Despite Spencer’s comments, it’s worth remembering that Xbox Game Pass missed its subscriber goal for the second year in a row, which coincides with the looming threat of recession. It’s a difficult, layered issue on which Harding-Rolls and Spencer have both made valid points in the past, and it’s a simple statement of fact that there’s no way to predict how the market will perform over time.
It goes without saying that the acquisition of Activision Blizzard will have a significant impact on how Xbox behaves in the coming years. Spencer admits that legislative scrutiny is warranted given the magnitude of the acquisition, but he remains confident that the deal will be completed before all is said and done. Having access to Activision Blizzard’s IPs and production capacities would undoubtedly boost Xbox’s output during a potential recession, but the specifics of how things might play out remain hazy at best.
