Microsoft’s Phil Spencer spent some of his Sunday answering questions on Twitter and the Head of the Xbox Division revealed quite a bit about the company’s future plans. Looking forward to this year’s E3 Expo, Spencer had this to say…
- He confirmed that at least one new property and (shocker of shockers) several sequels will be announced at E3.
- These new game announcements will include several new studios that Microsoft is working with.
- And as we’ve been hearing for months, an Xbox One game from a Japanese developer will be announced at E3.
- But we won’t have to wait for E3 for all of Microsoft’s announcements. Spencer said that several pre-E3 announcements will happen in May. Hey! That’s this month!
- Finally, Microsoft plans to make the hardcore gamer the “main focus” of this year’s E3 Expo, whatever that means.
Spencer also told his followers that Fable Anniversary is most likely not in development for the Xbox One and that Microsoft and Mojang are getting close to a Minecraft: Xbox One Edition announcement, but they’re not there yet. Minecraft might be one of the last digital games Microsoft has a direct hand in as the company is currently moving away from publishing third-party digital games. This is due to the fact they would prefer to focus on “opportunities with IP we own that we’ve neglected.” However, he didn’t elaborate on which properties he was referring to.
And in case you were hoping for an Xbox-branded handheld to be revealed at this year’s E3 Expo, you might want to know that it’s probably out of the question. However, development on games for Windows Phones and Windows 8 tablets will continue, possibly with controller support in the future.
Finally, one thing Spencer didn’t talk about was Halo 5, stating “I can’t talk about anything related to a 343i IP.” Hopefully, we’ll learn more about that one at this year’s E3 Expo.
