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Phil Spencer blames capitalism for games industry woes: 'I don't get the luxury of not having to run a profitable growing business'

HL3.exe

Member

The problem, according to Spencer, is a "lack of growth" across the videogame industry as a whole. "When you have an industry that is projected to be smaller next year in terms of players and dollars, and you get a lot of publicly traded companies that are in the industry that have to show their investors growth—because why else does somebody own a share of someone’s stock if it’s not going to grow?—the side of the business that then gets scrutinized is the cost side," Spencer said. "Because if you’re not going to grow the revenue side, then the cost side becomes challenged."

If you can't grow by making more money, in other words, then you can "grow"—in terms of profits, share price, EBITDA, and all those other metrics that Wall Street types care about— by spending less. The obvious question is, why are you bringing in all these new people if you can't afford to pay them? Of course, Microsoft can afford to pay those people, it just doesn't want to, because, that's right, growth.

(My edit tools are 'greyed out' for some reason, so cant mark these are quotes, apologies)
 

drganon

Member
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Thick Thighs Save Lives

NeoGAF's Physical Games Advocate Extraordinaire
It's basically the same interview that was posted earlier this week here but with a different headline lol.

Polygon asked Spencer if the ABK layoffs were part of this wider trend, or if there was something unique about the layoffs as they pertain to the current Xbox business.

It’s a little bit of both,” said Spencer. “But I’ll say the thing that has me most concerned for the industry is the lack of growth. And when you have an industry that is projected to be smaller next year in terms of players and dollars, and you get a lot of publicly traded companies that are in the industry that have to show their investors growth — because why else does somebody own a share of someone’s stock if it’s not going to grow? — the side of the business that then gets scrutinized is the cost side. Because if you’re not going to grow the revenue side, then the cost side becomes challenged.

“We’re a business. I’ve said over and over. I don’t get any luxury of not having to run a profitable growing business inside of Microsoft. And we are that today. But just across the industry — you mentioned it, and in sitting here at GDC, I reflect on friends of mine in the industry that have been displaced and lost their jobs and how just, I don’t want this industry to be a place where people can’t, with confidence, build a career. So that’s why I keep pivoting back to: How does this industry get back to growth? But to your question, for us as Xbox or any of the teams that are out there, it is really an outcome of an industry that’s not growing. It can grow and it will grow again. But you see this time right now and the implications have human impact. And we should all reflect on that and think about it.”
 
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Damigos

Member
No Phil, its capitalism’s fault, not lack of good exclusives, not having a plan of where xbox is going, moneyhatting every problem, promoting series S as next gen and having devs create inferior versions of games so it can run on S.
No Phil, its not that Forza Motorsport sucked, last 2 Halos sucked, Fable and Gears of War are dead, the pirate game sucks, hellblade is 5 years late etc
No Phil, its not the tv tv tv, kinect, used games policy and always online policy from last gen that lost you millions of customers
No Phil, its not the endless game pass everywhere promo that made the actual xbox useless since every game can be played on PC or via stream
No Phil, its not that Nintendo and Sony offer excellent exclusives and that is what pushes the industry forward (maybe unpopular opinion, but still).
No Phil, blade capitalism, blame Canada, blade anyone but you. Its their fault, not yours
 
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adamsapple

Or is it just one of Phil's balls in my throat?
Already posted like three times.



(My edit tools are 'greyed out' for some reason, so cant mark these are quotes, apologies)



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Expecting unlimited growth is just a fundamentally dumb idea. In so far I agree that capitalism sucks in its core.
But expecting growth by tapping into almost unlimited ressources fails again and again with these big corps, because they don't really aim to achieve something real, nothing other than arbitrary growth itself, which should just be a byproduct and not the actual goal.
 

Unknown?

Member
Expecting unlimited growth is just a fundamentally dumb idea. In so far I agree that capitalism sucks in its core.
But expecting growth by tapping into almost unlimited ressources fails again and again with these big corps, because they don't really aim to achieve something real, nothing other than arbitrary growth itself, which should just be a byproduct and not the actual goal.
Capitalism is a word used as derogatory by people who love collectivism(which always leads to poverty), a better word for it is Free Market. The free market is what has lifted people out of serfdom.

The ironic thing is Microsoft being so large today has nothing to do with capitalism, it was chosen as a winner by the government and received special funding that helped it out compete other companies of the time. This is more accurately called corporatism.
 
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Bernardougf

Member
Blaming capitalism from a big corporation? Well, they gotta cater to lowest common denominator of intelligence out there I guess
Its the morden westerm executive problem ... having to deal with making money in a place were everybody wants to do political/social activism.... in the past activism came from ONGs and donations.

Now the same company who wants to sell your male white/straight ass games also wants to tell the word how fucking shit you are.... its quite funny ... LucasFilm should be the prime example on how to completely fuck up your business with social inclusive feminist practices

And these people dosent have a clue.. they go down with their ship looking at the whole thenselfs made and blaming everybody
 
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londontko

Member
I don't hear him blaming capitalism. I hear him saying he can't run an unprofitable business -- which is just, duh, of course you can't. He's just stating the obvious reality.

He's not saying anything remotely controversial, people on here just like to REEEEEEEEEEEE
 

Cyberpunkd

Member
Pretty sure that there are multiple companies that have grown in the past few years even if the industry as a whole didnt (the industry did grow too if you consider 2020 for what it was, an anomaly)
This. If you are only growing when the industry is you are a bad manager. Spencer should do less interviews and work more on solving Xbox problems.
 

IAmRei

Member
"Corporate" blaming capitalist is kinda weird to me 🙄 well, stop blaming everything else, its not too late to redo or fix it...

Could be too late...
 

LordCBH

Member
You know, Phil, your direct competitors don’t have the problems you do and they exist in the exact same market. Maybe stop blaming everything else and start taking responsibility for being shit at your job?

Like PlayStation has had an absolutely anemic first party output the past few years and they STILL shat on Phil’s Xbox constantly.
 
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He's not saying anything remotely controversial, people on here just like to REEEEEEEEEEEE
If he had to make a profit from the start, Xbox would survive 6 months tops. Xbox had been unprofitable since forever, and they should have left and let someone else have a shot. To complain about needing to make a profit NOW, after so many years of grace and paycheck for doing nothing productive, is just embarrassing to watch.

Sony and Nintendo need to make profits too, you know. Don't act like Xbox is the victim of circumstance.
 

ProtoByte

Weeb Underling
This guy is a fucking idiot. Holy shit. What an inane comment. Gaming has always been a business. It wouldn't exist otherwise. He works for one of the most crony capitalistic companies of human history. One that has more power than some countries.

The fact that he's managed to cling to leadership at Xbox for more than 10 years is an indictment on the meritocracy. Fuck.
 

LordCBH

Member
why Xbox people (fans and executives) don't understand that Xbox is a complete faliure, as a brand, console and ecosystem.

The excuses making is so damn pathetic.

Oh god Twitter yesterday was so full of delusion. It’s like they all move in unison.
 

mejin

Member
Xbox business is not profitable? I'm surprised lol

Microsoft spent billions and they finally understood It's time to get some money hence multiplatform is the solution.

Spencer is directly attacking MS with his horseshit. What an audacious puppet.
 

SHA

Member
It's a wonderful idea to write comments and see it in the headlines the very next day, Jesus! is Phil's job that insecure and stressful?
 

Sentenza

Member
It's basically the same interview that was posted earlier this week here but with a different headline lol.
Game journalism 101: release a three-minutes interview on video? Be ready for seven different headlines, each one highlighting a different sentence in the same period.
I've seen this pattern at work for years.
Another recent example was Larian's CEO barely few days ago.
 
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