update:
Shuhei Yoshida, former president of Sony's worldwide game studios, responded via Twitter to Spencer's statements: Yoshida writes that Sony often works hard on technologies that no customer would have asked for.
('-`) .. oO (we often have work hard to make things that no customers are asking for them)
- Shuhei Yoshida (@yosp) November 26, 2019
Original article from November 26, 2019:
Microsoft sticks with it: The Xbox does not need Virtual Reality. Confirmed Xbox boss Phil Spencer in relation to Project Scarlett.
Xbox and Virtual Reality: This story goes way back. Already 2016 There was a collaboration between Microsoft and Oculus in the room, but nothing came of it. It was said in spring 2017 from official sidethat the Xbox One X (at that time still Project Scorpio) Get VR support.
Microsoft did not keep its promise, even though the company was Windows Mixed Reality operates its own PC VR platform - though here too the signs are goodbye, A software update might have been enough to make Windows glasses compatible with the Xbox.
According to a report from 2018 Microsoft worked on one own Xbox glassesbut have the project set. The reason: Microsoft should have feared that an "immature VR experience" could damage the image of the Xbox One X.
In an interview with the Australian website Stevivor from 2016 Xbox boss Phil Spencer said that most VR content feels like demos and experimentation and that the Xbox One X will not get VR support until the technology is more mature.
Microsoft leaves the work to others
Three years later, Spencer is again answering the website and commenting on VR policy regarding the next Xbox console Project Scarlett.
Virtual reality is not a focus of the new console, says Spencer opposite Stevivor, Xbox would not be associated with Virtual Reality and customers would do not expect VR glasses.
"I have my problems with Virtual Reality: it's isolating and I think of gaming as a social experience. We respond to what our customers want and ... nobody wants VR, "says Spencer.
"Most of our clients know where to get a VR experience when they are looking for one. We see the sales potential on the PC and with other devices. " No one sell millions of VR glassesSpencer says. That's not quite true: Sony is expected by the end of the year almost five million sold Playstation VR come. This is not a commercial breakthrough, but not a full flop.
Sony wished for more VR competition in the past for an overall faster market growth, but obviously will not get from Microsoft. The VR breakthrough can still come, says Spencer, but bring this is not a focus at Microsoft.
Microsoft's next console will appear in the fourth quarter of 2020. For Playstation 5 is not yet PSVR 2 (all information) announced, however, the new console supports the old VR glasses.
Why I consider Microsoft's VR retreat to be a mistake, I have written down in this comment.
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Cover picture: Microsoft (screenshot on Youtube), source: Stevivor