Xbox Boss Says Gaming Consoles Aren't Going Away Anytime Soon

It is no secret that Xbox and other major video game companies are investing heavily in cloud gaming, but both PlayStation and Xbox will still have new physical gaming consoles coming out at the end of this year. In fact, Xbox recently revealed a bunch of details about the upcoming Xbox Series X, and it sounds like a fairly powerful bit of gaming hardware. But the question on everyone's mind is: how long until consoles go the way of the dinosaur as the market's shift? According to Xbox head Phil Spencer, that point in time might be a lot further off than you might think.

During a recent appearance on The AIAS Game Maker's Notebook podcast, hosted by Insomniac Games founder Ted Price, Spencer was asked about Microsoft's Project xCloud, the cloud gaming service from Xbox, and whether video games as a whole are moving from console wars to cloud wars. Spencer initially says, "I hope not," but then goes on to explain that he thinks there's still at least a decade or more before physical hardware really phases out -- at least, for him personally.

"I do think getting to a world where you don't have to own one device to play specific games helps the industry, and not everybody believes that, I get that," Spencer says about 42 minutes into the podcast. "That doesn't mean that owning a device isn't part of my gameplay experience. I think I'm going to have a game console plugged into my television for the next decade plus. Like, I think it's going to be the best way for me to play on my television is to have a local device, download the game, and play, but sometimes I'm not in front of my television. Sometimes I'm not in front a device that has the native capability to play, and that's our bet on cloud."

What do you think of what Spencer had to say? Are you a fan of cloud gaming? Let us know in the comments, or hit me up directly on Twitter at @rollinbishop to talk all things gaming!

The Xbox Series X, the latest and greatest iteration in the Xbox line of gaming consoles, is set to launch later this year around the holidays. No definitive release date has been announced as of yet, though certain system specifications were recently revealed. You can check out all of our previous coverage of Xbox right here.