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Ten years ago on March 31, 2014, then-Xbox Game Studios boss Phil Spencer was named Head of Xbox. And he inherited quite a mess. You all know the story; there’s no need to beat the horse corpse for the ten-thousandth time. The brand was in disarray after what can, without hyperbole, be called a pretty disastrous launch of the Xbox One. So how far has Xbox come under Spencer’s tenure? And where’s it going from here? Let’s look back and then look forward.

To his credit, Spencer didn’t waste any time trying to clean up that mess. In May of 2014 he unbundled the Kinect motion controller from the Xbox One, thus instantly lowering the price of the console to $399 and back to price parity with Sony’s PlayStation 4. One year later at E3 2015 he announced Xbox’s extensive backwards compatibility effort to some of the loudest applause I’ve ever heard at an Xbox E3 press conference. It was a much-needed dose of player-first good news for Xbox fans, and it would be a years-long effort that brought hundreds of legacy games forward to present and future Xbox consoles (with many of them later technically improved to boot), but it would not be the last.

The Xbox One generation was nevertheless a rough one for Spencer and the Xbox team, though, primarily because of some significant first-party disappointments during much of that time. Halo: The Master Chief Collection’s online multiplayer was an unmitigated disaster at launch and for a long time after (though to the studio’s credit, 343 Industries eventually got it working brilliantly while also adding Halo 3: ODST and Halo Reach into the package). Lionhead weirdly tried to pivot Fable into a 4v1 multiplayer game, and not only did it not work, the game got canceled shortly before release and the studio was shut down. The highly anticipated Scalebound was canceled too. Crackdown 3 was a dud. Halo 5’s campaign couldn’t live up to its fantastic marketing campaign.

Sunset Overdrive was a criminally overlooked gem.

But there were some serious bright spots. Sunset Overdrive was a criminally overlooked gem from a studio that had only ever worked with Sony prior to this and, in hindsight, Insomniac’s critically acclaimed and commercially successful Spider-Man series wouldn’t have happened without it. Exclusive-at-launch Cuphead was a breakout indie hit and one of the most visually unique games ever made. Microsoft bought the Gears of War franchise from Epic Games and its new caretakers at The Coalition made two absolutely fantastic sequels to continue the series. The Ori games were both phenomenal.

Hardware was given a welcome refresh under Spencer’s watch too. The Xbox One S was a much smaller, sleeker, and even slightly more powerful version of the console that, as a bonus, had a built-in power supply, meaning that there was no massive power brick like the original Xbox One had. The Xbox One X came along in 2017 and was a true step above the PlayStation 4 Pro in horsepower, able to deliver native 4K gaming while the PS4 Pro frequently faked it. And console prices continued to come down.

Another initiative that launched in 2017 is probably the one that will go at the very top of Spencer’s career resume when it’s all said and done: Xbox Game Pass. It’s fair to say that it has changed gaming as a whole, offering subscribers access to a catalog of hundreds of games each month, including any and every first-party game Microsoft makes. In fact, there’s even a first-party Sony game in it! In just seven years, Xbox Game Pass has swelled to over 34 million monthly subscribers and arguably become the thing you think of first when you think of the Xbox brand.

Of course, you need lots of games to feed a service like Game Pass in order to keep people subscribing each month, and so Spencer set out to fix the first-party game problem in the boldest of ways: by leveraging Microsoft’s massive war chest and buying studio after studio after studio. A ton of talent suddenly came through Microsoft’s door, from the Forza Horizon wizards at Playground Games to the RPG gurus at Obsidian to game design legend Tim Schafer and his team at Double Fine Productions.

He also deserves credit for Xbox’s industry leadership in normalizing accessibility features in gaming, winning awards in the process. From the Xbox Adaptive Controller to ASL support baked directly into games, Xbox has walked the walk of Spencer’s talk of bringing gaming to everyone.

As Spencer did what he could to salvage the Xbox One generation, his hardware ambitions got bigger for the first console generation that he’d be heading up from the get-go. The Xbox Series X is a great machine that has plenty of horsepower, looks awesome, and works as whisper-quietly as it does reliably. Meanwhile, Spencer’s strategy of lowering the price of entry for the new console by offering a non-4K version of the Series X in the form of the Series S also seems to have paid off, with Xbox doing better than it ever has.

Xbox has walked the walk of Spencer’s talk of bringing gaming to everyone.

But Spencer would only get bolder as the Xbox Series era unfolded. Microsoft spent $7.5 billion and bought Bethesda/ZeniMax, which included Todd Howard’s Bethesda Game Studios, Doom developer id Software, Dishonored’s Arkane, and more. And then they spent SIXTY-NINE BILLION DOLLARS to pick up the whole of Activision-Blizzard-King, which includes Call of Duty, Diablo, World of Warcraft, and Candy Crush. The purchase price dwarfs the previous largest video game industry acquisition ever by a factor of five, triggering regulatory challenges in multiple countries before the deal was ultimately approved and finalized. Unfortunately, thanks in part to the pandemic and also to the ever-growing incubation time needed to make AAA games, players still have yet to see a steady flow of first-party games despite all of these larger and smaller acquisitions.

And so I would argue that Phil Spencer’s first decade as the top man at Xbox can be summed up this way: a gamer-first focus on great services like backwards compatibility and Xbox Game Pass that hasn’t quite yet delivered a consistent quantity and quality of first-party games, though the future looks incredibly bright no matter where and how you like to play. As for the next ten years? Personally, I’m incredibly excited, as Spencer has shown that, above all else, he puts players first and he’s not afraid to spend money to build out Xbox Game Studios. Soon there will be a never-ending wave of first-party games in any genre you could ask for, all available as part of your Xbox Game Pass subscription, and you might even be able to play them on the go too. Here’s to the next decade of Xbox.

Phil Spencer Has Now Been Head of Xbox for 10 Years; We Look Back at His First Decade - IGN

Ten years ago on March 31, 2014, then-Xbox Game Studios boss Phil Spencer was named Head of Xbox. And he inherited quite a mess. You all know the story; there’s no need to beat the horse corpse for the ten-thousandth time. The brand was in disarray after what can, without hyperbole, be called a...

www.ign.com

 

[kazuyamishima]

 

[Gamer_By_Proxy]

 

[mansoor1980]

the reluctant superhero

 

[SantaC]

Lots of talk, but not a lot of action.

J Allard actually got jrpg exclusives to Xbox 360.

 

[LectureMaster]

 

[BennyBlanco]

Pure conjecture but I think Phil isn’t making the decisions anymore. They gave him a decade to turn Xbox around and somehow are even worse now. All these AAA studios with big headcounts sitting around doing teambuilding exercises and hitting their DEI quotas. Like what is The Initiative doing?

Oh well, can’t really say I care too much. AOE2: DE and AoE4 were greenlit by big Philip and I still regularly play both. Thanks lad.

 

[sendit]

Pure conjecture but I think Phil isn’t making the decisions anymore. They gave him a decade to turn Xbox around and somehow are even worse now. All these AAA studios with big headcounts sitting around doing teambuilding exercises and hitting their DEI quotas. Like what is The Initiative doing?

Oh well, can’t really say I care too much. AOE2: DE and AoE4 were greenlit by big Philip and I still regularly play both. Thanks lad.

How are they in a worse position now? Phil has expanded the Xbox family by placing one of their highest rated Series S/X console exclusive on the PS5.

 

[Danny Dudekisser]

Hopefully his last decade, too. What a sinking ship this brand has become.

 

[Hudo]

Oh well, can’t really say I care too much. AOE2: DE and AoE4 were greenlit by big Philip and I still regularly play both. Thanks lad.

This.

I cannot hate the guy who resurrected Age of Empires.

 

[Crayon]

How are they in a worse position now? Phil has expanded the Xbox family by placing one of their highest rated Series S/X console exclusive on the PS5.

Doubt that was phil's idea. He was daydreaming about buying steam and Nintendo. I'd be surprised if he got the money for abk and then suddenly had a change of heart about "spending Sony out of business". His $80b plan turned out to be a monkey paw when the adults showed up.

 

[SlimySnake]

He shouldnt be getting credit for Insomniac's Sunset Overdrive. That was Don's doing. Even Titanfall 1 was Don. What Phil did was that he bought lifetime exclusivity when he took over then spent god knows how much for Tomb Raider exclusivity instead of you know teaming up respawn and insomniac again. You know the studios who had two different dev teams and couldve built him a franchise.

He cancelled Scalebound, Fable, Coalitions new IP when Xbox needed them the most. While wasting $2.5 billion on a needless Minecraft purchase.

Those decisions were likely responsible for Xbox sales completely dropping off a cliff after a somewhat strong first three years. Things were not as dire as IGN is making them out to be. At least when it came to sales. XS is actually trailing the X1 in sales. When people see cancellations instead of investments, why would they continue to make the investment in your console? no wonder the X1X didnt move the needle despite being a great console.

Had he invested in Ryse 2, Scalebound, Fable, Coalition's new IP and Sunset Overdrive 2 instead of Minecraft in those crucial early years, things might not be this bad today.

 

[ChorizoPicozo]

tell me how they do it to make it look good. I'm curious but not curious enough to watch it.

 

[Kacho]

Phil’s greatest achievement was losing me as a customer

 

[Topher]

That's just a puff piece. Amazing that Ryan McCaffrey is still writing shit like this......

"Soon there will be a never-ending wave of first-party games in any genre you could ask for......"

 

[amigastar]

Phil’s greatest achievement was losing me as a customer

Why??

 

[Arsic]

 

[FinalBossWithTheMostPower]

It's long past time for Phil to pass that shit..

 

[Kacho]

Why??

It was a culmination of things. Weak first party output, too much focus on Game Pass, lacking Japanese support, etc. I could write a novel on my disappointment with Xbox. Series X is the last Xbox console I will ever own. I won’t be investing anymore time or money in that ecosystem. Street Fighter 6 will be remembered as the last game I purchased on that platform.

 

[T-Cake]

I thank him for bringing Xbox titles to Steam.

 

[FalconPunch]

It was a culmination of things. Weak first party output, too much focus on Game Pass, lacking Japanese support, etc. I could write a novel on my disappointment with Xbox. Series X is the last Xbox console I will ever own. I won’t be investing anymore time or money in that ecosystem. Street Fighter 6 will be remembered as the last game I purchased on that platform.

I get where you’re coming from. I actually sold my Series X and recently repurchased a 360. As far as I’m concerned, Xbox is pretty much dead.

 

[cinnamonandgravy]

i barely remember anything about xbox one

 

[amigastar]

I thank him for bringing Xbox titles to Steam.

Assuming you are serious i also like the fact that Xbox games are coming out on PC/Steam. Its really great as a PC gamer.

 

[T-Cake]

Assuming you are serious i also like the fact that Xbox games are coming out on PC/Steam. Its really great as a PC gamer.

Absolutely otherwise we wouldn't have Halo MCC, Gears 5, Forza, etc.

 

[Dane]

It was a culmination of things. Weak first party output, too much focus on Game Pass, lacking Japanese support, etc. I could write a novel on my disappointment with Xbox. Series X is the last Xbox console I will ever own. I won’t be investing anymore time or money in that ecosystem. Street Fighter 6 will be remembered as the last game I purchased on that platform.

This has been the best japanese support for Xbox probably ever, the 360 even with its support missed out franchises like Kingdom Hearts, Yakuza, and had a ton of the niche stuff that was Japan only which was brought to the west with PC and PS releases, the late last generation saw at least part of them being ported and brought worldwide for Xbox One.

 

[Syphon Filter]

I thank him for bringing Xbox titles to Steam.

xbox games are bad for years so it really doesnt matter who gets them.

 

[adamsapple]

 

[Loomy]

What Phil did was that he bought lifetime exclusivity when he took over then spent god knows how much for Tomb Raider exclusivity instead of you know teaming up respawn and insomniac again.

It's funny that he made the comment about the exclusivity deal being Xbox wanting an action adventure game like Uncharted of their own right when Naughty Dog was working on releasing their last 2 game in the franchise.

That's just a puff piece. Amazing that Ryan McCaffrey is still writing shit like this......

The guy is incapable of being objective about Xbox.

 

[digoutyoursoul]

I can’t do this anymore, borderline North Korea behaviour

 

[Robb]

We Look Back at His First Decade

Pretty easy to summarize;

 

[havoc00]

I won’t lie gamepass has saved me so much money, also Phil assembled the Xbox army which I have served in for over 10 years now.

 

[StereoVsn]

He shouldnt be getting credit for Insomniac's Sunset Overdrive. That was Don's doing. Even Titanfall 1 was Don. What Phil did was that he bought lifetime exclusivity when he took over then spent god knows how much for Tomb Raider exclusivity instead of you know teaming up respawn and insomniac again. You know the studios who had two different dev teams and couldve built him a franchise.

He cancelled Scalebound, Fable, Coalitions new IP when Xbox needed them the most. While wasting $2.5 billion on a needless Minecraft purchase.

Those decisions were likely responsible for Xbox sales completely dropping off a cliff after a somewhat strong first three years. Things were not as dire as IGN is making them out to be. At least when it came to sales. XS is actually trailing the X1 in sales. When people see cancellations instead of investments, why would they continue to make the investment in your console? no wonder the X1X didnt move the needle despite being a great console.

Had he invested in Ryse 2, Scalebound, Fable, Coalition's new IP and Sunset Overdrive 2 instead of Minecraft in those crucial early years, things might not be this bad today.

I don't disagree with most info above, but thinking Minecraft purchase was bad is crazy talk. They made back their money and a lot more on top.

 

[nush]

Is this topic group therapy for green rats?

 

[thicc_girls_are_teh_best]

Hopefully his last decade, too. What a sinking ship this brand has become.

Between this and all the interviews basically framing him as a prophet, sounds like retirement might be coming sooner rather than later whenever this multiplatform transition is completed.

Just too many hints feels like.

I can’t do this anymore, borderline North Korea behaviour

Maybe closer to Jim Jones.

It was a culmination of things. Weak first party output, too much focus on Game Pass, lacking Japanese support, etc. I could write a novel on my disappointment with Xbox. Series X is the last Xbox console I will ever own. I won’t be investing anymore time or money in that ecosystem. Street Fighter 6 will be remembered as the last game I purchased on that platform.

TBF, outside of mainline Final Fantasy games Xbox hasn't been lacking Japanese support this gen. It's just that vast majority still prefer to buy those games on anything but an Xbox.

 

[Kacho]

This has been the best japanese support for Xbox probably ever, the 360 even with its support missed out franchises like Kingdom Hearts, Yakuza, and had a ton of the niche stuff that was Japan only which was brought to the west with PC and PS releases, the late last generation saw at least part of them being ported and brought worldwide for Xbox One.

It's improved for sure, but there are still massive blind spots for my tastes. Steam and Nintendo serve me well there.

TBF, outside of mainline Final Fantasy games Xbox hasn't been lacking Japanese support this gen. It's just that vast majority still prefer to buy those games on anything but an Xbox.

For your specific tastes, sure.

 

[ChorizoPicozo]

Is this topic group therapy for green rats?

that's was weeks ago in Tim's Dog twitter space

 

[Kacho]

Is this topic group therapy for green rats?

Kinda. We're reflecting on 10 years of Papa Phil by sharing our own personal experiences.

 

[thicc_girls_are_teh_best]

For your specific tastes, sure.

Genuine question then: what Japanese games have skipped Xbox this gen besides FF XVI, FF VII Rebirth and Forspoken? All the big ones I can think of have come to Xbox: Elden Ring, Dragon's Dogma 2, Dragon Quest, SF6, Tekken 8, RE4 Remake, RE Village, Wu Long, even smaller ones like Octopath Traveller, let alone stuff like Yakuza, Persona, KOF, Samurai Showdown etc.

Even stuff like that Little Red Riding Hood game and Unicorn Overlord are on Xbox this gen. Missing a few of the big Square-Enix FF gamaes doesn't sound like Xbox is missing most Japanese games anymore IMO. And stuff like Rise of the Ronin are 2P (1P/3P co-developed exclusive); Stellar Blade's a Korean game and also 2P.

Just not seeing this reality where most Japanese games are skipping Xbox, even when sales are lowest on that platform (which is all the time).

 

[Bumblebeetuna]

Ready for the shit takes on Papa Phil

 

[Kacho]

Genuine question then: what Japanese games have skipped Xbox this gen besides FF XVI, FF VII Rebirth and Forspoken? All the big ones I can think of have come to Xbox: Elden Ring, Dragon's Dogma 2, Dragon Quest, SF6, Tekken 8, RE4 Remake, RE Village, Wu Long, even smaller ones like Octopath Traveller, let alone stuff like Yakuza, Persona, KOF, Samurai Showdown etc.

Even stuff like that Little Red Riding Hood game and Unicorn Overlord are on Xbox this gen. Missing a few of the big Square-Enix FF gamaes doesn't sound like Xbox is missing most Japanese games anymore IMO. And stuff like Rise of the Ronin are 2P (1P/3P co-developed exclusive); Stellar Blade's a Korean game and also 2P.

Just not seeing this reality where most Japanese games are skipping Xbox, even when sales are lowest on that platform (which is all the time).

It’s the more niche stuff. You’re listing the obvious big games. I’m talking about games that likely aren’t on your radar. One easy example of the top of my head is Monster Hunter Stories.

 

[GHG]

The headline implies there is a second decade to come.

 

[havoc00]

Uncle Philly my ass!!

 

[Panajev2001a]

Phil Spencer Has Now Been Head of Xbox for 10 Years; We Look Back at His First Decade - IGN

Ten years ago on March 31, 2014, then-Xbox Game Studios boss Phil Spencer was named Head of Xbox. And he inherited quite a mess. You all know the story; there’s no need to beat the horse corpse for the ten-thousandth time. The brand was in disarray after what can, without hyperbole, be called a...

www.ign.com

For the Spencer super fan here two things. First, when did you start writing for IGN? Second, you have impressive stamina and can go for a long time without breathing for sure, but Spencer might get sore… take some deep breath too once in a while.

 

[solidus12]

Here’s a summary of Phil Spencer’s 10 year tenure at Xbox:

2014:

2015:

2016:

2017:

2018:

2019:

2020:

2021:

2022:

2023:

2024:

 

[Nydius]

Phil was promoted to right the ship after the disastrous Xbox One reveal and Mattrick consistently putting his foot in his mouth. Instead, he’s steered the ship right on a sandbar.

He hasn’t been able to get consistent exclusive quality games on the platform and when it became apparent that he couldn’t rescue the platform with games he decided to push the brand into services (Game Pass). When Game Pass began to stagnate, he spent Microsoft’s money buying studios to prop up Game Pass. Yet despite spending a near combined 80 billion on acquisitions, Game Pass growth is flat and Xbox sales are lower than they were compared to the Xbox One era.

Anyone lifting Spencer up as some kind of savior is either a fanboy or a fool. He’s presided over the absolute destruction of the Xbox brand and dragged the gaming industry through the mud with consolidation and acquisition.

Here’s a visual representation of the results of Phil’s “leadership” at Xbox:

 

[IDKFA]

The alpha male of the gaming industry.

 

[Unknown?]

Pretty easy to summarize;

Holy crap, I remember every year being hyped as the year for Xbox. Phil EVEN said 2015 was the best lineup in Xbox history!! XD XD

 

[twilo99]

People have been saying he is killing xbox from year one...

How long does it take to kill it? Waiting for whole decade ain't fun so I hope he can do it it soon

 

[Topher]

People have been saying he is killing xbox from year one...

How long does it take to kill it? Waiting for whole decade ain't fun so I hope he can do it it soon

"People" have been saying he has been saving Xbox from year one as well. "People" say a lot of things.

 

[Kacho]

People have been saying he is killing xbox from year one...

How long does it take to kill it? Waiting for whole decade ain't fun so I hope he can do it it soon

i recall people giving the guy the benefit of the doubt for a very long time. He’s been trying to regain what they lost after the 360 generation for 10 years and instead of improving things, they’re going backwards.