Xbox Boss Phil Spencer Says They’re Not Interested in Entering VR Just Yet
Phil Spencer, the head honcho at Xbox, has reiterated that they still have no interest when it comes to creating their own virtual reality hardware. Speaking at the Wall Street Journal’s WSJ Tech Live event, he told the gaming community that, although he applauds Xbox’s competitors, the company just has no current interest on making an Xbox VR headset.
“I think that the hardware innovation that is happening is great and it is an important enabler,” Spencer said at the event. “But, right now, I am deciding to stay more in the software side of that enablement.”
“I applaud what Sony is doing, I applaud what Oculus id doing, what Valve is doing—there is a lot of good players out there that have done some amazing VR work,” Spencer added. “But, we are going to stay as a company right now in the consumer space focused on software.” According to Spencer, this is going to be “a good bet.”
Despite Spencer’s recent comments about deciding not to delve into the VR cup of tea, it would seem that he is not closing the doors to that industry entirely. Just last year, he did share that even though Xbox is currently not supporting VR, he has hopes that, one day, the space for virtual reality gaming will become bigger and then they could think about delving into it.
“I hope it gets bigger,” he confirmed last year. “I hope it is something that is so important that it would be a no-brainer for us to go support it.”
In November of 2019, Spencer got some fan backlash because of his then comments about VR gaming after he called the niche “isolating” and pointed out that Xbox customers are not “asking for VR.” The Xbox head honcho then pointed out that his main point “was not to shade anybody who is working in VR.”
“I wanted to be clear with our customers on where our focus was,” Spencer explained. “If somebody was waiting for us to bring out a VR headset for Series X, we are not going to do that.”
What do you think of Phil Spencer’s stance on VR gaming? Do you want an Xbox VR headset? Let us know in the comments below.