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According to Mat Piscatella, executive director at The Game Business and Circana, Xbox should expect more ports in the future. In an interview with Christopher Dring from The Game Business, Piscatella discussed video game and hardware sales for June 2025. During this period, the Nintendo Switch 2 became the fastest-selling gaming hardware in US history, and Forza Horizon 5 was one of the top-five selling games on PlayStation in the US.
Piscatella explained that people now buy console systems due to their ecosystems and friend lists rather than exclusive titles. He stated, “We’re way beyond the point where exclusives will make someone transition consoles. People are entrenched into their systems, and bringing content to them is the only way to win.”
He continued, emphasizing that publishers and developers must bring games to where players are. In the US, the top ten live service games consume half of all gaming time each month, leaving other games with a smaller share. Piscatella noted, “Forza being this strong… that’s great. That really bodes well for its next iteration if they come out day one across systems.”
Live service games dominate player engagement globally, as seen in Newzoo’s reports. Recent releases have potential to crack the top-10 list of best-selling games, but the top-10 for player engagement are consistently the same.
Xbox has not succeeded in attracting players to its platform this console generation and is now trying to reach them where they already play. Even PlayStation has adopted this strategy by porting its games to PC. Nintendo remains the last platform that can still convince players to buy into it for exclusive games, a trend likely to continue in the foreseeable future.
Christopher Dring predicted that Xbox will port more of its games to Nintendo Switch 2 and PS5 in the coming weeks, which is a common-sense expectation as we approach Gamescom 2025.
📚 Reading Comprehension Quiz
According to Mat Piscatella, what factor is more important than exclusive titles when consumers choose a gaming console system?
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