Maybe, but equally I think 2023 will be much heavier in first party content - there won’t be quite the same need to ramp up on third party deals.
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Voting A, as Phil Spencer and his team inherited a dying brand that they had to revitalize. During his time as head of Xbox they got Microsoft to go all in on gaming by allowing Xbox to become its own division, found a way to allow Xbox to compete with Playstation with game pass.
They have started acquiring the studios that Xbox needs to have compelling 1st party line for the future. Something that all other Xbox heads completely ignored because Xbox was under another division(maybe), which left Xbox in a bad situation when the Xbox One launched and they were losing support. They have started fulfilling their cloud gaming promises, with Flight Sym being what the original idea was supposed to be and then going further by allowing us to actually play all Game Pass games on the go.
Right now, Xbox isn’t where we want it to be, but starting so late to do all the necessary things need to complete with Playstation means that there was going to be some hard times ahead (like 2022), but Microsoft is now fighting to be able to grow in gaming as much as they can and things are looking up IMO.
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As for my rating, A. Phil has assured that a dying brand will be around for a long time even after his tenure with his decision making and acquisitions.
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Yeah there is no way i can play them all, it will probably take me all of 2023 playing just Starfield and exploring all the planets and moons and the mods.
Convincing Nadella to turn an unloved side project into one of the core pillars of the company deserves an A on it’s own.
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A-. He’s not perfect, but he’s exactly the leader Xbox needed. It will take time for his efforts to pay fruit, much like Mattrick’s have reverberated for eons beyond his ousting, but the man has done so much for Xbox. There is a distinct chance, without his efforts, Xbox may not be here as we know it now. That’s worth something.
When he leaves, he will be very missed and I hope the next leader continues his positive momentum (If it’s Sarah, I’m very confident).
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I would give him a B/B+. He took over at Xbox’s lowest point where Microsoft were seriously thinking of shutting down the Xbox division and he managed to prevent that without any funding. He’s managed to finally persuade is bosses to invest which has seen a build up the first party, start up gamepass and get the hardware in a good place. The big thing now is to see if they can get the output to the level it needs to be
I give him an easy A. An A doesn’t mean perfect however I’m looking at the big picture and there really isn’t a gaming leader who’s over-seen a more significant turnaround. You’d be hard pressed to find many leaders in any business turn around a product in a mature market with established competitors to this extent in this amount of time. To go from an Xbox division which was a sinking ship that Microsoft wasn’t sure they wanted to keep investing in towards a pillar of one of the world’s largest companies which represents their largest investments ever and is a market disrupting paradigm changer is unprecedented. It takes vision, great communication, and consistent results from leadership to get investors to buy in.
Anytime a division (or company) grows extremely fast and has significant philosophy changes, there’s going to be inefficiencies and transitional mistakes. They are still trending upwards quickly with no sign of a slowdown.
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It’s really frustrating to see such good products as the Series consoles with all the cool and meaningful things they are offering like Game Pass, Smart Delivery & xbox 360/OG xbox BC for example not being promoted in certain regions…of course the lack of localization is another big problem (which is something Sony is promoting strongly here). They have a product that can easily turn heads and they barely even promote it, instead you have PS5’s outselling the SX with a price that’s 200e + more than the SX here which is completely crazy if you think about it.
In the 360 and One eras MS Hellas did a decent job at marketing the consoles and games (ads, promotions, events e.t.c) but when they closed the local Xbox department around 2016 IIRC and moved it to Italy (for the greater region here) everything just fuckin’ stopped…it’s like the marketing here is still stuck in the 2016 days of shoestring levels of budget for some reason. I still don’t understand how Europe isn’t a big focus for MS considering the lack of brand awareness here. 
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Great post overall. Very well articulated and thought out.
This part I do not understand though. What kind of back up plan did you expect? Materializing a AAA game out of thin air?
You already mentioned that their 1P only started growing in 2018. It was always gonna take time for them to start releasing games. And if the few ones that seemed to be ready earlier than expected get delayed, well shit. I don’t think there was anything he could’ve done tbh.
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A B+ for me and it is not an A purely because the ship has not quite turned in terms of an even cadence of releases
But he has led the Xbox division from being in a position of Microsoft debating whether to keep the division to now being all in. Xbox is actually one of the best companies when it comes to interacting with their fans. He got Xbox back in high end gaming and his PC and cloud initiative means more people get to play Xbox games. Also, under him, Xbox is making a renewed push into Asian markets.
Finally, him driving Game Pass has been the biggest shift I have experienced for a long while in terms of how I consume games and it is for the better.
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In 2022 Microsoft was struck by a several events at once in both the first and the second party.
- Starfield and Redfall both were delayed from the first party
- Stalker and Atomic Heart were also delayed from the third party
The backup plan should always be the third party deals - there is no such a thing as enough of third party deals. But we know Microsoft’s approach to that. My main problem with Phil is that he lacks aggressiveness. I hope 2022 and ABK taught Xbox anything…
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While not inexpensive, they could have opened up their wallets and paid some 3rd parties for their output. If not for them to be exclusive, then at least for Day 1 on Game Pass.
Elden Ring on GP on Day 1 would’ve generated a lot of goodwill. Expensive as shit, yes. Probably not worth it, yes. But possible? With Microsoft’s wealth? I have to imagine, also yes.
Note that I’m mostly just playing Devil’s Advocate here. Just pointing out that there are some things that could’ve been done, but for whatever reason Microsoft chose not to do them.
I for one had a pretty good gaming year in 2022, so I have no complaints. But there’s plenty of people who did not.
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Yeah Phil needs to be more aggressive and lock up 3rd party deals. PlayStation this will will get Forspoken, Final Fantasy 16 and Final Fantasy 7 rebirther all exclusive from a company that is struggling for money. I think Phil and Team Xbox needs to go to Ubisoft and get the Splinter Cell Remake exclusive
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Microsoft has clearly shown their stance that they want Game Pass deal or bust. Some exceptions like Death Door happen, but not with big releases. There is no reason to expect big third party exclusives from Xbox.
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Need more Wo Longs then. Day 1, AAA, full price game, big publisher. Still shocked Koei went from no GP support to this, especially since they are often stingy on discounts as well.
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If publisher does not want that, then nothing can be done 
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My suggestion is that they need to going forward. If the ABK deal fails then a slight tweak will be needed. If you can’t buy 3rd party publishers to make exclusive games then you better spend money to get them exclusive
Everyone has a price and it’s up to Microsoft to meet it