On June 18, Capcom revealed that it’s porting the beloved arcade fighter Marvel Vs. Capcom 2—as well as six other Marvel arcade games—to modern consoles. But, the new collection won’t be released on Xbox consoles, continuing a trend that has some Xbox fans worried.
During today’s massive Nintendo Direct, Capcom announced Marvel vs. Capcom Fighting Collection: Arcade Classics, a new retro bundle of popular fighting and brawling games. As mentioned earlier, MvCFC:AC includes Marvel Vs Capcom 2, a true fan-favorite pixel art fighting game from 2000 that hasn’t received a proper console port in over a decade. So a lot of people are extremely excited to play MVC2 and the other games in this new bundle. However, Xbox players will have to watch from the sidelines.
As confirmed by Capcom, the MVC Fighting Collection will only be available on PlayStation 4, Switch, and PC. This has been noted by Xbox fans online, who aren’t happy about the decision.
“THIS IS WHY YOUR FANS ARE PISSED! BECAUSE WHEN XBOX MOVE GAMES TO OTHER PLATFORMS, WE STILL DON’T GET GAMES COMING TO XBOX IN 2024,” tweeted one totally not angry player in response to Capcom’s tweet confirming the lack of an Xbox port.
Kotaku has reached out to Capcom and Xbox.
MVC Fighting Collection is far from the first game to skip Xbox in the last two years. Megaman Battle Network Legacy Collection, Final Fantasy Pixel Remaster, The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles, Monster Hunter Stories, and Gundam Breaker 4 have also skipped Microsoft’s console.
Limited Run Games, famous for remasters and physical ports of older titles, has also occasionally skipped Xbox. In early 2024 two games—Felix the Cat and Rocket Knight Adventures Re-Sparked—only arrived on PlayStation and Switch. Limited Run’s CEO explained on Twitter that this decision was made because Xbox gamers just don’t buy many physical games. There was also the weird situation of Resident Evil 4's fancy 2023 remake, which skipped Xbox One, but still arrived on PS4. The horror remake did arrive on Series X, however, so it didn’t fully skip Microsoft’s home console.
Still, it’s becoming more and more common for third-party games to skip Xbox. This lines up with a previous report that suggested some publishers aren’t sure if it’s still worth it to release games on Microsoft’s home console anymore due to low sales and Game Pass competition.
Of course, it should be noted that big games like Grand Theft Auto V, Battlefield 2042, Suicide Squad, Star Wars Jedi: Survivor, and more still launch on Xbox alongside other platforms, so it’s not like the console is going to suddenly stop getting new third-party releases. But if this trend continues, it could make it harder for Xbox to sell consoles as players worry if their favorite franchises will be available on Microsoft’s device in the future.
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