Microsoft Reveals Fate Of Xbox As Major Retailers Step Back From The Console

It has been a tumultuous month for the Xbox brand. In the face of near-simultaneous price hikes on Xbox consoles and Xbox Game Pass Ultimate, reports indicate that retailers like Costco are not only putting existing Xbox consoles on clearance pricing, but have no intentions of restocking them. This, as well as rumors of Xbox going third party and giving up on the console race entirely, are ringing doomsday bells for the brand, but there is still some nuance here and other information to consider.

Back in June, Microsoft announced that AMD would still be powering its next-generation hardware, confirming that another generation of Xbox consoles (at least one of them) is still on the horizon. 


But times are certainly still dire for the Xbox brand. These price hikes are a response to tariffs, not market demand. And while the reports of Costco dropping Xbox consoles entirely do stem from Twitter / X, photographic evidence corroborating at least the clearance sales does exist. $179 for an Xbox Series S and $279 for an Xbox Series X is certainly a steal for actual fans of the console, especially those hoping to make use of its backward compatibility or who just want a cheap entry into the current generation, but it bodes poorly for machines with an MSRP of $399.99 and $599.99, respectively.

While Xbox does seem to be obligated to continue the console race moving into the next generation, the writing on the wall of Xbox as the least-prominent console gaming brand seems set. Xbox's own strategic moves to put all of its most valuable properties on PC, PlayStation, and Nintendo platforms also hasn't served it particularly well in the console wars—some would say that they're already playing like they've lost. Finally, while there does seem to be some hope for Xbox-branded PCs like the upcoming Xbox ROG Ally and Ally X, the price-to-performance ratio may not be there and the console-centric audience may not take kindly to PC gaming's higher barrier of entry.

On the other hand, parent company Microsoft certainly shouldn't be compared to the Sega of the 90s, and the Xbox may yet shake the Dreamcast comparisons. For what its word is worth, Microsoft did double down on its next generation Xbox hardware commitment in a statement to Windows Central.