A few hours after Epic Games' co-founder Tim Sweeney slammed Microsoft's Universal Windows Platform in general , and its possible effects on PC gaming in particular, the company's Xbox division head Phil Spencer took to Twitter to offer his own response to Sweeney's comments.

In his editorial that was posted on The Guardian's website, Sweeney was critical of UWP apps only being available from the Windows Store by default, and not from third-party stores and websites. He feared that will make Windows more of a "closed garden" for PC developers.

On his Twitter account, Spencer stated:

"Windows has always been an open ecosystem welcoming the contributions of hardware and software partners, and will always continue to be. UWP is a fully open ecosystem, available to every developer, and can be supported by any store. Broad range of tools. We will discuss our next steps with the Universal Windows Platform at //build later this month."

Spencer also responded to a couple of fan's questions concerning Sweeney's statements;

"@TimSweeneyEpic is a friend and he pushes for what he believes. I agree UWP has to be open and that's what we are doing." "The feedback is great, even when it's negative, I read it and it impacts our plans. Thanks for being vocal."

Update; Spencer's comments did not go unnoticed by Sweeney, who responded on his own Twitter feed:

"I like the sound of this, and look forward to thorough technical details on UWP's planned openness at //build."

Source: Phil Spencer (Twitter)