Xbox Game Studios Adopting Longer Development Cycles & Dropping Xbox One

[T0@st]

Axios has recently interviewed Microsoft's game studio chief Matt Booty about development strategies for the company's vast array of first party studios (under the banner of Xbox Game Studios). Several of these teams have not yet released any Xbox Series console and Windows PC exclusives, with only a couple of examples newly revealed at last weekend's Xbox Games Showcase. Booty believes that closer collaboration between first party studios will help improve output and quality, with the added benefit of catching up with big rivals—Axios mentions Sony/PlayStation and Nintendo producing a number of excellent games in recent times. The Coalition is mentioned as a prime example of a studio spreading its expert knowledge of Unreal Engine 5 to other parts of the Xbox division.

Booty acknowledges that his company has taken into account that AAA game development is taking longer than before (compared to previous generations...more on that in a bit). He states that the expected norm nowadays for a high-end project will take "four and five and six years" to finish, due to "a longer creation process...(and the) increased complexity of modern games, plus the desire to reach higher technical marks with 4K-compatible graphics and advanced lighting...There are higher expectations. The level of fidelity that we're able to deliver just goes up." Microsoft's management of its game development teams has been called into question following the poor launch state of Redfall (an Arkane/Bethesda production). Booty says that the "house style" is somewhere between the parent group's set of rules and complete creative freedom at each development house: "We optimize for creative output, which can have some pros and cons, sure, but that is the goal."




When asked about the state of development for any upcoming Xbox One games (notably absent from his company's recent showcase) Booty replies: "we've moved on to Gen 9." With the exception of Minecraft and ongoing support for the prior generation's library, all internal teams are dedicated to software for Series consoles and Windows. He also says that Microsoft is "going to maintain support" for Gen 8 through cloud gaming—customers stuck on old machines (Xbox One, One S & One X) will be able to access newer titles through streaming services.

Axios also brought up the subject of the Xbox Series S causing headaches during development processes—software engineers have expressed frustration about projects becoming overcomplicated due to restrictions imposed by the weaker console. Booty is aware of the problem: "Is it more work? Sure." His first party teams will continue to support Series S: "They can plan better, knowing where some of the sharp corners are." He praises some of these groups who have managed to squeeze more performance out of the base model with second or third phase releases, thanks to accumulated experience on the lesser platform.

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[Denver]

I hope this translates into better graphics quality and less bugs.

 

[64K]

I'm not a fan of the MS Store and I will never buy a game there again but if the game gets launched on Steam then I might buy if it's worth it. I doubt that MS would put a game on GOG but I buy games there also.

imo MS is doing the absolute right thing by increasing game development time and I applaud them for that. It's not popular at all with gamers to have to wait but that is exactly what is needed to get games that launch with less bugs and possible performance issues. Assuming of course that the Development Team will put more time into Bug Squashing before release.

 

[ymdhis]

I hope this translates into better graphics quality and less bugs.

Best joke I heard all day, thanks.

 

[ViperXTR]

that will be 80usd per game sir thank you

 

[scheilinkin]

I`m wondering what`s the incentive for developers to invest more money into Series S optimization, on a platform where they sell the least amount of games ...

 

[TumbleGeorge]

I think that new improved AI will accelerate game making process substantially.

 

[Vayra86]

I'm looking at all those acquisitions and studios under the Xbox wing and with most I'm like 'yeah they were great, 10-20 years ago'.

Rare... responsible for Goldeneye 64 and others... what the hell have they been doing since then for example?

Still though, I think MS is honest when they say they want to promote true creativity coming out of their studios. They know they need to deliver unique experiences, and not marketing experiences. There is but one problem. True creativity is unpredictable.

I think that new improved AI will accelerate game making process substantially.

If used to produce code, certainly... if used to populate games... get ready for a massive influx of stuff we won't care about It'll be No Man's Sky all over again, times many

 

[TumbleGeorge]

if used to populate games... get ready for a massive influx of stuff we won't care about It'll be No Man's Sky all over again, times many

Given the lack of creativity over the last decade, and in the people working at the studios themselves, to make good stories in development, I don't think we'd notice. But we'll know for sure if the AI does better.

 

[Bomby569]

Like more time solves anything, the problem isn't more time, games are delayed all the time and still come out like trash. The problem is unreal expectations, projects that want to do everything, bad time management, shitty management changing the direction of the projects for money

 

[wolf]

About time they ditch the cross gen era. I know shortages really drew it out, but it's about damn time.

 

[Frick]

Rare... responsible for Goldeneye 64 and others... what the hell have they been doing since then for example?

Kinect Sports and Sea of Thieves, among other things.

 

[Naito]

I honestly think the Series S should have at least targeted 6TF on the GPU. Don't know what they were thinking

 

[Vayra86]

Kinect Sports and Sea of Thieves, among other things.

Ouch. Yeah

 

[TechLurker]

Considering how Microsoft prefers to lean hard into popular series until it's beaten dead, most exemplified by the Halo series, even going as far as their first modern assistant being called Cortana, and allowing studios to dilute and stagnate the series, I don't have much faith in longer development times leading to better games. If anything, Microsoft will be even less experimental than Sony or Nintendo and mostly iterate on existing IP rather than innovate, given the need to recoup the investment costs in all these studios. The other thing this does is further reduce the odds of any new games made from old IP that was loved by fans in their childhood who can now buy and play them as adults.

I guess Microsoft being more open to uncensored R-18+ games with explicit content is one thing they got going for them; Sony started to shy away from it after formerly using it as a silent advantage over the Xbox and X360 days, whether it was extremely foul language, violence, or sex.

 

[Deleted member 185088]

Why does it take longer to develop? UE seems to offer all in one engine, plus games aren't very impressive, with such long development we should expect Crysis level of graphics, yet most games are meh at best (one reason is they waste resources on useless RT).

 

[Chrispy_]

The XBOne was low-spec even a decade ago:

• Sub 2GHz netbook CPUs from with cut-down, low-power architecture borrowed from Bulldozer :\
• 5GB of shared memory between the game engine and graphics VRAM,
• A GPU equivalent to a 2GB Radeon HD 7770 but hamstrung by DDR3 instead of DDR5.

It's honestly amazing the XBOne is as capable as it is, with low single-threaded performance for the main engine thread, very little VRAM to work with, and a GPU that would struggle to run today's games at 480p24 if it were in a windows PC.

Dropping first party support for it is no issue, I bought one (new) for €199 for my brother-in-law in early 2017 and even that late in the console's lifecycle it had another 5 years of AAA gaming left in it, which is pretty crazy for such a low investment. Cyberpunk was the first game that didn't really run, and I don't think we can blame the console for that. It's just not good for the games industry to hamstring developers with an obligation to make their games run on a decade-old netbook with what is effectively a 2GB DDR3 graphics card.