As someone who used to really like Phil, I agree with this. He’s clearly banking on his popularity as a “celebrity” within the gaming community to put a smiling spin on what is a clearly horrible business record.
The question here is not whether Microsoft does the same things that all businesses do (i.e. be evil Capitalist monstrosities that run people’s livelihoods over in the name of investor greed)- that much is obvious.
The question is whether Phil Spencer is actively enabling this behavior and also covering for it- which he is.
And that is why, as the article suggests, people need to stop treating him as anything other than a corporate representative who wants to extract as much value as he can before it all runs into the ground.
If you haven’t listened the How Did This Get Made episode about Morbius, you owe it to yourself to do that immediately.
They get into some stories about Jared Leto’s antics on set and trying to do improv and it sounds more like an Ambien-induced dialogue than a description of actual human behavior.
“Generally it’s not a good idea to tell people to refund and leave negative reviews when you’re a community manager. TIL,” Spitz said. “I appreciate all the support and I appreciate even more that everyone can play the game again without restrictions. I knew I was taking a risk with what I said about refunding and changing reviews. I stand by it. It was my job to represent the community, that’s what I did.”
They added: “I wanted to work for Arrowhead because they’re my all-time favorite studio. I got that chance. I’m thankful for that opportunity. I’d happily continue working for them if I had the choice, but that isn’t up to me or anyone else in here. I can walk away happy and I don’t want anyone causing trouble on my behalf, especially not to people I still have a lot of care and respect for.”
This definitely sounds like Sony wanted them out and Arrowhead wanted them to stay.
Corpos are incapable of learning the right lessons. I wouldn’t be surprised if the take away from this at Sony was to eliminate internal voices that were against the decision so it’s easier to pull off next time.
What’s weird about the whole incident is that anyone with even the slightest knowledge of the PC gaming space could have told you that this is exactly what would happen.
It makes sense. I respect the hell out of the guy for being honest and true of his morals and standing by his community, but I'm sure he knew what he could get into by doing that, and he took the shot anyway. I hope he's just been shuffled around elsewhere and still has a job.
Idk, Kotaku isn’t exactly a good source for ethics in this industry. They list something that every single large game company does: buy studios, move talent around, close the old studios. They also talk about how he claims to champion preservation and emulation, something we all agree with.
Yeah their head editors just left saying that they were being forced to write lower quality stories and things with agendas. I wouldn’t trust Kotaku much anymore.
Just as a heads up, when you post an article, unless otherwise stated, you are telling people that the source can be trusted. So, yes in a way you are asking us to trust them
They list something that every single large game company does: buy studios, move talent around, close the old studios.
Not every large game company acts this way. This is also not what he did at all - he didn’t restructure the studios after buying them, he closed them and laid off their employees.
They also talk about how he claims to champion preservation and emulation, something we all agree with.
He’s a known liar (just a year ago he claimed Arkane will continue to polish Redfall, now Arkane Austin has closed before giving people DLC they already paid for)
Phil Spencer has been the head of Xbox for a decade, a decade where Xbox consistently got worse. The only smart decision they made this entire time is Game Pass IMO.
I’d like you to name a large game company that hasn’t done this, I’m not aware of a single one.
This is also not what he did at all - he didn’t restructure the studios after buying them, he closed them and laid off their employees.
Incorrect, employees are being moved to different studios. I’m unaware how many, if any, are being laid off. For example, Roundhouse is being assigned to Zenimax who run Elder Scrolls Online which is admittedly actually a pretty cool game.
He’s a known liar (just a year ago he claimed Arkane will continue to polish Redfall, now Arkane Austin has closed before giving people DLC they already paid for)
A corporate hack who is in touch with what gamers want is still better than some other out of touch corporate shill, as the state of gaming exemplifies every single day. On the subject of Redfall, it’s no surprise that studio got shut down after the incredible failures at launch, they clearly were never qualified to work on the title anyways, and that’s hardly Phil Spencer’s fault.
Why are we quoting each other? I remember the comment before yours. I made it. Idiot.
It’s Phil Spencer’s fault that they released Redfall at 70$. It is his fault that he promised the game will be polished. It is his fault people who paid for the DLC will never get it.
He also closed Tango, which made a critically acclaimed game.
Valve has also published 8 games in 10 years. They did acquire Campo Santo studios between 2016 and 2018 which lead to the delayment of Valley of the Gods because Valve put the studio’s members on other projects including Steam, Dota Underlords, and Half Life: Alyx.
They didn’t close Campo Sango though, and haven’t closed other studios they bought historically (like Turtle Rock, which eventually became independent of Valve again and released Back 4 Blood).
Why are we quoting each other? I remember the comment before yours. I made it. Idiot.
Because quoting in a response provides structure to the response that improves readability.
Also, you are posting on a publicly accessible forum, not having a one-on-one conversation. In that context, that fact that you may remember what you said doesn’t mean that it’s not beneficial to repeat it for others.
The “idiot” comment was unnecessarily rude where someone was engaging in what appeared to be a good faith response, and only brings down the tone of your entire post.
It feels like people do it so commonly while making such weak arguments that it might be a bot trying to parse the prior comment. Feels like it doesn’t have use in any other circuimstance.
Multiple teams are being cut, at least at Arkane Austin. I don’t know the total heads rolling. Many of my friends are now out of a job. The severance isn’t terrible, at least for some of the engineers. That’s not better than a job, though.
Game Pass is a profoundly stupid decision. It doesn’t make it’s money back and now Xbox users are used to not paying for games. And from a consumer perspective, enshittification always eventually happens with subscriptions.
The article didn’t say he needs to go, they said people need to stop treating him as though he is actually on the side of consumers and employees, rather than investors.
The literal last line of the article is
I hope moving forward Xbox fans and the media hold Spencer more accountable for future mistakes, cuts, and failures.
The biggest stumble seems to be from releasing without the requirement initially, and making the game available for sale in non-PSN countries.
Other studios like EA and Microsoft have traditionally required their accounts on online games since release; but unless I’m wrong, those accounts are also available in more countries.
As always, probably a decision that came from up high, I assume everyone actually on the floor in Sony know this world be a terrible thing and universally hated and argued as such.
Very smart of arrow head to announce the update to get the public’s opinion before the change was implemented.
Article gets kinda weird at the end and calls the review bombing harassment. Seems like a 180 from the beginning of the article, unless the writer thinks Sony would have changed its mind with 0 protest action.
It also calls all the customers who don’t want to be locked out of the product they paid for ‘fickle’ and brought up gamergate out of nowhere, so I’m honestly not sure what sort of agenda they’re pushing.
The whole article was poorly written honestly, but yeah, that part really felt off. If the only thing they care about is money, then by nature our only real means of protest is to affect their money.
PlayStation often makes unforced errors that make you wonder how it gained such a significant foothold across the last few console generations and such a fiercely loyal audience.
Mostly unforced errors from other companies. It’s dumb decisions all the way down.
Yeah they both make a bunch of really anti consumer choices constantly, I never got the diehards who go hard for the console. Exclusive games I can at least understand, but is an Xbox really that functionality different from a PlayStation?
I was a Nintendo kid in the 99s, then had a PS2 followed by a 360, I really only got a PS4 cause the opportunity for a deal came up, and I only got a PS5 cause I already had a PS4.
Admittedly that’s probably where most of the fan clubbing comes from, generationally upgrading until you’re to use to the system to change.
I don’t think they would be ditching the table if they were winning tbh. Their goal is always to get as many people to subscribe to their stuff as possible
Let's not forget that with Gamepass, it's not just a better game by folding in PC, but they're doing something completely different with their consoles than Sony is. More and more, Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo are either competing with Valve or against themselves, and not each other.
Except for Nintendo, they’re still just doing what they’ve been doing for the last 20 years, releasing consoles with outdated hardware and relying on gimmicks to sell them, at this point they’re not even trying to compete anymore, Valve is a stronger competitor for Microsoft and Sony than Nintendo nowadays.
Still, raw processing power comparatively it is underpowered, can’t push beyond 1080p for example, which is fine for Nintendo games because they make games with that limitation in mind, third party switch games are a lot more hit or miss, especially ports of pc games.
Compared to even cell phones the switch is laughably underpowered in the year 2024.
Not saying it can’t be useful or enjoyable, just gotta face facts about what the device is lol.
Steam deck is starting to eat their lunch I think.
Playstation’s exclusives are on the whole, a lot more interesting to me. I honestly have almost no interest in Xbox because of that. It’s not the hardware, it’s purely the software.
I feel like we‘re not seeing/talking about the reason the console market is another duopoly. Its a harsh failure on cartel prevention laws imo. New consoles should pop up here and there yet they dont (very small opening for steamseck likes). Its not a healthy market.
At first glance I think the IP laws are the problem here. A new console should be able to run xbox games and/or ps5 games and compete on hardware and ergonomics alone imo. That way the competition would drive prices down and decisions would again be for improving the service, not the bottom line.
I think the answer is simple (they probably mentioned it in the article I’m not reading). Sony makes good hardware and good games. They don’t really need to compete with Nintendo since they kinda do their own thing at this point, and Microsoft is really no better. I also think Playstation is generally regarded as having better exclusives, even during the 360 era where Xbox clearly won.
My experience is that seems to be a US centric view that the 360 “won” it’s generation, I’ve never encountered that view locally and it’s ultimately not born out by statistics although it was the closest Microsoft ever came.
In the UK, where I’m from, it’s widely considered 360 won too.
The reason the PS3 won in the end I think was due to a worsening opinion of Microsoft towards the end when the original plan for the Xbox One was being discussed and shown, along with a lot of teenage gamers now being older with more disposable income allowing them to buy a PS3 later in the generation and trying out all of the exclusives they missed out on.
I don’t know how true this rings out in general, but that was pretty much my experience.
The north east for me. Pretty much everyone had a 360 and everyone still calls it “the 360 days” or something of the other. But might just be the people I come across. Only had a few friends that had a PS3 in school, they always seemed to be left out from what the others were doing gaming wise. Wasn’t until the PS4 until I started seeing people back to playing PlayStation by default like the PS2 days.
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