In today’s gaming age, even if you can’t be at the various big events that bring many industry leaders together, you can often find ways to watch what’s going down on the show floor. Livestreams are easily one of the best parts of technology today, and multiple companies host them so that people from afar can see what’s being shown off by various developers and publishers. For the upcoming Gamescom event, Microsoft has decided to do a live stream over three days to see not just trailers but gameplay footage, interviews with some of the dev teams, and more!
If you go to their official website for the Xbox@Gamescom event, you’ll see the following description for their booth:
“Join us at the Xbox booth with over 60 gaming titles and experiences from Xbox Game Studios, Blizzard, Bethesda, and third-party partners, including our ID@Xbox friends. Players will be able to experience a huge amount of exciting new games coming to Xbox consoles, PC, and Game Pass with fantastic photo opportunities and the return of Xbox FanFest.”
As you can see, Microsoft is going big with this, and they arguably have two very big reasons to do just that. The first one is the easiest: they’re the only “big game” at Gamescom. It’s already been confirmed that neither Nintendo nor Sony won’t be there. That was curious, given that both companies have games to show off or tease, especially The Big N, with some of the titles that are only months away from release.
With the competition away, Xbox has a unique chance to shine and see what kind of impression it can leave on gamers. To that end, the Xbox Series X/S does have some big games coming up from significant developers, so it’ll be smart to show them off to build up some nice buzz before they release this year and next.
The other big reason is just as simple: Xbox needs a shot in the arm. Much of 2024 has been about the “state of Xbox” and how Microsoft was “bleeding money” from the company’s gaming division. To some, this might have sounded like an exaggeration, but other things point to it being more true than realized. Layoffs have happened, companies have been shut down, the Xbox Game Pass has gotten controversial new tiers and a price hike, etc.
They need a place to build up some goodwill with gamers, so them doing what they can at Gamescom is a good idea.
