Xbox Won't Have Series X Exclusives for at Least a Year

Microsoft announced that the upcoming Xbox Series X won't launch with exclusive games for at least a year. Instead, any new title playable on the Series X will also be playable on older Xbox One consoles. IGN reports: "As our content comes out over the next year, two years, all of our games, sort of like PC, will play up and down that family of devices," said Xbox Game Studios boss Matt Booty in a recent interview with MCV. "We want to make sure that if someone invests in Xbox between now and [Series X] that they feel that they made a good investment and that we're committed to them with content."

What this means is that Xbox will still have console exclusives on Xbox and PC, but they won't be limited to just the Series X. Upcoming games for the next-gen Microsoft console will also be playable on the Xbox One, Xbox One S, and Xbox One X. This is somewhat of a departure for next-gen hardware. While there are cross-gen games that are usually released within the first two years of a console launch, there are also next-gene exclusive games that are released to incentivize the early adoption of new hardware. But Microsoft seems to be avoiding that strategy with the Series X.

Genius

[cygnusvis]

Good marketing tactics to keep people from putting of XBOX one purchases. Although, people who already have a console (like ps4) might still put it off.

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[drinkypoo]

It's also a refection of a wise decision. Sony is known for making the development process for every console. Microsoft is known for making it similar for every platform. (Both are also known for being dicks, but so is Nintendo, so that's not a competitive disadvantage.) Microsoft probably wouldn't even be in the gaming market today if Sony didn't make development a PITA, which is funny because Sony probably wouldn't be in the gaming market today if development for the original PlayStation hadn't been so mu

Re:

[spire3661]

SEGA were dicks too.

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[tlhIngan]

Microsoft probably wouldn't even be in the gaming market today if Sony didn't make development a PITA, which is funny because Sony probably wouldn't be in the gaming market today if development for the original PlayStation hadn't been so much easier than for the Saturn.

No, Sony is in it because Nintendo screwed them over over the Super Nintendo Playstation (you may have seen that prototype around where they demonstrated it). At CES, Sony was in the audience expecting Nintendo to announce their partnership w

Re: Genius

[aliquis]

Then again CD32 was an American product and a complete failure and definitely part in making the Saturn perform worse because they had already sold that one.

Also Saturn was more powerful and I'd rather have one and would assume it's games has aged better and considering the capacity of it it could be worth 1/3 more.
Dreamcast was also a good console and you could view Xbox and by extent Xbox 360 kinda as follow up consoles to it.

Weird to apploud SEGA America considering the CD32 failure ruining everything.

Ev

Re:

[drinkypoo]

Saturn had twice as much CPU but a weaker GPU. It didn't even have hardware transparency. So you had to waste a CPU and bus bandwidth to do it in software. Plus the system was described as a pile of chips on a board, you had to do everything manually and the documentation was atrocious. If Sega had given any thought to ease of development it would have been "Sony who?" but they totally dropped the ball there. By the time the Dreamcast came along it was too late. (Plus their copy protection was weak AF.)

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[An Ominous Cow Erred]

Um, I think you're talking about the Sega CD and/or the 32X expansions. The CD32 was Commodore's 32-bit CD console that came out in 1993, and was basically just an Amiga 1200 no keyboard and a CD drive instead of a floppy drive (and was thus very underpowered in 1993, though a simple clock bump on the CPU and some extra dedicated RAM for the CPU would have improved matters greatly).

*Shoots self in face*

[locater16]

"Hey guys, come get you new console. It cost $600 and does nothing new, there's zero reason to upgrade, don't buy our product. Definitely buy our competitors though, they're cool!"

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[leonbev]

Yeah, that's kinda crazy that Microsoft will still be releasing new games in 2021 that have to be backward compatible with the original XBox One gaming console that was originally released in 2013.

Doesn't exactly give you much motivation to upgrade, does it?

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[Blightor]

yeah, cause what we all really want is forced upgrades. You upgrade for performance and graphics, seriously what sort of morons think this is a bad decision? It promotes an ecosystem rather than a specific device. I am not a console gamer but I will bet Sony will look to copy this as unlike idiot fan bois they understand what this is trying to do, i.e. lock in gamers for MULTI generations rather than compete for them every gen. very smart move.

Oh great - here come the fanboys. derp.

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[Computershack]

Nothing to do with being fanboys. This isn't any different to the way PCs game and seeing as the Xbox One runs a stripped down version of Windows 10 and an x64 processor why shouldn't it work the same? Series X gets to have all the top end graphics and things like raytracing, Xbox One doesn't get the top end graphics and raytracing. It's no different than now with games like Battlefield V where if you've got a card capable of raytracing you get that, if you don't you don't.

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[kingbilly]

Related to fanboyism.. I'm realizing now that one difference about being a PC fanboy is, you aren't really bending over and giving money to a specific company. You might not be even shelling much money out if you already have a decent PC and are a GPU upgrade away from quality gaming. But it isn't like there is a specific PC manufacturer that will benefit. And the companies pretty much make the majority of components in ALL systems so they get the money either way.

I'm not a fan of artificial exclusives. Y

Re: *Shoots self in face*

[im_thatoneguy]

Fanboyism is agreeing to fork over $500 to a console manufacturer in order to play a game that would run perfectly well on any other mainstream console.

Console exclusives are the most egregious form of Hardware DRM and yet fanboys fight to the death to get the "most exclusives".

It's 2020, every console is just an x86 PC. Console exclusives are anti consumer.

Re: *Shoots self in face*

[aliquis]

Sony used to offer good backwards compatibility too.

Re:*Shoots self in face*

[spire3661]

You mean like PCs have been doing for decades? Its not weird. This is a good thing.

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[The123king]

For the consumer, yes. For Microsoft, they're strangling their own sales by not encouraging people to upgrade.

Backwards compatability has always been a thing in home consoles, with newer consoles being compatible with older ones (Atari 2600/7800, Sony PS1/2/3, Nintendo Gamecube/Wii and SNES/Gameboy), however it was backwards compatible consoles that created platform lock-in, and not forward/compatible games. A lot of people in the PS2 era bought a PS2 because they wouldn't need to keep their PS1 around to

Re: *Shoots self in face*

[xushi]

Presuming itâ(TM)ll have better graphics on the new one, or slightly faster or something.

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[Aereus]

I've never cared to own any of the Xbox consoles, but to be fair: There is still probably plenty of reason to own the next system over a stock Xbone. They use a modified Windows10 build on x86 hardware, so it's no different than having a PC that can only run stuff on Low settings vs one that can run it on High or Ultra settings. The newer console will support higher resolutions, framerates, and post-processing effects. I doubt there will be any appreciable development differences on the backend short of gua

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[tlhIngan]

Yeah, that's kinda crazy that Microsoft will still be releasing new games in 2021 that have to be backward compatible with the original XBox One gaming console that was originally released in 2013.

Doesn't exactly give you much motivation to upgrade, does it?

Well, given how bad sales of the Xbox One are, Microsoft is probably planning a two-pronged attack here.

First, get good games out exclusive to Xbox (but not necessarily Xbox Series X). Attract people who went Sony or who skipped the Xbox One. There's a l

Re: *Shoots self in face*

[aliquis]

That why you have a single core 1 GB RAM Voodoo 3 PC?

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[Computershack]

May I suggest taking out a trial of Gamepass and trying their first party titles? I think you may be surprised.

So basically like iPhone or android

[NotSoHeavyD3]

Where the new one will run the old stuff and the old hardware will work until it's a just a little too old and you upgrade. Makes sense to me, get people locked into a platform and upgrade hardware every 3-5 years.

Im not sure this is good at all.

[Blightor]

Just purely speaking about the sales battle this year. Microsoft already have a disadvantage that more people have PlayStation ecosystems in the home, and considering what is happening with backwards compatibility this time around that could be a pretty big resistance to getting those people to come across considering the investment in games already made. I mean, you already hear people saying they already own a PC so don't need a XBOX. I am picturing the launch presentations between these two and I just

gotta do something

[nagglerdamus]

either have kick ass exclusives or do cross-platform titles extremely well (higher res, better framerate and frame timing, lower latency, better controller, etc.).

you need at least one to do well, with consoles sales favoring the former.

(and personally, the x1 controller was a step backwards from the x360 one.)