The whole situation at Xbox seems so self inflicted it's difficult to watch. The OG Xbox was never going to be a success as people were unsure of it and happy sticking with PS2/GC. Xbox were then handed a golden opportunity as Sony got arrogant off the back of the PS2. For the next few years with the 360, xbox were in their prime. They had game after game of great titles in a variety of genre's and the majority of people were happy with the platform going forward. Then, it was time for a change of management. This saw a completely new direction for the 360 that saw them chase the success of the Wii. Slowly but surely, xbox were losing their grip as less games were being made for us and more games were being made for the casual audience. This all came to ahead with the xbox one reveal and to add insult to injury, they threw in a bunch of DRM nonsense to their hardware.
Sony were now able to coast their way up to the top with little trouble and xbox were left in ruins. Rightfully so, xbox changed the team and a new person was put in charge. Someone who understood gaming and knew the task in hand. However, despite this, the new team seemed to want a new direction for xbox. Something to leave their mark on it and maybe find the future of gaming. They started putting games on PC and buying up studios when they could. This wasn't a bad start, as it was putting the foundations in place for a brighter future for their console.
Fast forward a few years and in my opinion the problems were starting to show. Game Pass, the Netflix for gaming. A subscription service that allows you to play all their releases and more for a monthly fee. For customers, this sounds great. For them? I'd argue it's a great way to undermine you're own exclusive line up. Why pay full price when you could just pay for a one month subscription to Game Pass to play it then ditch the service?
With all the news lately of xbox sort of going third party in some form, it's got me wondering. Why on earth didn't they just go back to what worked with the 360? Even before the buyouts, they had a decent selection of dormant games of different genre's just doing nothing. In fact, we still haven't seen any of them to this day and I doubt we will. If the rumours are true, it's yet another way of them undermining their own hardware and system. I don't see why any third party studio would bother releasing on their hardware if gamers are savy enough to just buy a playstation and can play most of the xbox library there.
Utter madness. Just go back to the early 360, and focus on making good games.