Xbox is making good money, but only by selling games on PlayStation. Microsoft's decision to stop exclusive has earned it $667 million

Xbox continues to strengthen its position in the gaming industry, but thanks to the sale of its own games on PlayStation. Microsoft's gaming division has already earned more than $667 million from this, said analyst Rhys Elliott of Alinea Analytics.

The sales leader was Forza Horizon 5, a former Xbox exclusive that was released on PlayStation 5 last year. The racing simulator sold 5.8 million copies on Sony consoles, bringing Xbox $323 million.

Another hit is Sea of Thieves, one of the first games released as part of the initial porting strategy. It sold 2.7 million copies on PlayStation and brought in almost $100 million. In addition, this game demonstrates good long-term audience retention: it has 300,000 monthly active users on the PS5.

Rhys Elliott separately notes Indiana Jones and the Great Circle with sales of 537,000 copies on PlayStation 5. Xbox earned $37 million on this. The game, which was released on Sony consoles just four months after its Xbox debut, has already surpassed its Steam version in sales.

The top also included Ninja Gaiden 4 and Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024, which sold over 250,000 copies on PS5, and the revenue from sales of each of these games on Sony consoles approached $20 million. Sales of Starfield, which appeared on the PS5 quite recently, also continue to grow and have already exceeded 200 thousand copies.

However, despite some successes, Xbox is still far from being called a financially successful division of Microsoft. In the last fiscal quarter, hardware revenue decreased by 30%, while total Xbox revenue fell by 5%. Asha Sharma stated that the division is aware of the need to do a lot of work to provide for every player today and in the future.

Do you think we'll see major Xbox exclusives in the future, given such sales of games on third-party platforms?