Phil Spencer not concerned with console sales

"The business isn't how many consoles you sell"

https://www.theverge.com/platform/amp/2019/6/11/18661247/phil-spencer-interview-xbox-project-scarlett-xcloud-e3-2019

Looks more and more like Scarlett is gonna be the last console MS makes before they pivot to the service route.

Lemmings on death watch next gen??

TLHBO

Phil atleast try to win ffs

Is there a source? I simply cant believe he just said that... the console war is officially over if so lol

Like... I simply don't believe that. If they are refusing to be competitive, there goes any and every reason to support them as a gamer.

If that's not a RED LIGHT warning sign for anyone contemplating getting an xbox next gen I don't know what is.

With MS showing their commitment to supporting their console fans already by releasing $500 hardware they've provided JACK SHIT in content to take advantage of it's power, this isn't an encouraging statement.

With Phil boy already acting like he gives a shit if the thing even sales, it tells you all you need to know about what kind of support you can expect from it in games that actually utilize it's real hardware.

Lol Phil Spencer. What a tool

Geez... I'll say it again, Lems better hope Sony opens up crossplat play next gen. They are gonna sell less consoles than this gen. Hopefully their games will still be on the Xbox One also, so the player base is at least decent.

That explains a lot lol

On the flip side Sony said:

https://www.gamespot.com/articles/ps5-more-cross-gen-backwards-compatibility-details/1100-6467385/

Seriously. How many more red flags can these people give you? I know the lukewarm Scarlett reception has something to do with this kind of talk. Microsoft knows when they've been licked. The clock is ticking down.

@BenjaminBanklin:

MS Citizenship tier list:

Mobile 1st class citizen

PC 2nd class citizen

Console gamers...illegal aliens," build a wall!".

Is anyone who's been watching Microsoft evolve their business strategy, both in gaming and other markets, since Satya Nadella became CEO, surprised?

I've said in a post a while back that I don't think Microsoft care about how many consoles they sell anymore. They'll continue developing hardware, of course, but I think they see it as merely another option for consumers to get into the real meat of the Xbox business: the Xbox platform itself, which between streaming, their return to PC both through Windows Store and more recently Steam, and their Game Pass, is becoming an increasingly hardware-independent gaming platform.

In the context of this, their rumoured hook-up with Nintendo makes all the sense in the world. Heck, with their partnership with Sony on cloud gaming, I would not be surprised one bit if Xbox Cloud and Game Pass ends up on Playstation as well.

I think people here still think a bit analogue; hardware sales, piece of the pie, own everything in it. And it's true, Microsoft of the Gates and Ballmer eras thought like that too. But Satya Nadella, as he demonstrated in his non-gaming businesses, does not. He thinks "presence;" he does not care how big a piece of the market Microsoft owns, so long as they have a presence in it. This was the logic behind things like open-sourcing .Net, scrapping Windows Phone and porting all their apps to iOS and Android, and porting Bash to Windows 10. And as their recent commercial fortunes show, it has worked out for them nicely.

Now, we are seeing the "Presence" strategy seeping into the gaming side of their business. We are seeing Spencer's interpretation of his boss's ideas. Xbox no longer care what hardware you play their games on, so long as you play their games.

It sounds like a good strategy for them but they'll need to improve the quality of their games to get my money. I'm part of the market they want, I game on PC and PS4 and I have expendable income but because most of their games not name HaloGearsForza are crap I have not yet really invested into their platform. If they can improve the quality of their output to match Sony's AAA efforts then I'll be willing to support them with my money but games like Sea of Thieves and Crackdown 3 I will not spend money on.

@madrocketeer: I get that, but I dont think any of the OG XBox fans like myself thought to ourselves "XBox is going to expand and improve gaming by offering server farms to Playstation". Its utterly bizarre going from "Halo 2 definitively started the unified online console gaming experience" to "Well, as long as we shoehorn our tech into this industry, our branding and hardware adoption doesn't matter." Its the difference between innovation and invasion.

So i guess now we see who drops 1st. Xbox...or Stadia?

True, and I get the sense that is partially the logic behind their recent buying spree of small, on-the-up studios like Obsidian and Double Fine. Would they be outputting the kind of content to compete with Sony's best any time soon? Probably not. They may, however, be looking to give these studios resources to do so in the future. Time will tell.

So for now, this buying spree does look like taking a page from Netflix; horizontal expansion. Volume over quality, which actually worked for Netflix - sort of. Eventually they're going to have to look at expanding vertically as well, as even Netflix have recently begun to inch their way towards. We'll have to wait and see.

Again, I think a lot of us are thinking a bit on the analogue side here. Change is the only constant in this universe, and as industries change, Microsoft have to adapt with it. All I'm saying is; this is where Satya Nadella thinks they should go. You might not like it, but I'm just explaining where the logic came from, and that it worked out for them in other fields, so you can hardly argue with why they want to pursue it.

Of course not ... they've been losing the whole time since literally the original Xbox ... no wonder they don't care.

Perhaps you geniuses should actually read the interview instead of just the headline.

losers will always be losers.

Well that makes sense. Consoles are usually sold at a loss anyway. They are completely focused on Xbox the brand and not the console itself, which why would you? When your not making money off them in the first place but the games (which they are currently lacking but E3 showed some promise)

Shhhhhhhh! Damnit, it is more fun to watch the cow circle jerk.

@SUD123456: why even bother, the usual five sad are going to circle jerk no matter what you say and once they are shown how ridiculous they are, they will just move on to the next stupid thread...

Do you blame him?

The Sony and Nintendo domination has broken Phil.

After the news of PS5 being more powerful than Scarlett combined with MS's abysmal first party showing at E3 they've already thrown in the towel.

I don't think cows can read...

So, after reading the article, that quote seems a little out of context... but strangely, its put back into context when he talks about reaching non-pc-or-console gamers with XCloud.

I'm not so sure that the lems claiming nobody read the article actually read the full article themselves.

Sony Chief exec in May says that console gaming is a niche market, and that going forward he doesnt see it as a major market, compared to mobile and streaming .... Cows moo, and throw darts at Phil Spencer pictures.

Phil Spencer says he doesnt care WHICH xbox players use, as long as they're using one to play services provided by ms, Cows experience total meltdown, form a circle and udder jerk.

David Attenborough called, he wanted your herd to be on his next UHD nature documentary, but then he remembered that a ps4 doesnt even play CDs, never mind UHDs.

LOL. Phil and Microsoft have given up. They are now pushing the narrative to lems that “sales don’t matter”.

That is just Xbox SAD.

@sealionact: Indeed. It would be funny if it weren’t so sad.

He's right, it depends on your business model and on how many territories you're investing.

Well the lines should be blurred now, so there is a point there. Unless MS and Sony are hustling you, you shouldn't need to buy a next gen console. It's different now.

Scarlet is a strategy which consists of two SKUs I think: Anaconda (high end), Lockhart (low, mid whatever).

However, there is ZERO reason the Xbox One X isn't the LOW END next gen console. If MS phase out the Xbone and Xbone S, they'd be hustling you if they forced a new clean generation.

PCs don't have generations, they never did. And for the first time, consoles are heading the way of new hardware updates every two or three years.

Most software and services should still work. Games should still run in low settings mode.

In fact console gamers have been getting hustled for years. How many times have they re-bought the same game in remastered mode (high settings). PC games have always had multiple settings allowing you to free up the CPU/GPU on lower end hardware.

So you can worry about the 'console wars' with generational sales and get hustled, or not worry about that and lose the so called console wars which for some reason keeps you up at night.

I've said this a while back. When we were guessing on how much money the live services make, it became clear that 3rd party royalty fees and console sales don't matter much. So I said maybe MS doesn't mind so much being 2nd or even 3rd place in sales, as long as they make a steady income. Their monthly subscriptions will be their focus. I think this is just confirmation of that seemingly logical path.

Ah, System Wars. Where you post a tiny part of something someone says, misinterpret it and blow it completely out of proportion. Fun stuff.

I think it’s easy from the outside to judge the health of our business around how many consoles any company sells. In the end, how many subscribers you have to something like Game Pass, how many games people are buying, those are much better metrics on the health of the business.

Sorry but this ^^ is bullshit,this is the lining they change to after getting their ass kick by the PS4,when they stopped reporting console sold and started grouping together live account including free ones on PC in a weak attempt to make everything seem bigger.

Is a big arrogant saying is not about consoles sold,if the were selling now close to 100 millions like the PS4 they could not stop bragging about it,this is nothing but loser Phill damage controlling 1 year ahead losing the sales race.

Is even a contradiction becasue he claim people on gamepass and the number of games sold are better metric,but reality is the bigger your user base is the more people will be on your service and buying your games.

So if the xbox one would have 80 million instead of 40 something,they would have more game sales and more people on gamepass and a even more healty business.

Every thread bro every thread.

Errr, wasn't Microsoft the ones to say first one to 10 mill wins... now it doesn't matter OK.

Sore losers.

@SUD123456: Oh, let the cows have fun in their silly fake news thread. It’s not like they had any input in this year’s E3 to even have an opinion on.

lol, bullshit

Full Quote

"I don’t need to sell any specific version of the console in order for us to reach our business goals. The business isn’t how many consoles you sell. The business is how many players are playing the games that they buy, how they play. So if somebody bought an original Xbox One from us on launch day, and they’re buying and playing games, I don’t need to sell them an S. I don’t need to sell them an X. If they want to stay on the Xbox One they have and stay as a great member of our community or subscribe to Game Pass, that’s a great business for us."

How is someone saying you don't need to upgrade your console if you don't want to, our aim is to give you a great community and games via a subscription no matter what you are on, a bad thing?

They have doubled down on Game Pass as they believe this is the model that works. The don't mind if you have it on PC or Xbox (or anything else for that matter). As long as you have it.

Only reason this will be their last console is if streaming really takes off, but that is the same for any console developer.

Phil Spencer is the best thing to happen to MS since the launch of windows.

With Don Mattrick the Xbox brand and their PC gaming branch was on its dead bed.

That is a contradiction dude.

Business are about fu**ing sales,what the fu** man are lemmings really this deluded?

More console sales = higher sales.

Higher sales = healtier busyness more games sold more services sold.

So if 90 million people would have buy an xbox one don't tell me that MS would still have the same amount of xbox live users,gamepass users and game sales as they have now.

Which bring me to my last point xbox exclusives on PC,if MS didn't care about sales those would not be on PC,those games are there because this gen MS sales are not on par with the xbox 360,so MS has to search outside its userbase to increase sales that other wise would been there if the userbase was bigger.

Business 101.

Whelp, saves me the key strokes...

lol :P

@tormentos: The same person wanting to teach people about business can't even spell it.

Well in my defence Ensligh is not my native language,what is your excuse for eating MS bullshit other than been stupid?

"Did you actually read the article?!" = "My fees-fees are hurt"

These lems know MS is just waiting for an avenue out of this console race, they're just scared of wrecking their public image if they do. So they're stuck making boxes and taking losses on them for the foreseeable future. Phil's talking about the new console in the article, but he's also realistic about it flopping, since the current goal with MS is to cast a wider net to people that don't want to buy the hardware.

@tormentos: Calm down. It's just a console choice.

Why am I not surprised. Phill knows full well that the average gamer is generally not aware of how much more they'll have to pay for streaming once conventional consoles die out.

At any rate, anyone who says streaming only future will work like most people think it will clearly hasen't done the math. So good luck to you're cable priced gaming subscriptions $120+, because there's absolutely no way you can make next gen AAA games on a service that nets over 200 games lest than a dollar or 2 month! Of course in more likelihood you'll be playing $80+ per game on top of various DLC, micro-transactions, and a $15-$50 a month subscription just to play your games.

If that is a threat to his job i'm pretty sure he'll be concerned.

But then again he makes millions of dollars a year so getting fired probably doesn't concerns him.

What Phil is trying to say is that the future for the lemmings pretty much ....

@BenjaminBanklin: Phil's just saying what Sony said last month....peoples gaming habits are changing.

Most people dont game on consoles, and the next gen isn't going to change that. It's a niche market according to Sonys CEO and what is going to shape future gaming is which service people are using, not on which console.

I'm falling further and further out of love with "the digital future" every day. I mean, it's like you need a Netflix subscription, Amazon Prime, Hulu, CBS All Access, Disney+, and HBO Now as it is just to watch the movies and shows out there worth watching. At this E3, Ubisoft announced their subscription service which is catching up to EA.

How long is it going to be before every publisher has their own walled garden? Its evident that third party games on a service like Gamepass are going to disappear slowly but surely in much the same way that shows come and go from Netflix as it is.

It's going to be expensive. You WILL lose access to your favorite games until you pony up and subscribe to the publisher that yanks their title back. It's completely inevitable because we already have perfect clarity on what that service model looks like. And the kicker is, he's not even afraid anymore to tell the gamers that built this industry back from the 1980s crash that they aren't good enough any more. The balls on this son of a bitch...

XBox has clearly come full circle here. All academic musings aside about industry change and triangulation to phrack the Candy Crush market aside, I see nothing at all in it for me. I'm not going to sit here with a controller in my hand and a phone. This is simply an admission that they are seeing the big phone and tablet market and being led by the nose to it. Furthermore, they had the audacity this generation to not even support their own hardware with dedicated games as it is. The more XBox execs and PR guys try to rationalize their position, the less it sounds like a brand that is about what I am about. They want to chase the big numbers, but they dont want to chase me, the gamer. The guy who holds up an industry bigger than Hollywood.