Peter Moore: Inside Gaming’s Evolving Landscape

In a recent interview with IGN, Peter Moore, a former executive at Xbox and EA, delved into the current market dynamics of the console gaming industry and offered insights into its future trajectory. Moore, who held the position of President at Sega of America at the dawn of the 21st century, served as Vice President of Microsoft’s Interactive Entertainment Business until 2007, and later as Chief Operating Officer at EA until 2017.

During his conversation with IGN, Moore articulated his vision for the future of gaming consoles, suggesting that these devices are currently grappling with significant challenges from alternative forms of convenient entertainment, a concern that has been paramount in the gaming industry for some time. The advent of smart mobile devices has liberated gaming entertainment from the confines of the living room, leading to predictions as early as 2007 that the consoles of the time might be the last of their kind.

Reflecting on his tenure with Microsoft, Moore shared his belief that the company is undoubtedly exploring the future direction of its Xbox business, including the potential impact of either retaining or discontinuing the Xbox gaming console. However, he expressed uncertainty regarding Microsoft’s willingness to transform all Xbox operations into cloud services. Furthermore, in discussing Xbox’s recent move to bring some of its exclusive games to PlayStation and Nintendo Switch, Moore viewed it as an experimental phase for Microsoft, although he considered it unlikely that flagship titles like the Halo series would appear on other console platforms.

Moore also touched on the financial risks associated with launching new gaming console projects, which could potentially result in billions of dollars in losses for the industry’s major players—Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo. Nonetheless, he opined that Sony, primarily a hardware company, is poised to steer the future direction of the console gaming industry. He believes that the next generation of consoles will focus on “new features,” “expanding the current generation’s gaming experience,” and “leveraging AI to aid game development.”