It was looking a bit bright for those who wanted to enjoy Microsoft video game title exclusives on the Nintendo Switch. In a recent announcement it was unveiled that Microsoft’s Ori and the Blind Forest was making its way to the Nintendo Switch platform, but don’t expect that to be a trend. It seems that going forward that Microsoft exclusives will remain Microsoft exclusives, at least for the foreseeable future. Regardless, it’s at least showing that Microsoft is willing to consider exclusives outside of just a Microsoft only platform.
Ori and the Blind Forest released back in 2015 so while this game has been around for several years now, it’s popular enough to warrant a release today for the Nintendo Switch platform. The game is slated to release on the Nintendo Switch platform on September 27, 2019, but according to a statement that was sent to Games Industry, it appears that the focus right now is pushing Microsoft exclusives for their own platforms.
“The past year has been an exciting time for us as we have more than doubled the internal creative teams making up Xbox Game Studios,” The company stated. “As these new studios transitioned in, we were aware of some existing commitments to other platforms and will honor them. However, going forward these new studios will focus on making games for our platforms. We have no plans to further expand our exclusive first-party games to other consoles. We continue to believe deeply in cross-play and progression of games with the right flexibility for developers to insure a fair and fun experience.”
The statement did mention that prior commitments to other platforms will be honored but anything new and announced afterward will be aimed towards the Microsoft’s own consoles along with the Windows platform. After all, the company has several studios under its umbrella so we’re likely going to see plenty of new and exciting title exclusives much like their latest creation, The Initiative which has yet to announce their debut title, but that could come during the upcoming XO19 event.
Source: Gamesindustry.biz