The future of gaming will not be based on exclusive video games for certain consoles, according to the perspective of the executive director of Microsoft Gaming, Phil Spencer, who is clear that this is the evolution that the industry will take in favor of consumers.
“Maybe you in your home buy an Xbox and I buy a PlayStation and our children want to play together and they can’t because we bought the wrong piece of plastic to connect it to our television,” he said during an interview with Bloomberg, where he also highlighted that his The goal is to “reduce friction” between the players.
It is about “making people feel safe when they play, allowing them to find their friends, play with them, regardless of the device. I think in the long run, that’s good for the industry. And maybe in the short term there are some people in certain companies who don’t love it, but I think as we get through the rut and see where this industry can continue to grow, it’s proven to be true.”
The comments come after a series of controversies between Sony and Microsoft over the possible exclusivity of the popular Call Of Duty, in addition to the fact that the Xbox company accused its competitor of paying “blocks” so that content was not added to Game Pass.
And it is that according to a document presented by Microsoft before the , as part of the review process of the acquisition of Activision Blizzard, one of the most important elements in Sony’s strategy with PlayStation is to have exclusive titles within its platform.
PlayStation has also expressed concern that COD does not reach its platform after the purchase of the company, as they consider that it would reduce their business, since the availability of this specific title influences the purchase decision by consumers.
Given this issue, Spencer highlighted his commitment that the game will reach the Sony console at least for a period and pointed out that the idea of games exclusively created for a device “is something that we will see less and less.”
On the other hand, the executive pointed out that while the acquisition of Activision Blizzard is an important step for their business, they are looking for more content through investment in new games, associations or more agreements to reach other regions of creators.
Xbox will address legacy issues left by Activision Blizzard
Once Microsoft gets approval to acquire Activision, the company will also inherit problems related to gender accusations made against the studio, including differential pay, as well as allowing sexism and harassment.
In this regard, Spencer stressed that Microsoft examined these issues to clean them up before a purchase agreement was reached and said he was committed to resolving the issues within the studio, including his relationship with the union that was formed there.
“I have never run an organization that has unions, but what I can say working on this is that we recognize the needs of workers to feel safe, heard and fairly compensated for doing great work. We definitely see the need to support workers in the results they want to have”, he concluded.
