If there's one thing Microsoft is lacking, it's major first-party game franchises.
With the exceptions of "Minecraft," "Halo," and "Forza," the portfolio of hit franchises owned by Microsoft is slim. And even if such franchises existed, Microsoft owns only so many studios capable of producing blockbuster games.
That's why Microsoft bought five game studios.
"We know that we want to create new franchises," Spencer told Business Insider in June. "We really thought we needed five or six new teams and products that we really believed in."
Spencer announced the quintet of studio purchases on stage in June as part of the company's presentation outlining the future of Xbox.
"We are committed to building an industry-leading first-party studios organization," Spencer said on stage. "And we are making one of our greatest single-year investments in teams by adding five new creative studios."
Why not buy one big publisher, like EA or Activision, with a bunch of major game franchises? It's complicated, but here's Spencer's answer: "I couldn't find a collection out there in one entity to do it."
Later in 2018, Microsoft announced the acquisition of two more studios: Obsidian Entertainment and Inxile Entertainment. That brings the grand total up to seven new studios under Microsoft's gaming umbrella.