Phil Spencer Focused on Xbox Ecosystem
During a recent interview, executive vice-president of Gaming at Microsoft, Phil Spencer emphasized how important the Xbox player base is rather than overall unit sales. Apparently, Microsoft’s primary focus is how many players are in the Xbox ecosystem, including the fans on PC. With the recent release of Project xCloud in various countries around the world, this ecosystem also now includes mobile. Gamers can play Xbox Game Pass Ultimate across all of these devices for a $15 monthly subscription.
When asked why Xbox stopped reporting their unit sales the same way Nintendo and Sony do, Phil Spencer said, “I know it seems manipulative and I’ll apologize for that, but I don’t want my team’s focus on that. The primary outcome of all the work that we do is how many players we see, and how often they play. That is what drives Xbox. If I start to highlight something else, both publicly and internally, it changes our focus. Things that lack backward compatibility become less interesting.”
Xbox stopped reporting unit sales as they shifted their focus from hardware to software and the Xbox ecosystem. “Putting our games on PC becomes a reason that somebody doesn’t have to go and buy an Xbox Series X,” continued Phil Spencer. “I’ll hold fast to this. We publicly disclose player numbers. That’s the thing I want us to be driven by, not how many individual pieces of plastic did we sell.” While the Xbox Series X/S recently released, it seems like Phil Spencer is less interested in console sales and more interested in expanding the Xbox player base, whether it’s on PC, Mobile, or the Xbox family of consoles.
Where do you do most of your gaming within the Xbox ecosystem? Let us know in the comments below!