Much has been said about the profitability of Xbox Game Pass and what the business model implies for Xbox in general. Phil Spencer, head of the brand, wants to put to rest reports that Xbox and its popular service are operating at a loss.
For this reason, he again affirmed that Xbox Game Pass is fully profitable. He also stressed that Xbox is in very good shape right now. On the other hand, he believes that Starfield is very important, as it will boost the brand and the service alike.
Xbox and Game Pass are profitable; Starfield will help them grow further
During a recent interview with Giant Bomb (via TweakTown), Spencer stressed that the Xbox business is sustainable and profitable. He further explained that Starfield is relevant to the growth of the service and, therefore, the brand.
"Game Pass is profitable, Xbox is profitable. I've said it's sustainable, but people ask me what I mean by that," the executive stated before explaining his point further.
From Spencer's perspective, people doubt the profitability of Xbox Game Pass as they feel the brand could sell a lot more games if they didn't offer them directly on the subscription service. He said the situation is somewhat similar to what happened previously, when Xbox focused on only console games and chose not to sell its titles on competing systems.
"The math is actually very similar for us. What you did on old-school console is you said, 'okay, how many consoles are you going to sell because Halo 2 launches, how long will those players stay on the platform and how many games will they buy, and is that more cost-effective to keep the game exclusive to your platform?" commented Spencer.
He further went on to express his belief that Starfield will make them money and help Xbox Game Pass grow. He noted that their goal is to expand the reach of their service and brand across multiple platforms, so Bethesda's game will be critical.
"For us it's about expanding our platform reach and we think important games like Starfield will be catalysts for Game Pass growth on a lot of different platforms.
"But anytime you're growing a platform, there's always this trade off with games. We're not a third-party publisher, right, we do something different with our content like Starfield, but not all the content. Obviously Minecraft ships on other platforms," Spencer concluded.
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