Loosely in line with recent rumors, Microsoft Gaming boss Phil Spencer says Xbox is bringing four exclusive games to other consoles.
Speaking on the Xbox event today, Spencer didn't specify which exclusives will become multiplatform releases, but he did remove two big hitters from the running: Starfield, and Indiana Jones and the Great Circle. Starfield isn't going anywhere, and Bethesda's Indy game will be an Xbox console exclusive as planned.
"We've made the decision that we're gonna take four games to the other consoles," Spencer said of the news. "Just four games, not a change to our fundamental exclusive strategy. We're making this decision for some specific reasons. We make every decision with the long-term health of Xbox in mind. Long-term health of Xbox means a growing platform, our games performing, 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, and we think this is an interesting time to use what some of the other platforms have right now to grow our franchises."
When selecting games to bring to other platforms, Spencer says Xbox looked at games that are over a year old, somewhat echoing Sony's longstanding PS5 to PC pipeline, which has seen a recent shakeup with Helldivers 2. Some of these four games are also "community-driven," and the "first iterations of a franchise that have reached their full potential on Xbox and PC."
"Two of the other games are smaller games that were never really meant to be built as platform exclusives with all the fanfare that goes around that, but games that our teams really wanted to build," Spencer adds. "We love supporting creative endeavors across our studios regardless of size. As they've realized their full potential on Xbox and PC, we see an opportunity to utilize the other platforms as a place to drive more business value out of those games, allowing us to invest in maybe future iterations of those, sequels to those, or other games like that in our portfolio. When we don't damage Xbox and we can grow our business, using what other platforms have to help us with that, we're gonna do that."
What are these four games? Based on Spencer's description and recent rumors, likely candidates are Sea of Thieves, Grounded, Pentiment, and Hi-Fi Rush. Per Spencer's outlook, we should get official announcements on these four now-multiplatform mystery games sooner than later.
Spencer reiterates that there's been "no fundamental change to how we think about exclusivity" as Microsoft tees up upcoming Xbox Series X games like Hellblade 2 and Avowed.
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