Xbox Game Studios head Matt Booty on VR and AR Market
Xbox Game Studios head Matt Booty believes that the virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) market is currently too small for Xbox to invest in. Despite the successes seen by Sony since entering the industry in 2016, Booty says Xbox considers console games that reach around 10 million total players as successful. However, this scale is not currently feasible in the VR/AR market.
“So Microsoft, obviously a very large company, with the way we assess any investment is, is the market size large enough to justify the investment?” Booty explains. “Typically, our metric for success is around 10 million players. And I want to say this very carefully, but I think that there’s a challenge in today’s VR and AR market to actually get to that scale of audience. So that’s why we’re a lot more cautious about investing in VR and AR concepts right now.”
Booty acknowledges that Xbox's regular console projects, such as Halo Wars 2, have been successful, but he points out that the player bases for VR titles are not comparable. He states, “They’re just not anywhere close to that scale yet. And I’ll say that Halo: Recruit was awesome, but we’re not looking at VR as a result of that.”
Xbox launched Halo: Recruit at the 2022 Game Developers Conference, a simple 3D shooter based solely on the brand. Although the game received mostly positive reviews and managed to earn over $10 million by the end of 2022, Booty states that it is not enough to change Xbox's cautious approach to investing in VR and AR.
In contrast, Sony has been investing in VR since 2016. While some of its popular titles, such as Blood Oath and Carrie’s Mission, have reached the 10 million player mark, the PlayStation VR2 has not sold anywhere near that number. Sony has struggled to maintain high VR sales figures, despite surpassing the original PS VR during its launch window.
Xbox is an investor in Skydance Interactive, the creator of The Walking Dead, which is releasing various VR games. However, Booty suggests that Xbox is not putting money into the VR market due to its cautious nature.
“It’s still niche. If you’re talking about the gaming industry, VR games are still far from reaching 10 million players on a regular basis,” Booty explains. “Whereas the traditional console game business is a proven, successful model that’s not going to change for the foreseeable future.”
The VR market is currently small, but with technologies such as the HTC V1 and V2, PlayStation VR, and Oculus Quest costing significantly less than regular consoles and providing the same quality gameplay experiences, many console titles may not be suited for virtual reality.
While Microsoft may be successful with its regular console line, Sony, Valve, and numerous indie developers have made significant moves in establishing VR games as a real genre, despite the existence of numerous poor experiences. Xbox may be waiting for more console-sized investments to enter the market, but with games like Vampire Nightcraft II making top Google Play charts without the backing of a big studio, that could be a long wait.
