Gears of War: E-Day and Clockwork Revolution are exclusive to Xbox consoles and PC; The Elder Scrolls 6 could follow.
Matt Booty, Chief Content Officer of Xbox, hinted at this in an interview with Variety after the Xbox Showcase 2026. With this move, new Xbox CEO Asha Sharma is correcting the previous course set by Phil Spencer, who in recent years had increasingly focused on opening the platform to PlayStation and Nintendo.
This isn't a complete 180-degree turn, however. Major live-service titles and games already announced for other platforms will remain cross-platform. The result is strategy changes on a monthly basis. From now on, the company will only disclose information about the exclusivity of individual titles once a concrete release date has been set.
Players will therefore have to wait anxiously until the final release date to find out which hardware a game will launch on. Booty justifies this step with the dynamic nature of game development, while management only plans within a twelve-month timeframe. No predictions beyond that are being made.
The Elder Scrolls 6: Playable, but behind closed doors
Bethesda's highly anticipated role-playing game, The Elder Scrolls 6, was completely absent from the showcase. According to Booty, a playable version of the RPG already exists. He personally tested the title during a studio visit at Bethesda and found it visually impressive.
Microsoft is deliberately holding back on the project. Their marketing strategy is to only present games in detail when the release date is imminent. Despite some concerns, development is proceeding according to plan, even if this means an indefinite wait for fans.
The new Xbox strategy is causing maximum uncertainty for hardware buyers. The era of reliable first-party exclusivity is over. Every game is negotiated individually. The fact that major projects like "The Elder Scrolls 6" are already in development internally only provides short-term reassurance to the community. As long as Microsoft remains tight-lipped about platform commitments until the final release date, the Xbox console remains a calculated risk for consumers.
Elder Scrolls 6 is exclusive and Bethesda is history.
Thanks to the acquisition, it's completely risk-free for Microsoft; if it fails, the studio will be sold off and go bankrupt. The reputational damage will also primarily affect Bethesda.
A shame, but predictable.
Microsoft should release everything exclusively, just like Sony.
Elder Scrolls will be 100% Xbox exclusive.
We still have no new information about The Elder Scrolls VI. It was revealed 8 years ago, and since then there has been radio silence.
Devian Lucifer's latest update was that he'd played it and publicly stated, "Stay tuned." He added that more would be shown later this year. After all, we still have Gamescom.
An Elder Scrolls 6 exclusive would be fatal.
Tobias Ströll is 100% coming.
They're waiting to see how things develop. If it turns out to be exclusive, I'll just pass. 🤷
Markus Schulz And why do without it?
Buying an overpriced Microsoft console just for a single game? Who does that?
I'd rather see Bethesda go bankrupt than have anything "green" in my living room. If only because of this artificial scarcity mentality. Disgusting, it can go.
There will be the occasional exclusive title. Most games will still be multiplatform. Everything will be available for PC and xCloud anyway. They're part of the Xbox ecosystem.
Elder Scrolls 6 will almost certainly be released on the PS5 as well.
Dirk Meletzky: No, I wouldn't be so sure anymore, now that they're focusing on exclusive games again to drive the Xbox division forward.
And TES 6 would cause the numbers to skyrocket.
I'd say the current chance is 50/50 🙂
Patrick Braune, you don't... but I'm sure of it, and that's what matters to me.
Dirk Meletzky: We might talk again when the time comes, but the fact is that it's currently not guaranteed to be released for the PS5, so just accept it 🙂
Elder Scrolls 6 will remain multiplatform.
More revenue for Bethesda.
Maxim Neumann of Microsoft said that the lower revenue and reduced sales don't matter to them and are simply accepted. Therefore, anything is possible. Unlike others, Microsoft can easily absorb this.
Marc Schmidt obviously doesn't care, especially if further layoffs are already planned to offset losses. Ms. wants to make money like any other company.
Markus Schulz: Yes, with a profit of 24 billion for the Xbox division and 129 billion for Microsoft overall, that's not necessary, and employees you don't need don't have to be paid anymore – that's perfectly normal when merging several corporations!
Marc Schmidt wasn't laid off because of the merger, but because they incurred massive losses with Game Pass. 🤷 How many more years after the merger are they going to keep using this specious argument?
The fact that the game hasn't been shown more yet is nothing new and also not surprising. After the incredibly low-level criticism leveled against the last BGS games before, during, and after their release (I was also part of that bubble!), it doesn't surprise me that they're adjusting their approach, and that's a good thing.
Bethesda will undoubtedly want to avoid any future missteps and release a game that will still be discussed years after its launch, whether in the obligatory staged outrage videos designed to generate clicks or to praise the high quality of its unique gameplay. The Elder Scrolls VI will certainly be significantly better than the already magnificent Starfield and will also appeal to a much wider range of gamers.
Microsoft would be as dumb as a doorknob if they hadn't learned from past mistakes, and Asha would sabotage their intended plan to get the brand back on track exactly where it happened in the past two generations if they didn't release the game exclusively on the upcoming Xbox.
Exclusively accessible quality sells a system, and I would be one of the first to place the new system next to my Playstation 6 solely for the sequel to one of the best RPGs of all time.