Futility, thy name is XBox

I was looking over the VGChartz table that I linked in my previous post, and I noticed something interesting.

I used VGChartz's Tie-Ratio tab for my cost-benefit analysis of Game Pass, but gaming system Tie-Ratios aren't the only data available to us. Tie-Ratio is the number of games sold for every console. To calculate a Tie Ratio, you naturally must know: 1. the number of games sold, and 2. the number of consoles sold. And VGChartz have, helpfully, broken those numbers out separately.

And if you switch from Tie-Ratio to just look at the hardware numbers, you can see something interesting.

E3's winners and losers

So, it's that time again... when everybody looks back, and tries to decide who "won" E3 2018. I thought Microsoft had the best press conference, but that Sony would probably be declared the winner by most commentators, but how do those predictions stack up to reality?

ScreenRant named XBox, Sony, Bethesda, and Ubisoft as their winners, while declaring Nintendo, Square Enix, and EA to be the letdowns of E3 2018. [Oh, shit, Ubisoft! I forgot all about Ubisoft!]

USGamer declared Microsoft to be the winner, and Square Enix to be the loser, with a few other "witty" additions:

• Losers: The crowd during Bethesda's Rage 2 Andrew W.K. performance; Walmart Canada; People who aren't emotionally invested in Super Smash Bros.; [their] health.
• Winners: Todd Howard; The people who have been yelling for a Metal Wolf Chaos release in the west their entire lives; Masahiro Sakurai basically saying fuck it and making Smash Bros. game people can't complain about; being hella gay.

[Dammit, why does everyone have to be a fucking comedian all the fucking time?]

Tom's Guide ranked their list:

1. XBox (grade: A)
2. PlayStation (grade: A-)
3. Bethesda (grade: B+)
4. Nintendo (grade: B)
5. Ubisoft (grade: B)
6. EA (grade: C)
7. Square Enix (grade: C-)

[Looks like someone's grading on a curve, but whatevs.]

It's early days yet, but so far, it looks like my take on things was pretty darn good. I do feel a bit bad for overlooking Ubisoft, though, so let's address that injustice.

Microsoft wants Windows 10 PCs to become Amazon Echo competitors

Continuing Microsoft's quixotic quest to become everyone except Microsoft, while still somehow maintaining Microsoft's user base, it seems that their next target is Amazon Echo. And why not? when they're already trying to duplicate all of Amazon's other cloud-based services.

From The Verge:

Microsoft has been working on a new HomeHub feature for Windows 10 to better compete with devices like Amazon’s Echo. HomeHub is designed to create a family environment for a PC with shared access to calendars, apps, and even a new welcome screen. Microsoft is even planning to support smart home devices like Philips’ Hue lights, to enable Windows 10 to act as a hub to control and manage smart home hardware. While we’ve heard about HomeHub before, The Verge has obtained internal concepts of exactly how Microsoft is imagining HomeHub will work.

Microsoft is aiming to include the new welcome screen, shared desktops, and easy calling in the Windows 10 update due in September. This update should also include improvements to Cortana, and support for third-party smart home devices. [...] Microsoft is tentatively planning to support Hue, Nest, Insteon, Wink, and SmartThings devices with its connected home app. Cortana will be used to send commands to devices, just like Amazon’s Echo.[...] Any devices that come with these new Windows 10 features will rely on PC partners to create. 

And that's the problem, right there, with Microsoft trying to become all of its competitors, overnight: Amazon Echo is a total package, with the consumer electronics front end already built to go with Amazon's cloud-based back end, which itself ties into Amazon's existing distribution infrastructure, and network of retail partners. Microsoft has none of that, really; even the software that's supposed to drive all of this is a work in progress, and the hardware is actually vaporware that third party OEMs have to design, build, and market.

Microsoft is all over the place, right now, trying to leverage their PC OS market share into, simultaneously, Google's business, Apple's business, and Amazon's business, all while trying to sustain Microsoft's own business. Time will tell if that's sustainable, but I have my doubts: after all, Microsoft (Mkt. cap. $532.35B) is actually smaller than both Google ($658.89B) and Apple ($824.28B), and only slightly larger than Amazon ($462.60B), but seem to be pursuing a strategy that requires them to become bigger than all three of these competitors combined. I'm not going to say that it's impossible, but I don't see how it would work, and the attempt has them wildly all over the place.

Even saying that Windows 10 is the common thread doesn't help, since it really feels like they're trying to force their OS to be a one-size-fits-all solution to every technological problem. Microsoft is like the proverbial handyman with only one tool available, treating every problem like a nail. Why is Windows 10 a better fit for Amazon's Echo business than Amazon's existing cloud-based computing, inventory management, and product distribution tools? How is Microsoft planning to build the network of retail partnerships that help make Echo work, when they can't even build the hardware that's needed for that job? Or are they just building it and hoping OEMS, retailers, and consumers all come to their HomeHub of Dreams?

What's the plan, here? Is there a plan, here?

The Tech media, like a lot of mainstream media lately, seems to be obsessively focused on The Latest Thing, and not really looking at The Big Picture, but they really should start looking at the big picture. Microsoft might be able to turn Windows 10 into iOS for PCs, or they might be able to turn it into ChromeOS, or they might be able to turn it into Amazon Echo, but I seriously doubt that they can do all three of those at the same time, while also chasing Steam's and PlayStation's businesses in the gaming space, and maintaining their hold on business workstations and laptop. Surely something's got to give; it's just a question of what, and when.

The Nintendo Switch's fast start may not be fast enough

When it comes to Nintendo's Switch, everyone seems to agree that it's off to a good start, with Nintendo hyping its first month sales results at every opportunity. And there's no two ways about it, those numbers are pretty good:

In the 12-month period ended March 31, Nintendo earned ‎¥‎489 billion ($4.4 billion) in revenue, slightly down on the ‎¥‎504 billion it earned in the previous year. However, net profit increased from ‎¥‎17 billion in FY2016 to ‎¥‎103 billion ($925 million), beating Nintendo's own forecast by 14%.

The company said that the difference was down to better than expected shipments of the Switch, which sold 2.74 million units in March alone. That figure was attained by Reuters, which attended a press conference with Nintendo CEO Tatsumi Kimishima in Japan. Kimishima said that the company expects to sell a further 10 million units in the current financial year.

So far, so good. Where I start to have issues with the hype, though, is when Nintendo start trying to draw parallels between the Switch's launch and that of their previous console success, the Wii:

According to Reuters, Kimishima said he was "relieved" by the console's early performance. "If the 10 million target is achieved ... that means the sales momentum would be close to the Wii," he said.

There's a problem with that comparison, though: the Switch is not the Wii, and the market that it's launching into is not the same as one that the Wii launched into.

Nintendo's Wii was a pop-culture phenomenon. Launching in 2006, at the start of its console generation alongside Microsoft's XBox360 and Sony's PlayStation 3, and prior to PC gaming renaissance, which didn't really get going until 2010, the Wii didn't have to vie for market share with established competitors. Everyone was starting from zero; no platform was coming into the year with tens of millions of customers who already owned huge libraries of compatible games.

The Wii had a couple of other features that gave it a competitive edge. One was its price point; the Wii was cheaper than its competitors. Its control scheme was also unique, and intuitively easy to use; children too young to read, and whose hands couldn't really wrap themselves around the standard XBox or PS3 gamepad, could still grasp and wave around the Wii's baton, as could older players who might suffer from, say, arthritis.

The elegance and simplicity of that interface also made it easy for non-gamers to use. You didn't have to know from experience which buttons normally did things in games, or work through a lot of tutorials to learn how to control the games. The result was a platform that could connect players from three to ninety-three; children could play with their grand-parents, allowing multiple generations of families to all equally access and enjoy gaming, really for the very first time in the history of video games.

The result was lightning in a bottle; people who Microsoft and Sony hadn't bothered to design for and market to were suddenly interested in gaming, connecting to and with the Wii in a way that they simply couldn't for the XB360 or PS3. Nintendo really couldn't make enough of them to keep pace with that early demand; stores couldn't keep the Wii on shelves. The only similar example of a game console success was Sony's PlayStation 2, which flew off shelves, in part, because it was also the cheapest DVD player on the market, in addition to being a game console.

None of that is really true of the Nintendo Switch, though. Gamers who'd previously discovered gaming thanks to the Wii have now outgrown it, and are demanding more variety and sophistication in their games, along with better performance. The gimmicky control scheme of the Switch isn't really a selling point, either, with many Switch owners ditching their Joy-Cons for the Switch's Pro controller's better ergonomics. 

Unlike the Wii, where the quality of the unit was at least comparable to that of its competitors, the Switch looks and feels cheap, with a plastic screen that gets scratched by its own included dock, controllers that need extra insulating foam installed in order to work properly, and inadequate storage that make it essentially incompatible with the digital distribution that is taking over the industry... the issues just keep coming.

And while none of these might have been crippling if the Switch were launching onto a level playing field, the market that it's launching into isn't a level playing field. Thanks to Steam's 125 million users, PC (which wasn't a factor when the Wii was launched) is dominant in the current market, and Sony's PlayStation 4 isn't just outselling the XBox One, it's also still outselling the Nintendo Switch:

Sony Interactive Entertainment sold 20 million units of its PlayStation 4 console in the last fiscal year, boosting revenue by 6% and operating income by more than 50%.

[...] 

Across the entire year, 20 million units of the PS4 were shipped, 13% more than the 17.7 million units in the previous fiscal year. Given that the PS4 had 40 million confirmed sales in May 2016, that puts the total PS4 installed base somewhere around 60 million - possibly just below, but certainly not very far away.

[...] 

Looking ahead, Sony expects PS4 shipments to decline to 18 million next year. However, it expects the GNS division to improve in general, with a 14.6% increase in revenue and a 34% increase in operating income.

Remember, Nintendo are saying that they'll be thrilled to sell 10M units in 9 months, a pace of roughly a million units a month on average; Sony, on the other hand, are forecasting sales of 1.5 million units per month for the same period, and that's down slightly from the PS4's sales performance of the previous year. Sony are starting with a 60 million lead in player base, and will probably increase that lead even if Nintendo's Switch performs as well as Nintendo is hoping.

At this point, it's worth remembering that the WiiU had a player base of 13 million when it was discontinued, because developers couldn't be bothered to make games for its different OS and weird control scheme when it didn't have even half as many users as the XBox One... which itself still has only half as many users as the PS4. And the only game of note that the Switch has going for it right now is Zelda; yes, ports of Skyrim and Shovel Knight will probably sell reasonably well to Switch owners who have nothing else to play and a desire to justify their Switch purchases, but ports of games that most interested gamers already own on other platforms aren't going to sell Switches to the skeptical.

And when it comes to Nintendo's own new-game releases for the Switch... is the obligatory new Mario game going to be a better system seller than Breath of the Wild? Will anyone care about the new Mario game that doesn't already own the Switch? Are gamers really desperate enough for gimmicky tech demos like Arms to drop hundreds of dollars on a new console just to get them?

I know that Nintendo fans (and shareholders) have a lot of hopes pinned on the Switch changing Nintendo's fortunes in the highly competitive gaming market, but... how does that happen, exactly? Unless the Switch suddenly starts selling faster than the PS4, fast enough to regain some of the ground that Nintendo lost with the failure of the WiiU, I just don't think that the Switch can ever have anything like the momentum of the original Wii.

And, failing that, I don't see how the Switch does anything but follow the WiiU into irrelevance and eventual obscurity.

[Quotes from gamesindustry.biz.]

PlayStation Now streaming service available today on Windows PCs

From TechCrunch:

You don’t need a PlayStation to play PlayStation games anymore: Sony’s Playstation Now subscription-based game streaming service is now out for PC, and you an grab the app and start playing some of PlayStation’s best legacy titles immediately if you’ve got a Windows machine.

It’ll cost you, of course – but not as much as you would’ve paid for the games available individually. A 12-month subscription to PlayStation Now will run you $99.99 as part of a limited-time promotion to celebrate the PC launch. Normally, a PS Now subscription will run you more than double that.

The $100 doesn't include a Dual Shock controller, naturally, which you'll need to buy separately, so you're actually looking at closer to $150 to try this for a year ($200 CAD), but the list of games is impressive. It includes Journey, for one thing, which I've always wanted to try, but not enough to buy a PS3; now I can try it, for about the cost of a PS3*.

Yeah... Hype, people. Never believe the hype.

For those keeping track, this is Sony, who are winning the current-gen console contest with Microsoft and Nintendo, now wanting to see PlayStation Now on Windows PCs because that's the money is. Just like Microsoft did with XBox Live, after admitting that we probably weren't ever going to see another console generation from Microsoft's direction, just PC-like updates of the XBox One. That just leaves Nintendo to pretend that console gaming economics still make sense, after announcing that they'd stopped production on Wii U entirely, and with NX not actually announced yet.

Yes, folks, this really is the last console generation. Sony will keep making boxes with the PlayStation logo on them, just like Microsoft will keep shipping XBoxes, and Nintendo will ship whatever their next thing is actually going to be called when that time comes, but the writing really is on the wall, and it's really not that hard to read.

* It is possible to pay $19.99 a month, instead, and there's also a free 7-day trial for people that are willing to give Sony their CC numbers, because apparently people still fall for that one. Personally, I will be giving this a miss.

Microsoft says this might be the last console generation

It's more of a confirmation than anything else, but this really is looking more and more like it'll be the last console generation.

From Engadget:

"The future of Xbox looks a lot like PC gaming." That's what Engadget editor Nathan Ingraham wrote after speaking with Phil Spencer earlier this year. Spencer spoke about wanting to see a steady stream of hardware innovation rather than seven-year gaps between consoles, citing the smartphone market as inspiration. Greenberg went one step further. In his opinion, this is the last console generation. "We think the future is without console generations," he said, explaining that Project Scorpio was a "big bet" that gamers will embrace that notion.

Q: The Xbox platform has moved forward to have such regular updates and new features coming all the time. It kind of seems like hardware is going the same way. There was a very short gap between the Xbox One and the Xbox One S, and we're probably talking an even shorter gap before Project Scorpio. Do you see a future of console upgrades continually happening? Is this the last console generation?

Greenberg: I think it is. ... For us, we think the future is without console generations; we think that the ability to build a library, a community, to be able to iterate with the hardware -- we're making a pretty big bet on that with Project Scorpio. We're basically saying, "This isn't a new generation; everything you have continues forward and it works." We think of this as a family of devices.

But we'll see. We're going to learn from this, we're going to see how that goes. So far I'd say, based on the reaction, there appears to be a lot of demand and interest around Project Scorpio, and we think it's going to be a pretty big success. If the games and the content deliver, which I think they will do, I think it will change the way we think about the future of console gaming.

Emphasis added, natch.

"Greenberg" is Aaron Greenberg, Microsoft's head of Xbox games marketing, who also tried hard to put a brave face on the way Sony handed Microsoft's ass to them, this console generation ("It's been a good industry for both of us, and we're innovating in different ways"), and some clarification on whether Scorpio will get console-exclusive releases ("It's one ecosystem -- whether you have an Xbox One S or Project Scorpio, we don't want anyone to be left behind"), but the headline of this piece just leaped out at me.

In other news: Told you so.

Sony is still selling PS4's (although Nintendo's given up on the Wii U completely), and it still remains to be seen how Sony's "Neo," Nintendo's "NX," and/or Microsoft's "Scorpio" are received by consumers, many of whom just either bought a gaming system or didn't want one, but the future of gaming really is looking more and more like PCs.

XBox Boss says that gaming is now "beyond generations"

Phil Spencer's team is losing this console generation badly, so I can see why he'd have a vested interest in getting people to break out of their pre-set thinking about console gaming cycles, but I was still a little surprised when he came straight out with the fact that Scorpio marked the beginning of the end for console generations in gaming.

From GamingBolt:

“Project Scorpio will be the next addition to the Xbox One family and it ultimately is the next step in delivering our vision for the future of gaming beyond generations,” Spencer said.

[...]

"Project Scorpio is a serious inflection point for team Xbox and we are announcing Project Scorpio today to gives our developers and partners to take advantage of that ability now in order to realize their visions for the future and deliver even more great games for you. Today marks the beginning of gaming beyond generations. A future full of choice. All future where can all play without boundaries.”

It’s a bold and ambitious vision, and a dramatic change from how console gaming has been so far.

It's a vision in which there essentially isn't a next console generation, so I guess bold is as good as way as any to describe it. I don't know if it's ambitious, though, so much as realistic. After all, some of us have been talking about this being the last console generation for some time, now.

That's right. I called it. Booyah.