The game console industry has seen a lot of competition between Sony's PS4 and Microsoft's Xbox One, and it can be tempting to get into the craze without really knowing the difference between the two. True, there are a lot of differences; but there are also a lot of similarities as inversely touted by Sony and Microsoft's advertising schemes.
Between the two, PS4 is more popular because of its longer-standing presence in the market. Just this year, PS4 sales reached a staggering 50 million units; while Xbox One sold a little less than half of that at 24 million units. Though the figures say otherwise, this is not bad for Xbox One given that Xbox consoles were founded seven years after the first PlayStation was released in 1994.
PS4 and Xbox One also both enjoy differing choices and exclusive rights in games. PS4 expectedly has more game choices, with over 1,200 games to choose from and 100 of these exclusives. It offers popular game titles such as: The Last Guardian, No Man's Sky, Grand Theft Auto V, The Last of Us Remastered, Bloodborne, Rise of the Tomb Raider, Destiny, Battlefield 1, Fallout 4, Call of Duty: Black Ops 3, NBA 2K16, Titanfall 2, The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, Dark Souls 3, Shovel Knight, Rayman Legends, Towerfall Ascension, Until Dawn, Unchartered 4: A Thief's End, Life is Strange, The Witness, Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain, and EA Sports' FIFA 17 among others. PS4 is particularly popular for its single and multiplayer strategy games, and sports games.
Xbox One, on the other hand, has around 846 games plus 30 exclusives. Its list of popular exclusive games includes: Halo, Gears of War, Sunset Overdrive, Forza Motorsport 5 and 6, Forza Horizon 2 and 3, Crackdown 3, Uncharted 4, Bloodborne, The Witness, Rare Replay, Powerstar Golf, ScreamRide, Shape Up, DiRT Rally, F1 2016, Project CARS, Trials Fusion, Mantis Burn Racing, Need for Speed: Rivals, Roundabout, Valentino Rossi the Game, and The Crew among others. While Xbox One has less games available on its console, it thrives best in its racing exclusives that are highly rated on Metacritic.
As of November 2016, Xbox One's Forza Horizon 3 is rated as the No. 1 racing game for the year. F1 2016 is also highly acclaimed due to its wide interest reach in the market.
Lee Mather, the principal game designer of F1 2016, says, "F1 is the most glamorous motorsport in the world and we wanted to capture that." He adds, "Our main focus was to introduce a deep and rich Career Mode, which would have the player coming back to the game over and over again. We also wanted to replicate the really cool and unique aspects of F1 to really immerse players into the sport."
It seems that due to PS4 and Xbox One's intense competition, and with PS4's bigger audience across the globe, Microsoft would want to thrive in a niche market that will allow race car fans choose Xbox One for its range of high-quality race car games.
Phil Spencer, global head of Xbox One, says of the company's game choice strategy, "That fact when you buy an Xbox One and start creating your game library... (with) those games and accessories... make it feel like part of the Xbox One family to me. That's why we communicate it that way. That was also part of the design point of the box."
