E3 Microsoft - Finished

[Robo_1]

 

Conference:
 

 

Conference Vids:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Spoiler

 

Conference Expectations:

 

Strap in folks, for Phil Spencer will be looking to rev the engine on his ambitions for the next step of his Xbox plans and already, senior management are teasing big announcements for the platform at this year's presser.
 

Unusually for an E3 less than three years since the launch of a new console, it looks as though - if the rumours are to be believed - that MS will be all about new hardware this year, with plans so extensive that they could be looking to re-launch the platform in all but name.... who knows, maybe that will go two?

So what’s on the cards? Well first off is Xbox Slim, a totally made up name for a hopefully real console. Current speculation suggests we’ll be getting a smaller, cheaper repackaging of the original Xbox One with 4k support thrown in. It’s said to be the smallest Xbox ever produced and will be available by the end of the year.

Then there’s Xbox Stream, no, it’s not a creator of tasty carbonated drinks (somebody stop me... please), but it is rumoured to be a Chrome Cast like device, which will plug directly into the back of your TV and allow people to run Windows 10 small apps and presumably stream Xbox games from a Cloud service.

Then there’s the big one, codenamed Scorpio, this new souped up Xbox is said to be sporting close to 6 teraflops of processing power (for comparison, the Xbox One has just 1.32 teraflops) and is said to be headed for a reveal during their E3 press conference, with a late 2017 release pencilled in. If they do announce it, then it could be a real show stopper if those specs are confirmed. On the one hand they could risk stunting sales of the current Xbox One if they’re announcing a new machine this early on, on the other, the audience for this device will typically be those twenty so million people who already own an Xbox, so maybe it’s not a big concern for them if they’re putting out a cheaper more mass market friendly version of the first machine to catch the mainstream market.

When it comes to games, I would have to write a novella to do justice to all of the titles MS could show at this years show, but aside from the stuff we know about, such as Crackdown 3, Halo Wars 2, Gears 4, ReCore, Scalebound, Cuphead, Ashen and Rare’s lovely looking Sea Of Thieves, there’s rumours abound that Ryse will be getting a sequel in the form of Ryse: Knights Of England whilst titles such as Horizon 3, Age Of Empires and a new Battletoads game, are all names being bandied around as potential announcements.

All but certain to be revealed now, is a new Dead Rising title. This classic Capcom franchise which has always enjoyed a close association with the Xbox platform, is said to be a planned remake of the first game, with an expanded city area.

It seems a lot of MS’s planned announcements have leaked, but they’re good at playing a few cards very close to their chest, so they could still pull something out of the box to give the show a true, wow moment. OG Xbox emulation would be a particularly sweet cherry to place atop of the conference, but either way, MS will be going in guns blazing this year.

 

E3 Conference 2015:

 

 

 

[Mr Do 71]

Really looking forward to seeing what they show.

[the_debaser]

Scorpio could be the show stealer here. 

 

If they announce that Scorpio is fast and cheap, then it could be the gateway to Oculus Rift for many. 

[macosx]

Can't see Scorpio being mentioned as it would kill sales of existing and slim hardware. 

[Mentazm]

I reckon it will get a tiny tease but nothing more, they will focus more on the slim.

[rafaqat]

Would be nice to see the Xbox Stream device.  Especially if it can stream xbox games from the cloud rather than an xbox.  I suspect it wont be THAT advanced though.

[BitterToad]

A device that lets me stream my Xbox downstairs without having to lug the monolith up and down a flight of stairs would make my E3. Cheers for the thread, Robo, I'm properly hyped for this now!

[Robo_1]

Cheers, yeah, plenty to keep an eye out for this year.

[The Mighty Ash]

First I've heard of a Ryse sequel. That's interesting!

[Rev]

3 hours ago, macosx said:

Can't see Scorpio being mentioned as it would kill sales of existing and slim hardware. 

 

It'd also kill, or at least do Massive Damage, to PS4 sales if it looks good. I think it's in Microsoft's interest to just go for it.

[The Mighty Ash]

I agree - they can't let the Neo be announced and offer no counter.

[rafaqat]

They're the first conference so as before it's more likely Sony will decide whether to announce Neo or not based on if Scorpio is mentioned.

I reckon it won't get mentioned at E3.   It'll totally take news away from the Slim.  

[Rev]

The Scorpio will be more expensive than the Xbox One at launch was. Probably £699 based on Surface pricing, so launching a £179 Slim at the same time as it is a fairly elegant move. They're completely different audiences, after all.

[The Mighty Ash]

11 minutes ago, rafaqat said:

They're the first conference so as before it's more likely Sony will decide whether to announce Neo or not based on if Scorpio is mentioned.

I reckon it won't get mentioned at E3.   It'll totally take news away from the Slim.  

 

If Neo is coming in October as rumoured I think they will.

[rafaqat]

5 minutes ago, Rev said:

The Scorpio will be more expensive than the Xbox One at launch was. Probably £699 based on Surface pricing, so launching a £179 Slim at the same time as it is a fairly elegant move. They're completely different audiences, after all.

 

I'm just thinking that ANY hint of a mixed message will put them back to that awful E3.  Granted it's a simpler message this time around and it's all about games but I'd be wary about anything that could cause people to wait until the better console comes out.  They're done an awful lot of good work in the past few years to turn it around.  Would be a shame to see a misstep at this one.

[Mike S]

8 minutes ago, Rev said:

The Scorpio will be more expensive than the Xbox One at launch was. Probably £699 based on Surface pricing, so launching a £179 Slim at the same time as it is a fairly elegant move. They're completely different audiences, after all.

 

A £700 console?!

 

 

[Rev]

4 minutes ago, rafaqat said:

 

I'm just thinking that ANY hint of a mixed message will put them back to that awful E3.  Granted it's a simpler message this time around and it's all about games but I'd be wary about anything that could cause people to wait until the better console comes out.  They're done an awful lot of good work in the past few years to turn it around.  Would be a shame to see a misstep at this one.

 

Where do you think they will announce it if they don't announce it at E3?

[Mr. Gerbik]

4 minutes ago, Mike S said:

 

A £700 console?!

 

 

Are you Elite enough? It makes sense though if they offer the choice: power for the enthusiast crowd or a less powerful, slim alternative for the casual crowd. You can't demand a powerful console and then not expect to have to pay for it.

4 minutes ago, Rev said:

 

Where do you think they will announce it if they don't announce it at E3?

Whenever they want to be brutally honest, E3 is nowhere near as relevant as it once was. They could also bring back that yearly Xbox event they used to do and announce it then - would be even better, because then they don't have to compete with every other company also announcing stuff at the same time.

[Rev]

5 minutes ago, Mike S said:

 

A £700 console?!

 

 

 

Comparing it to their £1399 tablet, I think I'll be fairly close with that guess.

[Mike S]

3 minutes ago, Mr. Gerbik said:

Are you Elite enough? It makes sense though if they offer the choice: power for the enthusiast crowd or a less powerful, slim alternative for the casual crowd. You can't demand a powerful console and then not expect to have to pay for it.

 

Well, I do have the Elite controller so....

 

But, really, for that money, I think I'd just be sticking a 1080Ti in my PC instead. I'll be surprised (and impressed) if there is a worthwhile market for a £700 console.

 

 

4 minutes ago, Rev said:

 

Comparing it to their £1399 tablet, I think I'll be fairly close with that guess.

 

A £1399 tablet?!

[Rev]

5 minutes ago, Mike S said:

 

Well, I do have the Elite controller so....

 

But, really, for that money, I think I'd just be sticking a 1080Ti in my PC instead. I'll be surprised (and impressed) if there is a worthwhile market for a £700 console.

 

 

 

A £1399 tablet?!

 

http://www.microsoftstore.com/store/msuk/en_GB/pdp/Surface-Pro-4/productID.326546100

 

(It's actually only £1300 for the bottom of the top of the range one which is what I was aiming for. Bargainz. It's more to compete with Macbooks though, to be fair.)

[Mr. Gerbik]

8 minutes ago, Mike S said:

 

Well, I do have the Elite controller so....

 

But, really, for that money, I think I'd just be sticking a 1080Ti in my PC instead. I'll be surprised (and impressed) if there is a worthwhile market for a £700 console.

 

 

Yeah, same here. I already have a high-end PC, all that needs updating is the GPU - the rest is brand new and freshly built. For that money I'll just buy a 1080 and get to play all dem Xbox games that are now also coming day and date to Windows 10 going forward anyway. Looking and performing a lot better too. But before I got into PC gaming, I was totally part of the audience for the Scorpio. An ultra-powerful premium console that gives me a comparable fidelity and performance to what the PC lot are always bragging about without having to buy a PC myself? I would have been all over it!

 

And that's also why I'm still excited about Microsoft unveiling the Scorpio, really looking forward to finding out what it is exactly

[Robo_1]

19 minutes ago, Rev said:

The Scorpio will be more expensive than the Xbox One at launch was. Probably £699 based on Surface pricing, so launching a £179 Slim at the same time as it is a fairly elegant move. They're completely different audiences, after all.

 

I think that's their thinking. It's a continuation of their Elite gamer idea, whereby they can target the most committed gamers with a premium product and price, whilst keeping a mass market product out there.

One thing I forgot to mention was that there is also talk that the basic Xbox One controller is going to get an update, probably to be inline with the aesthetics of the slim console.

[RubberJohnny]

He's right it will be very expensive, but I expect £499.

[Mike S]

10 minutes ago, Rev said:

 

http://www.microsoftstore.com/store/msuk/en_GB/pdp/Surface-Pro-4/productID.326546100

 

(It's actually only £1300 for the bottom of the top of the range one which is what I was aiming for. Bargainz. It's more to compete with Macbooks though, to be fair.)

 

 

Aah, right. If it's a touchscreen mac competitor then the price seems slightly more justifieable but, really, this sort of fusion/hybrid machine is not for me.

 

I am old fashioned like that. 

[Rev]

5 minutes ago, RubberJohnny said:

He's right it will be very expensive, but I expect £499.

 

£70 more than the Xbox One launched at isn't particularly expensive. Admittedly it (almost certainly) won't have the Kinect to shove the price up, but if it's got the rumoured leap in power I think they can go much further than £499.

[Mike S]

11 minutes ago, Mr. Gerbik said:

Yeah, same here. I already have a high-end PC, all that needs updating is the GPU - the rest is brand new and freshly built. For that money I'll just buy a 1080 and get to play all dem Xbox games that are now also coming day and date to Windows 10 going forward anyway. Looking and performing a lot better too. But before I got into PC gaming, I was totally part of the audience for the Scorpio. An ultra-powerful premium console that gives me a comparable fidelity and performance to what the PC lot are always bragging about without having to buy a PC myself? I would have been all over it!

 

And that's also why I'm still excited about Microsoft unveiling the Scorpio, really looking forward to finding out what it is exactly

 

 

I dunno. I know consoles have a very different target market to PC's etc but anyone enthusiast enough to spend £700 on a higher spec'd Xbox would surely be enthusiast enough to be looking at a PC option?

 

I mean, if the new console can run games of the same graphical fidelity as the current Xbox One but at 4K and maybe even at 60fps then it's going to be an easier sell of course.

 

I'm now very interested in seeing the real world specs and performance of this machine.

 

The name Scorpio is just a development name though isn't it? I hope so.

 

 

 

[Harsin]

 

29 minutes ago, Mike S said:

 

A £700 console?!

 

 

 

 

 

[Mr Do 71]

6 minutes ago, Rev said:

 

£70 more than the Xbox One launched at isn't particularly expensive. Admittedly it (almost certainly) won't have the Kinect to shove the price up, but if it's got the rumoured leap in power I think they can go much further than £499.

 

Nice discount for people who bought Day One Xbox One from Microsoft store, pls.

[Guest]

45 minutes ago, rafaqat said:

They're the first conference so as before it's more likely Sony will decide whether to announce Neo or not based on if Scorpio is mentioned.

I reckon it won't get mentioned at E3.   It'll totally take news away from the Slim.  

I wonder why they don't let Sony go first for once. That way they can do exactly as they did and tailor their conference based on the customer response from it. As Sony have discovered it's an easy way to not only win E3, but also a whole console generation, by the looks of it.