14 DAY TRIAL // Sony worldwide studios boss Shuhei Yoshida has recently praised the newly ointed head of Microsoft's Xbox division, Phil Spencer, commending on the good job he's done so far.
After the disastrous unveil of the Xbox One saw so much backlash from the community, Microsoft had to backpedal and scrap a lot of their ideas in a matter of weeks in order to appease the roaring crowds. As such, Microsoft's attitude was much humbler at this year's edition of the E3 gaming trade show.
"It was very interesting. The attitude was great, like from Phil Spencer. I read and listened to his interviews, and he's a reasonable, smart guy, compared to some other people who used to say some unbelievable things," Yoshida says in regard to Microsoft's E3 showing, in an interview with Eurogamer.
The "unbelievable things" that Yoshida is referencing came from former Xbox head Don Mattrick, especially in the days immediately following the unveiling of the Xbox One computer entertainment system.
Microsoft has been forced to play catch-up ever since then, constantly implementing changes and second-guessing their initial decisions, followed by a change in management and policy that lead to the appointment of Phil Spencer in the position of president and to the exclusion of the expensive Kinect sensor from the Xbox One bundle.
"Some media people totally believed they should have done it earlier, but some other media people thought it was a unique selling point. Personally, I was expecting that at some point in the future they'd unbundle Kinect, but I wasn't expecting it this early," Yoshida comments on the decision to remove the Kinect from the core offering.
"My interpretation was the management change had really helped them to reset and re-sync everything. And since then they've been consistent," he continues, praising Phil Spencer's work.
It's not as if Microsoft had a choice either, as they have to hit the ground running from now on in order to be able to catch up to Sony, or at least attempt not to fall further behind, as the PlayStation 4 has greatly outsold the Xbox One device so far, for months on end.
The company's continued efforts to market the Xbox One more aggressively have most recently been seen in Japan, where the Xbox One Day One edition seems to have gained quite some popularity, especially considering that Microsoft has also rallied support from numerous local developers, in order to deliver software products custom tailored to the specific tastes of the Japanese public.