In an exclusive interview with Windows Central Managing Editor Jez Corden, Microsoft Gaming CEO Phil Spencer discussed the future of Activision Blizzard, reviving dormant franchises, and tapping into nostalgic IP.
Windows Central Interview with Phil Spencer
While the Activision-Blizzard portions have been summarized below, we highly recommend reading the full article, which covers much more discussion with the head of Xbox; such as plans for Game Pass on other consoles, discussing Xbox Cloud Gaming, and the future of PC games streaming.
What Makes Microsoft's Strategy Different?
- Microsoft has put over a billion dollars a year into supporting third-party games coming into Game Pass — what they've created is a financially positive service supporting all games, from the biggest studios with hit franchises to small individual publishers introducing their games to new players. Having people play more and stay engaged on the platform, regardless of the types of games they're playing, is a part of their strategy.
Phil Spencer, via Windows Central
When you look at things, we've done over the past 12 months. If you look at things like Pentiment, Hi-Fi Rush, long-term investment in games like Grounded, all of these games have had real success for us in our subscription and in our platform. The diversity of business models allows us to invest in different kinds of content and still have financial success with that content. When we look at the back catalog of games from Bethesda, we get really excited. We look at the back catalog from Activision and Blizzard, we get really excited about the things we can do. It's early days, so we need to be talking to the teams that are fully staffed and working on things already. It's not
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