This year really is going to be the year that the Xbox One excels. That’s not to say that Sony and the Playstation aren’t going to do well too, but there are a few things Xbox have up their sleeves that might just trump their console war competitors!
We’ve already caught wind of one delay for the Sony guys with Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End getting a pushback until Spring of 2016, and with other delays a possibility it’s looking like Xbox are going to have the best Christmas line up of games. Let’s take a closer look at what games are in store for Xbox this year.
Firstly, as I said in a previous post, we’re looking at a new Gears of War, or at least some sort of Gears of War Collection for the Xbox. This is a fan favourite that will bring in plenty of Gears fans from the last gen which will make up a huge majority of the sales for this game. This is a really exciting concept that I hope sees the light of day this year.
Then, we have Fable Legends and a New Halo coming. These games are awesome in their own right, but also have the same effect seen above with the possible Gears collection. These games have spawned up fan bases on the 360 who are sure to upgrade when they see their favourite game are “better on Xbox One”!
This year we’re also going to see a controversial Xbox exclusive Tomb Raider. Some people in the gaming space saw this as underhanded as Microsoft penned a lucrative exclusivity contract with the developer of this beloved franchise. We are yet to find out how this affects future ports of this game but you can be sure that as Microsoft are publishing, there will be little to no Sony PS4 advertising associated.
There are just a few of the games we are super excited for at This Gen Gaming this year, be sure to keep your eye out for games like Crackdown and Quantum break too, as well at a lot of smaller arcade titles with Games with Gold.
Enough game talk. Although they are the brick and mortar of this industry, we still need the foundation to build upon. This is where Microsoft’s plans for a Windows 10 kernel come in. While it’s not confirmed to be added to the console in 2015, the new Windows operating system will be available for PC users sometime this year. We have an article already which goes a little further in depth on this, but allow me to cover the main talking points and point out how being partnered with PC’s will benefit the Xbox.
All Xbox owners with Windows 10 PC’s will be able to enjoy the following benefits:
- Streaming Xbox One games directly to your PC – Playing games from your Xbox One on your PC, laptop or tablet device over your wireless connection.
- Cross device multiplayer – Play against people on PC while your play your Xbox. Fable Legends will pioneer this new feature!
- Staying fonnected to friends, games and achievements on the go – Better smartglass integration with PC’s, tablets and phones!
- Capturing, editing and sharing game-clips directly from your PC – Easy gameplay recordings with the GameDVR and use of Upload Studio on your PC.
- Better graphics and game performance with DirectX 12 optimisation – High end games look and play better, this could make the difference this year!
- And more…
Just head on over to Xbox’s website and search Windows 10 to find out more, there’s some exciting stuff in there that makes me happy to be an Xbox owner!
But back to the matter at hand, there’s a lot of good stuff coming to the Xbox One this year alone, making it the perfect time to be an Xbox One owner! In the run up to Christmas I predict the Xbox gets a huge bump in sales mainly due to exclusive games, remastered collections of older games and new software and technology.
What do you guys think? Are we going to see the Xbox get a huge boost this year? Will it be enough to get back on level terms with the Playstation in terms of sales? Have your say in the comments below!