Microsoft’s PC-Only Games Are An “Anomaly,” Says Phil Spencer

Between World of Warcraft: The War Within, Ara: History Untold, and the early-access release of Towerborne, Microsoft has an unusually prominent slate of PC-only games this fall. Of those three titles, Towerborne will eventually make it to Xbox Series X|S, but don’t get used to having Microsoft games skipping consoles. The company’s gaming CEO, Phil Spencer, has indicated that this was “an anomaly” that’s unlikely to be repeated.

“This is historical,” Spencer told Game FIle. “There might always be some anomalies, but I look at those three as an anomaly. We want our games playable across as many screens as possible. We think about the Xbox platform as the Xbox console, PC, and cloud. We want all the games playable across all of those. We want them to be Play Anywhere.”

While there don’t appear to be any plans to bring World of Warcraft to Xbox consoles, Spencer has been bullish about sharing select Microsoft-owned titles with Sony’s PlayStation. The most prominent example is Call of Duty: Black Ops 6, but even upcoming games like Indiana Jones and the Great Circle will get a PS5 release after an initial debut on Xbox consoles and PC. Spencer also mentioned his larger goal of allowing players to own a title regardless of where they’re playing it.

“We want to get to the point where, when you buy, whether you’re buying on cloud–which we’re getting ready to introduce–buying on PC and buying on console, you own it across all of the Xbox ecosystem,” said Spencer.