Microsoft to stop promoting Xbox consoles to focus on Xbox Game Pass

Microsoft is reportedly starting to wind down promoting Xbox consoles in certain regions per a new report from known insider Tom Warren.

Per Warren (and Reddit, who transcribed the newsletter):

"In May, I received a tip that Microsoft is changing up its Xbox strategy for the new financial year in regions like Europe, Africa, Middle East. I haven't been able to fully verify this, but the tipster claimed Microsoft will stop marketing Xbox consoles in certain markets in EMEA and focus only on Game Pass, cloud gaming, PC, and Xbox controllers. Microsoft has been struggling to sell Xbox Series X/S consoles in many countries across EMEA, and the tipster believes Microsoft will allocate less console stock to Europe as a result."

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If true, this lines up with how Microsoft has been approaching the service as a whole. Recently, the company heavily increased the price of the subscription service while also removing day one releases from all but one tier, suggesting that they're pushing users to the higher tier as a means of making up an existing profit deficiency. The company also announced that they were partnering with Amazon, and more specifically their Fire TV hardware, so that Xbox Cloud Gaming would be supported by more devices overall.

It's long been said by industry analysts and journalists that Microsoft's product is no longer the console (indeed, it hasn't been for a long time now), it's the subscription service. It remains to be seen whether the pivot to selling a monthly product will work for the company over the idea of selling a console, and it'll all depend on exactly what the audience wants, but it's certainly interesting.