E3 2018: 10 Xbox-Saving Announcements Microsoft Must Make

8. Exclusive Content Deals With Third Parties

Ori and the Will of the Wisps
Square Enix

Love or loathe it, the practice of denying platform owners access to content as a means of encouraging a switch of allegiance is here to stay.

Given the trend's continued prevalence, we're to assume it's a successful business strategy but also one that has seemingly fallen out of favour with Microsoft. Currently, PS4 owners have first dibs on all map packs released for Activision's shmup behemoth Call of Duty, as well as other timed exclusives like additional Destiny 2 content.

Given its current lack of exclusives, multi-platform releases remain the bread and butter of the platform's software sales, but if there's no incentive to choose Xbox over PS4 for such games (especially true for those that have yet to upgrade to One X), then it's not at all surprising that player numbers for those aforementioned titles are higher on the latter.

Microsoft would do well to broker a deal with EA or Rockstar for next year's Anthem or Red Dead Redemption 2 respectively.

Contributor
Contributor

Joe is a freelance games journalist who, while not spending every waking minute selling himself to websites around the world, spends his free time writing. Most of it makes no sense, but when it does, he treats each article as if it were his Magnum Opus - with varying results.