Microsoft fanboys would point out, i have actually read this argument, that well ms supports and develops directx making games easier to make and better looking, they will go on and on about the wonders of directx development and dx 8 vs 10 vs etc.
Problem is microsoft used to make great games, they used to take risks to a degree, when pc was their sole bread and butter we saw games like age of empires, mechwarrior, and a bunch of other quality games that had microsofts actual name on the box.
But why should ms support pc? now that they have a console, there is very little incentive for them to do any development for pc other than making sure directx makes any games that someone wants to make for pc run well on pc. But xbl people pay for, want a game on xbox? pay microsoft a fee to get it on there, sell more games because people that could not afford a high end gaming rig or we just anti pc tech scared, got a console. piracy also is a disincentive for ms to support gaming on pc, sales prove that when games get a synched release for pc and consoles they sell fewer copies as a certain segment of the buyers chooses to get the game free for pc vs buy it for console. the frequent delay for pc games is because they sell more when said pirates are just too impatient and go out and buy the game on console.
I see more devs and ceo types talking about non platform gaming more and more as cloud and other new wiz game anywhere on anything services start to arise. This could be the thing that puts pc back in the driver seat, more accessable gaming for a wider range of pcs. developers smacking their lips over the fact that lest at this point and time cloud based gaming seems to be pretty pirate proof.
for ms to get off their console first, pc last mentality. a more than likely combo of things would need to happen, piracy on xbox would need to skyrocket, and i mean like 1000% since piracy on xbox takes some effort, and there are so many of them it would really have to jump to get ms to move off the xbox's jock. people would have to bail on xbl with the piracy trend. cloud would really have to be the end all be all of gaming easy and security. And microsoft would have to get rid of a number of suits at ms that just do not give a damn about games period.
To expand on the last point i could point over the years how microsoft just totally shit on the gaming community. A few highly popular IPs with successful games in the past, like mechwarrior and shadowrun. Ms snapped up the rights for years ago, made a few mw games that got gret reviews and were great sellers. Then what happened? mechwarrior just up and vanished, ms had the rights to it yet they did absolutely nothing with them.
shadowrun a ip that had several rpgs on early consoles some of which were really good, and a fairly popular pnp rpg, especially in europe, and microsoft sat on them and sat and sat. finally they announced a shadowrun game sr fans were elated finally after all these years sr was going to get the game it deserved a........a fps? WTF? meanwhile while sr fans railed at microsofts treatment of a rpg ip, microsoft did them one better. a small company was working on a proof of concept for a shadowrun mmo, they had a engine they had art they had assets, said they had working client etc. they were simply showing it could be done and had a rabid fanbase that would want to play it and wanted to present it to microsoft. it went on for awhile they seemed to have tacit ok to processed and continue work, but when things were getting to you know a finishing point stuff was running art was modeled and textured, microsoft sent them a cease and desist order. now maybe wires got mixed up, maybe ms never expressly said sure go ahead with it, but they never sent the lawyers down until the proof was pretty damn far along.
I know microsoft does not like mmos. they in fact loathe them. i mean why not when you can churn out 100 fps games that sell a million + copies to slobbering xbox fans that just cannot seem to get enough of the latest fps of the month games, for the basic cost of maybe half the development costs of a modern day mmo. nevermind that typical mmos are pc only, and are generally unwieldy on consoles, tho ms would have gotten a pass on the xbl fees i am sure, but the controls of most mmos are not console friendly. but really why would ms want to invest 200 million + in an mmo that is pc based, that would will not see return on your investment for about 5 years, if the game does not flop utterly, and while you can make a generic fps game for maybe 20-50 million in a year or twos time and get it out the door.
