Bethesda and Activision might look to go third-party with their future releases. It is already rumored that Starfield and Indiana Jones might be released on the PlayStation 5 despite being exclusive to the Xbox Series X/S. However, this might not be a long-standing decision by the company. The Xbox environment for the past couple of years has been unsustainable, not only due to decreasing console sales but also a lack of intriguing titles That is why, Xbox is thinking of going third-party.
Essentially, going third-party means releasing your games not only for the home console but also for other platforms. In this case, eligible Microsoft games will now also be released for the Nintendo Switch and the PlayStation 5 among other possible devices like Death Stranding recently did for the iOS. On that knowledge, industry insiders and sources claim that Bethesda Softworks and Activision might release titles for the PlayStation 5 and the Switch in the near future.
Therefore, nothing will stay exclusive to the Xbox consoles anymore. Buying the Xbox won’t give anyone a different experience than playing the game on a different platform. In the end, the customized and unique playthrough of an Xbox-exclusive game can be experienced on other consoles as well. This may or may not bode well for Xbox as a whole and there are several reasons for that.
Reasons Why Xbox Might Have Taken a Decision To Go Third-Party
All Xbox games rumored to come to PS5:
✅ Indiana Jones
✅ Starfield
✅ Doom Year Zero
✅ Hi-Fi Rush
✅ Sea of Thieves
✅ Microsoft Flight SimulatorThese games have also been in the rumor mill:
✅ Halo Infinite
✅ Pentiment
✅ Grounded pic.twitter.com/ugbSzAlrPI— Hunter (@NextGenPlayer) February 4, 2024
X user, XcloudTimdog offered tons of reasons why Xbox has decided to go third party to save the console and the brand. A lot of those reasons relate to the comparatively lesser hardware sales for Xbox over the past few years in comparison to the Switch and PlayStation.Interestingly, despite being priced lower than the competition, Xbox consoles were not flying off the shelves. Hence, despite the Game Pass being a huge aspect of Xbox’s services, it is being marked as ‘unsustainable.’
The Xbox Game Pass as a subscription provides tons of value for the consumers but not for the company itself. Providing access to multiple games in the same place for a nominal fee might not be sustainable, especially because the subscription is prone to Day One releases like Persona 3: Reload and Hi-Fi Rush. However, Microsoft has no problem with buying more studios and sustaining a subscription-like environment if they can take the third-party route. This can cut down losses if any and sustain studios by themselves.
The biggest problem with the third-party decision is that console exclusives won’t be ‘exclusives’ anymore. Halo, Indiana Jones, Hi-Fi Rush, Sea of Thieves, and even Hellblade will go to PlayStation so that they do not turn up lesser profit than projected. However, there is a silver lining to this. While gamers will get to experience these titles without any restrictions, Xbox followers won’t be elated with how things have led up to this point. XcloudTimdog also points out that Activision games like Call of Duty might not be coming to Game Pass which is also a downer for fans wanting such titles in the subscription.
