Companies should give gamers more options

Aug 6, 2015 22:34 GMT  ·  By

Recently, Phil Spencer, the leader of the Xbox division inside Microsoft, has made it clear that his company has plans to focus more on first-party titles in the future, which are created by studios that it owns, and it will reduce the number of video games that it secures from third parties.

Basically, the executive says that it is more efficient to invest money in well-known franchises like Halo, Forza or Gears of War than to work with other companies to guarantee timed exclusives, like Rise of the Tomb Raider, which arrives on the Xbox One this fall but will also be offered on the PC and the PlayStation 4 in 2016.

Phil Spencer has also talked about the deals that Sony has been making with Activision in order to secure exclusive content or timed exclusivity for DLC for big coming shooters, like The Dark Below expansion for Destiny and Call of Duty: Black Ops 3.

The executive says that big sums of money have changed hands in order to secure these deals and that his own company is not interested in them anymore.

Gamers should not forget that, for the most recent Call of Duty titles, including 2014's Advanced Warfare, timed exclusivity for DLC was on Microsoft's side, with the Xbox One and the 360 getting packs about one month before other platforms.

Phil Spencer has not offered any reason for the change of policy.

Rise of the Tomb Rider might be an expensive failure

It's possible that Microsoft is getting ready for the very real possibility that the new Lara Croft-powered game, which will be launched on November 10, might fail to generate as many Xbox One sales as the company initially thought.

The Tomb Raider series is an important one for the history of video games, but those who love it are not as passionate as those who love bigger franchises like Halo, Uncharted, Gears of War, or Call of Duty.

It's very possible that those who have played the reboot on the PC won't be willing to get an Xbox One just to be able to play the game on launch date, given that they can wait a few months and enjoy what will probably be a superior version of the same experience.

A focus on internally created experiences also gives Microsoft more control over the games and makes it easier to time the launches in order to maximize presence and make sure that they serve the interests of its console.

Xbox One needs more bundles, fewer exclusives

With the launch of Windows 10 and all the talk about creating a unified gaming ecosystem between the two platforms, Microsoft should gradually abandon the idea of exclusive titles altogether, be they first or third-party creations.

Halo 5: Guardians, Forza 6 Motorsport, Gears of War 4 are clearly attractive and might become classics in a few years, but on launch it's unlikely that they will generate huge increases in the number of Xbox One home consoles that are sold.

So far, Microsoft has managed to improve its performance only with price cuts and with carefully created bundles, which pair the device with one of these high-profile games and add a few other extras for fans to enjoy.

Such a package, especially when sold for the normal price of the Xbox One, gives those who do not own a new gaming console a way to both keep up with a favorite franchise and secure a new device.

In an ideal world, both Sony and Microsoft would drop the idea of exclusives, but in the world we currently live in, a bigger focus on bundles for the foreseeable future would be a good move for the console makers.