The reader is not impressed with the recent performance of Sony and Microsoft and says they have done nothing to make 2023 a good year for gaming.
I have to admit, the fact that so many video game developers are losing their jobs this year is something that had largely never occurred to me until this month. Ironically, I didn’t notice this until after people started complaining about the Game Awards ignoring the topic (and giving developers little time to talk on stage), and then I read an excellent GC article about the current state of the industry and why so many people are getting laid off.
It made the point that while we all sit back and enjoy this year’s bumper crop of games, the people who make them are all sitting there fearing for their jobs. Not just indie studios but everyone from Naughty Dog and Bungie to 343 Industries. It is not the decision-makers who cause problems, but the people who are forced to carry out their orders.
This led me to realize that no matter how good games are this year, there are two companies that have almost nothing to do with gaming: Sony and Microsoft. Their production this year has been nothing short of pathetic, and their constant mistakes and missteps make you wonder how either of them got this far.
Microsoft has spent the GDP of a small country (I looked it up, Luxembourg’s $85.51 billion) on buying developers, and so far they’ve gotten out of it pretty decently. Xbox sales are down this year, not up, and after all the hype and hype, Starfield turns out to be little more than a wet game. Their best game this year was the digital-only Hi-Fi Rush, which they barely did any marketing for, and somehow managed to make Forza Motorsport more boring than Gran Turismo.
Granted, they’re now the biggest publisher in the world, thanks to the Activision Blizzard purchase, but none of these things are exclusive, so that doesn’t help Xbox, it just brings money to Microsoft as a whole. Maybe being on Game Pass next year helps, but nothing else has ever happened with Game Pass (or PS Plus) that has moved the needle, so I don’t think there’s much reason to expect this to be any different.
All these tens of billions of dollars, and it’s still in last place, declining, with almost no good exclusives and a president that has been promising for a decade Next year will be the moment things change, even though it never will.
At least Xbox has a boss, who’s not afraid to get in front of the camera. I doubt most PlayStation owners have any idea who Jim Ryan is or the fact that he’s leaving next year. It increasingly looks like he’s been fired, too, after his plans for dozens of live service games over three years were dropped before they even hit the air.
Naughty Dog’s announcement this week about the cancellation of The Last Of Us Online was downright bizarre; It felt like a rebellion, a slowing down of independence from the idea of having to make live service games anymore.
They wasted four years making that game, which will never be released, and we can only assume other Sony developers are in a similar situation, because they haven’t announced anything new in ages either.
Sony has done absolutely nothing all year, except sit on its hands and release Spider-Man 2 – which was in development long before the live-service mania began. They even managed to launch the PlayStation VR2 in February and haven’t announced a single other new game for it since then, just letting other publishers support it. Not even the PS Vita was that bad from them.
I remember those naive days when people thought Sony’s silence was some kind of 4D chess game with Microsoft, while they were stuck in their legal case over Activision Blizzard. But that wasn’t what was happening at all. It just turned out that Sony were incompetent jerks. Both, they and Microsoft.
If I sound angry, it’s not because of some sort of fan rage – I own both consoles – it’s because this inefficiency is costing people their jobs. Over 9,000 so far this year, and while this isn’t just at Sony and Microsoft, they are meant to be industry leaders, leading by example. Instead, they fumble like teenagers who use their parents’ credit card and don’t care at all about the consequences.
2023 can’t be considered a great year with these kinds of things happening, but even if you somehow ignore it, none of the positives have anything to do with Microsoft or Sony. The gaming industry deserves better than these two officials, but other than Nintendo, who are happy to do their own thing, there is no alternative.
I always thought Google, Amazon, and everyone else would be worse than the status quo, but now I’m not sure that’s even possible…
Written by reader Tom Meadows
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As gaming technology continues to advance, it has become increasingly clear that both PlayStation and Xbox are falling short of meeting the demands and expectations of modern-day gamers. From subpar graphics and outdated hardware to lackluster exclusive titles and limited backward compatibility, it’s evident that these consoles are incompetent and gamers deserve a better gaming experience. With the rapid progression of gaming technology, it’s time for a change in the industry, and for gaming consoles to step up and provide the innovative and cutting-edge experience that gamers truly deserve.