XBox Predictions and Announcements

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Rumblings of a major XBox announcement in a post Activision/Blizzard acquisition world slated for mid-Feb 2024 started a number of rumors around what might happen...would all XBox games go cross platform?  What would this mean for the XBox hardware?!?

Then on Feb 15th....Phil Spencer, Sarah Bond, and Matt Booty fulfilled the special announcement...with a whopping 4 games (all unnamed) slated to go cross platform...followed by a lot of corp speak. And, ahead of that, there was an internal meeting where they seemed to be doubling down on the XBox hardware.

So it seemed like the wild speculations...were untrue....or were they?

In this episode, Rob and PJ pick apart the XBox strategy...analyze what is there and speculate what is still yet to come...

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:08):
Alright, everyone, welcome back to Tricky Bits with
Rob and PJ.
So earlier this week weactually recorded some
predictions about the Xboxannouncement that was going to
come out.
Let's just do a quick recap ofwhat those predictions are going
to be.
This was planning on making itsgames completely cross-platform

(00:30):
.
Gamers were outraged on this,rob, you had a particular
prediction that the gamesbecoming cross-platform for Xbox
, or moving Xbox exclusives, wasa fairly genius move.
You want to dive into that alittle bit?

Speaker 2 (00:45):
I still think it's a genius move.
I think the outrage that thehardcore gamers are expressing
right now will blow over.
From a business point of view,it is a genius move because it
gets eyes on content.
They have good content, they'rejust not the market leader.
So by simply making your gamescross-platform which this

(01:05):
obviously all fits into theActivision acquisition making
your games cross-platformimmediately makes you a much
bigger player in the market.
Microsoft is kind of now thebiggest publisher on PlayStation
, which is kind of a crazy world.
But again, it's from a gettingeyes on content point of view,

(01:26):
it is a genius move.
I said that they want eyes oncontent.
Phil said he wants Xbox onevery screen and the only way to
do that is to not be only onyour own platform.
You can get Xbox to besynonymous with, say, netflix,

(01:48):
where every smart device thatexists as a Netflix portal.
If you can do that for Xbox andget Xbox games and PC games
streaming to all of thosescreens, regardless of who owns
the platform, then you've won.
You've got eyes on content, andthat is literally what gaming
is about it's eyes on content.
If you take away the superhardcore people.

Speaker 1 (02:11):
So just to pick on two points, one from a business
standpoint.
I believe you said thatPlayStation outsells Xbox two to
one.

Speaker 2 (02:20):
Right now I think it is, and it has been that on
pretty much every generation.
The 360, playstation 3 war waskind of close for a while, but I
think ultimately, especiallyworldwide, playstation 3 still
outsold it by a long way.
The last two consoles have beencut and dry.
Playstation one, if you factorin PlayStation five, now has I

(02:44):
don't really know the numbers, Ihave to look them up, but I'm
guessing it's 50, 60 million.
Xbox has half of that.
Add them together and make yourgames cross platform.
You now have 75, 80 milliondevices which you can sell,
which, if you're all aboutselling content, that's a hell
of a big market compared to whatyou originally had, and all
you've got to do is swallow yourpride of being a platform owner

(03:07):
.
You can be a platform owner anda cross platform publisher.
There's no rules that say youcan't do that.

Speaker 1 (03:12):
Correct.
And just to make a fine pointon the prediction we originally
had.
I believe it was all Xbox clueswould go to PS5 and maybe even
the PS4.

Speaker 2 (03:24):
I think over time that will happen.
This is just the tip of theiceberg.
They're just going to do a fewtests of waters, that sort of
thing.
They could also go back on whatthey said they.
I think the PS4 thing, if ithappened today, may be viable
for some of the games they have.
It's absolutely humongousmarket If they're going to
gradually do this.

(03:45):
The PS4 gets more and moreirrelevant as we go forwards.
So maybe not.

Speaker 1 (03:49):
All right.
So these are our predictions,but actually I'm going to make
my wild prediction, which I knowa lot of people actually were
chomping at the bid on this oneafter we said it was that Xbox
has a piece of hardware will getdiscontinued because it was
third place in the market.
And then hardware is a hardbusiness to be in.
The margins are low as wechatted about it.

(04:12):
To recap from last time themargins and many times are
losses Like these are lossleaders for folks to make it up
for the games and the licensing,but software is a great
business to be in software andservices.
So this was my wild dark horseprediction of what was going to
happen.
We'll grade that one in asecond Spoiler alert Widely off

(04:36):
base so far.

Speaker 2 (04:39):
Let's grade that one right now.
I don't think you're wildly offbase.
I think it's off base for now,and the reason I say that is
because the time frames relatedto game consoles are so long.
So Phil Spencer said they'renot planning on stopping making
hardware for now, and all theyhave to do is make one more Xbox

(04:59):
, which is probably alreadybeing designed to come out in
three years of time, four yearstime, something like that, and
that gives them a 10 year windowof telling the truth.
Effectively, they've got theremaining half of this
generation.
If they make one more Xbox,they have a whole generation.

Speaker 1 (05:17):
Five to seven years, basically right Of that
generation for that generationplus the three that's left on
this generation.

Speaker 2 (05:23):
That gives them a 10 year window.
So if they say today they'renot planning on stopping making
hardware even if long term it'smaybe a good idea, they're still
correct.
They're not lying for the next10 years and then 10 years, who
knows what the market is goingto look like?
If you go back 10 years, itlooks pretty much like it looks
today.
Mobile today is a much, muchbigger player.

(05:43):
We have mobile devices like theSwitch and obviously all the
iOS, android devices.
The consoles are still doing thesame old thing they always did.
They've been doing it for 20odd years with the two competing
back and forth.
It's not much different to whatconsoles will icon.
The Sega Nintendo days Yep,it's big platform was so if you
factor in, they said they're notgoing to stop making hardware.

(06:04):
All that really says is theyare going to make another Xbox.
Who knows what?
They're going to make anotherone after that?
Should they?
I don't know.
I think for eyeballs on contentyou can go OK, don't make a
hardware, we'll just publish onPlayStation because they're
bigger than us, but that's rightnow.
If they did that, it wouldfundamentally change PlayStation
2.
They wouldn't be thatcompetitive pressure, they

(06:28):
wouldn't be potential need torush out another console.
So I think if you took asnapshot right now and say all
games are PlayStation 5 crossplatform, it makes a lot of
sense for them to discontinueXbox Ultimately, especially for
the next generation.
I think, while it makes sensefor an eyeballs on content point
of view, it would fundamentallychange the market, remove the

(06:52):
competitive pressure.
Playstation would probablybecome crap and then this room
for someone else to come alongto make a better platform,
potentially another Xbox.
So I think the market needsthat competition.
There's no one left, I meanunless Apple TV steps up and
starts to become a serious gameplayer to make it.
So there is competitivepressure.

(07:12):
I think having the Xbox is,from a hardware point of view, a
thing that we need, even ifit's a loss leader, even if it's
second or third in the market.
I think just having it andhaving the two big guys fight
head to head is needed for themarket.

Speaker 1 (07:29):
You bring up a really interesting point, which is
that it's needed for themarketplace, and it's
fascinating because is it themost optimal decision for
Microsoft?
And I think you have to.
If you say it is the mostoptimal decision for Microsoft,
what you're saying is thatthey're doing an investment in
this.
Then pushing PlayStation isbetter for improving the

(07:53):
marketplace, which expands it,which then again goes back to
the bottom lines for Microsoft.
That is actually better forthem by keeping that pressure up
.

Speaker 2 (08:03):
I think so.
I think that is true.
I mean, if they lose a billiondollars on the hardware due to
loss leader financials and theymake it back through again,
eyeballs on content licensingbeyond every screen, stream
games, play games if thehardware can support it, etc.
Etc.
I think it's just almost markedat that point.

(08:24):
It's just brand recognition.
I think you have to.
I think you already said this.
If you split the Xbox as aplatform versus the Xbox as
hardware, you can see how it allwould play out.
But I think they do need theXbox hardware, at least for this
foreseeable future.
And again in 10 years, at theend of the next Xbox, who knows

(08:45):
what the world or the marketlooks like.

Speaker 1 (08:47):
I'll add one more curveball in here, because we
talked about it earlier in theweek, which was my comical irony
was that the antitrust casethat was brought against
Microsoft's acquisition ofActivision Blizzard was due to
fears of Microsoft basicallycutting off PlayStation and
removing competition.
Part of the theory around allthe games becoming

(09:09):
cross-platform, discontinuingXbox as a piece of hardware, was
that the Activision deal inthis case would have removed
competition in hardware ifMicrosoft got out of the
hardware game.
Now, as you point out, they'renot just yet, but there's a
question for the long term.

Speaker 2 (09:27):
Yeah, like I said, I think somebody has to be that
competitive pressure on Sony,otherwise why would they make a
new PlayStation?
Just keep selling the currentone by now.
They're making money on it,they've cost-reduced it and done
all that it's like without thatwe're going to release a new
one.
So you have to.
Without that pressure theywouldn't do it and so we need to
.
I mean, we have two phoneoperating systems.

(09:48):
We have there was beat-a-max ofVHS, there's Xbox PlayStation,
there was Sega Nintendo.
There's always been the pairand without them can go on to
dominate but it doesn't improve.
So it really makes a point LikeVHS.
Yeah, it won in the end but itwas crap and never really got
any better.

(10:09):
It would be a shame for consolesto start having a 10-year life
or 15-year life just becausethere's nobody to replace it.
That's kind of where theoriginal 2600 was.
It's kind of why we've got somany awful games and so much
just blandness.
It was finally, marketpressures.
External market pressures, likethe whole video game crash of

(10:29):
the 80s, is what finished thatoff.
But they had no real plans ofreplacing it to the cash cow,
and I guess we know Belly nowwith 30, 40 years ahead of that
and we know that burning peoplehaving a cash cow isn't
necessarily the way to keepcustomers long-term.
Some of these games that haveso expensive and have so many
sequels that long-term planningis far more important than

(10:52):
short-term benefits.

Speaker 1 (10:53):
It's an excellent point, and it's fascinating to
try to compare some of thesethings, like the 2600, as you
point out, was the only thing intown at the time.
There was a few other sort ofalso rands at the same time, but
it really was the thing thathad dominated, at least in the
US, obviously with VHS, betamax.
Betamax was always the bettertechnology, and yet it lost out

(11:17):
due to sort of market pressuresto VHS, and I think the
stagnancy that you point out, orat least the potential
stagnancy you point out, ifthere was no Xbox hardware would
effectively just makePlayStation the hardware du jour
.
Now, the counterpoint, though,is that it is like we had

(11:39):
actually discussed the idea thatif there was only the
PlayStation line, it wouldbecome that common set of
hardware that people could writegames to, and you wouldn't have
to be worrying aboutretargeting.
Ps5, the PS5 Pro, the Xbox S,the Xbox X, like these would
collapse effectively into asingle, more stable platform.

Speaker 2 (12:03):
So there's two pressures there, right, I think
there's the ideal developmentworld, which is exactly that.
There's one platform and it'swell supported and the vendors
update that platform as needed.
And then there's the real world, where financials and bin
counters come into effect andyou don't necessarily get that
ideal development environmentbecause they'll look at that as

(12:23):
the fact that they're makinggames.
Now, why make it better?
We're making a lot of money,we're doing this right, we're
doing that right.
It's like developers can suckit up.
Would it be better?
I think it'd get better games.
I think you'd have a big, openpool of ideas.
It wouldn't be so secretivebecause you wouldn't be caring
about your competition, learningabout what the hardware could
do.
It would as an idealdevelopment environment.

(12:45):
It'd be nice but realisticallynot going to happen.
But I do think that we're onthe right path of splitting the
Xbox hardware, which we'vetalked about a lot, from the
Xbox platform.
Look at what Microsoft can doto the table.
They have some great games.
I'd love to see Gears of War onmy PlayStation and lots of
PlayStation gamers will too.
That is where they're going towin big time with their

(13:08):
exclusive content being on thePlayStation.
They have a lot of mic.
They have more mic now.
They all, like I said, thebiggest developer on PlayStation
at this point.
They can do things like makeXbox Live and PlayStation talk
to each other.
It can be done now, but it'sstill a pain in the ass.
To normalize things like thatWould be really good for all
developers, not just the twoplatform holders Xbox Live and

(13:29):
the Game Pass, and all of thatthat they do is significantly
better than PSN.
So, with all of the antitrustactions that are going on right
now regarding Apple and Androidgaming in particular because
Epic's involved in a lot ofthose and the EU rules about app
stores it's not hard to see aworld where, potentially, you

(13:50):
could have Xbox Live onPlayStation.
It's just no different to aNetflix app.
You run the Xbox app and youget streamed games.
You get whatever you're payingfor and there's all the
different subscription levels.
It's literally no different topaying Netflix.
Sony have nothing to do with it, they just put the app on their
platform.
If Sony can overcome the hump ofallowing Xbox Live on

(14:11):
PlayStation, you know damn wellit would be there in a heartbeat
because it makes absoluteperfect business sense and, like
Phil says, they want Xbox everyscreen.
They don't care about who ownsthat screen or what runs that
screen.
If they can overcome some ofthese issues and lockdown app
stores might become a thing ofthe past.
With all of the legal actionthat's going on all over the

(14:31):
world, that's the case, then whycan't you have multiple stores?
Why can't you have an Xboxstore on the PlayStation where
you can buy games?
It's just a different store.
So having a different app storeon iOS or a different app store
on a PC, it's just a vendor.
It opens up competition back tohow it was in the brick and
mortar days, I think.

(14:52):
Overall, I think that's a bigwin and I think it would take
someone the size of Microsoft topressure Sony into doing it.
I mean, if me and you decidedto make a store and put it on
PlayStation, it'd be like, yeah,get out of here and that's the
end of the story.
But Microsoft, I'm going totake that as an answer.
If Microsoft goal is to getXbox on every TV, then they have

(15:13):
the resources to do it and youprobably don't want to stand in
the way.

Speaker 1 (15:16):
That, I think, captures the set of predictions
we had at the start of the week,because we knew there was a big
mid-February meeting going tohappen, announcements from Phil
Spencer and company on some ofthe future of Xbox.
So we said we think all thegames are going to be going
across platform.
We had the probable long-termgoal of getting rid of Xbox's

(15:41):
hardware.
So the meeting happenedyesterday, which was February
15th.
In the interim, phil did havean internal meeting stating
there were no plans to stopmaking hardware.
So Xbox as a piece of hardware,like you said, is still going
to continue.
Now we get into the actualinterview that happened

(16:02):
yesterday, on February 15th,which had Phil Spencer, sarah
Bond and Matt Booty.
We had talked about the sort ofmass diaspora of things going
across platform.
Right now we know that fourgames out of the exclusives are
going across platform which areas yet unnamed.

(16:23):
There's some people who suspectStarfield may be one of them.
What was said in the meetingwas that Indiana Jones is not
going to be there and thatActivision Games are going to
Xbox Live, rob, for what youwatched of it.
Any particular takes on theinformation so far, which again
covers kind of a small aspect ofthe predictions that we had.

Speaker 2 (16:45):
I think the games they announced weren't the
obvious ones, but I also thinkthey had to announce something.
There were so many rumorsflying around and people
speculating, themselves included, that they had to say something
.
So I think the games theyannounced are the ones that they
could legally clear.
You've been involved in games.
You know how much legalback-end stuff this takes or

(17:05):
what platform can this thing beon.
The licensing is very specific,so some of these games maybe
will show up later as theyfigure it out.
New games will probably show upon both platforms.
And the idea of games going toXbox Live I kind of liked the
idea.
Now that Xbox Live is allowedon iOS.
It wasn't for a long time.

(17:27):
Every game had to beindividually.
Even if it was streamed, everygame had to be individually
improved as itself.
Now they can have Xbox Live, sothat's step one into getting
Xbox on to every display.
Now we have a billion iPhonesout there that can stream games.
I think it makes a lot of sensethe more content they can push
into Xbox Live, especially likeit says.

(17:49):
Now they're off the Xboxhardware onto all the hardware.
They are literally a contentprovider.
The eyes on content is thewinner for them.
I think that's the biggest winfor the software platform of
Xbox is there is many people toplay that content anywhere they
want to play it.
If it makes sense, why shouldwe say no?

Speaker 1 (18:07):
And this goes right back to what we discussed
earlier, which is that,classically, when we said the
word Xbox, it meant a piece ofhardware.
It meant you know the deviceyou made 20-something years ago.
It was a physical item.
Now, and you stated thisearlier in the conversation,
xbox is starting to transmuteitself as a brand identity,

(18:30):
which isn't just necessarily thehardware platform, but it's the
back-end services, it's thecontent, it's the whole unified
experience that starts toService, basically, multiple
service.

Speaker 2 (18:45):
I mean you take all of it in Microsoft's very good
at the back end stuff, like saysthey way better at the
streaming side than Sony is.
Just make sense to make it aContent platform more than a
hardware platform, and I thinkthat's where they go in and I
think that's what they alludedto in the Announcement, but
without saying anything specific.
And they have to be verycareful.

(19:06):
Of course, it's like announcinga new console will kill sales
of an old console because justpeople who are gonna buy one now
I'll just wait a year and bringthe the brand new one, and With
backwards compatibility being abig thing now it's probably the
best move to make.
As soon as they announceanything hardware related, it
decimates the sales of thecurrent hardware.
So they have to protect thecurrent market too.

(19:28):
They've got a lot invested init.
I do think, speaking ofinvestment value, the amount
they paid for Activision is sohigh that they have to have
bigger plans over then keepreleasing games for Xbox
absolutely.
By taking Activision and makingit a exclusive platform, you're
decimating Activision's value,which is usually 60 or billion,

(19:50):
for it's now only worth half ofthat because it's only gonna
sell half the games, and that'sa simplistic way of looking at
it.
It's probably much worse thanthat in reality.
So why would they spend 60 orbillion and then half the value
that they paid for it?
I thought it was obvious fromday one that something like this
was gonna happen.
Why Activision?
Why would they buy a gamethat's Got massive titles that

(20:13):
are cross-platform?
You, they knew from day one itwas gonna cause a huge stink.
They knew it wasn't gonna gopast all the various regulators
around the world and they, Ithink they knew this was what
they were always gonna do.
They were never gonna make Callof Duty exclusive, because why?

Speaker 1 (20:29):
correct.
I'll tell you my take on theAnnouncement yesterday.
I think you're right, they hadto announce something.
I also believe that, like youtalked about, I think these four
games that are goingcross-platform are in some sense
like almost like a scoutingparty.
It's going out to kind of testthe waters and there was an

(20:51):
amazing amount of corporatespeak throughout the majority of
that discussion.
But the majority of thatannouncement really was a lot of
Try to talk around Xbox as acentral platform.
They definitely were doublingdown on the hardware, especially
like hey, the best Xboxexperience is going to be on the
Xbox.

(21:11):
But I also believe that they'redoing this as smoke screen For
what is the long-term play.
I think our predictions areright.
In the long term, I think theydo end up leaning into the
services.
I think they do end up Lookingat getting rid of the hardware
side of things, like we talkedabout at the beginning.

(21:31):
But I think they are not readyto do that.
I think you already answeredthe reason why, which is that
you don't want to decimatehardware sales right now.
They've put a lot of money intoit.
If there was too much thoughtthat everything is going across
platform, who would buy an Xboxat this point in time.

Speaker 2 (21:51):
Exactly and, like I said, it's it's such long time
frames that they have the nextone in the works.
That gives them ten years.
Think about it halfway throughthe next generation, and it's it
just delays it.
It's, I think it's inevitablywill happen.
It could happen to PlayStation2.
Maybe by that point, in tenyears, internet so good that
everything can be streamed andyou don't need hardware at all,

(22:14):
which I Don't know.
That's probably a ridiculousprediction, but I said it was
ridiculous ten years ago whenPeople were trying to oh, toy
originally tried it.
There's a whole bunch of peoplewho were doing it back then and
the only one who reallysurvived of all them was Nvidia
and Microsoft started doing itwith the Xbox, and it's not a
bad experience.
In ten more years, who knowswhere things will be?

Speaker 1 (22:38):
We probably could have dialed back the clock 20
years or even 15, and Stated hey, you're not gonna be buying
most of your physical Media forwatching movies.
Most of your movies are gonnabe coming via streaming or your
television shows.
All of these things Becausepeople I think 15, 20 years ago

(23:00):
would have thought the bandwidthrequirements were gonna be too
much and again we're talkinglong, long terms here.

Speaker 2 (23:06):
It's yeah, it.
I don't think hardware is gonnachange for the next generation.
They're gonna both be optimizedfor shitty PCs that decent when
they first come out, but thenyou have to really optimize for
them to keep up with the PC,which is exactly what happened
the last two generations.
I can see them being the samehardware base again, just
because he gives them that easybackwards compatibility.
So maybe we're on that pathwhere new consoles anyone can

(23:29):
make one, it's just.
It's just a AMD APU with someoptimized features and custom
software.

Speaker 1 (23:38):
And basically all you need is an inner internet
connection again.

Speaker 2 (23:41):
Maybe that's the counter argument to myself at
that point, that maybe so manydon't need competitive pressure
because that's all the nextPlayStation could be.

Speaker 1 (23:49):
it could be basically like a Effectively an upscaled
Apple TV at that point in time,Yep and that's an unknown too,
of like.

Speaker 2 (23:58):
Could Apple step in and do something here?
Have make a more competitivepressure elsewhere?
I don't know.
Games tend to be crap on Appledevices and Apple's not really
known to support game developersin the way they need supporting
.
They're not just apps where youjust click on a button and you
get a piece of information shimto you, which is tend to be like

(24:20):
all the frameworks that Appleproduced, tend to be in that
mindset.
All the big games they announcethat their announcements are
what?
Visually?
Ones that they've paid for,because no other giant games
typically come out for iOS andthe Apple platforms as a whole.
So we'll see.
I think there's some thingsApple could do.
Whether they want to or will do,I have no idea and, like I've
said many times in this one, sofar these time frames are so

(24:42):
long.
They said they're not stoppingmaking hardware and then they're
technically not lying.
They're not, won't be lyinguntil the next generation and by
that point everything will bedifferent, different people
winning the show, yeah,different market forces and
everything.
So Nothing's gonna change, Idon't think, on the hardware for
another generation, but thesoftware dynamics are, like Phil
said, of Xbox on every screenis definitely gonna be a big

(25:05):
mover and that being such a bigplatform will change the
industry and will change thedirection ultimately of the in
of the industry.
I think people like to look if,if you did this right now, it
would be like this, but youcan't do it.
Yeah, these things gonna takeyears to play out and by which
point they're gonna have theirfinger in the pie.
All the people are gonna showup and have their fingers in the

(25:26):
pie and it's gonna be what itis in ten years time, but I can
see Xbox becoming a softwarecontent platform.

Speaker 1 (25:33):
It, with an accompanying set of back-end
services, effectively to supportthe games.

Speaker 2 (25:38):
Yeah, and it's not an unheard of thing.
If you look back at all theother different hardware
platforms and games, they're allnow software platforms.
Yeah, has games on Nintendo.
Atari is still making the samegames it made for years and
they'd literally just softwareplatforms.
Sega and Atari tend to be likeliving in the past.

(25:59):
With there, we'll just keep relicensing and rebranding and
redoing everything with thecontent and the IPs that we have
.
Obviously that's just goingstagnant, it's.
I don't ever see Xbox doingthat.

Speaker 1 (26:12):
They have especially now, after the acquisition, I
mean they have every incentiveto continue to push their first
parties and push the ActivisionBlizzard folks to keep making
the next Diablo, the nextWarcraft, the next Starcraft,
you know, etc, etc, etc.

Speaker 2 (26:27):
Yeah, the interesting , though, that if they do this,
it'll be because they want to doit and not because they were
forced to do it.
Like a Tori leave in thehardware market and Sega leave
in the hardware market wasultimately because they couldn't
compete on the hardware sideand Didn't have the mindset of
developers at the time They'dmove to all the interest in
platforms.

(26:47):
Interesting that in this caseit would be Microsoft doing it
to themselves.
It's right now.
It's a bit of pilter swallow,but over the next 10 years,
while Xbox hardware will stillexist, it'll become much more of
An easy pill to swallow andthey won't be as much backlash
from the hardcore fanboys,because taking the baby steps

(27:08):
like says that the waters.
Some things will work, somethings don't work, but in the
end everyone will see that itmakes sense.
And when Joe blocks can go tohis friends house and play his
Xbox live game on his friendsPlayStation and it starts to be
a convenient thing for the enduser, that's how you win the
hearts and minds of People.

(27:29):
It's all about 100% this of theexperience.
If you can, if you can apple,if I, the Xbox experience.
Yes people will just like.
I'll take this minorinconvenience over here for this
awesomely smooth experienceover over here and Again.
Eyeballs on content is whatwins and that's how you get

(27:51):
eyeballs on content and I'venever really understood even
myself.
I've made a whole bunch ofthese hot, these platforms on
both sides.
I have no affliction for anyplatforms like whatever, I'll
play it.
If I need to play the nextbooks, I'll play the next box.
I'd rather not have to switchinputs and do all that and go
buy another console and I'drather just turn my PlayStation

(28:12):
and play it there.
But it is what it is.
If I want a mobile platform,I'm not gonna bitch that my
PlayStation is not mobile.
I'm just gonna go buy a switchand Do it like that.
So again, I've worked on thisbook, I've worked on the
PlayStation.
I have no love for any of thehardware.
It's all out of date at somepoint and the next one will be
better the hardware bit hereReminds me of a story from 15

(28:33):
years ago at Dreamworks.

Speaker 1 (28:35):
Now this is taking place at the Really the tail end
of the last big media matchupfor physical devices, which was,
in my mind, blu-ray versus HDDVD, and you had, effectively,
people who went on to eitherside of the fence Dreamworks
animation, it was actually onthe HD DVD side Until, obviously

(29:01):
, the consortium effectivelyjust turned that down.
Well, there was a bit of ahubbub that was happening at the
time.
A lot of people were askinglike, hey, why isn't Steve Jobs
putting a Blu-ray player writerinside of the new, you know,
apple machines?
And Jeffrey Katzenberg'sresponse was because it doesn't
matter.
This physical media thing isnot going to matter at all

(29:23):
because everything's going to bestreaming and, yeah, obviously
Blu-ray one in in the sense thatit is the the highest end
physical media that you can gettoday.
But I think the point thatJeffrey Katzenberg was making,
which is like hey, it became anirrelevant question because
everything became a streamingservice for video.

(29:44):
And To your point earlier, Ithink that might be where we're
heading again, where thehardware questions effectively
Become mood, because we're nolonger talking about necessarily
Having a bespoke physicaldevice, but it's really more
about this content that existssomeplace that we're able to get
in an ad hoc basis.

Speaker 2 (30:03):
Yeah, having two minds about streaming games,
you've got to fix a lot ofproblems.
Stadia had a lot of theseproblems.
They didn't fix it.
They should have done.
I think Microsoft understandgames enough that they are.

Speaker 1 (30:13):
I agree, I agree.

Speaker 2 (30:15):
Make active progress in things like modifying
hardware and operating systemsso you can get fast latency over
the network.
But you think on a triple-A60Hz PlayStation game 60Hz, 16ms
of frame the latency is that itisn't.

(30:35):
It's nowhere near that.
The latency for a PlayStation 5game, if you factor in, like TV
input latency could be 100msfrom pushing a button to see in
the result.
And if you restructure thatpipeline if we're comfortable
with 60Hz frame rate being 100mslatent, if we refactor that

(30:55):
pipeline, that model, you caneasily transmit button presses
over a network processor andsend them back to Spader Results
.
Some of that latency goes awaywhen you do that, Some of it
doesn't, but it is a viablemodel.
The years ago people were sayingit's not even a viable, Can't
do it, blah, blah, blah.
And when it's shown that itactually is possible, if you
tweak a few things, then you getall the game streaming services

(31:16):
and they're not going to getworse, they're only going to get
better.
With better networks and moretechnology, more thought put
into how you manipulate thesegame pipelines, Then I think it
becomes viable.
But it's not really.
It's not the best experiencetoday.
And again, you've got to factorin today, You've got to factor
in five years and 10 years.
So in 10 years, who knows?
But today the best experienceis still in hardware 100% agree.

(31:37):
Yep, you get nice visuals forstream stuff.
I mean, it's just as nicelooking and potentially nicer
looking, and the limiting factoris the back end is an Xbox or
the back end is a PlayStation.
If you take that away and makeit the back end of PC.
Now there's no limit on thehardware, you don't need to buy
the 4090s, blah, blah, blah.
But this is getting into likereally great territory because

(32:00):
this is literally stadia andthat didn't work.
But it probably didn't work forGoogle reasons, more than it
was.
Yes, I think so I know you did,you did.
I'll just give you aopportunity to bash off.
Well listen.

Speaker 1 (32:14):
I'm actually going to weirdly compliment Google in
one way, but it's going to bestill a bit of a bash, would
Google?
Google looked at stadia, in myopinion, as kind of a fun
technical problem, that's it.
And I have chatted with folkswho've been in the game industry
from a production side from theproducers and what have you and

(32:36):
they were like Google wasn'tlistening to them and putting in
the appropriate tooling andthings that you need to actually
like make games for real there.
And when they first came outwith it and I think many people
and I was at Google at the timereally thought Google is not
going to have the stamina to dothis and they kept stadia around

(32:57):
for three years and then shutit down.
So we were right that it didn'thave the stamina to actually go
through with it, because ittook, I believe, microsoft seven
years before Xbox was aprofitable engagement.
The thing that I will complimentGoogle on in this one case is
that they had the guts to shutdown a product area.

(33:19):
They said, hey, we're not goingto do this.
They didn't.
I mean, yes, they did it in twophases where they cut off their
intern, like their first partysupport, and then they cut off
the third party support later on, but they actually had the guts
to go ahead and say we'reshutting this down as opposed to
, you know, paper cutting thesedifferent product areas.
So the only thing that I willsay as a compliment was like yes

(33:42):
, google made a hard choicethere.
Ish, hardish, yeah, whatever.

Speaker 2 (33:47):
It's, I think, google or the big guys like that.
Amazon's will always be a real.

Speaker 1 (33:50):
I don't think they are invested in it.

Speaker 2 (33:53):
And I think that's Apple's problem too.
But I think this wholediscussion of can you stream
games is something that I agree,come in a war and more even for
the consoles.
And it also fits into the, likeyou said, of 20 years ago
people were buying DVDs.
The idea of not owning content,yep, was foreign back then.

(34:14):
You'd now today.
You don't really own CDs, Iguess vinyls and exception for
digital media.
You don't really own anything.
You stream it when you want itand you in return everything you
demand anytime you want it, andI think vinyls, vinyl, just
they were not going to considerthat at.
Consider that at all.

(34:34):
Games are the exception.
Today you still buy physicalgames.
Some consoles you can buywithout discs, so you can't
physically buy the disc, but youstill buy it and it's on your
machine.
Even if you download it fromSony, you still have it.
There's lots of great questionsthere of like what if they?
Well, that's all of this uplike.

(34:55):
Is there any benefit?
in having a physical copy.
If the game checks in straightaway, then probably not.
And then Ubisoft came out a fewweeks ago and said people have
to get used to not owning thegames.
So is games the next mediathat's going to go down this you
don't own it path, it's just.
Even if you do own it, it'sjust a license to play it.

(35:17):
You don't actually own it.
They take away any time, justlike it is if you buy.
Well, let's just use my ownexample.
Let's just.
If you buy Top Gear on Amazonand you buy season one and then
Amazon decides you can't haveseason one anymore, they just
take it away, even though youpaid for it.
Because I didn't ever own it.
I owned the license under theterms which I bought it under

(35:38):
and they changed those terms.
And whether they should orshouldn't is an argument we can
have and I'm sure it'sultimately going to play out in
the courts.
But it's going to take a lot ofpeople to be annoyed before it
gets that far.
But games are the next frontierin this.
You don't own it.
Platform mindset Again, 10 yearsis a long time in technologies.

(35:59):
I think Microsoft is alreadythinking out there and they're
already preparing for a worldwhere this would make sense and
hardware isn't.
You don't want to be the onewith the pants down when you
realize hardware is irrelevant.
Yes, everything they've donemakes a lot of sense from a
business point of view.
It doesn't estimate sales today.
It keeps the hardware around.

(36:19):
It gives them the opportunityto stream and not own content in
the future, I think, across theboard.
It's a great genius move youdid.
I said at the very start ofthis podcast, it gets eyeballs
on content, however it takes.

Speaker 1 (36:31):
Yes, it's a classic content play.
I've got content.
I want as many people to see itand engage with it and pay for
it as possible, no matter whatunderlying hardware is there.
I want to read this one quotewhich is a fraction of the
internal memo that came outyesterday.
It got leaked to the verge andI believe it's from Phil Spencer

(36:52):
, and this bit of it is.
We have a different vision forthe future of gaming.
A future where players have aunified experience across
devices.
A future where players caneasily discover a vast array of
games with a diverse spectrum ofbusiness models.
A vision where more creatorsare empowered to realize their

(37:12):
creative vision, reach a globalaudience, unite their
communities and succeedcommercially.
A future where every screen isan Xbox.
I think this goes right to whatyou're saying, Rob, of what
does it mean to be an Xbox ifyou're not a piece of hardware?

Speaker 2 (37:31):
Yep, I guess we have to wait 10 years to find out.

Speaker 1 (37:34):
I think We'll find some answers out ahead of time,
I think you'll get the answers Iget.

Speaker 2 (37:38):
It's a slippery slope , it's going to be a long spiral
, but you'll see answers overtime.
But I think 10 years from nowwill look very different than 10
years ago, which looks kind ofsimilar.

Speaker 1 (37:52):
We can probably make some predictions of some of the
markers we believe are along theway.
I think you stated it earlierwhen Xbox Live goes to
PlayStation, that's a massiveone that says hey, the sea
change has happened, and now youcan get access on PlayStation
to whatever you want.

Speaker 2 (38:10):
Yeah, and I think Sony have got their play too in
all of this.
So we'll have to see, on thatside there are a lot more
tight-lipped than Xboxes.

Speaker 1 (38:19):
What do you think their play is going to be?

Speaker 2 (38:20):
I don't know.
I have to think about fromtheir point of view.
They are the market leader,they have the hardware, they
have the sales, they have thedevelopers, they have the great
exclusive games.
Yes, so I think for now theydon't have to do much, but they
also have to not get caught withthe pants down if things change
real quick.

Speaker 1 (38:37):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (38:38):
I think the story will start to unfold
dramatically at the next consolelaunches.
Okay, so three years, the stateis set for this platform.
Things are just going tocontinue as they are.
No one's going to stop buyingXboxes.
No one's going to stop buyingPlayStations.
It's the content's going tochange around.
Maybe moving around, maybe showup on a switch every now and
then the next generation ofconsoles.

(39:00):
As to what the two big guys do,sony and Microsoft, will start
to dictate the future and, likeI said, that puts us 10 years
out, to the end of that life,and so I don't think nothing's
going to change for now.
We're just going to start tosee some Microsoft games on Sony
, but once we get to the nextgeneration, that's going to set
the path in stone more thananything they can do today.

Speaker 1 (39:22):
So here's a curveball .
Curveball, if Xbox Live creates, obviously it's on Xbox, it
creates a toehold on PlayStationand it's available on PCs.
Do you think that the gamesthat they start developing,
which can have more of a focuson the higher end PCs, is that

(39:44):
enough of a pressure to put onPlayStation and Sony to upgrade
what they're doing so that thegamers basically aren't going to
go out and buy PCs?
They still want to buyPlayStation, but Sony needs to
be providing even higher endPlayStation because of the
pressure that's come from PCs asopposed to Xbox.

Speaker 2 (40:05):
That's kind of where the pressure comes from.
Anyway, it's kind of aconvoluted path.
But you think that Microsoftdoes DirectX 12, which puts so.
They work with Nvidia and AMDyes, mostly Intel too to make
the next generation of DirectXand expose all the features that
the hardware can do, add APIsfor things like ray tracing when

(40:27):
it first appeared, blah, blah,blah.
So on one hand Microsoftpushing the content and the
developer experience withDirectX as hard as they can they
slow down a bit in the last fewyears.
We're hitting a bit of aplateau.
There'll be more steps in thefuture, more than just
generational performance steps.
There'll be new things like raytracing and various other

(40:48):
shader stages, which makes sense.
Or maybe it all just goes tocomputers and it's all software.
Who knows where it goes.
But there will be biggerchanges coming in the graphics
pipe in the PC world in thefuture.
Directx 12 isn't the end of theline, so Microsoft's already
involved there.
So they're helping PCdevelopers to do this.
But then Sony of the last twogenerations have kind of just

(41:08):
been using PC hardware.
So all Sony then do is look atthe PC, amd in particular.
They look at their current andfuture products APUs,
potentially GPUs too, knowingthat they have to do a two chip
solution at that point Harder.
Cost reduce may never costreduce.
So looking at APUs to startwith makes a lot of sense from a
cost reduction and initial costpoint of view.
So they kind of look okay, well, this APU in two years time is

(41:32):
going to have all of these newGPU features and that becomes
the new PlayStation.
And it just happens to be thatXbox and Sony both kind of
picked the same APU because it'sthe one that obviously made the
most sense at the time and theypicked it two years early.
They're not going to pick ittoday because it's going to take
them years to get the hardwareout.
So they are looking at what'sgoing to be in the market in a

(41:52):
couple of years time.
So in some ways the PC doesdrive the consoles and it drives
them from a developer side too,because developers expect
certain features.
Like I can't do my cool game onthe PlayStation because it
doesn't have hardware feature XFor PlayStation 4, that would
have been ray tracing.
The new consoles have raytracing.
Although it's not used thatmuch, it can be used.

(42:16):
Developers get someexpectations from the PC world
and that's not only the hardware.
It's a level of performance.
It's a level of quality in thetools and the debuggers that
they use and then ultimatelythat all feeds back into the
consoles.
Years ago Sony didn't useVisual Studio for development.
Now it's all Visual Studio.
So I do think the PC feeds theconsoles and has them for at

(42:38):
least the last two generations.

Speaker 1 (42:41):
So I'm going to ask a question this is for the
audience's sake, which I know ismy prickish question I ask all
the time on this one Do youthink, Rob, that another marker
could be that, as an optionalAPI, DirectX would ever make its
way over to the PlayStation, ordo you think that one of Sony's
hallmarks really is thatlow-level graphics access that

(43:03):
you don't want to have anythingon top of?
Don't and can't?
Two different things.

Speaker 2 (43:07):
Sony have always given us these crazy low-level
graphics APIs and I was involvedin a few of those.
Like GCM on the PS3 was superlow-level, at least after We'd
Finish with it it was andbasically it's user mode
application-level command buffergeneration, like command
buffers on the PC, are notfirst-class citizens.
You can't do what you like withthem and probably never will be

(43:29):
.
But many other reasons are notworth getting into today.
But on a fixed piece ofhardware it's like let's do what
we want to do and Sony go okay,and all the exclusive games the
really good PlayStation 5exclusive games all take
advantage of that.
They're all very good graphicsengineers.
They have very nicearchitectures.
None of them are saying well,let's just write a high-level

(43:50):
API and put it on top of thislow-level API, just so it's
easier.
Yep, none of the first-partyteams are doing that.
But no one says you can't dothat.
Sony have made half-assedefforts implementing OpenGL and
Vulkan and things like that, andit always gets to the point
where like to be standardizedenough that it's familiar.
You've got to write a bunch ofextensions to deal with how you

(44:13):
work on these platforms and thememory models and things like
that, and ultimately it's notworth it, just do it with the
other API.
But again, no one said youcan't do it.
If somebody wants to add, I'msure somebody has Some point
written DirectX 11 or 12, notofficially, but just took the
API and be like, well, this iswhat it does, I'll just rewrite
it.

(44:33):
And they've done it enough toget their DirectX 11, 12 code to
work on a PlayStation and Iknow for a fact it was done on
the older PlayStation.
But an official implementationwould be super useful.
I mean you wouldn't get theAAA-quality, exclusive
PS5-quality games, but you wouldget easy development.
So no, you wouldn't get thesame quality.

(44:54):
So no one says Microsoft can'trelease it.
You can't make it official.
People make third-partymiddleware all the time for
these consoles.
Why can't Microsoft just go?
There's DirectX 12 for PS5.
And we implemented it ourselves.
If you want to use it, it'sthere.
If you don't use Sony's API, noone says you can't do that.
I could do it today and releaseit as a valuable library for

(45:17):
the PlayStation DirectX 12, itworks perfectly and if Microsoft
did it it would be better thanme doing it.
It's totally allowed by therules today.
Sony wouldn't take the game offthe store just because you use
the library Microsoft provided,which happened to be DirectX 12.

Speaker 1 (45:31):
So I wonder if, as part of this, every screen is an
Xbox strategy, if we would seebasically some sort of DirectX
for PlayStation, simply to makedevelopment easier, even if it's
only for Activision, blizzardand maybe for anyone else For
anyone else.

Speaker 2 (45:48):
I mean if the longest Microsoft give it make it
available.
I mean that's just part of it,of the ease of development.
Xbox has always beentraditionally easier to develop
for not necessarily the bestperformance, because these APIs
do get in the way.
Even though 12 is significantlybetter than DirectX 11, as part
of the API overhead CPU side,the developers will pick the

(46:11):
battles.
It's like some developers don'tcare.
Directx 12 is perfectlyacceptable.
All the developers want to beat the metal with the mindset of
if I don't optimize this, mycompetitor will, and then
they'll be better than me.
It depends who you are.
I think if you're an exclusivePS5 first party, absolutely Sony
developer, then everyoneexpects that your next game will

(46:34):
be significantly better thanyour previous game.
They expect no games will justbe good all the time and you've
got on the PC.
That same mindset comes from.
Well, in six months hard, it'llbe faster and there's a lot of
developers out there that arejust well, this works good
enough.
I'm not pushing the envelope inthis area, so I don't need the

(46:55):
best of the best.
It's like not all games are allabout pushing the graphics.
Some are very simple and pushanother side of the spectrum.
Audio, for example, like guitarhero games and all of those
games fairly basic graphics hada different criteria they had to
meet to make sure thosegraphics lined up with audio etc

(47:15):
.
But it was an audio game.
You don't have to push thegraphics to make a good game.
There's plenty of other areasthat people can push and we see
it all the time with especiallymobile games where there's a lot
more tinkering.
I think it would be fine.
I don't think anyone would haveany complaint if DirectX was
available on all platforms.
Make an iOS version, a Linuxversion of what you asked for.

Speaker 1 (47:36):
That would be fun.
I think it would be a reallyinteresting move on Microsoft to
actually do that as afulfillment to getting every
screen to be an Xbox.

Speaker 2 (47:45):
Yeah, I mean they could always make just their own
libraries, like all iGames willwork on all these platforms,
because we just make librariesthat will make it look like
Win32.
You could definitely do that.
I mean, it's no different towhat Proton or what things like
that do.

Speaker 1 (47:58):
Wine or a game engine .

Speaker 2 (48:00):
It's.
Yeah, a game engine is the samething, but just higher level.
Yes, I think it's totallyacceptable that they do that and
they might, they might not, butit's.
I don't think it'll be much ofa marker because it's possible
today and I'm sure it exists insome form somewhere.

Speaker 1 (48:17):
So to recap our predictions from here going
forward, obviously four gamesare going cross platform.
I think it's probably prettyeasy to say we think that more
will go cross platform and thatone of the big markers will be
Xbox Live getting ontoPlayStation sometime in the next
few years.

Speaker 2 (48:37):
That'll be a big step and like that's, that's so any
relinquishing the reins on theirplatform too.
So that's that's a two-sidedbig step.
It's.
It's not as simple as Microsoftjust making an app that happens
to be Xbox Live, because Sonymight have something to say
about that.

Speaker 1 (48:52):
Yes, that's true.

Speaker 2 (48:55):
But that may be how it starts.
They all will just do it, putit out there and then we'll see
in court when you see we can'tdo it.
And you've got to bear in mindit's like Sony is a big company
but Microsoft massive.
Right now it's the mostvaluable company in the world.
It like surpassed Apple theother week.

Speaker 1 (49:08):
They keep going back and forth.
It's hard to keep track.

Speaker 2 (49:11):
Yeah, right now it's Microsoft's number one.
So if Microsoft do somethinglike that and it's like they're
tempting you to sew, basicallyOkay, we'll do this, and then if
you don't like it, you couldsue us.
But don't forget where it was.
It's like come at me, bro, andthere's all these other app
store lawsuits going on whichMicrosoft's, funny enough, not

(49:33):
involved in.
It would be a big step for Sony, but I think it's an inevitable
step.

Speaker 1 (49:39):
And I think it's a mutually beneficial one.

Speaker 2 (49:42):
Because you own it, becoming kind of a no-no.
And what was the numbers?
Like the EU say, if you've gotmore than 45 million monthly
users, then you're a requiredplatform type thing.
They have more than that.
So Sony effectively could be inviolation of that law if they
try to enforce something againstMicrosoft wanting Xbox Live on

(50:04):
PlayStation and it'd be nice,it'd be nice to have the Xbox
Live app.
I think it's.
I think, take it all the way.
I have competing stores.
I'd love to see competingstores on various platforms, ios
included in this whole thing.
It's like if you get to pickyour poison of like this store
has adult rated games, you don't, that's fine, you don't have to

(50:25):
.
I know if I want adult games, Igo here.

Speaker 1 (50:29):
Yes, it's the content moderation question I want
gambling games, I can go here.

Speaker 2 (50:33):
That's fine.
No one's saying you have to doit.
It's open up the competition.
Let everybody decide who doeswhat, and these stores will
naturally pop up to servevarious markets.
Maybe you have a game that'sjust retro game, an engine, a
store that's just retro games.
Maybe you have a store that'sjust Xbox games.
Why is that not a thing today?

(50:53):
It seems to be like these appstores are removing our choice
because you only get to choosewhat they approved and it's like
I don't necessarily agree withyour approval and I'll go to a
different store.
Maybe you sideload games likeAndroid style.
You lose all security.
You do it yourself.
If you get a virus, you did itto yourself.

(51:13):
I think all of these things aregoing to be addressed in the
future on a lot of platforms,not just the game consoles.
Obviously, android, ios iswhere this battle is going to be
fought.

Speaker 1 (51:25):
Again, it feels like technology keeps going in
circles in many ways, but if wekeep taking so much of this
stuff to the limit where westream movies, maybe in the
future we're streaming games.
So much of where we seem likewe're going is these centralized
servers, these things in thecloud, versus the importance of

(51:45):
having something locally on yourdevice, whether it's a console
or whether it's a DVD player orwhether it's your phone, where
now, hey, all of this stufftakes place someplace else.
You get to put whatever youwant, or you get to access
whatever you want from whateverdevice you have and not have,
effectively, the tyranny of oneapp store or another telling you

(52:06):
what you can or can't do withit.

Speaker 2 (52:09):
Yeah, and then everyone thinks like these
devices will be like this willbe Xbox device.
Who cares what the device is?
I bought this device for amultitude of other reasons.
Correct, it happens to have anXbox front and I like that.
I think the idea of a hardwarefor one purpose is gradually
becoming a thing of the past.
I think Sony is missing theball here to some extent because

(52:30):
they don't have much presenceon other platforms and maybe
that will change.
I mean, they do have, like,these various PlayStation
properties in the iOS store andthat's about it.
There's no PlayStation.
There is a PlayStation live appfor iOS, but it's more account
side stuff.
I think it will kick them intodoing something similar.

Speaker 1 (52:51):
Well, let's roll back the clock 35 years.
At this point in time, I thinkit would have been anathema to
Sega to have its IP on Nintendo,and obviously today that's
basically where you can get it.
I've played Sonic, the oldSonic, on my Apple TV.

Speaker 2 (53:10):
Yep, it's on Apple TV .
There's lots of iOS Sonic gamesyeah.
And 35 years ago, like in theWell, even go, go back to 1990.
Yeah, that is 35 years ago.
God, I'm old.

Speaker 1 (53:22):
We're all old.

Speaker 2 (53:22):
It's a Go back to 1990, before the PlayStation,
when it was purely Sega Nintendo.

Speaker 1 (53:28):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (53:28):
Then, yeah, the idea of a Sega Sonic game on a
Nintendo platform was completelylike ridiculous.
You suggest it.
You'd be like what the hell areyou talking about?
It will never happen.

Speaker 1 (53:40):
Right.

Speaker 2 (53:40):
And look at everything that's changed from
then of like platforms becomingrelevant, new parties showing up
, Sony showed up, Microsoftshowed up.
Neither of the two bigplatforms today, even Apple, in
these mobile space.
None of them existed in thegaming space in 1990.
100%, In fact.
From 1990 to 2000 is the decadethat we keep talking about in
this podcast.
From 1990 to 2000,.

(54:03):
Everything changed.

Speaker 1 (54:04):
Yes.

Speaker 2 (54:05):
It went from 2D to 3D , it went from Sega Nintendo to
Sony, microsoft, and Nintendo isstill in there and still are.

Speaker 1 (54:12):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (54:13):
But the head-to-head competition was Okay.
That was a decade of change ingames and it went from offline
playing to online playing, itwent from standard-deaf to HD,
it went from cartridges to discsLiterally everything in that
decade changed.
So there's no reason thatdecade can't happen again.
So it's all about knowing themarket of where it's going and

(54:36):
where you think it's going.
If you're a big player, thenyou probably have a better
handle on it than any of us do.
But the idea of it's going tobe the same over and over and
over again is ridiculous and Ithink that's kind of Sony's
downfall is they just do thesame thing again, and PS4 is no
different to PS5, which isreally no different to PS3.
It's the same old saying withbetter tech, better games,

(54:59):
better content.
But I think Phil, when he saidthey have a different vision, I
think that's literally true.

Speaker 1 (55:05):
He's looking ahead.
He talks about it in terms ofthe business models.
He talks about it in terms ofevery screen is an Xbox.
But to everything we're saying,what does an Xbox make If not?
Hey, it's really just accountsfor the content.
Nothing else really matters atthis point in time.

Speaker 2 (55:22):
I'm not so never mad.
It's always been content.
It's always Eyeballs on.
Content is what wins it,whether that means making
hardware and getting yourexclusives on it, or whether it
means putting your exclusives onsome of the platform.
It's like they have the content, they have the IP, they have
the developers.
Put the games where people are.

Speaker 1 (55:39):
There's a quote from the movie Star Trek 6 that I've
always liked.
It's towards the end of itwhere Kirk says some people
think we're at the end ofhistory.
Well, I think there's a littlemore history left, so it's
exactly right.

Speaker 2 (55:52):
To your point.

Speaker 1 (55:52):
I think we've got a lot more change that's actually
ahead of us and that thestability we've seen over the
last 20 years really 25 yearswith Sony and Microsoft I think
that is actually going to beseen as this, maybe even a
stagnant island for a littlewhile in the game space.

Speaker 2 (56:08):
I think again nothing's going to change in the
future.
In 10 years, I think the gamespace will look very different
to what it was today.