Phil Spencer: video games industry to feel impact of pandemic in early 2021

Many video games companies are reporting unprecedented profits due to users’ increased engagement amid the pandemic. However, this doesn’t mean that the industry is immune to the ongoing crisis. In fact, the impact of coronavirus on the video games production will become obvious in the early 2021.

This is coming from Xbox head Phil Spencer who spoke to Business Insider.

“Through the summer, early fall? I feel pretty good about those games. Games that were targeting a year from now or beyond? There’ll be some impact, but they’ll be able to react,” said Spenser.

COVID-19 made sure that studios can’t do motion capture (“mocap”) or big audio work as those require physical presence in studios.

In any case, Spenser reiterated that Xbox Series X is still on track to arrive this holiday season. Other things surrounding the launch, he admits, might be moved a little bit. As for the industry in general, Xbox leader is optimistic.

“I’m pretty confident in the industry’s ability to continue a steady flow of games coming out. There’s just a lot of games in production across the industry right now, and I think we’re going to be — as an industry — we’re going to be fine. I’m bullish on what this means in the long run for games, even if there’s a certain impact to a certain launch window for certain titles that we might see.”