Remedy’s Quantum Break is one of the more intriguing exclusives that’ll be heading to Microsoft’s much maligned Xbox One; taking the best from Alan Wake and Max Payne and blending them with a live-action series. It’s a terribly ambitious game, which goes some way to explaining why it’s exclusive to just one platform.
There’s no way it could have been made without Microsoft’s help, says Remedy
“This is clearly a strategic move for them as well as us. This is something – we have crazy ideas – but we need to fall back and let the full force of a company like Microsoft see it through,” Matias Myllyrinne, CEO of Remedy, told GI International.
“There’s no way on God’s green Earth that we would take on a venture like this on our own. We might have the appetite but there’s no way we could.
“For us, our interests are nicely aligned. We serve a strategic purpose for them in delivering unique content for their platform with a unique twist. And for us that allows us follow the creative passion that the team needs to fulfil through a project like this.”
Basically, they needed a lot of money, and Microsoft was happy to bank-roll it. There’s nothing intrinsically wrong with that either; platformer holders regularly pay for games they think would be beneficial to their systems. I just hope Quantum Break lives up to its promise. Alan Wake was great, but it took five years to long to be released, and wasn’t quite as ground-breaking as it should have been.
Last Updated: July 18, 2013
RinceWind
July 18, 2013 at 10:04
Man I love Alan Wake, if this is even 50% of that game I will be happy. Pity I’m going the SONY way at the moment #mindcanbechanged
FoxOneZA - X-Therminator
July 18, 2013 at 10:22
Alan Wake is a very underrated game along with Max “Emo” Payne.
Ultimo_Cleric N7
July 18, 2013 at 10:11
I will say this: Some of the Xbox exclusives are pretty damn amazing. No doubt about it. #mandeladay#noXBoxOnehate
Kromas
July 18, 2013 at 10:13
I give it less than a year before we see the PC version. Only PS is stingy when it comes to exclusives.
Argentil
July 18, 2013 at 10:27
Sony don’t own an operating system that would benefit from game releases. I assume that’s a large part of the reason MS have been ok with PC-Xbox exclusives.
Kromas
July 18, 2013 at 11:03
Indeed but that sort of reasoning is why apple is losing stock faster than than a McDonalds on a Saturday night. Close off potential sales and you are done for. Sony is in such a heavy debt that they almost sold of their entertainment division. Meanwhile Samsung makes massive amounts of money from its android phones yet they tried their hand at windows 8 phones.
Argentil
July 18, 2013 at 11:10
As far as the Playstation division goes, they’re one of Sony’s most valuable assets. If Sony were to publish their games across platforms, the hardware division would lose it’s value and probably not be profitable anymore.
Sony’s Mobile and Television departments are dragging down their electronics division, which Playstation is a part of. First-party is a HUGE incentive for choosing a console, Sony would have to lose all of their sense to go multiplat, but stay in the console biz. As far as console hardware goes, Sony are the best there is. Nintendo is off and on the most innovative, and Microsoft have the best OS and feature-set, unsurprisingly. It really shows in the history of the console makers. Sony are hardware, MS are Software, and Nintendo are a games company (having started out with playing cards iirc).
Kromas
July 18, 2013 at 11:20
Let me try this again. Exclusives only work if they boost your sales yes I agree but if you own a certain dev and their game was great but sales are dwindling then it is high time to release the game on other platforms. It will not affect your hardware sales since the game is not really moving stock anymore but it will increase the sale of said IP. This is how MS does it for their games. Sony is way more closed off and it will hurt them late game specially when they sign devs exclusively for themselves. In this aspect I would rather support EA than Sony and that is saying a lot. Then again I much prefer pc to console anyways and don’t really care. I did buy a PS3 for Last of Us though.
Argentil
July 18, 2013 at 11:22
Which platform exclusives have MS released on PS3?
Edit: This also doesn’t take into account the various costs associated with promoting, publishing and developing for another platform.
Kromas
July 18, 2013 at 11:52
None. Microsoft has not published a AAA console game in years. What they do is sign contracts with other publishers like EA and Ubisoft to make their games exclusive for a set period of time. It works well for both companies and MS does not have to deal with much.
Argentil
July 18, 2013 at 13:12
They’re not fronting development costs for the game, they’re just purchasing a timed-exclusivity deal. It’s not at all the same thing. If you were to see Halo on PS4, it would be a comparable deal.
Kromas
July 18, 2013 at 14:32
MS does not own Bungie anymore so yeah it is more than possible now but I think they are way to busy with Destiny to care about Halo. Still my point remains that Sony is losing sales as a games distributor not as a console manufacturer. You really think that if someone like Valve decides to bring out their own console that most of their games will be console exclusive …. I bet you it won’t. I’m not arguing that having exclusives is good for business, I’m arguing that keeping those exclusives will hurt sales to the distributor and unfortunately that is what Sony is (apart from other things).
tl;dr – I like pie
Argentil
July 18, 2013 at 14:42
MS, as publishers, own the intellectual property; Halo.
Bungie had already left MS before Halo 5 was completed – by another team. In another example, would you see MS making Forza multiplat? of Gears? Or any of their coveted exclusives?
It’s not a good idea. Besides, Sony Online Entertainment has quite a few PC games. Planetside 2, Everquest, Payday: The Heist, DC Universe: Online etc. that are PC and PS3/4 titles. Would you fault Nintendo for hanging onto their 30+ year old IPs, with their already ageing console architecture? No, because their 1st-parties sell their consoles. No matter how poorly the Wii U performs, you will continue to see Nintendo games on Nintendo systems.
Kromas
July 18, 2013 at 15:09
Did not know about Halo. Always thought Bungie kept the IP. I guess that’s why they are developing Destiny. As for your list of games … none of those are near AAA titles. And Valve is actually working on a console (not steambox) but I was talking in hypotheticals. All those titles you mentioned would not have even covered their production costs if SOE did not make them cross platform. Case in point. Had SOE made them on;ly PS exclusive they would have lost money.
Also … I really am enjoying this discussion.
Argentil
July 18, 2013 at 15:55
Yup, I raised SOE as a point because they develop primarily for PC, with playstation as a secondary platform if demand is high enough.
The PC is not a competing product to the Playstation brand, as such it has a different market to tap into, and a wider market also.
edwin
July 19, 2013 at 23:09
Sony does make better exclusives but no game. I mean no game has a higher replay value then Nintendo’s games. Especially Mario . Cmon no what console you supported he’s everyone’s favorite .
Argentil
July 18, 2013 at 11:20
Also, the shareholder who was punting the selling of their entertainment division was a bit of a scaley bastard. The entertainment division is Sony’s most profitable arm, selling it off would be hugely detrimental, and Kaz Hirai himself said it would be bad for Sony in the long-term, and that there are no plans to do so.
Sony’s weakness right now is it’s Electronics Division, more specifically, the TV and Mobile Phone parts. Their Mobile phone development is on the rise, but their TV sales are in dire straits, and have been slumping for years. It’s going to be a long road to profitability for them. Who knows if Sony TVs will ever reclaim the prestige they had years back.
Trevor Davies
July 18, 2013 at 10:17
The amount of money that goes into making games like this makes me think it could backfire if it’s only released on one platform.
pdexter
July 19, 2013 at 07:09
I don’t expect they are expecting to make big profits or even their cash back, but that’s why Remedy is talking about MS being so important.
Remedy is getting a paycheck for making the game and MS gets its possible, initial console seller.
OVG
July 18, 2013 at 10:20
header WIN 🙂
FoxOneZA - X-Therminator
July 18, 2013 at 10:20
I’m sure I read this story before on LG or am I time travelling :/
RinceWind
July 18, 2013 at 10:26
Me too! Thought I was losing it!
Macethy
July 18, 2013 at 10:35
This is one game/studio that could sway me to buy an Xbone 🙂
I’m still quite unsure about the tv/game interaction of this game, will the show air in South Africa or will we miss plot points?
Exalted Overlord Geoffrey Tim
July 18, 2013 at 10:37
It’s all on the Blu-Ray; so you play, watch, play watch.
OVG
July 18, 2013 at 10:48
You pay watch, pay watch, pay watch :p
Argentil
July 18, 2013 at 10:49
Coining a new term P2Watch.
OVG
July 18, 2013 at 10:53
Remember, the console may have done a 180 to pull back those who were about to jump the fence, but the games are all going to be on-line only episodic content half finished products.
One is going to pay R599 for FORZA 5 and it is not even complete. That is the future.