Phil Spencer: Microsoft Heard Starfield Might Skip Xbox Before Acquiring Bethesda - News
by William D'Angelo , posted on 02 July 2023 / 5,593 Views
Microsoft Gaming CEO Phil Spencer while being cross-examined by the FTC counsel during the FTC vs Microsoft hearing today revealed Microsoft had heard Starfield might skip Xbox before the company acquired Bethesda's parent company ZeniMax Media.
"[Xbox] needed to do a lot of work with a lot of partners given the competitive situation we had against the market leader," said Spencer.
Spencer said Xbox was worried about losing Starfield after Sony paid ZeniMax to make Deathloop and Ghostwire: Tokyo a timed exclusive to the PlayStation 5.
"When we acquired ZeniMax one of the impetus for that is that Sony had done a deal for Deathloop and Ghostwire and pay Bethesda to not ship those games on Xbox," said Spencer.
"So the discussion about Starfield when we heard that Starfield was potentially also going to end up skipping Xbox, we can't be in a position as a third place console where we fall further behind on our content ownership so we've had to secure content to remain viable in the business."
Spencer also mentioned the recently released Final Fantasy XVI, which Sony paid Square Enix to make the game a timed exclusive on the PlayStation 5.
Starfield launches on the Xbox Series X|S, PC, and Xbox Game Pass on September 6.
Thanks, IGN.
A life-long and avid gamer, William D'Angelo was first introduced to VGChartz in 2007. After years of supporting the site, he was brought on in 2010 as a junior analyst, working his way up to lead analyst in 2012 and taking over the hardware estimates in 2017. He has expanded his involvement in the gaming community by producing content on his own YouTube channel and Twitch channel. You can contact the author on Twitter @TrunksWD.
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It was definitely a rumor, but nothing ever concrete. Not even this is concrete as Phil just heard about a potential deal.
But, if true, Sony was really going for the deathblow on Xbox this gen lol
Guess Sony fucked around and found out.
If Sony got the rights to Starfield, no one would be batting an eye. Xbox get it and it's the end of world.
Bethesda was a smart choice of purchase.
As I recall there was an earlier report that Sony had been negotiating with Zenimax to get Starfield at the same time they negotiated for Deathloop and Ghostwire Tokyo in 2020, but Zenimax decided to hold back Starfield because they were already negotiating with Xbox for the acquisition, and they knew that Xbox would be willing to pay more for the acquisition if they knew that they would get Bethesda's biggest game as an exclusive as part of the acquisition.
If Sony did end up getting the deal, there is a good chance it would be PS5 only with a port to PC and Xbox 1+ year later. Xbox Thano snapped any chance of it.
What's good for the goose is good for the gander.
Sony sure were going in on those Zenimax deals.
Having already lost Deathloop and Ghostwire Tokyo, and being at risk of losing Starfield (and possibly future iterations of Elder Scrolls and Fallout?), that actually was an existential threat to Microsoft's console business. Fair enough!
Man Xbots sure have short memories. MS was doing a lot of this during the Xbox360 days. MS chose to buy instead of creating content with their own studios. They have only themselves to blame!!! So many bad moves over the years !!!!
They could have bought the starfield rights, don't know why they thought it was necessary to buy all of zenimax.
They'd already lost two games, and were at risk of losing a third, and that created uncomfortable questions around future titles such as Fallout 5, Elder Scrolls 6, and Indiana Jones.
Buying Zenimax may have seemed like more value than being in perpetual bidding wars over Bethesda titles.
Plus, Microsoft would be paying more for exclusivity than Sony would
The way paying for exclusivity works is you're paying for how much the publisher would be losing if it doesn't release on other platforms. Because the Playstation platform is bigger, MS would be paying bigger for exclusivity. Since the Xbox platform is smaller, Sony would be paying less for exclusivity
So it's not an equal bidding war for exclusivity
So, to Microsoft's thinking is, if they gonna have to pay larger for more and more exclusivity bidding wars, may as well use all that money to buy the whole house. That in the end pays for itself, since they're building equity by being the intellectual property owners
Cuss they can. Now everyone with a smartphone and gamepass can enjoy starfield via cloud. In 2023 even some homeless people have smartphones. So closed a small door and opened a bigger one
Yeah, "exclusive" for Microsoft means Xbox, PC, and streaming... which really isn't that limiting, actually. That means you can even play it on Mac and Linux through streaming (or through a Windows compatibility layer). When you can play it on your internet-enabled refrigerator if you really want to, I'd call that pretty accessible!
