5 ms·

The MS first-party games were supposed to be the way the company made money on the Xbox, originally. Halo, Fable, all the tent poles of the Xbox platform starte

The MS first-party games were supposed to be the way the company made money on the Xbox, originally. Halo, Fable, all the tent poles of the Xbox platform started at MS. But those studios they'd purchased to make those games are all now off on their own, and MS is left with an internal games development group. Traditionally, MS has just hired this group up: they had Jordan Weissman, Elan Lee, and Rob Rinard working on games back in the day. Those folks left long ago. Thing is, traditionally, you make money from consoles on games, not on consoles. In fact, you sell the consoles at a loss until late in the cycle. That's changed now that youn can make a chunk on app-store sales. Every game sold in MS' online Arcade is giving MS a cut of around 25%, and these games sell much faster, more continually, and require no publisher BS or retail deals. The industry has changed, and MS' internal studios weren't exactly producing gold. Best thing they'd done in a long time was 1 versus 100, which was murdered likely because it didn't make any money.

jonnathanson 12y ago
All true. I think at one point MS figured that original shows were a way into the "war for the living room" that everyone was talking about back then. XBox had a decent share of Netflix streaming traffic, and a strong share in games, and it seemed like a decent idea to solidify the XBox platform's lead as a multi-category entertainment device by covering all bases. In retrospect, I think people have been streaming Netflix on XBoxes because it's been convenient. And because, for several years, few alternatives existed that streamed Netflix on your TV, and that didn't require the purchase of yet another specialized piece of hardware to cram into the media cabinet. Netflix on XBox was easy, and that was the source of the correlation. Nothing more and nothing less. Microsoft can be forgiven, IMO, for having read more into the correlation than might have been there. For all of Microsoft's missteps and organizational challenges, you can't fault it for having imagination in this case.
thekaleb 12y ago
Actually Halo started at Apple[1]. [1]: http://kotaku.com/5796019/when-halo-was-on-the-mac-and-was-a-totally-different-game http://kotaku.com/5796019/when-halo-was-on-the-mac-and-was-a...
- freehunter 12y ago
  And how much money did it make as a Mac exclusive? Oh it only ever released on the Xbox, as a Microsoft property. So bringing up Apple isn't even relevant. At all.
  - briandh 12y ago
    VonGuard wrote: > Halo, Fable, all the tent poles of the Xbox platform started at MS. So it's perfectly relevant to point out that it didn't.
    - VonGuard 12y ago
      None of Microsoft's Xbox IP that lasted originated at Microsoft. Bungie's work was on the Mac and PC at the same time for Halo. I know that, I was there, I saw the demos from Alex and Jason at E3 in 1999. Literally, what happened was: Halo was THE game at E3, but no one could talk about it because it was behind closed doors. Microsoft basically said "What's the best IP we can get, the best game out there? The one everyone is excited about?" and so, they went to Bungie with a semi-truck full of cash.
      - DevKoala 12y ago
        Wait, where are you getting this from? Bungie sold to Microsoft because they had financial issues, and Microsoft was looking for "anything" to increase their portfolio. It was almost accidental. In fact, Bungie contacted Microsoft, not the other way around, because MS was going around looking for games for the Xbox.
        VonGuard 12y ago
        It was a perfect timing. MS was bringing in developers, and Bungie was the perfect target because it needed help, and because it was the coolest IP in development at the time. The trailer they showed at E3 2000 was the bee's knees, and ended up having little to do with the end game's actual plot, but it sure sold MS on the idea that this was killer IP. It was actually a compromise to bring Halo to the console because it was an FPS, which was not really a console thing, outside Goldeneye. But then, MS had signed Rare, too. Isn't it obvious MS was buying up things it specifically thought were cool? The original Xbox lineup was a who's who of bad ass computer game devs like Molyneux and the Rare folks. And, clearly, all of the studios were able to negotiate decent contracts because they all were free of MS in the end, unlike other studios that have had their publishers run them out of business rather than see them keep their IP. In the end, bungie was glad to be rid of Halo, actually.

jonnathanson 12y ago

All true. I think at one point MS figured that original shows were a way into the "war for the living room" that everyone was talking about back then. XBox had a decent share of Netflix streaming traffic, and a strong share in games, and it seemed like a decent idea to solidify the XBox platform's lead as a multi-category entertainment device by covering all bases. In retrospect, I think people have been streaming Netflix on XBoxes because it's been convenient. And because, for several years, few alternatives existed that streamed Netflix on your TV, and that didn't require the purchase of yet another specialized piece of hardware to cram into the media cabinet. Netflix on XBox was easy, and that was the source of the correlation. Nothing more and nothing less. Microsoft can be forgiven, IMO, for having read more into the correlation than might have been there. For all of Microsoft's missteps and organizational challenges, you can't fault it for having imagination in this case.

thekaleb 12y ago

Actually Halo started at Apple[1]. [1]: http://kotaku.com/5796019/when-halo-was-on-the-mac-and-was-a-totally-different-game http://kotaku.com/5796019/when-halo-was-on-the-mac-and-was-a...

freehunter 12y ago
And how much money did it make as a Mac exclusive? Oh it only ever released on the Xbox, as a Microsoft property. So bringing up Apple isn't even relevant. At all.
- briandh 12y ago
  VonGuard wrote: > Halo, Fable, all the tent poles of the Xbox platform started at MS. So it's perfectly relevant to point out that it didn't.
  - VonGuard 12y ago
    None of Microsoft's Xbox IP that lasted originated at Microsoft. Bungie's work was on the Mac and PC at the same time for Halo. I know that, I was there, I saw the demos from Alex and Jason at E3 in 1999. Literally, what happened was: Halo was THE game at E3, but no one could talk about it because it was behind closed doors. Microsoft basically said "What's the best IP we can get, the best game out there? The one everyone is excited about?" and so, they went to Bungie with a semi-truck full of cash.
    - DevKoala 12y ago
      Wait, where are you getting this from? Bungie sold to Microsoft because they had financial issues, and Microsoft was looking for "anything" to increase their portfolio. It was almost accidental. In fact, Bungie contacted Microsoft, not the other way around, because MS was going around looking for games for the Xbox.
      - VonGuard 12y ago
        It was a perfect timing. MS was bringing in developers, and Bungie was the perfect target because it needed help, and because it was the coolest IP in development at the time. The trailer they showed at E3 2000 was the bee's knees, and ended up having little to do with the end game's actual plot, but it sure sold MS on the idea that this was killer IP. It was actually a compromise to bring Halo to the console because it was an FPS, which was not really a console thing, outside Goldeneye. But then, MS had signed Rare, too. Isn't it obvious MS was buying up things it specifically thought were cool? The original Xbox lineup was a who's who of bad ass computer game devs like Molyneux and the Rare folks. And, clearly, all of the studios were able to negotiate decent contracts because they all were free of MS in the end, unlike other studios that have had their publishers run them out of business rather than see them keep their IP. In the end, bungie was glad to be rid of Halo, actually.