Project Scorpio might bag loads of game exclusives
Microsoft wants to "win developers back" with Project Scorpio, an interview with the corporate vice president of the Xbox and Windows gaming has revealed.
Xbox's Mike Ybarra was interviewed by Digital Foundry's Richard Leadbetter as part of the enormous dump of Scorpio information by the outlet yesterday. According to Ybarra, the idea to create a more powerful mid-generation console was part-inspired by a desire to make the Xbox a more desirable development platform.
"The team looked back at developers and the developer relationship we have," Ybarra said. "With Xbox 360 we had the absolute best platform for developers, [with Xbox One] we sort of lost that in a two-year time-frame. So we said, 'How do we win the mindshare of those developers back?'"
A common complaint of the Xbox One has been a lack of software exclusives. Since its battle with the PlayStation 4 began in 2013, Sony has secured a greater number of deals ensuring that top-quality games come to the PS4 and not the Xbox One.
Other franchises like Call of Duty, which was once only available on Xbox consoles, are now available on both and have adopted a "PlayStation first" approach.
"We have to win the hearts and minds of developers," Ybarra said. "We have to have the right toolset that lets them bring out their games across the whole family of products and let them create the absolute best versions of those games."
The change of heart among games studios is partly down to ease of use. The PlayStation 4 is seen as a friendlier, more useful platform for games development than the Xbox One.
In order to bring big-name studios back on board, Microsoft is offering powerful hardware that has been partially designed and engineered around their needs.
Who knows whether this will be enough to bring developers back on board, but if Scorpio is to change the fortunes of the Xbox, it's going to need some killer titles.
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