One of the most surprising bits of news to come out of this year’s E3 was the fact that Microsoft had acquired five new studios, with one of them, The Initiative, being a brand new creation, and the other four including the likes of Playground Games and Ninja Theory. That is significant news, of course, because it immediately doubles the number of major studios that are part of Microsoft’s first party portfolio, and because the move hints at the fact that Microsoft are building toward a future generation where they can have better exclusive content.
Industry analyst Michael Pachter of Wedbush Securities certainly feels that way too. We recently asked him if these five new studios will help Microsoft in the next generation in any meaningful way, and Pachter responded by saying that they’re definitely going to beef up Microsoft’s next-gen launch.
“Yes, I think the five new studios are intended to beef up their first party content for a next generation launch,” he told GamingBolt. “I am not sure any of them is going to move the needle, but they’re all pretty solid developers, so Microsoft may have a good launch lineup.”
In the same interview with us, Pachter offered his two cents on when Microsoft might be planning to launch the next Xbox. He figures it might be 2020, but whenever it is, Microsoft are probably going to launch it before the PS5. Recently, Microsoft’s Matt Booty chimed in on their expanded first party as well, re-iterating the the publisher was confident that acquiring five new studios was the right move. And things are certainly going to continue in this vein- Microsoft’s CEO recently stated that the company is going to continue to heavily invest in its video games division. Based on their recent revenues, it’s not hard to see why.