Sarah Bond—President of Xbox—recently described the console maker’s next-generation hardware as “a very premium, very high-end curated experience.”
In an interview with Mashable, she linked this next-gen device to the recently launched ROG Xbox Ally X—an Asus-Microsoft handheld around the US$1,000 mark—and suggested that the thinking behind that device foreshadows what’s to come.
She also emphasized that Xbox hardware isn’t being abandoned, but rather evolving: the idea of being “locked to one store or one device is antiquated.”
Price hikes and context
Recent months have seen larger than normal price increases across Xbox hardware and services:
- The base-level Xbox Series S in the U.S. has risen from around US$299 (at launch) to US$379 or more, according to the AP.
- The flagship Xbox Series X is now listed around US$649 in some U.S. markets, up from its previous US$499 mark, according to Thurrott.com.
- For developers, the cost of Xbox dev kits reportedly rose from US$1,500 to US$2,000, signalling broader upward cost pressures in the ecosystem, according to Pure Xbox.
I think I’ll be sticking to PC gaming.
It feels like they’re trying to blur the line between console and high-end PC gaming.
I really hope they allow their current gen console being open and having flexible OS options.
It just feels like game designers and console companies are forgetting what gaming actually is
To get their recently mandated 30% ROI, they gotta talk like it’s an exclusive club.
Hard to imagine Xbox becoming ‘high-end’ when they were throttling the industry to pretend their Series S was viable hardware. Wish that had been Phil’s mindset.