So, for the past three years, Microsoft has been kinda a disappointment (well, maybe not last E3, where they debuted three new IPs, showed new technology, announced sequels to their biggest franchises--including Halo 4 without Kinect--added new XBL functionality, etc). The focus has been on the games with the biggest sales and Kinect.
Many of us have taken this to mean that Microsoft is more interested in focusing on the big, dumb, dudebro crowd that'll buy anything, as well as the casual crowd, who made Kinect the best-selling electronic device of all time in the Fall of 2010.
Last year, I had an opportunity to visit a game store that sold a lot of previous-gen (and beyond) games. I made myself a shopping list of what games to get, and found a lot of original Xbox-exclusive titles that were really unique and interesting. "Man," I found myself thinking, "I wish Microsoft was still like this."
Shortly after, I found myself playing Viva Pinata. I'm not actually sure why I picked it up, only that I did and enjoyed it so much that I almost immediately went out and purchased Trouble in Paradise. I started looking for more early 360-exclusive games, and found some really cool, really innovative stuff, like Shadowrun and Crackdown.
"So," I found myself thinking, "what changed in 2010?"
The most tangible answer is Kinect. It released in 2010, after all, but then, I realized something else: most games take two or three years to develop.
What happened before then? Ensemble, FASA, Aces, and other studios got shut down. Rare stopped making games and went into making avatars and Kinect games. These were long-time studios that had made Microsoft a great deal of money. Aces, in particular, had been developing Microsoft Flight Simulator for... what, decades?
What caused that to happen?
The 2008 financial crisis.
This is where I start speculating, but I think this is all pretty close to what actually happened:
The Xbox lost a lot of money, but got its brand into the public mindshare, which was Microsoft's goal. In 2008, when the economy collapsed, Microsoft was determined not to lose that kind of money again, so they started shuttering the AAA studios that weren't doing extremely well (basically, everyone who was selling fewer games than Lionhead). Assuming a three year development cycle, games that might have been announced in 2010 were dropped. In addition, the PC studios got shut down, because the guys who fought for PC gaming at Microsoft (Allen, Gates), weren't around as much, and the guys running the Entertainment division were mostly Xbox guys. My understanding is that the profit margins weren't too good at Ensemble, despite their games' great sales.
On top of this, Microsoft had invested a lot of money into the Kinect, which they thought might do really well (it did, at first) based on the Wii's success. They shifted over to that as a priority, not just because of the Wii's track record, but also because it was costing them a lot of money. They believed it was their best shot at success, and given their limited funding, they decided to put that as a priority.
Remember, development takes time. Decisions made one year won't necessarily become public knowledge for two or three.
In 2010, when the Kinect launched (and initially did really well--apparently the attach rate is kind of bad), Microsoft began working on their next generation console. Actually, I wouldn't be surprised if they started before then, concurrently with 343's formation in ~2009, but I'm pretty sure the major work started in 2010.
Microsoft's approach for the past two generations has been to shotgun launch a massive variety of games within the first few years, then sort of pull back on the experiments that don't work and emphasize those that do. We've seen this greatly exaggerated this generation because of the financial crisis, as I've surmised above.
I think what we've seen is Microsoft playing it safe as a result of the 2008 financial crisis.
I remember hearing, about a year ago, that Microsoft had earmarked around three hundred million dollars for core AAA game development. We know for a fact that Black Tusk Studios is working on an AAA shooter and that Kinect has been pulled from the project. We know that Rare is hiring people with AAA shooter/action-adventure experience. We've heard that Microsoft is working on at least four new IPs. I think when I counted last, Microsoft had between 8 and 12 studios who had never made a game before. LinkedIn profiles and rumors I've seen the past year or two seem to indicate that a lot of experienced people from AAA games are being hired by Microsoft for more than just Halo, Forza, and Fable (Gears of War is an Epic IP, and, as such, it's up to them--I'm guessing that Black Tusk's new game is going to replace Gears in Microsoft's lineup).
While the rumors suggest that you will need to have your Kinect plugged into your Xbox, many people seem, rather stupidly, to assume that this means all games must have Kinect functionality. We know that Halo 4 went against Kinect functionality. We know that the Forza series has Kinect functionality, but it doesn't replace anything core.
I would like to suggest that we're going to see a Microsoft we haven't seen for a long time when the next E3 comes. I think we'll see a lot more core games than we're used to. Yes, Kinect is going to be there, and it's going to be a big part of their presentation, and Microsoft, without a doubt, is going to push this far more as an all-purpose media box than the PS4 (which barely had any discussion in last night's conference), but...
I am not arrogant enough to suggest that people will be eating crow, but I do think that on the software front, Microsoft will end up surprising people quite a bit.
