Redfall Proves that Microsoft’s Xbox Strategy Works (Premium)

It's the story of an eagerly awaited video game that was so poorly made that Microsoft delayed it for a year, and yet still released it in lackluster shape. No, I'm not talking about Halo Infinite, though I could be. I'm talking about Redfall, an open-world co-op vampire shooter---yes, really---that has been lambasted by critics for a variety of problems.

But this is the one that struck me the most: IGN, a nearly 30-year-old video game reviews website, and thus the grand old dame of this industry, declared that Redfall was so bad that it was a "worst-case scenario" that "tests the patience of Xbox fans." The theory being, I guess, that Xbox fans face an existential crisis brought on by the dominance of the Sony PlayStation and the surprising fate of Microsoft's acquisition of Activision Blizzard, a move that was supposed to change everything.

Please.

Leaving aside the obvious---that video games don't live or die on opening weekend sales like movies, and can, and are, updated regularly, a situation that should answer all of the complaints---we need to remember a few things about where Xbox is now as a platform and where it's heading. I've written a lot about Xbox head Phil Spencer in the past, about how his truthful, plain-spoken everyman approach to revitalizing Xbox in the wake of the Xbox One debacle is the greatest gift that Xbox fans have ever received. But let me draw a few parallels and then get more specific in making my case for this man and the platform he leads.

Phil Spencer is to Xbox what Terry Myerson was to Windows: he took a product line that was dinged badly by his predecessor, and he turned things around, giving fans what they wanted and, as important, what they needed. Phil Spencer is likewise to Xbox what Satya Nadella is (perceived to be) to Microsoft: he took a powerful but aging set of products and forced it to diversify and modernize and address new needs and wants, and in doing so he made the thing better and more resilient to whatever market changes come down the road. The Xbox of today is not the Xbox of yesteryear. It's better.

More specifically, Phil Spencer took a platform that was all about a single thing---people buying individual games at retail and installing them on a console---and expanded the definition of the platform to meet its customers wherever they want to game. Xbox today is cross-platform and provides multiple entry points to gaming that include not just the console, but also PCs, mobile devices, and even smart TVs. It has expanded access to gaming by giving people more choice. You can still buy games and play them on a single device if you like. Or you can subscribe to an Xbox Game Pass subscription and choose from hundreds of games for a relatively low monthly price, or even stream hundreds of games for a few dollars more.

This diversification makes for a healthier Xbox, and this is exactly what Big Tech firms are doing (or trying to do) at a higher level by moving beyond a si...