Microsoft Gaming CEO Phil Spencer has made a statement regarding the company’s plans for an Xbox game-streaming device, codename Keystone. He’s saying the team decided to rework the unit this past May because it was proving to be costly.
Spencer spoke to The Verge’s Decoder podcast, as transcribed by VCG, saying Microsoft opted to focus more on building the new Samsung smart TV Xbox app, shifting away from Keystone for now due to higher costs than what was expected.
The Series S is priced at $300, so the delta between the S and the streaming device would need to be “pretty significant” commercially, according to Spencer. He added the Keystone device, whenever it launches, will likely cost between $100-$130. Spencer has a desire to include a controller with this device, making it difficult to reach that price point.
“I think you’ve got to be $129, $99, like somewhere in there for that to make sense in my view, that we just weren’t there. We weren’t there with the controller. And I love the effort,” Spencer said. “The reason it’s on my shelf is the team rolled up their sleeves and in nine months they built that thing. And a bunch of us took it home and it worked. It worked really, really well.”
Spencer also said Keystone was designed as a standalone unit, meaning it required everything to be “bespoke.” In the end, costs for “some of the silicon choices” Microsoft was making at the time has resulted in the halt of the project for now.
Microsoft still plans to release a streaming Xbox device, but it won’t be anytime soon.
