Xbox Bosses Promise to Deliver More Games to More Players Around the World

[T0@st]

Yesterday, during a special edition of the Official Xbox Podcast, we shared an update on plans to continue to bring more games to more people around the world, with the exciting news that the first Activision Blizzard game on Xbox Game Pass will be Diablo IV, beginning March 28. Phil Spencer, Sarah Bond, and Matt Booty also shared the vision on game exclusivity, the future of Xbox hardware, and the overall Xbox promise. There's a lot to talk about, so we encourage you to watch the full episode (see below).

With the combined creativity across Team Xbox, players can expect an incredible 2024 with the likes of Senua's Saga: Hellblade II, Indiana Jones and the Great Circle, Avowed, Ara: History Untold, Towerborne and more coming your way, alongside continued updates for our blockbuster franchises Call of Duty, Minecraft, Forza, The Elder Scrolls Online and Microsoft Flight Simulator.




There will be even more to play as we begin to fulfill our commitment to offer Activision and Blizzard games with Game Pass, both new releases and classic games from its legendary catalog. We're happy to share that Diablo IV will be available to play by the 34 million Game Pass subscribers on both PC and Xbox consoles beginning March 28! This is only the start of Xbox players being able to enjoy Activision and Blizzard games on Game Pass - we look forward to sharing more soon.

Our combined studio teams already ship some of the biggest franchises and critically-acclaimed adventures across multiple platforms: Minecraft, Call of Duty, Overwatch, Diablo, The Elder Scrolls Online, and more have built communities across consoles, PC, and mobile. Likewise, Xbox Game Studios and Bethesda have brought dozens of games to Steam alongside Xbox consoles on launch day; the teams at Xbox have extensive experience supporting multiple platforms, while continuing to invest heavily in our studios, our consoles and services.

Indeed, our games are reaching more players than ever; across Activision, Bethesda, Blizzard, King, and Xbox Game Studios, we reach hundreds of millions of players across console, PC, and mobile.

To ensure long-term success for both Xbox and the industry as a whole, we must continue to evolve. Today we announced that we will expand the communities we reach: we are currently in the process of bringing four Xbox games to other platforms. These are titles which have been available to Xbox players for at least a year, including hidden gems that deserve to be experienced more widely, and live service games whose communities will benefit from welcoming even more players. We will share more details on these titles soon.

By bringing these games to more players, we not only expand the reach and impact of those titles, but this will allow us to invest in either future versions of these games, or elsewhere in our first-party portfolio. There is no fundamental change to our approach on exclusivity.

Likewise, our commitment to game preservation is unwavering. Xbox players should have confidence in building your digital library in the Xbox ecosystem. We will continue to reward that with the most robust, player-friendly experiences, including backwards compatibility, cross-play, cross-save progression, convenient cloud gaming, and more. Xbox consoles will continue to provide a flagship experience for players; it's where you get the best value and convenience, it's where Game Pass provides unprecedented access to an ever-evolving library of games. To be clear: Game Pass will continue to be only available on Xbox platforms.

This is what it means to be part of Xbox:

• The biggest games in the world will be on Xbox.
• Our games will come to Game Pass day one.
• A robust and innovative multi-year hardware roadmap
• Compatibility with your library is a priority, inclusive of cross-play, cross-save, and robust cloud features.
• Xbox will continue to help game creators find the biggest audience possible.

Whether you've been with us since 2001, recently joined Game Pass to enjoy games like Starfield or Palworld, or are looking forward to the next season of Call of Duty, the creative teams at Xbox are stronger together - no matter where you play. Xbox will be around for decades to come - we hope you'll join us on this journey.

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[scottslayer]

exciting news that the first Activision Blizzard game on Xbox Game Pass will be Diablo IV

They desperately need to sell those microtransactions huh.

 

[Deleted member 229121]

They don't just need more games, they need more high quality AAAs.
Sony is still trouncing them handily in that dept.

 

[Vayra86]

Bwahahahaaaa

You bought an empty shell, you idiots. The world is moving on. Diablo is dead. CoD is declining. Actiblizz wont ever get healthy, all talent has long since left the building.

Just die already. Again. AAA has steadily been cutting into its own flesh and no corporate approach will save it. Gaming isnt fast food. Its art. And you cant manage art and true creative talent - you can only manage it into the ground and out of your company.

 

[TheDeeGee]

aka "Hot Garbage", cuz today's youngster don't want boomer games.

 

[neatfeatguy]

aka "Hot Garbage", cuz today's youngster don't want boomer games.

I'm not a youngster and I don't want boomer games. I played them already. I don't want rehashed, remastered, re-released games. Been there, done that. If I want to play these older games I'll just install the ones I have (which I have been doing actually).

Give us something that's newer and not Call of Duty # 645 - the shit got old and tiresome. Move on.

A guy at work the other day asked me if he should pick up the remake/remaster of Tomb Raider 1-3. He said he enjoyed playing the originals when they came out and thought if it was a good idea to get the re-released ones. I told him hell no. You already played. I said the copy of Helldivers 2 my brother got me turned out to be pretty fun and he should look into that game. This morning he said he was having a blast with Helldivers 2 last night and was happy he didn't get the remake of the Tomb Raider games.

Blizzard/Activision/MS or whatever the hell the company is now they need to let Call of Duty and Diablo die. They need to shift gears and create something new and polish the shit out of it so it runs great, is fun to play and it's not focused on microtransactions or in game ways to milk money from players. Microtransactions should be something done as an after thought and not the main focus of designing a game around.

 

[b1k3rdude]

Still not interested, its like they are having these fake marketing/PR blubs to desperately try and convince world + dog that they matter. And Phil in attempting to look like one of the 'cool kids' has only succeeded in looking like a twit, with his vacuous boat race not doing him any favours.

 

[Vayra86]

What the fck is this anyway.

• A robust and innovative multi-year hardware roadmap

Eh? Robust and innovative... roadmaps? For hardware no less? Why would I be interested?

One thing I can applaud is the push of cross play, cross save, device agnostic gaming. Get on with it. Good stuff. But to do that you don't need to make games.

 

[Imouto]

What a load of BS to say in the end that business is so dire they have to put their first party games on rival platforms.

"Just the tip" uncle Phil said and the Xbox community still doesn't know where this is going.

 

[Broken Processor]

What they needed to do was put out a proper road map to calm the Xbox fan base because of the rumours and the way they have handed it Xbox fans are nervous to the point a lot are regretting buying a current gen console.

Adding actiblizz games to game pass was bound to happen and yeah fine I've played them including D4 but didn't spend a penny on MT when they add WoW on I'll cancel my bnet I play a lot of classic mostly HC at the moment. CoD I'll try it but like D4 I tend to avoid anything with MT.
Now HotS is a game I'd love to see them invest time and energy in it doesn't need to be another edge lord moba like LoL but update it and keep it fun and it will do well it's a great game.

 

[Random_User]

What the fck is this anyway.

• A robust and innovative multi-year hardware roadmap

Eh? Robust and innovative... roadmaps? For hardware no less? Why would I be interested?

One thing I can applaud is the push of cross play, cross save, device agnostic gaming. Get on with it. Good stuff. But to do that you don't need to make games.

Man... Device agnostic, cross play... they've even tried to cut support for Sony from the established franchises, which had it since the beginning. I have more belief in Nintento become cross plaform that MS fixing their cr*p and become open.
MS would better fix the bugs, that prevent people to play older games they have.

BTW, MS intentionally was dumping PC/Windows gaming capabilities, to "look" worse than Xbox. Despite being owner of both and never been punished for this.

 

[Vayra86]

Man... Device agnostic, cross play... they've even tried to cut support for Sony from the established franchises, which had it since the beginning. I have more belief in Nintento become cross plaform that MS fixing their cr*p and become open.
MS would better fix the bugs, that prevent people to play older games they have.

BTW, MS intentionally was dumping PC/Windows gaming capabilities, to "look" worse than Xbox. Despite being owner of both and never been punished for this.

MS thinks it has control over what they do with gaming but its really governed by the powers that be. Always been that way, if we look back, and at today. They keep throwing money at perceived problems or strategies but I still don't quite get it. They HAVE their reach in the gaming market. All they have to do is keep providing it, they could have started in earnest on building that trust twenty years ago. Instead they focused on getting Windows out of the hands of everyone who's now on a phone. Metro... touch UI... its all bullshit.

Its like a few decades of missed opportunity, and now they're still trying it their way. No one gives a singular flying fk who makes a game or who bought studio X or Y, in the end, the games are judged on themselves, if its good, we can even love EA or Ubi coming from years of pure hatred. After all, we all play games for one purpose: to play games. Good ones that are fun.

Sony's success... Nintendo's success? Games. Its just that simple. Nobody gives a shit about hardware, people want to play games, and it must be easy to do so. This will never change. All the games that drop extra unneeded complexity on us is at best a temporary success because of the wow what's new factor. That also applies to on demand/streamed gaming. When the promotions end, the player count plummets. All the added hardware, from an EyeToy to Kinect to VR: similar. In the end, people are still playing games, not gadgets.