It looks like the PlayStation 5 will not be the only next-generation system to see a price increase. According to a recent Twitter tweet by Tom Warren, Phil Spencer believes that the costs for the console and game pass are likely to rise in the near future. He claimed that they have managed to keep the rates stable for a long period, but that they would have to raise them at some point.
Speaking of Phil Spencer, he recently had some things to say about Call of Duty, as we learned through another batch of Tom Warren tweets. He has mentioned that the franchise will be accessible only for PlayStation, although they would also want to see it on Nintendo Switch. He would like to see the game playable on all screen sizes since they aim to handle Call of Duty similarly to how they treated Minecraft.
Furthermore, he stated that their primary goal in making the deal is to enter the mobile gaming market. He claims that there are over 3 billion individuals who like playing video games, but only approximately 200 million homes own a console. The bulk of gamers come from mobile gaming, which is the area that Phil Spencer hopes to target with the acquisition.
In other instances, Reuters reports that Microsoft is seeking for an IP similar to Genshin Impact. According to the research, Genshin Impact has amassed billions of dollars in revenue in just two years owing to its unrivalled market performance. Microsoft is also seeking for a similar IP that would bring in large dollars. Both the gaming industry behemoths, Sony and Microsoft, have been aiming to enter the Chinese gaming markets for quite some time now; Sony has succeeded, and Microsoft appears to be next in line. Daniel Ahmad, Senior Analyst at Niko Partners, told Reuters the following:
“Chinese game developers are trying to standardize their development tools, create advanced production processes, invest in really large-scale teams. Ultimately, that helps provide them with the competitive edge to reach a broad audience both in terms of geography and platforms.”
In other news, Microsoft has revealed its first-quarter results, which show a year-on-year increase of roughly 0.47%, making this their greatest quarter ever. The previous greatest quarter for Xbox was last year, with revenue totaling $3.59 billion; this time around, revenue totaled $3.61 billion. Gaming income increased marginally, but content and services decreased, while Xbox hardware revenue increased by 13%.
