Xbox Game Studios conquers market with 23 first-party dev teams

Microsoft isn't playing by Sony's rules any more, and plans to conquer gaming by saturating the market with content. Now its 23 dev teams are ramping up projects to populate its console, PC, and service offerings.

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Today Microsoft made a big move against its competitors. It bought Bethesda for $7.5 billion, acquiring titanic IPs like Fallout, Doom, and Elder Scrolls as well as studios like Bethesda Game Studios, id Software, Arkane, and more. This follows two years' worth of acquisitions for its Xbox Game Studios banner, which now sits at 23 studios compared to Sony's 15.

The idea here is Microsoft is buying up studios to add value to its cross-platform Game Pass service. The subscription is now so powerful it's defining the Xbox brand and has convinced Microsoft to pay triple for Bethesda than it did for Minecraft back in 2014. At the time of writing, Xbox Game Pass has more than 15 million paid active subscriptions, and grew nearly 5 million subscribers since April 2020.

To illustrate just how big Xbox Game Studios has become, we made a handy list detailing the full Xbox Game Studios roster and what projects they're working on.

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1. Turn10
2. RARE
3. 343 Industries
4. The Coalition
5. Mojang
6. The Initiative
7. Ninja Theory
8. Undead Labs
9. Compulsion Games
10. Playground Games
11. inXile Entertainment
12. Obsidian Entertainment
13. World's Edge
14. Double Fine Productions
15. Bethesda Game Studios
16. ZeniMax Online Studios
17. Bethesda Softworks
18. id Software
19. Arkane Studios
20. MachineGames
21. Tango Gameworks
22. Roundhouse Studios
23. Alpha Dog