With the closure of 4 studios at Bethesda, catastrophic communication from Sarah Bond and disappointments among developers who were bought out billions, Microsoft and the Xbox brand are no longer really in the odor of sanctity today. It must be said that for several days now, the American giant has had a string of bad news, disappointments and clumsy, not to say catastrophic, speeches, so much so that a week before the release of Hellblade 2, almost everyone forgot that the game was coming out, even within Xbox I want to say, since there is no marketing around the game. What is Microsoft playing? Has the American giant lost the trust of its community? Is its business model based on Game Pass really a good idea in the end? When it is rumored that it is not over and that other layoffs will be announced in the months to come, everything suggests that Xbox has once again become this money machine that does not care about the creative spirit …
For a week now, the Microsoft and Xbox brands have seen their image badly damaged, even within their community and their biggest defender. “Xbox is done. How can we still trust Microsoft?”protested Jez Corden, Editor-in-Chief of the Windows Central site. “This is not the Xbox brand I want to see. I don’t recognize it anymore these days. To all employees affected by these closures, I want to say that I am deeply sorry”, also denounced the Klobrille Twitter account, specializing in Xbox news and followed by 162,000 people. Gene Park, journalist at the Washington Post, also had fun with the situation by retorting “one thing is certain: no one will believe Xbox when one of its spokespersons says that Hellblade 2 is a potential hit for us and for the players.” Internet users also dug up an old tweet from Aaron Greenberg, marketing manager at Xbox, who loudly proclaimed in April 2023 that Hi-Fi Rush was a total success and that Game Pass needs these kinds of games. Comments which were made just a few days ago by Matt Booty, the head of the studios who takes care of the dirty work in place of a very discreet Phil Spencer these days. “We need smaller games that give us prestige and rewards”, that’s what he said after shutting down Tango Gameworks, the makers of Hi-Fi Rush, which had started thinking about a sequel. Words which also dismayed John Johanas, the game director of Hi-Fi Rush.
There are actually several explanations for the schizophrenia that has been hitting Xbox for a few days, but which has actually been anchored in its DNA for a few years now, but which was not yet made public until now. This all stems from several things. The first is obviously the bulimic takeover of these dozens of studios which obviously cost Microsoft a fortune, but also because Game Pass is a financial pit that the American giant is in the process of creating. If we are to believe an investigation by Jason Schreier the day after the announcement of the closure of the 4 Bethesda studios, if Microsoft has decided to cut its workforce, it is not because of disappointing results or commercial performance. games from the impacted studios, but for reasons of organization and understaffing. Believe it or not, but this is what Matt Booty, the head of Xbox Studios, threw out in a meeting with Zenimax (and therefore Bethesda) employees, which means that there is a lack of personnel at Xbox, but above all that the almost impulsive takeover of Microsoft, also to respond to Sony and its domination, generated dispersion in the objectives. And if you doubt the veracity of his interventions, know that Jason Schreier recovered an audio recording of this meeting where we even hear Jill Braff (director of ZeniMax studios) say “It’s difficult to support nine studios around the world with a small core team and a growing to-do list.”
Has Microsoft had its eyes bigger than its stomach? Certainly. Especially in this race for the one who has the biggest advantage over Sony, the American manufacturer has forgotten one essential thing with its Game Pass: it is that copying the business model of streaming platforms, but adapting to video games, this is not the case. It’s not quite the same thing. So of course, in the all-digital era, in the era where people prefer to watch a film or a series at home, under a blanket in front of their 4K television, or even on their PC or their phone, it requires fewer resources than in video games. You have to understand that making a film takes less time than making a video game. So, not everything obviously and there are plenty of counter-examples like Avatar or the recent Planet of the Apes, but overall, we are capable in the film industry of making a film in 1 or 2 years, from the start of the production until release. And obviously, when we are a streaming platform like Netflix, Disney+ or HBO Max, we need content. We are stuffing the platform with all kinds of programs to sell a catalog to consumers. Of course, you need flagship, exclusive films or series to act as showcases, but you need content, a lot of content.
Except that in video games, making a good video game requires at least between 3 and 8 years minimum and other resources as well which are attributable to development. Result, 7 years after the start of studio acquisitions by Microsoft, we are only starting to see certain projects released. It’s long, it takes time, and in the meantime, well, the Game Pass remains a formula that is certainly interesting on paper, but with meager and niche content. Honestly, in 2024, does the general public know about the existence of Xbox Game Pass? We pick up 10 people off the street, half of them are unable to explain how it works. And that’s also a problem for Microsoft, less for Xbox, but especially for Microsoft. Because we must make no mistake, all these brutal and massive layoffs are above all the decision of Satya Nadella, the CEO of Microsoft, with Xbox not really having a say in recent actions. According to Jason Schreier of Bloomberg, since the American giant dropped $70 billion to pay for Activision Blizzard, Microsoft has been closely monitoring the Xbox branch. A buyout of 8.1 billion for Zenimax and Bethesda is OK, Microsoft isn’t looking too much, but 70 billion for Call of Duty is another story.
It must be said that Microsoft, like many companies, has been caught up by post-COVID. The growth of the service between 2019 and the end of 2021 has come to an end, the crisis and inflation have set in, leisure activities have multiplied and video games are even becoming too expensive for some. Moreover, if seeing Call of Duty land in the ‘day one’ Game Pass was obvious a few weeks ago for everyone, internally, at Xbox, we are still scratching our heads. According to journalist Tom Warren, the question is currently under debate at Microsoft, which knows full well that putting Call of Duty on Game Pass on the day of its release is a huge loss of profit, knowing that there is no There will be no going back once Xbox and PC players get a taste of the game available from launch at no extra cost. An increase in the Game Pass subscription is also being considered, because the objective is obviously to have a return on investment. Speaking of games arriving on Game Pass day one, there is Hellblade 2, whose external release is set for May 21, that is to say in a week. You still realize that the game is coming out next week and that the general public isn’t even aware of it. Preview sessions which were organized almost confidentially, no marketing campaign is there to generate interest, this is also the other side of the coin of Game Pass: saying that all communication is useless since the subscribers will have their notification. It’s also a way to save money.
In the meantime, Seamus Blackley, one of the creators of the first Xbox, criticized Microsoft’s financial decisions, thinking of all the developers who have just lost their jobs and their dreams: “I know the stench of decisions made by money men and how they destroy the lives and confidence of creative people. And that’s the tragedy. The games industry keeps forgetting, then forgetting relearn *the hard way* that it’s the DEVELOPERS who count.”
