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Will Microsoft Spread Themselves Too Thin?

Will Microsoft Spread Themselves Too Thin?

Xbox One…Windows Ten…Xbox Live…how many irons in the fire is one too many?

You have to hand it to Phil Spencer, as he truly seems like a guy who sincerely wants what’s best for his company. More importantly, he wants what’s best for his consumer base (which isn’t always an easy thing to figure out). Running a major gaming division involves more than just churning out games and hardware with your feet kicked up as you watch the money roll in. The Xbox One’s struggles in 2014 can attest to that.

Although, it would appear 2015 is shaping up to be a very different story. At least, that’s what people like Spencer and others on Team Xbox are hoping. During their recent OS briefing, they threw just about everything at us besides the kitchen sink (but a next-gen sink does sound kinda’ cool). One message to spring from the conference was quite clear: the future of their console is now tied directly to the launch of the next iteration of Windows. Some folks are seriously worried by this, as they feel this is a front where the twain should probably not meet.  However, Microsoft essentially stated that Windows is the company’s priority…not Xbox. “I will tell you, for the company, if we just want to get to the company level, success of Windows 10 is critically important to this company. And gaming will be a very important part of success for Windows 10. I love the Xbox business that we run. I love the console. But if you just look at scale inside of Microsoft of Xbox One/console and Windows, I don’t think anybody would be fooled to think that the console somehow outweighs what we do there.” Phil Spencer said in a recent interview.

Another huge reason this new attitude gives gamers pause is our memories of the “Games for Windows” debacle. Many of us remember the last time Microsoft attempted to roll out an initiative such as this, which crashed and burned pretty hard. Tying yet another attempt at a failed venture to their already shaky next-gen business model doesn’t do much to reassure doubting Thomases such as myself (who feel they should double-down their efforts at fixing the One). Even Phil’s own words on the matter do little to sooth my trouble minded. He called this linking a necessary part of the “gaming ecosystem,” as their goal is to “…grow the number of people that are connected and the amount of content that’s available on both platforms… I don’t feel that there’s some kind of financial motivation for me to keep things off of PC. At the Microsoft level, clearly that’s not true. And in the Xbox side, I want Xbox gamers to be proud that Windows is a Microsoft product and Xbox is a Microsoft product. So I think we’ll be able to thread the needle and do both.”

Will Microsoft Spread Themselves Too Thin?

You might wonder why anyone would baulk at the idea of a company expanding their digital base. That only means more fun content trickling down to us on the receiving end right? Yes that’s true in a sense, but Microsoft now seems to have its focus split between both PC gaming on Windows AND the building of a solid future for the Xbox One. What worries me is their track record, as they’ve not done either terribly well up ‘till now.

If they can pull off the kind of seamless integration they’re promising, this could turn out to be a huge win. If not, they’ll quickly discover the perils of trying to serve two masters at once.

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