Is the XBOX brand making a strong case about WHY it exists?

First of all:

I know why it exists.

I understand why people enjoy any one of their products individually.

I realize how the market is a better place if its around. BUT...

Besides getting timed exclusives and purchasing random IPs from third parties, the XBOX brand seems to really be making a very poor case for why it exists, identity-wise. Beyond having a company powerful enough to be able to "hold hostage" a set number of exclusives backing it up, besides Halo and uh...Forza...Fable? it seems to have no ambition in building a long lasting legacy that bonds people to their brand of products. They seem to play a never ending game of IP grab and drop ever since the first XBOX, and with that type of conduct, a solid sense of what to expect from them before each generation, is completely lost IMO.

I think of XBOX, and the first thing I realize is that its probably the mainstream console brand that perhaps has the less ammount of long-term IPs that I immediately get reminded of by association. It is ABSOLUTELY a perfectly valid console brand of choice if you are mostly expecting third party support, dont get me wrong, but if you remove the financial investment from the equation and simply look at how the brand builds its identity, you suddenly realize it has... none?

Its mostly a faceless box where you can play most entries of third party multiplat releases, and whatever Microsoft managed to secure or greenlit as an exclusive for that generation, that month, etc... or what outsourced studio was available to fill in their exclusive quota. There is very little that Microsoft proposes as a multi-generational calling card long time fans can grab on to and always expect from them regardless of the shape, controller input or amount of RAM in their latest device.

So, business-wise I know why its here. But for the sake of the type of variety only offered by distinct brand personality (something fueled mainly by household IPs or consistent in-house dev teams and talent), what the **** are they doing to set themselves apart in the long run?

People keep wondering why the enthusiastic gaming masses seemingly had no issues detaching themselves from the 360 grip when choosing PS4 over XBONE, after a decade of "green loyalty". This is why IMO. There is next to nothing keeping people attached to them.

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TL;DR: XBOX brand has no fucking flavor, son! Its a bland, vanilla box that runs most third party discs and a few random exclusives, but never actually retained anything resembling a strong brand identity throughout all these years.

If it was a flavour, it would be the water used to clean the Vanilla Ice cream container.

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Discuss!

Tastes like chicken.

It's built to take over Japan.

3rd party Multiplats are important, they make up the most of why consumers (beyond a system wars poster) purchase a videogame system. They want the ability to play current-gen games, which make up most of the quality releases.

If there's any system that you should question the existence of, it's the Wii-U.

Its existence is validated solely by Halo and that's it.

If you don't care about Halo there's no reason to own an Xbucks.

Nintendo's specific brand of game design and long lasting IPs validates their existence probably far more than any other simillar company right now. Its the reason why they are still around and profitable after financial bombs that would wipe out most who would find themselves in the same situation.

So no.

If you are using the Wii U's lack of third party as a rebuttal, this thread clearly went completely over your head.

magicalclick, where is Gears right now?

Who made the last Gears game?

Same could be made about Sony and Uncharted? Of course making such a claim would be AS IGNORANT.

@princeofshapeir:

Agreed. Xbox=halo. That is pretty much the only reason I have ever bought their consoles and that is also why it is so important that 343 get their shit together for halo 5.

Sony consoles always had more exclusive content than MS consoles. Even the PS3 had more exclusives than 360 and that was a bitch to program for. MS should have cleaned up with that year head start and the easy arcitecture in comparison to it's competition. Why didn't they get more exclusive content? Their PC support is a huge factor to though.

Also Uncharted is made by proven developers who can actually do other things and do them well. This is likely the final Uncharted game. Something we won't see from Halo until the day the Xbox brand dies. Sony make more IP's on average than both MS and Nintendo and they also secure more exclusives to boot.

Xbox's only argument is that it has better online, more apps, and Halo is better than any FPS Sony has ever done. Other than that, Xbox isn't exactly a world beater in comparison.

So ps4 exists because of unchartered? Which is entirely different because reasons

Other than that ps4 has nothing to offer except shitty indies only a few losers care about

Yes youre a hypocrite

Xbox lost its identity when Bungie left.

TC along with other similar threads about the Xbox is why i never owned an Xbox console.

Xbox can be summerized by Halo. It's an IP more iconic than Sony ever managed to muster up. The closest they got to it was Crash Bandicoot. That thing was a household name for a long time. And you could say Gran Turismo but the thing is, it's a car game and not so much an IP other than the name of the game.

To sum it up, Sony have never relied on a mascot to be huge yet they are by far the most successful home console manufacturer of all time. That is because instead of leaning on two or three core franchises since it's inception, they gave people new experiences every gen. 5 years from now who knows what new big franchise Sony has on their console. Something to replace Uncharted?

Xbone is the new water cooler

I could say the same thing about Sony last gen.

I'm not sure that even Microsoft fully know what they want to do with Xbox.

MS didn't get the console market to go their way (home entertainment system rather than pure gaming console) and now they just don't have any real ideas due to it having very weak hardware. I get the feeling that as this gen progresses they are going to move back towards PC and integrate Xbox more into that space. Not sure if that would be good or bad though.

Last gen the PS3 was the water cooler

@Thunderdrone: No, all of its games come out on pc and barely has any exclusives. MS treats indies like crap and the policy that they only release games that don't get released on other platoforms first is pathetic.

Like TLoU Re-mastered, God of War Re-mastered, Uncharted Re-mastered, Killzone again, Uncharted again, Infamous again, Little Big Planet again, Dark Souls again (different name this time but much the same game). Sony are milking all their old franchises again and again with the PS4. What have they pushed out that's new? The Order, what a pile of steaming shite that turned out to be.

They have some good indies but if you want the best indie games you need to be on PC (that goes for just about all gaming)

Instead of dumping billions into faulty hardware with Xbox they should have spent time and money making windows work properly on television sets.

I know it's hard to believe but when they released the original XBOX their games division was run by gamers. Now it's run by suits. That's why their absolutely disastrous Xbox One launch was, well, a disaster.

They are all about money they don't care about games. Sony are all about money too but they know the importance of appearing to be all about games to gamers i.e. people who are going to buy their hardware.

it's actually fairly safe to say that in a games environment Microsoft haven't got the fucking faintest clue what they are doing. They managed to persuade a legion of complete idiots that paying twice for their own internet connection was reasonable and on the basis of that went insanely over the top with the X1 launch and they also believed very weak hardware was not an issue because everyone would buy their box to watch TV and maybe play a game or two now and then. Staggering stupidity.

Sony also fucked up with hardware the PS4 really isn't 'that' much better than the X1 and while they have garnered the goodwill of gamers they have made a big mistake going for relatively low end hardware to keep the price of the console low it will bite them in the ass by the end of next year. All things considered though I would take ANY Sony console over what the fuckwits at MS come up with and also the old men at Nintendo who still believe shoving out a piece of cheap junk and charging full price is doing a service to gamers who will then get low tech versions of Mario and Zelda which they've already had by the ton.

Wow, gotta sell my Xbone then and erase all 360-related memories, whole 6+ years of them!

Gears is a better Cover shooter/TPS than any Exclusive cover shooter/TPS on Playstation, Forza is a better driving sim than any Exclusive Driving sim on playstation

Try to at least be objective and not subjective, the Playstation Doesn't even have an exclusive cover based shooter apart from the Order and Forza generally scores far better than Gran tourismo.

To say the Xbox only has HALO is extremely Naive and ignorant

'This is likely the final Uncharted game.'-Based on what exactly? do you work for naughty dog?

In answer to the TC, Neither the Xbone or the Ps4 have justified there existence this gen, the Xbone shares all it's exclusives with other Hardware and all we see on the Ps4 is Remasters or flops, i wouldn't drop the money they are asking on either of these consoles if my life depended on it.

Saying that, they are both Great Multiplat machines if you cannot afford a gaming rig.

Than again, the Xbox 360 and Ps3 are still a great multiplat machines if you can't afford a gaming rig.

And if you own a 360 , the icing on the cake, you Don't have to even buy a new console to play next gen Xbox titles like Forza Horizon 2 and titanfall.

Thats the Joke really, why the F*** would i go out and buy an Xbone when i can play most of it's so called Exclusives on my 360.

Why the F*** would i go out and buy a PS4 when i can play TLOU, Uncharted Trilogy remastered on a much cheaper Ps3.

This gen should be called the Generation of the Joker, you all spent all that money for virtually nothing, should have waited till they actually had the games to justify the Price, Would have cost you less then.

I'd actually argue that it had a stronger case for existing last gen than Sony did. It was the go-to for social ad generally competitive gaming on console. That was it's legacy, and most loved it for that. It's definitely faded a bit from that now, but there's still a lot of residual love and loyalists for the brand on that basis. What the hell was PS3 last gen? It did almost literally nothing better than the 360 did except a few exclusives. Microsoft popularized the indie console scene with XBLA. Microsoft retained the best social console gaming hub. Microsoft retained the easiest to use console interface (this is obviously subjective, but it's so heralded it's practically objective.) I'm a PS4 guy this gen, but this question posed by the TC is so incredibly paltry in depth and inconsequential. It could be effectively posed to any losing console.

Not really, because Uncharted wasn't around for the PS1 and PS2 era, and if you buy a Sony console just to play Uncharted you have pretty shit taste. I hate those games but still value the PS3/PS4 because of all the other great games on the console.

There's nothing else on Xbox except for Halo and racing games. And Gears maybe. But Halo and racing games have been a fixture of the Xbox brand since the original Xbox.

This is dumb... you can make a case like this for PS & Ninty as well. So what if Xbox has a few big-name IPs... so do the others.

Its identity has been and still is the go-to console for online gaming.

PSN is still shit and Nintendo... lol

Not really. PS3 had Uncharted 2, MGS4, LBP, TLOU, and Demon Souls (all GOTY award winners)

Xbone has nothing to its name but TV and Sports watercooler talk.

Well apart from the better network service, different controller and party chat

legend players in fifa are xbox only and i like to play with those legends

some have a street value of 2000$

No japaneser rpg can top me scoring with a legend player in a good game

here you have those (new) legends for fifa 15 and that's not counting the ones that already released in fifa 2014

FIFA ultimate team has more revenue in one year. than all playstation4 exclusives together

So yeah, that flavor is my kind of thing

So much jelly of Forza Horizon 2's greatness around here.

After the Xbone reveal debacle, they are slowly realizing this.

I think it will make a strong one at e3

Xbox should just be a windows app on a PC

@Thunderdrone: halo forza gears. It's cliche but it's true and those are popular games. Gears 1 was one of last gens best. Halo is a blockbuster and forza is the first franchise to give gran tourism a run for its money. Xbox has other good games too like chrome hounds and steel Battalion ,mech assault. More than enough to stand on its own, and they're the only console to take big risks. ,Steel Battalion kinetic sucked but the one before is without equal. It was 720 p before 480i was popular. Just a shame none of the big 3 or 4 if u count steam are willing to be risky anymore. We are in a dark age of gaming again, we need a new player like Google apple Samsung or amazon to shake the industry to its core. All any of them need to do is get behind a new groundbreaking ip similar to Microsoft and halo to make things fresh again. I suspect we will have one new big player soon and it will save the industry.

Personally, I would get an X1 if they came out with a Fable Game, I mean a real fable game that was on the scale of skyrim that would be kickass :P My ps4 would be gone with the quickness...

They had a lot of ambition in building a long lasting legacy that bonds people to their brand and they worked hard to build their identity off of something that Nintendo and Sony ignored for so many years. It's called Xbox Live. When people think about the best console for online gaming, they think Xbox. And many people are bond to the brand because of Xbox Live; I know I am; Xbox consoles could have nothing but multiplats and I would continue to buy them soley because of Xbox Live.

I hate when people act like the only reason people buy Xbox is because of Halo. I hate Halo and think it is one of the most overrated franchises ever yet I love Xbox.

Yeah sure. They are actually competitive, a market exists that buys their shit, and regardless of how SW treats these franchises Halo has a passionate fanbase, Forza has a fanbase, Gears of War is still a block buster. In between Microsoft bets on an exclusive here and there like a Remedy title or helping Platinum on their mercenary dev status by publishing Scalebound.

Their original identity of PC styled games on consoles is no longer much of an identity, since the consoles are dumbed down PC's for the console audience, but beyond that Microsoft validates their brand product perfectly fine by the most important measure: they actually have mind share, they sell, and more video game developers give a shit about their platform than say I don't know a Nintendo console.

/thread

You are a knucklehead if you say so. The 360 had more to offer in terms of quality games than PS3 and Wii combined.

I think Xbox has been ran fine with the exception of the Mattrick years. That period was a disaster and they're still suffering from it because he oversaw the design of X1.

It's not really the Xbox brand perse' but the XBO specifically. With M$ making the decision to transition a lot of it's "exclusives" to the windows platform, it negates the reason to own an XBO.

The Ps4 did justify its existence though, are you forgetting the PS4 just got an exclusive that has currently a 93 metacritic score?

Biggest load of fanboy shit I've smelled in SW all year. Damn, you must be one hell of a blind loyalist to believe that.

Bet the 360 is the only console you played last gen.

Line up all the quality Wii exclusives, PS3 exclusives and multiplats and list them against the entire 360 library. Your statement is bananas.

Remember, the Xbone isn't the 360.

With MS as good as saying "**** our first party devs who are developing a reboot for a classic IP, how dare they want more money" yet have the money to make some of the most retarded deals in gaming, yeah I agree.

Say what you want about Sony or Nintendo, at least they work on their IPs first and make silly deals later.

I've made it no secret at this forum that my big problem with X1 is the hardware. Imo they botched that BADLY. A company as big and profitable as MS getting outdone in R&D by Sony whom is bleeding cash is just plain disgraceful. It blows my mind how willing they are to throw around huge sums of cash on advertising and timed exclusivity deals and getting craploads of apps on their dash and whatnot yet were apparently completely unconcerned about the quality of their hardware. X1 is only half the system it could and should have been. 1.8 tflops from a broke-ass company like Sony doesn't much surprise me but I was expecting something like 2.5 tflops from the economic juggernaut that is MS ... certainly not the bad joke that 1.3 tflops is.