Microsoft CEO: We're Investing Aggressively in Gaming

https://wccftech.com/microsoft-ceo-investing-aggressively/

"Microsoft hosted the yearly shareholders meeting conference call yesterday. Among various topics, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella talked about the company’s plans to invest aggressively in content, community and cloud services for gaming.

[…] in gaming, we’re pursuing an expansive opportunity from the way the games are created and distributed to how they’re played and viewed. And we’re investing aggressively in the content, community and cloud services across every endpoint to expand the usage and deepen engagement with gamers, including the 57 million monthly Xbox Live users. Finally, we added seven new gaming studios to bolster the first party content for fast growing gaming services like Xbox Game Pass subscription service as well as Mixer."

In case anyone was wondering MS is not leaving gaming and is Going in Balls Deep! What it looks like will not live up to typical console war numbers and BS.

To be Clear this is not a PR pitch to gamers and consumers. This is The CEO telling Shareholders how their money is being spent.

Great to hear. Exciting times ahead. ??

seems like they are doing the important things right, hopefully the games turn out well

Good stuff, this was already clear to me over the last year or 2, if you follow all the stuff they did in gaming you'll see they invest in many other things not just the upcoming "exclusive" games which everyone keeps talking about.

As a consumer of their products Im just pleased to see their support, whether or not more "exclusives" are coming out soon or in 2 years it makes no difference to me now already have too much to play and I'm a big fan of Forza/H/G so I got what I wanted, just nice to see them being more aggressive now as opposed to them being more quiet in the past leading up to the release of the X and shortly after. I think the success of the X and Gamepass, and even the failures they had, all a learning process for them to go full throttle when the timing is right.

System Warriors are going to go Nuts! Everyone will be able to play their games without a Console soon or maybe even a PC, or at least a gaming PC. Some might try to rub in Lems face but don't realize they will patronizing the same company.

As long as they put out a great console and games that are meant for it I will be happy.

It's nice to see MS is taking this gaming more seriously into next-gen consoles, planting the seeds for tomorrow is the best way to do it now and take gaming development more demanding. It's great hearing MS has learned from their mistakes with this gen and all you can do now is prepare for next-gen is all MS can do at this point.

Because of Gamepass. MS is going to push gamepass hard and in-order for it to succeed as the new model for gaming, they need content which they will not be short off in the coming years.

1. if it wasn't PR...you wouldn't be reporting it now because it wouldn't be publicly announced. SMFH

2.

Check the date....

That is all.

@tgob89: 6 studios in one year. Counter that.

The ultra Consumer friendly moves and services along with new tech like the Adaptive controller for people with disabilities have been great. Loving this new MS hope it does not change.

Also the level of community contact From Phil, Mike Ybarra and others is great.

Side note: Iron Lords Podcast YouTuber King David said he talked to Mike and Phil separately at E3 last year and both told him "Wait until you see next year!" They are going Big into Gaming!

@tgob89 said:

@the-a-baum said:

https://wccftech.com/microsoft-ceo-investing-aggressively/

"Microsoft hosted the yearly shareholders meeting conference call yesterday. Among various topics, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella talked about the company’s plans to invest aggressively in content, community and cloud services for gaming.

[…] in gaming, we’re pursuing an expansive opportunity from the way the games are created and distributed to how they’re played and viewed. And we’re investing aggressively in the content, community and cloud services across every endpoint to expand the usage and deepen engagement with gamers, including the 57 million monthly Xbox Live users. Finally, we added seven new gaming studios to bolster the first party content for fast growing gaming services like Xbox Game Pass subscription service as well as Mixer."

In case anyone was wondering MS is not leaving gaming and is Going in Balls Deep! What it looks like will not live up to typical console war numbers and BS.

To be Clear this is not a PR pitch to gamers and consumers. This is The CEO telling Shareholders how their money is being spent.

1. if it wasn't PR...you wouldn't be reporting it now because it wouldn't be publicly announced. SMFH

2.

Check the date....

That is all.

There are Thousands upon thousand of Shareholders. Not very hard for any reporter to hear the call.

This again is for the Shareholders first and foremost telling them how they plan to make more money!

This aint Unisef. this is a business you see? Maybe one day Unisef will get into the video game business and revolutionize the whole industry, but for now... (That was a Joe Dirt reference for you kids out there)

@Pedro said:

@tgob89: 6 studios in one year. Counter that.

XD

Its about time.

Moving in the right direction MS, good stuff.

I'm hoping MS stay committed the studio acquisitions show they are going in the right direction regards to competition. Results wont be determined until next generation this current gen cant end quick enough for phil spencer.

But all I ever hear is Microsoft is leaving gaming. ROFLMAO! Yes, technically Microsoft is in last place, but they obviously see they can make money or are making money. If not why would they keep investing in this? Microsoft is known to pull the plug on projects if they are not working. *cough* *cough* Nokia!

I can't wait to see what Microsoft, Nintendo, and Sony do next. Great gaming times we live in!

Kind of surprised nobody picked up on the 57 million active monthly Xbox live users?

@the-a-baum said:

Kind of surprised nobody picked up on the 57 million active monthly Xbox live users?

That is a lot more then I thought they would have.

@Xabiss said:

@the-a-baum said:

Kind of surprised nobody picked up on the 57 million active monthly Xbox live users?

That is a lot more then I thought they would have.

Somebody else is going to start a "57 million Xbox live users" thread and Cows will Stampede it! lol

Cool. Doubling down on the multiplat strategy. As long as I don't have to continue buying the dedicated hardware, it's all good.

Yep, great to see. The next 3 years or so are going to be very interesting (and exciting, as an Xbox gamer).

@Pedro: Depends on what these new studios make and I'm hoping it's new games rather than on the usual 4 Ms ip(I know there's a couple more old ones I just can't remember them)

Im interested to see what ms do next gen all we hear Phil spencer say is we are not doing generations but I can't see that working.

'investing aggressively in gaming' is what you would have expected them to do BEFORE releasing the Xbox One, not years later after it's dead and buried.

@hrt_rulz01: ehhhh, doubtful. Things will most likely get exciting in 2 years. New system by then most likely and one or two possible games from the acquired devs.

Why not?

I'm glad they got over the "exclusives don't matter" phase. Lord that was some Bee Ess. I always thought MS could be a force for good in gaming but they were in the woods there for this gen. Here's hoping for some new great games. If you got great games, I will buy your console. It's never been a complicated thing with me.

I think bc held back the Xbox one this generation I want them fully focused on next gen hardware to start competing.

@hrt_rulz01: I know you were not talking to me but,

The no generation thing won't work because the old hardware will hold back the new hardware and new games. Unless they put Xcloud on the current boxes.

I don't think the old consoles will be supported forever... there'll be a point where they are discontinued and no longer supported (like iPhones). Then the XB1X will become the "base" console, and so on.

Like you said, the old consoles will probably just become stream boxes eventually.

Older systems as streaming boxes is the only way it could work. I have a feeling ms will drop the S very quickly. If the new system comes 2020 we will go into the last 12 months of support.

The Competetion next gen will be great. the PS4 has been shitting on the Xbox this gen

I guess MSoft really didn't like that and they plan on going to go all out next gen.

Let's see how it plays out.

I hope for a competitive ms the aggressive style they were at the start of the 360 gen.

Well that's something to look forward to especially if they encourage new IPs. It would be foolish for MS to invest in these companies to constrain diversity in content.

Nah

BC didn't hold X1 back, MS's greedy and lazy ass corporate market approach held it back.

1. They obviously had ZERO intention to invest in AAA games this generation was hopping to piggy back completely off 3rd party support the entire generation.
2. All the AAA games that MS released this gen were games that started development during 360's time.
3. MS tried to change the narrative to suggest that no one cared about single player games anymore so they could push cheap, low quality, budget level titles like Sea of Thieves for easy reoccurring service money.
4. BC was only a continuous effort by MS to distract from the fact that they weren't investing in any current generation AAA games.

Now that they have folded because their attempt to cripple the gaming market of quality games failed, they are finally doing what they should have done as a gaming company from the beginning...make some real damn games.

Is it what you would expect them to do before releasing their next console, though? This is future building for next gen, not trying to close the gap for the current gen.

The 360 was popular but I saw no reason to purchase the system because the games were less interesting than that of the PS3. So, I hope they don't go back to the staleness of the 360.

Yeah I get that it's them trying to avoid making exactly the same mistake next gen but really, how does any company with a games console fail to invest aggressively in gaming?

How did it take Phil Spencer years to realise that his games console actually needs games? Hilarious really. He even tried to cover up his total and absolute **** up by dumping all Xbox exclusives on PC to make it look like he sold a few games. Total jackass.

Its disingenuous to say that they didn't invest in games for the Xbox One. Sunset Overdrive, Ryse, Ori and the Blind Forest, Recore, Kinect Sports Rivals, Sea of Thieves, Quantum Break, Max: The Curse of the brotherhood and then there are the no shows, Scalebound, Fable Legend, Phantom Dust. Then we have the long awaited Crackdown 3. So they did invest in games but the system was poorly received and managed causing the closer of studios thus the "reset" with the Xbox One S and X.

As long as MS does not read the market wrong.

It would be rather interesting to see them read the market wrong again. LOL.

@Pedro: Phantom Dust got remastered and was given away for free initially, so you can scratch that one off of your list.

From Industry Insider @Klobrille on Twitter:

"Alright. Let’s talk about the elephant in the room. Microsoft Studios growth isn’t done yet. They are in active talks with multiple studios - both big and small. Some of which might you surprise more than others. It’s early for all of them though. 2019 will continue this story."

He was the first to report Obsidian being purchased by Microsoft. Where there is smoke there is fire. And the future of Xbox is Beast Fire as of late!

Nope. It was supposed to be a new game to be developed by Darkside Game Studios.

Thought it was a remake not an entirely new game.

Good on microsoft. Competition is a great thing.

I've noticed! They've had a stellar year in terms of building a promising future. I just wish they'd make game pass fully compatible with PC.

I’ll believe it when I see it!

I hope they do not do that. If gaming goes in the direction streaming services are going now, with each company trying to make their own platform, taking away content from other platforms that already had it (think Disney's latest move as well as Cartoon Network), we'll end up with multiple different services one would have to invest in to get everything. You can already see them beginning to go down this road with the disc-less xbox. They tried it with the always online DRM fiasco at the beginning of 2013; what they've done now is simply repackage the same deal with a 'consumer-friendly' PR image.

Also, expect Sony to do something similar. Sony is already the highest grossing gaming company from streaming, so in a sense they are ahead of MS here. If one thinks that Sony won't try something like what I'm saying here, they are sincerely mistaken. Nintendo is most likely considering it as well.