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A new rumour suggests Project Helix will have physical media-friendly features.
"Hello everyone and welcome back to another GRTV News. Today we are going to be talking a little bit about a rumour that started circulating in regards to Xbox. Obviously one of the big topics of conversation this summer has been Sony's decision to end the production of physical media for PlayStation starting in January 2028. And we've seen lots of different reports and rumours in regards to how Xbox and how Microsoft are going to fit into that equation."
"And seemingly Microsoft isn't going to be moving away from physical media support as of yet. They still have a plan in place to a degree. But anyway, this is the latest rumour on that topic so let's dive on in and let's go from there.
So yeah, rumour Microsoft leans towards continued disc support and the next generation. Digital Foundry expert John Linneman, it sounds like Microsoft was actually very much going to continue disc support. It's been a month since Sony announced the somewhat shocking news that they will be phasing out physical games as of January 2028. Even though a clear majority of all games are sold digitally today, many people are strongly critical of the move."
"Among other things, concerns have been raised that PlayStation consoles aren't particularly backward compatible, that the only opportunity to buy games at a lower price will disappear and that Sony doesn't provide adequate protection for digitally purchased products while your physical games won't work at all. Michael Futa, co-founder of the gaming industry consultancy F-Squared recently stated that Sony's decision to stop selling physical games is extremely anti-consumer. Sony however is standing its ground and as recently as Friday announced that the decision is final. Many have believed that Nintendo will be the only company to continue supporting physical games in the future since Microsoft was an early adopter of digitally downloaded games. But so far nothing has been said about Project Helix and physical discs and now Digital Foundry expert John Liderman is weighing in on the discussion. He says he's not at all convinced that Microsoft will phase out physical games in the next generation. On the contrary, his latest information suggests that Project Helix will support discs. I'd heard from a couple of sources, but at least before the current Xbox reset, I don't know where it is now, it sounds like Microsoft was actually very much going to continue disc support. Not because they value retail disc sales, but because they wanted to ensure that all of your Xbox games are still playable on the new Xboxes."
"What Liderman is referring to is the Positron programme which makes it possible to convert your physical games into digital licences. This would allow you to play, for example, your old Xbox 360 games on both PC and Project Helix, but to do so you'd need a disc drive so your old games would work. He continues, I think that might all tie into this disc and digital stuff as well, but I get the feeling that they might actually, especially given their reaction, I'm not saying they're going to solve problems, but I do see a future where Microsoft actually supports discs going forward for users that want to take their library with them, or Sony just completely cuts people off. In short, the final word doesn't seem to have been said on whether Project Helix will support physical games, hopefully we'll hear more this autumn as Microsoft has an event planned to celebrate the Xbox's 25th anniversary. How important is it to you that the next Xbox has a disc drive?
I do think, when you consider the back compatibility work that Xbox or Microsoft has put in over the years for Xbox, I think it would be unusual for them to sort of abandon physical media support entirely. There's a lot of back compatibility that is reliant on the physical side of things, and if you cut the physical media, you lose access to all of that good stuff. PlayStation on the other hand, again, they've never been particularly good at supporting last generation well, anything really, on their latest hardware. So yeah, I don't know whether we'll see the next Xbox launch in two variants, not like a Series X and a Series S, but similar to what PlayStation did, in that there will be a digital version of the console that is probably pushed as the primary one these days, but if you do want to get a disc drive, then maybe there's like an option to install an external disc drive or something like that so people can tap into it. Because again, there's a good reason to be frustrated about this decision from Sony, because in many ways it is anti-consumer, in fact it affects so many different parts of the game's business, particularly at retail level. That being said, there is clear data that the majority of people, and we're talking like 90 plus percent of players, tend to go for digital media these days. So would it surprise me to see Xbox launching its next console as a digital first sort of system? Not at all, not at all, because it's just what the consumer trend is pushing for these days. But we'll see, we'll see. Again, it's all rumours, none of it's confirmed yet. Xbox is 25, or turns 25 this year, so there are rumours as well, it's thought there's going to be a big sort of event later this year, sort of November time, when they'll look at the future of Xbox. Maybe this is when we'll get to meet Project Helix properly. The only thing you would say is that because of the RAM crisis and the price of things, I don't know whether they're going to be rushing to get Project Helix out the door."
"You know, the Xbox Series X got its hardware, well it got its pricing, well Xbox Series as a whole actually got its price increase in the UK and Europe over the weekend, and now they're incredibly expensive. That's £640 or something for an Xbox Series X. It means that a Project Helix is going to cost an absolute fortune, so I don't know whether they're going to be rushing to get these consoles out the door, because they're not going to be cheap to make, and I don't think you're going to be seeing a lot of people adopting them either when they're priced as high as they are. But we'll see, a lot of moving parts. Otherwise that's all the time I have on today's episode of GeoTV News, but I will be back now tomorrow for the next one of the week, so thank you for joining me, and I'll see you all on the next one. Take care everyone."
