Microsoft is undoubtedly the biggest software company in the world with $118.2 Billion of sales in 2019 Fiscal Year, with the market cap of $946.7 Billion. A failure for such an organization is not an option. But, Microsoft’s streaming venture failed, as the Mixer has officially been announced to be dead by the 22nd of July 2020. As Microsoft’s game streaming service failed, there is certainly going to be effected on the other gaming-related business. Now the point is, while the launch of Microsoft’s next-gen console the Xbox Series X is near, is shutting down of Mixer streaming platform going to affect the business anyhow? If you ask my opinion, I would say yes certainly. But how? Let’s discuss over the matter in this article folks.
Business Opportunities on Horizon with Mixer
Though Mixer is officially dead, when Microsoft takes over the ownership of recently launched streaming service (Beam) and branded with a new name (Mixer), everyone got a clear message that Microsoft is here in the streaming business now. As twitch.tv and YouTube Gaming are the two most loved streaming service of all, it was a subtle competition which Microsoft participated when they came into this genre of the industry. Becoming the best in the industry and competing against the best in the industry are two different things. Especially the fight becomes even more crucial when your company is at the leading position of its present genre and intervening in some other genre against the world’s best.
- Microsoft definitely had a couple of plans related to the streaming industry, including bringing the biggest streamers/gamers under their own pay-role.
- Featuring the best game streams on their platform would have helped Microsoft to market their own produced games easily, also it was a great marketing strategy for upcoming Xbox Series X, where they could have bundled these two platforms alongside to create a new chapter in the gaming.
- If the biggest streamers had been promoting or playing the Microsoft games on a Microsoft based streaming platform, it would have created a phenomenal market base for such games.
- Also for better streaming experience on Xbox, they could have provided an inbuilt Mixer app, which would have worked out of the box with the least amount of processing power and lag. But, as Mixer failed to create its own market, all such above discussed plans are now 20-feet under the water.
How Mixer Failed?
In short, Mixer failed due to a rash marketing approach and a lack of opportunities for the upcoming streamers. Microsoft surely eyed for the Xbox Next Gen launch, that is why they did not care to spend time and money to grow a base of streamers and audiences of their own. Microsoft directly targeted the most popular streamers from Twitch like Ninja, Shroud, etc. and lure them towards their own platform with high paying contract and brand promotions.
Microsoft/Mixer expected that all the audiences of such popular streamers would follow those streamers towards the Mixer platform, which did not happen actually. Though primarily Mixer experienced very high traffic from the audiences in the first couple of months, the footprints started to demise with time. Most of the people are sentimental about their most loved platform, and on the other hand, the subscription system, follow system, and patron systems are quite more user friendly with Twitch and YouTube.
Which pull back almost 80% of the audiences again, and people started watching the other streamers over Twitch and YouTube, which in turn started to decrease the popularity of the biggest streamers like Shroud and Ninja. While such streamers felt the problem they also decided to leave Mixer in order to go back to Twitch for the sake of their career.
Therefore, Microsoft had no plans to promote the ground level upcoming streams or to create a good base of regular streamers, which would create a loyal base of audiences. Thus Mixer had to fail, and it failed. Though there is a little chance for Mixer’s comeback with a different name, different form, and with a different strategy, as Microsoft has partnered with Facebook to create Facebook Gaming. See: Why you Should Quit Mixer and Choose Facebook gaming
Effect of Mixer’s Failure on Xbox Series X Business
First of all, every kind of plans related to the out of the box streaming capability of Xbox Series X games is now gone for a while. So, the live ground level streamers would think a lot before investing in Xbox Series X. They might end up buying the console, but the business would become slower as people won’t feel any immediate need for getting the next-gen console.
To make people feel that they need the Xbox Series X ASAP, Microsoft needs to work hard on their exclusive games. As they are already reportedly doing with their Halo: Infinite, where they are working on One Shot Camera scenes, to increase the game’s intensity and movie like feelings. Also, such features are very good for exclusive Gaming content creators, so that they may feel the need for next-gen Xbox, as soon as it is launched.
Exclusive games or Exclusive features are the only things that make a Console better. As consoles are closed system which does not have much flexibility like a PC, so the users have to depend on the provided apps and games only.
As we know the number of popular exclusive titles is greater with the PlayStation, and people also do prefer the PlayStation due to the exclusive games. But Microsoft does not go for many exclusive games, as they tend to target the PC gaming market with the same games.
Just like Gears of War, Halo (apart from Halo 5: Guardians), Red Dead Redemption, Quantum Break, etc. all have PC versions released couple months later from the original release date. Onboard Mixer compatibility could have been a new evolution for a gaming console system, but that is not going to happen any time soon, so yes it is going to affect the business of Xbox Series X quite a bit for sure.
As when potential buyers would be considering which next-gen console to buy while knowing none of them to have any onboard streaming platform support, anyone would go for the one with more popularity, more exclusive games, and more powerful hardware.
In short, the expectations from the Xbox games have increased by a couple of bars due to such a breakdown of Mixer as featured support for Xbox Series X.
Hence, in order to grab a competitive business against Sony’s PlayStation 5, Microsoft needs more good quality exclusive games in all the genres, including FPS, RPG, PvP, Multiplayer, Competitive, etc. Also, Microsoft needs more highly anticipated exclusive games like UFC, Forza Horizon, Gears 5, Forza Motorsport, Sunset Overdrive, Red Dead Redemption, etc.
Conclusion
Yes in terms of lack of exclusive onboard streaming app support is going to affect the business of next-gen console, and if before the launch of PS5, Sony managed to develop and provide such on-board streaming support then Xbox Series X business may going to be ridiculed.
Also, the inferior number of exclusive titles is already affecting the Xbox One’s business and letting the fans criticize Microsoft gaming, if such a trend keeps on going after the launch of Xbox Series X, then it is going to be a big drawback for the business. Unlike Sony, Microsoft is also not announcing many next-gen games prior to the launch of upcoming consoles, which is leading to the creation of fewer hypes in the market for the Xbox Series X in comparison with Sony PS5, and lack of publicity is not good for any business. That’s all if you have any point on your mind related to this discussion please add those in the comments below.
Interesting article. I happened to believe Xbox is too focused on Xbox Game Pass and which is leaving a gap in titles at the retail level. A tangible console needs tangible games for me people to see and touch and buy. Game pass is great idea but the physical game just has a different feel to it. Where is Hellblade 2? No word, no preorders. Is it delayed like Halo? It makes you wonder what is going on. I remember when mixer came online about years ago I never used. What’s the point when you havr YouTube? If Game Pass is being basically given away for A dollar when will microsoft realized people like their service because its a dollars for the first month and really want games?
According to me as a gamer, Microsoft’s idea of promoting Mixer was not a viable one as they did not offered any growth to the new streamers, while in Twitch or Youtube gaming you gets tons of opportunities. Even the Facebook Gaming is providing a good platform for growth for the upcoming streamers. Also Microsoft never tried to promote esports through Mixer, that was also another reason why they failed. In such competitive market, each product of yours must provide something better and something unique, which they failed to provide, instead they tried to steal popularity from other platforms.
And I really do not understand the game business policy of Microsoft now a days, especially after the launch of Xbox series X/S; the idea of exclusive games are also fading slowly from Microsoft’s side. Even they declare the same kind of decision after taking over the Bethesda studios, a the Bethesda games are going to be released on all platforms. Not being unique and not touching the sentiments of the gamers, is the main point where Microsoft is losing.