Reaction: Xbox's Third-Party Strategy Is Finally Making Sense To Me

GamePass totally is enough for brand loyalty to me. It rocks and 2025 is its best year yet!

I can't say I'm to interested Xbox/Microsoft's finances but as an Xbox gamer I hope they do well once we are getting top quality games still releasing on Xbox and especially on gamepass I'm happy the value of gamepass has sky rocketed with top tier releases over the last month whatever the negatives are I am delighted I chose to stay on Xbox this gen gamepasses value is to good to ignore for me personally!

It’s very simple really and sticking just to consoles because that is really what it is about the Xbox console.

It enables Xbox studios games to be available to another 75 million PS5 owners and 150 million Switch owners.

If you add the 2 together that’s 225 million owners which of course will get higher overtime.

This is of course at the sacrifice of selling more Xbox consoles and potentially game pass sales on Xbox consoles.

So very simply the accountants did the accounting, the analysts did the future potential losses and gains and Microsoft decided they can make more many selling games on other consoles against potential Xbox console and Xbox console game pass sales being lost.

Will they make more money, the future is not ours not to see and of course the Microsoft accountants and analysts hope so, because that’s the gamble and maybe theirs or someone’s jobs are on the line.

For me personally I love the old Xbox 360 days and even the Xbox one days and the fight and the exclusives and it will never be the same.

With this strategy they're going to kill all value and point in buying a future Xbox console (for me at least to an extent).

Before you tell me "But Gamepass!", I couldn't care less about it. I only get it once in a while to either grab a perk for a game or try out a game that I am interested in and it happens to be on Gamepass. Plus I don't have enough time to use Gamepass to its full extent so it is a waste of money for me.

It is sad to see Xbox in this state that it is, shame that we will never see the same heights of the brand like it was with the 360 where they were serious about competing and being the best place to play games. It was the first and last time they shook Sony to their core and made them get their sh*t together.

I see it as a "Look what you could play right now if you had game pass" strategy. No game pass on PS5 and Switch means pay full price or wait and save while people on Xbox can play now while saving money if they want to eventually own the game. Or they can stream it but it won't be native. I can play Oblivion while saving to own it.

I know I'm in the minority but I couldn't care less about Sony first party exclusives.
Retrocompatibility and Game Pass is enough for me to enjoy Xbox a lot more. And even games are cheaper on some regions.
I don't care if Xbox games are exclusive or not.

I do wish some third party exclusives like Nioh or Rise of the Ronin would come over, but it is what it is.

It has always been easy to see the benefits of going multiplatform. I think all publishers would benefit from being fully 3rd party. It's nice to see the industry trending towards this reality.

I'm looking forward to xbox focusing on making innovative hardware that isn't relying on exclusive games as the sole selling point.

The main thing keeping me on Xbox now is pre-existing sunk costs in terms of console, accessories, and digital games library as well as cheaper access to games via Microsoft Rewards scheme, games being sold on third party key sites, and the Core-to-Ultimate prepaid conversion offer for Game Pass. If they mess about with any of these things or raise prices too much they will lose me to Steam. That’s just the way it is now. By contrast Nintendo have raised prices with Switch 2, but they retain my loyalty because they have exclusive experiences I can’t legitimately experience elsewhere. Microsoft have given up on that sort of loyalty and focused solely on value for money and so value for money is what I shall demand from them going forwards.

The console will NEVER be competitive with Playstation or Nintendo Console because its 'optional'. PC gamers may well buy a Playstation for its 'exclusives' rather than wait a year or more for Sony to release on PC for that 'extra' revenue potential - but a PC gamer has no need to buy an Xbox as all exclusives, and of course Game Pass too, are available Day 1 on their Platform. They can play on MNK or their favourite controller.

Therefore I doubt Xbox will ever sell as many Consoles as Sony/Nintendo because its not the ONLY option to play 'console' exclusives - you don't even need a Console at all to play 'Xbox' Exclusives.

I still think that 30m is a decent figure for an optional 'part' of your ecosystem that is NOT required to play Xbox games. A Student with a Student Laptop and Student Debts can still play Indiana Jones, Doom, South of Midnight etc via their Browser as a 'cost effective/budget' option. Of course its not as 'good' as playing native on a Series S or X or even a High end Gaming Rig, but its better than nothing.

Consoles too cost a LOT of money too - often sold at a loss to get you in to their ecosystem where they have a monopoly on Digital Sales and of course require a Sub to play Online to recuperate their Loss. If you lose £10 per console, which seems not too much to lose - but 30m units is £300m 'Loss' and 100m is £1bn.

Its not just Game Pass & Play Anywhere - but those are still incentives. If you play CoD, Doom or any of the other big IP's now owned by MS, they are all on Xbox and Game Pass guaranteed - and with Games costing £70+ (that's just for the 'base' content, not any of the extra and/or post release content), Guaranteeing you can play those Day 1 at no 'extra' cost due to Game Pass maybe will benefit MS next gen. This Gen, CoD was associated with PS5 - like the 360 was and what helped that sell - now its back with MS and maybe CoD gamers will jump back to MS.

Also you have everyone on this gen Xbox hardware with Digital Libraries and Achievements they'll want to 'keep' and Xbox gamers are much more likely to buy 'Digital' so I'd say more likely to buy the next Xbox to keep their Digital collection - even though I could game on my PC with my Xbox Controller and maybe even get higher performance and better graphics so have no need to buy an Xbox, I'd likely still buy for all those games I own that aren't Play Anywhere...

From a money making perspective, I think Microsoft going multi-platform makes total sense. However, I do think that this will ultimately be to the detriment of the future of Xbox consoles, which will have a direct impact on the future of Game Pass.

Right now, Game Pass subscribers are eating well, but truthfully, I think the best things to do is stuff your face, because I don't see it lasting!

The question is, is Game Pass going to be enough on it's own to entice people to buy an Xbox console, and by doing so, deprive themselves of those games that are exclusive to the PlayStation and PC? I think the answer to that is based on how veraciously to consume Game Pass; if you only play a couple of titles a year, then arguably, you are better off elsewhere. If all you do is feast on Game Pass, then of course Xbox is the place to be.

My concern is not for Xbox right now, but what happens in 3 to 5 years time. If, and I honestly don't think it is 100% nailed on right now, so, if Microsoft bring out another generation of console, do you have sufficient confidence in Microsoft to invest your hard earned cash in another system? Or do you see them dropping out of the console space in the not too distant future?

I guess it all depends on what Microsoft do with Game Pass from here on out; if Microsoft do bring out this rumoured PC-lite console, with Steam integration, does that mean that they will stop charging for online access, which will directly impact the revenue that Game pass brings in? If they do, then will Core or Standard even survive, because let's face it, if you have that, then most likely you only have it for online access. And if they do continue to charge for online access, who exactly are they looking to attract to their console? A PC-lite console will not come cheap, and the price will in itself push many away from Xbox. Thus, will enough people stick with Xbox, and therefore Game Pass to keep it viable...?

Personally, I think that Microsoft will be done with consoles by 2030, and Game Pass will become solely a first-party service by then. But hey, at least then you can access it on a PlayStation then...

@FraserG Great write up!

I could not agree more, and on top of what you have put, there's so much more, imo, on the table. This really is the best way forward, not only because it works best for MS, but because it works best for the consumer, and it's quite necessary given how harsh the market is getting (looking at all the closures, cancellations, job losses etc...) it makes total sense.

I've said it a thousand times. MS are the first to do this. They wont be the last to do this. Given how well the ecosystem and services are for us all right now, and given what we know about exciting next gen info drops, I'm massively looking forward to what I think will be MS best gen yet.

As long as they keep making an Xbox console for me to buy, I’ll buy one, as it’s my preferred platform, still. I’d rather the majority of first party games were timed exclusives, for Xbox, but have to agree that more people playing XGS games is good for Microsoft and Xbox, especially if it helps create more first party games that come to Game Pass, on Xbox.

The last major final hanging thread for Xbox consoles and loyal fans to hold onto to is game pass on Xbox consoles. Which is great value.

That’s probably why they still sell a few consoles even if at a lot lower amount nowadays.

Will deffo be sticking with xbox. Great new games recently released and more on the way. I have over 700 owned games in my xbox library that i wont be abandoning and gamepass is amazing value, especially when purchased using MS reward points.
As long as they continue to release consoles i'll be there. Green Army!!

I go where there are games I want to play at a price that is acceptable. At the moment that's with Xbox & if that changes in future then i will rethink things then.

I don't care if their strategy is successful or sustainable long term or whatever it doesn't matter to me or interest me. I never understood why folks get so worked up about that stuff its just dull.

I suppose how you come down on this argument hinges on a couple things: do you care more about future Xbox games or the Xbox console ecosystem and your current library?

Full disclosure, I was a Xbox 360 user, but switched to Sony in the PS4 generation. I have a Xbox One that I bought from a friend a couple years ago and use it every once in a while to play the MCC, Witcher 2, etc., but by and large, I'm a PlayStation user.

With all that said, I think Microsoft has done lots more pro-consumer moves than Sony since the Xbox One generation (I'm thinking Play Anywhere and Back Compatibility, specifically). Was that due to Microsoft's desire to stay competitive when they were bleeding users? Probably. But those features remain pretty exceptional for their userbase.

I totally get the resistance in the Xbox userbase to Microsoft moving to a 3rd party publisher model. You don't want your existing library to become segmented off from the future of gaming, nor do you want to be forced to relinquish those pro-consumer features to a colder, less friendly ecosystem.

BUT, given the perpetual state of games libraries in today's era and users' unwillingness to relinquish those libraries, I don't see any scenario where Xbox gains console users from PlayStation in the future, unless as a secondary console.

So, if Microsoft wants to be profitable with an increasingly shrinking console userbase, they need to publish elsewhere. My hope is that they use that cashflow to keep their console ecosystem alive, but Sony will never willingly seed that ground, so Microsoft needs to play by Sony's rules to stay alive.

@Titntin I agree with you.

I care about the console. Xbox to me is nothing but the console. It is what I grew up with. 360 was my first and favourite console and I have many great memories and I have too many of them lol.

I'll never get people cheering for less competition (which is what many people are literally doing by cheering for Microsoft's 3rd party move), I tried warning them that this is only going to badly hurt the industry and us consumers, but I immediately get dismissed and crapped on for having an "outdated" mindset.

Competition benefits all of us and that means exclusives must stay to keep a competitive and healthy industry and maintain product quality.

I'm a Pony with zero interest in Game Pass, but Xbox still has a use-case: enhanced 7th and 8th gen games! Series X is my 4K retro and FPS Boost machine because I'm fairly certain those PlayStation versions will never get patched.

As far as everyone going multi-platform, I don't see it. I know the diehards are trying to spin it as innovation, but Xbox was in a hard place and needed to do something to quickly bring in money. The other two aren't in that situation and are just fine with their own ecosystems. Putting in time and money to market to a much smaller userbase (who also brags about never paying for games) likely isn't worth it.

I'd love to get Del Tacos at Pizza Hut, but that just isn't realistic.

I've said it before and I still believe that the next generation of consoles will be the last from both Sony and Microsoft. There won't be a PS7 or Xbox whatever in my opinion because there won't be a need.

Bespoke hardware costs billions of £+$ to develop, build and ship.

I can see a future where we all have a disguised PC in a box under our TVs that allows us to access each individual store front to buy, stream or subscribe to.

If this happens, Microsoft's strategy makes perfect sense. They are already building loyalty from PlayStation only gamers by porting their games to PS5 and those players will have no other option but to buy or subscribe directly from the Xbox store when PlayStation hardware is obsolete.

The shift to digital during last gen sealed the deal for me. GamePass isn’t enticing for me. I have over 800 games in my digital library, 345 of which are PS+ games. I could never buy another game again and still have a backlog until I die.

As it stands, I do not see a reason to buy the next Xbox, it makes more sense to me to buy whatever 2026/7s PC handheld of choice is or upgrade my PC, and have access to ALL PC storefronts, all Xbox games, many PS games and CHEAPER Game Pass.

Don't get me wrong, I'm really hoping Spencer's "We're going to be at Sony on features, not by withholding exclusives" manifests something and I'll happily buy NeXbox instead.

Game Pass is great, but what does this all mean for Game Pass when most subscribers come from Xbox owners? The way i’m seeing it, they need people to keep buying Xbox consoles to keep subscribers up, but they’re also losing people to other platforms with this 3rd party publisher strategy. Man, it’s a real predicament they’ve got themselves in

No crystal ball to tell the future but if they approve more variety of games as a result and these games are in gamepass that I can play on Xbox hardware if I want to then I'm all for it. I love Gamepass and am very interested in their handheld. So I really don't see any reasons to switch platforms myself as lossing gamepass, cloud and play anywhere isn't something I'm willing to do.

Just don't be greedy and reinvest into more games of all genres and sizes please.

Yeah I can see what they're doing now too and it's working. They're building up a positive brand, quietly releasing awesome games at a pretty fast cadence, and increasing mindshare for Xbox just by being on other platforms.

And yeah yeah, people will say all this "built a digital library" bull, but that's not the reason. If Xbox creates a better product with more access to great games than PS6 it'll win back some market share. Sony won the last gen and continue to win because their marketing is in your face everywhere. Now Xbox is everywhere and the game is on.

I think the point is that the cloud needs consoles to stream games and the idea of owning a console will eventually be a novelty. They’re not getting out of the console business… but they will eventually be getting out of the home console business.

They see streaming Game Pass as the lowest barrier of entry. If people still want to buy games and a console that plays them they’ll be options for that too ala Sony or PC

This always made sense but a fair amount just refused to accept the clear shift in strategy. Xbox simply could not compete in the console space and it would have been a hard sell for MS to keep throwing money at a declining market.

They can however compete in software and the best way to do that it's no red lines. Also by going full third party it allows them to acquire future studios with much less scrutiny, which has to be the long term goal.

It makes sense for revenue of course but it’s just a shame they didn’t give their console much of a chance after the acquisitions. Imo Zenimax has been an incredible purchase and would have given Xbox almost a must have library single-handedly.

But it’s happening so whatever. Still think XGS should be exclusive and make ABK and Zenimax multiplat.

Do you not worry about your job? If everything is an Xbox and literally all the same games go everywhere then Xbox news is Playstation news etc.

Either way I think Sony is actually a scummy company and I will happily stick with the next Xbox instead.

Only thing that’s keeping me on Xbox now is my massive library of digital games and game pass. If it wasn’t for those I’d of moved over to PS5 Pro by now.

I will get the next new Xbox console but I do think it will be the final one before Microsoft go full third party publisher and abandon console hardware altogether. It’s quite sad as I’ve been gaming on Xbox since the original back in early 2002 up to Series X.

I have zero loyalty to any corporation and I've flip flopped between Xbox and PlayStation over the years with the occasional Nintendo thrown in for good measure.
Game pass is the key thing for me now and it is literally a game changer. For as long as gamepass exists, I'll stick with Xbox, the value that I personally get from it is unbelievable.

The value of consoles may not be defined by hardware or exclusives anymore, but value of their subscription services. If GamePass Ultimate continues to include day-1 games from all of the MS Game Studios and continues to be able to be legally obtained a little bit cheaper than the current official price, then I think it may be well competitive against Playstation with its PS Plus Premium.

They're really not becoming the Netflix of gaming. They're becoming the Microsoft Office of gaming. Getting on every possible device.

@Xboxian360 couldn’t have said it better.

I ve played exclusively on Xbox essentially since the 360, with the One I went all in on digital games. I have hundreds of titles across all Xbox generations and I love them all. For me as long as new hardware allows me to play all those, I will be in the market for an Xbox. Honestly I am not a huge fan of gamepass as subscriptions just eat my money, and I am tired of it. Anyways I do hope Xbox will do something new and exciting with their next console, something that makes it unique from the other consoles, so they offer an experience you may only get there. I am excited for the future of Xbox and I hope we still have them in 20 years!

I don't think this 3rd party strategy is the plan forever. I think Xbox's biggest hurdle has been overcoming the "no games" narrative. They've always had good games, and now more people are seeing that. They are actively building an audience amongst PS players with this strategy. People that never look beyond their own console, are buying and playing xbox games new and old. Now what if they built that audience then decided to go back to only releasing on GP, Xbox, and PC. I'd imagine there are some PS5 players that will notice Xbox has given them better experiences than Sony, or realizing the value of gamepass. remember when Phil said we can't beat Sony in one generation? I think this gen was only meant to lay the groundwork for what's to come. (whatever that is)

even if I'm wrong on that I still love gamepass so I'm in on that alone. Consoles are money losers and they limit software sales, so from a business perspective it makes the most sense. If you want more people to play your games you have to remove barriers.

@RPGsus “They are actively building an audience amongst PS players with this strategy. People that never look beyond their own console, are buying and playing xbox games new and old”

Well, the audience was already built by Bethesda, ABK and other former 3rd party studios like Obsidian, Microsoft just purchased them. In stead of paying Bethesda and ABK for their games, PS players now have to pay Microsoft. But not really because Microsoft actively created a new audience. It’s the same people who like those games.

Thats why i find comments like “oh, so now PS gamers like Xbox games all of a sudden” so weird. Not saying you said that, but thats just a running narrative people have.

Of course thats gonna happen, some of their games were from 3rd party studios until recently, so yeah of course some will be into those games.

For example, there will be many PS players who grew up playing Elder Scrolls, Fallout, Wolfenstein or Diablo, so if a new IP like Starfield or Indiana Jones comes out or an Oblivion remaster from the same studios, many PS players might be into it. Not because Xbox created a new audience for those games. It’s the games that created the audience, not the platform

But i get what you’re saying about if they went the exclusive route again with the next console they may have attracted some new costumers from their competition. And frankly, i think going the exclusive route is the only way their next console would succeed, but i’m afraid the damage to the brand will have been so that it’s almost impossible for them to pivot back to going exclusive.

Edit: Unless you were talking about Forza going to Playstation, then yeah with that title they are creating a new audience

Cheering on for Xbox to just be a 3rd party publisher is wild to me. Xbox is and always will be a console. No matter how badly they want to change that.
Every success on PlayStation for an Xbox game is another nail in the coffin for the Xbox console...but keep cheering....for..Microsoft's pocketbook.

"it's bad for Xbox fans, but great for MS shareholders!"

Oh ok I'm on board now

I think most of us xbox consoles players just feel a frustration at this point. Its clear day and night MS has a new strategy and they dont really care about xbox consoles anymore period.
I dont really wanna root for them because they dont want to root for me as their consumer.

Even last gen I did not feel that xbox is that behind.
Not only PS5 has xbox games now but they have strongest 3rd party support I have ever seen.

The only reason I am still with xbox is because I prepaid GP till 2027. I do like controller and xbox OS more but you know what - PS5 has also cool controller, cool OS. And more importantly great games. Yes we can bash them for paid upgrades and remasters. I did it too. But man I experienced so many great games in a past 1.5 years when I pciked up my PS slim.
I think if you can experience those games along with xbox games along with better 3rd patty support and community- why drop another 600-800 next gen for an optional xbox console just for GP?

Yeah I guess it makes sense from a financial perspective & all that.
But......
If only they had held out a little longer, they would've seen Sony stumbling with first party releases, and taken advantage of that with a killer first party Xbox line up. It could've almost been the 360 vs. PS3 days again. But nah MS just couldn't help themselves, they didn't even give themselves a chance. It's pretty pathetic. Now they talk more about PS5 & PC rather than their own console, it's like they're ashamed of it.
But hey they have their fancy rental service and squeaky controllers.....so yay?
Not only that, but the smug levels radiating from Push Square are at astronomical levels, you'd think George Clooney bought the site.