The much-anticipated Xbox Business Update via a special podcast episode featuring CEO Phil Spencer, Xbox President Sarah Bond, and Xbox Game Studiosโ Head Matt Booty is over. The podcast revealed numerous details about the future of the Xbox business, exclusivity, and their future strategy on Game Pass, hardware and more.
If you have missed out on what has been told in the podcast, we have pointed out the highlights and key announcements from the podcast.
Four Xbox Exclusive Titles are Coming to its Rival Consoles PS5 and Nintendo Switch
The main thing that all the Xbox and other console gamers were looking towards was Xbox launching its exclusives on other platforms. Phil Spencer announced this business event after rumours emerged suggesting Xbox might bring its exclusive titles to platforms like PlayStation 5 and Nintendo Switch.
As speculated, Phil Spencer confirmed that four Xbox games will come to PS5 and Nintendo Switch for the first time. However, he did not reveal any names of the titles but mentioned that a couple of them are community-driven, more than one year old, and they do not include Starfield or the upcoming Indiana Jones. Two of the other games are smaller, which Microsoft did not mean to build they are platform-exclusive.
While details remain unconfirmed, some reports, such as one from The Verge, have named Hi-Fi Rush and Pentiment as possible candidates for wider availability. The other two titles are reported to be Sea of Thieves and Grounded.
“Over the next five or 10 years, games that are exclusive to one piece of hardware are going to be a smaller and smaller part of the game industry,” Spencer said in a podcast.
While the specific motivations behind this move remain unknown, it aligns with broader initiatives by Microsoft to expand the reach of its gaming ecosystem. This includes attracting new audiences through potentially wider game access and strengthening their cloud gaming offerings.
Next-Gen Xbox Console Teaser
Xbox president Sarah Bond discussed the company’s future hardware plans. While no specific announcements were made, her comments sparked speculation about the possibility of new Xbox console technology.
Sarah Bond alluded to “delivering the largest technical leap you will have ever seen in a hardware generation,” suggesting significant performance improvements over current consoles.
Diablo IV Coming to Xbox Game Pass
Good news for ARPG fans and Xbox Game Pass subscribers! Blizzard Entertainment’s highly anticipated “Diablo IV” has been confirmed for release on Xbox Game Pass on March 28th. This means subscribers will be able to play the game at launch without additional purchases.
- Only Xbox Game Pass Ultimate and Xbox Game Pass PC members will have access to “Diablo IV” via Game Pass. Subscribers using Xbox Game Pass Core will need to upgrade their membership or purchase the game separately.
- This marks the first title confirmed for Game Pass from the recently acquired Activision Blizzard library. Xbox has announced that additional titles from the studios will be made available to Game Pass users in the future.
- Xbox also revealed that the Game Pass subscriber base has now surpassed 34 million users.
Sony, a major competitor to Microsoft in the gaming industry, expressed concerns during the acquisition of Activision Blizzard by Microsoft in 2023. One key concern was the potential for popular and widely played titles like Call of Duty, currently available on various platforms including PlayStation, to become exclusive to Xbox consoles.
To address these concerns, Microsoft made a public commitment to maintain Call of Duty‘s multi-platform availability for at least the next ten years. This commitment aims to ensure continued access for players across different platforms and prevent potential disruption within the gaming community.
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