Xbox boss says that the current metaverse is a 'poorly built video game' and is 'not how I want to spend my time'

• Xbox chief Phil Spencer compared the metaverse to a "poorly built video game" and a "living room."
• He said it's "not how I want to spend my time" at a conference on Wednesday.
• But he added that the metaverse is in "the early stage" and would "evolve."

Phil Spencer, head of Microsoft's Xbox, isn't a fan of the metaverse — at least in its current form.

Spencer compared the metaverse to a "poorly built video game" during The Wall Street Journal's Tech Live conference on Wednesday, but admitted that it would "evolve."

"Today it's a poorly built video game," Spencer said. "Building a metaverse that's like a living room is not how I want to spend my time. What I see in the metaverse world is that we're at the early stage and this will evolve."

Spencer's comments could be a dig at Meta's efforts to build the metaverse, which had been criticized for poor graphics earlier this year. The metaverse, generally speaking, is a virtual world that Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg believes is the next phase of the internet.

The company formerly called Facebook reported its Q3 earnings on Wednesday, and Zuckerberg doubled down on his commitment to his passion project — despite sinking billions of dollars into it and Meta's share price dropping 70% this year.

Microsoft, which owns Xbox, has struggled to enter the metaverse, according to a Wall Street Journal report published on Wednesday. Its HoloLens augmented-reality headset hasn't caught on, and the team behind it has lost over 100 staffers in two years, according to WSJ.

Microsoft told WSJ that it remains "committed to all aspects of mixed reality and the metaverse."

Spencer, meanwhile, has other ideas for the future of gaming that don't involve it quite yet.

Notably, he reiterated in August to Bloomberg that he believes cross-play is the future, and that games made exclusively for one console are "something we're just going to see less and less of."