That seems to be the case.  

It's just that Ryng Tolu and JRPGfan kept repeating that VGC numbers were wrong.  And they did so with such confidence that I ended up believing in them.

Why don't Microsoft give out xbox live gold numbers anymore? When was the last time they did and what were the figures?

I think many of us (myself included) have had a hard time understanding Microsoft's strategy for XB. They've talked about "games as a service", and we all just heard "microtransactions". But, they've actually put together something much better, and more consumer friendly. They're looking to get $15 per month from every XBox gamer ($5 for XBL, $10 for Gamepass). In return, they'll give us tons of games to play as much as we want.

A year ago, I figured they were going to phase out the XB console, or sell the brand. But, now that their strategy has become more clear, I'm feeling optimistic about the future of XB under MS' control.

Know this isn't a very Xbox oriented website but its good to see Microsoft doing well the Xbox one X is a really well designed console with lots of neat out of the box upgrades and they really knocked that out of the park.

With their new IP coming up soon and other exclusives planned for this year alongside with the terrific news of Gamepass I feel like they are heading in a completely different path than Sony and Nintendo, which is great and will give lots of people, not most of the people on this website, but lots of people regardless a ton of value.

The more gaming sells (all platforms) the more it benefits us all in the end, so good news to see strong numbers from all 3.

Where are you guys getting that its up yoy?

The article says revenue is up, which could just mean the x sold for more of a profit since its  a premium console. As far as we know individual devices could have sold less than last year. I think A good indication of this is software sales being down. wich would indicate that there are less xbox gamers, but many existing ones seem to have upgraded to the x.  

To be fair, it's not even only that. Revenue is up yoy because they launched a new and more expensive console, so it's not surprising at all. But what about profits? Did they say anything about that? 

Considering the price difference between one s and one x, a 14% revenue increment probably means flat sales in the best case.

By the way, those xbox live numbers look weird and a little pointless.

Well yea, i think the lower software says it all. Less gamers, less software sold.

For software to be down, would have to mean that the majority of sales of last year had to be upgrades to either the x or s. On top of that, a lot of old xbox owners while still having the xbox, would have jumped ships to either ps or nintendo, which would explain equal or higher number of live user. Or a bunch of multi console users, who could have been xbox main, have now less reason to use their xbox and are either pc, or ps4 main users and just have the xbox collecting dust. 

I really believe the health of a console, now that we have upgrades, xbox 2 s far, has to be measured in how much software it moves. Wich would explaine the xbox last desperate attempt of including new games with the subscription. Doesn't mean much though since its like one game a year. 

Two things make me believe that it might be up yoy (or at the very least flat in the worst case scenario).

1) The X1 was cheaper in 2017.  That would mean less revenue even if it was flat yoy.

2)  According to VGC the X360 sold only 60,000 units in 2017 as opposed to 392,000 in 2016.  Again, that would mean less HW revenue even if the X1 was flat.

If we add to that the supposedly drop in X1 sales then we have a huge margin of revenue that the X1X needed to make up for. 

And about the software, well, MS didn't release any big games in 2017, so of course software sales were bound to be down.

"revenue up 14% from last year"

Releaseing a 500$ xbox one x, it makes sense its up.

Also good news that Xbox made 8% more renvue in 2017, than in 2016.

46 million back in 2013.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/insertcoin/2013/04/20/always-on-microsoft-xbox-live-subscriptions-up-to-46m-will-never-be-free/amp/