Those high profile Xbox One policy reversals? Nothing to lose sleep over, according to Xbox Europe vice-president Chris Lewis. Speaking to MCV in a new interview, Lewis insists that the next generation Xbox is performing well despite the abandoning of Microsoft's original digital strategy, which would have obliged users to sign in every 24 hours in order to ascertain game ownership.
"That said, we want to offer consumers choice, including physical discs and being able to do all the things that they want with those physical discs. We want to be available in any format that our consumers are looking for. We've always been very committed to consumer choice."
Some have attributed the "failure" of Microsoft's original digital plan to miscommunication rather than any inherent flaws, which is a credible-sounding line of thinking. Perhaps most notably, Xbox execs gave differing, partial accounts of how game trading would work on Xbox One back at reveal, cue a sizeable backlash.
"As a business, the minute we don't listen to our customers attentively, and adapt and react in an appropriate way, then we would be in a dangerous place," Lewis observed, when asked whether Microsoft could have stuck to its guns. "I love the fact that we are reactive and agile in that way. We remain true to our vision - digitally and physically - and we are genuinely in an enviable position versus anyone else in being able to deliver that. I wouldn't trade places with anybody.