Gamescom 2014: Sunset Overdrive, Halo, and plenty of Windows Phones...

Having an press ID and mobile gaming becoming more important I thought I might give the Gamescom in Cologne a visit as press this year. Note here: I am not a gamer; I own an Xbox One and enjoy playing a bit sometimes, but I really do not consider myself a gamer.
The only thing I wanted to see there was Microsoft and Xbox, because frankly, that is the only thing that interested me there (which does not mean I did not throw an eye on the other boots as well…). The queues were not too long and since I am really looking forward to Sunset Overdrive and the new Halo parts, I thought I might give them a try. They were not the only thing I played there, but possibly the most important.
Microsoft’s Xbox presentation on Gamescom was pretty great. They have shown us lots of new stuff and games to come.

Sunset Overdrive is absolutely grand. It is crazy and fast but really fun to play, even though I did not really know what to do the first two minutes. But one gets used to the game very quickly and then it is really enjoyable, unless you are into that kind of genre. The graphics were great (just comic-ish, of course) and the game ran smoothly. Same goes for Halo. I sucked at it, but it was fun. The game (Halo 2) looked good. It was nothing special, it was just good, but considering this is a refreshed old game, the job they’ve done is pretty impressive.

However, that is not what this blog is all about. This blog is about mobile phones, specifically Windows Phones. And since last year the Gamescom had at least a little bit of phone gaming to present, and since mobile gaming is becoming a more and more serious business for developers, I expected it to improve here. This was not the case unfortunately.
Over the whole day there I have seen plenty of Windows Phones, but in the hands of visitors. About 30% of all phones I’ve seen were Windows Phones, no lie, so Microsoft could have had a big audience if they had something Windows Phone specific to announce. At the end of the day, the count of Windows Phone devices was the only news regarding Windows Phone I could get. I even tried to get someone from Microsoft to answer some questions, but as it seems, the company really has nothing to announce just yet.
This is not to blame Microsoft. After all, the Gamescom is still for real gaming on consoles and PCs. It is just that I thought there might be something new, some games or so, for Windows Phones, or that Microsoft could announce something regarding the Windows/Windows Phone/Xbox ecosystem. And not only Microsoft had nothing to announce, also other companies and game developers only announced companion apps for their games, at most.

So if you expected some mobile gaming news from the Gamescom – this thought was not even a false one, especially considering the actual situation of Xbox on Windows Phone – the only thing I can tell you is, that there was nothing.