Are we back? Are we back?
Who is Spencer?
I don't remember him. Oh hell, dog are we back, baby
Dog will this age badly? I don't care, girls, we're back.
Oh, we're back. Xbox back.
Oh. What a.
What an interesting turn of events.
Bashi wears you in the fire. Guess how baby?
Watch your back. Boxer ponies are gunning for
you. Some security man.
With that lawyer money and AIG income, I'm going to need some
security, bro, because I'm guarding everybody, bro.
I'm coming for everyone but ponies.
Everyone. Everyone deserves to get client
bro. I say this where things have not
really manifested itself physically, but what an
interesting turn of events. What an interesting turn of
events it seems. It seems there is hope and
that's the word hope in competition in Xbox finally
getting their shit together. Man, we needed this.
The moment it got announced with Xbox's Xbox Y article came
through boom the energy shifted entire the entire gaming
industry. Everyone discourse, even
PlayStation guys say you know what fucking we need this.
We need this to happen because the in the space was dead.
The space was so dry. Xbox finally realised the shit
that I've been saying for ages. And if you've been a member of
this fucking shadow, you know since what, November, December,
I've been telling you that the the whole fucking shift has been
felt with an Xbox so much that they're on a mad scramble what
they're going to show Xbox Showcase and developer Direct,
the loss of hits with gay pass subscribers, all sorts of shit.
And now what? What's happening, bro?
The leadership, the AI lady, fucking dude doing what fills
Dominus Maximus Aurelius expired.
Spencer couldn't do bro. She is standing in the face of
the execs that put her in this place.
Maybe they realise oh shit the AI game wasn't enough.
And I know you were thinking guys you're such a bot, look at
you celebrating all of this. But I am one of the few people
in this in space that just wants competition.
It is better for everybody. Guys on a Thursday, Aeronation,
we have to go live because fucking it's crazy.
It's crazy man. We have seen since Xbox's whole
strategy shift announcement of its third party thing sucked the
life out of the industry. Nah be Xbox is dead hang it up.
Thank you bash bro. We have seen the life sucked out
to the entire industry, but especially Xbox community and
and so many, so many just played the the corporal game.
So many bucks the trend for the sake of their channel, for the
sake of viewership, for the sake of the hardcore Xbox fanboys who
just you would would just basically parrot whatever the
Xbox would say they fucking did. Even if at the very cost of the
soul of the brand. They just prove themselves that
they care about their own channel or they care about the
narrative of the Xbox brand, even if it cost them everything.
And you know, I've been one of the few people, the ex exports
people who said fuck that, no way, no way.
This is not good enough. I came to PC, built a beast PC,
and I still vociferously defended the exclusives.
So much so that the moment PlayStation announced that they
were going back to exclusive, see, I said well done.
Even at the cost of my fucking elite enjoyment, at least it's
better for the industry. I support it.
Boom. What did I do?
Bought the Pro. Why?
Because some of us, some of us don't fucking rely on money from
YouTube channel to do this shit. Some of us are in this space
because we're in it for the source we're in it for that
means we're in it for the truth. We actually believe what we say
and it's it's a rare commodity. You need to recognise that shit.
How many times did I get it? Fuck, I know it's Alex of the PC
bot community on it's Alex. We are.
He's that guy. But we have polar opposites of
this entire debate. And he's completely wrong.
It's completely wrong. Completely wrong about the whole
thing about the role of exclusivity in this space, about
what it's done to gaming to take us to where we are now, about
what platform level exclusivity has done to rise the tide in
this space. And now what trillion dollar
Microsoft fucking has to go back to the drawing board.
Why renounce that? They just went down and reduced
the Game Pass thing, which we'll talk about maybe on Saturday
because it's a different topic, but this today we have to talk
about this woman. Asha Sharma is a fucking beast
already. What is going on?
Don't count the the chickens or whatever till they're hatched or
whatever they say until all this manifests itself.
How does it work? I have, I have a keen idea of
how this will manifest. The wording was very clear from
Asha Sharma, in my opinion, about where they're going.
But it was this manifesto. This manifesto sounded so much
better than the kind of corporal Babble that we get from her
predecessors. It actually sounded convincing
and she's built up goodwill because of successive changes.
Immediately off the bat, the things that people used to come
at me for, it's like Ashley Sharma.
How can I hate Ashley Sharma when Ashley Sharma is doing the
very things I have said that she needs to do?
Starting with this is an Xbox killed it.
First thing she did was kill that stupid ad that everyone
came at me faller because they're spending what, 24 hours
gunning that ad, putting pictures of this is an Xbox,
getting a colonoscopy and all that shit.
How many people came at me? Oh no, Alex came at me.
He's crashing bro. They're like shit.
The fuck? Listen man, listen, do you guys
deserve an Xbox or X Xbox guy who tells you the fucking truth?
No chance. No chance because the fucking
corporate cock channels are still going strong.
They'll just fucking feed into your confirmation bias all the
time. All the fucking time.
But the truth with stands head and shoulders above it wasn't
just fanboys, it was real understanding of what the
business needs to do. This trillion dollar company
doesn't even UN fucking understand.
But this woman, Ashish Sharma, this lady has surprised me.
I will say so far, and I still say it's early recency bias or
galore. There's a lot of statements.
I'm sure there's going to be some anger in the face moments,
but it's changing. We are seeing finally, finally
changes, real changes since 2022.
I was watching this Phil Spencer's meandering commitment
to gaming. It was weird there went and
chewed on this ABK deal. You know what the 2022 that was
dog shit that had the the Xbox committee on my throat.
I had death threats. Had to make a fucking rap tune
to diss track on these Xbox hardcore because that's what
they want. They want to be told what what
they want to hear. Oh, Xbox is safe.
Oh, this is an Xbox is good. Yeah, gaming everywhere is good.
Are we going to get your money off, man?
That shit and that trillion dollar.
Microsoft understands that in order to withstand an
appreciable brand and not no longer distracted by AI, the
little shits that they need to actually do something.
Asha Sharma came out from the outside in looking in and she
realised, hold on a minute, we need to fuck it.
And This is why it's actually fucking amazing how this has
panned out. How has someone from the outside
AI bod come in, had a look at the business in the space of a
few weeks and realised, oh right, we know what she said,
hear you. We all laughed at that, like OK,
hear you. Just what?
We're in response to exclusives and we still don't know how it
will pan out. But all I'm saying is for the
first time in a very long time, the Xbox executive that's come
in seems to have a finger on the pulse and is flying in the face
of the mandate that the corporate bods gave at the top
Game Pass Too expensive, took it, said we're taking Coda out.
No more bullshit. We're going to make it cheaper.
Great move, but also at the cost of Call of Duty, which might
also be a double edged sword because it opens the flood games
for other first party games coming out.
But like I've said on this channel, I don't do it or
wherever I want Game Pass if it means bringing back exclusives
and bringing back competition. I don't give a shit about value
and gaming. I care about competition more
than anything because this is an art form.
This is a space where art thrives.
And so if you're looking for value or look at value gaming,
and I'm not saying I'm not trying to bemoan more access to
gamers, but what I'm saying is you need to fundamentally value
quality first. If it's an art form, then value
the art. No Lies 78 Inc with the $10.
Good. Thank you, man.
Because she surprised me. Yeah, she surprised me.
She came in, cleaned the house and made me and my changes and
made changes immediately. Makes you really think, what the
heck was Phil's and Sarah doing now?
I don't know what's going on. Like we can say, oh, a lot of
people are saying that they they, you know, Xbox execs,
Satya had their set them up to fail to replace them with Asha
Sharman. But the close proximity of her
appointment and her just instantly gutting things is
remarkable. This is an Xbox dead great.
And I thought, OK, that's a good move.
She actually has some some awareness of good fucking common
sense that you don't absolutely scupper your own brand by
telling everyone don't need to buy this, the toilet's an Xbox.
My face is an Xbox, my ass cheeks are an Xbox.
This is an Xbox. Nah, she killed it.
She killed it. Then she made a statement and it
was saying all the right things on paper, but I was like, what
the fuck does that actually mean?
Bring the renegade spirit of Xbox back, Focus on console 1st.
And she's reiterated that now and then.
She's talked about how she's going to make sure that it's all
about and it's statements like focus on that there's access.
We'll go through the the statements in a bit, but power
of this thing. Thank you.
So this is console first, console first, console first.
How many times in the last couple of years I said consoles
have been relegated? You're third class citizens if
you're an Xbox consoles. And Despite that people still
sucked off Xbox because PlayStation was getting those
games with updates like Hellblade 2 and Starfield and
all the games like formal. Even down from what's a hifi
rush running better on PlayStation not the pro that
didn't even come out at that point.
Still suck them off. I'm like you are a console
hardcore fanboys. You're not even on PC, why the
fuck are you sucking them off? Because Xbox the flag and Xbox
the flag became Microsoft gaming and I made a video on it showing
the fucking transition from Xbox to fucking Microsoft gaming.
I'll show you what don't understand what the fuck they
they were expressly saying you weren't enough.
You're a piece of shit. They were saying we need.
We have a primary market with PlayStation Now.
That doesn't mean that they're going to completely forsake
exclusives. You need to understand the
reality of the situation here. They're not literally just going
out and saying oh bye bye PlayStation.
This is going to be manifesting itself and very carefully in
one, well, specifically, in my opinion, timed exclusives.
But even if it's timed exclusives, and I think it needs
to be way more than that, it just means that they're actually
starting to realise what the value of the brand is.
She, the Xbox has come out, We're there.
This is Xbox. We, we are Xbox.
It's a very strong message. She's out there telling you what
Xbox actually means. Finally, she today she announced
they're killing or actually Tom Warren had to scoop that they're
dropping the Microsoft gaming thing and now it's confirmed.
And where's my my video where I said Xbox loses the console war.
Yeah. And I will bring it when we mute
this. Let me show you the hypocrisy of
the executive. Hey, here we go.
This is the video I released when Xbox bullshitted you.
We know that exclusive games from our Microsoft studios are
what originally turned so many of us into Xbox fans.
My team and I take our commitment to you seriously to
make Xbox. The best way for you to play.
So we made the decision that we're going to take four games
to the other consoles. Just four games.
Not a change to our kind of fundamental exclusive strategy.
So if you're on those other platforms and you see these four
games coming, please don't take it as some signal they are not
Starfield or Indiana Jones. What you see the imagery there,
it's quite clear what I'm showing you is the elimination
of the Xbox brand, forsaking it for Microsoft.
You see the Xbox logo being that was the biggest problem.
The Xbox went in and just fucking shat on its own
identity. It was the biggest insult to to
to gamers, the biggest insult to the brand biggest insult,
biggest announcement that they they thought that you guys were
not enough. Fundamentally, they thought they
could ride on the coattails of their their their parent brand.
And it's absolutely atrocious. And I'll play this is about
delivering great exclusive games for you that ship on platforms
where Game Pass exists that that logo there that needed to
disappear in the space that logo needed to disappear.
And they've announced that they're bringing back Xbox back.
They finally understand that this faceless corporation has
only one real inroads into society in terms of cultural
movement and that's gaming. But after chasing AI so
vigorously and failing, they're real as shit.
What do we do? And that's that should give you
an idea of why should never have absolute faith in but any
corporation, any corporation, including Sony as well.
We've seen the the bullshit that from from them this entire
generation. I don't we've got David Jaffe
scathing comments today that set people up and a lot of people
agree for a reason. So This is why you should never
including astrostrama. Don't take them at face value,
but you have to judge them by their actions right now.
It's a lot of words, but even with the words there's the
statement is clear, the manifesto is clear actually.
Why she thank you so much for the $20 super checkers.
Now guys, I like you and I like Alex.
Both are my boys. Having disagreement is healthy.
Both of you have valid points of view.
Don't get dragged into Twitter hate mobs.
I trust you and respect your text.
I appreciate that. No, no me.
Look, me and Alex always go back and forth.
We are very strongly minded about what we think, but that
doesn't mean that we hate each other.
Starfield is actually my favourite first party game since
2020. That's just G good to see you
bad. Oh Alex is here as well.
I I know exclusive anti consumer by the way.
I just want to see the blood and mayhem.
Don't do that. I don't give a shit what you
think about your wrong opinions Gene.
You are wrong, you are wrong. It's not anti consumer.
Ultimately, if anyone understands gaming as an art
form, it's you. You understand gaming as an art
form. So why do you have this close
minded thing that you know, give access to everyone and that's
what's pro consumer. It's an art form.
You need to fucking save it. You have.
It's just sanctify it Bram. Now this is what platform and
level exclusivity will do. It will make them fucking
realise that we want to stand on our own 2 feet as Xbox and not
rely on this lazy drive by because we've got PlayStation
there and they're going to fucking buy N mass.
This is the platform level. Competition has moulded the
space. It is not a fucking alien.
It's not a theory, it's not anything like that.
It's just fact, historical fact. You've had execs from Sony come
out and say it, The whole first party lineup that PlayStation
guys have that fucking jizz over and have jizz and swallow that
shit. What happened?
Who created that? It was because of the 360 and
the competition in the space that they fucking invested and
the tail under the PS3 generation to do that in the 1st
place. So Laden said it, everyone knows
it. It's fucking historical fact.
You say guys, it's more nuance. I'm not a fan of framing things
as pro anti consumer either. I'm just saying as APC player, I
want my games on PC. Gene, I'm APC gamer as well.
But the difference between me and you, Gene, is that I can
forsake my personal enjoyment, my personal enjoyment for the
greatness, the better good because I want that competition.
So I could be on a selfish level.
Oh, no, it's Alex. Oh no, it's fanboy content
coming back. Oh, no, it's Alex, your Xbox
fanboy. Where?
Where's your noise? I want to see.
Oh, no, it's Alex. Really fucking go.
Let's, let's, let's, let's see. Oh, no, it's Alex's fucking
Twitter page. This guy better be fucking
raging at this. How dare he is a backward step.
Let's see. Let's see.
Oh, I'm sorry, Alex, what was this I'm seeing?
I'm seeing nothing today. He just retweeted Hideo Kojima.
And then he says what if Xbox brought Mixer back?
The energy levels are discombobulated, bled.
What happened? Breath, I thought you hated
exclusivity, but when an Xbox you want to bring the MXO back?
Get out of here, Gene a bit of I did didn't skip out on my PC
like Alex did. I'm not a little communist
little little bill this PC from a you know from the back of a
fucking bin bro. I spent serious money on this
build on my PC so of course I would rather have Soros on my
fucking PC bro. But at the same time the the
entire space is reinvigorated and it's not console war
content. It's the entire space and how
the the the the developers and publishers now have precious
standard. They're all 2 feet in an ideal
fucking scenario where Xbox actually does go full exclusive.
That's the point. That's the point.
Where? Where is it?
Yeah, Bashi, I'm exposing him. Where is the energy for anti
consumer? Oh no, it's Alex.
He just didn't even he went. He saw the news.
I said bring back mixer because why bring back Mixer?
Because Xbox is back. That's why.
Fucking Oh no, it's Alex said bring back Mixer because he
knows Xbox is back. He's who wants to feel the
energy back. He just doesn't want to admit
it. Admit it.
That's the reality, bro. Listen, I'm a divisive
character. I'm fucking crazy, you know, I
went fucking up. We all know it.
But the fucking I know what I'm talking about, bro.
I know what I'm talking about. And despite my madness, despite
my craziness, I will tell you right now what I'm saying is for
the betterment of the entire industry.
It's not my personal mandate against PlayStation fanboys.
If it was, I would be doing what Alex is doing and saying
exclusivity sucks, oh exclusivity is disappearing,
bring back gaming, we're getting money, blah blah blah.
If, if PlayStation fan was on the forefront of my fucking
priorities, I would be doing what everyone else did.
But I am one of the few singular almost figures that in the X
Xbox spaces that had the fucking testicles to stand by by what I
said, including clues. Lord addict Channel 2 bring back
320 by 200 resolution bring back Bill Gates bring back Windows
Phone bring back Zune bring back antagonist gaming Look what does
it mean I'll tell you what what's actually going to happen
from the her statement, it sounds like to me that they they
talk about spacing release of tiles.
Don't expect wholesale exclusives right off the bat.
GAS. Check out my tweet.
Thank you, Gene. Let me check out your tweets.
What is Gene Park saying? Let's see what fucking Gene Park
is saying. Gene, I love you, but I swear to
God, if you fucking laser me with some retarded logic, I will
fucking laser you, bro. Here we go.
Let's see what Gene is saying.
I saw this tweet, I assume to
say PlayStation will die. That's a fucking sick tweet.
Gene Sweets are fucking sick. Imagine being in.
What the fuck are you talking about?
Oh you copied BG do it. Bring back.
Yeah I love. I agree with BG.
Bring back the console. What?
We need it. And what did you say?
Go crazy with the wall. Upload a video of Asher
personally setting a mountain of Fable disc on fire like she's
the Joker. Show her firstly pressing back
space on the entire piece car. I would love her.
Fucking would love that. Please make it happen.
Nothing is set in. I saw this, I saw this and
you're right, nothing is set in stone.
But personally I never once thought you can't put the GD
back in the bottle. I thought different.
I'll be honest with you, I thought that when Pandora's buck
is open the the floodgates are open.
How do you when you get a taste of the flavour of those
PlayStation sales? It's like fucking fentanyl
crack. They can't go back.
That's why Dreamcast still does meth.
But what else have you said? But I agree with you.
I do agree with you. I agree with you.
That it. Well, I agree with you that I
didn't. Well, I can see they.
I didn't think they would bring it back.
I didn't think that once you cross that bridge, that's it.
It's done. It's over.
Fuck excuses. They do nothing for me as APC
gamer. Well, I'm sorry.
I'm sorry. Well, PC can stand on his own 2
legs. Yeah, do you think it said on
his own 2 legs? Listen, most games are
multiplayer anyway. But I'm talking about platform
level competition. Who are the market leaders?
Nintendo and PlayStation? What are they doing?
Is Nintendo doing forsaking exclusivity?
Where? Where do I see them?
They're they're seen as the harbingers of creativity, the
fucking apex of creativity, and they don't fucking bother
capitulating at all. Everything is on their platform.
And what is that? Does that harm the industry?
Does Nintendo harm the industry? Banned the Fable 5 PS 5?
Fucking I would love that. You know what I would love?
And I know it's not going to happen.
If they cancelled the announcements of this game, they
could never do that. Like Fable.
Holy shit that would send such an insane message.
It will never happen. It will never happen.
It will never happen, but Nintendo doesn't and PlayStation
going back and say fuck that PC money is not good enough.
We're going to focus on our single player games being on our
console and we're going to focus on it and it's absolutely the
right move. I mean why?
Why would they capitulate now? They, they are the Kellogg's of
the industry. They are the fucking cereal
everyone buys. Everyone talks about gaming in
in the UK or what you going to play on?
I'm going to play on PlayStation.
PlayStation just means gaming in the UK.
Cancel them all now. Leave them off Steam.
Well a lot of people talking about PC exclusivity.
What does it mean? Obviously PC is all the next
Xbox is APC so don't even think about PC being allowed.
Guys I'm going to be honest, exclusives won't do anything to
Xbox unless they go back and money hack games from something
like 360 days. Besides that at the moment
people at the moment nothing will make people go back to the
Xbox ecosystem. Bashy.
That's a good point to make and I am not a fan of third party
money hatting. That for me doesn't do that
much. However, however, in the space
you have PlayStation that aggressively money hats.
So Bashiyashi is right because we saw Mass Effect, Bioshock,
all of these games are third party games.
Gears of War was actually made by Epic, but these are third
party games that were published by Microsoft and it's a Gears of
War. But still there were third party
games that Xbox returned fire with that.
And I don't like I don't like it as a policy.
There's something I just don't like.
But them doing so bashy bashy is right.
It fucking made PlayStation say oh fuck it out man.
They lost out on Mass Effect for years, about Bioshock for years
and Xbox built an identity of the back of it.
But I said no one had PlayStation or Xbox didn't
really have that many first party studios.
So he's absolutely right. And PlayStation is not holding
back on this money hatting. We've seen that in the entirety
of this generation. So I do agree, although I hate
money hatting, but it's if you're if you're you're in a
space that comparison is doing what did you just sit back and
go? And that's what fucking Phil
Spencer was doing. He was too cosy, bro.
There was too much oestrogen flowing out of that man, bro.
He was not. And ironically, it took a lady
like Asha Sharma coming in her bam, she's got bigger fucking
testes than Phil Spencer because she came in and she fucking made
the moves like get rid of this as an Xbox without calling it
Windows fucking gaming. Chop the price of Game Pass, Get
the fuck Call of Duty out of here.
We're going to focus on console first.
Unlike you bastards, not everything is an Xbox.
My toilet is not an Xbox. Your face is not an Xbox.
Finally, finally, this the the level of that competition and
discourses will be elevated from this fucking homogeneous dry sea
of everything is everywhere and you've just sucked the lifeblood
of this industry. My theatrics aside, I'm telling
you this is the right move and if they double down to commit,
they will succeed. Phil Spencer comes out in that
into it kind of funny goes oh, I promise you've start feels a 10
out of 10 games still won't make a difference.
Motherfucker, what do you? How can you even say that?
It's not like you're sitting on the fucking, you're sitting on
the pedestal with Xbox and having a whole decade worth of
great fucking games that you have a legacy and goodwill that
you've built. You had an entire failed
generation, Entire failed generation.
So what the fuck do you think? Who on earth is expecting a
singular game to make a change of three games or five games?
10 games wouldn't change the fucking fate of Xbox.
But you are now a mega publisher.
You have more publishers than anyone than Sony, than Nintendo.
The whole thing about PlayStation has Xbox has no
games is dead. It is fucking dead.
That narrative is gone quality wise.
You saw them last year already. You saw the Metacritic ratings
that their Playstations sat down a fucking what, 22 or 12 or
somewhere down below? Not even the top five.
And after all that rally with ABK and all the fighting and all
the Xbox fans fighting for this brand to actually grab a chisel
it's teeth, The moment you secured everything you fucking
went multiplat and it was disgraceful and it hurt the
industry. Do you leave Steam if you are in
charge? It's not even conscionable at
this point. Xbox, when I say a Pandora's
box, Steam is not even constable.
Your next your console is an PC hybrid, whatever the fuck it's
called, it's a hybrid console. You can't even take out Steam
out of it. But Steam won't Merc your
fucking console sales. But listen, just don't.
We're talking about platform holders here.
Platform holders between Microsoft X, Xbox, PlayStation
and Nintendo, You start there first before you're bold enough
to forsake Steam. Because Asha Sharma in her
fucking blog says we are way behind on PC.
It's a very frank blog here. Philly was a friend.
Asha is a business shark. It's about time we had some
fucking sharks in this space. You're right.
Needs some shots. Yeah.
Jerk off, Lita. People are waiting.
Where?
What? Where I don't know what people
are waiting. People are waiting.
I looked at my fucking thing. The Xbox, these real exclusives,
Xbox, PC store exclusives. Well, if they have the appetite,
they have to fucking fix that shit first.
And I agree with you, fix that shit.
But they, I don't know how they can't fix.
They're in the PC space. Microsoft Windows is a fucking
PC company. They can't even fix that shit.
They need to sort that shit out. Well, let's go through what the
hell that she's actually talking about in this space.
Let's go through the blog, and I'm not a sucker for little
statements here and there, but this is a strong statement.
I can almost hear her delivering this fucking speech to a whole
We are Xbox. Xbox has always been different,
and that's the thing. Different from what?
What is it different from? What do you think is different
from is different from Microsoft?
It's it's been the old thing that is the renegade Xbox was
the outlier. That's what I'm hoping she's
alluding to. We started with a simple idea
game should bring people together through shared
experience. This is the I don't give a shit
OK that led to the first Xbox 2001 live in 2002.
We changed the game. Thank you Xbox new ways to
connect from friends achievements with Xbox fucking
was when it back when Xbox was actually fucking innovating blah
blah blah blah blah. We have work to do.
The first sub paragraph is admitting we got loads of things
and look players are frustrated. The only time, the only time
you've seen that kind of disclosure was Phil come up on
kind of funny games after the CMA fucking absolutely blasted
his back doors and then blocked the the ABK deal and then he was
like he was looking deflated as fuck.
He's like and and even Paris lilies looking like he got all a
deer in the fucking headlines like what the fuck is going on?
That's when he got that kind of disclosure.
This is a written bit. This is this is not pre.
This is not spur of the moment. This is predetermined.
There is intent behind these words that has the sign off of
everyone. We have work to do.
Players are frustrated amazing new new feature drops of console
have been less frequent. First thing focuses on console.
Amazing. Our presence on PC isn't strong
enough. Amazing.
Who talks like this in a fucking press release?
This is holding their hands up to saying we done fucked up.
Gaz was right. Oh hell Gaz.
Oh no, it's Alex is a communist peasant.
Fuck him. I love you Alex.
Pricing is getting harder for people to keep up with.
What does that mean? I reckon with the pricing bit,
you're going to start to actually potentially see Xbox
Series X&S actually get cheaper. They might do a price, a price
reduction and I'll tell you why later on in this very blog.
And core experiences like search and discovery, social
personalization still feel too fragmented.
Facts. Developers and publishers are
asking for more. So she's the main developers and
publisher are also asking for more.
We didn't really think about the whole developer and publisher
element. We thought, OK, then they just
doing their bits, but she's holding their hands up.
And this is a message not only to fucking fans, it's to
publishers and other developers. They I know you want more,
better tools, The tools, better insights and a platform that
helps them grow faster. At the same time, a new
generation of players is coming online with different
expectations. Their time is split across
media, and everything else is competing for their attention.
This was such a divisive comment when Matt Booty or someone else
made that comment. But it's true.
It's true for me. Even us older bods, we're on
Instagram, we're sharing reels, we're making fucking dank memes.
Everything is competing with everything.
So how do you do? How do you deal with that?
How do you reconcile with that? But do you sacrifice?
This is where the dangerous step lies, where a lot of a lot of
companies will make missteps. They expect more content in
familiar places. And this is where you're, oh,
are they going mobile? Are they going mobile?
What to shape the and it's funny because there there was some
reporting that my Xbox was going to abandon their mobile store.
And then she comes out directly says, no, no, we're not doing
that, sorry. Socialise together, not just
play together. These changes are happening at
the industry that reshapes us, blah, blah, blah.
Console remains largely, this is interesting.
Console remains large and stable.
So that's an admission that they're not forsaking console.
And it makes a distinction between consoles and PC.
And that statement says it is stable, which means Windows
recognises that they still have a core fan base.
We, we have a lot of goodwill where the vast majority of their
Game Pass Subs reside. It'll be console Windows now
represents more players and more hours and is increasingly where
competition is most intense. That is very important.
We've seen multiple fucking developers coming in at GDC and
whatever, wherever will you see all the, what's it called polls?
Not polls, the surveys that they do, and they're just remarkably
PC first. Now players have access to more
games than ever before, even as the cost and time to build
blockbuster titles continue to rise, putting pressure on what
games get made and how risk is taken.
In fact, some of the biggest recent hits are coming from
small teams or even single creators.
Absolutely they are. Unlike Kiln though.
Kiln. Rest in peace.
Kiln's got like 3 players. There's there's more people
watching this fucking stream that people playing Kiln so
double fine. You need to fix up or do
something. It might be a good game, I don't
know, but dank memes and places like Roblox are producing
experience that rival major franchises in scale.
More players also choose this is interesting.
More players are. More players are also choosing
subscriptions and services as their way to play, with
expectations set around instant access, ongoing value in
libraries that evolve. A lot of the Xbox changes to the
game pass thing a lot of people were assuming.
Oh well, actually fuck. And it's true, they've bled,
they've bled subscribers. So for her to make that
statement, I find it interesting.
I do. Industry has been global
compared to blah blah blah blah blah.
More than half of markets, revenue, players and growth are
happening outside our core markets.
Again, more concerning, I don't want to just do anything that
indicates my throat is fucked, that they're going to go mobile
or something. Developers are increasingly
competing with the most developers that there are some,
but the rest of the world is not just a large market.
Developers there are increasingly competing with the
most established Western studios, combining scale, speed,
and willingness to reinvent genres many once considered
mature. Hey, what the fuck?
That's very interesting. That's interesting.
That model, that model that got the model that got us here won't
be the one that takes us forward.
Deep Dick. What does that mean?
She's talking about where, you
know, the global market, talking about the competition in the
space because the Far East Asia is kicking the shit out of
Western Dems. And they're they're talking
about her, their speed and agility.
And we've seen markets like Korea, we see China coming,
China and they're just fucking killing it.
They're killing it and they're reinventing genres like we've
seen. We've seen them murk it.
So there, there's an acknowledgement there about the
challenges that are presented globally and you'll talk,
they'll talk about where they're focusing next, which will make
more sense and lends credence to these things.
Oh shit, what doubt? Where'd that go?
Xbox will be where the world plays are.
This is sounds like hubris. So let's see, what does Xbox
become in the next era? It's the existential question,
where are you seeing Xbox in the future?
Are you going to sacrifice? Are you going to sacrifice the
lifeblood, the DNA of Xbox and all the decades?
Well, apart from the Xbox One generation of goodwill you
built, it was a fluke. You did it with Xbox, the
original Xbox, with Halo. You got Halo, boom, the Unicorn.
Unicorn changed the fate. Then you LED with the 360,
changed the face of online gaming, blood boom.
And then you fucked it up broadly.
But now, now you're at a crossroads.
Where do you want Xbox to be? A mega publisher that just looks
at numbers and the spreadsheet? Or you want an appreciable brand
and the house actually has some value.
This is an artistic, creative space.
If you don't don't maintain your identity here, you're finished.
It's just dying slowly. But this is a very pertinent
question. Xbox will be where the world
plays and creates. We will build a global platform
that connects, plays and creates every blah blah blah.
Consoles are the foundation. That's important.
Her reiterating that is extremely important.
Console being at the foundation, delivering a premium experience
and cloud brings that experience to any device.
You can play where you want and your games progress, your games
progress, Friends and identity stay with you across console,
PC, mobile and cloud and that's Play Anywhere and Play Anywhere
is dank. It is.
Xbox will be built, and this is where it's interesting, built to
be affordable, personal and open.
How do you reconcile this affordable console when the next
Helix is rumoured to be a beast of a machine that costs?
I don't know how much it's going to be a beast of a machine
that's going to cost apparently upwards of 1200 grand.
It's like 12-12 hundred pounds or dollars.
We'll be offering flexible pricing so it's easy to get
started and keep playing. So there's that this experience
will adapt to you, letting you to customise how you play.
And apparently this customization is going to lend
itself in the way Game Pass is structured as well.
There'll be, there's rumours of a pick your Game Pass model as
you want, which sounds really good.
I don't know how that will work. Helping you find what you love
and connecting with the with the right people.
We'll also we and we will open to all creators, from
individuals to large studios, giving anyone the tools to reach
a global audience. That's more for developers.
And yeah, this is a key point on New North Star.
Will be daily active players. We've talked about monthly
active users all the time, but it's the focus is on players.
This is so funny, isn't it? We've seen we've seen focus on
sales, console sale and not saying that it's not important,
but Xbox guys made a big mistake of disregarding that and that's
not true. That's not the right move.
But monthly active users was the next metric.
Even Sony, the market leader then said that's what is what's
really important. Xbox are going a further, going
further and saying the new North Star, the way that they measure
success and the sort and measure how they're performing is daily
active players. And that is interesting because
it's all about engagement. Engagement is the new metric.
It's the be all and end all of everything.
We will execute this through 4 priorities.
This is their game plan. This is the manifesto and how
they execute it. They've told you what their
priorities are, what they think that they need to do.
Now they're going to tell you how they're going to do that.
Hardware very important. Stabilise Gen 9 as a healthy and
high quality base. Good luck with that, Brav, if
you need to do that because yeah, develop, deliver project
healers to lead in performance and play your console and PC
games. This in itself is massive.
This is a massive departure from the status quo since time began.
A console that plays console games and PC games.
The execution of it, we have no idea how it's going to be.
We've got an idea through the Asus wrong Ally, maybe a glimpse
of it, but expect it to develop when it comes to this thing.
Think about it. The new Xbox comes out for him.
Our Project Helix, hybrid console, whatever.
This is the piece of a thing. People now suddenly play World
of Warcraft on it. Think about the marketing.
Xbox owns fucking Blizzard. They're going to shut.
Are they going to just sit, sit that one out?
The opportunities to market PC games on this thing is massive.
World of Warcraft, though, is a big one.
A big one. And don't give me the bullshit
you can't play on controller, things like that.
So the delivering project he is to lead in performance.
Now obviously this thing is rumoured to come in to come out
next year. So it's just going to lead in
performance by default anyway. When the PlayStation 6 comes out
then expect it to be more powerful maybe.
But then the you know, I don't know what's happening with the
rumours. Petran knows about specs.
He's that more tech minded in the chat.
So I don't know. I don't know what the rumblings
are on on the console power front.
And for me after this this generation, I say let's wait
till the results come out because they want to get burnt
by whatever bullshit happens. Then Digital Foundry are like oh
what the fuck. The series X is weak lead in
comfortable personal high performance accessories.
My fucking face is so I didn't even look.
I mean spitting like a madman. I didn't even focus this thing.
Glad I'm so close to the Tig. Glad.
There you go. You see my baldy?
Look at my baldy. Look at the creating.
Look at my baldy. Wait, wait, wait.
Hold on, hold on. I think that's in focus.
That's better. I'm fucking my face.
Wasn't the camera. Sorry for making you guys
uncomfortable. You can watch my baldy.
I bowed it. I bowed it.
All right. Build a strong ecos lead in
comfortable, personal, high performance accessories.
I don't give a shit. Build a strong ecosystem that
expands choice and reads OK, that's hardware.
The main two things we care about is basically project Helix
of what they're going to do there, and I think the you're
going to start seeing affordable fucking.
You're going to see price price reductions on the Series X&S.
They're fucking they're normal's buying them.
Xbox might be around 5080 septic source if and managed to deliver
an RDNA that's closer to NVIDIA feature set.
I'm seeing some rumours that this thing is going to be a
$3000 machine and 1200. It's going to be fucking
amazing. I'm just going to wait and see.
I'm just going to wait and see, but for me as APC gamer, this
Xbox Helix device, this hybrid is amazing for my fucking living
room. If it's like anywhere close to
that power content and grow and extend an enduring portfolio
franchises players love, they're already on their way to do that.
They're doing that much better than they ever have.
You get a gears, Halo, Forza, all of that this year already,
but it's their stable trademark. But you now you've got Fable
coming out you Gears of War looks better than ever before.
You've got Elder Scrolls under their banner.
You've got the entirety of fucking Blizzard now there.
So well, Wolfenstein, the next Wolfenstein.
Give us fucking Quake, man. I'm dying from Quake.
But I guess that's a niche market now, which is
disgraceful. But they've got a whole fucking
suite of studios, so them doing their portfolio is beast.
Anyone trying to downplay that is a moron.
Evolve. But yeah, like funds would say
we need more fucking beast critical hitters 90 plus Metal
games. And I agree with funds.
Epic, why are you typing in Chinese?
What's up here? It's good to see you, man evolve
our third party partnerships and strengthen our five years late.
This is what Bashi Washi was talking about.
Web down. What's up man, evolve their
third party partnerships and strengthen their five years
late. So do that.
Obviously, Japan is a key area focus there.
And the next one is China. China expanded China emerging
markets and mobile first audiences.
Yeah. But yeah China you cannot
ignore. China is fucking huge.
Then you just be stupid to even ignore it.
Just look at the blackmail through Kong sales.
Yo gaming with Pashon. Thank you for being a member
again, bro. Lord out of gas over here
fronting on me. I'm not.
I'm just having a fucking solo show bro.
But I will get you on. Just stay there, stay the
course. I will get you on, but you have
to be on my fucking discord. I will send you an invite
shortly. In fact, I'll do that now.
I can do that now, you know. Yes, I can.
I will send it to you on Twitter.
One second, one second. I'll do that a bit.
Let me just go through this and then we'll make some memes.
Maintain and grow in live games and long term stewardship.
So this this generation, they've been focusing on fucking single
player games more than their fucking live live service games,
which is interesting. I now I'm feeling like we need
more multiplayer games from Microsoft.
Elevate, create a set of perfect Minecraft.
I don't give a shit. Fix the fundamentals for players
and partners, the experiences, the fucking marketplace,
especially the Windows fucking marketplace.
You need to fix that shit. Overall discovery,
customization, this is a lot for discoveries, more important for
developers and players. So, but yeah, that's more
important than personalization to connect, community, blah,
blah, blah. That's why the Discord thing
that was announced today. Safe, safe services 45 Game Pass
with clear differentiation. We've been talking about how
Game Pass has just been fucking. The tears don't make any sense.
Good luck trying to fix that. I don't know how what they're
going to do but good luck. Return to return the business to
durable growth with strong cost discipline.
Good luck with that Brav. Make cloud play feel native,
fast and reliable across TV's. Yeah fucking G force now has
been shitting on you so good luck with that.
There's no excuse for you as a trillion dollar company to be.
Although people are saying cloud is actually really good now, but
I haven't used it yet. Use.
Oh I didn't I missed this bit. Use mergers and acquisitions to
deliberately deliberately to accelerate growth where organic
parts are too slow. It's acquisition season baby.
I didn't expect that. I didn't see that.
Oh wow shit. Well, what are they going to buy
Xbox have the fucking commitment to now still wait what they have
they pulled the rug from developers so many council games
like project Blackburn, which is supposed to be fucking amazing.
They pulled the rug out there because they were chasing AI the
next shiny thing like Magpies, and now they're saying they're
going to fucking go back to re kindle buy more shit, buy more
shit at least fucking re reinforce some confidence in the
existing studios. I know for a fact people, the
developers in these studios are like, what the fuck?
We have no faith. These masters might stab us in
the back again. So, but that is surprising.
That is surprising. Hockey of all the people, hockey
is in the chat because acquisition season, baby.
Hello dad. It's good to see you and I'm
proud. It's so funny that you come out
when it comes to acquisition. It has been massive support of
acquisition G punk G force now shits on Xbox yeah I know that's
why I don't fucking use it. Everyone talks about G force now
fork G Gene park has been using G force now correct me if I'm
wrong Gene to play fucking finally realise greatness of
cyberpunk. I think in path tracing you used
to play path trace or or was it Resident Evil Requiem?
And Gene Park isn't a console fucking fanboy or anything like
that. Gene Park is an alter.
You're lucky. I'm lucky to be in the Steam
company of such a gentleman who understands the art form, but
when he says PC gaming is dank, fucking take notice bro, take
notice. It's not us, it's not Xbox guys.
Oh come in. Fell into favour, then what?
There's an errand, guess an element of it.
But PC gaming this generation, if you're PC gaming and you're
playing with so many games of Path trace now including
Pragmata, including Resident Evil, then the next game James
Bond. But the the fact that Path
tracing is now coming to the fore and becoming mainstream is
a fucking amazing. He has GeForce now.
It's a 5090. So GeForce is basically using a
PlayStation 6. PlayStation 6 wishes it was a
5090. Fucking crazy.
It's PlayStation 7 bruv. And you could do that through
cloud. You don't have to spend 67 grand
on a fucking PC. You could do that now.
That's how do you good. GeForce now is Xbox.
Good luck with that, but that is surprising.
Mergers and acquisitions to deliberate.
Except that means they're buying again.
They're buying again. Holy shit who would they buy?
Oh my God, we're back to this conversation again.
But fucking crazy I I did not see that and that's like a
fourth bullet point. Maybe I'm reading too much into
it, but mergers and acquisitions with what?
Smaller things where organic parts but organic parts for a
trillion dollar company could be fucking Capcom.
No one but we could wish. I'm still pro consolidation.
Along the way we'll re evaluate our approach to exclusivity.
This, this little line at the end has changed everything.
This changes everything. Along the way we will re
evaluate our approach to exclusivity.
Guys, just fucking just let that go, safe windowing and AI and
share more as we learn and decide.
Xbox has opened Pandora's box. They have to now have a measured
approach. What do I think this means?
Principally, I think this means timed exclusives.
That's what I think it means. I think it means they know that
what they've got, next Gen cuts are coming out next year.
They can't just fucking put everything out there, completely
kill the value of it. I don't think they can fully put
the genie back in the bottle. And it's a fluid approach.
It is a fluid one. But they cannot be emboldening
their competitors or previous competitors here.
They have to tread very carefully.
But this is I, I believe. I believe this.
Look at the end. We are Xbox.
To achieve our master plan, the way we work must transform.
Our best work happens when the full stack moves together.
Microsoft Gaming describes our structure, but it does not
describe our ambition. So we are going back to changing
the team's name. We are Xbox.
Thank fucking thank fuck for that fucking Microsoft.
No one has any love for Microsoft.
Every time you think of Microsoft, you're thinking
fucking Microsoft. That fucking what's that space
movie? I forgot the space series with
the guy from the Office. What his name?
And fuck it, I say that all the time.
Fucking Microsoft with Outlook, with Teams.
Teams is dog shit by the way, if you use Teams, rest in peace.
We are high agency. We are a high agency culture
where wild and wonderful ideas thrive.
Let's see. Our job is not to smooth over
our differences, but to connect everyone into something greater
than anyone, studio or product. We have to be honest about where
we are. We are a challenger and meeting
this moment will require pace, energy, and a level of self
critique that should feel uncomfortable.
I love this woman. I love this woman.
When did you get this from Phil Spencer?
Phil Spencer, someone's literally fucking hugging you.
You had little purses, sofas there.
You had the Lube out. Or you're just like, Oh yeah,
come on, let me massage you. You want to feel good?
Don't worry about it. Oh, yeah.
You were spending a decade to build this game.
You don't even know what it is. Don't worry about it.
Let me touch you up a little bit more.
Yeah, Yeah. You know, you need to feel
uncomfortable. Bruh.
This is a fucking creative space.
You'll be battered so Roly despite you brute forcing it
with cash. It's time.
It's time for you to get your testicles out and make the hard
calls. And this is where Asha Sharma
comes in. And I pretty much attribute this
to South Asian parenting. That's right, it's never good
enough. No matter what it is, it's never
good enough. I can speak attest to that.
But that's like lawyer, So what? Who cares?
So what you should have done, You got a lawyer 10 years ago.
Oh Dad, I'm making this much money, I don't give a shit.
You should be making £1,000,000, but that's what helps Xbox, the
hard Asian parenting. Just go everywhere onto my mic,
jizz everywhere like Phil Spencer to just all the
developers and say yeah, good things, soft things, everything
is everywhere. No, enough, enough.
And I love the next 10 bullet points.
Earn every player. Yeah, protect our art.
Art. Some motherfuckers don't
understand it. It's an art form.
No fucking welfare system. We're gaming.
Let's sing value for gaming. Yeah, it's an art form, so treat
it like an art form. But everyone gets to walk into
the art gallery. Bro, this is some fucking
Picasso shit. Then fucking let's show the
people who pay premium get the first fucking go away.
It's an art form. Protect it vociferously.
Your mother, stay rebellious. Yes, Xbox, just like the old
renegade space. Stay rebellious, bro.
Don't be fucking making games by committee.
Don't give fucking developers a fucking manifesto.
This is the game you should do. Don't make their tits too big.
Make it a little bit. It'll be a little bit inclusive.
Don't fucking touch the art. It's artwork, right?
So then just fuck off. Let them do their thing, but
keep an eye on them and say, all right, what are you doing?
Oh, she's got big tits and justify it.
Oh, she's a hoe. Fine, she paid for those things
progress over perfection right Where does Xbox's studio on
product has actually shown an over fascination for perfection?
I haven't seen that in a while all right, so this is dial that
back a little bit make sure the quality is still there progress
yes, but perfection save decay three I'm looking at you signal
over ceremony shut the fuck I don't know what that means call
before more. What the fuck is this is getting
retarded as I got sorry ow ow work.
The problem. This is when ChatGPT came in.
I'm sorry Co pilots did the the rest of this speed is like shut
the fuck make makers over managers.
OK, clarity is kindness, all right, the the the the the the
top four OK, top three. The rest of it was shit.
I take it back over the last five years Xbox in the industry
has been through an unimaginable amount of change.
That's facts, and this team has continued to deliver throughout
for it's has delivered through it for our community, which is
dwindling because we're really there.
Thank you for staying focused on what matters 62 days in this fan
is so fucking loud. Sorry, 662 days in, we're proud
of how we've honoured our commitment of great games. 6 is
that what do you mean? 62 days in?
Is that 60 days in? Asha Sharma joining?
We're proud of how we've honoured our commitment of great
games, return of Xbox and feature of play.
We're here to do the most creative and courageous work for
our of our lives, and that's what we'll do together.
Oh my God, Let's see. Let's see, let's see.
Let me send you Adm. Let me send you Adm addict who
has been one of the few people in this space just getting
grilled, even on Iron Lodge with King David in there who was
fucking, You know what? King David, he loves what Xbox
does and Microsoft does, so he was there grilled all the
fucking time by his own Co house.
And as all audience, I've sent you the fucking invite.
Join me, join me my disco channel.
And what I'll do is I will add you join the waiting room and
we'll make some memes. And if you're in the disco
channel already, you can still sit in the waiting room and we
can have a chat about it. Yeah, let me bring the chat up
again. I'm sorry, I've lost it.
Had to look at look it up. A signal versus ceremony.
What the fuck? Yeah.
Why is that? It prioritises the results,
understanding and efficiency over how things should be done
traditionally. All right.
OK, that's what it means. How does signal of a ceremony
mean that? Fuck it.
I'll take your word for it Thank you for a shout out to 180
people smash the like button as we try and get some people in
here to talk some shit. Gaming addict is here oh how
will this work? It will work it will work Your
addict is in here. I will put this Cam oh shit,
this camera fucking wire. Let me get my game serve mic out
let's here. I think it's going to go off or
what. I know it, bro.
I know it bro. Say that we're going to turn
your camera on and we're going to bring you in in 5432 and one,
please put some clothes on. Oh.
Here we go. Here we go.
What's? Going on, guys.
There he is, there he is. Turn your camera on you piece of
shit. OK, hold on.
Oh, addict, addict, addict, addict.
What a day, huh? What a day.
How are you feeling, addicts? Oh, I'm feeling great.
I'm feeling great. Good to see you man.
I, I, I was, I was. I always use the analogy from
Game of Thrones. You know how like Cerseius was
like dragged through the street butt ass naked with rocks being
thrown at her? That's what that's how I felt
all last year, the year before like.
I know. I know that feeling.
Yeah, it it, yeah, it was
definitely. Joined Gene, was up on 2
weekends. I can do it.
I've got two man overlay, so I might have to hop through, but I
need to speak to Gene as well, addicts.
But before you do, you need to get your fucking you.
Get off your chest, bro. Talk to us, bro.
Wait, your camera's moving everywhere, bro.
Your fucking mic has fucking got so many hairs on it.
What is that? Yeah, we'll see.
I had this, this mic in the, the, the closet for a little
bit, but then I switched it back out.
So yeah, it's, it's, it's been a, it's been a hectic, hectic
day, man. Like my, my thing, my, my thing
is like, I always got upset with the community because they
always came at me like crazy. And I never said they were
wrong. All I said was I don't, I, I
don't think that's the way that they're going to succeed.
And but they were very vocal about telling me my ass was
wrong. Yeah, I like I got called, I got
called the Xbox cord. I got all kinds of stuff.
Bad people. People live to talk shit about
me. Every time I even come into IOP.
Often. Often it was just you arguing
with the chat. It would have been you and then
King David would be rallying up the chat against you and there's
you saying no. It's saying all the things that
I've been saying and I rate that.
I respect that. Because it's just, it's at the
end of the day, it's just like people like all exclusives are
antiquated. Like all these, all these these
little talkie points they got from the Microsoft PR PR and I'm
just like, I get that people people don't believe in like
that, that concept, but it's just like, show me one time it's
worked. Yeah, absolutely.
Because we're we're talking about an industry like people
are trying to like look, technically, yes, by the letter
of the law, exclusives are anti consumer, but the practise is
better for the actual competition of the industry in
general. Yeah, because what exclusives
lead to a healthier ecosystem and and healthier ecosystems
lead to actually competing with their competitors.
And I don't think it's like a coincidence that the moment Xbox
like truly put their put put their guns down, everything just
stopped. Like it, it, it it's just, it's
just crazy, man. Because like they all.
The momentum was lost. All the the spirit in the
industry was lost. The Game Pass Subs, Subs tagged
the the brand had no identity. So everyone's saying or more
players listen. Now look at the cost of it.
This is an open admission of everything you've been saying
and I've been saying about the value of exclusivity being
correct. So, so many people.
How wrong, so many people. I took the Kool-aid.
I, I posted a video and I, I posted a GIF and I was like, you
know what, all these people that came at me and I use that Walter
White eye one. I was like this is the only GIF
I have for you hating ass bitches.
Bro how does it feel? Tell everyone, how did it feel
when Halo was announced for Xbox, iPhone, PlayStation?
At that, I think by by the time Halo showed up, I was already
this this this launch like I didn't care like I'm going to be
honest with you, like the last six months before Asha took
over, I was just like, look, this is the ship that Microsoft
Xbox is now and this bitch is just going to sink.
There's no discourse, there's no getting around it.
This thing is taking on water and sooner or later the whole
bitch is going to be in the ocean like and you know what
Asha took over. I was just like, look, I've been
asking for new leadership for a while.
So I, I find it, I, I find it myself to be hypocritical if I
don't at least give her some, some some time to work and see
about something. And I'm going to be real.
Like, look, do we know exactly what's going on?
Do we know that the landscape of things?
No, but like you to me, it's it's hard to look at what's
going on and not feel like this is this is leading to a better
place than the what direction that we were going.
Absolutely. There's a aimless this
direction. There was no direction.
It was Xbox sacrificing the vision of what it was to pacify
the shareholders or the executives at the cost of
everything. And the messaging is clear.
Why are they saying we are Xbox? Why are they getting rid of the
whole Microsoft label? Why all of that is a
confirmation of everything we've been saying that the cost of
this. Too much in the crazy the car
crazy park guy. She did this in two months.
I know. Like 60 days that like like she
it's just it's wild that so much stuff can be reversed.
Then why did why wasn't it reversed a long time ago?
Like you know what? That is a very good question.
Like a lot of people are saying, like, you know, they had a
mandate, they had to follow it. But this woman came in and the
space of 60 days has changed fundamentally everything.
She recognised immediately off the bat that this Xbox is not
going to work. This is the exclusivity question
has to be answered. And you know, fucking gay pass
is too expensive. So maybe she, you know, we gave
too much credit to Phil Spencer for like maybe fine.
I don't know what the dynamic is.
We can only guess, but she's made changes remarkably quick
and it's fundamentally changing the way we look at Xbox.
It is definitely a huge argument to be made that, you know, would
that when that dip happened in, in the stocks and they try to
blame that shit on, on the gaming division, they
stockholders didn't believe that shit.
Like they, they they knew it was their over commit to AI that led
to that shit. And, and, and Satya is in
probably a way worse situation in terms of like the
shareholders than he was. Because when you're, when
you're, when you're sucking up all the air out of all the, the
shit, there ain't nothing to breathe anymore.
Xbox was suffocating And and I will say that when this
happened, in my opinion, and obviously I'm probably wrong
because you know, we can only go off the information we have.
I think there was a lot of backlash and you can't just
reverse the ship and people believe you.
There had to be leadership change to show a change in
trajectory after the leadership change.
Because if they would have just still came out one day be like,
OK, we reversed. No one would have believed them.
No one, especially how like mixed messaging they've been for
the past three or four years. Like, like it's got to the point
where it's just like, I don't believe anything they say, but
Asha is, is, is doing the things that she say.
And what I like is when you read that statement that they put
today, there was accountability in there.
She's like, we pissed off our audience.
They pissed. They pissed, pissed.
Saying, saying that players are frustrated as the starting salvo
of your fucking blog is a very bold stance to me and it shows
that it's an open admission that fucking hell, we got things
wrong. We need to fix shit.
And I that's what I rate. I rate the honest conversation.
I don't like this glossing everything over, you know, like
in that game, video game that failed haze where they injected
those chemicals to you and everything looks nice and
fucking everything is nice. And that's what Phil, Phil's
person was just glazing it through because he was so
scared. I mean, at the same time there
was a pros and cons. Phil Spencer was very, a lot of
people had a lot of Laura Fry and loads of other people have
said they they really helped. He went out of his way to help
them. But you're running a business
and very competitive business with a very competitive, very
eager, determined players in the space.
So Kumbaya doesn't work. And not to mention it makes
your, the core audience that you know, are in your ecosystem.
Like it's like we've been saying a while for like second class
citizens, because it's like, you needed to tell me that you're
going to put the only reasoning people would buy into your
ecosystem to another platform that's going to take that 30%
and then use that to lock other games off your platform.
Like it is just, it made zero sense.
Like nothing made sense. And that's why there was no,
there was no gas lighting. There's not enough gas lighting
the world to make me jump on that.
No exclusivity shit matters like that.
There's not any look. And it's like I said, Alex and
them, they are right. It is anti consumer.
It helps no one. But here's the thing.
No, it doesn't. That's not.
Xbox be Xbox being a competitor in the space is better than them
than them keeping exclusives off other platforms like.
Absolutely. I disagree vociferously, very,
very, very aggressively with that notion that it's not good
for players because it depends on what you what, What do you
value in this space? Do you value?
No, I, I, I was saying the letter of the law, like it's
just giving people less options is anti consumer.
But there are practises, there are practises that's anti
consumer that have a better healthy impact in the industry
than other anti consumer things. Some things it just, it's just
the way business is done. Yeah.
And that's what that was blowing my mind.
When you looking at like other industries, every industry,
every industry, there's not one industry I could think of that
does not have some form of exclusives.
Bro streaming services have exclusives.
Does two other players in the space have exclusives?
But Microsoft Kumaya is going to work for their brand.
It's so I don't understand how these trillion dollar companies
fucking operate. Some of this is so obvious.
You want my honest opinion, what I thought happened, I think they
generally wanted to be like a like a a third party multi
platform approach. I think they were generally
going in that direction and then they saw the sales of their
games on other platforms and they kept seeing the sales on
their games, other platforms. And now they're they're they're
looking and like maybe this isn't a good idea because if you
look at it look look at other industries, yeah, look at other
publishers. How every year we're seeing this
publisher getting bought off. This publisher has to have like
some large sum of money that's influx to to to survive.
I don't understand how Microsoft looked at the publishing like
the AAA publishingly and say, yeah, that that we want in that.
Because the the problem is is when you are a like when you're
a publisher, you go off the merits of your games and games
alone. But if you're if you are a
console manufacturer and and you you host games on on your
console, you can also thrive off the industry in general
thriving. Because when Resident Evil
requiem sells good, you make money.
When GTA6 sells good, you make money.
When pragmatics sells good, you make money.
But when you're just a a multi platform and you only really
have your games to work off of. If your games don't hit every
time that you don't make money. And Sony PlayStation is the
perfect example of that when they their platform is a brand
that withstands its name, has Providence.
And that why that's why when what you're saying is correct,
third party titles will make them money.
Most of the sales are on PlayStation.
They make money as a result. And if you if you and if you
don't, yeah, you're making money off of your own bag, but you
have no real brand value. And the game doesn't hit like
kiln, which only has like 100. And I know it's a smaller
studio, but then what? What happens to that studio like
it the the brand identity is so fundamentally important for the
success of the platform long term.
If you're talking about access to players, what is it going to
be good with PlayStation? Xbox is just whittled down to
being nothing and it's short sighted thinking.
And The funny thing is the just the Capcom games, the Capcom
third party games, I'm willing to bet you who's going to make
more money for PlayStation, that 30% the Xbox has made on the
entire time that they've been publishing on PlayStation with
that 70%. Yeah, absolutely.
Absolutely. What they said like what?
2,000,000 on on PlayStation with just requiem.
We're not talking about any other game, just Requiem.
What? That's great before because I
have to get Gene Pocket. I've only got 2 manners with me.
What do you want to say? Your closing thoughts?
You're on the main screen. I want to see Addict, What do
you want to fucking say to all the fucking people who said fuck
you, Addict, what do you want to say?
Say it. It's it's at the end of day,
like like here's the thing, like I don't like these people that
speak in indefinites. Like they want to go out there
and they act like every time I speak like, look, man, I'm only
some dude on the Internet giving my opinion.
It is what it is, but ain't not that annoys me more than these
people that come on this platform and come on Twitter and
come on X whatever you want to call it and say this is the way
the industry's moving. And then guess what?
The industry moves. And it's like this industry will
be saying shit on a Monday, changing that shit up on a
Friday, and you're going to tell me with a straight fucking face
that you keep you got a crystal ball in the back.
I guess. Like it's just it's annoying
because I never tell these people what they're saying is
wrong, but they have no, they have no problem pulling up of my
shit and saying you're wrong and everything you're saying.
Like it's just like, dude, shut up.
Especially when you, especially when I see some of these people
be changing their perspective and the way they look at the
industry. The moment there's a tweet that
goes out by Xbox like. Oh, I wonder.
Who's like that? It's it's like I I was stabbed
in the back. I was rock thrown at me.
And now one time did I think exclusives weren't important?
I said I just took back and be like look man I hope it works
out and guess what? It did.
It didn't work out. Thank you so much.
I'll. Let Gene get up on you it.
Was appreciate you Madam. Thank you so much for that.
We need to do this morning take care bro.
Well, ladies and gentlemen that was addict getting it off his
chest, but now I'm going to get some stuff on someone's chest.
It is none out of that. The one man only Gene fucking
Park. Ladies and gentlemen.
Gene. Hello, can you hear me?
I can hear you but I can't see you bro Uh.
Oh. We need to see that sexy face.
There it is. You wearing a?
Project Helix shirt as well. Yes.
Gene's wearing the Project Helix shirt.
No way. No way.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, No, I, I would say earlier I actually had my
titties out. I was not wearing a shirt or
clothes, but I was like, wait, wait, I got the perfect, got the
perfect outfit for today. So I got the Project Helix hat
right here, got the shirt right here.
Paid off all curtsy with an autographed card from Oshit,
which I threw away. Whatever.
He threw away the card. She's a legend now go E with a
paid good money for. That I I got.
I got to dig it out of the trash.
Yeah. What's wrong with me?
Yeah, I think he's already gone. Yeah, he's gone.
Yeah. Yeah, I only have too bad
overlay so I can add to juggle that.
But Gene. Gene, you have some choice words
to talk about this strategy. You it seems like are on the
other end of the the scale. You're very kumbaya.
This is pro. Tell me.
No, no, no. You get you're you're really.
That's why I was frustrated, you guys.
I was like, you're reading me all wrong.
I really want the blood you want.
I want the smoke. Oh, I thought you.
I thought you. I thought you were being
facetious. When you were applied to BG, you
actually meant that. No I no like personally I have I
I have been bored with the kumbaya stuff.
Yes. I don't, I don't.
I don't like that stuff. Competition is healthy.
I think it I guess good and you know, like when this
competition, there's just better games overall because you're
trying to you're you're just trying to make a better game.
Thank you, Jane. So that does serve the art bed,
as you say, right, absolutely. So like it's just like what
addict said, like at a base level, giving people less
options is quote anti consumer. But like for me, and I know Alex
like, like will probably get pissed off at this, but it's
like I, I am personally bored of always framing things that pro
consumer, anti consumer. Oh, you know, you know where
they're talking from. That's just like 2012 YouTube
talk when like, you know, Stephanie starting with what
we're just, we're just saying that shit all the time and
whatever like that. Like can we like grow up,
graduate and like talk a little bit more broadly about like,
like what is interesting about what about what?
Why video games are different to market, why they're different to
sell? Why?
Like owning ATV to watch any show you want is different than
owning a specific piece of hardware or platform.
And for example, we keep talking about, well, everything is
everywhere. You can get Instagram on your
phone, but you know where you can't get on a Google phone?
Siri. Right.
You can't get that stuff. You can't get, you know, like
Apple, but like, you can't get that stuff.
There are exclusive features to the iPhone that people like.
Absolutely. And it's it's, it's a banger.
It's a banger product. I've, I've also have amazing
cameras. They have and I, I love iPhone,
but I don't have an iPhone, but I recognise that fact.
Streaming services are galore. You have Apple, you've got
Paramount, you've got all this shit.
They've got all these shows and I'm subscribed to all of them
because I don't want to fucking miss out.
That's why I have no fucking savings because that's what it
is. But I fucking love it because
that's and what what happens these these streaming companies
just competing. Every other fucking arena has
filled with competition. But for some reason we have to
allow the third place loser in the space to dictate the
narrative and say, hey, we're the outlier.
We're in 3rd place and we think that we should be in a position
to dictate what means what what, what constitutes healthy gaming
and competition. We'll still maintain it.
You can't eject yourself out as a competitor and then say we
still maintain competition. It's I so so that's why I found
I found it weird. I'm like Gene is saying this
Gene, Gene understands the value of the art.
You, if anyone treats this spaces are this this arena's art
form, it's you. So I'm like, why is Gene saying
that? I'm a massive Nintendo fanboy.
I have the fucking talking flower here.
Was I asleep? It's opening.
That sounded really sexual. For a second, yeah.
Yeah, it looks sexual, you know, but but I have to talk and fly
here. I'm a Nintendo fanboy and guess
what Nintendo is oops, shit, shut up.
Guess what? Nintendo is the most profitable
gaming company, you know, and I think like, like a lot of
PlayStation like like like like podcasters or whatever that you
know what I'm talking about. I'd like to say like, oh,
PlayStation is making the most pay.
Look at look at their market share.
Look at you're counting revenue, you know, which is more
profitable, which is making more money for the company to grow at
scale at at a responsible level, right.
And for me, like so like I've interviewed Phil Spencer many
times over the years, right. So this is what I've understood
about what the original, the older, the the now old Xbox
strategy was right where it's like Phil wanted to buy a Call
of Duty, Phil wanted to buy Activision because he felt like
in terms of. All the the great tech companies
out there right now, Google, Meta, Facebook, Apple, right,
they all have a foothold in some kind of interesting system or
service that they offer. Amazon offers shopping, but they
also offer TV shows and Movies Now, right?
And Google is search and the Meta is social, right?
And now VR and no more the metaverse, but they try to do
that. So Bill wanted Microsoft to be
the tech giant in gaming space because he believed gaming is
going to be and, and, and he believed, he correctly believed
that gaming will be the entertainment medium of the
future, right? And I certainly believe that
too, as somebody who loves video games and, and, and, and loves
medium. But so I think that's what kind
of guided them that, that, that this belief that Microsoft can
be the gaming Titan in Silicon Valley, in the tech space.
And that didn't really happen because Nintendo is running
rings around them with exclusives, right?
And yeah, maybe, maybe a, a, a Tomodachi Life isn't, isn't
selling well. But guess what?
Nintendo can afford to put out a fucking game like Tomodachi
Life. They can afford to pay Tetsuya
Takahashi millions of dollars to only sell $1.2 million of his
beloved 0 Blade Chronicles trilogy because because they
they're making money elsewhere. Because they're making all this
money off exclusives. Absolutely.
That's a brand. Identity so so it's yeah.
And it's like, yeah, maybe they're not bringing in as much
millions of dollars as PlayStation, but guess what?
Playstation's also losing more money.
Hiroki Totoki literally fucking said that.
He said that we need to worry about our fucking profit
margins. And for some reason people don't
understand that he's not it's not he's not talking about
making money. He's talking about we're losing
more money that we're make that that we want to make right now.
So so that's what I'm saying, the agility, this whole broad
brush blunderbuss approach and we all want to be and Sony's
shown this when the PS3 at the start of the PS3 Gen, we want to
be the multimedia player. Remember Ken Kutaragi was saying
that thing. Oh, we want to be every,
everywhere. That fucking approach killed the
Xbox One with this TVTVTV and we're still starting to see them
play this meandering. Oh, we need to be on mobile, we
need to be on global, bring more players in.
And she talks about it even in this blog that they're talking
about, you know, player. We're competing for pill players
attention. People are on Instagram and
stuff like that. But there's but that one company
like you said, Nintendo that can fucking withstand and fucking
fail because it, it values exclusive.
It's built its identity on offering exclusive creative
games and it shows how fuck their revenues.
Their cost of development is nowhere near what fucking Sony
and play Xboxes are in their AAA space and they're agile, they're
small and they focus on the right thing.
So how much confidence do you have?
Do you, do you read the Xbox Wire blog or maybe listen to me
spit on the microphone and camera as I was going through
it? How much more confidence do you
have in Xbox going forward? What do you think this means for
Xbox? Well.
Here's the thing, Like I've always I always really, really
dislike what Phil said on Kind of Funny when he said that if we
had the best games in the world, it wouldn't matter.
I think that is objectively just false and wrong.
And I don't know, I have no idea why he said he's a smart guy and
he he knows games. You know, that's why we were all
like, Oh my God, what about office Gaber score?
Because Phil's neighbour and it's like he knows games.
It was weird to for him to say like having great games doesn't
really matter when it does completely.
So my confidence will only be bolstered really.
I've, I, I still don't really have a lot of confidence right
now, despite I know I'm not dressed like it right now, but
I, I think that's actually a joke in the Mario movie.
It's like I disagree despite what how I appear.
I disagree despite how I appear. I would only be more confident
if they release a really fucking good game.
And to be fair, and I am Starfield's number one Glazer.
I guess me and Paul Tassi are right, but it's like I'm I will
go to record. Starfield is my favourite first
party game in this console generation.
Over editing Nintendo made over editing PlayStation made over go
seyote over over Ratchet and clank over Donkey Kong bonanza.
I start if it was my favourite game, I don't think it's the
best game. That's my favourite game.
It's the game I played the most played like 700 hours of it,
right. So it's like, so it's like if
they just ate a great Halo again, you know, like Halo
Infinite I loved, but it's like it has like like like 10
different caveats to that. You know I hated Hell Blade too.
I liked it. Oh yeah.
I, I, I, I despised it. But for me, it's like everything
like that that's wrong Games basically.
I can see that point. For me, I understood it as a
padlock, a project where it's about mental illness.
They, they get a little bit of leeway there.
I I was astounded at how they. Get too much leeway for that.
I think they get too much leeway for that.
I I agree with you because other simply on the basis that their
gameplay systems remarkably the same.
I couldn't believe that that got greenlit other than the saving
grace for me was the combat and the animations of that combat
and how smooth it ran. It didn't feel like an Xbox
game. Now this is a PlayStation good
game. With how much, how good the
mocap is, how the animations work, how seamless that was.
I was really engrossed into that.
What's your cat's name again? Jack.
Jack how this is good to see Jack.
It's a gorgeous game. Like like while I was playing, I
was like, dude, imagine that Eldering game that looked like
this, you know, Oh my God, we're not going to get that for for
for years. I'll probably be be on 60 or 70
by the time a game like that that comes out.
So. DLSS 5 we might help it.
Yeah, yeah, maybe. But it's like it's like I am
looking at the future of visual graphics, but as as a game, like
it was just bad. It would you do less things than
Hopefully one. Hopefully One was a much better
game than Hell Blade 2. I do help one was a better game
but. That aside though, again, like
to answer your question simply, it's like like like once they
get a great game out that like people will love and I love to,
then I'll be like, fuck yeah, like like like, like Xbox is
back because it's the games that matter ultimately and you and
need better quality control there.
Absolutely. They do.
I'm not to say that PlayStation doesn't have quality, good
quality control, because look at the garbage marathon's good.
It's not for me. But it's like, but it's like
Encore was obviously a failure in the quality control.
Yeah, because it's as much as people want to say, oh, Concord
control. Well, that's like saying a book
was readable. That's.
A good way to say it. That that, that the print, that
you could read the print and the paper didn't fall apart.
Every game should be fucking controllable.
Good. Every game had a baseline.
So why are we giving Concorde credit for that?
No, it was a terrible game and and that's it should have, it
should have died a long time ago.
So clearly PlayStation doesn't really have the best tastemakers
there too. But it's multiplexing.
Absolutely. When it comes to multiplayer for
sure. Yeah.
So, you know, like I think Xbox just need to just get a hit out
something, you know. I mean, this year it looks quite
strong. I mean, Forza Horizon 6, a lot
of people decry that because it's a sequel.
Fable Fable, Fable, Fable. Come on, Fable has to smash it.
Fable looks like you all smash it.
Come on man. This could be better than Peter
Molly news games. This could be better than Peter
Molly news games. It looks amazing.
I, I, I, I love the presentation they did on it.
You know, I, I, I, I I that game, if that game is great, I
will have so much confidence in the Xbox.
I'll be like, well, I love Xbox right now.
I I so I just bought like a new fucking PC right here, right?
Beast PC. Yeah, it's a nice 58 and like my
whole PC setup right now is Xbox branded.
I have an Xbox Series X wallpaper and everything like
that. This is an Xbox right here.
I uninstalled my Xbox Series X because this PC is now the Xbox
so all the Xbox are. Same here.
Yeah, yeah, I I still have my Xbox Series S installed to my TV
because you know what, Xbox Series consoles are really good
back compat machines, you know, so I got my Otogi, I got my ads
rising on Xbox Series S. You know, the the you know,
gears two and three, of course, because, you know, Lord knows
when that they will be ported anywhere else.
But yeah, it's fable as a hit and and and and it's great.
So that's why I'm like, dude, they're like, that's why.
Like I, I, I kind of joke, but it's like PlayStation players
never play Fable. They don't know anything about
Fable. Why do they get Fable now right?
But I wonder how much that will sell on Fable.
What's the what's the strategy about what other than they have
all that signal to me they didn't have much faith in the
Xbox brand. All this.
Now, in terms of the what she's saying, she's saying the right
things, but I think she's backing it up by I mean, you
can't by going so strongly, by saying all these things, by
doing some of this stuff. I you'd be you'd be sitting
well, not silly, but at the same time you have to put respect
like you wouldn't push this out. You wouldn't come out and say
players are frustrated to lead. That's your opening salvo play.
Players are frustrated. She she does.
She is so much more convincing to me than any of the the the
the previous. I mean, Phil Spencer was
convincing at the start, but I feel like he's, you know, he
lost the battle to the suits and eventually his words didn't
really mean much. She's leading.
Here's what I'll say about Asha 'cause I had my I, I have my
doubts about it too. And you know, to be fair, you
know, you can still be sceptical because it's still like you
said, 60 DS out nothing really Well on paper, yes, like they
they dropped the price. They shouldn't be heroes for it.
You just you just readjust the price kind of closer to back
where it was right. But it is a smarter decision.
But here's why I'll give Asha and and the Xbox team credit,
like really good credit. And to speak to what you said.
The fact the speed in the speediness of these decisions
is, is impressive for for these decisions that are so broad
reaching to be to, to, to have the communications for it to,
to, to create a press release for it to create that whole
like, you know, that the Tina Tina and and Matt booty
interview and everyday at that. Like what that the
communications department is all fired up right now, like they
and, and like, for a huge company like Microsoft to move
that S on messaging and getting it out that quickly is
astounding. Actually.
Like I work at a big company too, not nearly as big as
Microsoft, but you know, like if you, if anyone who's familiar
with government or larger companies, you're a lawyer, I
guess. Like you, like, you know more
than most that the bureaucracies of paperwork and, and, and
approvals and that, and for, for, for, for all of this very
consequential messaging to be approved that fast.
It does kind of speak to me how Xbox is actually kind of
blocking in right now honestly. Absolutely.
Like it does feel like that, that they're prepared for war.
So that's why I'm like, fuck it, just go, go for it.
I want to see you pull back all those announcements for Fable,
Force the six, pull it all back, all back.
I know that's crazy. I know that's crazy.
People will get so upset. Fuck them, you know, whatever,
you know, go crazy with it, you know?
Yes, make Call of Duty completely console exclusive and
take it up, take it out, take it off the launcher.
Make put it only on the Xbox PC app.
And find the fucking regulations.
On the PlayStation. Don't even really set up
PlayStation anymore. Lose all that money, see what
happens. My money's out of here.
What Gina said is what I would the exact same thing I would do.
I would do the exact same thing and I would, I would convince
Satya Nadella, just shut the fuck up, let me do it and it
will work. I absolutely love the fighting
spirit. You know for a fact that I'm
going to clip that bit because that's exactly what needs to be
said. Oh God, people are going to get
so mad. But but like, here's the thing
though. Like I grew up on the old 90s
style. I grew up on the old 90s style
of aggressive marketing, right? And look like, like, like Sony
is only company that takes shots all the time.
Yeah, Microsoft, Nintendo just ignores everyone and, and just
makes a lot of money, right. Yeah, but every time.
So like Sony, remember when when Sega went up and says, hey, the
Sega 7's gonna be 399 and and they did all their their spiel
and then Sony went up and says 299 and just left, right.
Absolutely. And it's like, Oh my gosh.
Oh, that's so that's such a dog or whatever like that.
And then several years later shoe.
Hey, does the whole like like this is how you treat games or
whatever? Oh my God, that's such a dog.
And then Microsoft just sits back and just fucking let's that
happen. Sega.
What did Sega do after that? They just fucking died, right?
So where do you? Fucking learn from the other
people's mistakes. You're the spiritual.
Where is the blood? Where is the blood?
Where's the? Fighting spirit.
I work in the Washington. I work in the Washington Post,
the New York Times that maybe the Washington Post is lucky
that I'm not in charge of the Washington Post marketing team
because I would be fucking talking shit about the New York
Times every fucking day. I mean, look at how fucking ugly
their their people are. You're so much more handsome.
Like I would like to get that petty, you know?
So that's why it's like, I would love if Asha is like, well,
here's a copy of Fable for PlayStation five.
We announced it and we were so excited for PlayStation owners
to experience it. So if you want if PlayStation
One owner won't want to experience it on an Xbox and she
just sets it on fire. Oh my God, if she did, I would
rate her so much then thank you narrative as well, said Jean
Sharma needs to go even harder. Yes she does, She does.
If I could get the blow torture and blow that freaking CD case
up. But think about the messaging
that would send. Think about the reverberations
around the industry that this lady comes out and just does
that. It would put Xbox on the map.
That renegade spirit she's talking about manifested itself
in adverts and within the. I should talk about.
That's fucking rebellious. You know burning shit, right?
That's more, that's more, that's anarchists.
But we want that. We want to show that we're not.
You have to have to decouple from Microsoft.
Microsoft is a big fucking faceless corporation.
It's just when it comes to branding, Xbox still because
it's gaming, like you said, it's different from movies and
everything else. It has it's own.
It is the future of the medium. I mean, it completely dwarfs any
other medium anyway. Movies, books, all of it.
But if you believe in that and they, they recognise it after
chasing AI and then having a, you know, getting, tucking their
Dicks between their legs and clocking back to, to the, to the
developers and saying we're sorry and we're trying to regain
their confidence. They now come back and say,
look, we recognise this is our only only entry in appreciable
consumer space in a cultural space.
We need to take this seriously. And Asha Sharma's starting to
show that it's very early, but you know, it's some change from
that status quo from the same faceless, you know, AI generated
fucking comments, which is ironic because she was a
previous AI bod. She seems to have exhibit more
human drive. She remind she's like a female
James Allard, the guy who was pissing Bill Gates off.
Oh yeah, yeah, And she reminds me of that.
And so I again early days. Let's fucking see that fucking
through. Oh, Hoggy ask a very good
question. Thank you so much for the Super
chat. Are we going to hear exclusive
at the June showcase? Do you think we should get live
showcases again? That's a good question.
I love live showcases.
Come on. You know, if people have been
paying attention to me on social media, I've actually been
outside like, like all week, which is wonderful.
You know, I had, I had AI was at a dinner with Reggie Frisumay.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. The wonderful man.
What is he like in real life? What is he, like Reggie feeds me
Just just like how you imagine. Just very cool, dude.
It was so cool 'cause like this, this was like, this was a dinner
attended by like people at the White House and like Congress
and everything. And so it was interesting to
see, like, once dinner was over, like, there was a line of people
like, like the White House photographer, the official White
House photographer. Just some kid, right?
Because because Trump has has had him around like since the
Mar a Lago days or whatever, but just some kid.
He he was like he had to switch with him.
He hasn't come to switch with him.
And he says, oh, like, yeah, I'm, I'm the photographer.
What for the White House? I'm Trump's official
photographer. But can you sign this for me,
please? Like, just like, wait, like it
looks like he's like 25 or 24 or something like that, you know?
But he's really young. OK, Yeah.
Yeah, really, really young fella, but it's like, yeah, you
just well, actually, no, he's probably older than that because
he was actually the photographer back in the 2016 era too.
So probably like late 20s or early 30s motivate that.
But at this point, but yeah, he he wanted he got an autograph
from Reggie and Reggie being professional that he is, he had
the correct marker in hand to be able to sign the back switch
that so it just shows up grey and everything like that.
So he's like very generous. Very.
He he knows Reggie knows the the place he holds in people's
hearts. He understands this very much.
Yeah, absolutely. And, and he's very accommodating
to that, you know. Shit man, but what?
So you're what? What about the whole exclusivity
question? Do you think that Xbox would
dare out of the word exclusive on stage this June or is it too
early? I, I look as somebody who
there's probably maybe like a media take, but it's like, I
like the competition because it's exciting, you know, as
opposed to, Oh well, you know, Xbox is losing this and Xbox is
losing that. They're just kind of giving up
and they're like, yeah, we got 4 game.
It's like it was so pussy for the last few years.
It's been so pussy for the last few years, right?
Like, just to put it boldly. You know it.
Is it has. Been they're just just is
they're just pussifying that everything was pussified about
Xbox. There was no drive and it's just
like and I was, I was very, very like, I was like, you bought who
was Asha Sharma? What does she do?
Does she know anything about games?
She's X AI, What are you doing? You guys have you guys have
phoned it in? I did not expect to be in this
position here, talking and waxing lyrical about this this
this woman who's come out in seemingly out of nowhere and has
done the unthinkable. Reinvigorated faith in Xbox just
seemed like was the was the domain of the most hardcore of
Xbox shills to to regurgitate and.
Here's why I think. Here's why I think Asha has got
bigger balls than than Phil, right?
Oh tell me gaming is not a disruptive space tech is.
All right. AI is, you know, so as a
disruptor, you have, you have no problem with just moving and and
moving quickly, you know, as opposed to, oh, well, do do they
like this game or do they like that game?
And Asha is like, I don't fucking care.
Let let's just make a decision right now.
That's, that's that's how, that's how I'm starting to read
her right now. Like, yeah, she, she may, she
may have been an executive, but in that space, you learn to move
things and break things quickly so you can, so you can keep
moving, you know, and that's kind of like the, the old
Silicon Valley tech, the of the early 2000 tens that I really
miss, you know, and I'd like to see more of that spirit come out
of Microsoft again, too. And I don't know, but yeah, I'd,
I'd, I'd love to hear, I'd love to hear more aggression out of
the man. You know, the, the make make it
more exclusive. That's I don't care.
That's music to my ears. I've felt so, so whatever, you
know. I felt like I was the lone
outlier there when I was talking about this stuff like an addict.
Addict just made a great point too.
Addict just made a a interesting thing that that I didn't.
I didn't even think about it until he said it.
But it's like to think about how it think about when it all
turned around. Is is when they all started
doing kumbaya shit, you know, Absolutely.
Yeah, it was Yeah, it was. It's like yeah but but.
That was exactly when it all started to sink.
That's when the game started to suck, yeah.
It's true, it really is true, but they've started going
kumbaya about everything. That's why I made the kumbaya
thing. I'm like, you have no
competitive spirit, you have no real and it doesn't show that
you have any faith in your own brand to stand on his legs.
And now all that is changing. So I, I can, I, I'm starting and
it's just, it's so early days and I, and again, I'm, I imagine
a lot of this is going to manifest itself in timed
exclusives more than real royal exclusives.
But if she has any real appetite to really make Xbox strong and
she's starting to really win those brownie points now, even
down to the branding I'm starting to see in the new logo,
all of that we are Xbox is a great, great way to bring back
the messaging from this is an Xbox emblazoned on a toilet.
It's so much so. Much about a microwave and
everything, you know. Fucking atrocious.
Atrocious. And apparently that was Sarah
Bonds doing. But the mandate came from up top
and there was no real. Resistance.
Yeah. Look, look, I love Sarah Bond.
I have, I have I have a lot of great respect for her.
She's I attribute like the the series S&X.
And you know, you can you can disagree whether it was a good
move or not, but it's like I thought it was a smart idea to
have a lower tier console, which I'm still using by the way.
You know the Crimson Desert looks fucking atrocious on it
for sure. Like.
Oh my God, I love Crimson desert.
I'm actually playing I'm actually playing on the Xbox PC
app. I I started a whole new run of
this 300 hour game on on the Xbox PC app just so I can have
those fucking Xbox achievements right, because I because I kind
of don't care about steam achievements, but it's like I
had 96,000 Xbox gamer score. I wanna I wanna I wanna pump
that pump those numbers up man fuck.
But mate. That that game is I've heard is
very very very stush on giving you achievements like You won't
get achievements after like. Oh, it's so stingy.
Yeah, yeah, I only have 6 achievements and I played 170
hours on it, man, you know, fuck that.
But I'm trying. So that's why it's like I played
178 hours on Steam with six achievements.
I I, I would rather invest my time in, in boosting my gamer
score and play it on Xbox. And you know, I love the Play
Anywhere programme. I know that it's it's hard to
do, but it's like that's why I chose the the Xbox version of
Queens and desert over the PlayStation because it's like in
terms of preservation, it's kind of better preserved on the PC
and the console now that as opposed to just on PlayStation
and the disc, the disc and PlayStation you still have to
make it download anyway. So it's like, well, fuck it.
I'd rather it sounds like the Xbox version is just a better
version overall then in terms of preservation and just, you know,
being able to take my game anywhere, which is great.
Absolutely. For me, that's that's the thing.
I'm on PC and I'm on Steam, right?
And now when the the next Xbox Helix things comes out, it's
going to be a very serious proposition for me to buy an
Xbox version of the game because I play anywhere because I want
to have that freedom to move things around seamlessly.
Xbox did it years ago when the saves got transferred over over
cloud PlayStation, I got boot up and I've lost my cloud saves
because I didn't have PS Plus stagnant there.
So it's this is that that that formula play anywhere.
All of that was all half warehouse.
Now you just focus on your fucking brand.
Focus on your console and the PC, which is broad enough.
That's more than enough. If you execute your plan
properly, the Xbox console and the PC space should be more than
enough to keep it going. That's a lot more than the Sony.
So you know, and I love fans, I've always enjoyed his takes on
his his appearances over the years too.
So shout out to you fans, but he's talking about time
exclusives too. And it's like, you know, it's
like, how does it, how is that really worked out for everybody
really? You know, sometimes exclusives
from Nintendo, you know. Timed exclusives, that degree,
you know, you've got Dusk Bloods, I think that's a timed
exclusive, isn't it? Or is that do we know?
No, no, no. That that's published by
Nintendo. Oh right.
Fuck, so you're not. Even so, the Blood Board sequel
was relegated to the Nintendo machine.
Not even. Nintendo, Nintendo lock that
shit down there. You will not see this, that shit
on PC. You you think Blood Board is the
PC port is bad. That's just I've never fucked
coming to PC unless it's emulated, which it probably will
be, but you know, yeah, in 2 minutes, yeah, yeah.
But look, I look again like I'm APC player now primarily
obviously I, I, I just spent, you know, the a couple $1000 on
this 5080 new machine. I which I have not upgraded
since 2018. I've been I've been gained on
the PC with a 1060 for the last several.
Years, that's must. You must feel like you.
It's a revelatory there. Yeah, Oh my God, dude, the pass
tracing. It was the pass tracing on
Resident Evil 9 Requiem. I think that that you said that
like once my friend Susie and Maximilian dude started to
showcase that I was like, wait, that looks way different as a
game experience like that's transformative.
That's not just fucking rate facing man.
This is like a whole new game and then so I so I subscribe to
G force now. I was like, OK, well, it's just
20 bucks. Let me take.
Let me get a taste of the 1590 right now, right?
And then I play Crimson desert on NVIDIA G force.
Now I played R9, I play cyberpunk.
Of course, I saw path Tracy and Cyberpunk and I was like, wait a
minute over RT OverDrive and cyberpunk has been around for a
few years now and it's like I've just been missing out by the,
the, the, the, the, the CS, you know, whatever Ray tracing on on
the Xbox series, because I was playing mostly Cyberpunk on the
Xbox series. The PS-5 pro now has decent ray
tracing on it, but it's like, well, well, congratulations to
PS-5 Pro. You now have ray tracing that PC
players had in 2021. You.
You just got it last month. Congratulations.
Meanwhile, I'm playing with, like you say, I'm playing with
the PlayStation 7 right now with the with, with Pat Tracy, and
it's incredible. You see what I said Listen to
me, don't I have so every time I share any footage of parts trace
Cyberpunk, which I've completed, I've completed the DLC, but I
love the game world. The world itself is fucking
beautiful to live in this. The AI let it down, but the
world design is so fucking incredible and with parts
tracing it just becomes even more immersive, even more
incredible. Immersive.
Oh my God, it's it. Well, like I was playing the
Record 9 Resident Evil Requiem and, and you know those zombies
that throw like wine bottles at you?
Like I was playing on the PC here and it was like so
immersive. I was actually ducking like,
like it's like I was dumb. Like I'm in a fucking commercial
for the from the 90s about gamers.
Like I'm in a sitcom or something at that.
Like I really thought that shit was going to hit me.
That's crazy. Bro, I'm telling you.
I haven't, I haven't been gaming like this since I haven't game
like that since I was 16 or 15 or whatever.
It's it's so cool. So it's like, yeah, like, so
that's it's like whatever PlayStation 6 is going to do,
this is like, dude, I already got the PlayStation 6 right
here, baby. And it's sing too much Star
Wars, too much Star Wars isn't going to do it.
But again, that's why Sony's pulling back.
But like, you wanted to play you.
Did you enjoy Ghosta Sushima, the beautiful Ghosta Sushima, as
Shuhe Yoshila said? Did you enjoy that experience on
PC on the sequel and gotta buy a buy?
Gotta buy a PS-5 then for it. And I respect that.
I respect that strategy. I think it works.
And I, I do respect PlayStation really going and safeguarding
their their audience because primarily it's been the
PlayStation, the console guys that have been doing it.
And I think the sales have been quite anaemic for a multitude of
reasons. Obviously stored delays don't
stored releases don't necessarily help because they
don't benefit from the marketing push.
But you know, Gene, I'm going to clip that fucking PC little
cyberpunk thing and you gave him more people fucking.
Well, can you just tell me what happened today?
This morning you I wake up and he said I'm fuck, fuck it.
I don't give a shit anymore. These people are idiots.
What was it about the Elden Ring thing that you tweeted that
pissed, that pissed you off? I didn't I.
Said, you know, like Elden Ring has never been my favourite film
soft game from day one. I was super hype about Elder
Ring, of course, because I, I, you know, people don't know that
I've been playing From Soft games since the fucking 90s and
I. Told you now.
Yeah, I I just mentioned a Toki. You know, I was a huge from
soft. I was a huge from soft Xbox fan.
They made Xbox fucking exclusive Ninja Blade.
You can, which you can still get on PC.
You can still get on steam right now.
Fucking awesome game. Fuck Ninja Gaiden.
You know, Ninja Blade is sick. It's all QTS, but but you'll
you'll never see, you'll never see cooler QTS.
They're fucking insane. But I've been playing from soft
games for for three decades now. So for me, like it's like I
tweeted Elder Ring had but but there's all these leaks about
the elder Ring movie out right and they kind of cool to me.
Yeah, the woman. Yeah.
They're kind of cool to me. So it's like, so I said Elder
ring hasn't really aged all that well for me, but the movie is
kind of re guiding the the the passion.
And then people started posting gifts as like like, like you
don't Elder ring go what? You should fucking die.
You're fucking insane. Wow, Gene is always saying the
craziest shit. He's always said the most crazy
shit. It's like, I still love Eldon
Ring. I still think it's like the the
best game of the 20 twenties. Like period.
Fuck Expedition 33. It's Eldon Ring, you know?
But even that wasn't. Enough.
It's like but. Huh.
And even then, just having a little bit of a muted kind of
reception of Eldon Ring got them fucking yeah.
Because that's. Crazy, bro, Crazy.
Yeah, but but because Eldon was probably their first fucking
game, these fucking children, you know, So it's like,
whatever, dude. So it's like I, I'm fucking,
it's like I learned my lesson. I I, it's, it's not cool to talk
about from stock games. Definitely on Twitter, but not
just not online in general. Like Reddit fucking sucks.
YouTube fucking sucks. Whatever.
You guys are cool though, yeah. I'm glad you said that, Gaz.
And. G like here's the thing, like
like, like I've been playing Crimson Desert and it's like,
man, I I like Crimson Desert's world better than elder ring
because you know what? There's actual fucking people in
it. Like talk to you as opposed to
just people going. And it's like, well, at least in
Crimson Desert I'm actually having fucking conversations and
relationships as opposed to this dead ass world of Elder Ring,
which I love, but for me that's what it has age there.
Well man, it's all just combat and Elder Ring and it's great,
but it's fine. Yeah, I mean, it's an
impressive. It's if I want the experience.
I prefer the original Dark Souls games.
I prefer a second row. Of course.
I prefer Bloodborne more. Yeah.
So. That's right.
I stand on Illinois.
I have to the third time lucky after to restart my because I
had to. I started twice on Xbox started
streaming Eldon Ring and then I had to stop because I've gone on
PC on a play here and I've start all over again Bears with
Sekaro. I did the stream here
Bloodborne. I fucking loved that game and
you know, it's it's one of those with eldering.
I still love it. I do, but I by God, the
community of fucking Ferrell. I remember posting a clip of me
and dealer just doing a Co-op on and some of the guys, Oh, you
fucking you piece of shit. You learn to play the game.
I'm like, huh, what do you mean you fucking play Co-op, you
bitch. I'm like, I just want to play
with my friend. I'm not allowed to do that.
And then there's another bit where someone's like, Oh, you're
such a bitch. You know that guy with the
shield and the horse and start. I was chipping him away instead
of like facing him head on. You're like, you're a piece of
shit. And he was like, Oh, if anyone
use I didn't use magic because a samurai that build and but
everyone's like, oh, you fucking use magic.
You're a piece of shit. I'm like, who are you Puritans?
Stop watching me fucking play the game.
You don't like you fuck off somewhere else.
I'm not here to please you, man. I'm playing the game the way I
want. But that's that's the the souls
community has those kind of fucking elitists and you can
just hear the sound of the asthma fucking inhalers just
going off in the background as the fucking 7 chins oscillate to
give you fucking advice that you don't want to hear.
It's. So yeah and the only game they
played is Elder Ring. The game they played is Elder.
I guarantee you didn't play fucking Dark Souls 2 if you
didn't respect you. Know or Sakura?
Or Sakura. Or Sakura, Yeah.
And you know, and Sakura was like, I think still the hardest
one. Yeah, Sakaros, but I think it's
the most inventive combat system.
I I always want to play Sakaro all time.
Bro same man, I almost like desperate to go back because
there's one boss I need to be to beat in that game.
It's fucking beautiful. Beach, beach hill.
Like thank you for the $2.00 super Gaz and gene gaming
streaming machine. Nice.
It's good to have gene here. I I always feel like really I
always want you here, but I was like, you're going through shit.
I don't. I just, I just want to check out
my health. OK, Good.
Fuck it. I'm not going to bother you and
be that annoying little prick. Get on my show.
But you said I'm like, you
fucking come on, Neil. Thank you so much, bro.
Neil, be such a nice guy. Thanks for the five memberships.
Yeah, I saw addict hop on. I was like, wait, if addict
because I kind of want to chat with addict.
Addict's a cool IT, you know so. I don't have a three man
overlay. We're all here, fawns in here.
Alex was here too, you know. I'm in Alex to chat all the time
too, so. I would, I would love Yeah, Alex
is Alex is fucking crazy. I would.
I would have invited all of you an addict in here, but I just
don't have a three man overlay which I need to invest in, which
I've been talking about for a while.
Shabetzu. But Congrats on the win on the
bet Gas. Claim your spice.
This is the bet that I said that game Pass would fucking take
away COD Gene. So glad you're doing well my
dude. Much love.
PS That slob nib is an absolute tit.
Oh God, thank you Charmaine again for that other five.
Have you guys been playing Super Meat Boy 3D?
It's low key amazing. It's been beating my meat for
weeks now. OK, I've not played Super Super
Meat Boy, have you? I have not.
I've been kind of like not really that interested in
platformers, you know, I just watched some Mario movie.
I was like, usually when you watch a video game movie, you
want to go home and play the video game.
Yes, and went home and I just played more fucking Crimson
Deserts. Actually, I haven't touched
Crimson Desert in over a week, which is crazy.
I just can't afford to do the time.
They just need to update. I'm actually interviewing a
problem in a bit tomorrow so. Fucking wicked.
Keep keep an ear out for that. That's gonna be the I think
that's I think that's gonna be the first interview since that
they dropped the game. So we'll see.
Oh shit, that's good questions to ask there a lot of their
critical reception how they feel about that as well, because
Metacritic scores and the shit but the.
Korean too. So it's like, you know, like,
like, let's talk about what's going on with us, man.
You know, like, let's talk about what's going on with us Koreans,
you know, so. Are you Korean?
I thought you're not Korean. I thought you're from like
Hawaii or somewhere. Yeah, I'm, well, I'm Korean,
from Hawaii are. You Korean from Hawaii?
Oh shit bro you S Koreans are killing it.
Bro S Koreans coming out nowhere.
I I used I used to joke in Hawaii that I I was actually the
the second most famous Korean in in in the state.
Who was the 1st? The the 1st is is Daniel Day
Kim, the actor from Loss? And he was also, he was also in
Saints Row, of course. Is he?
Yeah, yeah, yeah, he was. What's his face ever forgetting?
Chad, help me out. What was his name again in the
Saints Row? I'm literally forgetting.
The main bro, the main bad guy. What's his name?
Saints. No.
No, he was a good guy. He was.
He was.
I thought he was, yeah. Saints Row No.
I feel like he's. I feel like his name was close
to GAT. Johnny or something or
something? Oh no.
Oh, Johnny, Johnny, Johnny GAT. There you go.
Johnny GAT. Johnny GAT.
Yeah, yeah, he was. He was the.
Same sort of, though they're all.
Kudos. Well, yeah, they're all that.
Yeah. So I so Daniel's an old friend
of mine, too. I used to joke to him that he's
like, hey, we're the two most popular Koreans in the state.
You're just a little just way more popular than I am, but.
Oh shit, that's wicked, man. There's.
Some of you used to, we used to karaoke to get out of time
because so, so he was trying to do acting on Broadway and he was
actually king in the King and I production of, of Broadway.
And he was like, you know, Gene, I need, I really need to
practise singing. So let's go hit up the karaoke
joint and, and, and just belt some tunes, man.
And you know, I've told the story before on multiple
podcasts, but, and I actually tweeted this yesterday, but
someone asked me if I was a fan of the TV show lost.
And I was like, I, I know those guys.
Like not only do I know the people on Lost, I literally have
the same attorney as them, all the lost actor, all the lost
actors in Hawaii, they were always parting it up like crazy,
right? Like in the state, they were
always drunk driving and they always got arrested.
They all, they all, they all kept being arrested.
Michelle Rodriguez, Daniel Dae Kim, like like all all the
stars. And they all had the same
attorney. So when I got arrested for drunk
driving, Daniel said, I, I got a good guy for you.
And then and he's, I got arrested cause Daniel got
arrested too, right? We both got arrested leaving the
same fucking bar, our favourite bar.
And yet we have, we, we have our favourite bar and we both got
arrested leaving that fucking bar.
And I hit up, I hit up Pat Pat McPherson, my, my attorney in
Hawaii and he got me off the, the, the, the, the charges were
dropped. Everything.
I was majorly fucking drug. I was super guilty.
Fuck, but I got off on a technicality because he's a good
fucking attorney, that's how. That's how good attorneys work.
Well, that was ages ago. Statute limitations perhaps
implies. OHS ages ago yeah that is the
that that that that that charge has actually been off my record
for a couple years now so alright fuck I don't have my
drivers licence still he. Doesn't have it.
It's probably a good thing. Yeah, probably a good thing.
Yeah, yeah, well, I, I mean, I don't want to fucking have a car
anymore. But you're in fucking New York,
right? Fuck that.
I'm in DC, OH. You're in DC, all right.
Fuck that. Yeah, which you don't need a car
here too. It's stupid because there's so
many motorcades like presidential motorcades in DC.
Like like driving is a nightmare here anyway.
You have so many motorcades in DC.
That's why. America's weird man, I swear to
God. America's weird.
But yeah, well, DC is especially weird because you're just
walking down the street just trying to go to just trying to
go to the drugstore to buy water or, you know, like soap or
whatever, right. That and like you can't cross
the street because like there's there's a line of Escalade
because the Prime Minister of so and so is here and you got to
wait until traffic goes by. That's kind of sick.
And another lie. You know, the only, the only
reason why it's, it's a little bit more quiet than the Obama
years or even the Biden years because Trump never leaves the
White House. So.
Like. He's he's always just home, you
know, tweeting. Yeah.
He's just always home eating and watching TV like that.
Like that's all he does. He never goes out.
So like, like, like we're never really interrupted by his
motorcade. But Oh my God, everyone.
Else everyone else is going on. That's crazy.
Not gonna lie, BAE. Ash's moves got me feeling
parasocials. The champagne supernova.
Can I just quickly address this one thing?
This whole parasocial business? I have been taking the piss a
little bit. I feel like Xbox has kind of
shot itself in the foot with some of gang up cosy and stuff
and it seems like they about to do the same thing.
Ashes sending the code postcards to you, but you graciously
binned. You've got the shirts and the
hats and stuff like that. How do you think that's going to
pan out for Xbox going forward? Do you think that's going to be
another thing that ages well and badly because Phil Spencer
receded away from the public eye in the last few years?
Do you think the same thing is going to happen?
Is I'm putting on my PR hat right now.
You know, if I was going to, if I was their PR advisor, I would
actually just say let's, let's just, let's just make some
decisions and not talk so much, you know, and, and a lot of game
companies are always working. Even Nintendo who doesn't say
Jack shit, they still have they still have a Nintendo creators
programme, which is notoriously difficult to to even state it,
But then let alone even get into PlayStation doesn't really have
anything like that. I think they have their own way
do bad. Yeah, I don't know.
I mean, it's like it was pretty cringe at first when Asha, it
was pretty cringe at first. But I didn't want to say
anything about Asha because she just got the job like 5 days
ago. Like, you know, and she's like,
she's clearly like a millennial like me.
So like millennials like me are, are very like cringey when we
post, you know, yeah, we still post like a 2012, 2013.
It's kind of what he was doing too.
And it's like it's not. That cringy.
And it's like, you know, yeah, it's like her gamer score isn't
that great, but it's like she's kind of being honest about it,
you know, She's like, yeah, I, I, I did like Halo.
I played the Halo finally, you know.
It's like, no, she was yeah, she was quite upfront about it.
And I, I like that as well. And yeah, yeah.
And and then I know, you know, execs don't necessarily need to
play the best execs haven't exactly necessarily been gamers,
have they? And the proof is starting to
show be in the pudding where she's seems to have a more for a
finger on the pulse with Xbox's needs, understand I think.
Do you think like her outside perspective, looking in has made
her a lot more capable in reacting and making the moves
that she's made? I think so, but it also seems
like she has Satya's real trust in a way that Phil doesn't, you
know? That's what it feels like.
You're right. That's what it feels.
Yeah, that's what feels like. Either that or maybe Phil was
sacrifice because maybe you know Phil, but it's like, but it's
like if Phil was sacrifice for the brand because he was too
toxic to be attached, then why is Matt booty still there right,
because Matt because a lot of people hate Matt booty.
I will say you know, like like I've I've had my own issues with
mad booty. Most most all due to the tango
game works closure. That's the only thing that I'm
really like salty at him about. Maybe it wasn't even his
decision, but he was the face of it right, yeah, exactly.
Now I'm kind of turning around. I'm like, what if Matt Booty was
actually the secret weapon that they've just been, like, not
using this whole time? Like you, you see those FTC
emails and he's fucking blood thirsty.
Yeah. We can outspend them out of
business and shit like. That that's what they need,
that's what. They need and.
It's like, what, what if you let him off the leash?
What if you what, what if you do let him outspend Sony, You know,
like cuz you, cuz you can, you can.
This is why I said like, This is why I said This is why I said
you can't put the genie back in the bottle.
I never really believed that because anyone can do anything
like anyone can do anything. You can do anything.
You can do whatever you want in life, you know, just laws and,
and, and matters that are protecting us from from doing
anything, right. But if there's any fucking
company or that if there's any companies that can do anything
they want, Microsoft is one of the three that can do that.
Not even Nintendo or Sony can do that, right?
Yeah, I'm. Talking about Amazon.
Nintendo is very cautious, Yeah, Apple and Google or whatever,
and not, not even Meta, really. Meta can kind of do that.
But it's like, Oh, well, we fucked up and spent $70 billion
on metaverse, you know, and then Microsoft was like, oh, well, we
bought, we bought Call of Duty and, and putting Call of Duty in
Game Pass was a dud. It really, you know, I never, I
never thought that that would work.
It's like, why would you put it on?
Why would you think that it was going to work on Game Pass when
you can just get on a PC where most people are playing it there
anyways? Or people just buy it because
it's just the one game that they buy out of the air.
And it's like Call of Duty's not going to sell it, man.
Call of Duty's been around, you know, like, like you like you
need something new that is exclusive to the service or to
your to your platform. And you don't have that.
And you still don't have that with Field.
Starfield's not on PS-5 right now.
You know, it's like, it's like, I could try to sell you on
Starfield all day. You won't believe me because
most people don't they. Enjoy my.
Time you rather listen to Luke Stevens or whatever and talk
about how Starfield is bad. I like Luke Stevens, but I think
he's, I think he's kind of fucked up on Starfield.
Yeah, I think some content creators get the fucking hard on
the title and they feel like they're committed.
To they get so fucking hard just to dunk on Bethesda and it's
like, dude, I wish I could defend Bethesda more without all
the caveats because you know, like, here's the thing.
I I love Starfield and I, I, I've, and I was so looking
forward to this free laying update and turn Armada.
I'm like, Oh my God, space travel.
It's been, we've been wanting this for the past three years.
And then I finally play it. I'm like, you know, and then
meanwhile Crimson desert is like, oh, you wanted the you
wanted to ride the legendary wolf and the legendary bear.
Boom. It's there in three days.
It's free, by the way. Free.
Yeah. It's, it's like, it's, it's
like, oh, you wanted this? Oh just can you just wait like a
week or two versus like we waited 3 fucking years for
Starfield to to fly around in fucking spaceships?
Well, this is what the fuck is the thing he was talking about?
And I fucking blog that the Far East, Asia fucking them up, man,
South Korea. And you know what those guys
fucking, I rate them, man. The game is too big.
It's so daunting. I have such a fat backlog.
But you know, I really respect them because they spent ages in
development, then they just pushed it back and obviously the
game hasn't abundance of fucking game modes and content and stuff
like that. And they get delaying it because
they want to add more stuff in. And that, that, that
manoeuvrability, the malleability and that that
desire. You're gonna have to fucking
great time interviewing these guys, but you just understand
that. Wait, I'm excited.
You'll have some fucking great questions there.
But yeah, no, absolutely. This is what I'm saying, you
know, But there's do deserve their Flack how they handle
space took combatted shit like that.
But yeah. Yeah, it's funny that I just I I
started out by wanting to praise, but there's a defend
there's and I get internal I'm. There with you I'm there with
you at the same time, you know I I respect it.
I thought this is going to be I I said this could be the game of
of the Gen contender and then it just I I look at I ended up
playing the game and I'd scale it back.
I said this is not because you fundamentally just fucked up the
most important thing about this game, which is space travel and
you relegated it to fucking menus and you can't you can't
have that win. I have so many arguments about
people like that who are massively defensive about this
game. I'm like.
I do, I do think the I do think the space travel was fucked up.
I, I think people like I, I hate whenever people compare it to
Mass Effect. Mass.
Effect Mass Effect is not space game guys.
There's no travelling there. I thought you could just like
put like Jack Palladium from planets.
There's no space. There's no space.
Mass Effect never was a space. Mass Effect 1 was the closest
thing and guess what they get? They got rid of all that shit
for the rest of the trilogy. It's just a third person hall
hallway shooter with some dialogue toys.
That's. It and a menu that.
Lets you feel like. Pro planets, which is not even a
planet. You could.
Speak, There are like a million things in Starfield you can do
that you can't fucking do in Mass Effect.
But oh, but but you get a girlfriend or whatever like that
and like the sex scene isn't as nice or whatever like that.
Well, can you hear what you're fucking saying?
Oh, the sex scene is nice in the game.
That's what you're complaining about.
And also people are like, oh, well, I can't talk to aliens.
And it's like Elite dangers is the most advanced Star Citizen
too, right? Elite Dangerous is probably like
the wires ranging space him out there.
Guess what? No fucking aliens in there too.
Well, actually there are aliens now.
They're called the forgot the name of them, but you get
interdicted. But they don't talk.
They don't talk back though. They're not like a society or
anything like that, you know? But I do think they were missing
a trick there. But they.
Aren't aliens a Star World? You shoot them, they don't talk
back either, you know? That's true, That's true.
But intelligent. People want it to be like Star
Trek or like or, or like fucking BioWare.
It was like, dude, Mass Effect was fucking 12 years ago.
And guess what? Mass Effect didn't even sell
that well. Go look at the Mass Effect
sales. If you really think Mass Effect
was that big of a deal, really go look at the Mass Effect sales
right now. It wasn't that big.
What do you mean didn't sell that much?
Didn't sell that much? Go look at it right now.
Go look it right now. Mass Effect.
See. You you think that they sold a
lot too see. I thought, I thought it was a
fucking. Was it how much they sell?
Not that much. 3.5 million. Yeah, Oh.
Nah, that's gonna be right. Yeah, come on. 07 million
copies. Yeah, guess what Resident Evil 9
made? Made almost as much in three
days or five or five days, right?
Crimson Desert just sold just as much in three.
Weeks 5 Original Master only sold sold 2 and Dromedon sold 5
as well. Oh but it was a different time
gene. The gaming wasn't that big.
It was 360 Gen. I thought those are good numbers
for the 360 Gen surely? I mean Final Fantasy?
Final Fantasy? Which one?
Final Fantasy 7 remit. One of them sold about 5 million
as well. I thought that that wasn't that
much final. That's not that much either.
Yeah, well, Final Final Fantasy 7 originally sold way more than
that on PlayStation One. Grant.
Theresa sold more than that. Yeah, that shit, man.
Fucking hell. Yeah, so people, people get it
in their heads on the go. Why aren't you like Mass Effect?
Mass Effect was huge. Mass Effect wasn't that big.
Guess what was bigger? Skyrim.
Guess what was bigger? Fallout.
Oh shit, no, it was a formula. So that's why I defend Bethesda.
There's nobody out there in the space making games like
Bethesda. I I hate that people are like,
Oh my God, Bethesda's so outdated.
It's like no one else is making games like them.
I will say though, Gene, I feel like the creation engine is
starting to show its age. I feel like.
Yeah, I mean. They they need I also think that
whole I like the bits like some bits I really like when you
leave a fucking body in the way it is a come back to that planet
10 days later and it's still there.
All the shit is there. I love that stuff.
But at the same time, I feel like that game engine needs to
evolve. And I really question whether I
know Elder Scrolls at the next Elder Scrolls game is going to
have a lot of people just fucking glazing over it just
because it's Elder Scrolls. But I question whether or not
they will make the necessary jump in their gameplay model
that I feel like it needs to evolve.
I feel like they're playing a bit too close.
I'll tell you why, Jane. Because when I play Starfield,
then I go to fucking Cyberpunk. I'm like fuck it I'll Cyberpunk
shits all over Starfield. Well, here's the thing, like
like that irritates me because it's like I like cyberpunk way
more than Starfield. Star Cyberpunk is like a top 10
game for me of all time, right, like just period, right, like
one of the best games of all time for me.
But it's like I I'm doing different things in Starfield
than I care to do in cyberpunk. You know, I think that they are
two fundamentally different games.
Obviously cyberpunk looks a lot better.
You know, our direction is better, but it's like I, I, I,
I'm, I, I'm, I have AI have a moon farm in Starfield.
You can't do that in Starfield, in Star Punk.
Yeah, that's true. That's true.
But but, but but your your point about engine, that goes back to
what I'm saying about fucking Crimson desert and their black
space engine. Whereas like that engine, you
know, I'm not going to pretend that I know anything about
engine or, or, or whatever, but whatever they got going on in
Pearl Abyss to be able to just be like, oh, the players want to
ride the legendary wolf. Oh, we should have thought about
that. OK, well let's take a few days
and let's do that. Versus the Creation Engine is
like, Oh well, we can't do anything without making Fallout
4 literally worse, which they do every single fucking.
Time. Every single time they update
Fallout 4, they they just make it worse.
And it's like, how are you? How are you updating the game to
make it better? And it's like there's more bugs.
You're breaking all the mods, you're breaking all the the, the
creation mods that that we have. And it's exhausting.
And it's like, but does I want to defend you like 99% of the
time, but you but but you got you got it.
You got to, you got to lock it and and and and keep it together
and, and I mean, I mean. Starfield.
Starfield was wasn't that buggy, I'll be honest with you.
It actually seemed. It wasn't.
It was quite decent even at
launch. I thought that would year's
delay or whatever it was actually really helped them as
that was Microsoft's doing. But that's all ready to.
I know, but then. But then look at how long it
took them to even implement an in game map versus.
You know, yeah, I get it. Cruising.
Desert. We want to give it praise and
they're. Like oh you have a phoenix now,
You can just get a phoenix now as of yesterday, you know bro.
Bro, let's be honest, yeah, Far East Asian developers are more
talented. I'm sorry, but they.
But but the vast. Majority of them, are they?
Don't give a shit about crunch like like like we in the West do
you know, crunch, crunch, crunch as a concept is not like an
issue other than like if you die like at work or whatever.
That right? If you die, as long as you don't
die. It's like Koreans, Koreans at
school, like, like we don't get Saturday.
We don't get weekends off at school in Korea.
You know, like I didn't go to school in Korea, but Korean
students don't get weekends off. You get Sunday off.
That's it. Bro, I was watching your
documentary in Korean, fucking studied bro.
It is oppressive as fuck. It is so competitive and you
don't have a life. I was watching your documentary
and how fucking do it depressed. A lot of the kids work because
it's so competitive. You don't get any free times.
And I felt sorry for that. And I'm Asian as well, but not
Far East Asian. I'm still Asian.
I had strict parents and fucking they're just like bloody get
your fucking grades. You know?
It's never nothing's ever good enough.
Asian parent. I was like, Oh yeah, that's
actually correct. Hope we're here like you need a
you need a fucking Asian hand to fucking just slap the shit out
of everybody. You know, my Phil is like too
white and too soft. He's.
Like, oh, he's too soft, you know?
That's why we love Phil because he's like a little teddy bear.
He's so funny and he's so, so charming.
And he's like, Asha is like she's cute, but it's like maybe
when it comes down to it, she could be like, no, just fucking
that's. What Xbox needs, that's what
fucking and she even recognises the fact that western developers
are falling behind. And I love the fact that she'd
say it's very candid of her and I think it's fucking.
I think it's a it's a breath of fresh air.
Obviously it's very early days. It's 60 days in.
She's made all the right moves. All of this can fucking come
back and to the slap her in the face because the execution means
everything. Who knows?
Yeah, who knows? Like you said, like, like, like
I said, like when you were like, when you ask, like, you know,
does it give me confidence? And it's like, I think she's,
she hasn't made a bad move yet, which is, which is amazing for
Xbox because Xbox is always like, like, dude, like, Oh my
God, I'll be so mad of like there's some shitty news next
week for Xbox. It's like you can't, you can't,
you can't keep doing this. Have a good news cycle and a bad
next week or whatever. It's like, so far it's all been
good. And that we haven't had that in,
in several years now. So it's, so it's been
interesting to see that the, the, the, it's, it's been really
interesting to see her, to see her work.
I, I basically again see communications results and
actual price results and Game Pass cheaper.
I might actually resubscribe to Game Pass now.
And PC game pass is cheaper as well.
The Game Pass is great, PC Game Pass is great.
I have my PC right now that could actually work for me.
Where I can go, I can go go play Q1 or whatever right now, you
know? Absolutely.
Well, you'll be one of like a dozen playing in that game.
But yeah, no, absolutely. I, I didn't realise I had game
Pass, the sub also running, but I was going to cancel it.
But now I'm like, oh right, they reduced it.
Fucking keep it on now because they, they, they've got their
head screwed on right. I have a lot more confidence in
the Xbox brand even in the space of 60 days from from this new
change of leadership that I didn't expect.
But we'll see, we'll see. We've got fucking Forza Riser
coming out next night in a few weeks that's gonna be fucking
hopefully. Everyone's expecting to be looks
amazing. Paris is out there fucking
enjoying his life taking pictures of cars with his Xbox
project Helix. Hoodie.
That's right. That's why he's out there, Yeah.
Yeah, he's, he's just loving. There's loving life there.
We've got that and then we've got the summer show that the
Xbox big event, which is literally on the day of my
wedding, which is amazing, so I won't.
Be getting married. Thank you man.
Thank you, man. Thank you, bro.
Yeah, yeah. So it was a.
It was a. Lock it down, lock down, lock it
down. Yeah, it was.
Luckily she's as crazy as me so that works out.
That's always good. Yeah, it's always good.
Yeah, but not bro. Like thank you so much for
joining me, man. It's it's an interesting time on
the on the the cusp of what could be of transformational
change for this very, very ill-fated brand.
Hopefully can turn things around.
Gene Park, join me along with addict, which is brilliant.
Gene, thank you. So much love, love the Iron
Lords and. Iron Lords are the ones man and
and I love and addict has been just there, just sat there
skulking for two years and I've been saying fucking yes, addicts
say something in this group and he's been doing it.
Today is his day of reprieve and I, I understand him so well.
So shout out to Addict and shout out to you man.
Before we go to tell the people, what can they expect?
You've got some fucking exclusive things going on.
Let the people know. Yeah, yeah.
So hopefully soon I'll finally be able to finish my Crimson
Desert review. And I said on Twitter like,
you're not going to expect more embargo day of embargo day
reviews from me that much anymore because I honestly get
way more traffic if I just take my time with a game and I review
it like a month or two later. Like that's.
Way more traffic. Amazing.
That's amazing. Like you don't.
Have to rush like don't get lots of noise, just a little more
traffic or whatever like that. Like actually like, like the
most like read stories I've ever made in my entire career are,
are reviews like my metaphor review with like 2 months late
fucking like, like, like the editors of Washington Post were
like, Oh my God, like this was so successful.
This was huge. You know I don't.
Think anyone? I I think others can't get away
with that. That's a gene park thing.
Well, that, that that that it's because I am gene tier, right?
As as Paul Tassie said, and Paul, Paul can get away with
that too. But it's like, you know, like,
like, like, you know, we just had a whole bunch of layoffs at
the Washington Post too, right? Like it's just layoffs
everywhere, right? But they did.
That's what but they did we we lost like half the company, man,
it's crazy. Like it sucks, but they did like
a recent meeting like they did they they wanted to show like,
OK, well, what are the good stories that that that really
like work for us as a company, right.
Guess what was one of the examples?
My review of Silent Hill F What Silent Hill F and their.
Gaming was even in that conversation for the publication
as a whole is crazy, but for. The whole publication and
they're like next to Trump, Iran, blah, blah, blah.
And they're like look, look at jeans review of Silent Hill F
which I which I wrote a month and a half later.
But they're like look at how many subscriptions he got.
Look at how many readers he got. So it's like, that's why I was
like, you know what, Like I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna review
Crimson Desert on embargo day. Fuck that.
You know, like this game is massive.
This game is 300 hours. Absolutely.
And I, and if I, if I did review on the 10 hours or so that I did
play it on, it would have been a bad review.
Yeah, I would have, I would have because I didn't like the game
that much at first. I thought it was a cool game,
you know, I. Saw your PD has changed quite a
bit on on some I love. The game now I, I, I think, I
think, I think like, like I think Elden Ring is a better
game. To be clear, Elden Ring is a
better game. It's a better design game.
It is peerless in terms of dungeon design.
The boss encounters are amazing, I love the characters and the
flexibility of the of the combat.
I like Crimson Desert better. Damn I'm.
Having more fun with Crimson Desert so.
Fonts. Stupid ass story.
Yeah, the story is supposed to be ass.
But but that's it just goes to show I I don't really care about
story that much in games, man, because you know what the story
that you play that that you make when you claim that's the that's
the important story. If the game gives you whatever
story. You're telling you yes, Yes.
If the game gives you that those that that agency, then it can
make up for any shitty story. If it doesn't have that agency,
then obviously you're going to be in the firing line.
But that's yeah, that's why I mean, like the star feel like
the story isn't that great, right?
Like like I, I, I the story was OK.
Right. That's right.
But it's like I feel like I can make better stories on my own,
and I do. And that's why that's why I have
a lot of fun. And I think that's that.
That's a bridge, that's a a gap that like some people can't
make, you know, like like they they need to story fed to them.
And I'm not saying that that they're like, you know, like
lesser than or whatever. It's just their their brain
works differently or whatever, you know, or they can't they're
they're not really like self starters in terms of in terms of
in games, you know, they they need they need to start for
that. But yeah, if you.
Have a vivid imagination that your best stories are in your
head. And if you've tried DMT.
Exactly, exactly. That's me.
So yeah, look forward to my Crimson Desert review will come
in hopefully next week, maybe in the week after.
I also have another piece that I've been, I've been writing.
It's one of my longest pieces ever.
It's about Is video game writing bad?
Yes. Yeah.
It's a straightforward yes. But it's like, why is it bad
though? So I actually talked to a bunch
of video game writers and directors, including one who is
very famous, and talk a little bit about what makes video game
writing different from TV or books or film or anything so.
They're gonna feature in that piece as well.
They're gonna feature in that piece, too.
Yeah. So I talked to four different
video game writers and they're all quite prominent.
One of them is like really, really prominent, but but I'll
save that as his price. You've got some interesting news
to break too, so. Wow, that's a that's a very
interesting. You know, that's actually a
really good like the kind of topic I'll make a video on.
I have my own opinion on why it's it's bad.
I think it's seen that medium is sometimes seen as like a toy or
like an extent, not not as mature and people that the
writers are hired who don't maybe necessarily give it the
credence that it deserves better.
Seriously. Whatever.
Yeah. Yeah.
Sure, but oh, I'm looking forward to your pieces, man.
I'm subscribed to Washington Post and let's see the let's see
the dank memes. Thank you.
But yeah, thank you so much. Everyone smash the like button
and shout out to Jean. We're gonna end this stream.
Well, we can stream and a surprise stream and hopefully
everything I've said and my energy doesn't age badly as
Ashish Sharma does, you know, does the Xbox rake thing.
Hopefully the Xbox rake is a thing of the past.
We'll see. Thank you, everyone.
Thank you, Gene. We'll see you very soon.
Peace.