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There was no Call of Duty at Microsoft's E3 conference, but the platform holder seemed to be focused on another exclusive element that recently ran into trouble: its control of your friends list. With Xbox One still trailing the PS4, this year's solid but conservative selection of mega-games only truly made sense with Phil Spencer's sign-off. "If you've been waiting to move from the Xbox 360," he said, "now is the time." Lara Croft! Master Chief! Marcus Fenix! I finally get it! For the last 90 minutes, Microsoft hasn't been trying to capture a new audience so much as it's been appealing to the audience it once had.If that's the case, Backwards Compatibility should be a big help. Announced early on, it's a smart move and one that allowed platform director (his real job title is waaaay longer) Mike Ybarra to score an easy subtweet against Sony's rather pricy PlayStation Now service: "We won't charge you to play the games you already own." The details that followed were kind of hazy, but we're promised over 100 titles by the end of the year, and you'll be able to both use Xbox One features like screenshotting, and play with people on the 360. This is a nice bit of housekeeping for a console that's still struggling, as was the announcement of a new Elite Wireless controller which included swappable parts.
Halo's also a nice carrot for the old fans, and so the conference duly kicked off with a lengthy in-game walkthrough of Halo 5: Guardians. We were offered a generous chunk of action as space marines explored an artfully shattered world, but it's hard not to feel that the magic of the series is in jeopardy with so many Spartans sharing the screen and bantering over comms. Halo 5's campaign will allow you to lead two different squads, which is lovely for variety, but a series that was once defined by lone heroics and vast environments now seems to be about travelling with a band through pretty corridors. Multiplayer should benefit from an increased headcount at least, with Warzone offering huge maps and - I think - blending PvP with PvE in a manner that suggests a glorious sci fi demolition derby. Now that's Halo.
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