Phil Spencer didn't technically lie about Starfield or Indiana Jones exclusivity

Did Xbox Gaming CEO Phil Spencer lie about Indiana Jones coming to PlayStation 5? No, not technically.

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Back in February 2024, Xbox made a controversial decision to bring four of its first-party Xbox games over to PlayStation and Nintendo platforms. It was the first time Microsoft had broken exclusivity with key first-party games that were specifically designed to launch on Microsoft platforms (Xbox consoles and Windows PCs). But as time as proven, it wouldn't be the last.

Xbox management made the announcement through a roundtable interview with executives Phil Spencer, Sarah Bond, and Matt Booty. In that video, Xbox's CEO Phil Spencer was asked point blank if Starfield and the new Indiana Jones and the Great Circle were among those four games that were breaking exclusivity. Spencer said that no, Starfield and Indiana Jones were not among them.

Fast-forwarding to yesterday's announcement that Indiana Jones and the Great Circle is indeed coming to PS5 in Spring 2025, gamers across the internet have accused Phil Spencer of lying.

But he technically didn't lie. The CEO was asked if Starfield and Indiana Jones were among those four games selected to break exclusivity at the time. We know now that these games weren't among the selection--the four games were Sea of Thieves, Grounded, Hi-Fi Rush, and Pentiment.

"Can we say if either of those titles are Starfield or Indiana Jones," host Tina Amini asked Spencer.

"They are not Starfield or Indiana Jones," Phil Spencer said at the time. "I think when we say what those four titles are, then it'll make sense.

Technically, he was right. Indiana Jones and Starfield weren't part of that specific selection of four games.

While that's a technicality, it certainly felt that Spencer was saying these games would stay on Xbox. That's what a lot of headlines ran with, us included. It felt like a done deal. But that's the real issue here--business decisions in the tune of billions of dollars are typically not conducted with feelings. Like any business, the interactive entertainment industry is decidedly profit-oriented--just take a look at the companies at the top of the list who routinely conquer their rivals with live service microtransactions in the tune of billions of dollars in revenues.

It's worth noting that Microsoft does not own Indiana Jones, and is merely licensing the property from Lucasfilm, a subsidiary of Disney. And it's also worth remembering that Microsoft made $77.5 worth of acquisitions since 2021 with the buyout of ZeniMax ($7.5 billion in 2021) and Activision Blizzard King ($70 billion in 2023), so profit maximization is at the forefront of Xbox's main goals.

Here's what Phil Spencer said at the FTC v Microsoft evidentiary hearing in June 2023:

"Gaming runs as a standalone profit and loss business inside of Microsoft.

"We have a commitment to the company and the board to run a profitable business. We are effectively a standalone business.

"The commitments that I make to the board around financial return of any acquisition, especially one of nearly $70 billion, I look at it as critical to my job function to deliver on the results that I commit to the board and the company, and manage an effective and growing business.

"There's no part of our business where I get to lose money over time. The overall part of our business of gaming has to be a profitable growing part of our business..."

A big part of maximizing profits is selling content and services across as many platforms as possible, hence the wide expansion onto competing cloud platforms like NVIDIA GeForce Now as well as smart TVs, and of course selling key first-party games onto gaming's largest console platform.