There’s a definite sense of change in the air at Xbox which all began back in February when Phil Spencer addressed concerns over a possible shift in strategy for the company.
While rumours that Starfield and Indiana Jones and the Great Circle were coming to PlayStation proved to be false, Spencer did confirm that Microsoft would indeed be experimenting with releasing certain former-exclusives to other consoles.
Those titles were eventually announced to be Pentiment, Grounded, Sea of Thieves, and Hi-Fi Rush which are all now, or soon to be, available across various platforms - including PlayStation 5 and Nintendo Switch.
It’s a move that may have proved to be pretty business savvy with Xbox reportedly eyeing up its next line-up of exports.
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Elsewhere, there are whispers of an Xbox handheld that’s in the works, plus let’s not forget that Xbox’s Sarah Bond previously teased that the company’s next-gen console would mark “the largest technical leap you will have ever seen in a hardware generation,” on the official Xbox podcast.
It’s all a far cry from Xbox’s lacklustre 2022, a non-event year that seemingly really kicked the company into gear.
As such, there’s so much to look forward to for fans of the green brand - including the possible arrival of Steam and similar storefronts.
Take a look at the aforementioned Indiana Jones and the Great Circle below.
While Phil Spencer is keen to ship out Xbox content to other platforms, so too is he keen to have other platforms’ content arrive on Xbox.
In an interview with Polygon, Spencer was asked about the possibility of having other digital storefronts arrive on Xbox such as the Epic Games Store and Steam, providing a definitive “yes” on whether it’s something he’s actively considering.
“[Consider] our history as the Windows company,” Spencer began. “Nobody would blink twice if I said, ‘Hey, when you’re using a PC, you get to decide the type of experience you have [by picking where to buy games].’ There’s real value in that.”
He continued, “Moore’s Law has slowed down. The price of the components of a console aren’t coming down as fast as they have in previous generations.”
“[Subsidising hardware] becomes more challenging in today’s world and I will say, and this may seem too altruistic, I don’t know that it’s growing the industry. So I think, what are the barriers? What are the things that create friction in today’s world for creators and players? And how can we be part of opening up that model?”
At the end of the day, the more people that can access a game, the more joy there is to be had for everyone.
