Xboss Phil Spencer Talks Console Name Selection, Bringing People Together, And More

Today, Xboss Phil Spencer sat down during a special Extra Life broadcast to raise some money for charity and talk about the world inside Xbox. Spencer glossed over several topics included console naming, what he feels about his job, handling fan disappointment, and more. Overall, it was pretty interesting, especially for Team Xbox.

There are a lot of jokes about the naming of the systems. Memes about it being the "Xbox One," but it's not the first console. Or the "Xbox 360" when PlayStation kept it simple with 'PlayStation 3'. Nevermind Nintendo, they've always done their own thing. But he did touch on the process of naming and how it's more of a creative process than anything else. Despite being a "headache," the marketing team comes up with a few pitches from extensive market research. They take the best of the best and select three names that passed through previous inspections. Spencer then takes those three names, and casts the deciding vote. He even joked that he should have chosen different letters than "S" and "X" because when he speaks, they sound very similar.

Of course many that love the Xbox platform, and respect the amazing changes Spencer has brought to the console brand itself, are curious as to what it's like working in the field he does with his specific job title. Spencer responded that it's both a blessing and a curse. He loves what he does, says it's "fantastic", but he doesn't like disappointing people. Disappointing team member that lend amazing ideas that unfortunately don't make the final cut, disappointing fans with expectations. It's a "balance" that is something that can frustrating, but he hopes this is "the last job he ever has" because he loves it so much.

At the end of the day, Spencer says he just wants people to play games. He wants discussion, competition, enjoyment - for the fans, for the team members, for everyone in the community. He then went on to go into detail about his thoughts on the community as a whole and how it is an incredibly positive thing for society. Case and point - this conversation is happening during a gaming charity stream - just gamers doing good! He wants fantastic relationships with both the fans and other developers so they never reach a "destructive" point in the brand's lifetime where they just don't provide an experience gamers want.

He also doesn't want to fall in the mindset of "crush" the competition. He holds a lot of respect for Valve, Nintendo, and Sony - and though they are competitors, he says they all have one goal in mind. Video games are an "art form," he said, and to want to destroy another artist is counter intuitive to their overall goal of gaming accessibility.

To hear more about this thoughts, such as his favourite games, you can check out the full stream here.