Xbox One : Thread 04

[VR46]

Seems Boris was 100% right about his Funk of Titans expectation, it's now out, 3/10 review here

http://www.purexbox.com/reviews/xbox-one/funk_of_titans

Conclusion

Funk of Titans feels like a game that would be perfectly at home on a mobile device, which isn't surprising given that this is the studio's first console title. That isn't to downplay the importance of mobile gaming, or to overlook the great strides that mobile games are taking of late.

Rather, it's to declare that this is an overly-simplistic and undercooked game that isn't what you'd expect from a console title at this price point.

This is far from an unplayably awful game, but there's very, very little depth here, and what is presented is incredibly repetitive to say the least.

[Family Fry]

The Escapists launches on Xbox One Feb 13th.

Gameplay teaser here.



Nice prison break game, mixes crafting with jail currency, prison rules and of course the opportunity to create your own break out plans.
Price is TBA but I would say ?9.99 (steam early access price) - ?14.99

[VR46]

Details of the first major system update due in February, as expected tile transparency is included

http://majornelson.com/2015/01/13/xbox-one-february-system-update-game-hubs-tv-updates-now-preview/

[VR46]

The "Playbox", PS4 & Xbox One comined in one hefty laptop

http://www.purexbox.com/news/2015/01/the_console_wars_are_over_ed_zaricks_dual_format_laptop_is_a_thing_of_beauty

[Lebowski]

Ed Zarick's Dual Format Laptop Is a Thing of Beauty

its a chunky square box with terrible typography on it as cool as it is the thing is not a looker.

[charlesr]

Details of the first pointless system update due in February, as expected tile transparency is included

http://majornelson.com/2015/01/13/xb...s-now-preview/

Fixed

[djtickle]

Ugh was really hoping they would add options for changing the snap TV window size.

[shaffy_oppa]

Erm can we not play music in the background while playing a game? I got horizon 2 and while the music in it isn't bad I wouldn't mind driving around to my own playlist...

[teddymeow]

Microsoft have dropped the price back down to $349 in the US after the bump it gave sales at Christmas.

Seeing as Xbox One has outsold PS4 for the past two months in America I wonder how Sony will counter as Microsoft are building momentum.

[Neon Ignition]

My suspicion is that they won't do anything for a while. XBO doesn't really have anything on the horizon for a long while whereas decent or not the PS4 has a few exclusives. With the US not being as important a territory as it used to be and the PS3 outselling the 360 for years without ever leading the US, I think they'll wait and see how the sales fare. If the steady flow of new games and PS4-hype doesn't stop XBO from leading each month they'll know to be more aggressive in the fall. If PS4 retakes the lead it's worth their while to let XBO hammer it's profit margins and take the lead in the one market. Given MS's biggest shortfall is non-US markets it's a shame to see them be so short sighted in their aggressiveness by focusing on such a small sample of the potential audience, if they ever convinced the EU market they'd be really dangerous to Sony

[Kron]

Just to play devils advocate..

Why has the US suddenly turned into a region that's not important as it used to be? it's still by far the biggest single area for console sales and the vast majority of console game developers are now housed there. If there's a region that's drastically changed in terms of sales and output you'd have to say its Japan.

Also there's loads of really interesting console exclusives out soon for the Xbox One:

#idarb
State of Decay - Year One Survival Edition
Ori and the Blind Forest
Escapists

I'm not sure what MS can do in Europe and Japan? They already offer a system with a better lineup imho, Better online infrastructure, Better system features plus updates and better customer care and non abrasive store terms and conditions and Sony manage to sell 20 million consoles while being in what could be described as a state of complete complacency while the profits are being used to prop up Sony and aren't being invested back in the gaming side.

[EvilBoris]

I didn't realise just how much Somy have Europe outside of the UK totally sewn up Til the other day. The top 100 games in Germsny was totally dominated by PS3 and to a lesser extent the PS4, the best selling 360 game was FIFA at about 25, whereas it was 1 and 2 in the charts for PS3/PS4.

Bit of an eye opener

[Neon Ignition]

That's the trouble, if you focus on single territories (Gafsters love doing this) then the US is a big slice however if you want your system to reach the kind of big numbers they theoretically can the US becomes much more expendable as it's no longer a case of winning in that territory and then mopping up your gravy between the UK/EU and Japan. You really need a wide net which is where Sony has really made up a massive amount of ground in the last gen.

It's probably one of the reasons PS4 sales have been so high, they didn't leave smaller EU countries behind to feel like after thoughts like MS did and Sony has been very good at capitalising on emerging markets. It's the wider net approach that allowed the PS3 to make such massive gains on the 360 in the later years and MS has pretty much completely missed the mark in that regard.

[Kron]

That's the thing I genuinely don't get though..

Are they focusing on a single territory? What exactly are Sony doing which is so drastically different in parts of Europe? I can completely understand any hard feelings in regard to the way they did that stupid tier 1/tier 2 country arrangement but in countries that did have a day one release like Germany it seems like it was already a foregone conclusion before either console dropped let alone games were released and promoted.

I think there's that outdated attitude that Xbox = Halo machine which is still weirdly prevalent with some people too. I just hope they keep being good competition for a long time as from what I'm seeing they are far more proactive than the current bunch at Sony who are a shadow of creativity from the good times and genuinely enthusiastic group we got with the PS1/PS2.

[Neon Ignition]

MS has always been relatively behind in the EU, they do well in the UK but the UK is small potato's to all three really, get most of the EU behind you and there's some serious sales clout. It's been Sony's market for a long while, MS is so US orientated I think Sony just really focused on the EU with PS3 and drove it hard to capture gamers once they cashed in their Wii's etc and the momentum has stood them in good stead for PS4 which was already coming out the gates swinging after MS's pre-launch stumbles.

There's a definite Halo stigma attached the Xbox for some but I don't think they've helped that either. In the latter years of the 360 it became very Halo/Forza/Gears/Kinect orientated and that didn't seem to appeal as much as PS3's more eclectic offerings. For example, in November and December XBO beat the PS4's sales in the US yet the same period overall saw PS4 beat XBO by a clear 1m units.

China is going to potentially be a massive decider long term for both systems too though early suggestions are PS4 is massively favoured there too. If only 1% of the population ultimately bought a PS4 this gen it'd smack at least another 10m units to the tally. It's going to be a massively interesting gen this time around with Nintendo out the running and so many new markets.