Head of Xbox Phil Spencer has expressed skepticism about NFTs in a new interview, describing them as "exploitive."
Speaking to Axios, Spencer said, "What I'd say today on NFT, all up, is I think there's a lot of speculation and experimentation that's happening, and that some of the creative that I see today feels more exploitive than about entertainment."
I asked Phil Spencer about NFT games. He said: “What I'd say today on NFT, all up, is I think there's a lot of speculation and experimentation that's happening, and that some of the creative that I see today feels more exploitive than about entertainment"
— Stephen Totilo (@stephentotilo) November 16, 2021
But he fell short of condemning the phenomenon entirely.
"I don't think it necessitates that every NFT game is exploitive. I just think we're kind of in that journey of people figuring it out."
The games industry so far has been split on the prospect of NFTs, or non-fungible tokens. On one end, EA CEO Andrew Wilson called NFTs and "play-to-earn crypto" games a "meaningful part in our future," though he neglected to say how. Other major companies such as Sega, Ubisoft and Epic Games have hopped on the trend. On the other end, Steam banned NFT games from its storefront in October.
As for whether NFT games will appear on the Xbox marketplace, Spencer says Xbox is on guard against potentially exploitive, and that the company will likely take things slow.
"I think anything that we looked at in our storefront that we said is exploitive would be something that we would, you know, take action on. We don't want that kind of content."
