‘Pick Your Lane’: Former Xbox Execs Question Its Current Strategy

The industry is bracing for a number of reported, upcoming Xbox layoffs, coming in the wake of enormous transformations for the brand, many of which may not be panning out as anticipated.

All these changes and the current state of Xbox have caused a few former executives to chime in about the situation.

The first is Laura Fryer, who posted a 13-minute video titled “The Future of Xbox” talking about the issues. Fryer is a former Xbox executive and part of the team that made the original Xbox console. Here’s what she said about hardware specifically:

“It's one year from the 25th anniversary of the Xbox, and it looks like they're abandoning pretty much everything that made the Xbox brand great in the first place,” said Fryer. “Let's start with the handheld announcement. I've seen mixed reactions and that has me really puzzled because I don't see any reason why anyone would buy this piece of hardware. Just like the original Xbox, it's built on Windows, a slimmed-down version of Windows, but it's still Windows. So, this isn't something new.”

“There is literally no reason to buy this handheld. Obviously, as one of the founding members of the Xbox team, I'm not pleased with where things are today. I don't love watching all of the value that I helped create slowly get eroded away. I'm sad because, from my perspective, it looks like Xbox has no desire or literally can't ship hardware anymore. So, this partnership is about a slow exit from the hardware business completely. Personally, I think Xbox hardware is dead. The plan appears to be to just drive everybody to Game Pass.”

Within a day, the former corporate VP of Xbox and ex-Activision Blizzard head Mike Ybarra also chimed in on Twitter:

"Tough to see Xbox confused about who it is and what it should be. Some great people there still. They have to figure out what needs to change …. and fast. I’m a big fan and will always bleed green. Cheering the team on from the sidelines. Pick your lane and stick to it."

Then, responding to a fan about the “everything is an Xbox” strategy:

“You're drinking the Kool-Aid. You ask anyone on the street what Xbox is and 99% of the time they say a video game console. That is the identity. Period.”

Even current Xbox executives like Phil Spencer have said that Xbox has lost the console war, which is why they’re pursuing these new avenues of cross-platform game distribution, cloud streaming and a fundamental push of Xbox Game Pass.

But from the outside, it’s easy to see all the holes in this, including the ones mentioned by Fryer and Ybarra. Microsoft has started branding non-Xbox hardware as Xbox-adjacent, like the handheld, and now a recent, temporary VR partnership. They rely on pushing the cloud streaming concept to other devices. They have jacked up prices of Xboxes so high in the wake of tariffs that it’s almost like they don’t want to move hardware. They maintain they will still make another console generation after this one and have already been teasing it, but other aspects of this strategy, giving most or all first-party games to PlayStation and pushing Game Pass eternally which is clearly running into a subscription ceiling, resulting in major problems that are easy to spot. But it’s even more pointed if this is something if even former executives are calling this out.

Hopefully these imminent layoffs are not going to be as bad as predicted, and it’s clear something needs to change. Again.

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