Phil Spencer: "We're not in the business of out-consoling Sony or out-consoling Nintendo"

gamesindustry.biz:

Phil Spencer says making great games wouldn't be enough for Xbox to claw out of third place in the console race.

In an appearance on the Kinda Funny Xcast published today on YouTube, Spencer laid out the reason for the company's pursuit of subscription services like Game Pass and cloud gaming technology.

"We're not in the business of out-consoling Sony or out-consoling Nintendo," Spencer said. "There isn't really a great solution or win for us.

"And I know that will upset a ton of people, but the truth of the matter is, when you're third place in the console marketplace and the top two players are as strong as they are and have in certain cases a very discrete focus on doing deals and other things that kind of make being Xbox hard for us as a team – that's on us, not on anybody else…"

Spencer said Microsoft is invested in making sure Xbox owners have a great experience and feel catered to, but seemed to acknowledge it can't beat Sony or Nintendo using a traditional console strategy.

"I see it out there, I see commentary that if you just build great games, everything would turn around," he said. "It's just not true that if we go off and build great games, all of a sudden you're going to see console share shift in some dramatic way. We lost the worst generation to lose in the Xbox One generation, where everybody built their digital library of games.

"This idea that if we just focused more on great games on our console, that somehow we're going to win the console race, I think doesn't relate to the reality of most people."

Spencer said around 90% of people who buy consoles each year are already in one of the three main console ecosystems, and the switching costs are higher now that people have established digital