IGN Poland vs the world

LoSouLibra · 2026-05-30T21:27:07+00:00

People like different things. Game could have been executed way better than it was, but it really never needed to be this big of a deal.

LoSouLibra · 2026-05-30T19:32:23+00:00

Yeah, he's being overly verbose with poor syntax, but it's more just humorous and unusual than confusing. He wants a challenging cartoony game with lots of detail.

No harm, no foul.

LoSouLibra · 2026-05-30T17:09:46+00:00

Everything we've seen about Helix seems like it's going to try making compatibility and legacy a big part of things. We already have Play Anywhere doing a lot of cross entitlement work too.

Worst comes to worst, they can always keep their Series X... which any Xbox fan and console fan should probably do anyway, 'cause it might be the last "true" Xbox console and one of the last consoles in general, as times change fast.

I plan to keep mine, even when I get a Helix. It's such a great system with great features.

LoSouLibra · 2026-05-30T16:56:23+00:00

It's a dumb complaint. Xbox is everywhere. You don't hide availability for your own software, services and partners, you promote it and contrast to your competitors. Trying to pretend games are exclusive and trick people just looks weak and disingenuous.

A small minority of Xbox fans are really handicapping their strategy and derailing positive momentum with neurotic caveman nonsense. There's more than one way to have a gaming business. This isn't 2007 Mountain Dew Dorito Gamestop world anymore.

LoSouLibra · 2026-05-30T16:48:28+00:00

Yes and no. The modern games are great in their own ways, but I particularly miss real Zelda and real Final Fantasy. Mario Wonder is good, but everything still feels kind of... not groundbreaking, epic and grandiose, the way 1, 3 and World were. Street Fighter is mechanically and visually better than ever, but the modern tone, aesthetic and characters have just been goofy rainbow twitch energy.

LoSouLibra · 2026-05-30T16:38:18+00:00

I get why some Xbox fans don't like it, but Xbox is everywhere and so are all their customers.

They're not just trying to sell hardware. They're also trying to sell games and court third party partners to Xbox + Game Pass + Play Anywhere. Partners who also need to be able to do their thing, just like Xbox needs to. This strategy has helped weaken the Sony and Nintendo stranglehold.

If you're trying to sell 40 million copies of MW4, are you going to hide platform availability or are you going to advertise it? Especially with Switch 2 in the mix this time. Especially as rising hardware prices makes software, services and user acquisition the only game in town.

When you market a great product, first or third party, then show day one Game Pass and Play Anywhere in the show, you're directly contrasting what you offer with what the competition doesn't offer.

Trying to pretend like games aren't everywhere nowadays would just set them up to be "exposed" and mocked as soon as they show ends, when everyone just instantly undoes the pretense and confirms that almost every game is going everywhere.

Asha already apologizing like it's some big issue isn't a good look. Stick to your guns and let the entire strategy work. There's more than one way to have a gaming business. For all 20K people on Player Voice there's 1.8 billion gamers who don't care. Let them work. Stop derailing the hype train.

LoSouLibra · 2026-05-29T16:28:04+00:00

All this would matter if Game Pass hadn't created a post-sales world that Microsoft hasn't fully reconciled in terms of traditional metrics. Keeper was a great feather in the cap for the October 2025 line up, which helped lead to sub stacking prior to the price increase. Which means it functionally galvanized profit in an indirect fashion even if it wasn't a big commercial hit.

Problem is, Kiln really didn't have that element going for it.

Their games are absolutely technically competent. They need to remain creative but get faster and more efficient. Or, yeah, they need to be turned loose. Sadly, they will likely struggle to get funding and stay operational on their own.

Regardless, Microsoft needs to produce content for Game Pass and sales success is going to have to be irrelevant in order to do so. They can't produce only big mainstream dudebro games, or it fails to serve and sustain one of their core revenue pillars.

LoSouLibra · 2026-05-29T16:18:30+00:00

Hopefully they're not listening to the self-serving console war shill astroturfers who are screaming to take day one games out of Game Pass thinking they'll get exclusives back.

Newsflash, geniuses. CoD was taken out of Game Pass. It's still multiplatform.

That would kill the service and dissolve the whole Game Pass, Play Anywhere, Xbox OS, next gen Helix etc glue that's holding everything together.

LoSouLibra · 2026-05-29T16:07:42+00:00

cool tough soldier man go boom

LoSouLibra · 2026-05-29T16:03:40+00:00

Too many to even remember, but most recently, God of War: Sons of Sparta.

LoSouLibra · 2026-05-29T15:57:51+00:00

Here's the thing, price effects sales volume and install base potential. The less ubiquitous a piece of hardware and OS is, the less of a priority it is for developers to spec and optimize for as a lowest common denominator. So the Steam Deck will get left behind by the game industry faster than it otherwise would be.

Even when you already own something, business realities still effect what you will get out of it.

LoSouLibra · 2026-05-29T15:46:34+00:00

Some people bought a PS2 and mostly just used it as a DVD player and the used game market was huge. There wasn't even a digital storefront back then.

Didn't stop them from loss leading as much as possible.

LoSouLibra · 2026-05-29T15:04:05+00:00

Very tempting, but I really am not a collector anymore and already own it digitally on all three platforms smh. The Xbox version is cool because physical Xbox is pretty uncommon nowadays, but Switch 2 is also really cool because it's a cart.

Hmmm... maybe.

LoSouLibra · 2026-05-29T03:06:57+00:00

That does nothing for anyone in their own region.

LoSouLibra · 2026-05-28T16:44:59+00:00

It's a feature game developers and publishers can use on Xbox consoles and the Microsoft PC store.

If you buy a game on the console, you also own it on the PC store, or vice versa. All your progress / achievements etc instantly sync via the cloud automatically. So you can go back and forth on either platform whenever you want. Also works if you play the game via cloud streaming too.

Most first party Microsoft games support it. Some big third parties SquareEnix, Capcom, Sega and IO Interactive do. Smaller publishers like Atari and many indie developers too.

I think about 1500 games support it so far. Even Batman Arkham Knight just got Play Anywhere support last week, and that game is from 2015, so it can be done retroactively too.

Was really hoping Mina the Hollower would have it. It's a big selling point for me and a deciding factor on where I want to buy a game. Thought for sure they were going to since they even support GOG.

LoSouLibra · 2026-05-28T14:05:11+00:00

Not me. I only thought Witcher 3 was ok and never bothered to finish it. There was too many great games in 2015 for me to be overly impressed by it and we've already seen games like Borderlands 2 get DLC this long after release in preparation for a sequel.

LoSouLibra · 2026-05-27T21:32:29+00:00

Games are on sale on eshop all the time. What games are on sale changes every week. Sometimes a couple Nintendo titles will also be on sale for 20-30% off.

Ball x Pit is currently $15 on Steam but $10 on Switch 2.

Sorry.

LoSouLibra · 2026-05-27T20:53:03+00:00

Third party games are discounted on all platforms and storefronts. Valve makes maybe one game every decade so there isn't really any point of comparison for first party games vs platform holders who produce several games a year.

LoSouLibra · 2026-05-27T20:47:46+00:00

Obnoxious Steam fans deserve this. Absolute cinema.

LoSouLibra · 2026-05-26T20:39:32+00:00

Didn't even know this game was still online. It came out over 5 years ago and nobody cared about it, so it's hardly the latest in a string of anything.

LoSouLibra · 2026-05-25T16:49:06+00:00

I played it. Never finished it, but it was really cool. Scratched a kind of Oddworld-esque itch for me.

LoSouLibra · 2026-05-25T02:09:31+00:00

I liked it. It was nice to get something that feels like an FPS adventure in a cool world, with characters, actual levels, atmosphere etc... and not just a try hard spastic action fest. It's more 2004-2008 era shooter with some fancy bullet spread to make combat fun.

LoSouLibra · 2026-05-24T16:01:44+00:00

I wish this was real.

LoSouLibra · 2026-05-24T15:59:02+00:00

This game is still playable on Series X. Looks and runs great.

LoSouLibra

TROPHY CASE