Xbox Head Phil Spencer Says He Prefers Higher Frame Rates on Xbox Series X Over Resolution

Logan Moore January 28, 2020 4:49 PM EST

Phil Spencer has said that he wants the Xbox Series X to make for better gameplay experiences, not just ones where there are "more pixels up on the screen."

Even though the forthcoming Xbox Series X platform has already been confirmed to perform at resolutions up to 8K, it doesn’t sound like Xbox head Phil Spencer is all that focused on hitting those benchmarks if it comes at the cost of frame rate.

Speaking with Stevivor, Spencer recently made clear that even though the Xbox Series X will be a platform that can hit some incredibly high realms when it comes to resolution, he doesn’t want it to come at the cost of gameplay. “As we were looking at the future, the feel of the games was definitely something that we wanted to have more focus on, not just throwing more pixels up on the screen,” Spencer explained.

“I think we’ve reached a point with Xbox One X in the generation where games look amazing, and there’s always work we can do to look more amazing,” Spencer continued. “But I want games to feel as amazing as they look. We don’t have that in today’s generation, mainly because the CPU is underpowered relative to the GPU that’s in the box in order to reach a feel and frame rate and kind of consistency or variable refresh rate and other things that we want.”

While Spencer seems to personally prefer it if frame rate is prioritized over resolution though, he said that the team at Microsoft will never try to limit how developers can go about making their own projects. “We’ve never really tried to limit what developers are trying to do on our platform, whether it’s 60 frames per second on Xbox 360 or people doing 4K, 60 [frames-per-second] now on Xbox One X,” he made clear. “We want to give developers the tools to go try things that they want to go try on any of the hardware platforms and capability can be there for them to go try things.”

Personally speaking, I think I have to agree with where Spencer is coming from. While I love it when my games look pretty, I’d always prefer to go with the option that makes for the better gameplay experience. Especially considering how many action games I play, frame rate being prioritized over resolution is almost a must.

That said, I am wondering just how powerful Xbox Series X will be and how high it will allow developers to increase the resolution before it starts to come at the cost of frame rate. Based on the in-engine trailer we have already seen for Hellblade II: Senua’s Saga, it seems like the platform is going to be quite beefy. No matter what the limits of the Xbox Series X might be, games will absolutely look better than what we’ve grown accustomed to over the past few years.

Xbox Series X is set to release later this holiday season at a yet to be determined date and pricepoint. It will launch alongside 343 Industries’ Halo Infinite, which is also set to arrive on the Xbox One and PC.