Xbox Boss Phil Spencer told Waypoint that Microsoft intentionally held off from showing teaser trailers of titles set to come in the next few years. The reason being is that he did not feel as if that would be the best move for the company at this time. Sony made a similar gesture at its conference holding back announcements as well. For Microsoft however these unannounced games will still be in development for the next few years or so, and he wanted to focus more on games that are going to be releasing between this year and the next.
Spencer has made a couple of controversial decisions as the head of Xbox such as the closing of Lionhead Studios, and more recently the cancelation of Scalebound, the high profile project that was announced back at E3 2014 and shut down in January of this year.”We are investing in new things,” Spencer said. “We’ve signed things just recently. I thought about, ‘Hey, from a PR standpoint it’d be really easier for me to put a trailer on screen even though I know the game’s not coming for 2.5 or 3 years.’ I didn’t want to do that.”
Acknowledging that announcing some of these titles would have reassured fans to buy into the brand knowing that more games are coming to Xbox, he didn’t want to tease titles too far in advance. He did go on to express the importance of investing in new content. “We are investing in new things,” Spencer said. “We’ve signed things just recently. I thought about, ‘Hey, from a PR standpoint it’d be really easier for me to put a trailer on screen even though I know the game’s not coming for 2.5 or 3 years.’ I didn’t want to do that.”