Items tagged with phil spencer
Microsoft recently published a preview video of the Xbox Series X’s design. The upcoming console design has garnered both praise, concern, and confusion. Microsoft's next-gen game console appears to be rather large and bears many similarities to a PC. One critic included Gearbox executive Randy Pitchford, who took to Twitter to complain about the design and performance claims of the Xbox Series X. The Xbox Series X features a design that differs from its predecessors. Phil Spencer, executive vice-president of Gaming at Microsoft, claimed that the console’s design is due to the deceleration of Moore’s law. He tweeted, “As Moore's law slows down and our ambitions increase,...
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Last night, Microsoft surprised us all by spilling many details on its next-generation Xbox Series X roughly a year before it will even be released. The Xbox Series X has a tower form-factor, is powered by an AMD Zen 2 CPU paired with an RDNA GPU, and features GDDR6 memory along with an ultra-fast NVMe SSD for storage. The console will also ship with a revised wireless controller that is patterned after the Xbox Elite Series 2 Wireless Controller. In an interview with GameSpot, however, Xbox Chief Phil Spencer and Jason Ronald (Partner Director of Program Management for Team Xbox) provided some greater insight into the console with regards to local gaming, the cloud, and first-party...
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Earlier this week, Xbox chief Phil Spencer ruffled a few feathers in the gaming world when he spoke his mind on the state of virtual reality (VR) for consoles. Spencer at the time lamented problems that he saw with VR technology, and stated his reasoning for not pursuing the technology with Microsoft's upcoming Xbox Project Scarlett gaming console. "I have some issues with VR—it’s isolating and I think of games as a communal, kind of together experience. We’re responding to what our customers are asking for and… nobody’s asking for VR," said Spencer in an interview with Stevivor. "The vast majority of our customers know if they want a VR experience,...
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While many of the concrete details surrounding Microsoft's next flagship game console are still under wraps, much has already been made about its promised features, such as solid state drive storage and support for real-time ray tracing on the hardware level. If you are wondering how VR gaming might factor in Project Scarlett, however, Microsoft's answer is simple—it won't. As far as Microsoft is concerned, the demand is just not there yet. Or as Microsoft's vice president of gaming Phil Spencer puts it, "Nobody's asking for VR," so it's not a point of focus for Project Scarlett. "I have some issues with VR—it’s isolating and I think of games as a communal, kind of together...
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The console wars will enter a new field of battle late next year when Microsoft's Project Scarlett goes up against Sony's PlayStation 5. It is a war that will not be won by either side in short order. However, Xbox boss Phil Spencer has made it clear that things will be different next time around, and that Project Scarlett will be competitive in power and price. Comparing the current generation gets a little fuzzy because there are so many different iterations, and at this stage of the game, prices can fluctuate wildly (particularly with Black Friday right around the corner). But if we look at sales, the PS4 is the clear victor—it recently breached 100 million units sold, reaching the achievement...
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Do not hold your breath waiting for a version of Project Scarlett built exclusively for streaming. Xbox boss Phil Spencer threw cold water on what was becoming a hot rumor, fueled in large part by comments he previously made regarding the company's future console plans. As it stands, Project Scarlett will stick to the usual script. The speculation stems in part from Project xCloud, a streaming service Microsoft is working on that will allow users to play games on any device. This is not meant to replace power consoles like Project Scarlett, the codename of Microsoft's next flagship Xbox console, but rumors of a dedicated streaming SKU launching alongside the main console have persisted nonetheless....
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One thing that is a given whenever a new game console comes out is that it will have upgraded hardware that is leaps and bounds ahead of the previous generation—it comes with the territory of riding a console for several years before introducing an entirely new model. That is again going to be the case when the next Xbox arrives, but what will it look like? We do not know yet, but according to Xbox boss Phil Spencer, expect something "cool looking." The design of the next Xbox—codename Project Scarlett—has not been finalized yet, which is not surprising since it is more than a year away from launching. Nevertheless, Microsoft at least has a general idea of the overall design,...
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Contrary to some of the speculation that is out there, the Xbox One X is not the the end of the road for Xbox. Phil Spencer, executive vice president of gaming and head of the Xbox brand at Microsoft, confirmed as much during E3 earlier this year, and now he's followed that up by saying he is "very excited" about the future of Xbox. This has not always been a given. Game consoles have become more PC-like with the latest generation of game systems, and have also gone the way of incremental upgrades, like the Xbox One S followed by the Xbox One X. On top of it all, there has been a resurgence in PC gaming of sorts, with esports taking off the way that it has. For Microsoft in particular, the Xbox...
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Crackdown 3 is proving a bit more ambitious than its developers anticipated. As a result, it will not launch alongside the Xbox One X this November. Both were scheduled to debut on November 7, 2017, and while that still applies to the Xbox One X console, Microsoft Studios is pushing back the launch of Crackdown 3 until sometime in spring of next year (barring any further delays). Gamers have been waiting a long time for this one. Microsoft initially announced the third Crackdown title back at E3...in 2014. It was accompanied by a short trailer highlighting some of the dark humor and intense action the game series is known for. But as time went on, the game evolved and became a more complex project...
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When Microsoft announced the new Xbox One X on Sunday, the first thing to spring to mind of gamers was how will the console compare to the Sony PlayStation 4 Pro. The PS4 Pro, which hit the market late last year, became the first available “4K” gaming console and helped to solidify Sony’s lead in the current generation console race. However, Xbox Chief Phil Spencer doesn’t see the Xbox One X and the PS4 Pro as competitors. In fact, Spencer throws more than a little shade on the PS4 Pro, saying that it isn’t a true 4K gaming console and that it should be compared instead to the Xbox One S: I look at Pro as more of a competitor to S than I do to Xbox One X. This is a true 4K console. If you just...
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Console gaming is in a sort of interesting place at the moment. New generations of hardware are building on top of previous releases, such as the PlayStation 4 Pro and Xbox One S, and later Project Scorpio. Rather than release brand new systems that leave the old ones behind, these incremental upgrades are faster and more capable versions. And on the software side, developers are spending more time supporting their games with extra DLC and graphical upgrades. These things combined have led to a sort of game-as-a-service model, which Xbox boss Phil Spencer would like to see evolve. Into what, exactly? Well, he envisions a subscription model similar to Netflix and HBO Go. "I’ve looked at things...
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There are plenty of competent first-person shooter (FPS) games on the Xbox One gaming console, but they all rely on Microsoft’s wireless controller. Any PC gamer worth his (or her) salt will tell you that the only way to truly become dominant in FPS titles is to use a mouse and keyboard. Microsoft has heard those cries, and mouse/keyboard support will be arriving on the Xbox One in the coming months. After last referencing mouse/keyboard support back in July 2015 in a tweet, Xbox chief Phil Spencer is once again talking up the feature. Given Microsoft’s Xbox Play Anywhere initiative, which is blurring the line between Xbox One and Windows 10 gaming, support for traditional PC peripherals...
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“Game over, man. GAME OVER!” After over ten years of production, it’s time to say goodbye to the venerable Xbox 360. The console celebrated its tenth birthday this past November and global sales for the console have surpassed the 85 million mark. Early in its life the Xbox 360 was fraught with quality control issues, as witnessed by the infamous Red Ring of Death that struck many consoles (and subsequently resulted in lawsuits). And we can’t forget the HD DVD add-on debacle, which saw Microsoft on the losing side of the next-generation, high-definition optical disc format war. Sony eventually won the standards battle with Blu-ray and Microsoft was forced to hang its head in defeat (the...
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The latest buzz from the gaming community is that Sony might be working on an upgraded version of its PlayStation 4 console, one that's built with a burlier GPU capable of playing games at 4K Ultra HD resolution. Nothing is yet official, but if Sony makes a bombshell announcement, will Microsoft follow suit with a beefier Xbox One? Don't count on it.Phil Spencer, the head of Microsoft's Xbox division, poured water on the fire just as it was getting lit. The inevitable question came up at Microsoft's 2016 Build conference last week, and rather than offer a canned response that would have left the door open to rumors and speculation, Spencer flat out said there are no plans to release an incrementally...
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