Indy Is One of Xbox’s Most Important Games Ever

Ask social media for a list of the most important games Xbox ever put out and Indiana Jones probably isn’t even in the top twenty. And yet Indy is whipping way above his weight.

I don’t want to put undue pressure on this game. It’s looking like it’ll be a great time, and the developers are saying all the right things. This isn’t a “Starfield is Xbox’s last chance” situation.  That boat has sailed and is long over the horizon by now.

With this game, Xbox has a chance to look at the handling of a giant IP and at the results when it finally releases on PlayStation next year. These are really important for how the brand moves forward (a question nobody seems able to answer – even Xbox).

In a leaked email from a few years ago, Xbox chief Phil Spencer talked about the state of the industry. “You’ve seen a rise of AAA publishers using rented IP to try to offset the risk (Stars Wars with EA, Spider-Man with Sony, Avatar with Ubisoft, etc,” he wrote. “AAA publishers are milking their top franchises but struggling to refill their portfolio of hit franchises, most AAA publishers are riding the success of franchises created 10+ years ago.”

With Indy and Blade, Xbox has seemingly changed their tune. Renting IPs, for better or for worse, is the way forward. And why should it be for worse? Spider-Man was an amazing game that felt fresh in a struggling genre. Star Wars is having a golden moment in gaming. It’s a shame that that’s what it takes to make people play games, but it doesn’t have to be bad.

With Indy, Xbox will see how things work with rented IP. Firstly with their own players, and then on PlayStation.

When Indy Comes Along…

The impact on Sony’s console is going to be the most interesting thing out of all this. We might never know the full extent. Tens of millions of potential customers who would have barely given the game a second thought as an Xbox exclusive will be fed trailers and pictures of a game they can actually buy. It will sell as well as any other AAA tie-in sells on PlayStation.

This is a test. I’ve seen people talk about holding it back six months for exclusivity purposes and for practical reasons. The latter makes sense – porting is a job, and it’s a job the team behind Indy weren’t necessarily expecting. But ultimately these problems are usually solved by throwing money at them. It could have been on PlayStation day one if that’s what Microsoft wanted. They could have spent enough to make it happen, or delayed the Xbox version. And who cares about exclusivity when there are billions to be made?

Indy is a test. It’ll show how angry people get about Game Pass Ultimate, about the port. It’ll show how well the FOMO works for PlayStation players over that six months, and the impact on day one sales over there. If the future of the Xbox brand really does rely on this game, it’s in the detail. The data behind Indy will be examined with interest.

And while there will be no great surprises (they’re not likely to put the genie of PlayStation releases back in the bottle no matter what happens), it’s the detail that will help us understand just what is going to happen on Xbox both this generation and beyond.