Xbox’s Phil Spencer has revealed that over the course of his career, various opportunities for exclusive agreements with developers came his way which he passed on. Some of these marked major milestones in gaming and would have helped the Xbox platform grow beyond its current state.
In an interview called “Story Time With Phil Spencer” at PAX West this past weekend, Spencer says a number of games that mattered the most to him over the years were offered to Xbox in some exclusive form. However, the Xbox boss passed on them.
One of which was Destiny back in 2014. Phil didn’t reveal exactly what offer he passed on but he says that Bungie’s Destiny “didn’t really click” with him at first. Spencer says it only landed when the first expansion for the game, House of Wolves was launched.
Keep in mind that Bungie was part of Microsoft at one stage and Spencer had the opportunity to help the studio grow and form Destiny. The Xbox boss did not see them as a key asset at the time. Sure, Bungie is in a rough state now but when the original Destiny launched back in 2014, the game was a powerhouse.
Spencer also believed that Guitar Hero wasn’t going to work. He says the original pitch for Guitar Hero took place at Microsoft. The team behind the game showed off an idea related to plastic guitars that would plug into their console. After the pitch, Spencer said to himself “Do we really think that’s going to work?”
“An interesting one is when this team came down to Redmond and Alex Rigopulos, he pitches a game where they’re actually going to make plastic guitars, and they’re going to plug into consoles, and then they’re going to sell tracks where you’re going to play Simon on this guitar and I’m like, really? Do we really think that’s going to work?
Guitar Hero went on to be the biggest music game in the industry….
Spencer admitted during the interview that he has made some of the worst game-choice decisions but he doesn’t live in the past.
“I’m not a regrets-type person,. Maybe that’s a fault of mine, but I passed on so many games. I could look back and say “clenches fist” but no, I try to look forward and be positive about the things that we are doing.”
Source: YouTube
