And yet there are people like me that have zero interest in Sony single player games. I'm still yet to want to play TLOU or GoW or Uncharted etc. I just don't have interest in those walking sim, heavy story, anime games, scripted etc. I'm just not into that sort of thing. I understand that's awesome for some, more power to you. Let us not pretend there aren't great games to play irrespective of the hardware you own. Sony have the lead in first party games, well when I actually think about it Ninty would be the top of the heap in terms of recognisability, replayability and icons within gaming. Sorry Kratos isn't in the same league as Mario. PC has perhaps Steam vs Scam Citizen as its posterchild.
Xbox shit on Sony and Nintendo online, from parental controls, crossplay, emulation, accessibility, value proposition and server quality to anti-cheat and patches etc. Sony shit on Xbox first party. Nintendo shit on them both. PC is enjoying perhaps a renaissance in terms of games available, really great to see one place where it can all come together. PC gaming is currently like the ICQ of chat software from the 2000s. When I look at what games I can play across Gamepass and Xbox with a console, PC and phone in cohorts and cloud-based game saves, friends, security, backward compatibility etc etc I see no reason to buy into the PS ecosystem. There isn't a single game that's a system seller for me and I haven't even entered into the value for money Xbox/Gamepass have over Ninty, Sony or PC. Currently there is more interest in games outside of first party tentpole games anyhow, they're important but they're not what they used to be exactly. The attach rate isn't where it used to e.g. Super Mario Bros sold like 1 to 1 with the NES. These days GoW sells around 1 in 10 console owners e.g. 10% of the install base of PS4.
I also find it pretty fucking funny so many go on about lacking first party. How about motherfucking
Minecraft bitches. Yeah, it's multiplatform but that's exactly the point I'm making. Y'all are so blinded by a brand on a box and paywall garden to get a hardon for the game/box you obsess over that you don't see that MS is beyond that now. MS/Xbox are doing what they did with Azure; open up your systems, standards, protocols, services and community to become agnostic to such paywalls and hardware limitations to maximise your audience/potential buyers, MTX and subs. They'll happily sell one GP on PC to one customer then sell a Series X and controller + 2 games to another while selling just xCloud to the kid with his phone and controller. It's a diversification of services to reach a larger audience and move another tier beyond just a gaming console box.
There is another point being missed entirely with such articles. MTX. The elephant in the room. Sony is reshaping or adding another appendage to push into online further and MTX/subs etc. Every metric out there for the last decade shows this is the growth portion of the industry and the way forward beyond bugged releases, delays, budget blowouts, infinitely complex games to build of first party cycles. Bungie and Sony partnership is proof of such. Why would you invest hundreds of millions on a one shot sales run vs GaaS/MTX?
All platforms have advantages and disadvantages. This article is frankly insulting to games like Sea of Thieves (as big as any Sony first party), Grounded (mimics Steam early access very well), Minecraft (seriously, how is this not in the conversation), Forza (bigger than Sony first party), MS Flight etc. For example let us take a non-game like MS Flight and compare it against GoW franchise, flagship Sony. Flight often gets written off as "not a game" etc, however, MS Flight franchise had already sold 20Million by 1999 as a franchise. The latest 2020 single title entry for Series S/X/PC of Flight sold over $2.5Billion of hardware accessories just to play Flight Simulator. GoW has approx. 50Million sold. Yeah, we can let this rhetoric that Xbox first party games don't sell die. How about Halo vs GoW? 80Million+ for Halo franchise overall. How about some MTX comparison...
Elitist shit if you ask me. It's also funny how 3rd party/F2P is still bigger and growing more rapidly than any 1st party from any platform but doesn't seem to dominate the conversation as much these days e.g. historically COD, LoL, FIFA/NBA/Madden/EA games, Fortnite, Overwatch 2, GTAV, Apex Legends, Rocket League, Destiny 2 and all the indies success recent years.
You get it. It will be interesting as more Xbox first party games drop next year, either way tentpole games will hit an upper limit of budget, quality and market share.
Take a look at the biggest gaming franchises by unit sales. Not a lot of Sony first party there either. In fact, the article should really be titled "Even with the success of Sony first party why are Xbox and Sony so far behind Nintendo?". At least that would be an objectively accurate article instead of a biased personal blog.