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Why did Microsoft show no PC games at E3?

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Microsoft’s recently re-committed to supporting the PC as a gaming platform, with Phil Spencer saying it’s now his job to refocus on Windows as a gaming platform.  Microsoft is even bringing its Capcom developed, Microsoft published former Xbox One exclusive Dead Rising 3 to PC. so why then, did they not show any of their cool PC games at E3? Because E3 is not for you, PC gamers.

It’s not that they were dismissing the platform, you see – just that E3 is all about consoles.

"I’m head of gaming at Microsoft," Spencer told Polygon. "When we’re doing gaming strategy, gaming focus inside the company, that’s my job. I think in a lot of ways, you could argue gaming on Windows has never been more healthy in that the biggest of the big franchises, League of Legends, World of Tanks, those things dwarf a lot of what we’re doing in this console space in terms of users and monetization. They’re all on PC."

Those are big , and Microsoft has some games of their own in the works, but they’re not necessarily a right fit for E3.

"E3’s a retail show," he said. "It’s a retail show, it’s a console show, so it didn’t really feel like the right place for us to talk about Windows, but Windows and gaming on Windows is critical to Microsoft’s success."

So when, and where will Microsoft start showing off these mythical PC games and their renewed PC focus?

"Well they do these huge world championship events and they fill up arenas," he said. "I do think there could be a space there.”

Last Updated: June 13, 2014

37 Comments

  1. Alien Emperor Trevor

    June 13, 2014 at 15:03

    LOL @ header image. There’s no Rift or headphones ;P

    Reply

    • Sageville

      June 13, 2014 at 15:30

      Is it me or does that whole rig look antiquated… wheres uberutang to do a master race check?

      Reply

      • BacchusZA

        June 13, 2014 at 15:40

        It’s a Flight Sim setup, & looks to be a fairly sophisticated one, though you likey can’t tell without looking “under the hood”, & having a peek inside the case. That CH FighterStick is somewhat dated now, but It’s still available so far as I know, & a damn good piece of reasonably priced kit.

        Reply

        • Sageville

          June 13, 2014 at 15:55

          I’m just looking at the center monitor which is more speaker than screen… who still has a 4:3 monitors these days anyway.

          Reply

    • BacchusZA

      June 13, 2014 at 15:42

      You don’t really need a Rift if you’re using TrackIR (that little box on top of the center monitor) 😉

      And there’ll be headphones there, cause that’s what you clip the little LED rig for the TrackIR too, they’re just out of the shot is all 🙂

      Reply

  2. Admiral Chief Cyber Commando

    June 13, 2014 at 15:08

    Quite silly

    Reply

  3. Sk3tz0

    June 13, 2014 at 15:08

    No cares about PC Gaming now that they all Mulitplatform. 😛

    Reply

  4. Alien Emperor Trevor

    June 13, 2014 at 15:09

    *cough* Allow me to quote myself from last week’s FFD:

    Reply

    • Rince&exhale

      June 13, 2014 at 15:20

      Cookie time?

      Reply

      • Alien Emperor Trevor

        June 13, 2014 at 18:34

        I already had my cookie because I knew I was right.

        Reply

    • Admiral Chief Cyber Commando

      June 13, 2014 at 15:22

      QUICK, TELL ME WHEN HALF LIFE WILL ARRIVE OH GREAT SEER OF THE FUTAWR!

      Reply

      • Mark Treloar

        June 13, 2014 at 18:44

        It will arrive when Duke Nukem is popular again.

        Reply

  5. Alien Emperor Trevor

    June 13, 2014 at 15:11

    Still think they’re talking crap, no matter how “nice” the current jacket-wearer is.

    Reply

    • Rince&exhale

      June 13, 2014 at 15:20

      Agreed. Can change the face of a company but rarely what is happening underneath.

      Reply

    • Corrie Botha

      June 13, 2014 at 15:24

      Guy couldn’t even reply to my tweet asking about Horizon 2 on PC , the ironic thing is the Xbox Divsion is bleeding money if I recall a couple of articles I’ve read over the year, But would like to know which show is ideal for Microsoft to show some PC love?

      I hardly ever use my Xbox ,have 4 games for it that I wanted MC:LA,Horzion,RDR and GTA V of which GTA is the only one I boot the thing up for.

      Reply

  6. Badass Eyepatch Man

    June 13, 2014 at 15:18

    Shame

    Reply

  7. Trebzz

    June 13, 2014 at 15:27

    Cause PC sucks that’s why *runs away*

    Reply

  8. Consumer of Little Rabbits

    June 13, 2014 at 16:01

    why does the centre screen have a pic of another screen lol

    Reply

    • BacchusZA

      June 13, 2014 at 16:10

      It’s the sensor for a TrackIR.

      Reply

  9. Sir Rants A Lot Llew. Jelly!!!

    June 13, 2014 at 16:35

    Dafuq? E3 is not a CONSOLE gaming event. It’s just a gaming event where you can show ANY platform.

    Reply

    • Brian Murphy

      June 13, 2014 at 17:20

      E3 isn’t even that, it’s an Electronics Entertainment Expo…everything electronic and entertainment related should (and is) on showcase.

      Reply

  10. HisDivineOrder

    June 13, 2014 at 17:00

    Please. Microsoft’s talking a lot of talk, but when the time comes to walk, they just stand there and look down.

    Seriously. The time for talk has long since passed, Phil. Show the games you keep promising are coming OR just go walk yourself back the way you came and leave us so we can all go to SteamOS when it’s finished ENOUGH to go to.

    I know you think that if you keep throwing platitudes at us, we’ll get confused and fractured and be happy you gave us what little you gave us.

    No. Sorry. I remember when Microsoft “valued” the PC gamer. First, it was Halo after a year or so, ported by Gearbox so poorly it chugged.

    Years passed. FASA and Ensemble were reduced to console-only development. Bungie, makers of great games on Mac, became obsessed with Halo and more Halo and only for Xbox. Other studios died. Microsoft Golf and Flight Simulator died ignoble deaths despite their long, storied tradition or the fact Microsoft had just bought up Links not a few years back.

    Halo 2 was announced as Vista’s stink began to be known. It would sell Vista because it REQUIRED Vista for no reason except marketing. Yay, buy the bloated OS to play the bloated, poorly done port. Yay. No.

    Licking your wounds, you came back once the word began to be whispered. Steam was rising and with it came publisher support, slow at first. And indies. Suddenly, there you were again. Promising to renew your focus on PC gaming! AGAIN! This time, you said, you were doing it. Leading to Games for Windows Live and your attempt to charge us a Live fee to use Live on PC. Plus one actually horrible game including cross-platform play. Naturally, we were unimpressed and away you went again, forgetting us like the ADHD kid who keeps trying to figure out checkers. Elsewhere, ignorant publishers started infecting their software with Games for Windows Live just to get the logo on their box, thinking it might help them sell more titles. Genuine 360 controller support was useful in some cases, but the GfWL that pushed it was horrible. A memory leak persisted for years that made every game chug and an ecosystem already rife with DRM soon had games infected with 2, 3, or even 4 types of DRM at once when you add in Games for Windows Live, which had a tendency to bug out, error out, or slow down your system. Fitting for the company who brought you Windows ME, Vista, and the incredible Microsoft Bob.

    A few years later, you came back with Games for Windows Live again. “This time we’re serious,” you said. This time, you said, we get you. The problem with Games for Windows Live, you tell us in a statement of bullish ignorance, is that it’s white/grayish. “We’re learning from what you like about Steam. This time, Games for Windows Live will be black. Plus, that memory leak you’ve endured for years? Yeah, we’ve got that MOSTLY solved. Rejoice, for we have returned.” Meanwhile, Games for Windows Live continues to infect SO MANY games, but the infection rates are diminishing as something called Steamworks appears to save us from it. Slowly, if surely.

    Fast forward a few MORE years. Xbox 360 sales start waning pre-Kinect as RROD and the lack of first party developers after you gutted most of them in the early days starts to really add up in the face of Sony’s far superior first party stable. Losing sales to PS3 en masse, you came back to PC gamers with the same song and dance again. “PC gamers, we hear you. Yes, we’ve said this before, but this time we get you. We haven’t forgotten you. We love you. We’ll make it up to you.” You even had Peter Molyneux do the outreach this time because you thought we’d care what that traitorous hack said. Except we didn’t care for him or his message. He brought with him the worst Fable in the history of Fables, which is really saying something. You brought a handful of indie titles. You even started releasing games on Steam because by this point NO ONE was releasing games on Games for Windows Live and many were actually removing support for it to get rid of the excess DRM in favor of Steamworks and all its bonuses (achievements, cards, etc).

    And so here we are today. You promise you are supporting PC gaming just like before. But when the time comes to SHOW it, what do you do?

    Nothing. Nothing as always. No, tossing us Xbox One controller support is NOT PC gaming support. It’s you covering your butt when it comes time to shut down production of Xbox 360 controllers and you need a PC gaming replacement. Plus, the Xbox One controller inexplicably costs a LOT more than the Xbox 360 controller and you haven’t even bothered to make a PC dongle. That’s how much you care about PC gaming.

    Where are the real games, Microsoft? No, re-re-re-releasing the games you made a LONG time ago with casually-thrown-in Steamworks support is not REAL support. Real support means you make new titles. You know. Like even Sony is doing for PC time to time. Sony has absolutely no reason to do it and STILL does more actual NEW game development for PC than Microsoft does even though MS is the one selling the damn OS.

    Think about that. It’s stupid. So yeah. Over the long, horrible history of Microsoft’s support of PC gaming, Microsoft loves to say one thing and do another. They aren’t doing ANYTHING, but token moves to SEEM invested in case they feel like actually BECOMING invested. Why burn bridges right? Why have more negative news stories?

    But they’re hoping against hope that Xbox can turn it around so they won’t have to even bother with PC gaming like before. It’s just that for the first time, they’re REALLY uncertain that Xbox WILL turn it around and they want to have PC gaming as a fallback position in case they don’t.

    The funny thing is by the time they FIGURE out that Xbox is on its way out, PC gamers will be on their way off Windows, too. Try selling Windows without PC gamers, Microsoft. Good luck. The only segment of PC’s that continue to increase in sales ARE gaming machines.

    With us, dies your bread ‘n butter computing platform. You sure haven’t made inroads in tablets, smartphones, consoles (this gen), or the Roku/Amazon FireTV/AppleTV market space.

    In trying to take over the living room, you sacrificed your future. Whoops.

    Reply

    • BSisko

      June 13, 2014 at 21:44

      You much nailed Microsoft’s on again off again support of the PC in a nutshell. I agree it is ironic that Sony has better PC support in terms of actual games from subscription/F2P games. Microsoft really needs to step up its game literally in the PC space or it could stand in to lose it in the future.

      In the last two years Linux gaming went from being extremely niche to getting interest from indies/AAA developers thanks to Valve, Kickstarter, humblebundles. I wouldn’t doubt at the end of this console cycle (5-8 years) that Linux gaming will be receiving the same ports as Windows. Major engines like Cryengine, Unity4, unreal engine 4, Source, and plenty others have been ported to LInux which is other examples that MS grip on the desktop is slipping.

      Reply

    • Chaz

      June 15, 2014 at 22:05

      Points!!

      Reply

  11. Mabenito

    June 13, 2014 at 17:09

    1990 something until 2007
    Everyone who plays video games was a nerd or something close, by default.

    2008 – do tate
    Everyone else who plays video games doesn’t necessarily mean they know WFT is going on inside a PC and they do not care.

    Master Race really need to start to understand this.

    Reply

  12. Brian Murphy

    June 13, 2014 at 17:15

    Because Microsoft only pays lip service to the PC community, they announced they’d be refocusing on PC recently, so now it’s time for them to do everything but PC games for the next 4-5 years. Besides, nobody really cared about it anyway. Steam’s already conquered the PC community that Microsoft forsake, and most PC gamer’s got what they wanted out of E3, and that was a PC date for GTAV.

    Microsoft lost the PC gamer a long time ago, and now they’re happy to lose the console race as well 🙂

    Reply

    • blackdreamhunk

      June 16, 2014 at 20:33

      I agree 100%

      Reply

      • Brian Murphy

        June 16, 2014 at 20:37

        It’s a sad thing, honestly, because Microsoft more than any company in the world sits in the driver seat for gaming, but because they want to continue to throw money into the bottomless pit that is their Xbox division (you don’t use patent royalties to artificially inflate your gaming division, if it’s doing well).

        I mean, the added comp in the games division is great, but Microsoft has always been in a unique position to own PC gaming, but they refuse to do so. No matter, I’m much happier with Steam involved, than what Microsoft would eventually do anyway.

        Reply

  13. Jim Lenoir (Banana Jim)

    June 16, 2014 at 16:35

    Cough! Probably because the only people who play games on PC, are “…sycophants and products of incest”. *Runs away* trololololololololololololololol

    Reply

    • Mark Treloar

      June 16, 2014 at 16:59

      So every developer in existence then?

      Reply

      • Jim Lenoir (Banana Jim)

        June 16, 2014 at 18:23

        It does explain a lot of things about the gaming industry in general… ho ho ho 😛

        Reply

  14. WufanGohan

    June 16, 2014 at 18:01

    It’s alright, because I don’t care and I’m proud to share that I’ve never bothered myself to attend any E3 event in my life.

    Reply

  15. MG

    June 19, 2014 at 14:00

    PC gaming is dead.

    Reply

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