thismeinteil
Member
Lol MS was never considering cancelling the Xbox division. If this were actually something they considered in 2015-2016, why is there only a single tweet from one person that can be referenced? Rumors that big with some bit of substance to them, would be getting reported on by everyone. Tons of journalists, Youtubers, IGN, Wired, Gamasutra, WCC, Forbes etc.
That should probably indicate there wasn't much smoke to that rumor, so no fire. But yeah, they were in a shitty place at that time and needed to rethink a lot of things.
They may have the dates wrong, as it was 2013-2014 when we heard the most noise about Xbox being spun off (which would have led to its death) or being sold off, but it did happen. Shareholders had been wanting MS to drop Xbox for a decade. They had never made up for the billions that they lost on R&D, selling HW at a loss, and RROD from the Xbox and 360. With Ballmer leaving, and a new CEO coming in, they thought they had a good shot at it happening. Bill Gates even stated that he was fine with spinning off the division into its own company. And without MS's resources, the company would have died. I believe it was rumored that one of the choices for CEO, Alan Mulally, would have done just that.
However, the new CEO, Nadella, chose to keep the Xbox division. Though, it was very obvious that he cut their budget drastically. Very few 3rd party exclusive games or DLC, whether timed or true. Many projects were scrapped. And ones that did finally release were mediocre, at best, with only a couple of exceptions that were actually good. A far cry from the 360 era. It is pretty obvious that they have an improved budget to start the next gen with. Of course, this is the norm. If the XBSX doesn't pan out, you can bet the budget will be cut, again. Or, at the very least, be taken from a focus on funding HW to more xCloud funding, where Nadella's true passion lies.