Xbox pulls Gears video featuring a PS5 logo, 24 hours after announcing it as an exclusive
Pulled Xbox video appears to suggest exclusivity decision was made late
The official Xbox YouTube account has pulled a Gears of War: E-Day video after it was discovered it featured a PS5 logo.
The Xbox Podcast deep dive on E-Day was published on Monday and briefly featured a version of the latest trailer that incorrectly stated that the game was coming to Sony’s console.
On Sunday, Xbox announced the new Gears of War as an Xbox console exclusive, in a pivot away from its recent multiplatform strategy.
The PS5 logo slip-up in the Xbox podcast seems to support claims that the decision to make Gears an Xbox-only game was made at the last minute by its leadership team.
Update - Xbox comments
Xbox’s marketing boss, Aaron Greenberg, has denied the decision to make Gears Xbox exclusive was made at the last minute.
“I can confirm this is not true. We just limited the knowledge of this news to a very small internal group. Intention was to share this news first with our players and everyone watching showcase.”
On Monday, Xbox’s new chief strategist attempted to explain the decision to make Gears exclusive, alongside the RPG Clockwork Revolution, when in recent years it’s been pushing towards a multiplatform future.
“This is the start of a program,” Xbox’s Michael Ball said during The Game Business Live. “Players can expect a reliable pipeline that validates their historical investment in the Xbox platform, keeps them as Xbox players going forward. And everyone in the industry understands that exclusives are important to the growth and branding of that platform.”
“It was important for us to include two titles so that people understood this was not a one-off, it was not commemorative. We were not saying it’s our 25th anniversary, it’s Gears’ 20th anniversary, we’re returning to Xbox, here’s an exclusive.”
Xbox has said the two console exclusives announced on Sunday “are not timed exclusives”, suggesting there are no plans to bring them to PS5 in the future.
