I’m not so sure Phil Spencer is correct in his assessment. Microsoft games and Xbox CEO Phil Spencer has recently said that Xbox One lost an entire generation of gamers due to poor game quality, leaving it doomed in the Console War.
Perhaps if Microsoft focused on making good games instead of controlling the entire gaming industry, then people would by some Xboxes.
The head of all Microsoft gaming divisions and Xbox CEO Phil Spencer has recently done an interview with Kinda Funny Games and claimed that Xbox was pretty much doomed in the Console Wars against their archrivals, Sony and Nintendo, as they lost the “Xbox One generation” with poor gaming releases, and it’s useless to make better games to attract these people back to Xbox.
Now, I’ve never been the CEO of one of the world’s largest gaming developers and have never managed the sales of some of the most popular games and consoles ever, but Spencer’s comment is crap. And he knows it.
To be fair to Spencer, what he exactly said was, “I see the commentary that if you just build great games everything will turn around. It’s just not true that if we go off and build great games all of a sudden you’re going to see console share shift in some dramatic way. We lost the worst generation to lose in the Xbox One generation, where everybody built their digital library of games…There is no world where Starfield is an 11 out of 10 and people start selling their PS5s, that’s not going to happen.”
I don’t want to sound like a jerk or extremely biased against Microsoft (for I actually do like the Xbox and it was the original console I used to play games on), but nearly every word he said in that statement is either false or flat out wrong.
Again, I don’t have the internal figures at Spencer’s disposal to make a definitive judgement on whether or not Microsoft “lost the Xbox One generation” (I know I logged hundreds of hours on my old Xbox One), yet in what world does it make sense for people to sell their Ps5s because Bethesda’s Starfield is a “11/1o” game? Shouldn’t Spencer be looking for people to buy both a Ps5 and an Xbox Series X, giving them the ability to play all of their PS5 games and Xbox games at will?
I don’t think anyone would sell their PlayStation just because all Bethesda games are now on Xbox. Why would Spencer even think in those terms?
I thought the purpose of buying huge, famous gaming studios like Bethesda and Activision (well, not anymore as the deal was blocked) was to get people back on Xbox, not completely converting them away from PlayStation. Is Microsoft really that greedy and monopolistic the company has now gotten to the point it actively wants gamers to shun EVERY SINGLE COMPETING CONSOLE in the world for Xbox?
You just need people to play and enjoy both consoles, not dominate the entire market with sub-par, half-assed products.
And what’s this about great quality games don’t sell consoles? That just doesn’t even make sense. Why else would I buy an Xbox if not to play the fantastic games, such as the Elder Scrolls, Starfield, Call of Duty, etc., on the console? I’m not buying it because it has a glowing power button, or I can customize its designs with Redfall characters.
I, along with every single gamer in the world, buys a console to play great video games on. Xbox will only be doomed so long as these gaming studios continue putting out rushed, unplayable, unpolished, and unfinished games due to corporate pressure, while Microsoft foolishly (and unsuccessfully) tries to become the global gaming conglomerate.
I do like Phil Spencer as he seems to be an honest, forthright person (he did do this interview after all), but this defeatist mentality towards the Xbox console and the nature of the video game industry is really worrying. It only takes the creation of good games for gamers to come back to consoles and publishers like Xbox and Microsoft, respectively, which has seemingly been lost on Spencer.
(Microsoft-Halo Infinite-Official Launch Trailer)
I’m not saying he should be fired or replaced, but a serious look at the leadership of Xbox and Microsoft games has to be in order, or else this company really will be doomed from all the negativity, greed, and sheer incompetence currently guiding the decisions of these corporate heads.
Images Source: Featured Image: (Microsoft/Bethesda) (The Elder Scrolls Online: High Isle Launch Cinematic – YouTube)
In Text Image 1: (Microsoft) (Halo Infinite – Official Launch Trailer – YouTube)
