Xbox Heads Drop Huge News On Exclusives and Game Pass

Earlier today, Xbox Head Phil Spencer, President Sarah Bond, and the head of game studios, Matt Booty spoke in a prerecorded podcast regarding the future of Xbox. They released a press release shortly after on their website, talking about exclusivity, and the future of Game Pass. Phil Spencer immediately started the podcast by cutting the rumors of going third-party. He revealed that only four Xbox exclusives are going to other consoles. All of which have been out for at least a year. This cuts Starfield and Indiana Jones from the list, which he later explicitly mentioned were not going multiplatform.

“We make every decision…with the long term health of xbox in mind…Long term health of Xbox means a growing platform, games preforming, building the best platform for creators, reaching as many players as we can. We’re always looking to learn as a leadership team and to grow.”

– Phil Spencer, CEO of Microsoft Gaming

Phil mentioned that two games coming to other platforms are community-driven games that have reached their full potential on Xbox and PC. Including franchises they want to invest in. The other two are smaller games, not originally built to be platform exclusives. They stressed that all of these decisions that they make are with Xbox’s long-term health in mind. Their goal with these games going mult-platform is to introduce people to Xbox, getting them more interested in the platform. This way they can utilize other platforms to drive value out of their other games.

Xbox Is Not Going Third-Party

“If you’re on these other platforms and you see these four games coming, please don’t take it as a signal that everything is coming…it’s not,” said Phil Spencer. Quelling any online discussion immediately of Xbox bowing out of the exclusivity race.

There was also big news on Game Pass. All Xbox games going forward will come to Game Pass day 1 on release. This was to be expected, but the second major news was less so. Activision Blizzard games are coming to Xbox Game Pass, starting with Diablo IV on March 28th. Setting a precedent that more major properties will be coming from the Activision Blizzard catalog. Perhaps Call of Duty or World of Warcraft will come next?

It was also stressed that Game Pass will exclusively be a part of Xbox. Meaning that no other console or platform will have access to Game Pass. The post on Xbox’s website mentioned several values that are a part of the platform, which are listed in the block below. Phil Spencer went on to mention that Windows has been a platform to maintain software compatibility. Xbox has taken that inspiration to consoles. Xbox has made a promise to maintain compatibility with a player’s library, being inclusive of cross-play, cross-save, and cloud features.

• The biggest games in the world will be on Xbox.  
• Our games will come to Game Pass on day one.
• A robust and innovative multi-year hardware roadmap
• Compatibility with your library is a priority, inclusive of cross-play, cross-save, and robust cloud features.
• Xbox will continue to help game creators find the biggest audience possible.

– Xbox Wire

Watch the full podcast on YouTube below.