Hopes For Xbox’s Future Might Be Over Before It Even Begins

Things aren’t going great for Xbox Game Studios. Despite efforts by new CEO Asha Sharma and well-received announcements like a return to exclusive releases for games like Gears of War: E, Xbox Game Studios’ fortunes have taken a turn. Not long after Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella sat down with New York Times’s tech podcast Hard Fork and mentioned that operational shifts are necessary at Xbox Games, the company has gone through several severe changes.

Head of Xbox Game Studios Craig Duncan and chief of staff Louise O’Connor are leaving after a lengthy tenure with the studio, with many fearing this is coming ahead of a wave of layoffs as the company restructures. This is already spilling out into the development space, with the new leadership reportedly set to shut down or sell studios like the BAFTA-winning Compulsion Games and Hellblade developer Ninja Theory — with other developers like Double Fine not safe either. It all has me very worried about the future of the company and if the Xbox I grew up with isn’t what Microsoft sees as the future of the brand.

Xbox Needs A Win — And The Last Week Really Isn’t Helping

After making a good showing as a newcomer competitor to Sony and Nintendo at the top of the century, Xbox has been lagging behind both platforms in recent years. Sales of the console have been dwarfed by their competition, all while mobile platforms and a rise in PC gaming have cut into the console audience as a whole. Recent restructuring has been all about resetting the situation for Xbox, giving them a chance to reestablish credibility with an audience that hasn’t been afraid to be vocal about their complaints with the brand. However, there had seemed to be a real change in momentum.

The XBOX Games Showcase was well received by the general gaming public, with new entries for Gears of War, Fable, and Persona all being met with a largely positive reception. It suggested that the studio was putting its best foot forward and highlighting the titles that fans are excited about. However, this quick string of closures and departures has undercut all that confidence — suggesting that the company is shuttering good developers for cost-saving purposes just a few years after it went on a buying spree. It suggests that Microsoft doesn’t believe the game developers and veteran game studio leadership at their company should be the ones running their gaming division.

These closures signal a larger restructure that has reportedly put multiple developers (and hundreds of jobs) at risk, making Nadella’s comments about Xbox Gaming as an “investment” seem much more dispassionate. There’s no denying that Xbox Studios has been struggling in comparison to the competition, especially when taking into account the financial cost of such a massive gaming company. This restructure could prove to be exactly what it needed to find new heights, and it’s clear that some studios that fall under the Microsoft banner (like Blizzard or Mojang Studios) won’t face the same risks. However, it does suggest that the studio is overcorrecting from their previous approaches while also not recognizing what this is doing to their future.

I’m Worried This Might Be The Start Of The End For Xbox As We Know It

As a middle-of-the-pack Millennial, I was 10 years old when the Xbox debuted in 2001. Though I’ll always be a Nintendo kid at heart, I have a great deal of affection for that original console I got refurbished a year after launch, the sleeker (and more prone to needing repairs) Xbox 360 I got right at launch, and the enduring Xbox One I’ve still got in my living room right now. It was a studio that, at its best, could deliver ambitious action games like Halo and Gears of War alongside the realistic recreations of Forza or the gorgeously crafted worlds of Psychonauts and Jet Set Grind Radio Future. However, there’s something disheartening about seeing the companies that made the games and inspired all those positive memories being shuttered for cost-cutting purposes.

It’s a bad reputation for the company if it wants to attract other game developers, who may now be far more likely to pursue cross-platform releases instead of letting themselves fall under Xbox’s control. Cutting these companies so drastically may allow Sharma and the rest of Microsoft’s leadership to try and right the ship, but that will take time — especially if the company is cutting people and forced to figure out this restructure with a largely new team. Nadella argued that Xbox is being better monetized on YouTube than through Microsoft, suggesting the company intends to find more projects that can draw in large amounts of revenue — and I’m worried that is coming at the cost of more challenging, engaging, and artistic titles from studios like Double Fine.

Microsoft is one of the biggest companies on the planet, which allowed it to purchase all those developers in the first place. That security allowed for some really interesting and ambitious games that didn’t always become massive successes, but enriched the gaming landscape. Even if it was trailing behind the competition, the games coming out from under the Xbox Games Studio umbrella were additive to the space. Now, it seems like Microsoft leadership sees that specific approach as untenable, leading to closures and layoffs. I don’t know what Xbox Game Studios will look like after this restructure is complete. I hope the developers they intend to shutter are spun off and survive, and that Microsoft has a plan in place for the future of the studio. No matter what, though, this feels like a change for what Xbox even means going forward, and that’s a sad reality to face when you’ve spent the last twenty-five years getting a lot of joy out of my time with the consoles.

What do you think of Xbox’s future? Let us know in the comments or on social media.