Sure you don't build a first party stable overnight, but in MS' case when they hell are they going to start?
Lets recap:
Started Turn 10, who went on to make Forza, the one truly original IP from Microsoft to ever succeed.
Bought Bungie when Halo was months from release, had them port it to Xbox, cancelling a much hyped PC version which did later arrive, not to mention the Mac version Bungie had been promising.
Purchased FASA as part of another acquisition in 1999. After doing very little with the Shadowrun and MechWarrior IPs on the Xbox family of consoles closes FASA in 2007, licences out all their worthwhile IPs to small studios.
Bought Rare in 2002, since they have mined the Perfect Dark, Banjo, and Conker IPs with zero success, made one new mascot IP for Xbox 360's launch that never got a follow up despite being a pretty solid (kid friendly) game (Kameo, FYI). Have since been largely relegated to Kinect titles, weren't even the ones who made the Killer Instinct reboot.
Purchased Lionhead in 2006. Proceeded to have them make nothing but Fable games, including a crappy Kinect Fable game. Stopped making PC versions entirely, games progressively got further and further away from the original concept for Fable. A large number of staff has been laid off over the past two years, another large group up and left with Molyneaux, which if it was anything like his departure from Bullfrog to found Lionhead constituted his core staff he's had everywhere (i.e. the real talent in the studio). Making yet another Fable game that is even further removed from the original premise.
Started up 343 studios as a replacement for Bungie when Bungie wanted out as opposed to eternally making nothing but Halo. Now 343 makes nothing but Halo, only not as well as Bungie. The game they wouldn't let Bungie make, Destiny, is now the most pre-ordered game yet. Winning?
Disbanded Ensemble Studios, Aces Studio, MS Flight Team, MS Victoria Studio (never released anything) and Carbonated Games. Have in the last several years purchased BigPark (absorbed into MS Game Studios), Twisted Pixel (who's next game was a full blown stinker), Press Play (nothing of note, so basically shuffling deck chairs with this and closing Carbonated).
Also, Black Tusk isn't new. It's Microsoft Vancouver. They just cleaned house and renamed it after Vancouver went years without finishing anything. Black Tusk is doing an admirable job keeping that history alive.
This is just a quick sample of how MS has handled their first parties. Forza is the only new IP they've generated and maintained worth a shit in their entire time as a console first party. Everything else was bought, mismanaged, and typically shuttered.
Buying their way into the industry with the Xbox with Bungie, Lionhead, etc. is one thing. Sure, you need meaningful exclusives and that was the fastest way to get them. They've been in the console business for nearly 13 years now though. The proof is in the pudding. Microsoft has never shown a commitment to developing their own legitimate first party stable. They closed much of what they did start with the Xbox during the X360 generation because Sony's failure to deliver with PS3 allowed them to pick off former exclusives and have a comparable 3rd party library at a lower price, so they weren't needed. The only significant reinvestment they've ever shown in software development was for Kinect, which they've now pulled back on nearly completely as well.
Microsoft brings nothing to this industry other than dump trucks of money. They're in the video game industry for all the wrong reasons. Making and selling video games is a secondary part of the business model and that has been the case from day one. Originally it was a Sony denial tactic. As Sony fell on hard times and the X360 emerged as a successful product they used XBL to turn it into a marketing push where their real customers were advertisers and games were just the gateway to get people in the door looking at all the ads. The XB1's original concept took this to the next level planning to have Kinect effectively mining data from within our homes while we lived around the system. Obviously the blow back was too great to continue that little project, but that was the original intent and Microsoft stated as much during a conference for their advertising partners.
Instead of this (which probably cost them $50M or better), Titanfall (which also likely cost them $50M or better) the stated NFL deal at $400M, and buying the Gears IP from Epic (likely a solid $50-$100M price tag) Microsoft could have funded over a half dozen of the biggest, most expensive AAA exclusives EVER. They gave the NFL more money for a fantasy football app than Take 2/Rockstar spent on Grand Theft Auto 5. Let that sink into your head when you excuse their lack of first party studios as "taking time".
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