This Success Story for Xbox Games Is Exactly Why The Console Is In Trouble

The gaming industry can be a fickle thing. Unexpected hits can come from any direction, while teams of the industry can fall apart in no time at all, a truth that’s been unavoidable since the days of the Atari 2600. Companies will rise and fall, with even giants like Nintendo having their share of struggles over the years. The companies that survive in this industry are the ones that can adapt and find a way to bounce back from struggles.

Take Sega, for example. Once a genuine contender for the home console crown, a few lackluster hardware launches led to the company shifting into more of a publisher (a move that has paid off dividends in the long run). A similar fate has been theorized to be awaiting the Xbox, which was once a major rival to the PlayStation and Nintendo consoles, only to find itself in a slump in the modern day. While parent company Microsoft Game Studios might have found some good news with their biggest recent hits, the details of those releases speak to the challenge facing Xbox, and why the console brand might end up following in the footsteps of the Dreamcast before long.

Xbox Games Are Selling Well… On PlayStation

Microsoft’s Forza Horizon 5 has become a huge hit on PlayStation 5, which is great news for Microsoft Game Studios — and a bad portent for Xbox’s future. Initially launching for Windows, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S in 2021, Forza Horizon 5 made the leap to the Sony console in April 2025. Since then, the game has made over $300 million on the PlayStation. This is a big win for the Forza series and highlights how Microsoft’s vast library of games can find a second life if they’re released on other platforms. This gels with recent announcements confirming that the likes of Halo and Gears of War will also be making the leap to the PlayStation in the coming months and years.

This seems to have become a key element of Microsoft’s plans for their gaming future, as Forza Horizon 6 will follow a similar trajectory as titles like Indiana Jones and the Great Circle. Although the title will launch exclusively on Xbox and PC, it will then be ported over to PlayStation sometime later. It’s a big win for Microsoft Game Studios after a year where they faced plenty of struggles. Considering that Microsoft has reportedly placed lofty profit-margin goals on the Xbox division of Microsoft and many of their other means accruing cash were less popular with gamers (such as raising the price of Game Pass, cancelling games, and shuttering developers), it’s encouraging to see Forza Horison 5 remind players and companies that a succesful title is all that it should take to succeed in this indusrry.

Microsoft Gaming Will Survive, Even If The Xbox Ends

However, while Microsoft Game Studios might be thriving on the PlayStation, it’s a bad sign for the future of the Xbox that Microsoft seems increasingly content to be a game publisher instead of a competitor in the console market. There was already going to be some necessary crossover between Xbox and rival companies like Sony after Microsoft purchased publishers like Activision and Bethesda (and their cross-platform franchises like Call of Duty and Fallout), but at the time, it seemed like it wouldn’t be too negative of an impact on the Xbox brand. Only a few years later, though, the PlayStation 5 has become the dominant home console for hardcore gaming, while Nintendo has solidified it as the fitting alternative.

The result has been that the Xbox brand has suffered, dropping in sales and losing out on exclusive titles that might have otherwise kept the brand afloat. On top of that, efforts to position the Xbox as less of a gaming system and more of a broad entertainment device have come up against the natural challenges of new rivals like the Steam Deck, constantly improving mobile tech, and the expansion of Smart TVs in the marketplace that undercut the Xbox’s intended role as a hub for home entertainment. At this point, the Xbox was relying on exclusive titles to keep it relevant in the race against PlayStation, along with cross-platform hits.

Now, however, Microsoft seems increasingly content to release games across platforms in a bid to turn the biggest profit possible. While this might be good for Microsoft, the game publisher, it’s a potentially devastating blow to Microsoft, the console maker — especially with launches like the Steam Machine coming down the pipeline that could further eat into their share of the market. With the Xbox lagging against the competition in terms of raw sales — to the point where most members of the media dismiss the concept of the console wars in the current marketplace — it increasingly seems like the Xbox may be more on life support than fans realized. In fact, if Microsoft continues to push itself as a publisher, there’s a chance that the next Xbox may very well be the last.