Xbox president Sarah Bond was recently featured in a lengthy video interview with Mashable as part of the press tour for the launch of the ROG Xbox Ally X (which we reviewed here). We already covered her comment about the next-generation console being 'very premium and very high-end', but there's also another interesting tidbit in that interview: Bond's statement about game exclusives, which she labeled as antiquated.
We're really seeing people evolve way past that. Like the biggest games in the world are available everywhere. You look at Call of Duty, you look at Minecraft, you look at Fortnite, you look at Roblox. That's actually what's really driving community in gaming. That's where people gather. They have experiences. And the idea of locking it to one store or one device is antiquated for most people. You want to be able to play with your friends anywhere regardless of what they're on. And we're really leaning into that with this experience because it just opens up another way for you to play. As does cloud, as does PC, as does the consoles that we all own and have in our living room.
Bond's statement comes as no surprise given Microsoft's u-turn on exclusives. Xbox did attempt to pursue exclusives for its Xbox consoles for around fifteen years or so, even going as far as making pricey deals with Japanese developers for games like Ninja Gaiden, Lost Odyssey, Blue Dragon, and Ace Combat 6 to name a few.
However, that effort eventually dwindled down alongside the Xbox One's weak exclusives output. In 2016, Microsoft started bringing all its exclusive games to Windows PC, beginning with Remedy's Quantum Break. That was the first extension of what an Xbox was. Much more recent is their choice to port first-party games to rival consoles like Sony's PlayStation and Nintendo's Switch. This major strategy shift took place in February 2024, when following a series of rumors Microsoft confirmed that Obsidian's Grounded and Pentiment, Rare's Sea of Thieves, and Tango's Hi-Fi Rush would be released on the PS4/5 and/or Switch.
Many more games have since followed, including Gears of War: Reloaded, Forza Horizon 5, Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition, Senua's Saga: Hellblade II, Indiana Jones and the Great Circle, and DOOM: The Dark Ages. This month, Ninja Gaiden 4 and The Outer Worlds 2 will launch day and date on PS5, Xbox, and PC.
Microsoft is really now looking to bring its games to as many devices as possible, but that's because, as they candidly admitted in 2023, they have lost the console wars. Sarah Bond also mentioned live service games, which certainly benefit from being available on the widest possible amount of platforms, but Sony and Nintendo, especially the latter, still put a lot of importance in non-live service games which can definitely boost hardware sales when exclusive to their console.
On one hand, I do wish all games were released across all platforms immediately. It would certainly be a big win for all gamers. On the other, I understand Sony and Nintendo's current stance, even though the former is already slowly moving toward multiplatform releases.
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