Xbox’s Matt Booty teases 'other new' Xbox games after showcase
Head of Microsoft Studios Matt Booty teased a few more new Xbox games in addition to what the team showed at the 2023 Xbox Games Showcase. Booty made the comments in a roundtable interview that GLHF attended after the showcase and said he’s “feeling pretty good” about where Xbox is sitting at the moment.
Booty naturally didn’t say what these projects might be, though he did say it’s part of Xbox’s goal to release at least four first-party games per year.
“Those [upcoming announced] games sit on top of the games that we've already got such big communities around – our service games, games like Minecraft games, like Elder Scrolls, Flight Simulator,” Booty said. “In the last five years, we have shipped 10 games that have over 10 million players life to date each.”
“So we've got 10 games that have built communities of up to 10 million people. And when you add that up across Bethesda, across Xbox Games Studios, we've got over 100 and 50 million monthly players, so 100 and 50 million across first party.”
Booty said Xbox uses those numbers to measure success based on how many people the studios are bringing into the Xbox ecosystem, which CEO Phil Spencer said is twice the number of people who played Xbox games during the 360 era.
For the rest of 2023, Booty is counting on Forza Motorsport and Starfield to bring in new players, while 2024 is where he says “it really kicks into gear.” Xbox’s planned releases for 2024 include Towerborn, an action game from the makers of The Banner Saga, along with Hellblade 2, Flight Simulator 2024, Avowed, and those other, unnamed projects Xbox has yet to announce.