Microsoft plans TO invest 1 Billion Dollars - Xbox One games

There are some concerns about gaming on the next-generation Xbox One. The system doesn’t allow independent developers to self-publish games on Xbox Live Arcade and Microsoft’s used game policy is still unclear. The company did confirm that it has big plans for its in-house gaming studio, however. Phil Harrison, a corporate vice president at Microsoft’s Interactive Entertainment Business, revealed in an interview with VentureBeat that Microsoft is investing heavily in the gaming experience for the Xbox One. The executive noted that the company is planning to invest more than $1 billion for new content, including 15 internally developed titles in the coming year, eight of which will be brand new. The Xbox One is expected to help breath new life into the struggling gaming industry when it is released later this year.

HOLY Crap, as the title suggests they are throwing money at this new Xbox thing. As they said they have 15 games in development (ALL first party) and 8 are new IPs. Gives me some hope that they give a crap and are dedicated. E3!!!

• Internally Developed
• Not Third Party
• Not DLC Exclusive Stuff
• Not 60 minutes of gameplay deals

Source

What's with the TO? Time out?

Well that is a LOT of money. Hopefully it isn't all Kinect games...

I'll wait till the games are announced before getting excited. Who knows how many of those are Kinect games.

I'm willing to bet 5 of those are Kinect focused.

Honestly all I need is MS to show 5 really good games at E3 and I'm kind of sold on the system.

Big emphasis on how they plan -TO- invest.

They never said it will be 15 first party games They said it will be 15 exclusive games. Which again is not really a high number.

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I'm pretty sure they said 15 first party games.

Can't find the slide right now:

The most useful nugget of gaming info to slip out was that over the first year of the Xbox One’s life, 15 first-party titles are expected to release, and eight of those are completely new franchises.

Source http://www.digitaltrends.com/gaming/xbox-one-announcement-leaves-behind-some-unanswered-questions/

They never said that. They clearly said 15 exclusive games in the first year at their conference. But they never said anything about all being first party. People often misunderstand things. I think it was the same 2 years ago or so when all people believed some game at the MS conference was announced as an exclusive and all people went apeshit without even really listening to the conference.

Eight posts in before someone posted Dr. Evil I'm surprised it wasn't earlier.

You're really gunna make me scrub through the whole press conference so I can screenshot the slides that says it... Jesus christ.

Here you go:

15 games from Microsoft Game Studios. THEIR FIRST PARTY PUBLISHER. First party games are always exclusive, it's not like Microsoft is going to publish games on PS4 you wazzak.

I watched it. It said Mircosoft Studios but again that does not mean first party. That also means published games by Microsoft like Gears or Mass Effect for example which never was a first party game.

Uh... I'm at a loss. What DO you think first party means? Because you clearly have no idea.

However, a first-party game is a title which needs only to have been published by the manufacturer of the console (regardless of who owns the IP of the game). Examples of externally produced first-party games are the Gears of War, Heavy Rain,Uncharted and Ratchet & Clank series.

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Video_game_developer#First-party_developer

1. Gears of War is not owned by Microsoft.

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/7.268622-Epic-Microsoft-Doesnt-Own-Gears-of-War

2. Mass Effect is not owned by Microsoft even it was published by them.

3. WE call these games second party games.

@darji: It doesn't matter if they own the IP or not, it's still a first party game. Whether you like it or not, Gears, Mass Effect and anything published by Microsoft Game Studios is a first party game.

Sorry.

@chavtheworld: It means games developed by their own studios. You know all those indie games that Microsoft gets from conventions and publishes them on Xbox and then 6 months later end up on PC? Those are games published by microsoft, but they aren't developed by them, and it doesn't mean they are exclusive for that long either.

I bet alot of those 15 titles will be kinect and indie games. And the indie games will most likely end up on PC in a few months.

No they are not. Seriously do not trust Wikipedia. That is like the first thing you learn at school or in Life.

Meh I think it's just enough to string along a lot of people, to endure for years the lack of more first party content, appart from Halo and Gears of War-esque games and third party content like Call of Duty.

I'm not trusting Wikipedia it's the industry definition of the term ahahahaha.

What about this list of first party games from the 2006 E3?

http://xbox.about.com/od/e32006xboxnews/a/e32006presrecap_2.htm

No its not. First party are games made by Sony Microsoft or Nintendo. By their own Studios.

And this list shows exactly that.

Microsoft Game Studios exclusives:

Remedy not owned by Microsoft

Mistwalker not owned by Microsoft

Epic not owned by Microsoft.

Bioware not owned by Microsoft.

Too human not owned by Microsoft.

They do not even own most of these IPS.

Hey @darji can you tell me what you think a first-party game is then? I get @chavtheworld's version but I am not clear on yours, would you mind explaining?

BTW - I think the Mass Effect example is weird because it was a first-party game when published by Microsoft and originally an Xbox exclusive, but when it went cross-platform it was published by EA.

@chavtheworld: First party games are games being made by (MS/Sony/Nintendo) owned studios e.g. Halo or Uncharted, second party games are games that are published by one of the big 3 but made by an "independent" studio e.g. Gears of War or Rachet and Clank.

As I said. First party games are games by their own studios. Like Naughty Dog for example is a first party developer. Turn 10 is a first party developer. Nintendo Japan is a first party developer. You could also make the argument that it is first party if they own the IP but let an other studio make the game through a contract.

Also Microsoft never owned Mass Effect. They published the first game but EA always could remade the game earlier if they wanted to the only thing they had to do was to fiance the game themselves.

Isn't Bill Gates worth around 70 Billion dollars? Chump change my friend.

Not sure who to believe to be honest. What would you say Gears of War is - Second Party?

Sounds good. Can't wait to see what they got.

It is second party if it was published by Microsoft so yes. But Microsoft does not own the IP in any form.

TO!

Considering that the XBox 360 still hasn't broke even in terms of the capital cost for the project, this is a "double down" move. Unless they make the same mistakes again I don't expect it to be such a "sink hole" for costs. This isn't unreasonable to for a couple for the budget for the first year.

8 new IPs:

1: One Kinect Sports
2: TV Center One
3: Kinect Dance One
4: Dogwalker Kinect
5: Kinect Twister One
6: Kinect Child Birthday Party
7: One to Kinect
8: Kinect Moba

Start the hype now!

spending a billion dollars on content over the life of a console is really not very crazy at all. That is taking into account exclusive deals, advertising, and the estimated costs of games for this generation is 30-60 million. That means they could be spending (assuming these aren't small downloadable games or kinect trash) almost $500 million just in the first year.

http://vgsales.wikia.com/wiki/Video_game_costs

Microsoft sure loves throwing the word "Billion" around.

Really? 15 exclusive games in the first year isn't a lot?

Considering Microsofts track record with their Xbox brand this sounds like it's par for the course to me.

I could be very wrong though, I usually am.

How did this topic turn into a page long argument? Oh its about the Xbox one.

Anyway, I do hope Microsoft studios maintain a healthy relationship with studios like Remedy throughout the generation and rather than give up half way through like last time. Does anyone remember the name of the studio they opened last year? They did a press release talking about them focusing on the next AAA Xbox game.

If they count Kinect games, and digital games as well. No it is not. If they talk about 15 exclsuive AAA huge budget titles than it is. For example look at the Ps3 launch lineup. In there alone were already more than 15 exclusive titles.

@darji: Lets say about half are kinect games, that's still a lot of games for the first year if you ask me. I doubt I'd be able to afford 8 or 9 exclusive games plus all the decent multiplat stuff. Then again most of that stuff appeals to me as long as its not a sports title so I'm an easy sell.

That's about 3 AAA games.

If they count Kinect games, and digital games as well. No it is not. If they talk about 15 exclsuive AAA huge budget titles than it is. For example look at the Ps3 launch lineup. In there alone were already more than 15 exclusive titles.

What is wrong with digital game??

1 billion isn't really that much considering that it apparently costs in the range of 30 million to 100 million to make a triple A title and that generally doesn't include marketing.

Being optimistic its like 35 games but realistically its like 10 to 15, then if you include reasonable marketing in the billion, its closer to 8.

Not much money all things considered. Best case scenario given how much development and marketing costs are that will be about 10 games. If that's their big trump card they've had it. And I guarantee you that at least half if not all implement Kinect in some form or another to varying severity.

Honestly I expect a new Forza, new Halo, new Fable, and 7 other things that'll probably be more Halo mixed with a little Gears. To be quite frank their exclusives library is lacking and it seems like they're scrambling to play catch up.