If that's a city of the future, then I don't want any part of it...
A lot of people would kill for a view of water and trees and the ability to walk outside at lunch.
While greenery is great, I'd rather be able to walk to a proper park than have it in the form of a glorified berm between parking lots.
Hell, even the photo itself doesn't have that much exposed concrete apart from the buildings themselves. You can clearly see that there's a lot of greenery surrounding buildings.
Granted the images don't show any parking structures or buildings that appear to have integrated structures. So it's quite possible the images aren't representative of the build-out you're referring to.
And, aside from the ballpark, the 'greenery' surrounding the buildings is exactly the sort of glorified berm I'm talking about: that's hardly functional greenery. It's better than none, but far less desirable than a proper park with functional spaces for laying out, taking walks, playing frisbee or catch, etc.
Kudos to Microsoft for having the ballpark though, and more is due, if it's one of several such spaces. The rest of the campus though, as characterized in those pictures, does not look great.
It's pretty remote, and the entirety of the city revolves around a single employer. Everyone who works there either works directly for Microsoft or is closely affiliated with Microsoft business. Ditto everyone who lives there.
It's far from the nearest major city (Seattle), and to make matters a bit worse, there is a large natural barrier between the Company Town and the city (a huge lake in the way, with highly congestion-prone bridge crossings).
The negative side effects of this are too many to fully enumerate. Beyond the general boredom of living in a place where everyone works for the same company, there's also the issue of not having ready access to cultural events (which tend to be urban), the lack of proximity to competitors or indeed actual users of your products, etc.
Being outside of a major urban area is also limiting for employees in that there is substantially less choice in where you can live. Companies based in Seattle offer employees the full gamut of commuting options and accomodate both urban and suburban lifestyles thanks to the hub and spoke model of transportation. Being outside of a hub reduces the number of places that are within reasonable commuting distance.
Bellevue can hope to have the diversity of Ann Arbor when they import a state school and a few cornerstone employers that aren't Microsoft or Microsoft-affiliates. I don't expect this to happen soon.
Hell, "Bel-Red" exists as a word for a reason.
In any case, I don't think my original point is at all an exaggeration. Redmond is a modern incarnation of a Company town, though it doesn't come with many of the stigmas of industrial company towns. Its proximity to Bellevue has meant the Microsoftification of Bellevue, rather than the diversification of Remond.
Redmond must suck a lot.
Plus it's not all that remote. It is a typically boring suburb with tract houses and squat apartment buildings punctuated by strip malls, but it is only 20-40 minutes from downtown Seattle (I've done the trip many many times). I think living in Seattle and commuting to Microsoft via the 545 is a reasonable commute. I used to do something similar when I lived in Green Lake and worked in Kirkland.
But don't get me wrong, I agree that locating a major company there instead of Seattle, or at least Bellevue, is a mistake. I just don't think calling it a remote company town is a fair characterization.