I don’t need Microsoft telling me how to spend my money and they were definitely some good quality 3rd party stuff.
Honestly, I’ve seen a clear drop in quality since Microsoft killed or bought most of their competition for the official products. I didn’t use to replace my remotes (3rd party or official) but now I need to at least once a year with the official ones which are now also three times the price.
Microsoft doesn’t care about you, they actively hate you. You are money bag they suck on. No matter what the boot says, less competition is ALWAYS bad for the consumer.