Level 62: Xbox's Next Gen Strategy
A review of Xbox's Games showcase, Nintendo's faltering IP strategy, and a new Nike shoe for gamers
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📜 This Week’s Notable News
Xbox’s Next Generation Play: Last week we had a deeper look at the lineup of games for the upcoming Xbox Series X, Microsoft’s newest console set to release this holiday season. Following Playstation 5’s impressive showing last month many industry veterans noted that there was a lot riding on this showcase for the future of console supremacy. Sony certainly didn’t pull any punches, highlighting new releases for the massively popular Spiderman and Horizon series, who sold a combined 23M units on the PS4.
The results of the showcase were...mixed. The previous generation hasn’t been kind to Microsoft, with both game and console sales not even breaking 50% of the numbers that the Playstation 4 produced. With the above in mind, Xbox needed to hit the ground hard with some exciting first party titles to get users excited for launch later this year. Highlights of the show included a first look at the latest entry in the Halo series, the official announcement of a new Fable game, and a first look at a Skyrim-esque title set in the Pillars of Eternity universe. All of which are certainly exciting, but with Halo’s questionable graphics and news of Fable leaking over a year ago the question lingered — why should we buy the next Xbox?
The answer lies in Xbox’s subscription services, Xbox Game Pass. The console blunder of the last generation has taught Microsoft that gambling the house on a new hardware release every few years isn’t going to cut it, so they diversified, not unlike one phone-producing tech giant based out of Cupertino. Microsoft’s investment in Game Pass is a radical departure from traditional console strategy, which has been primarily based on unit sales. Which console are you going to purchase?
💡 Industry Content
Disney’s resiliency compared to Nintendo: Nintendo and Disney are companies built on the backs of strong IP. But where one company [Disney] innovates and expands with theme parks, entertainment, streaming, and video games, the other [Nintendo] lags in mobile and meaningful IP expansion. Author Matthew Ball paints a sobering picture behind one of our favorite gaming companies and their stagnant ambitions for hardware and software development. He posits that there are cultural elements behind Kyoto-based Nintendo’s obsession with IP perfection over monetization expansion. But this is also a limited viewpoint. Importantly, he makes note of Nintendo’s apparent disconnect on how to make good mobile games, as compared to their console releases.
It’s not that their IP will suffer, it’s more that comparable companies like Disney have found success in expansion through M&A of powerful IP (Marvel) and transitioning to a closed ecosystem service (Disney+). Nintendo could maintain the static course, but ideally has the potential to revamp into a more dynamic, global presence. Link
Tim Sweeney on the Metaverse: Tim Sweeney, CEO of Fortnite developer Epic Games, joined Deconstructor of Fun for a podcast to talk about the Metaverse and voice his criticism against the monopolistic practices of Apple’s App Store. Read or Listen
I think the most plausible way the Metaverse is going to rise isn’t from one company even Epic building this thing and forcing everybody to use it. It’s going to be from more and more companies and brands connecting their products and services until you have a much, much more open thing that everybody participates in. — Tim Sweeney
Partnerships in the LEC: It’s no secret that League of Legends is trying to make inroads into the Middle East, where competitor Dota 2 has a large presence. Yesterday morning, Riot announced that it’s League of Legends European Championship Series (LEC) will be partnering with NEOM, the brand representing Saudi Arabia’s mega-deluxe, futuristic and desert tech city. Saudi Arabia has seen vocal criticism due to repeated human rights violations like the murder of active dissident/reporter Jamal Khashoggi. The announcement was followed by immediate backlash from both Riot employees and the greater League of Legends community. In perhaps a surprise move, Riot has quickly reserved course on the deal. Link
Riot Games on Revamping Company Culture: In the past few issues, we’ve covered the extensive allegations of sexual misconduct in the gaming workplace. For those who aren’t aware, League of Legends developer Riot Games has also had their own suite of sexist cultural issues in the workplace, and has since taken important measures to fix this problem, including instituting diversity and belonging initiatives across the workplace. To the companies coming to terms with their own cultural reckonings, Riot CEO Nicolo Laurent came out with a statement about leading a company through transformation. Link
🎮 Fun & Games
Fall Guys: This past weekend’s top viewed game on Twitch wasn’t GTA V, Fortnite or League, it was a new, debut title called Fall Guys. It’s not often that new games, populated solely by beta players, make it to Twitch’s top slot. However, this Mario Party-esque Battle Royale (backed by publisher Devolver Digital) managed to do through famous streamer key drops. The best part? It’s coming out next week for free on Playstation Plus. We’ve got all the signs of an instant classic right in front of us. Link
Yone or Yassuo?: League of Legends announced their latest hero, Yone, through an animated short. This is an awesome transmedia strategy that continues to build on their Runeterra universe. Real talk, do you prefer Yone or Yassuo? Link
Cop or nah?: Nike is releasing a video game-inspired sneaker, the Nike Blazer Mid '77 Vintage "Have a Good Game" 👀. Looks like an instant buy to us. Link
😎 Other Cool Reads
“On Making a Gay AF Trans Game”: This is a phenomenal interview with CEO, Llaura McGee, on exploring themes of underrepresented minorities, being intentional about team-building and creating nuanced characters in games. Link
In May this year, If Found made a splash. The interactive visual novel developed by Ireland-based studio Dreamfeel and published by Annapurna Interactive follows the story of a trans girl burnt out of uni returning to her home place on Achill Island. Importantly, the story that resonated with so many both in and out of the community was developed by a team composed almost entirely of queer, trans, and nonbinary developers.
Mine-craft: This essay’s thesis is that Minecraft is a microcosm and reflection of how the real world presents information gathering and information organizing. As a game, Minecraft celebrates generalism, giving agency to the player to own their choices. The Player is hungry, so the player eats. Player encounters coal on a mountain, so the player mines coal.
The optionality aspect is interesting: you can approach the game with a goal, but the goal shifts and changes as the player encounters short-term gratifications or as objectives change. In this sense, the game is celebrated for its directionality and self-determinism. No one is ever penalized for choosing their own goal, however mundane or exciting. Link
📊 By The Numbers
Roblox added 35M members in six months to hit a staggering 150M MAUs. The company is expected to pay out nearly $250M to in-game developers in 2020. Link
Indie classic Cuphead has staggering sales numbers — 1M units sold in the 2 weeks after its Xbox launch in 2017 and 6M units to date. It was just released for PS4 yesterday. Link
😍 Our Current Favorites
Fawzi (@fawzitani): I realized that I actually know so little about Roblox, even though it’s a hit game that raised $400M and has 1.7B created accounts. Those are crazy numbers and it can’t all just be kids playing. I came across a gnarly list of the most visited servers on Roblox. I know I’ll be playing on some of them, the numbers are out of this world (Adopt Me at 10 Billion+ sessions!!). What’s even more mind-blowing is that these are relatively small dev teams or solo-founders managing entire servers visited by billions of people! Link
Max (@MaxLowenthal): My day to day job is focused on Monetization — how much things cost, and finding new ways to make money. With that in mind I am always looking for new and creative ways to monetize a game. When one of our readers showed me what the most recent Trackmania title is doing with subscription services, it immediately caught my attention. Similar to the Battle Royale model, Trackmania is gating a majority of the game’s content behind an annual subscription. The notion that a non-free game is gating content behind a subscription is odd to me; will users really pay for a game and then a subscription on top of it? One thing is for certain — if this model works there’s going to plenty of money to be had for developer Ubisoft. Link (Thanks to Pause Button subscriber Tyler D. for sharing this info with me)
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