Host/Executive Producer of The Gaming Hub Podcast, which can be found right here on The Xbox Hub. When I'm not working, I love playing and talking about games. I also enjoy hockey and baseball.
With only two weeks left until E3 2019, news is pretty scarce in the world of gaming. To make up for that, we discuss whether other developers will try to use the wildly successful Fortnite business model to their advantage in other genres, possibly as a way to replace the pay-to-win loot box model. Which games and genres could it work in?
This week brought news of Xbox and PlayStation working together to make streaming games in the future more smooth and consistent for everyone around. How optimistic are we about where this new partnership will go? It's not going to be life changing, and they're still competitors, but we talk about what it could mean for the future of gaming.
This week, we dig into the legislation proposed in the United States Senate that would severely limit the ability of game developers to include loot box microtransactions in their games.
This week starts our E3 preview content, as we discuss what we might expect to see from Electronic Arts and Square Enix at this year's show. We cover what they've done at E3 in recent years, talk about what they each need to do there this year, and finally, discuss what we expect to see from them this year.
Gone Home, developed by The Fullbright Company, was originally released on PC in 2013 and has now made its way to Xbox One. When originally released, Gone Home won a multitude of awards, including Best Independent Game and Best PC Game. Now that it has shifted to consoles some two and a half years later, is it still a game worthy of such high praise?
At E3 2015, Martin Sahlin won over the crowd at the Electronic Arts press conference with his genuine, nervous reveal of Unravel. Sahlin, the creative director of Coldwood Interactive, gave us a glimpse of Yarny and his travels through Sweden in a shaky voice that showed how important this project was to him and his team. From that moment, Unravel became the talk of the show.
Now that it is finally in the wild, does Unravel life up to the hype? In every single way, the answer to that question is, yes.
Rebel Galaxy, developed by Double Damage Games, is a space combat and commerce simulator now available for Xbox One. The game received largely positive feedback on Steam and Windows 10, but how will it translate to consoles?
Well, if you enjoy grinding, exploring, and trading, you will love how it translates to consoles. This is a game that requires large investments of time and patience, with the payoff being a much more enjoyable gameplay experience in the end.
Lovely Planet, developed by Quick Tequila and published by tinyBuild Games, is a first person shooter now available on Xbox. The game had previously been released on the Wii U and Steam, and is now available on the Xbox One. Does it hold up as a quality title?
The answer is a definitive “it depends”.
In November 2014, the Xbox One was the best-selling console in the United States for the first time since it launched. It technically won December 2013 as well but the PS4 launch was so successful that they weren’t in stock through much of December. The November 2014 win was helped by Halo: The Master Chief Collection, but the real driving force behind the success was a price cut of the system to $349 USD through the 2014 holiday season. Microsoft repeated its success the next month, winning December as well. Then came the one significant misstep in Phil Spencer’s tenure – the (brief) decision to put the console back to its $400 price point after the end of the holiday season.
On March 31, 2014, Phil Spencer was announced as the new Head of Xbox. Almost immediately, the fortunes of the Xbox brand began to change. Spencer brought a gamers first mentality to everything the Xbox team worked to accomplish, and the changes that came in the next few months gave repeated evidence of that commitment.
I’ll just come out and say it – anyone that truly believed that Sony only cared about the gamer and never even toyed with any (or most) of the policies that the Xbox One got pummeled over should contact me immediately because I have a map to the island where unicorns live to sell them.
I’ll never forget May 21, 2013. I was so excited for the Xbox One reveal. I told my boss that I was taking a two and a half hour lunch so I could go home and watch it live. I remember even telling him he could fire me if he wanted (we were good friends so I knew he wouldn’t). The Xbox 360 had become such a focal point of my entertainment time, and ultimately the reason I identify myself as a gamer, that I felt like a kid on Christmas morning. I sat down on my couch, had a soda, and prepared to bear witness to what I thought would be the greatest gaming machine ever made. And then it began.
6180 the moon, developed by Turtle Cream, was previously released on Windows PC and Steam, and has finally made its way to the Xbox One. The game has received a good amount of praise, winning Best Indie Game at the 2014 Tokyo Game Show. Even Phil Spencer, head of Xbox, has heaped praise on the game, so I was excited to get my hands on it.
Are you getting an Xbox One for the holidays this year? Or maybe you’re getting a few shiny new Xbox gift cards to spend on games? I’m anticipating some of the latter myself, and was thinking about all the great exclusive games that are out there right now for the Xbox One. Here’s a list of the top ten Xbox One exclusives you can spend your hard earned money on this year.
The other evening when I turned on the Game Awards, I was given such a pleasant surprise. I was given a two hour reminder of why being a gamer is awesome, and why almost everyone involved in gaming does what they do: because games are fun and we love playing them.
