Earlier this week, a story began doing the rounds about Xbox wanting to bring Game Pass to PlayStation and Nintendo along with various other "screens" - brought about by a comment from the Xbox CFO, Tim Stuart.
The CFO had alluded to this in an interview at Wells Fargo TMT Summit, as we've highlighted elsewhere on Pure Xbox:
However, Xbox boss Phil Spencer has been talking to Windows Central in a new interview today, and he confirmed that Microsoft doesn't have any plans to bring Game Pass to PlayStation or Nintendo devices - at least not right now.
"I'll start by saying we have no plans to bring Game Pass to PlayStation or Nintendo. It's not in our plans."
In the same response, Spencer went on to discuss the importance of Xbox consoles and a desire to "continue to innovate for people who've made the commitment to our hardware platform", pointing out that Xbox Game Pass has been an "important part of the Xbox console identity" and the team will continue to innovate in the console space:
"When I think about investments in things like Game Pass, and Xbox Cloud Gaming, cross play, and cross save, and ID@Xbox, all of these things — I want us to continue to innovate, so people on our console feel like we're making investments in console that matches their commitment they're making to us."
From our perspective here at Pure Xbox, if you go back to that Game Pass comment about PlayStation and Nintendo, it definitely reads like mixed messaging when you compare Spencer and Stuart's responses - although they're likely still coming from the same mindset. After all, Microsoft would love to bring Xbox Game Pass to PlayStation and Nintendo at some point (as has been revealed in the past), but actually achieving that goal is easier said than done!
Could it happen one day? Maybe, but in the case of PlayStation in particular, it seems very, very unlikely...
What are your thoughts about this? Let us know down in the comments section.
[source windowscentral.com]
Comments 20
I'm actually shocked that Sony allowed EA Play on PlayStation. It did take them some time to green light it, though. Don't think it happened until after EA Play was added to GPU.
Perhaps they have decided Xbox consoles are important after all. As I have said since day one of this generation.
'Wanting to' and 'plans in place to actually do that in the 'near' future' are two very different things and can both co-exist - LONG term, it would make sense for MS to 'want' Game Pass Available on EVERY possible device inc Nintendo/Sony hardware - but that doesn't mean they have a plan in place to do so when they are not yet fully up to speed with their Cloud streaming service and all these 'new' handheld devices coming on the market - inc Windows 11 PC hardware handhelds too from a 'tech' side to sort out.
Not only that, the 'Xbox' side has just massively grown with the acquisition of ABK. No doubt there is a LOT of planning and work ahead to merge and integrate ALL these new Teams into one big productive gaming unit under MS, get them pushing each other, put also helping each other too to produce Games in reasonable time and quality standards 'expected' from a First Party studio.
So I do believe that they have NO PLANS to bring Game Pass to Nintendo/Sony platforms and potentially won't need to, maybe they may 'ask' first or decide to want to 'trade' services so you can 'stream' Nintendo or Sony games from their services on ANY hardware (inc) Xbox but can ONLY download/buy games native to the hardware from 'their' respective store.
I also believe that 'long' term, they want Game Pass on EVERY device inc ANY future Playstation or Nintendo console so therefore BOTH statements can still be FACT and make logical sense....
Has the left hand met the right hand ?
So as i said all week long. All this Xbox is done, there won’t be a next gen Xbox, thats the final nail in coffin, etc etc etc. is all for nothing, nothing more than negative Xbox news to keep people company in misery online. I said this 20 times and I’ll say it for the 21st. COD is not even on GP yet and people think they are throwing in the towel? That makes 0.00% sense. Xbox is here to stay until the market shifts into a possible shift away from dedicated console setups that we know today. Can’t wait to see the next Xbox is doom story, while Sony whom i like and respect very much, is headed to court over unlawful PS online pricing practices and is canceling more games as a service than revealing and a story of how some insiders think Sony could go bankrupt with them carrying large amounts of debt. There’s no Xbox tax there is a common sense about how money works tax.
I want to buy a Ferrari but I have no plans to at the moment.
At least he shows he's aware console owners have bought in and have had a rough few years - fingers crossed for the Game Award reveals
@HonestHick Right. More or less the same as I've been saying. Microsoft makes winning-awards desktop PCs, laptops, tablets and even smartphones. They make Windows. Xbox consoles are PCs optimised for gaming and run Windows. It's a no-brainer! Microsoft is earning a lot of money via the Xbox store and Game Pass. After the acquisition of ABK, they are ahead of Sony in gaming revenue. They had more premium subscribers than Sony before Starfield, that set a new record for Game Pass. All of this before Call of Duty! In short, Xbox consoles will be released as long as there is a consoles market. That doesn't mean that they won't earn money on other platforms, not just PCs and mobile but also PS5 and Switch because of Minecraft and Call of Duty being sold on PS and Nintendo shops. Instead of hating Xbox irrationally, our resident PS die-hard fans should celebrate the success of Xbox, because they don't want to know what Sony would do if they were alone in the business...
@OldGamer999 id be more inclined to believe the guy in charge of microsofts money ,than Phil (changed my mind again) spencer
@BAMozzy well in 2018 phil Spencer did say he wants game pass on every conceivable device ,the guy who mentioned ps and Nintendo for game pass has worked for ms since 2015 ,so he's hardly an amateur ,he's also the money man ,I think he didn't pull this out of his ass ,there has clearly been discussions ,and you also have the fact that I wouldn't personally believe anything, that comes out of spencers mouth,isn't it great to see all the xbox heads on the same page 🙄
@Banjo- they're not ahead of Sony in gaming revenue, thats just projected figures after the acquisition,and you better hope nothing comes of this court case against Sony, she will just go after ms and Nintendo if it does ,and who do you think will suffer ,us gamers.
If the opportunity was there they would take it and put game pass on playstation and Nintendo. They are waiting for the if/when that happens.
This is exactly like the "they are trying to buy nintendo" reports. If that was a possibility they would absolutely be interested. But until that is possible(if ever) they are just sitting back and waiting.
Literally nothing has changed with these last 2 articles. We have known for awhile that they have a desire to put gamepass on competitors platforms.
It was a total overreaction over nothing, like so much with ‘big bad evil nasty’ Xbox these days. Of course they’d like to put GP on PS and Nintendo. Of course they’d like to buy Nintendo. I’m sure they’d like to own the moon. It doesn’t mean anything though. It’s just an aspiration, something that they would do if it was a possibility. Most corporations and indeed individuals will have these, it doesn’t mean they’re going to happen or even being pursued.
Gaming gaming gaming such a fun mystery.
I mean take the PS5, who on gods earth designs a device that needs a stand to be put horizontally or vertically and on top of that when horizontally can still tip when touched in the corners.
Now I’m not picking on the PS5 as a whole, but who the hell designs something as stupid as that, especially from a consumer point of view.
Also has to have the case and a screw removed to add more memory.
None of it makes consumer sense and should fail from a purchase consumer point, but not in gaming.
Only the gaming world.
@OldGamer999 but PS5 design is not stupid. They made the best looking console of this generation where you can add universal Nvme M2 Gen 4 SSD. Microsoft couldn't do it and just made another boring black box with sticking SSD card. From consumer's point Sony made a better machine.
The CFO comments did shake my long term confidence in Xbox so good thing Phil stepped in to clear things up. This clarification was much needed. They need to stop sending out these mixed messages. They shouldn’t always be relying on Phil to perform damage control in interviews.
@DonaldMcRonald it shouldn't blend, cause It's important part of room. It's also depend on furniture's color. I have white and gray furniture mostly.
@AnVold
No they did not make the better machine.
From a consumer friendly point of few.
Needing a stand and to open the device up to add memory in 2023 is a bit of a joke.
@DonaldMcRonald
Opening a device outside of the PC master race to add memory is not really consumer friendly console wise and simple on those that don’t have a clue on what to do.
Don’t get me all wrong the faster internal ssd is brilliant when used correctly.
@OldGamer999 yes they did. PS5 sales proved it. You buy console with stand, so it's not a problem. Proprietary SSD that sticking from console looks much more then a joke. It look like a bad joke. 1 Tb is too small for me. It's not usable. I use 4 Tb HDD for past gen games for example, so I do't need SSD less then 2 Tb.
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