The DFC Intelligence report reveals that despite a huge sales advantage between the two consoles, Microsoft could succeed thanks to Game Pass.
With a new generation of consoles in the making, major market research firms are beginning to publish their first reports of expected sales for PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X, which have already presented much of their initial battery of games at two summer events. . At the moment, the company DFC Intelligence has already published its forecast of what will happen in the next generation, and that is that the Sony console will exceed the sales of its competitor by 2 to 1, which however does not mean that Microsoft’s strategy is not going to be successful. Let’s see why.
Both will win, in their own way
“In recent months it has become clear that Sony and Microsoft follow two very different strategies in the industry,” the report begins. “The upshot is that PS5 will sell significantly more than Xbox Series X, but Microsoft may have the long-term victory plan nonetheless.”
According to DFC, the public has a very good perception of Sony and PlayStation, with Xbox being “a brand only popular in English-speaking countries, without relevance in Japan and with very little in Europe”, highlighting that “there is nothing that Microsoft can do to change that. ” Still, the plan of the North American company with Xbox Game Pass may pay off.
“Game Pass and Project xCloud are two subscription services that are platform agnostic,” the report continues. “As we have discussed, Game Pass is an extremely attractive service that could be a very important growth vehicle for Microsoft, which in fact does not require an Xbox Series X. The big challenge is informing Game Pass consumers. Recently, many they have realized that Game Pass does not include the Xbox name, and causal consumers are generally unaware that an Xbox system is not required. ”
This leads DFC to conclude that Microsoft might even have an advantage in terms of attracting new players. “There is limited competition in video games. Companies like Amazon, Apple, Google and Samsung have not proven themselves as serious competition,” they say. This opens up space for Microsoft to find a middle ground in which to reach a more diverse audience.
Meanwhile, and although we already know both the technical characteristics of both consoles, as their first-time catalog, a section that will also be critical for the success of PS5 and Xbox Series X is yet to be revealed, such as its price.
