The Xbox One X launch is now just weeks away, and Microsoft already believes it will be a big hit. However, according to Xbox boss Phil Spencer, the lower-cost Xbox One S will remain the best-selling console for Microsoft this generation. In a way, this could mean that Microsoft Xbox One X console will not sell as much as the Xbox One S.
Spencer backed his conclusion with a pretty convincing reasoning. Speaking to GameSpot, Spencer said “Xbox One S will be the market leader for us. It’s the more affordable console. It plays all the same games. It will be the console that sells.”
Talking about the Microsoft Xbox One X console, the executive said that it is targeted at players looking for the “very best experience.” The console’s increased horsepower and more functionalities will be capable enough to give players an enhanced gaming experience even if they don’t have a 4K TV, the executive noted. However, Spencer said that the Microsoft Xbox One X console is not for everyone just like the Xbox One Elite controller.
Microsoft knows that in the gaming segment there are two types of users, one who play the games “casually,” and the second, for whom the gaming is their “number one hobby,” Spencer says. For such players, gaming is their number one form of entertainment, and thus, the company wants to give them a choice to get the “very best experience.”
“But it’s not for everybody. It’s like when we built the Xbox One Elite controller, we didn’t try to say to everybody, ‘If you need an extra controller, go buy the Elite controller.’ We sold a ton of those controllers,” Spencer said. The executive acknowledged that with such positioning it is “hard to do that with gamers. I guess we’ll see; I feel very confident in the product we have coming to market.”
Such a setup of premium gaming was so far typical to the PCs, but now consoles are also joining in. Last year, it was the PS4 Pro, and now it is the Xbox One X. In the U.S., Microsoft’s newest console will roll out on November 7 with a price tag of $499.
Spencer’s comment could also be seen as addressing the concerns among some gamers, who might feel left out believing the new machine will get more attention from the company. For such gamers, the executive cleared that with the comment, the “Xbox One S will be the market leader for us.”
Separately, at E3 this year, we first heard about the backward compatibility support for the original Xbox games. Since then there has been no update on the features. So, when a question about the same was put to them by GameSpot, Spencer said, “We’re close, we’re really close,” adding, “I have a little dashboard I go to and I can see all the games [and] where they are in getting approvals in the pipeline.”
Spencer said they are on track when it comes to backward compatibility. “I feel really good,” he said. The executive is also confident on coming up with the feature before the end of the year. In fact, he teased that details of backwards compatibility on the Xbox One X are still to be revealed.
