Game Inbox: Is Xbox Worth Saving?

Wednesday’s Letters page has new theories as to why Nintendo being so secretive Zelda: Ocarina Of Time, as readers are disgusted by corporate takeovers.

Games inbox is a collection of letters, comments and opinions from our readers. To join the discussions, email yourself gamecentral@metro.co.uk

The rescue package
So this month is going to get worse and worse Xboxhuh? Its developers, its fans, and… I would say its executives, but they never seem to lose. How Matt Booty is still around after all of this I’ll never know, except he obviously knows how to play the corporate game, even if I doubt he’s ever played an actual video game in his life.

I don’t know what will be left of Xbox by the end of this month, but maybe a few thousand developers and maybe at least a few studios will be scared off. I wouldn’t be surprised if they is postponed The Helix Project also, at that point the whole charade is over.

At this stage I don’t think it’s a question of whether the Xbox can be saved, but whether they deserve to be saved? They got online back in the Xbox 360 era, but what have they done for gaming since then? He brought it to its knees by buying half the industry and then taking it all out.

It’s the people at the top that I can’t stand anymore. We can complain about Sony never being explained, but at least we just assume they’re all terrible. Because they never stop talking, we know for a fact that everyone on top of Xbox is.
Hameriron

The day today
That reader wasn’t wrong it was a new disaster every day for Xbox at the moment. I don’t know if a developer as big as Rare is going to shut down, but all the smaller ones are toast as far as I can see. Much blame must go on Microsoft for buying them in the first place because I don’t know what they ever expected from a place like Double Fine, but to kill them all off like this is just awful.

I hope they will be able to buy their freedom and become independent, but I doubt they all will. For those that do, I can’t imagine they’d ever make a game for an Xbox system again. If there ever is a new one. Surely Project Helix should be canceled by now? Who would ever buy it, especially if it costs over a fortune.
VISION

No silver lining
I understand that vanity is why everyone hates it, but no one did Fortnite AI video do you realize how that would happen and how pointless it would look to use AI? It seems like they saved themselves virtually no time since they can’t trust AI to do a good job and have to go back and check and change it afterwards. So there is little to no time saved and you still have to hire the artist because someone has to be able to fix the mess HE made afterwards.

Oh, and as a bonus every time someone finds out you used AI, everyone hates you and you get terrible PR. When people look back on this era, in the future, they will assume that we were all crazy.
wrong conceptions

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21 again
I haven’t seen it mentioned anywhere, so I thought I’d point it out here about what we can expect from Zelda: Ocarina Of Time Remake.

When we see Link revealed that he is in a fetal position and he even performs an unborn kick or kick like a child.

Coupled with Nintendo’s wording that this is Ocarina Of Time reborn, I think we should expect a whole new incarnation of a beloved classic.

The teaser trailer was basically the announcement that we’re all ‘waiting’ and a very deliberate attempt to defend what deserves a dedicated reveal or birthday.

That’s my interpretation anyway.
Bad editing

GC: Ocarina Of Time’s birthday is November 21st, Zelda in general is February 21st.

Rare answer
Can anyone answer the question of why Rare and Nintendo ever decided to part ways? Two studios that worked so well together and provided much needed non-Nintendo studio content for every generation.

What’s happening on Xbox is so depressing and it’s easy to think we’re witnessing the last days of Rare. Do you think there is any chance Nintendo will step up again and bring them back? I don’t even have one Switch 2 but I would be very happy to see it happen.
crack

GC: The reasons are still unclear after all these years, but it seems to have been a combination of some relatively common issues. Most notably, Rare’s output was declining in quality and quantity, and they had missed many deadlines for various games, especially Star Fox Adventures.

Nintendo was also moving away from using outside Western studios in general, dropping Excitebike 64 maker Left Field at the same time. There’s also the fact that they just don’t like buying studios, and while they’ve done it from time to time, the chances of them making a move for Rare if they were to become available are very low.

Corporate relations
All this news about Xbox and their developers remember EA during the 90s and 2000s. Everyone knew what would happen the moment they bought a new developer: they would be shut down within a few years and everything they did would never be seen again. Westwood Studios is the one that hurt me the most from that time and the only one that survived was BioWare and that’s by the skin of their teeth because I feel like they could go at any moment.

It’s the same with Xbox, another huge ultra-rich American corporation that couldn’t care less about gaming, just for the short-term boost they’ll get from buying a company they have no idea how to manage. For years we’ve heard reports of poor management on Xbox and it never seems to change. It’s probably a matter of Microsoft company culture, so the only option these developers have is to either break away or have Xbox split into its own company.

I doubt Arkane or Double Fine can last long enough to take advantage of this, and we’ll probably hear confirmation this week or at least this month. I have a bad feeling it’s going to be even worse than we currently think.
FOCUSING

Impulse buying
I don’t get Microsoft or Sony for that matter. They spend all this money buying developers, spend stupid money to do it, thinking they can do better. Then you realize they made a big mistake and shut down the company.

This, in my opinion, is what is wrong with games. Why don’t they just let them do their thing. In my eyes, this is what is bringing the game to its knees. Xbox should forget the next gen console and go developer only. They would make more money and have less risk of another console flop.
DAVID

GC: You’re right, it’s a terrible practice that has destroyed so many studios in the last decade. Often the purchases seem to be made for no other reason than a mixture of boardroom bravado and dragon sickness.

Secret reasons
As for the secrecy surrounding the Zelda: Ocarina Of Time remake, I think it’s probably the same reason why their Summer Direct was so focused on Japan.

The Switch 2 price hike has already started in Japan, and this is Nintendo’s healthiest market. It feels wrong at this stage to go so hard with a focus on Japan, but it seems they may be trying to tightly control the timing and focus of their announcements and reveals to counter region-specific price increases.

Since the price hikes in the West are scheduled for September, and they really need a proper Zelda reveal by then, it makes sense that they’d want to counter the impact at that time. As I said right after the Direct, I don’t hold out much hope that it will be a much better event, but I expect they’ve deliberately held back at least a few efforts until then.

However, assuming that’s right, if Ocarina Of Time turns out to be just a visual and presentational upgrade and maybe some quality of life tweaks, I don’t think it’s a good idea to give away so little information and encourage months of speculation only to have it basically confirmed as something that isn’t already available on the Nintendo Switch, aside from reasonable access to all of their devices. 1998.

If it’s really the same game underneath, to position it like a late 2026 release would suggest they’re going for some low-hanging fruit as a stalling tactic instead of having higher-effort first-party stuff ready in the short term. It would also be a missed opportunity to offer a truly modern take on the classic, one that doesn’t rely on some of the more basic dungeon gameplay that I feel brought down the Link’s Awakening remake.

It’s interesting to think how well the announcement could have turned out if none of us had any idea about it. If it was more than a superficial remake and the leaks hadn’t happened, we could have said they absolutely nailed it. But as others have said, the leaks were well documented for months and it really didn’t feel like it should be impossible to spin a little and show or say a little more.
Panda

GC: This makes perfect sense… which Nintendo rarely does.

Inbox-ka too
I was quite interested in them Commodore rotary phones until I saw the price. The price hikes for all electronics at the moment are simply out of control.
Mags

Full props to the company that does ‘synthetic DNA’. If they are talking to companies to buy their crap, then I take my hat off to them. I’d say Sega should know better, but this looks nice on them.
Calzones

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The small print
New Inbox updates appear every weekday morning, with special hot topic inboxes on the weekend. Reader letters are credited and may be edited for length and content.

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MORE: Game Inbox: When Will Zelda: Ocarina Of Time Remake Be Released?

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