Defining Duke, Episode 212 | Our Thoughts On Xbox's Developer_Direct 2025... - Did It Deliver?!
Added 2025-01-24 00:52:16 +0000 UTCThe January Developer Direct has come and gone! With it, Xbox has finally achieved what many fans have desperately sought out for them to do since this generation started back in 2020: Have consistent releases in the front half of the year. Indeed, you'll be getting three major games from them between April 8th and May 15th on Game Pass. Those titles are Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, South Of Midnight, and DOOM: The Dark Ages. That's not all as the mysterious fourth (fifth?) showing is a strong return for Ninja Gaiden. A fourth entry is real and inbound for Fall of this year. Today, you can play Ninja Gaiden 2 Black which aims to straighten out problems over a decade old. With the return of 2D and 3D Ninja Gaiden, it truly is "The Year Of The Ninja" and the Dukes couldn't be happier about it.
Timestamps:
0:00:00 - Intro
0:23:52 - Xbox Financials
0:36:25 - PlayStation’s live service initiative is a failure
1:18:07 - Extas1s has shared more games leaving Xbox
1:25:41 - Respawn’s upcoming Star Wars RTS game reveal soon
1:30:23 - Dragon Age Veilguard director leaves BioWare
1:39:25 - Hollow Knight Silksong is still real
1:41:40 - EA Origin is shutting down
1:42:34 - Some new sales numbers
1:43:55 - What We’re Playing
2:01:28 - Xbox Developer Direct
2:59:33 - BioWare Sales Update
3:12:19 - Indiana Jones sales
3:19:12 - Coming soon to Xbox Game Pass
3:24:11 - Game Pass Pick Of The Week
Comments
I’m giving myself credit for the 3:22:45 callback 🤣🤣🤣
Bartevious
2025-01-30 20:57:06 +0000 UTCU
Ryan Hayman
2025-01-30 20:16:33 +0000 UTCBethesda nailed this with oblivion. Long, tedious tutorial (not much recap, but story set up), but you can save right at the end so you only ever have to play it once. Once you exit the tutorial you can completely remake your character.
Bartevious
2025-01-27 17:50:07 +0000 UTCStarfield was plagued with much much less gamebreaking issues on day 1 than cyberpunk, and starfield has already been out a year and some change
Bartevious
2025-01-27 17:45:59 +0000 UTCYeah, I am trying to finish Eternal now, after I have dropped it in 2020. And I absolutely hate several thing about it. Mostly the platforming. I typically die 5-7 times during platforming between areas. Loosing most of my lifes in the process. Other thing is that need to do specific activities to get specific resources. Like I am usually out of ammo and out of fuel for chain saw before the end of each area. So I am basically just running around until I get killed. Also the hub world is uterly stupid. It always gets me out of the game and I just quit the game after I am transported there. That is usually the last straw for me for that that session..
Robert Olbert
2025-01-26 11:47:39 +0000 UTCBecause they are owned by Microsoft. A year is definitely a shout, however being owned by Microsoft is the reason.
Edwin Juarez
2025-01-26 06:25:28 +0000 UTCFine, I’ll play Lost Odyssey 🤷♂️
Jordan
2025-01-25 12:57:26 +0000 UTCExcellent episode Gents! #NinjaDD To be honest, after the Director's interview with Matty, I canceled a preorder for Dragon Age. I just thought there was no way there wasn't going to be a political ideology forced down on the consumer. So, I was like, let me wait and see. After release, these stupid, rote scenes, which rip you out of the experience so bad people made giphs with Peter Griffin mocking them, starting popping up, and I knew I made the right decision. I don't hate anyone for living their life whatever way they choose, but I don't want political ideologies hamfisted down my throat (which isn't coated yet). It would be the same for a religious game forcing conservative religious ideas on me. It's too much. It's in commercials, corporate trainings, the news, sports, TV, movies, games, at your kids schools, etc. It's gone way too far. If you want a message in your medium, it needs to be intelligently done, maybe subtlety, with excellent stories and characters that feel real. Now more than ever, again because of years of forced, rote bullshit, political messages need to be thoughtfully done with a touch here and a touch there. Or you know, just make a great game with a good story. And I'm sorry, but if Bioware folds because they couldn't read the giant fucking neon sign saying NO MORE, then they earned this closure. The writing talent and leadership (for sure the decision makers) that made Bioware great are clearly gone. /End Rant
Mr. Scott If You're Nasty
2025-01-25 12:22:20 +0000 UTCI loves Doom 2016 and Eternal. This Doom looked sick af. ID knows what they're doing.
Mr. Scott If You're Nasty
2025-01-25 11:36:54 +0000 UTCI’ll never get why they canned Spidey and TLOU mp. If Helldivers 2 can succeed, those would’ve done just as well, if not better. Enjoyed the Developer Direct. Looking forward to trying out those games. Good sign for the year hopefully if the beginning is this loaded. #NinjaDD
NeO JD
2025-01-25 10:00:12 +0000 UTCLike Matty mentioned, that’s what we thought for Xbox games too, but those long development cycles are no joke. Bend is out for this gen. Bluepoint too unless they work on another remake. The smaller studios got shafted hard.
NeO JD
2025-01-25 09:53:46 +0000 UTClol. If there’s 1 thing I’ll give Xbox it’s not having to pay full price to play these.
NeO JD
2025-01-25 09:50:10 +0000 UTCYeah, I didn’t really agree with his thoughts. Eternal cranked the movement and mobility to 11 - so; where was ID to go with a sequel? I think switching gears and focusing on a slower gameplay style sets it apart from Eternal. Otherwise, I feel we would’ve got something entirely too similar to eternal, which is fine, but, wouldn’t have its own identity.
Cameron Sturre
2025-01-25 01:51:14 +0000 UTCI’m in it’s “free” with gamepass so I don’t mind too much
Mosuke Juchiha
2025-01-24 17:33:11 +0000 UTCThey said you can turn the stop motion off, which is great. But yeah, the actual gameplay screams 7/10, been there done that. This one will live or die by the story and characters.
Jimmy G
2025-01-24 17:18:42 +0000 UTCSouth of Midnight sounds interesting on paper but I just HATE stop motion shit and the gameplay just looks so flat to me even in the reveal showcase I just can't bring myself to care about it
Zac
2025-01-24 16:35:38 +0000 UTCBUT WE COULD HAVE HAD TWO GAMES PER STUDIO ROBERTO
Gooch Gobbler
2025-01-24 16:12:27 +0000 UTCWhy does Marty expect a Phantom Liberty moment from Bethesda in 1 year when it took about 4 years for CDPR to do it? Super unfair imo.
Jeff Caseres
2025-01-24 15:56:59 +0000 UTCShout out to the goats that coat the throats with the ropes
Joshua Brown
2025-01-24 15:46:22 +0000 UTCLegit went to Target half hour ago and got some Throat Coat. My throat is really scratchy this morning. It’s steeping as I type this.
Michael Mashpotato
2025-01-24 15:11:12 +0000 UTCMatty throat coat goat
Matthew Kincaid
2025-01-24 14:36:44 +0000 UTCI hated the tug o war of health and shields in eternal. It made it so you basically couldn’t avoid getting hit by enemies. So stupid.
CUMSoftware
2025-01-24 13:27:29 +0000 UTCY’all discharged all that xbox frustration on playstation this time.
Drew
2025-01-24 13:22:13 +0000 UTCI think people who pine for these games buy them, the issue is that most casual gamers don’t care for these games anymore . Like it’s not 2008 any more your average joe legitimately would rather play Fortnite or Marvel Rivals for hundreds of hours than pay 70 bucks for a dead space game that they will complete over a few weekends. As much as that sucks for the hardcore, that’s what the people (at large) want .
Derik Mozzarella
2025-01-24 12:56:51 +0000 UTCSo funny Matty has like the opposite take of most hardcore and casual doom fans. Most people absolutely hate the constant weapon swaping and Mario ass platforming (with monkey bars and fireballs), and more casual shooter fans did not like eternal because of the skill level it demands. Cog is right that this is much more inline with classic doom which has almost no verticality (90s doom you can’t jump, and in Doom 3 you almost never jump even though you can). Although if you want more doom eternal Matty, if you haven’t played Doom Eternals DLC expansions they are quite meaty and challenging (each level takes like over an hour to complete, and the boss encounters are borderline insane).
Derik Mozzarella
2025-01-24 12:27:53 +0000 UTCI agree with you apart from when he said at this moment there isn’t a skip button, you need that for people who’ve already played part one.
Garry
2025-01-24 11:12:25 +0000 UTCDoes everyone really think all the PS Studios games will be PS6? They will all release games within the next 2-3 years with this console cycle. Like the end of the PS4 era bangers. Too much gloom and doom from the live service misses.
Roberto Ramirez
2025-01-24 08:23:36 +0000 UTCJust a note Dukes, Shpeshal Nick said Platinum was working on a new Ninja Gaiden all the way back in 2022
Birds Aren't Real
2025-01-24 06:47:14 +0000 UTCA big problem is timing and self awareness in terms of releasing the game. You can’t release your game in month that 5 other bangers drop and then whine why no one played it… more games need to release in the dead months to space it out more so people actually have time to play them. Instead of everyone releasing on top of each other.
Big titty drinker
2025-01-24 06:23:12 +0000 UTCI know, mitigating circumstances and there’s never a perfect example. But, I feel even as a small sample size it’s pretty emblematic of a much broader issue. Good games do slip through the cracks, but in a period where people are so seemingly vocal about their disdain for service games and the like, it is odd to see so many fail, so consistently.
Cameron Sturre
2025-01-24 04:05:08 +0000 UTCDead space had some of its audience siphoned by Callisto(unfortunately), Hifi rush was a new ip that was shadow dropped and it’s only marketing was anXbox direct and Guardian’s followed the lackluster SE Avengers. Good games slip through the cracks all the time.
Mosuke Juchiha
2025-01-24 04:02:53 +0000 UTCAlso, Cog’s on the money regarding people not showing up for the games they romanticise and pine for. Dead Space Remake, Hi-Fi Rush, Guardians of the Galaxy. Phenomenal, single player games with no live service or underhanded monetary practices. All three titles languished and didn’t find an audience, and have just been forgotten about. People will say they long for the days of great, single player games, but, when push comes to shove, the support is rarely ever there, except for the big zeitgeist titles (I.e. elden ring).
Cameron Sturre
2025-01-24 03:45:43 +0000 UTCMatty’s tirade against KCD2’s prologue / recap seems a bit off, and unnecessarily harsh. I know he admitted that he had to play through it twice, and hence, it was fairly aggravating. But, it’s a sequel to a game that was released 7 years ago. I don’t think having a recap at the beginning of the game in any way points to ulterior motives or a financial imperative. Seems a little bizarre.
Cameron Sturre
2025-01-24 03:39:36 +0000 UTCWooooooo i usually don’t see eye to eye with matty but he spittin on this PlayStation topic , my feelings exactly for the most part.
Big titty drinker
2025-01-24 02:28:40 +0000 UTCAlso to Mattys point about cultivating a particular type of talent that doesn’t jive with live service. I think PlayStation has cultivated a particular type of fanbase that doesn’t jive with these live service games or at the very least needs them to be as close as possible to the 3rd person action adventure style of games they are used too. It would be like Nintendo instead on trying to make Mario cart for multiplayer games tried to make COD. That’s not your fanbase taste my guy.
Big titty drinker
2025-01-24 02:25:10 +0000 UTCI bought an xbox. It's working.
Beau!
2025-01-24 02:21:23 +0000 UTCAs a diehard PlayStation fan it makes my balls jiggle a little everytime one of thier live service games fail. I have always hated that shit.
Big titty drinker
2025-01-24 02:02:53 +0000 UTCShoutout to that dental health is wealth guy. I’ve also been focusing on my dental health recently and feel so much better knowing I’m treating my teeth well.
Haru Discourse
2025-01-24 01:49:04 +0000 UTCThat Developer Direct was easily the best game showcase I've seen in years. PlayStation needs to take notes because Xbox have lapped them completely on how to deliver a well-paced and well-presented showcase with great-looking games. And I say all this as a life-long PlayStation guy.
Adam Razak
2025-01-24 01:16:20 +0000 UTCI was surprised at the PS5 tags. Great games thow
drew
2025-01-24 01:00:11 +0000 UTCThe Playstation Direct was 🔥 😉
Jacob Lesperance
2025-01-24 00:53:29 +0000 UTC
