Despite a Successful Showcase, XBOX Might Be Falling Into a Trap

This year's XBOX Games Showcase gave us a lot of reasons to be excited for the future of XBOX. Gears of War: E-Day looks like a great return to form for the franchise, Fable is shaping up to be well worth the wait, and there were plenty of surprise announcements to look forward to next year.

Sure, there's no word of Elder Scrolls 6 yet, but honestly, I wasn't expecting any until next year at the earliest.

What we did get word of, however, is that XBOX is back. Gone are the days of "This is an Xbox" and multiplatform releases. Under new CEO Asha Sharma, XBOX is planning a return to focus on hardware, first-party exclusives, and bringing back everything that made XBOX a gaming juggernaut back in the 360 days.

We've already seen hints of that with Gears of War and Clockwork Revolution being console exclusives for XBOX Series X|S. Games like Fable and Halo: Campaign Evolved will still arrive on PlayStation 5; it's looking like the company is moving away from releasing its marquee first-party games on competing consoles.

Instead, it's all about delivering an XBOX experience on an, well, XBOX. Which makes some recent comments from new chief strategy officer, Matthew Ball, a little more confusing.

XBOX CSO Talks About the Strength of XBOX Cloud Gaming

Speaking at The Games Business Live, Ball alluded to the elephant in the room when it comes to gaming hardware in 2026: it's really, really expensive. However, there may be a solution in place: cloud streaming.

It's a great window because there's a bunch of outstanding games, we have a shortage of [console] supply, and that is definitely evident in the data. We are seeing a lot more people using the platform. They are trying it. There are, of course, a number of challenges in the market that people are navigating.

Ball adds that they feel "very strongly" about a return to XBOX, but also alludes to the fact that XBOX gamers have multiple ways to play, whether it be console, PC, or cloud.

"We have tens of millions of people on console, and we have the xCloud platform," he adds. "More people are using it every day." This comment is in line with comments made by Phil Spencer in 2025, saying that Game Pass cloud hours are up 45% year over year.

A Return to XBOX as a Console Faces Stiff Market Challenges

The issues regarding console supply aren't a revelation. In a company-wide memo, Sharma spoke on how in February, it's twice as expensive to purchase console storage components compared to last fall. Since then, the price has doubled yet again. Sharma said that they're expecting the price to increase again for the 2027 holiday season, "taking us over 5x the prices we paid only two years ago."

As someone who could stand to use a PC upgrade (and most certainly a laptop one), I'm fully aware of all the issues regarding hardware pricing today. We're seeing Sony and Nintendo raise the price of their consoles as a result of various market conditions, including some that may be due to Microsoft itself.

Having said that, it's a little odd to see Ball talk about the growing prevalence of Cloud gaming while saying they're focused on a "return to XBOX." If the whole point is a return to playing exclusives on your XBOX console, then pushing the same talking points from the past (failed) regime seems a little contradictory.

I'm sure there's a world where XBOX can focus on growing the brand through console exclusives while also leveraging the power and convenience of both Game Pass and xCloud. It's been great to dive through the library of hidden gems on Game Pass over the past year. My wife recently had surgery, and having access to cloud gaming through our Fire TV Stick in our bedroom is beyond convenient; having to physically move an XBOX console to and from the bedroom gets old quite fast. I don't want to be in a world where XBOX abandons these things, but I also want to be in a world where the XBOX console is in a position of strength. The industry is better when Microsoft, Nintendo, and Sony are all performing well.