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“We run a business”—why Microsoft’s Indiana Jones will be on PS5

Spencer: “There’s going to be more change in how… games are built and distributed.”

Kyle Orland – | 102
So I'm not stuck on Xbox, eh? Credit: Bethesda
So I'm not stuck on Xbox, eh? Credit: Bethesda
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Bethesda’s Indiana Jones and The Great Circle is the latest game from a Microsoft subsidiary that will make its way to the PlayStation 5. The game will hit Sony’s console in the spring of 2025, Microsoft announced yesterday, months after a planned December launch on Xbox Series S/X and Windows.

In an interview with YouTube channel Xbox On, Microsoft’s Phil Spencer expanded on that decision, implying that multiplatform releases for Microsoft gaming properties were important to the Xbox division’s bottom line. “We run a business,” he said. “It’s definitely true inside of Microsoft the bar is high for us in terms of the delivery that we have to give back to the company, because we get a level of support from the company that’s just amazing in what we’re able to go do.”

Phil Spencer’s comments come about three minutes into this interview.

Amid massive layoffs that have hit Xbox and other gaming companies in recent months, Spencer noted that there’s “a lot of pressure on the [game] industry” these days. “[The industry] has been growing for a long, long time and now people are looking for ways to grow,” he said. “And I think that us, as fans, as players of games, we just have to anticipate there’s going to be more change in how some of the traditional ways that games were built and distributed [are] going to change… for all of us.”

“It’s just going to be a strategy that works for us”

Although Microsoft released four former Xbox exclusives on other platforms months ago, Spencer suggested that there hasn’t been any commensurate dip in total Xbox usage. “What I see when I look is our franchises are getting stronger; our Xbox console players are as high this year as they’ve ever been,” he said.

“So I look at it, and I say, ‘Okay, our player numbers are going up for the console platform, our franchises are as strong as they’ve ever been… So I look at this [as] ‘How can we make our games as strong as possible?’” Our platform continues to grow both on console on PC and on cloud and I think it’s just going to be a strategy that works for us.”

Microsoft’s last four multiplatform game releases were a bit smaller than Indiana Jones.
Credit: Microsoft
Microsoft’s last four multiplatform game releases were a bit smaller than Indiana Jones. Credit: Microsoft

Microsoft has long prioritized maintaining a healthy number of overall Xbox players over selling more raw consoles than competitors like Sony. Still, the continuing cratering of sales revenue from Xbox hardware likely contributes heavily to Microsoft’s decision to release its games on competing platforms.

A big-budget, big-name Bethesda release like Indiana Jones could act as more of an Xbox system seller than the four older, smaller games that Microsoft recently let go multiplatform. Then again, The Great Circle‘s multiple months of Xbox exclusivity—which include the 2024 holiday buying season—could still provide a bit of a relative advantage for Microsoft’s consoles.

Indiana Jones and The Great Circle‘s PS5 availability may come as a particular surprise to readers who remember Spencer saying in February that neither The Great Circle nor Starfield were a part of the company’s current multiplatform plans. But a careful parsing of Spencer’s words at the time shows that he only promised those titles were not among the four multiplatform titles they were announcing at that time.

Back then, Spencer said that those four multiplatform releases didn’t represent “a change to our fundamental exclusive strategy.” But he added that there was a desire to “use what some of the other platforms have right now to help grow our franchises” to help “the long-term health of Xbox.”

“[I have] a fundamental belief that over the next five or 10 years… games that are exclusive to one piece of hardware are going to be a smaller and smaller part of the game industry,” Spencer said in February.

Listing image: Bethesda

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Kyle Orland Senior Gaming Editor
Kyle Orland has been the Senior Gaming Editor at Ars Technica since 2012, writing primarily about the business, tech, and culture behind video games. He has journalism and computer science degrees from University of Maryland. He once wrote a whole book about Minesweeper.
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the_frakker
A game sells most copies during the first week on the market. If one has not already subscribed to Xbox Game Pass or purchased a copy for/with an Xbox console, then it only benefits Xbox to launch on other platforms and attempt to reinvigorate sales of that game for another burst.

Sony has seen this work for them with their exclusives going to PC at a later date. Sony just isn’t ready yet to let their big games go to Xbox.

Adding to that is the Indiana Jones brand is established and has a wider reach to generate sales on other platforms.

These and other factors might help determine which Xbox games get other console releases. I don’t know if they’ll release all their games multiplatform within the next 10 years, but maybe.
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