How do these munchkins get the job?

I don't understand how these people get the job.

Halo 4 is poster boy for my confusion. Here is the break down
- Halo is the largest franchise from Microsoft
- Halo 4 looks to be the best in the series, gameplay and graphically. Everything screams, porting to PC is a must
- PC Gaming on Windows continues to be the largest demographic of gamers.
- Windows 8 has Xbox crap integrated into it.
- Microsoft makes Halo 4, Microsoft makes Windows. We are already loyal Microsoft customers.

Ok so how does it make sense, for whoever that has the job... It is in the best interest of Microsoft to give the finger to PC? How does such a person get the job?

The list of confusion is endless
- For example. BioWare RPG games were born on PC, most extensible on PC, provides the best experience on PC, and overall most creative and artistic freedom on PC. So how does someone get the job and keep it by saying, yes lets make all BioWare games from this point on Console primary?
- Rockstar. Again above. So why is Red Dead Redemption console exclusive when PC is far better platform for that type of game?
- Bethesda. Yeah Skyrim and Obilion IV are undoubtedly console primary and so was Dishonored. That game has lots of press about it's artistic greatness, but why does it look like crap with blurry and amateur level of detail for textures? Oh right, because it's console first. So even for artists and creators, console first is massive constraint.

So who gets the job to make these decisions?

 

If they did it would be less of a reason for people to buy their crappy consoles lol

 

No it wouldn't. There are plenty of people like me who didn't buy their console and bought the game. Why does it matter, a Halo 4 sale is a Halo 4 sale. Making games cross-platform is standard. It's not a big financial ordeal anymore. Game engines are normally built to be cross-platform friendly.

Plus it's not the consoles that gets MS, Sony the money, it's the games. Every game that is sold, they get a piece of the profit. That's how it works. So for Halo 4, who cares, it's still a sale.

I won't be buying a 360, which means MS lost on on a customer for Halo 4. That seems moronic to me considering 360 runs on DX9.

 

The main reason is because Halo is pretty much their flagship title for the xbox, it has to be exclusive. What I don't understand is why it has to be exclusive forever.

I still think since halo 2 vista failed so miserable, same as GFWL they won't bother with the pc market atleast for the near future.

Xbox 360 runs DX9 becuase its using a processor that was designed in 2004, it still has elements that make it onpar with DX11 since over time they optimize the hardware more and more, wait for xbox 720 which will probably have 4k resolution support.

 

Clearly missed the point of my post about game sales and DX9.

 

If you take this as a premise, then obviously it's insane that they haven't ported it to the PC.

However, Halo is an Xbox franchise. They know they have an audience there, and I don't think they want Halo players who could buy the game on the xbox to buy the game on the PC. The Halo franchise probably drives a significant portion of xbox console sales, as well as xbox subscription sales, and the price that they can charge for the game is higher on the console.

probably not, seeing as 4k resolution displays require a ton of graphics power and aren't common anywhere. I think 1080p and 3D are more reasonable approximations. Most 360 games today are 720p or less. Halo 3 was 640p, it looks like Halo 4 is 720p. Call of duty runs about 600p. Bumping everything up to 1080p would be a big jump, and 3D basically requires double the horsepower, you need 2x framerates per resolution.

 

It's an exclusive title meant to sell consoles, period. If the 360 didn't have exclusives then people wouldn't buy as many of them. Pretty simple.

 

Clearly missed mine, its wayy beyond DX9, Xbox 360 games are made completely differently than PC games. The development environmental is very similar but the architecture is very different. There is Unified RAM for cpu and GPU, but the gpu has a special "fast" memory area inside its die that works like a cache bus or whatever. Games aren't DX9 games as they are on the PC, directX is constantly being improved as the xbox ages and as they learn to do more with the hardware. Go look at the SDK's and you can see how it changes from the inicial versions and how they keep adding DX11 elements to it. The problem is that at this point they've pretty much gotten all the juice they can out of the console.

^ Also if you are going to make a console that is supposed to have a 10 year cycle and it won't support 4k resolution then why bother. The next xbox is slated for a 2015 release. I'm very sure we are going to have 4k screens at reasonable prices around then.

 

They would bother because new hardware could allow for improved performance, image quality, and other features, and most likely not 4k resolution for consoles with a 2015 target.

 

You are one person... It takes resources to make a port, even if its simple.
Selling one copy to you doesn't fill their coffers, it drains them due to the costs involved.
Selling a few copies to all your friends doesn't really fit the bill when they consider all the costs either.
It takes X copies sold to break even, and apparently they didn't project X sales.

In their calculation, Halo is not worth selling in the PC gamer market as it is firmly aimed at the console market.

Most PC gamers really don't care about Halo.
In my opinion, Halo is just awful. I am glad they didn't waste their time.

 

I would love to see the data to back that up. Love to see you prove your claim that porting Halo 4 would cost more than they could profit from or not enough to be worth their time and that PC Gamers don't care about Halo. I guess this is the same group of PC Gamers who don't care about Skyrim, COD, GTA, Dark Souls, BF3, BC2, etc, all these other console games and are now essentially console franchises with PC ports.

 

Proof is in the pudding...

No Halo3 for PC, no Halo 4 for PC.

Microsoft is all about making money. If they could, they would.

Skyrim and Halo is apples to rotten oranges. Try again.

Remember Halo 2?
Xbox Critic scores in the 90s
PC Critic scores in the low 70s.

Skyrim
Xbox Critic scores ~96
PC Critic scores ~95

Skyrim was altogether a better game.

Perhaps the question is... when is Halo 3 coming out for PC?
Halo 4 will likely be 3 years afterwards.

I'd advise not holding your breath.

 

So now the people who can't decide whether to buy a PS3 or Xbox will just buy a PS3 and play Halo 4 on their PC. Microsoft gains a game sale but loses on all the money they would have made if the person bought into their console and the Xbox ecosystem (via accessories, other games, Xbox live, etc).

Who gets a console and only buys one game? Exclusive games like Halo 4 help people decide to buy one platform over another. An Xbox sale will make Microsoft more money over the long run over whatever lump sum they would get from releasing games like Halo 4 on PC.

Not if you want to get the most out of the console. That's why the best looking games on Xbox (Gears of War) and PS3 (KillZone, Uncharted) are all platform exclusive. halo 2 took 2.5 years to come to the PC, so obviously porting isn't as easy as you make it seem.

Microsoft does market research. Halo 4 might make some money in the short term but it will probably hurt Xbox sales (this gen and next) because that would be one less exclusive that the Xbox has. I'm sure that the "muchkins" working for MS have more knowledge about business and the video game industry than you or me so you can rest assured that their doing what is best for Microsoft's profits.

 

I don't believe that at all. I just can't see how making a game exclusive 360 is more profitable in the long run for MS considering the PC and 360 platform are synonymous, the same. The Xbox community? Please, that's why MS released Windows 8. Xbox community will be cross platform, whether you are on your phone, PC or tablet or console. Doesn't matter. A Halo 4 sale is a Halo 4 sale for MS. Windows 8 IS A MICROSOFT PLATFORM. If MS was smart, they would just release all their games for both Windows and 360. Just make it one thing, that way every game sold on Windows, they get a piece of it anyway.

I just don't buy the whole 360 sales loss. I just don't think the consoles themselves are what gives MS $$$, it's the games. Doesn't matter if the sale is on their PC or 360 platform, it's still profit for MS either way.

Also the best looking games on console? What planet you on... There isn't a single game on console that can come close to PC. Any game that is on console looks better on PC. Even Doom 3 with two free community mods has better lighting, shadows, and textures than ANY game on console. You must have been joking and I just don't see what was humorous.

 

Your pc is 10 times more powerful than the 360 lol. Of course games look better on it. He was saying that Halo and Gears are the best looking games on the 360 (which they are.) They're optimized and developed solely for the 360, which allows them to overcome hardware limitations.

R3d made a completely reasonable argument: Microsoft knows what's best for their long-term profits, much more than we do. They have educated market analysts who make these decisions for them. Just because you disagree doesn't make them wrong. Or "munchkins" for that matter. No point in stressing about it bro.

 

We can neither prove nor disprove the claim. Proving (or disproving) the claim would require access to internal Microsoft documents which we don't have access to. What we can do is make an educated guess. Microsoft is a large company that is very successful and has access to experts in economics and business among other fields. There's more merit to the guess that Microsoft evaluated their financial interests than that they ignored their financial interests.

It's not just about direct profits from console sales. Every console they sell is a console their competitors do not. That means they get money on the sale of the console + percentage of all future games purchased + their competitors get less profit. Also, the price of the game itself can be kept higher longer if it's console exclusive. Another major factor is that Halo is a huge source of Xbox live subscriptions, which have a large profit margin.

 

Still think that a proper port job on a Halo game would help sell Windows 8.
I would even rebuy Halo Reach even if its an older title.
Since they integrated the Xbox Live features into the OS they could also skip the clunky GFWL client.

I mainly bought my Xbox 360 for Halo & Forza, and both Forza 4 and Halo 4 look damn impressive considering how old the hardware is.
Not sure if Halo 4 runs at 1280x720 30fps or 60fps but i know Forza 4 does 1280x720 60fps.

Sent from my GT-I9300 using Tapatalk 2

 

More consoles sold means more games sold. Maybe they don't make a lot of money on consoles sold, but those people buying an Xbox to play halo are going to buy other games and accessories, and they do make a lot of money on those.

It's lame, but honestly, do you really think the folks at Microsoft sat down and said "well boys, we have a huge untapped market for Halo 3&4 that would bring in a bunch of money, but we probably shouldn't sell it to them because... I don't like the cut of their jibs." If it would benefit them they would do it. The benefits of not releasing it on PC outweigh the rewards.

 

At least read my post thoroughly before responding... :/

 

Just a Guess here. And Two Cents

PC (Why they didn't make for pc.)
Because of the diversity in pc market / hardware (netbooks,ultrabooks,notebooks,desktop,you get the point).
And then the support depending on the user OS. XP,Vista,7,8.
And then the (Digital) launch on windows live for pc.
And then the support for networking ip4,ip6 ,wireless.
And then the fan fare about whether to support dedicated servers or peer to peer or they control servers.
And then the modding have it open or brute.
And then the hackers.
And then the pirates.

VS.

Xbox 360
Hardware known for 8 years got it down to science
OS Known and control (Users limited)
Controlled Launch with Disc's
Known how each xbox 360 network abilities (And Control xbox live)
Control all servers
Modding Can be done but can be controlled(Usually less interest on console)
Hackers still present but can be handled better then pc.
Pirates still very much present but can be controlled to some point.

With this. I know if I had to the job to choose. It would be on xbox 360 and stay there.
Because then I would control most of the game and content.
Also a Port to pc may reflect more profit upfront but the cost to support over time would outweigh it.

 

None of this has anything whatsoever to do with why they didn't release it on the PC. It's all about selling more consoles, and more games for those consoles, and more accessories to play those games. When you have a killer app, you leverage it to sell hardware. It has nothing to do with all that stuff you posted. Bottom line, if they thought it would make them enough money to justify the costs, they'd have done it.

 

People claim PIRACY!!! And on the consoles, they fall prey to DLCs, which is an easy money maker.
Looking at Console ported games to PC, its just atrocious. Just look at Dark Souls, it's just disgusting.

Well my only reason I bought my Xbox was because it was being sold for $75 and for another $25 It came with Halo 3 and Halo Reach. To be honest, Halo is the only reason I'm keeping the Xbox.

 

If every game available on Xbox was available on all platforms, including PC and PS3, there would be less incentive to buy an Xbox.

 

Just a Guess here. And Two Cents

Let also and a opinion in which you don't have to take into consideration. Just like they did with the pc.

 

Basically there wouldn't be a reason to buy a Xbox at all..

 

I don't see why people are all that worked up about it.

All of the best parts of Halo are posted on YouTube not long after they ship.

All you are missing out on is the auto-aim/auto-win button press.

 

The best thing about Halo 4 is the 4 player coop called Spartan Ops each week they release 5 missions per episode and season 1 has 10 episodes.

Sent from my GT-I9300 using Tapatalk 2

 

I'll probably buy two copies once it gets cheap so I can play co-op with my brother. I bought halo 3 full price and was incredibly disappointed.

 

I rented it from redbox last night, played a couple hours so far. It looks good for a 360 game, and it has great production values, but it's still just more Halo. The devs played it really safe and strictly followed the decade old Halo formula. I know there are millions of people out there that want exactly that; I just got tired of the gameplay by the time Halo 2 was out.

I wouldn't buy this game, regardless of the platform it's on.

 

My issue with the Halo series (at least the ones I've played for a significant amount of time) is that the game introduces you to an enemy that is both interesting and fun to fight, and then halfway through the game replaces them with the Flood, who are just boring and annoying. It appears that the Flood don't make an appearance in the single player campaign, though.

 

lol yeah that was annoying in the older games. fortunately the flood doesn't make an appearance in the new campaign.

 

Hey y'all...

I just want to give a shout out to the Lollipop Guild! Hooo!

Ding-dong, the witch is dead, yo.

 

So...Steve Ballmer is a witch?

 

Munchkins... lollipop guild... wicked witch of the west... :hi2:

 

Kids these days... sheesh.

 

Micro$oft tried to kill Alan Wake on the PC as well, till Remedy were able to wrestle their IP back from them. Remedy made the development cost of Alan Wake PC back in 24 hours after release, PC gamers got a great game, and Remedy expanded their audience. Pretty good for a game that was a near flop on XBox. Anyway, are PC gamers even interested in Generic Bland 4? I know I am not, Gears of Snore can stay were it belongs as well, do we need another console port with weak characters, a paper thin story and annual releases? I didn't think so.

 

I'd like to point out that Alan Wake is a much more fitting title for the PC than Halo ever was.

Most PC FPS veterans that I know feel the entire Halo series is little more than a movie with a "FPS for beginners" tacked on...