3DO SAYS NO TO XBOX
May 1, 2001

Army Men video games, action figures, maybe even a TV show... but nothing for Xbox. Trip Hawkins told The Standard that the 3DO Company, needing to stay tied to one system in particular, will be focusing on the PS2 in favor of Microsoft's Xbox.

The reason? Edward Williams, an analyst at Gerald Klauer Mattison, said that the cost of developing for the next generation of consoles is up 30-50% over the previous generation. Of course, this does not take into account that the new generation of consoles is very likely to grow by much more than that number, but it is a reason, at least for now while PS2 still undisputedly dominates, for smaller publishers to be wary of both GameCube and Xbox. (Obviously, there are ease of development factors to consider, but that's for another day.)

Hawkins summed it up by saying, "It would be very inefficient for us to try and do a little bit on every platform." That is not to say 3DO will never develop for Xbox, but the company has made it obvious that the system is not on the table at least for the foreseeable future.