Microsoft says selling more Xbox One S units than X next year has ‘always been the plan’

Microsoft’s E3 press conference may have been all about the power of Xbox One X (previously Project Scorpio) this year, but Xbox boss Phil Spencer still expects the company to sell more Xbox One S units over the next twelve months than the Xbox One Xs.

Speaking with Eurogamer,Spencer said one of the main reasons why it showed such a wide range of titles during its presentation was to emphasise the variety of the Xbox ecosystem.

"The majority of our consoles that are sold next year will be S. That has always been the plan," he said. "That’s why S launched last year, the way it looks, that is the console that will drive most of the volume for us in pure unit sales.

"If you’re a customer who’s just looking to get into this console generation, Xbox One S is a great console for you. If you’re somebody who wants the premium experience with all the fidelity we can bring with the most powerful console, Xbox One X. So we’ve got the value and we’ve got performance and compatibility across the line."

Indeed, Spencer said he saw Sony’s PS4 Pro as a "competitor" to the One S rather than the X when asked about the $100/100 price gap between each platform holder’s high-end console offering.

He also confirmed that Microsoft will have the marketing deals for Assassin’s Creed Origins and Middle-Earth: Shadow of War, but said he "wasn’t a fan" of deals that hold back exclusive content from other platforms.

"I don’t think it’s good for our industry if we got into a point where people are holding back the technical innovation of game developers based on a marketing deal," he added.