Xbox chief calls recent PC exclusives an “anomaly,” reaffirms Xbox ecosystem goals
In context: If you’ve been keeping tabs on Microsoft’s upcoming game releases, you might have noticed something a little unusual – several of their major titles launching this fall are PC exclusives, at least initially. Games like World of Warcraft: The War Within expansion, the indie hit Ara: History Untold, and the early access version of Towerborne are all skipping Xbox consoles for now.
However, according to Phil Spencer, the head of Microsoft’s gaming division, this PC-only approach is just a temporary “anomaly.” In an interview with Game File, Spencer made it clear that the company’s goal is to have their games playable across as many platforms as possible under the Xbox umbrella – whether that’s consoles, PC, or cloud streaming.
“We want to get to the point where, when you buy, whether you’re buying on cloud – which we’re getting ready to introduce – buying on PC and buying on console, you own it across all of the Xbox ecosystem,” said Spencer.
If you’ve seen Xbox’s latest marketing campaign (above) that rather outlandishly declares just about every device with a screen an Xbox, this starts to make sense.
On the subject of sharing games with rival Sony’s PlayStation, Spencer spoke how he’s bullish about the company’s plans to release certain Microsoft-owned franchises on the other console as well in the future.
As for the specific reasons behind this fall’s PC exclusives, Spencer provided some context. The World of Warcraft expansion is limited to PC because the core game itself isn’t on Xbox. The indie game Towerborne is sticking to PC in early access before expanding to other platforms later. And Ara: History Untold simplified development by launching first on Series X|S, with other versions coming down the road.
However, Spencer reiterated that these are exceptions rather than the new norm, saying “I want the expectation to be that when we talk about a game, it’s available every place our Xbox user is.” He name-dropped plans to have the Diablo 4 DLC “Vessel of Hatred” playable across Xbox’s full range of platforms as an example of their cross-ecosystem ambitions.
All this talk about expansion and an Xbox “ecosystem” will bring the Xbox handheld to mind, which we’ve been hearing about for years. It indeed is coming and the company is seriously pursuing the project, as confirmed by Spencer in a previous interview with Bloomberg. But the project remains in its early stages and an actual product may likely be years away.
Another project the Xbox team has been working on in the way of expansion is a Microsoft mobile game store. While originally slated for a July launch, it’s now been delayed indefinitely as the company “does additional research on the market.”
