Xboxwas poised to have a spectacular first-party game output at the onset of the current console generation, with titles likeFable,Forza Motorsport,Halo Infinite,Avowed,Everwild,State of Decay 3, and more announced before the Series X/S even launched. To bolster this amazing lineup further,Xboxacquired massive publishers like ZeniMax and Activision Blizzard in later years. However, things pivoted in a dramatically different direction for Xbox after the latter acquisition, as the brand’s senior leadership officially confirmed in early 2024 that its first-party games will start showing up on rival platforms PlayStation and Nintendo.
Microsoft started withGrounded,Pentiment,Sea of Thieves, andHi-Fi Rushto test the multiplatform waters. The experiment evidently worked, as Xbox then confirmed PS5 versions ofDoom: The Dark Ages,Indiana Jones and the Great Circle, andThe Outer Worlds 2before the end of 2024. The rumor mill started spinning even faster as 2025 rolled around, with tentpole Xbox franchises likeHalo,Gears of War,Flight Simulator, and more purportedly heading to PS5 this year. While these rumors are unconfirmed, Xbox recently announced thatForza Horizon 5will launch on PS5 in spring 2025. Some might rejoice at this, but the open-world racer may very well be Xbox’s sneakiest Trojan Horse for the Sony platform.
Xbox May Intend to Dominate PlayStation from Within
Forza Horizon 5is arguably the most popular Xbox first-party game of the generation. Since its late 2021 release,Forza Horizon 5has attracted over 40 million playersacross Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, and PC, and no doubt been a desirable yet unattainable game for many PlayStation users up until now. Therefore, it comes as no surprise that the open-world racer’s PS5 launch in the coming months has generated incredible levels of hype.Forza Horizon 5didn’t take long to skyrocket among the trending games on the PlayStation Store, indicating that PS5 users are hitting the wishlist button at an unprecedented pace.
Seeing a prominent Xbox franchise likeForzaat such a high echelon on the PlayStation Store is surreal, but this could be exactly what Microsoft wants to achieve with its multiplatform push. Xbox Series X/S consoles are extremely far from matching, much less surpassing the PS5’s sales pace, but Microsoft can essentially “infiltrate” PlayStation on the software front by releasing its biggest and most desirable first-party games on the Sony platform.Sea of Thievestopping PlayStation’s European most-played chartsin April 2024 felt like a taste of this, and one can only anticipate thatForza Horizon 5would be majorly popular on PS5 as well.
Follow that up with therumored PS5 ports ofHalo: The Master Chief Collection,Gears of War: Ultimate Edition,Flight Simulator 2024, etc. throughout 2025, and it wouldn’t be too surprising if PlayStation’s most-bought and most-played charts for the year are heavily populated by Xbox first-party games. So, while Xbox is catching flak right now for relinquishing console exclusivity, it could win in the long run by carving out an all-new fan following from PlayStation’s user base and becoming the biggest publisher on the platform.
How PlayStation Might Lose Face as Xbox’s Multiplatform Initiative Expands
Aside from Xbox racking up sales and players on PS5, there’s also the intangible loss in repute Sony may experience by continuing to stick to the console exclusivity model. Many gamers, especially on the Xbox side, could develop a distaste for PlayStation if the platform holder sits idly by and never reciprocates whileMicrosoft ports game after game to PS5. Granted, PlayStation isn’t obligated to port its first-party games to Xbox consoles just because Microsoft is doing so, but with the latter brand championing the “play anywhere” concept by forsaking console exclusivity, Sony remaining committed to the model might send the opposite message to a lot of gamers and may ultimately end up hurting it.
