Xbox is receiving a lot of praise for its annual showcase this past weekend. That praise is deserved, as it was packed with excellent trailers, big reveals, and updates on games we’ve been waiting so long for, not to mention a handful of surprises I personally did🍸n’t expect and a🃏 handful of cool hardware reveals. Compared to Sony’s State of Play or the official Summer Games Fest show, it’s very clear that Microsoft did not come to mess around.
Whether it was 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Gears of War, Fable, 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Life is Strange: Double Exposure, or Avowed - it would take hours to break down every single trailer and exactly why I’m looking forward to it, and I think the praise thousands are already throwing at the console giant is justified. But part of me does think we need to think a little deeper, and not forget industry-shaking events that occurred not very long ago. More specifically, the closure of Tango Gameworks, Arkane Austin,𝓰 and other major layoffs across Xbox, which weren’t brought up in the showcase.
We Shouldn’t Be Surprised That Xbox Is Brushing It Under The Rug
Geoff Keighley opened the Summer Games Fest showcase by actively acknowledging that it has been a tough year in video games with myriad studio closures and layoffs, shortly before he highlighted th⛦at many of the top Steam games of 2024 are all independent. One such ti💜tle made obvious use of generative AI, but his heart was in the right place. Xbox, as it has in past years, put out a pre-recorded presentation with only a handful of in-person presenters across its 90-minute sizzle reel of trailers and reveals. Phil Spencer, Sarah Bond, and Matt Booty popped up occasionally to read a bunch of marketing spiel off a teleprompter that hyped up how big the Xbox family has become and how it really cares about video game preservation.
After receiving some of the worst PR in its history after the closure of Tango and Arkane, I’d really expected Phil Spencer to say something about the current state of the industry, but i🌃t was ignored entirely in pursuit of the same empty words we hear every year. This i꧟s the greatest line-up in Xbox history, just like it was the year before that and the year before that and the year before that. It’s an empty platitude that means nothing, especially when it has proven in recent months how fragile its own current situation is. You aren’t safe if you’re working in video games, even on projects as exciting as the ones featured in this showcase.
Then Again, Maybe It Knows It Doesn’t Need To
Cha❀nces are the majority of mainstream consumers aren’t aware of recent studio closures or layoffs, and most of them tuned into the showcase to see shiny new video games. Xbox might have earned some positive karma by acknowledging its mistakesဣ in such a setting, but it just didn’t need to, nor does a corporation of its size benefit from putting human emotion above its need to attract players and sell products. That comes first, and always will in this medium, as the focus is on making profits, not making art. We can pull all the creative fulfilment we like from it, but the suits at the top calling all the shots only really care about one thing, and that isn’t conducive to admitting your own failings on the biggest digital stage of the year.
But as we heap praise upon Xbox for saving video games once again, I implore you to take a closer look at the bigger picture, and how just weeks before the company was putting out slates of absolute bangers at Summer Games Fest it was tearing down two studios who all deserve so much better, yet in spite of their successes, were forced to clos🧸e regardless. I’m sure a time will come for Phil Spencer and other big names at Xbox to talk about the closure of major studios at length, but the fact it was entirely glossed over at its marquee showcase is not a good look, and one that shows us very transparently where iꦉts core interests lie.
