Xbox Set to Announce Multi-Platform Plans Next Week

Grabs popcorn.

I love the smell of copium in the morning…

So there's definitely fire with all this smoke then.

@colonelkilgore Im pretty sure that's coming from you

@Nepp67 🤔 I doubt it

Very exciting news. I'm actually super stoked by the prospect of Sea of Thieves on PS5. I've wanted to give that a go for a while. Maybe this means Spyro and Crash are saved as well! It's gonna be a long week.

Bit wild all this. I'm old enough to consider Mario and Sonic on the same platform completely crazy, and now this.

I wonder if Microsoft are trying to get ahead of the game with this though and they consider the traditional console cycle fading out in a few generations, especially with their reported chip issues, maybe they had to jump now?

The only MS game i want is Elder Scrolls, but even then id feel like i was massively missing out without the same type of VR port Skyrim got

@get2sammyb i was thinking the same. If it wasn't true he would have squashed the rumors in one tweet. Making Xbox fans wait a weak is pretty crappy move. Next week is going to be insane.

@GuttyYZ their traditional console cycle is fading out, Sony and Nintendo are still going strong.

What a crazy few days its been. I'd like to be the first to welcome the Xbox players to PlayStation. For the players. One of us. Jim Ryan is now your saviour.

@get2sammyb
In fairness to MS, if this was Sony we would get a response a few months later, if we were lucky.

@GuttyYZ I'm a firm believer that consoles will become obsolete in the future as you'll just be able to play all your games directly from your TV. I mean, why would a sensible person spend €700 on a console when you can just pay for a subscription and play on your TV. No need to buy new consoles every 6-7 years either. So you could be right in that Microsoft is thinking ahead.

I also think that Microsoft mostly cares about Game Pass now. You can still play their first-party titles day one on Game Pass as well as for as low as €10 each month. Meanwhile, if their games would come out on PlayStation, PS users would have to wait months for them to come out after Xbox and also pay €70 at launch. That is unless you want to wait years for a price cut.

So yeah, I think this new direction makes good business sense for Microsoft. There's still a good reason to own an Xbox. Not for the exclusives, but to save money and also get early access to the exclusives.

@DonkeyFantasy nah the last remnant will go to PC or just quit gaming entirely. Their whole identity has been built on hating Sony… there’s no way back from that.

They aren’t going to say anything yet. This keeps people talking about them

Well it's gonna be a helluva week till we find out. What a dramatic turn of events...

Well I think we all know now that the narrative "Gamepass is profitable" was a bit of a porkie although I think we all suspected it.
Anyway sad day as competition is needed although Sony hasn't had competition for quite some time, and it shows.

@thefourfoldroot1 What about Flight simulator on PSVR2? That would be awesome.

This is great news. Very excited to see what is announced.

I know it's silly, cause it's been a few years. Could Insomniac get to release Sunset Overdrive on PS5 now?

Thats going to be fun.like the legendary macho man randy savage use to said oh yeahhhh.word up son

Here’s hoping that every fanboy celebrating Microsoft’s demise finally gets to enjoy that monopoly they’ve been asking for.

Spoiler: you’ll be wishing Microsoft had stayed in the game after a few years of a competition free Sony

@DonkeyFantasy Yep, I’ll be getting that PS5 Pro as soon as it launches. I’m just bummed out that I can’t bring my existing games library and game saves with me. I’m going to have to slowly rebuild from scratch, ugh.

They should just rename it the ex-box

Hope they stream it. This will be must see TV for sure.

@Neither_scene From the sounds of it, XBox will be keeping their XBox Game Studios IP mostly exclusive...they aren't going anywhere yet. And MS is still worth over $1 trillion...they'll be fine.

@Neither_scene
Yeah. I'm a PlayStation guy but I also like Xbox and MS dropping out of the console race will not be a good thing. As much as I like Nintendo, it doesn't compete in the high-end market, so basically there's only going to be one real option now. Hope I'm wrong but people are probably right that if there was no truth to the rumors, they would've been shut down by now.

@Neither_scene "Microsoft is monopolising the gaming market..."

..by bowing out of the gaming market and letting Sony dominate it.

@Cakefish In all seriousness, this must be pretty gutting for you guys. Hope they don't do you all dirty.

While all of you wait, I already preordered the PlayStation Series X

So it transpires Microsoft need Sony more than Sony needs Microsoft then. So long as we get forza and gears of war. Halo is a bonus.

This is very exciting! A lot of Xbox exclusives I've always wanted to play; hope they bring over Gears and Halo! It would be great to finally try them

Hell yes, let's do this! This is gonna be awesome!

This very much sounds like a leak that is now causing MS to panic and scrounge something together. Maybe there are in fact some merit to these rumors....

@CKFilms I’ve actually wanted a PS5 port of Sunset Overdrive for awhile now, too!

I've missed this feeling in gaming for a long time. Things just going bats*it crazy... yes!

Here's more food for thought: what if Microsoft is doing all of this because they realise that if they want to keep acquiring studios, there's no chance in hell that's going to happen after the whole ordeal they went through with the ActiBlizz acquisition. So in order to be able to keep acquiring studios, they need to show that they won't keep their games locked to one platform.

@CaptD Flight Sim on PSVR2 would be awesome.

“ We're listening and we hear you”

That’s a weird thing to say, I imagine a lot of the messages he and others were getting are from worried Xbox users who are rightly getting very worried. So you’re listening to these people and you’re going to reassure them in a week with news that could be pretty detrimental to customers loyalty to a system

This could turn out very nasty for Phil’s image

Wouldn't it be funny if everything is a lie and the announcement is the all digital series x?

@get2sammyb this is it!

@get2sammyb they own the ip but they don’t own the game as I believe Microsoft invested in Insomniac making the game for them. Same situation with Dead Rising 3 when the xBone was announced. Microsoft paid Capcom to make the game for launch in which it only released on X and PC

Its been like a week or so since the xbox direct and xbox fans seeing a square enix game and immediately asking for it to be on gamepass day 1 lol

Gamepass will be on PS soon imo. I’d be surprised if it’s just selling games on other platforms without Gamepass given they would be gambling on people coughing up. Much easier to gamble on adding millions to their subscription service.

Sony should do this too. But without the series S requirement on all games cuz that’s just dumb.

I have both series x and ps5 but the most fun to play due to Sony remaster hell and Spiderman being the same game rehashed for the last few years has consistently been the series x with gamepass. While it's good playstation only players are getting some new games to play, I can't see it being tit for tat and Sony will keep their exclusives (if they ever make any more in their own studios) at premium price and they won't ever reach Xbox. The way Sony relies on third party Microsoft will just be further third party so they don't have to make any effort and continue overcharging. This will make me buy less games on PlayStation if anything.

Bro just you watch this whole "multi-platform" thing turn out to be some mobile crap.

Pretty stuffed up on the gaming news front this week and the week after. We'll have quarterly financial reports from Nintendo etc. tomorrow or so (plus probably a Nintendo Direct next week) and now Microsoft will probably confirm (at least some of) the 3rd party rumors next week as well.

The only thing we're now missing out on is some actually exciting/interesting games to play or look forward too that aren't remasters or remakes. Very exciting times ahead when it comes to information about the future of gaming on a whole.

My personal prediction on the future is that in 4-5 years there will be Nintendo, PC and streaming on the hardware front.
On the software front it will only be Nintendo that publishes 1st party software. PlayStation and Microsoft will be 3rd party publishers and maybe host some streaming channels.

Please Phil, don't bring Redfall to PS5 🙏

Maybe they are buying EA/Take2 and making EVERYTHING exclusive. Now that would be one way to deny it all. I jest of course.

Microsoft on seeing WWE dominating the headlines online over Cody not finishing the story - "hold my beer, we got this"

No denials. All over for them in hardware I think.

Spencer going to be 'not waving but drowning' next week.

Gotta love the cope of the hardcore… after lay-offs last year involving Bethesda staff, 1900 layoffs this year from ABK alone… yes of course, this is just some 4d chess move so that they can buy another publisher (who they can then decimate with lay-offs) 😵‍💫

Plot twist: Xbox never planned to go multiplat. They purposely spread fake infos about becoming third party hoping the insiders would leak it, so MS can pretend that they "heard and listened" to the fans and act accordingly and appearing as a pro fans listening company.
Phil Spencer is the master at PR.

Oh wow, three State of Plays in three weeks.

@colonelkilgore The crazy thing is that without ABK this new strategy might not be happening, possibly.
And to think that Jim was really trying to save XBox from themselves.
Again, possibly.

@MidnightDragonDX oh, I’m not in the least bit worried about Microsoft. If they go the software only route they’ll sell off or disband any studio/game that doesn’t give them a decent return. I’m more concerned about how Sony will behave in a market free from competition and with barriers to entry so high that even google and apple aren’t interested in investing.

@TrickyDicky99 coming up next from Sony: Redfall remastered, dropped back down to 30fps and with extra tree foliage

Microsoft is proud to announce that previously multi platform publishers and developers will now be multi platform publishers and developers once again

@Neither_scene Could there be another compeitor if Microsoft bow out? Been rumblings for years that Tencent is interested in entering the market - they already have a solid number of studios under their belt

Joke is on me for buying a Series S to play Starfield in September, and then falling in love with BG3 and spending the next 4 months playing that and only that. Tried Starfield last week and it just feels weird playing on Xbox, like what I would imagine it would be like to drive in a country where it's the opposite lane. Hopefully it comes to PS5 and I'll just play it there, where it feels like home lol

I think that it would be beyoend aswome to see the Indiana Jones game and Starfield on PS5.

@Czar_Khastik I heard it was gonna be the Xbox Series P with a yellow controller.

@CaptD yeah I think there was a reason (which is easy to see now) why Sony’s vociferous opposition to the deal suddenly quelled.

I think that Ms could be donig this becuse it could increase the revenue of their game business basically not for some ohter reson. Which I think make senare in this era of live service games which makes gameing competive space hehe

@oliverp I only care about Indiana Jones. Though, I still wish it weren't first person.

Well I can for see some current circumstances. For one theirs going to be alot of xboxs traded in at gamestop and sold on ebay. For two alot of upset xbox fanboys. Cause what I'm figuring and I'm sure alot is expecting is their going to faze out existing xbox hardware over time and that's going to be the last of hardware.

Exactly what I predicted. You don't seriously believe that you can just spend over $100 billion in a very short time and then believe that the investors continue to believe Phil's lies.

MS can be 10 times the most valuable company, anyone who spends so much money has to deliver results.

btw I'm not worried that Sony will become arrogant again. It's not for nothing that Sony is investing in South Korea, China, India and most recently South Africa. They want the PlayStation brand to get bigger.

In addition, Sony and Nintendo could (again) become direct competitors.

If the console market is going to become a one horse race then I will sell both the ps5 and series X while I can still get something for them and switch to PC as it will have everything from both sides, guess it will save me paying for both subs and drop down to just pc gamepass.

I’m not one of the console wars people but still… war won lol. I’ve actually just invested in an oled deck. Can’t wait

PS5 Pro the best place to play PS5 & Xbox games.

@LN78 wasn’t that supposed to be the initial plan? Which hasn’t worked ? Lol

@DonkeyFantasy Jim Ryan will be gone by the end of the month.

I can see one of two things happening next week.

1, Microsoft announce that all current and new Bethesda games are coming to playstation consoles, maybe after timed exclusivity on xbox first.

2, the amount of salt and crying online from xbox fans and the abuse Microsoft is getting on social media will force them to backtrack on their plans to keep their fanbase happy.

@SeanOhOgain I don’t see halo gears or forza being on ps for awhile. I see Microsoft dripping games of theirs into ps and Nintendo to test the reaction. Sea of thieves type games. Now I will say. If halo infinite and master chief collection dropped on ps store I bet that ***** would sell like crazy. Sure people will buy to play but a lot would buy also because it’s just insane to think you are playing halo on ps5 lol. I say it would sell a ton. Not talking gamepass. Ps gamers wouel buy halo and probably gears too like a damn new release. Big numbers. Ps4 and ps5 can run halo easy. So huge built in base buying an Xbox game at big numbers. But I don’t think they are gonna give us those type games for awhile.

I've been used to seeing a lot of Xbox exclusives on PC for a while now but nice to see PS5-only players being able to play them now.

@UltimateOtaku91 Too much money in selling PS5 games to go with #2.

@KahnArtizt07 So will Uncle Phil. They can retire together and live in a house like Bert and Ernie.

@thespectre I understand that the Indiana Jones game mixes the first and thired person perspctive hehe.

What if Sony's terms to Microsoft putting gamepass onto PlayStation consoles is that they must also have a native version that can be installed, and not just cloud versions, hence why Microsoft is going to be putting their games onto playstation. Microsoft get the full cut from gamepass subs whilst in return Sony get 30% from game sales.

@Neither_scene True, but not thinking that’s their plan just yet.

@LN78 Yeah, can also see it not being the full gamepass catalogue, they will probably start with a lite version that's just a small amount of Microsoft first party titles. Third party contracts would be hard to sort out as they would be losing sales on playstation consoles, sales that wasn't taken into consideration when Xbox made the deals with these third party devs.

I’ve always wanted to try Gears of War so that could be awesome for me. Also, if this means any future Spyro games can come to the PS5, sign me up! That is if they ever make another Spyro 😭😭😭

IT'S NEVER BEEN MORE OVER FOR EM

Phil doesn't want to admit Game Pass isn't working out in its current form, so they have to put games on other platforms to generate the necessary unit sales. We already know, but it'll be nice to hear him say something truthful for once.

@get2sammyb if I'm not completely mistaken, the Insomniac leaks revealed that Sunset isn't going to happen on PS due to contractual stuff that is still tied to MS. Something like they still have the publishing rights or something like that

@dschons now they can port it.

Halo and Gears of War on Playstation

I'd buy them.

@PegasusActual93 Will Fallout 5 even make it out before PS7?

@LN78 no chance as if Sony would allow it to undercut there prices for new releases

The American Trillion dollar corporation with unlimited resources waves the white flag to the two Japanese Billion dollar corporations.
"The problem with Microsoft is they just have no taste. They don't think of original ideas and they don't bring much culture in to their product." - Steve Jobs

My guess: Xbox first party games to be available day 1 on Game Pass. Then they will be releasing as full price games on PlayStation a few months after that.

@oliverp It does. James Bond 007 Nightfire did the same (and I love that game). But Indiana Jones appears to be primarily first person, which just seems strange for Indiana Jones.

Alfred Hitchcock Presents..The Wait To Melt Down..

I guess every brand gets the delights of the ABK loot box now there will be no escaping it whichever platform.

Amazing how many Xbox games are rubbish over the years and now oh Ill play blah blah blah lmfao not two faced much hey

@jsnow they haven't waved he flag at all it's money , The only reason they are doing this is for the money even Sony themselves are discovering that without games doing multiplatform with the prices of creating games they won't make Thier money back of them with one platform , why do you think sony are buying pc games conversion companies??? Remember how ppl used to say they would never put Thier exclusives on pc ...... That went well

Look at the insomniac leak they were told to make the games cheaper

@bpomber
That’s what I think, but will that kill off xbox hardware sales. So what is the point of the Xbox hardware.
It’s a tricky situation.

@LN78 for example you will have gamepass with farming simulator 27 for free or farm sim 27 on ps store for probably about £50

@OldGamer999 Xbox will probably market all their games by saying an Xbox console is still the best way to play. So they can hope to at least maintain decent hardware sales with this marketing strategy. Plus they know that there will always be the hardcore Xbox fans, like many of the PureXbox users, who will buy Xbox no matter what.

So Sony fought for COD for no reason? 😆

@LN78

Take away the individual device (Xbox/PS5/Switch/PC with millions of different configurations) and stream from a software container and that's a massive amount of development costs and testing gone in a blink.

@bpomber Who cares if they still buy the Xbox hardware, we still get the Xbox games on PS5!? It's still better on PS5 Pro.

Microsoft paid millions for COD and then sacked almost all its staff. Then said given free games away if profiteering and now they want to return to the light side. Flight simulator forza horizon and any new banjo in 4k I’m happy

@JAMes-BroWWWn I mean, he and the Xbox PR team have hit such lows in the last few years that I wouldn’t put something like this beside them but no they want paying videogamer money to get out of the grave they dug for themselves

scrumdiddlyumptious, giving us those old backwards compatible games that Activision has locked away would be sweet, if they're not cloud based on the playstation side of things I will highly thank them for that.

@Rob_230 " Microsoft on seeing WWE dominating the headlines online over Cody not finishing the story "

I thought Cody getting stabbed in the back by Dwayne was to cover up McMann raping women in the back w/ his pals?🤷‍♂️

@get2sammyb Nobody should ever say they'll tell you big news "next week" on a Monday, that's a Thursday or Friday phrase.😛

i am pretty excited for this. i don't think this means ms will be leaving hardware , i think you'll still see a new xbox coming out , but they'll be doubling down between hardware and software. i mean i called this years ago. do you really think they bought all these developers just to keep their games exclusive? or to sell those games on multiple consoles including ps5 , maybe nintendo and pc along with xbox.

Imagine Banjo-Kazooie and Perfect Dark on PlayStation.

If this is true, the meltdown form the Xbox fans will be big enough for a new season of Chernobyl.

@LtSarge I've had the exact same thought. I wholeheartedly believe the gaming market will turn into a quasi-monopoly under Microsoft, not as a console manufacturer but as a third-party publisher.
Dropping out of the console race entirely would pretty much ensure that they can buy another slew of publishers to unite the vast majority of IP under their banner.

Maybe, just maybe, this will persuade Sony and MS to make true cross play and cross save between platforms, its a mega pain can't cross play/save across all devices in so many games, eg Remnant 2 and many others, shouldn't be a barrier anymore.

Not sure if it has been mentioned, but another under the radar sign of Microsoft's indecision and likely pivot is word that Microsoft has not committed to AMD on its chip order for the next gen system while Sony has. Supposedly this would lead to them being far behind Sony on the next gen device even if they commit now. As the ABK acquisition showed, they have a planned device, but not committing the order shows they may be waffling on the platform of the future and being in that game.

I could envision them doing a mobile Steam deck type device (as rumored), possibly a base box to allow Gamepass use for casual gamers like the Series S, and making a lot of money selling games into Playstation's and Nintendo's large base, nevermind mobile game apps. Seems like a very solid business plan when they know it is likely impossible to catch up now. Microsoft is a very smart business and they have done the math likely showing far more profit and revenue from being a publisher with Gamepass and a basic box than trying to compete as a true platform leader.

@Ultrasmiles I highly doubt it. Where there's smoke there's fire. Around two dozen reliable industry insiders have pretty much confirmed major Xbox exclusives are coming to PlayStation.

We're listening and we hear you

This guy 😂😂😂

Just give me Rare Replay on Switch. or PS4.

Maybe it will be the time to see original xbox classics having a second life like Panzer Dragoon Orta, Otogi, Jet Set Radio Future or Conker.

Sony according to various sites has sold 50 mil PS5's but the Insomniac leaks showed the licensing costs for Spiderman2 and insufficient sales means they need cheaper games to be profitable. Up steps Xbox .... which might end up the only way both brands survive.

I've always seen Microsoft going the Sega route, or at least slowly heading that way. Of course they'll still be making hardware but I think with the Game Pass strategy, getting all those games out on as many platforms is just sensible business.

As silly fun as it is to argue over the console wars, this is bad for everyone but Sony and Microsoft. Ms expands their sub service and will continue to accumulate to add to it. Sony gets hegemonic/monopoly status in the console space. Consumers lose big time at the lack of competition

@LN78 is that more value than play it on xbox for cheap or don't play it at all? It still strikes me as less valuable.

@Loamy the difference was sega was a dead brand , they had horrible console sales , xbox still can make money off of hardware , but also double down with timed exclusive software and then sell those games later on to people on playstation.

Did anyone have this on their prediction list this year? I’m honestly surprised this is happening so quickly. Although, as an armchair CEO, I saw after the release of Starfield that the model didn’t look like it was going to work. That was the game that was supposed to turn this thing around for them. The bump in GamePass subscribers must have been negligible.

I do worry that PS+ might decline in its quality as a result of the weakening of GamePass.

But I’m excited that I can hopefully play Hellblade II and Indiana Jones on my PS5.

@Th3solution I just want gears , that is all

Seen a lot of concerning stuff about the future xbox has planned. Including a unified account across gaming, hope that part is resisted by Nintendo and Sony.

@twitchtvpat Yeah I think they'll continue to make hardware. Just a shift of focus to software, playing to their strengths.

So many people moan about timed exclusivity but in my eyes it makes the most sense and is most fair to gamers, as well as giving devs extra £££ for that economically dry release period.

@Reptilio totally agree with you , do i want xbox to pull out of the console game, of course not , but like you say, it is silly fun 😁

@Neither_scene From what I remember, it was Xbox fans who were celebrating PlayStation's demise after the ABK acquisition.

Microsoft has been giving people less of less of a reason to buy an Xbox for years. Competition is good for the industry. I don't wanna be limited to only Sony hardware. This is really sad. Microsoft has playing defense for 10 years ever since Don Matrick made an ass of himself in 2013. To make that huge Activision buyout, have a great recent developer showcase with Kojima, only to announce this? What a stab in the back to Xbox fans.

@pyrrhic_victory As an Xbox fan, I was never celebrating the "demise", on Sony. I'm a fan of Sony too, albiet a very critical one. I want PS to do better, just like I wanted Xbox to do better after ruining their brand with Don Matrick in 2013. I want more hardware in the market and serious competition.
The Activision fiasco seems moot now, given this new turn of events. 😔

As an Xbox first gamer, I’m excited for this. While I’ll still get the games on Xbox, there’s a lot of great games that gamers on other consoles can experience. Hi-Fi Rush for instance was one of my top games last year. While I didn’t love Starfield I did enjoy it for what it was. Of course, there’s Gears and Halo which are both phenomenal.

Phil Spencer to Playstation: "I want money, power and glory... I want money and all your power, all your glory"

@Odium why is it only xbox games to ps/Nintendo but not other way around?

People forget Xbox is a brand inside of Microsoft & it's apparently Microsoft that's wanting more of an investment especially after buying both Activision & Bethesda. While apparently the Xbox CEO's like Phil Spencer want Xbox exclusives. This tells me some where down the line the numbers aren't adding up for Microsoft inside of Xbox. Just keep Activision & Bethesda multiplatform like they always been this helps Microsoft as a business, while also having Xbox exclusives from Xbox first parties.

Maybe there will be something about that xbox barrel/cylinder thingy also?

These rumors have been absolutely bonkers… I own all platforms so I’m good but I feel bad for those that have been loyal to the Xbox brand, especially over the last 10 years. Here’s hoping whatever this announcement is that it’s positive. A strong Xbox brand is good for everyone. That said, I would buy Gears, Forza, and Halo in a heartbeat if they ever came to PlayStation,

Owning both platforms (and a Switch), I think this could be interesting. I see Microsoft publishing their games in Game Pass on day one, while making them available in competing platforms for full price, months after Game Pass launch. If the games are good, it will drive revenue while still provide an incentive to buy their platform. The only thing I hope (and I think it will be the case) is that Microsoft remains competitive in the console market. It would never be good to have only one player in the high-end console space, and definitely wouldn't want to see Sony run unchallenged, would be worse for all of us.

Xbox as been in a coma since the days of the Don Mattrick announcement now Phil is about to pull the plug.

It will be a shame to see Xbox leave the console market though

@MegaManX-7 just when Xbox finally starts to get good exclusives they give em away oi

Probably wishful thinking, but if Xbox stops being a console, a new SEGA console would kind of perfectly fill the void. No one makes fun arcade games like SEGA did, and they're already building hype by bringing all the classics back. Assuming the games are actually good, they're going to be filling a gaming need no one else really does well anymore. Simple, fun, wacky, arcade games.

Release the console with a new Virtua Fighter and Virtua Cop, include controllers with light gun attachments or something, I think people will buy it.

@Valkyrian I never said it wasn’t the other way around too, but Xbox to others is what’s being discussed here. If PlayStation or Nintendo start throwing their exclusives onto other consoles, I’m all for it. I’m not one of the people that complained when PlayStation games started migrating to PC, I personally think it’s a good thing to branch out after a while.

If this does happen then what was the point in Microsoft buying Bethesda and Activision.
At least this means that ES6, Blade,
New Crash and Spyro games won’t be Xbox exclusive if this is the case.
Hoping to play Hi-Fi rush, sea of thieves, Viva Piñata and Banjo mostly on PS

@LagunaX1
Miss house of the dead games and time crisis with the gun support last we had this was the PS3 with the move controller that had a light gun.
Would love a remastered or remake collection of all the House of the dead games and Time crisis games.
Especially if they do Scarlet Dawn and Time crisis 5 as console games.
Also there’s the JP arcade games that are really good as well

@LtSarge

You already can play games via TV, my TV has Xbox, Luma and Nvidia streaming apps...

Alright let's gooooo

@get2sammyb I think the idea is to allow some time for the hardcore fans to go through the five stages of trauma before it gets official. Seriously.

Moreover, if they announce, say, Hi-fi Rush and Sea of Thieves as originally rumored, fans will go "phew, I thought they were porting Gears and Halo." A bad thing becomes a good thing.

Then, Gears and Halo will eventually make their way on to PlayStation and nobody will complain. Similar to how no one cares when new PS5 games are announced for PC nowadays.