Phil Spencer: Xbox Wants to Help Bring Japanese Games to Players Around the World

During the Tokyo Game Show 2021 Xbox livestream Phil Spencer himself had an announcement to make and talked about the Japanese Xbox market.

On top of that, he announced that XCloud will release in Japan tomorrow, alongside Australia, Brazil, and Mexico.

Hi everyone, it’s great to be back, albeit virtually, at the Tokyo Game Show. I know it’s a big year for the show celebrating the 25th anniversary.

So I’d like to recognize and congratulate the CESA organizers and the supporters who have help making Tokyo Game Show one of the most influential and important events in global entertainment. I look forward to meeting in Tokyo in person again to celebrate our industry together.

Right now, I know we’re all more grateful than ever for the power of gaming to bring people together. The art form we all share unites us globally. At Xbox, we’re so thankful for the opportunity to help bring the joy and community of gaming to everyone on the planet.

At Xbox we also have a significant milestone this year: we begun our Xbox journey globally 20 years ago this November, and as I reflect on this two decades, I wanna thank the players in Japan and across the Asia region who helped support us over the years and have given us the opportunity to share your entertainment experience.

We’re humbled by the creativity and dedication of our partners who have included Bandai Namco, Capcom, Koei Tecmo, Konami, Sega, and Square Enix to name a few.

[…]

“We have always enjoyed wonderful support in Japan, and in recent years, Japan has emerged as the fastest-growing market for Xbox anywhere in the world.

This is one reason why I’m so pleased to announce here at Tokyo Game Show 2021 that we’re bringing Xbox cloud gaming to 4 new countries globally including Japan. And you don’t have to wait any longer. In these countries, we launch tomorrow. “

We also heard further comments from Spencer about the Japanese market later in the stream during a conversation with Tango Gameworks boss Shinju Mikami.

“The Tokyo Game Show is an important part of our commitment to the Japanese market and the Asia region overall. It’s an honor to support the show and our Japanese partners. We’re working with Japanese publishers every single day to increase our lineup of Japanese games on Xbox. We know it’s really important to fans and customers on Xbox.

We also added more than 100 titles in Game Pass from partners in Japan, and it has really helped the Xox community find games that maybe they haven’t played in the past through an easy mechanism, but it’s not about big developers.

We now have more than 200 Japanese developers in our ID@Xbox program, which really highlights the most creative independent games for broad audiences everywhere on the planet.

We’re also working to increase console supply. I know that’s a big issue. People want consoles and we’re constantly working to get more consoles into the market.”

[…]

“We’re excited by the growth of the Japanese gaming and we want not only to participate but to help bring Japanese games to players around the world.”

Speaking of Xbox Game Pass, Microsoft also announced that Scarlet Nexus and AI: The Somnium Files are joining the service today.