PlatinumGames has announced The Wonderful 101: Remastered will be released for Nintendo Switch, PS4 and Steam on May 19 in North America and May 22 in Europe (no Australian release date available at time of writing). This is being referred to as a "general" release date and, to our knowledge, backers of the game's Kickstarter that paid to receive a copy of the game will still be receiving it in April as stated on the crowd-funding campaign's page. [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2020/02/26/the-wonderful-101-remastered-release-date-clip"] In a message to fans, the original version's director, Hideki Kamiya, thanked fans for supporting the game after its commercial failure on Wii U, saying, "I’m considering this a chance to show it to the world again. I’m looking forward to seeing how it measures up." He adds: "This isn’t just a simple port, either. We’ve tuned the controls for each new platform and made several adjustments that should make it easier to grasp and play. On top of that, we’ve improved the image quality and frame rate to suit modern hardware. On the whole, I’d say The Wonderful 101: Remastered is the definitive edition of the game!" The Wonderful 101: Remastered has seen a wildly successful Kickstarter campaign, asking for just under £38,000 ($50,000 USD) and receiving £1.4 million ($1.8 million USD) with 9 days still to go. That success has unlocked a number of stretch goals, including a separate 2D game, Luka's First Mission, and a Steam port for Switch exclusive Astral Chain. [widget path="global/article/imagegallery" parameters="albumSlug=the-wonderful-101-remastered-kickstarter&captions=true"] The Wonderful 101: Remastered was the first of 4 annoucements teased by PlatinumGames. The second has also been announced today - Project G.G. is a new Hideki Kamiya game, a spiritual follow-on from TW101, and is the studio's first fully self-published game. We awarded the Wii U version of The Wonderful 101 a 7.4 review, calling it "a charming, boisterous and deceptively complex action game". [poilib element="accentDivider"] Joe Skrebels is IGN's Executive Editor of News, and he loves The Wonderful 101, aside from its horrific use of Wii U rumble. Follow him on Twitter.

5G connectivity and 8K video seems to be the running theme of the most recent smartphone announcements and the LG V60 ThinQ 5G promises to deliver both of these features at a bargain. Okay, the exact pricing for the V60 ThinQ 5G is still under wraps, but LG told us it should cost less than the existing V50 Thin-Q, which originally retailed for $999. If the final pricing falls somewhere between $699 and $899, this could be one of the best value devices around. [widget path="global/article/imagegallery" parameters="albumSlug=lg-v60-thinq-5g-hands-on-impressions&captions=true"] Even without knowing what the price tag will look like, the LG V60  ThinQ 5G looks like a great smartphone and an impressive upgrade. For starters, it features a 6.8-inch OLED display with an extra tall 20.5:9 aspect ratio and FHD+ (2,460 x 1,080) resolution. LG has also replaced the wide notch found on the V50 ThinQ 5G with a waterdrop notch similar to the one found on the OnePlus 7T. The LG V60 ThinQ 5G display gets even better when you double it with the Dual-View case that will be included for free during its initial release. This special case gives you a second 6.8-inch OLED display to run two apps at the same time, play games on one screen with a virtual game pad on the other, or just split what you’re viewing across the two screens. Around back you might notice the LG V60 ThinQ 5G only has two cameras, whereas the previous version had three. Well LG has simplified its camera setup with a 13MP Super Wide and a 64MP main camera. The main camera does the most heavily lifting of letting you shoot photos at full resolution, pixel binning low-light shots to 16MP when you need to capture more light, and giving you the ability to crop in 2-10 times with only a marginal loss in image quality. Normally we’re not fans of digital crop zooming, but we were genuinely impressed by how much image quality was retained as we punched in. LG also promises the two cameras can capture more realistic 3D photo effects and attain accurate focus faster thanks to a newly integrated time of flight sensor array. Aside from stills, the LG V60 ThinQ 5G will allow you to shoot 8K videos with HDR10+ colors. Additionally, the phone comes equipped with four microphones to power Voice Bokeh, which sets the microphones to pick up in a faux-cardioid pattern to minimize background noise and boost the subject’s voice. In terms of specs, the LG V60 ThinQ is powered by the latest Qualcomm Snapdragon 865 processor you’ll find on all of the major 2020 flagship phones. This central chip is also backed up by 8GB of  RAM and 128GB of storage that comes standard, and you can further expand your data storage space with an up to 2TB microSD card. Lastly the phone comes with a 5,000mAh battery, which LG promises can regain 50% of its charge by plugging it in for just 30 minutes. LG plans to release the LG V60 Thin-Q with a dual-screen case in the coming weeks. [poilib element="accentDivider"] Kevin Lee is IGN's Hardware and Roundups Editor. Follow him on Twitter @baggingspam

5G connectivity and 8K video seems to be the running theme of the most recent smartphone announcements and the LG V60 ThinQ 5G promises to deliver both of these features at a bargain. Okay, the exact pricing for the V60 ThinQ 5G is still under wraps, but LG told us it should cost less than the existing V50 Thin-Q, which originally retailed for $999. If the final pricing falls somewhere between $699 and $899, this could be one of the best value devices around. [widget path="global/article/imagegallery" parameters="albumSlug=lg-v60-thinq-5g-hands-on-impressions&captions=true"] Even without knowing what the price tag will look like, the LG V60  ThinQ 5G looks like a great smartphone and an impressive upgrade. For starters, it features a 6.8-inch OLED display with an extra tall 20.5:9 aspect ratio and FHD+ (2,460 x 1,080) resolution. LG has also replaced the wide notch found on the V50 ThinQ 5G with a waterdrop notch similar to the one found on the OnePlus 7T. The LG V60 ThinQ 5G display gets even better when you double it with the Dual-View case that will be included for free during its initial release. This special case gives you a second 6.8-inch OLED display to run two apps at the same time, play games on one screen with a virtual game pad on the other, or just split what you’re viewing across the two screens. Around back you might notice the LG V60 ThinQ 5G only has two cameras, whereas the previous version had three. Well LG has simplified its camera setup with a 13MP Super Wide and a 64MP main camera. The main camera does the most heavily lifting of letting you shoot photos at full resolution, pixel binning low-light shots to 16MP when you need to capture more light, and giving you the ability to crop in 2-10 times with only a marginal loss in image quality. Normally we’re not fans of digital crop zooming, but we were genuinely impressed by how much image quality was retained as we punched in. LG also promises the two cameras can capture more realistic 3D photo effects and attain accurate focus faster thanks to a newly integrated time of flight sensor array. Aside from stills, the LG V60 ThinQ 5G will allow you to shoot 8K videos with HDR10+ colors. Additionally, the phone comes equipped with four microphones to power Voice Bokeh, which sets the microphones to pick up in a faux-cardioid pattern to minimize background noise and boost the subject’s voice. In terms of specs, the LG V60 ThinQ is powered by the latest Qualcomm Snapdragon 865 processor you’ll find on all of the major 2020 flagship phones. This central chip is also backed up by 8GB of  RAM and 128GB of storage that comes standard, and you can further expand your data storage space with an up to 2TB microSD card. Lastly the phone comes with a 5,000mAh battery, which LG promises can regain 50% of its charge by plugging it in for just 30 minutes. LG plans to release the LG V60 Thin-Q with a dual-screen case in the coming weeks. [poilib element="accentDivider"] Kevin Lee is IGN's Hardware and Roundups Editor. Follow him on Twitter @baggingspam

PlatinumGames has officially announced its first self-published game, Project G.G. Directed by Hideki Kamiya, it will be a spiritual follow-up to Viewtiful Joe and The Wonderful 101. Project G.G. (a working title) will be a 'giant hero' game in the vein of Ultraman. No platforms or release date have been announced – in fact, Kamiya says "the finish line is still a long way away". The initial teaser trailer, below, shows a man (from the viewpoint of an excellent dog) transforming to fight a kaiju amid a cityscape: [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2020/02/26/project-gg-teaser-trailer"] Project G.G. is a major step for Platinum, which has always partnered with publishers for its work until recently. While the Kickstarter for The Wonderful 101 on Switch was a start, this is the developer's first fully self-published title, and it will be developed at a new 100-person studio in Tokyo that Platinum is currently staffing up. In a message to fans, Hideki Kamiya said: "In the fourteen years since we founded this company, we’ve worked towards the dream of making and releasing a game based on a Platinum intellectual property. Now, we’re finally stepping up to that starting line." He explains that because of restrictions based on other companies owning Platinum's work, sequels and new platform releases have historically been hard or impossible for the developer to push through. "Project G.G. is different", he goes on. "Unlike any of the games we’ve made so far, it’s going to be a 100% PlatinumGames title. For everything from its setting and characters, to its game design and story, to how it’s promoted – PlatinumGames is in full control." [widget path="global/article/imagegallery" parameters="albumSlug=project-gg-new-platinum-game-first-images&captions=true"] Project G.G. is the second of four game announcements teased on the Platinum website - it's not clear when we'll hear about the others. The first was a release for The Wonderful 101: Remastered, and we also found out today that that game will be released for Switch, PS4 and Steam in North America on May 19, Europe on May 22, and Japan on June 11. [poilib element="accentDivider"] Joe Skrebels is IGN's Executive Editor of News, and he's very much hoping that 'G.G.' stands for 'gigantic gorilla'. Follow him on Twitter.

PlatinumGames has officially announced its first self-published game, Project G.G. Directed by Hideki Kamiya, it will be a spiritual follow-up to Viewtiful Joe and The Wonderful 101. Project G.G. (a working title) will be a 'giant hero' game in the vein of Ultraman. No platforms or release date have been announced – in fact, Kamiya says "the finish line is still a long way away". The initial teaser trailer, below, shows a man (from the viewpoint of an excellent dog) transforming to fight a kaiju amid a cityscape: [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2020/02/26/project-gg-teaser-trailer"] Project G.G. is a major step for Platinum, which has always partnered with publishers for its work until recently. While the Kickstarter for The Wonderful 101 on Switch was a start, this is the developer's first fully self-published title, and it will be developed at a new 100-person studio in Tokyo that Platinum is currently staffing up. In a message to fans, Hideki Kamiya said: "In the fourteen years since we founded this company, we’ve worked towards the dream of making and releasing a game based on a Platinum intellectual property. Now, we’re finally stepping up to that starting line." He explains that because of restrictions based on other companies owning Platinum's work, sequels and new platform releases have historically been hard or impossible for the developer to push through. "Project G.G. is different", he goes on. "Unlike any of the games we’ve made so far, it’s going to be a 100% PlatinumGames title. For everything from its setting and characters, to its game design and story, to how it’s promoted – PlatinumGames is in full control." [widget path="global/article/imagegallery" parameters="albumSlug=project-gg-new-platinum-game-first-images&captions=true"] Project G.G. is the second of four game announcements teased on the Platinum website - it's not clear when we'll hear about the others. The first was a release for The Wonderful 101: Remastered, and we also found out today that that game will be released for Switch, PS4 and Steam in North America on May 19, Europe on May 22, and Japan on June 11. [poilib element="accentDivider"] Joe Skrebels is IGN's Executive Editor of News, and he's very much hoping that 'G.G.' stands for 'gigantic gorilla'. Follow him on Twitter.

Rian Johnson has let slip an industry secret about how the presence of an iPhone in a movie could serve as an early indication as to whether a character is going to be a hero or a villain. Speaking to Vanity Fair, the Knives Out director shared a helpful tidbit for moviegoers, as he revealed that Apple imposes a strict rule that prevents their products from being used by villainous characters in movies. [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2019/11/20/knives-out-rian-johnson-on-why-daniel-craig-is-his-perfect-detective"] "I don't know if I should say this or not," he admitted. "Not 'cause it's lascivious or something, but because it's going to screw me on the next mystery movie that I write, but forget it, I'll say it. It's very interesting. Apple, they let you use iPhones in movies but - and this is very pivotal if you're ever watching a mystery movie - bad guys cannot have iPhones on camera." Johnson then joked that "every single filmmaker who has a bad guy in their movie that's supposed to be a secret" will now want to "murder" him, as he has divulged the details of a prop spoiler that could potentially help audiences to figure out the on-screen motivations of certain characters before they are officially revealed by the movie's plot. [widget path="global/article/imagegallery" parameters="albumSlug=59-movies-to-geek-out-over-in-2020&captions=true"] While it is unknown whether any other companies operate a similar mandate over product placement, fans will now be donning their sleuthing hats to identify which character is using an Apple-branded product in Knives Out 2, though they will have to try and not get distracted by the whole new cast, mystery, and location that has been proposed for the sequel. [poilib element="accentDivider"] Adele Ankers is a Freelance Entertainment Journalist. You can reach her on Twitter.

Rian Johnson has let slip an industry secret about how the presence of an iPhone in a movie could serve as an early indication as to whether a character is going to be a hero or a villain. Speaking to Vanity Fair, the Knives Out director shared a helpful tidbit for moviegoers, as he revealed that Apple imposes a strict rule that prevents their products from being used by villainous characters in movies. [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2019/11/20/knives-out-rian-johnson-on-why-daniel-craig-is-his-perfect-detective"] "I don't know if I should say this or not," he admitted. "Not 'cause it's lascivious or something, but because it's going to screw me on the next mystery movie that I write, but forget it, I'll say it. It's very interesting. Apple, they let you use iPhones in movies but - and this is very pivotal if you're ever watching a mystery movie - bad guys cannot have iPhones on camera." Johnson then joked that "every single filmmaker who has a bad guy in their movie that's supposed to be a secret" will now want to "murder" him, as he has divulged the details of a prop spoiler that could potentially help audiences to figure out the on-screen motivations of certain characters before they are officially revealed by the movie's plot. [widget path="global/article/imagegallery" parameters="albumSlug=59-movies-to-geek-out-over-in-2020&captions=true"] While it is unknown whether any other companies operate a similar mandate over product placement, fans will now be donning their sleuthing hats to identify which character is using an Apple-branded product in Knives Out 2, though they will have to try and not get distracted by the whole new cast, mystery, and location that has been proposed for the sequel. [poilib element="accentDivider"] Adele Ankers is a Freelance Entertainment Journalist. You can reach her on Twitter.

Harmonix, which kicked off the music gaming renaissance via Guitar Hero and Rock Band that filled our homes with rock music, and our closets with plastic instruments, is back with another appealing attempt at keeping the beat alive. Fuser, set for launch on PS4, Xbox One, PC, and Nintendo Switch this fall, shows the clear DNA of the studio’s older games like the original Guitar Hero, while blending in some of the music mixing innovation of its recent board game DropMix, for a unique experience that looks to emphasize player choice in every aspect. Fuser’s campaign will put players in the position of a DJ headlining a series of rocking festivals, but this is not about Harmonix finally offering up a competitor to Activision’s DJ Hero. Instead, Fuser is about, well, players fusing together tracks from the promised library of over 100 songs to keep the crowd entertained, satisfy mid-set requests, and achieve new high scores. [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2020/02/26/fuser-announcement-trailer-from-the-makers-of-rock-band"] You do that by mixing together different strands of each particular track on four different disc plates. Start off by choosing, say, the drumline to Lady Gaga’s “Born This Way,” mix in the bassline to Billie Eilish’s “Bad Guy,” throw in the guitar line of Blue Oyster Cult’s “(Don’t Fear) the Reaper,” and layer on top the vocals of….Smash Mouth’s “All Star,” if you’re me at least.

We Got the Beat

Each track featured in the game has four different stems (some mix of vocals, guitar, bass, keyboard, percussion, etc.) you can choose from, and outside of early tutorial-lite suggestions and requests (which I’ll get to in a bit), it’s up to you to mix and match to taste. Harmonix’s music mixing tech – something it showed off so well in the board game DropMix – is kind enough to all the artists involved to make everything sound cohesive, even in a weird mix like the one I described above. There’s an incredible joy in testing different track parts together to find a mix I really grooved with. Though Fuser’s full launch includes a freestyle mode so you can experiment to your heart’s content, while playing a show in the campaign, as I did in the tutorial level, there are some rules to adhere to if you’re interested in scoring well. Throughout the level – which is playable at PAX East 2020 – the audience shouts for specific elements to be thrown into the mix, and completing these timed objectives contributes to your overall score. [widget path="global/article/imagegallery" parameters="albumSlug=fuser-screenshot-gallery&captions=true"] Requests pop up as you’re playing, with requests for an ‘80s track, or a hip-hop song, or the vocals of Lizzo’s “Good as Hell.” You can ignore them and a little text will pop up expressing their disappointment, but if you’re a score chaser like myself or any long-playing Rock Band fan, you’ll want to satisfy those requests ASAP. Smartly, Harmonix has found plenty of little touches to evoke the key elements of music into the gameplay, since you’re not just trying to beat match a guitar riff or drum pattern anymore. For example, above your virtual DJ plates is a beat counter, measuring out the beat and tempo of the song. Dropping a new track on a beat can earn you more points, even though dropping a track on an offbeat could occasionally be an objective. [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2020/02/26/fuser-3-minutes-of-gameplay"] Things get increasingly more complex, and evocative of musicality, in more difficult levels. I was shown a hands-off demo of a much later level, in which objectives included things like changing the key and BPM of a song, hitting on specific beats, satisfying a freshness meter, and more. Watching this level was like watching someone play Guitar Hero on expert for the first time — I knew pretty instantly if I took the controller I’d be fumbling requests, mixing, and more. But I could easily understand the natural progression from what I played to what I was shown, and it had me eager to train up to get there.

Your Song, Your Artist

One of Harmonix’s most intriguing selling points that I only saw a sliver of in the demo was the extrapolation of self-expression at the core of the music mixing. Harmonix really wants to emphasize the player’s power in bringing this DJ fantasy to life through a host of customizable elements. The DJ themselves is entirely customizable, including hair, tattoos, and more. Even the venue can be adjusted to your preferences, from what’s projected onto stage screens to the beach balls being bounced around the audience. (When asked about future DLC content, Harmonix declined to state post-launch plans, instead emphasizing how fully-featured the developers are planning for the launch game to be.) There will even be the option for players to custom-make their own loops that can be implemented as tracks instead of the officially licensed music. I only saw a brief inclusion of it in the hands-off level, but I appreciate Harmonix’s ambition to have its latest music experience revolve around player creativity, not just the creativity of the musicians included. I’m excited by the potential of Fuser from what I saw in my demo, even if many of Harmonix’s plans were more tell than show. Still, the escalation from the tutorial to the advanced stage demonstrates a clear attempt to recapture the magic of jumping from Easy to Expert on the plastic guitar. I’m eager to chase that loop again. Coupled with the customization options, and the joy of mixing music in an environment meant to encourage choices, and Fuser is setting the stage for a comeback I’m eager to take part in. As a longtime music gaming fan, I’m all for seeing a resurgence of it, especially if the barrier to entry doesn’t involve a lot of plastic instruments. And I can’t imagine anyone better suited for the task than Harmonix. [poilib element="accentDivider"] Jonathon Dornbush is IGN’s Senior Editor, Podcast Beyond! Host, and The Beatles: Rock Band is one of his favorite gaming experiences ever. Talk to him on Twitter about your favorite music gaming setlists on Twitter @jmdornbush.

Harmonix, which kicked off the music gaming renaissance via Guitar Hero and Rock Band that filled our homes with rock music, and our closets with plastic instruments, is back with another appealing attempt at keeping the beat alive. Fuser, set for launch on PS4, Xbox One, PC, and Nintendo Switch this fall, shows the clear DNA of the studio’s older games like the original Guitar Hero, while blending in some of the music mixing innovation of its recent board game DropMix, for a unique experience that looks to emphasize player choice in every aspect. Fuser’s campaign will put players in the position of a DJ headlining a series of rocking festivals, but this is not about Harmonix finally offering up a competitor to Activision’s DJ Hero. Instead, Fuser is about, well, players fusing together tracks from the promised library of over 100 songs to keep the crowd entertained, satisfy mid-set requests, and achieve new high scores. [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2020/02/26/fuser-announcement-trailer-from-the-makers-of-rock-band"] You do that by mixing together different strands of each particular track on four different disc plates. Start off by choosing, say, the drumline to Lady Gaga’s “Born This Way,” mix in the bassline to Billie Eilish’s “Bad Guy,” throw in the guitar line of Blue Oyster Cult’s “(Don’t Fear) the Reaper,” and layer on top the vocals of….Smash Mouth’s “All Star,” if you’re me at least.

We Got the Beat

Each track featured in the game has four different stems (some mix of vocals, guitar, bass, keyboard, percussion, etc.) you can choose from, and outside of early tutorial-lite suggestions and requests (which I’ll get to in a bit), it’s up to you to mix and match to taste. Harmonix’s music mixing tech – something it showed off so well in the board game DropMix – is kind enough to all the artists involved to make everything sound cohesive, even in a weird mix like the one I described above. There’s an incredible joy in testing different track parts together to find a mix I really grooved with. Though Fuser’s full launch includes a freestyle mode so you can experiment to your heart’s content, while playing a show in the campaign, as I did in the tutorial level, there are some rules to adhere to if you’re interested in scoring well. Throughout the level – which is playable at PAX East 2020 – the audience shouts for specific elements to be thrown into the mix, and completing these timed objectives contributes to your overall score. [widget path="global/article/imagegallery" parameters="albumSlug=fuser-screenshot-gallery&captions=true"] Requests pop up as you’re playing, with requests for an ‘80s track, or a hip-hop song, or the vocals of Lizzo’s “Good as Hell.” You can ignore them and a little text will pop up expressing their disappointment, but if you’re a score chaser like myself or any long-playing Rock Band fan, you’ll want to satisfy those requests ASAP. Smartly, Harmonix has found plenty of little touches to evoke the key elements of music into the gameplay, since you’re not just trying to beat match a guitar riff or drum pattern anymore. For example, above your virtual DJ plates is a beat counter, measuring out the beat and tempo of the song. Dropping a new track on a beat can earn you more points, even though dropping a track on an offbeat could occasionally be an objective. [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2020/02/26/fuser-3-minutes-of-gameplay"] Things get increasingly more complex, and evocative of musicality, in more difficult levels. I was shown a hands-off demo of a much later level, in which objectives included things like changing the key and BPM of a song, hitting on specific beats, satisfying a freshness meter, and more. Watching this level was like watching someone play Guitar Hero on expert for the first time — I knew pretty instantly if I took the controller I’d be fumbling requests, mixing, and more. But I could easily understand the natural progression from what I played to what I was shown, and it had me eager to train up to get there.

Your Song, Your Artist

One of Harmonix’s most intriguing selling points that I only saw a sliver of in the demo was the extrapolation of self-expression at the core of the music mixing. Harmonix really wants to emphasize the player’s power in bringing this DJ fantasy to life through a host of customizable elements. The DJ themselves is entirely customizable, including hair, tattoos, and more. Even the venue can be adjusted to your preferences, from what’s projected onto stage screens to the beach balls being bounced around the audience. (When asked about future DLC content, Harmonix declined to state post-launch plans, instead emphasizing how fully-featured the developers are planning for the launch game to be.) There will even be the option for players to custom-make their own loops that can be implemented as tracks instead of the officially licensed music. I only saw a brief inclusion of it in the hands-off level, but I appreciate Harmonix’s ambition to have its latest music experience revolve around player creativity, not just the creativity of the musicians included. I’m excited by the potential of Fuser from what I saw in my demo, even if many of Harmonix’s plans were more tell than show. Still, the escalation from the tutorial to the advanced stage demonstrates a clear attempt to recapture the magic of jumping from Easy to Expert on the plastic guitar. I’m eager to chase that loop again. Coupled with the customization options, and the joy of mixing music in an environment meant to encourage choices, and Fuser is setting the stage for a comeback I’m eager to take part in. As a longtime music gaming fan, I’m all for seeing a resurgence of it, especially if the barrier to entry doesn’t involve a lot of plastic instruments. And I can’t imagine anyone better suited for the task than Harmonix. [poilib element="accentDivider"] Jonathon Dornbush is IGN’s Senior Editor, Podcast Beyond! Host, and The Beatles: Rock Band is one of his favorite gaming experiences ever. Talk to him on Twitter about your favorite music gaming setlists on Twitter @jmdornbush.

Xbox boss Phil Spencer recently talked about where he thinks Microsoft will take gaming in the future, beyond the next-gen Xbox Series X, specifically when it comes to business models, monetisation, and cloud streaming services.

Spencer joined Insomniac Games CEO Ted Price for an hour-long episode of the AIAS Game Maker's Notebook podcast to discuss "what lies ahead for Xbox and Project xCloud, thoughts on monetization," among other topics.

One major topic centred around whether he thinks the industry will move from console wars to cloud wars in the future. "I hope not," was his immediate reply. "I think I'm going to have a game console plugged into my television for the next decade plus," he added. "I think the best way for me to play on my television is going to be having a device that downloads the games I want to play, but sometimes I'm not going to be in front of my television, sometimes I'm not in front of a device that has a native capability to play. That's our bet on cloud."

[ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2020/01/31/ps5-xbox-series-x-power-increase-is-substantial"]

Microsoft, Google, PlayStation, Nvidia, and the rest of the competitors moving towards game streaming services still have a lot to learn when it comes to monetisation and input, according to Spencer. But his hope is that it will encourage game developers to be more creative with their games in the future.

"Once you get through the pragmatics of making [a game] playable on [multiple screen sizes] then you get to the promise," Spencer said. "You start talking about 'well wait a minute, now if my game isn't just dependent on this one piece of hardware that someone maybe bought five years ago in the home, but actually something that a large cloud provider is updating on the back end and is scalable, then what can I do with our games?'. That is a very cool future up and down. How do we scale the cloud computer to the creative experience that somebody wants to deliver?"

Spencer also thinks that rather than having one machine that plays games, in the future, we'll have multiple devices in the home that we play games on. He looks at how he can listen to music and watch TV on a number of devices these days, whereas in the past it was just one. This is why Spencer thinks you'll have many game-playing machines under your TV and across multiple rooms going forward.

[ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2019/04/16/phil-spencer-talks-e3-project-xcloud-and-the-future-of-xbox"]

"One of the things that's always bummed me out about consoles is I usually have one TV in my house that a console is plugged into... The idea that I can't go to any TV in my house and sit down and play the games I wanna go play - we should have that ability."

That is, apparently, what Spencer is already seeing people do with the Microsoft xCloud preview. "The number of people that send me pictures of their Android tablets that they've mounted in certain places and have certain controls set up," he said. "People going out and buying specific devices so they can use remote play, or different streaming scenarios from their console to different screens. I think we're early on in that journey. It's gonna be fun."

Another important part of that journey for Spencer is coming up with new business models. "Our point of view, as Xbox and Microsoft, is that there's not one business model to rule them all. We actually think it's healthy not only for our industry from a monetisation standpoint, but also from a creative standpoint, if multiple business models will work," Spencer said. "I think for us as an industry we should embrace monetisation dexterity because I think it leads to the best creativity."

[widget path="global/article/imagegallery" parameters="albumSlug=xbox-console-power-levels-compared&captions=true"]

Thinking on how business models need to diversify in the future, Spencer explained that he recently went to Africa, where they have a business model based on earning credit. His example was that you watch an advert on a bus or taxi, and that earns you five minutes of time on the internet, which he called "pay to earn, or play to earn." As to how this kind of model would work in gaming, Spencer isn't exactly sure, but he says it could definitely work.

"Could that be a model that works in games? Well absolutely. I think it could," Spencer said. "I dunno if it's gonna completely mirror the business models that we have today. It's not necessarily free-to-play, it's not necessarily ad-funded, it's something different."

However, Spencer also said that he thinks game developers need to be careful when looking into new business models. He warns against finding new ways to get money out of existing players - the 200 million console owners that currently exist - as that's not actually growing the business and is "dangerous" for the industry. Instead, he urges towards attracting new players. "I think we need to find new players and new forms of monetisation to open up those new player bases, and new ways to build games, new creativity, and that's a great path to growth," he said.

The more immediate plan for Microsoft is get the Xbox Series X into the world as it launches in holiday 2020. So far, Microsoft has revealed features that prove the Xbox Series X will be a powerful machine with 12 teraflops of GPU power, making it capable of supporting 120fps. It's also got a small but enticing lineup of launch games which will be supplemented by the system's backwards compatibility. But what makes this generation of consoles different to previous ones are features like Play Anywhere and Project xCloud which, as Spencer said in the podcast, are future visions of gaming beyond the Xbox Series X.

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Chris Priestman is a freelancer who writes news for IGN. Follow him on Twitter.