Yesterday, Microsoft confirmed that they will be delaying Crackdown 3 again, this time into early 2018. There are many things that can be said about this delay and what it means for the overall state of Xbox’s games portfolio, some good, most of them not so good. However, Xbox boss Phil Spencer himself decided to chip in on the delay on Twitter.
“It’s always disappointing to move a date. We are very committed to shipping Crackdown 3 to the level of quality the fans deserve,” he said. Which is about as standard a response as you can expect from a company in a situation such as this. He has not come out and addressed how dire the state of Xbox exclusives is looking at the moment (as of right now, the only games Microsoft will have launched this year are Super Lucky’s Tale, Forza Motorsport 7, and Halo Wars 2)- but hopefully, his actions in the coming months speak louder than his tweets could.
That said, even as Microsoft themselves drop the ball on games, their third party partners are more than filling up for them. Speaking on Twitter, Spencer confirmed that third party support for the Xbox One has been far more than what he anticipated. Which is fair, more third parties seem to be rallying behind Microsoft on Xbox One X than did behind Sony on PS4 Pro. Microsoft definitely deserves some credit there.
Me 2, I looked at the current list of games doing work for X, exceeded what I thought we'd see. Partners are really supporting.
— Phil Spencer (@XboxP3) August 16, 2017
It's always disappointing to move a date. We are very committed to shipping @Crackdown 3 to the level of quality the fans deserve.
— Phil Spencer (@XboxP3) August 17, 2017
