Only On Xbox 360?

"Gears of War 2" is finally out at retail to equal amounts of both hype and rapturous rejoicing.

Okay, so I haven't played Gears 2 yet, but plenty of evidence suggests how awesome it is. But ignore that user score, that score is bogus ;).

But the bigger take away for me is this: Now that Epic has released a proper Gears of War sequel on the Xbox 360, what will happen to the future of the intellectual property? According to Epic's deal with Microsoft, they retain intellectual property ownership after the fulfilling their contractual agreement. Will Epic take one of the most notobale franchises of this console generation multiplatform? Or will they ignore the potential multi-billion dollar sales, and submit to another exclusive agreement with the boys at Redmond?


Honestly, Epic can go either way, but the wait for their next big announcement will be tantalizing, and the end result will still undoubtedly surprise.

The Death of the Exclusive

The fight for console exclusives rages on
On Monday morning, Microsoft made the surprise announcement that "Final Fantasy XIII", formerly a Sony Playstation 3 exclusive, would be available day and date for Xbox 360 in North America and Europe.

It was possibly the biggest "surprise" announcement at the E3 Business & Media Summit in Los Angeles, but it also signifies another exclusive title shifting camps since the next generation of consoles were announced back in 2005.

"Assassin's Creed", "Grand Theft Auto IV", "Devil May Cry 4", "Ace Combat 6", "Virtua Fighter 4", "Resident Evil 5"* are all titles that Microsoft has secured over time, bringing once hyped "only-on-Playstation" franchises to their console.

Multi-platform development seems like the only answer large publishers can come up with now that budgets on their major titles are soaring to unbelieveable heights. Yet, as many were sure that Final Fantasy XIII would never jump ship and assume multi-platform status, the announcement shouldn't really surprise after the Game Developers Conference announcement that any game created using Crystal Tools could be ported easily to PC and 360.

To be fair, Sony has attempted to turn the tables and seek prior Microsoft exclusives but without the same impact. Timed exclusivity of Unreal Tournament 3 and Haze have not influenced hardware sales, instead being met with mixed reception by critics. Although "Bioshock" has recently been released from Microsoft exclusivity, it was no where to be seen during the Sony Press Conference. As last year's near unanimous Game of the Year, it would have been impressive to highlight some of the new features for the PS3 version, yet Sony didn't take the opportunity to do so.

The only major exclusive (by a third party publisher) left in the Sony bag belongs to Konami as "Metal Gear Solid 4" remains the tactical espionage action adventure of the year. But as the year continues to progress, and the final sales numbers of MGS 4 come out, we could only wonder if that exclusivity will continue.