Xbox's Phil Spencer Sees Amazon And Google As Their Biggest Future Competitors

@mooglestar: Comments like these completely (and willfully?) fail to understand what Spencer actually means.

Spencer wouldn't release the Xbox Series X, or spend hundreds of millions of dollars (billions?) on new studios, if he wasn't aware of and reactive to the reality that, right now, they are competing with Sony and Nintendo within the narrow confines of console gaming and content. He's spoken at length, including here at Gamespot, about how they completely made a mess of this generation, and spent a long time digging their way out.

But these comments of his are talking about where gaming is eventually going, not where it is right now. And if cloud gaming is indeed the future, there's only a handful of companies who will have the global infrastructure for it, and "own the wires" so to speak. Nintendo and Sony are emphatically not among those companies.

A cloud future could ultimately turn Sony into essentially a game publisher, whose products are made available over Microsoft's actual infrastructure. In such a scenario, Sony are basically a customer, not a competitor. It also results in a situation where Microsoft will always have a profitability edge for their own services, PLUS receiving indefinite revenue from clients whose business rely on their infrastructure.

People are too fixated on stuff like "oh, Stadia failed". Stadia could go away tomorrow, and it wouldn't change that Google Cloud is likely going to make Google a ton of money helping to facilitate a "cloud gaming" future.

Are we there yet? No, of course not. Spencer himself has said that future is still years away.

@mooglestar: 3rd place in the gaming market is irrelevant. Business is about money and Microsoft wastes more money than Sony and Nintendo make combined. Think what Sony or Nintendo could achieve with Microsoft's cash flow. Sony is a hardware company. Microsoft is a software and cloud computing company. Dedicated hardware will be nonexistent eventually.

@Tidus1012: That moron has completely turned the Xbox One around and is looking far into the future rather than just next gen. Even Sony is now buying cloud services from Microsoft. The future is cloud gaming and library subscriptions played on any device you own. Dedicated consoles are going the way of the Doe Doe. I don't see Sony coming up with the cash to create the infrastructure Amazon, Google and Microsoft already have in place. Once dedicated hardware is obsolete, what is Sony going to have to sell? Microsoft is making sure they stay relevant in a changing market. Sony will have to do the same eventually. Already partnering with Microsoft for some services opens the door to more cooperation in the future.

@Tidus1012: lol how is he a moron? He's responsible for some of the most significant and positive changes we are seeing with not only the Xbox brand, but gaming as a whole.

@Tidus1012: What did he say that was stupid? Gaming are going the way of Netflix where they become more of a streaming service 8n the near future. Since Amazon and Google have as much money as Microsoft to invest, buyout, and control the segment this all makes perfect sense. If any of the companies wanted to they could buy bot Nintendo and Sony and not be hurt financially.