Xbox At E3

So with the dust beginning to settle on another E3, it's time to take a little look back at what Microsoft brought to the table this year. We will begin where Microsoft's conference began, with the announcement and revealing of the Xbox One S.  Well actually it turns out that the reveal of the Xbox One S happened a day earlier when a leak turned up on the Internet showing off a picture of Microsoft's new console and also some details about what the new machine was all about.  

The console itself is gorgeous in my opinion, the white finish suits it well and it really puts the launch machine to shame when you see the two side by side.  The first thing you'll notice, apart from the colour of course, is that it is much smaller than it's launch brother, it's 40% smaller in fact.  Microsoft have also added 4K video capabilities to the new S, those of you that were hoping for 4K gaming must be feeling a little disappointed but HDR gaming has being included and from what I have read, Gears 4 looked incredible running in HDR. The port for the Kinect has also being removed from the back of the machine, so if you upgrade to the S and you have a Kinect, you'll need to get a new adapter to connect it to your new console.  The new S can also be stood upright, so it might fit into some people's home entertainment units a bit better. 

Now Microsoft have stated that the new Xbox One S will NOT improve framerates or resolution over the launch machine on Xbox One games but there are stories knocking around that dispute this, time will tell but I can't see why Microsoft would lie about it.  The price of the the new console starts at E299 for the 500GB model, E349 for the 1TB model and E399 for the 2TB version.The Xbox One S will be released in August and I think you can only pre order the 2TB model at the minute if you live in the UK.

Next up on the stage for Microsoft was the announcement of the new Play Anywhere feature.  This feature will bring Windows 10 on PC and Xbox even closer together, if you buy a game digitally on the Xbox One you will also be able to play the same game on your Windows 10 PC at no extra cost, basically your getting two copies of the game for the price of one.  Now not only can you play the same game on both systems, but your saves and achievements will also carry across, so you won't lose any progress that you've made.  It's important to keep in mind that this only works with digitally downloaded games, disks will not work in the same way unfortunately.  Some games that are going to take advantage of this new feature are the new Gears 4, Forza Horizon 3 and Killer Instinct 3, actually going forward all Microsoft Studios titles will be Play Anywhere games, which basically means that there will no more actual real Xbox exclusive games but it does mean that because of Cross Play, multiplayer lobbies will be a lot bigger as our PC friends will now be facing of against us in the next Halo title.  It's my understanding that games that take advantage of Play Anywhere need to be designed to do so, nothing special has to be done according to Microsoft, but developers will need to opt into the program and Microsoft tools to share their data across platforms.

The next part of the show I want to discuss is the games themselves, for me this was the biggest let down.  There was nothing new announced, apart from a few new indie titles that in fairness did look very cool, there was no new AAA exclusive games at the show that we didn't already see.  We did get a chance to see the new Gears 4, Forza Horizon 3, Halo Wars 2, ReCore, State Of Decay 2, Scalebound, Killer Instinct 3 and Sea Of Thieves, nothing new on that list but we did at least get to see some new gameplay footage from those titles.  We Happy Few, which is going to be added to the Game Preview program was by far and away the most interesting title that I seen at the show on Microsoft's stage.  Others may disagree, but I was rather under whelmed by the games on show from Microsoft, especially in terms of Xbox exclusives, or Xbox and Windows 10 exclusives, which is in stark contrast to what Sony showed off, they had brand new IP's and lots of exclusives, it certainly looks to be a good year ahead if your a PS4 player.

Last up is the Xbox Scorpio.  The show started with the new Xbox One S and finished with the announcement of the Xbox Scorpio, a machine that will bring in the new era of 4K and VR gaming for Microsoft, a machine that won't be available till close to Christmas of next year and a machine that apart from showing you what the inside might look like, they had absolutely nothing to show us at all in terms of games.  Look I have no issue with this being announced but the Scorpio has kinda overshadowed everything else that happened at the show for Microsoft and in my opinion it was pretty pointless talking about this at all if there was nothing to showcase what it might be capable off.  I can understand that this now puts Sony in a tricky situation because the specs for the NEO have already being pretty much set and it looks like on paper at least that the NEO will be about 40% down in power next to the Scorpio.

Anyway lets have a little look at what was actually announced.  The machine itself will of course display games in glorious 4K, to achieve this it has an 8 core CPU, it will deliverer 6 TFLOPS of power, the Xbox One runs at about 1.3 TFLOPS, the NEO is rumoured to be about 4.2 TFLOPS so you can see that the Scorpio outstrips the NEO in terms of raw power.  It is also being built to run games in VR, and although no official VR partner was announced for the Scorpio, maybe Microsoft are leaving  it open for more than one VR system to be used with it.  The system will also let you use your current controllers and all games, actually no matter what system your using, be it the Xbox One, Xbox S or the new Scorpio, no one is being left behind is the theme coming from Microsoft.  This is PC gaming on consoles, the games will be scaled for whatever console your playing on, there will be no exclusive Scorpio titles, apart for maybe pure VR games.  The system is set to be released in the Fall of next year and there has was absolutely no mention of what the actual price of the "most powerful console ever built" will be.

Around the show floor there was lots more games to see on the Xbox front, For Honor from Ubisoft looks like a blast, as those the new Battlefield and Resident Evil 7 looks to be a return to form for the Resi series, I played the demo this week on my PS4 and it is brilliant, drips atmosphere and bloody scary as hell.  Also looking forward to the new Mass Effect, looks like it is going to be bigger and better than ever.  

Overall though, I was left a little disappointed, I've no interest in the new S console, as I already own an Xbox One and I don't see the point in upgrading to it.  I'm certainly interested in the Scorpio but it's release is probably 18 to 20 months away and there was nothing at the show to really get you excited about it.  For me, I was just hoping for more new games, maybe that's why I'm being a bit down on the show, with the announcement of new hardware for both the near and distant future, there is still much to look forward to, next years E3 could be the biggest yet from Microsoft, hopefully then, we'll see the Scorpio in action and what 4K and VR will look like and hopefully a host of brand spanking new games to be excited about to.