Netflix Now: Third Party Pseudo-Exclusives

Alec Kubas-Meyer

4 years ago

It’s Gamescom, which means big game publishers not named Nintendo are all in Germany telling people about big new things that they’re doing with their money. The biggest, showiest example of this was the announcement that the next Tomb Raider game is going to be an Xbox exclusive. The internet basically exploded, but when it turned out that the game is simply a timed exclusive, a lot of people shook their heads. Why? Because that’s even worse than an actual exclusive. (Especially since we know the PS4 version will be technologically superior.)

Bayonetta 2 is an exclusive. So are Bloodborne and Scalebound. These are games made by third parties that will be created directly for the hardware, and will take advantage of its uniqueness in a way that a game thrown onto every platform will. Sure, Nintendo, Microsoft, and Sony respectively definitely paid to make those games exclusive, but there’s a desire to do something great with the hardware, not just get a paycheck. A timed exclusive is about the paycheck. It drums up controversy, releases to critical acclaim, and then gets to do exactly the same thing a few months later.

Bullshit.

Also, Netflix. It isn’t the best week they’ve ever had, but a few good films made their way to the service. As per usual, everything (good and bad) can be found below.