Third-party publishers are second-guessing their continued support of Xbox consoles moving forward.
According to a new report from the head of GamesIndustry.biz Chris Dring, the predominant feeling around last week’s Game Developer’s Conference was the status of Microsoft and Xbox.
“The other thing I heard—I heard it from a very prominent company and one not so prominent—was Xbox’s performance in Europe is just flatlining,” he said via the GI Microcast.
He continued: “You can follow our monthly coverage in the games market and you can see that Xbox sales are falling, and it’s been falling all throughout last year and it’s falling even harder this year. The phrase one major company who released a big game last year said [was], ‘I don’t know why we bothered supporting it’.”
Lastly, it was mentioned that third-party publishers view the market right now as PC and PS5.
One thing to note is that this report specifically mentions European sales. It’s unknown, however, if the publishers referenced were European publishers or studios based elsewhere.
Insider Gaming has reached out to Microsoft over these potential concerns. As of writing, none of our requests for comment have been answered.
What do you think the future holds for Xbox amid the concern surrounding publishers and future support? For more Insider Gaming, see what Xbox head Phil Spencer would like to see from an Xbox handheld.
