exclusive games. Sony is porting their games over to PC. I already have a PC, so getting a PS5 is pointless. Sure, they may wait 2-3 years after release, but I have enough of a backlog that I can wait to play the better versions of their games.
3. $70 games. Why the heck do games cost $70 on PS and not on Xbox or PC?
4. PS5 isn't built to last. Sony has shown that they don't want your console to last past 7 years. The CBomb exists in the PS5.
https://www.reddit.com/r/PS3/comments/mieg0e/your_playstation_software_has_an_expiration_date/ My PS4 broke three times, and each time Sony showed a callous and greedy attitude towards getting it fixed.
5. No Bethesda games. This one isn't Sony's fault, but it's still a problem.
6. Not enough harddrive space. The usable HDD space in PS5 is under 700 GB. Why does the OS take up so much of the harddrive? Why is the OS so bloated? Why are there ads in the OS? I shouldn't have ads built into a device that I already paid $500 for. The OS should be simple, and clean like that of the Nintendo Switch. I buy game consoles to play games, and maybe watch TV. All those other features in the OS are just useless bloat. Take them out and slim the OS down please. Come out with a version that has at least 1TB before you install any games.
Re: CDPR's Blockbuster RPG Cyberpunk 2077 Now Nearing Three Months Missing from PS Store
@FatalBubbles
Eh, I thought it was okay. The world is really bland once you get past all the fart jokes. Like GTA you can only go into a select few buildings. Like Skyrim dungeons are lazily thrown together. Every enemy looks and feels the same, except the Animals gang. AI is dumb as rocks. I'll be shooting people with a shotgun in one room, and an enemy NPC in another room will be like "I'm gonna find you, you coward!" Dude... just follow the screams of your fellow gangmembers.
Re: Reaction: What Next for PlayStation?
@blinx01
Yeah a Gamepass-like service on PS5 and PS4 would do wonders for them. So long as you could download the games to your harddrive you'd be good to go. It wouldn't take that much to implement either. Just expand on what's already being offered via the PS+ collection.
Besides. Most PS 1st party titles are $20 a year after release anyway. Not that hard to throw them onto PS+ for free.
Re: Reaction: What Next for PlayStation?
@blinx01
It's definitely the future of gaming. It really makes me worried because if people stop buying games, and developers have to rely on whatever money MS gives them for Gamepass, then I see a lot of developers forced into monetizing their games. And for me, that is pretty much the end of gaming. If a game is free on Gamepass, but comes with a monetization model, I'm not playing it. I don't want every game to become like Fortnite or Fall Guys with an in game store. I'd much rather pay $60 to $70 and have the entire game like with Spider-Man, Mario Odyssey, or GoW. Sure, maybe there's $30 DLC added on later, but that's no big deal, compared to the hundreds of dollars you can spend on other games' monetization models.
Re: Reaction: What Next for PlayStation?
@suprnova23
Oh man. I'm half asleep today thanks to Daylight Savings Time. Only slept about 4 hours last night. Turn out MY math was the wrong math.
Re: Reaction: What Next for PlayStation?
@blinx01
Microsoft regularly offers gamepass for $1 a month to new users. If you buy a new graphics card it will likely come with 3 months of Gamepass for free. So we can't even assume that all 18 million Gamepass users are paying the full price. That 2 billion a year is cut down by the cost to run servers.
Now keep in mind that big AAA games regularly cost well over $100 million to make. For one extreme example, Halo Infinite has a budget of over $500 million.
Gamepass is not profitable, and won't be for ten years, if ever.
Edit: I forgot to multiply gamepass' $9.99 by 12 months. This caused me to say that Gamepass brought in 179 million a year. That's what I get for commenting on no sleep.
Re: Poll: Which Bethesda Franchise Will PS5 Miss the Most?
None of them. I have a PC and can play them all there.
Re: Reaction: What Next for PlayStation?
The problem here is that Sony is being outspent. MS is determined to buy up every 3rd party studio that they can get their hands on. Gamepass is not profitable, or sustainable. MS wants to crush Sony so that they can transform the game industry into a Live Services model, that charges gamers out the wazoo. The best thing for Sony to do is focus on staying in business so they can offer a counter for when MS goes back to it's old anti-consumer ways.
MS will continue to purchase whatever 3rd party studios that they can get their hands on. All so that they can slap their name on that dev's games, while keeping them off PS consoles. If MS were to buy Capcom, Square Enix, and Sega, then PS consoles would be reduced to nothing. They would be like Nintendo, lacking many great 3rd party games.
Gamepass subscriptions alone are not enough to cover the costs of game development. If you don't believe me, just take a look at the Anime industry. Anime costs much less to develop than games, yet that industry is slowly dying. Why? Because subs don't pay nearly as much money as selling physical media. Hardly anybody buys Anime on physical discs anymore. We all stream it. MS is pulling the age old trick of selling items under cost in the hopes of putting a competitor out of business. They don't care if Gamepass loses them billions per year, so long as they can get the majority of gamers playing exclusively on their platforms in the next decade. Whether you stream games to your phone, buy an Xbox, or play on PC MS wants you to play their games and sub to their services. And yes, they want you to do that instead of getting a Playstation or Nintendo console.
The ultimate goal of MS is to get rid of the competition, in ten years, so that they are free to charge up the wazoo for everything. Gamepass will double or even triple in price. Microtransactions will become the norm on Gamepass, as MS rakes the money in. Gamers will wind up spending three to four times as much per game as they do now. But most Gamers won't even mind. They will be like a frog in a pot of water as it slowly comes to a boil.
Sony's best strategy is to do their best to stay in business long term. The strategy of outspending your competition only works if you drive them out of business, so you can be the only game in town, and then jack prices up to recoup your losses.