The acquisition of Bethesda by Microsoft It is now official, and they have celebrated it with a round table in which key people from both companies show their opinion on the agreement. In it, the Xbox boss, Phil Spencer, has returned to speak on the subject of the exclusivities of Bethesda for Xbox, a matter on which there was no clear answer.
This time, the response has been much more forceful: “If you are an Xbox user, what you should know is that our goal is to offer exclusive games that reach all platforms where Game Pass is“That is, PC, Xbox Series X / S, Xbox One and Android. You can see it from minute 9:00 of the video.
However, this does not mean that all Bethesda games become exclusive to Xbox consoles. Spencer mentions other cases:
- Games already existing on other platforms that they will continue to support (such as DOOM Eternal, which still has DLCs to release).
- Games with agreements already signed on other platforms (Two examples are Deathloop and Ghostwire Tokyo, the closest new Bethesda games, both with temporary exclusivity agreements with PS5).
- Spencer's verbatim words: "Maybe even in the future there will be things like agreements or legacy (legacy) on other platforms".
This last sentence can be interpreted both to other games with contractual agreements signed on other platforms that we do not know, or even games whose legacy (previous installments of the saga) are on other platforms.
Therefore, the door remains open for sagas like DOOM or The Elder Scrolls to also come out on PlayStation or Nintendo beyond the Xbox or PC consoles, or Android through the cloud. Actually, it is early to know, but what is clear is that, at least for the long term, Microsoft's goal is that all future Bethesda games are exclusive to the platforms Game Pass is on.
At the moment, there are not many announced Bethesda games in the future. We have the aforementioned Deathloop and Ghostwire Tokyo, scheduled for this year, and with a temporary exclusivity of one year with PS5. Then, in the indeterminate future, we have The Elder Scrolls VI and Starfield, two great RPGs that never confirmed platforms, and that still seem very far away, so talking about whether or not they will come out on other consoles apart from Xbox would be speculation.
We also have the Indiana Jones game from Machine Games, which did not announce platforms either, although there was a third party involved (Lucasfilm Games) could have contractual agreements (And according to an insider, they would be prior to the agreement with Microsoft). This summer we should see more games in development from Bethesda.
Whatever happens in the future, it is clear that the present couldn't be brighter for Game Pass, because tomorrow 20 Bethesda games will arrive on Game Pass, most of them on all platforms (Xbox, PC and Android consoles).
And what if Game Pass reached other platforms? Spencer already hinted at Nintendo about including Game Pass on the Switch. It seems like a long shot ... although what seems more certain is that Game Pass will be included in smart TVs, as one more application, a potentially revolutionary concept ...
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