Starfield's sales on PlayStation 5 make me wonder why Xbox even bothered... was this worth devaluing exclusivity?

Starfield’s reported PS5 sales have surfaced via Alinea Analytics, a firm that often reports on game sales. While its estimates cannot be verified, the figures raise some obvious questions.

According to Alinea, Starfield has sold around 140,000 copies on Sony’s PlayStation 5. If accurate, that is a relatively weak showing for what is supposed to be Bethesda Game Studios' premier RPG and its first real new IP, whatever that actually means.

It also brings the exclusivity debate back into focus, which remains a constant talking point among Xbox fans and haters alike.

If accurate, 140,000 sales would put Starfield behind the likes of even The Outer Worlds 2 on PlayStation 5, which Alinea estimates has sold 160,000 copies. It would also fall further behind titles like Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 and Ninja Gaiden 4, both of which are said to have surpassed 240K copies on PlayStation 5.

With that said though, this is still early days for Starfield's PS5 release, and according to Alinea, the game is currently selling faster than those titles.

I’m not sure whether Alinea’s estimates are accurate or not, and realistically we’ll never know for certain unless Todd Howard descends from the heavens and confirms it himself. If the figures are correct, though, it does, at least to me, raise a bigger question about whether Xbox’s multiplatform strategy has actually been worth it.

It’s great that more players can access these games, and some Xbox titles have performed well, such as Sea of Thieves and Forza Horizon 5. At the same time, it does raise a valid concern about why someone would even invest in Xbox hardware if those same games are available elsewhere.

I’m not trying to say which approach is right or wrong here. I’ve largely moved to PC myself, but I still enjoy my Series X, especially for its extensive backward compatibility library going all the way back to the original Xbox.

For now though, it feels like Xbox fans are in a bit of a standoff, unsure what direction Xbox might take next. I’m genuinely more excited about the brand than I’ve been in a long time, and whether it commits to exclusives, leans on timed exclusivity, or does something totally different, I’ll be watching closely until we find out.

If you haven’t already, weigh in on the exclusivity debate yourself, and if you have, there’s no harm in doing it again for what is probably the millionth time if you’re anything like me.

Let me know your thoughts in the comments, and be sure to take part in our poll below!

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