If I have to report on outright marketing, I appreciate when the brands involved can add a dash of proper spice to keep things interesting.
Following this morning’s hour-long PlayStation Showcase, Xbox dropped a tweet full of games that had just appeared during the show. Sony’s showcases are usually platforms for it to crow about its roster of upcoming exclusives (and it certainly did a bit of that this morning). There’s a feeling that everything you see in a PlayStation direct-to-consumer live stream is an exclusive, whether that’s openly stated or not.
This means the competition has to get its digs in where it can, and remind punters which titles are actually cross-platform.
What a good looking group 😎 pic.twitter.com/eDZo8vTXtB
— Xbox (@Xbox) May 24, 2023
Xbox’s angle of attack here is a solid one. It doesn’t go after Sony directly. Rather, it walks the viewer to the realisation that all these big titles unveiled at the PlayStation party aren’t exclusive to the PS5, and lets them come to the realisation on their own.
It’s an expansive list of major games:
- Alan Wake II
- Assassin’s Creed Mirage
- Cat Quest: Pirates of the Purribean
- Dragon’s Dogma II
- Ghost Runner II
- Legends of Aveum
- Marathon
- Metal Gear Solid Triangle: Snake Eater (they put a triangle in the title instead of a 3, and I understand what they’re doing there, but I’m saying Triangle and I can’t be stopped)
- Neva
- The Plucky Squire
- The Talos Principle II
- Teardown
To be clear, Xbox just says these games are coming to the platform. It doesn’t specifically say where in in its ecosystem they will land. While it would be fun to see Assassin’s Creed Mirage or Metal Gear Solid Triangle: Snake Eater show up as Day One Game Pass drops, I somehow doubt that will be the case.
Anyway, point to Xbox on this one. Could have made a big song and dance about it, tried to throw a spanner in PlayStation’s big day, and chose the classier option instead. Well played. Smart comms.
You can check out the full list of trailers from this morning’s PlayStation Showcase here.
Leave a Reply