Phil Spencer denies ‘parity’ issue behind Xbox’s Baldur’s Gate 3 delay

Phil Spencer has dismissed suggestions that parity issues are behind the delay of Baldur’s Gate 3’s Xbox release, despite Larian Studios stating otherwise.

Baldur’s Gate 3 was released on PC on Aug. 3 and is set for a PlayStation release on Sept. 6. However, while a launch on Xbox is still planned, neither party have provided any details on the release.

In July, Baldur’s Gate 3 developer Michael Douse stated the issue preventing an Xbox launch was a “technical hurdle” and that Larian Studios are “obliged to launch with feature parity”—which isn’t currently possible due to split-screen issues relating to the Xbox Series S.

However, speaking to Eurogamer at Gamescom, head of Xbox Phil Spencer denied that was the case.

“In terms of parity, I don’t think you’ve heard from us or Larian, that this was about parity. I think that’s more that the community is talking about it.”

Spencer added that, even in Xbox’s own games, there are features that ship on the Series X that do not ship on Series S, like ray-tracing for example, which raises questions behind what is actually going on regarding Baldur’s Gate 3’s Xbox release.

There was a positive, however, as Spencer revealed he met with Larian at Gamescom and is “confident” of finding a “good solution”.

The Xbox chief also denied the restrictions of the Series S were behind the lack of split-screen multiplayer in Forza Motorsport at launch, which was reportedly a decision made by the developers “based on usage.”