Xbox Stays Vague About Multiplatform Future

A huge topic of conversation in gaming the past few weeks has been Xbox’s approach to exclusive titles. With newly acquired studios boosting their owned IP library, rumors that Xbox-owned games would head to other consoles caused an uproar. In a podcast that was meant to clarify the business strategy at Xbox moving forward, top execs did little to provide actual clarity, opting instead to keep things rather vague. Here’s what we learned.

The podcast, which you can view below, was the company’s grand response to whether or not Microsoft-exclusive titles would go to other consoles. In summary, four titles that were released over a year ago will go to other consoles with announcements coming soon. Microsoft did not name those titles as of now, but speculation from numerous reports believes the titles to be Hi-Fi Rush, Pentiment, Grounded, and Sea of Thieves. Again, however, this is not confirmed yet. Phil Spencer did confirm, however, that Starfield and the new Indiana Jones game, would not be included.

That said, Spencer, who is the Xbox CEO, did say he believed that each decision in the future about games and their exclusivity would depend on a number of factors. If fan responses to rumors ahead of this podcast are any indicator, many see the multiplatform approach to be a bit of a betrayal to those who purchased Xbox consoles. That said, Xbox for years has said they want Xbox to be “everywhere,” so this might be a sign of what they meant by that.

Xbox named multiple franchises they own that are already multiplatform, including Minecraft, Call of Duty, Overwatch, Diablo, and The Elder Scrolls Online. Other than Minecraft, all of those game franchises were just acquired in the last two years via Bethesda and Activision-Blizzard purchases. To me, this points less to a wait-and-see approach and more to a we know we’re heading toward a multiplatform approach to many releases, but we don’t want to tell players yet.

After news yesterday that Sony is predicting the PS5 era will wind down soon, two of the three major game console companies seem to be in a period of transition. Nintendo can be included in that as well, as it prepares for the inevitable reveal of their Nintendo Switch successor. With large-scale games becoming more laborious and time-consuming to make, we might not only see the way games are made change but also the ways in which we play them, or rather, where we play them.

The most frustrating thing about the update today is that little is clearer for fans. It’s probably a sound business decision on Microsoft’s behalf to stay a bit vague at this stage, so as to not eventually go back on what they promise now. Still, not even naming the four games is an additional sign that Microsoft’s approach to transparency at this stage of their “vision of the future,” as they call is less a vision and more a chapter in a story that seems uninterested in keeping the audience informed in a meaningful way.

Longtime readers of Phenixx Gaming will know I am an Xbox-first console gamer, but it’s mostly out of my creature-of-habit personality. I don’t find myself on either side of the Xbox exclusivity argument. I’m comfortable seeing where this goes and deciding in the next console cycle how I spend my money. Like over 34 million others, I’m a Game Pass subscriber who primarily uses the service to play my games. Exclusivity doesn’t make me feel any strong feelings. I’ll simply try to play games I am interested in and have access to when I have access to them.

Let us know what you think of the Xbox podcast released today and what you think Microsoft should do with its exclusive titles.