Phil Spencer on the future of Xbox: ‘Most people just want to find a great game’
Phil Spencer is sitting alone on the stage at the Novo Theatre in downtown Los Angeles. The building is across the street from the empty LA convention centre which, in Junes gone by, would have been the thronging heart of the games industry universe. But that universe has changed irrevocably over the past two years. Things have to be done differently now – the future is uncertain.
Nobody knows that better than Spencer. Earlier today, he’d hosted a live showing of the Xbox 2023 Showcase in this auditorium, the seats packed with members of the Xbox fanbase. It was a raucous two hours of whooping and cheering, but Xbox has ground to make up. “2022 was a light year,” Spencer says, before instantly checking himself. “That’s kind of a positive way to put it.”
A few weeks ago, he gave a downbeat interview to the Kinda Funny podcast, in which he referred to Xbox as
