I'll be honest, I'm not wild about either Sony or Microsoft. I can't get behind either of their visions.
Sony had a vision of transforming the game industry into one that operated like the major label music and big studio film industries, which they were able to accomplish. While I have an interest in some games that they've backed, produced, and had a hand in developing (Journey, Tokyo Jungle, echochrome, Flower, Patapon... was rooting for Heavy Rain and The Last Guardian although it doesn't seem like they turned out as well as they could've), I think that their vision is what lead to the triple-A industry becoming so uninteresting to me personally. Still, I can't deny that they've funded some of the weird games that I really love like PaRappa the Rapper, Boku no Natsuyasumi, and Depth. Final Fantasy VII is one of my favorite games, and honestly Sony's marketing is what propelled it to the mega-hit it became. What I'm saying is that I think their overall influence has been bad, but they still fund and support interesting exclusives that other publishers might pass on from time to time.
Microsoft is good at making multimedia platform boxes and online services. That's it, really. And Sony is also really good at doing that, too, so personally, I just don't see what their brand is offering me. The last Xbox console that interested me was the original, and that was really just for all of the Sega exclusives (Breakdown, Phantom Dust, Ninja Gaiden, and mostly superior ports were nice bonuses, though). Had Microsoft purchased Sega in 2004 and supported them I might have a different opinion of their brand, but right now they're the company that used to have the best online multiplayer service and that used to be the cheaper option, but there's a good reason why they've been losing out to Sony for a decade now. They deserve some credit for Cuphead, but that's going to be on the Switch soon enough. Ori and the Blind Forest looks great, too, but it's on Steam... pretty much anything I'd want to play on the Xbox One I can get elsewhere, and I don't see them radically changing their approach so I just don't see the point for anyone who's not a Gears of War/Halo mega-fan.
If I'm being honest, I don't particularly like seeing either of them succeed. Both are bad cases of big budget over vision. Had Microsoft started off with Sega, Nintendo, or, hell, even Sony-money they never would've lasted as long as they have. But Sony were the ones who transformed the industry to where you had to have Sony-money to be a player in the industry in the first place, which hurt it immensely from my point of view. But for other people, the industry is doing great, and I do have to recognize that -- Gears of War, Halo, God of War, Gran Turismo, and Spider-Man were big hits for a reason, but they just don't interest me very much. I wish the game development landscape wasn't what it is today, but it is... and since it is that way, the Xbox brand just seems redundant. If they stopped existing, I don't think the industry would change much.
I'll stick with PC, but if I had to choose between PlayStation 5 and Xbox Two, I'd go with PS5 'cause at least they have exclusives that interest me from time to time, even if I don't like them as a company very much.
