(Business Perspective) Does MS really need Xbox Hardware?

[Chazore]

PixelPirate said:

Competition is a key driver of innovation and can help keep prices in check. It also provides consumers with a range of choices. I doubt the PS5 would have achieved its current level of quality if Xbox had completely dropped out of the hardware business during the previous generation.

Innovation sure, but prices?, I dunno, we've seen prices going up with time this gen.

As for the range of choices, you get a digital PS5 or a PS5 with a disc reader and a weaker Xbox and a "high end" xbox, but you're still going to be using the perf/quality modes either way, which still leads you to the same path from the fork in the road. 

I feel like some here only want Xbox to remain because it somehow makes Sony's side look good, not because of what Sony did themselves. 

This makes me actually want Xbox to leave, just to see which holds true. Even if they were to leave, you as customers can simply vote with your wallets and not buy the next PS system or Nintendo one, if they get too complacent. 

I also don't think we should want a competitor to remain, if we never truly cared for what they were selling to begin with, it kind of reads as fake competition, when you're in it for only one player in the game, and no one else. 

Like I'll be honest, I loved my 360, but after that gen, that was it for me and Xbox, and has been that way since. Them going the way of the dodo on the console side wouldn't really do much for me (especially since all I ever liked from MS was what they had already made before Xbox, like AoE for example).

This gen so far hasn't really done much for Xbox fans in terms of quality content, I mean going by general reception and sales, it doesn't look as bright (especially with the cancelled projects, staff and leads leaving, etc). I fail to see how Xbox's current gen is somehow a heavy driving factor into making Sony so much better by comparison, when Sony just aren't doing what MS is doing (Like not screwing up, not cancelling projects left and right).