Apparently the situation at Xbox has gone from “reorg fatigue” to triage. What I’ve heard from a few places now (marketing, product ops, and even one external PR vendor) is that an emergency restructuring is being drawn up that would make the last layoffs look like a warm-up.

The term they’re using internally is “Platform Rationalization.” Translation: full exit from dedicated console hardware. No successor to the Series line, not even a half-step. The internal memo says: “We will not pursue further capital expenditure in loss-leader consumer devices.”

And it’s not just hardware. Entire business units are being amortized out. Bethesda’s publishing ops in Rockville? Folding into Activision corporate. Turn 10? “Evaluated for integration.” Obsidian and Ninja Theory? No plans for future platform exclusives.

Phil hasn’t been seen on campus for two weeks. One source says he’s “consulting,” another says he’s “under review.” The rumor that’s really circulating — and this came from someone in HR systems — is that Microsoft Finance pulled Xbox’s P&L out of the main consumer division’s dashboard. That’s never happened before. That’s the kind of thing you do when you’re preparing for a sale or spin-off.

Even more alarming: Game Pass Ultimate is testing internally at $49.99/month, but this time there’s a catch — it no longer includes day-one first-party releases. The logic is to make the sub profitable “on a content library basis only.” In other words, they’re retreating from the very thing that defined the platform.

The only real “strategy deck” circulating now is a 40-slide presentation titled “From Platform to Protocol.” It talks about converting Xbox Live into a middleware layer that third-party cloud providers can license — think Azure for entertainment identity. But there’s a line in there that made me freeze: “Legacy console owners will be offered a ‘continuity program’ to migrate their digital libraries to external storefronts by FY27.”

One person described it to me like this: “Imagine if Sega had given you store credit to move your Genesis collection to the PlayStation Network — that’s where we’re heading.”

Phil apparently tried to get ahead of this by pitching a “Series Expansion Module” — a clip-on GPU boost like the old 32X, meant to extend the gen through 2028. Engineering costed it out, Marketing laughed, Finance buried it. The project code-name (“Project Prometheus”) was quietly deleted from the build tracker yesterday.

The last line in the memo reads: “Xbox identity will persist as an experience tier, not a physical brand.”

TL;DR:

• No next-gen console.

• Studios merging or closing.

• Game Pass going to $30 with fewer perks.

• Digital library migration program planned.

• Phil MIA.

It’s over. Like truly over.

“We used to make worlds,” one dev told me, “now we make decks.”

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5784978&forum_id=2#49338886)