Microsoft Gaming head honcho Phil Spencer says 'I don't like expansions that are manipulative... like, the third level you cut before you launched'

Microsoft Gaming chief Phil Spencer has been doing a few interviews as 2024 draws to a close, celebrating Microsoft's generally strong lineup of games over the year while also warning that the PC-heavy lineup is "historical" and an "anomaly" following the $69 billion Activision-Blizzard acquisition.

Spencer's focus at the moment is talking up the strength of Xbox's lineup while flogging Game Pass, and moving towards a "Play Anywhere" marketing line that will see Xbox games work across a variety of devices. It's Game Pass that feels like the real driver right now, however, with the recent launch of Black Ops 6 the first time a Call of Duty title has been available day one on the subscription service. But that's part of a wider slew of offerings that, for the moment at least, tend to exclude most DLC and expansions across the slate.

In a new interview with newsletter GameFile, reporter Stephen Totilo pointed out to Spencer that three of Microsoft's nine fall releases are expansions: Diablo 4's Vessel of Hatred, World of Warcraft's The War Within, and Starfield's Shattered Space. Given that the Game Pass model is the blindingly simple subs, subs and then more subs on top, Totilo suggested that expansions are becoming more important revenue-wise, with Microsoft able to hive off paid expansions for popular titles and then offer them to a captive audience. This isn't small beans: Shattered Space was a $30 release while Vessel of Hatred was $40.

Spencer says there's no "top down mandate" on expansions, but then that's exactly what he would say from the top. "It's really left to the creators what plan they have for their stories. I think it's a great way for us to re-engage players who may be lapsed."

Big Phil points out that Vessel of Hatred offered a new class in Diablo 4, while Shattered Space added a new world to Starfield, both being of obvious interest to existing players.

"I don't like expansions that are manipulative," said Spencer. "I want it to have a unique point of view. I don't want it to be, like, the third level that you cut before you launched.

"But we're always learning. Todd [Howard] and I were talking about Shattered Space. Starfield is a game I put a ton of hours into and really love, but they've had this thing where they've added features throughout the year and then they had an expansion. I think some of the feedback on the expansion is: 'We wanted more features.' And he's like, 'Well, should we have waited to put buggies out?'"

The buggies arrived shortly before the paid expansion, and were free for existing players, though I'm not sure they're the slam-dunk response to player issues that Howard and Spencer think. Not least because the buggies were, essentially, solving a traversal problem where the game's treks between locations can be extremely boring.

Anyway, Spencer goes on to talk about balancing "both development effort and the impact of the expansion" when managing Microsoft's portfolio in this respect, ending on the note that "not every game will do expansions."

The odd element is that idea of expansions being exploitative. Players are rarely happy about the pricing of any expansion (unless it's free) but the better examples quickly win over the crowd: For many people, this year's GOTY may well be Elden Ring's $40 Shadow of the Erdtree expansion. When I think "exploitative" I don't think of expansions for games like Diablo 4 or Starfield so much as the pattern followed by the likes of the Sims, with constant minor DLCs and a nickel-and-diming approach generally.

Shattered Space didn't seem to go down tremendously well or offer a huge amount of new content but, even then, I wouldn't call it "exploitative" or muse too much about the balance between the free buggies and the paid stuff. The truth is more banal: People will smile and fork over for great expansions without complaint. Maybe Starfield's expansion just wasn't a very good one.