Xbox CEO refuses to confirm if Project Helix will have a disc drive

Xbox's new CEO is making most of the right moves after taking over from Phil Spencer earlier this year, but her candid nature continues to peter out when Project Helix comes calling.

Asha Sharma faces the monumental task of overhauling Microsoft's gaming division, which has never recovered from falling behind in the console wars when the PS4 embarrassed the Xbox One.

But Sharma has taken huge strides in putting Xbox back on the right path. From releasing updates with enhanced graphics to demanding answers for the next Elder Scrolls and Fallout games, the Xbox CEO has taken her new role and really put her foot down.

The biggest blight on her record sits with the mass layoffs at Xbox's in-house studios, although that can easily be perceived as years of mass failings by Microsoft, which has simply been bad timing for Sharma.

But arguably the biggest thing on Sharma's priority list is Project Helix, its features, and its price tag.

After being so candid about her strategies around every other branch of Xbox's business, though, she continues to shut down questions surrounding the next-gen console.

Even as recently as yesterday, when she skirted around a question regarding Helix and the physical game treatment.

Xbox CEO says physical media is 'important' but Helix is in a hardware 'crisis'

With Project Helix tipped to be just as pricey as the rest of the consoles, which is only inching up from the Steam Machine's $1,000 bar, fans are hoping to see that the console will be worth such a huge investment.

One of the most divisive features is a disc tray, with gamers desperately clinging on to hope that the new consoles won't be entirely digital.

READ MORE: Xbox's latest console pricing confirmed, matches the extortionate PS5 Pro

Speaking to the BBC, Sharma claimed that physical games are important to Xbox, but refused to comment on whether that translates to the development of a disc tray for Helix.

"I know players love physical media, and I know there are a lot of benefits in digital media, and I want to make sure people have a choice," she said.

"This next generation, we have to be thinking about efficiency and affordability alongside performance.

"All of the industry needs to start to innovate on affordability and efficiency. That is something that we have not had to do [previously].

"But with the crisis that's currently happening in hardware and components, it is absolutely something all of us need to be thinking about and innovating on and giving people more choice in terms of how they play their console and how they purchase their console."

The comments suggest that despite the efforts to commit to physical media, Helix can't commit to a hardware component like a tray without increasing the price.

This comes after Sharma flipped the bird to PlayStation with the announcement that the Series X is getting a new programme that will download physical games to be playable on the cloud - effectively meaning you can insert a Fable disc into your Xbox, download it, and play offline on your Ally handheld.

Considering PlayStation is going all-digital, Xbox's physical stance is a chance to get one over their rivals, which makes Sharma's silence even more confusing.