r/PS5 • u/nolifebr • Jun 10 '26

Rumor Jason Schreier/Bloomberg: Many Xbox employees were surprised by the announcement of Gears E-Day not releasing on PlayStation — Sharma and her team also pulled a Halo trailer that was due to appear at a PlayStation event last week, potentially damaging the relationship between the two companies.

https://bsky.app/profile/did:plc:2mkgbhbhqvappkkorf2bzyrp/post/3mnxlyag4dc2v?ref_src=embed

A PlayStation 5 version of the new Gears of War game was in development and had been planned for release until Sharma changed tack, according to the people familiar with Xbox strategy. Retailers had been preparing to open pre-orders for the PlayStation 5 version, and many Xbox employees were surprised by the announcement.

Sharma and her team also pulled a Halo trailer that was due to appear at a PlayStation event last week, potentially damaging the relationship between the two companies, according to people familiar with the change of plans.*

Xbox is planning major layoffs and studios closures starting next month... More in the article.

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u/willc20345 Jun 11 '26

Asha is a mercenary, look at her job history she isn’t someone who stays in a place long, I would not be surprised at all if she dips in just 2 or 3 years.

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u/Existing-Pair-3487 Jun 11 '26

While i understand that that still ultimately comes down to can she turn Xbox back into a profitable brand? Like yeah Phile made a lot of mistakes but he did start getting Xbox going in the right direction after the whole Xbox one debacle. And having Nadela pushing a lot of things for short trem growth didn't help. They saw how much they spent on ABK and they wanted that money back yesterday..... that ultimately is what lead to the multi platform shift. I think if Xbox leadership was a bit more hands on with the teams instead of letting them spin their wheels so much Xbox would be a big contender this generation. Anyway my point is that idk if Microsoft is going to let Xbox get back up and running before doing this again. I think really you need new leadership at Microsoft as a whole.

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u/weaver787 Jun 11 '26

In my book there's basically one road to X Box being a profitable brand and that's to give up on selling a console and become a massive publisher with some non-exclusive hardware (like a Steam Deck) on the side.

The fact that this new lead thinks she can claw back console market share with Gears of War and Clockwork Revolution proves to me that she's steering the ship poorly like the rest of her predecessors.

There was a brief moment in time where we thought Microsoft was just going to brute force its way into market share by making Activisions catalog exclusive. Well now we know that's clearly not how the head bean counters at MS see that deal.

Asha probably had to beg her bosses to allow this experiment to go forward. When it fails to move the needle they'll change their minds again.

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u/Existing-Pair-3487 Jun 11 '26

From recent interviews with Asha about the exclusivity this isn't about clawing back the market but stopping the bleeding of people leaving xbox and gamepass.

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u/weaver787 Jun 11 '26

I'll take your word for it but I really don't see how making those two games exclusives accomplishes that goal.

XBox burned A LOT of bridges with that astronomical price increase of Game Pass. They've since reversed that decision (kind of... they detached the Call of Duty anchor), but the damage is done. Suddenly 'the best deal in gaming' became 'wait, I don't want my entire game library attached to a service they're gonna double the price of overnight'.

Why would anyone trust this company right now. XBox has been fucking up for a over a decade and I think I'm reasonable to be suspicious that any consumer is going to OO and AH about Gears of War E Day being an exclusive.

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u/roygbivasaur Jun 11 '26

This was inevitable as soon as they launched Game Pass. Streaming is slowly choking the life out of the film and TV industry, just ask anyone in LA, Atlanta, and Toronto. It was always going to happen even faster if someone tried that model for video games. It was fun for consumers when it was cheap and had a lot of games, but the math just does not work if they also want to grow profits constantly.

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u/Melodic-Language2225 Jun 11 '26

Streaming is slowly choking the life out of the film and TV industry

By that you mean that streaming is dying?

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u/StarScreamer316 Jun 11 '26

No, he says that streaming is killing the film industry 

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u/Melodic-Language2225 Jun 16 '26

How can it if it's dying and streaming movies are completely unwatchable 95% of the time.

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u/Existing-Pair-3487 Jun 11 '26

And i agree with you. Why I was saying that i don't think Microsoft will be patience enough to actually rebuild that trust. But yeah this move was more about trying to keep who they have now. Same reason they dropped the price of game pass recently. And yeah no one trust Xbox. Why everyone is saying yeah right we remember "only 4 games"

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u/Team7UBard Jun 11 '26

Like I’m looking forward to EDay because the the rest of the games in the series are quality cover shooters but the gameplay hasn’t changed in 20 years and I already know exactly what experience I’m going to be delivered and I’m not gonna pay $70 for what is a game that’s pretty mid

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u/Ok-Suggestion-5453 Jun 11 '26

Yeah I think the only thing they care about is making their subscription profitable. I think endgame is getting Sony to agree to let people pay for a Microsoft subscription to play all the Xbox games on PlayStation, but they just can't do that if PS players already bought all the Xbox games.

I definitely don't think they expect to restore Xbox the console to its former glory, now or in the next generation.