The new Xbox Series X is coming this year, so it’s a great time to look back at Xbox history. After discussing those of PlayStation and Nintendo extensively, the second part of the highs and lows of Xbox follows. Read back part 1 here.–
Highlight: Xbox Game Pass
Xbox Game Pass was received in 2017 with raised eyebrows. The idea sounded nice: a large catalog of games to download for a fixed amount per month, but it soon turned out that the offer was not so convincing. That changed when Microsoft announced that every Xbox Game Studios title would be made available upon release. Games like Forza Horizon 4 were on launch for a dozen, instead of the full pound. It was a switch that proved how eager Microsoft is to change the game landscape.
Today, Xbox Game Pass is almost too good, with tons of excellent games to play. From titles like Sea of Thieves, Gears 5, Grand Theft Auto 5 and The Outer Worlds to fantastic indie games like Celeste and Outer Wilds: Game Pass has them all. With the recent PC version, it seems that Game Pass is only continuing to grow and Microsoft is very much entering the next generation of consoles thanks to backwards compatibility and Project xCloud.
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Low point: External HD DVD player
Parallel to the battle between Microsoft and Sony, a second rivalry took place during the previous generation of consoles: Toshiba’s HD DVD versus Sony’s Blu-ray. Where Sony naturally bet on a blu-ray player for the PlayStation 3, Microsoft decided to support Toshiba with an HD DVD player. Not an integrated one, but an external one that you had to connect to the Xbox 360. In addition to being incredibly large and ugly, it also cost $ 200 on top of $ 300 for an X360.
It was an unfortunate guess, because as we all know, the HD DVD medium died a silent death. The major film studios, including of course Sony Pictures, as well as hardware manufacturers, sided with Sony because of the blu-ray player in the PlayStation 3 and the better security. Although the Xbox 360 sold better than the PS3 in 2007, Sony took the lead in the HD storage war with about two-thirds market share. When Warner Bros., one of the largest film producers in the world, released films exclusively on Blu-ray, HD DVD was over. This made Microsoft’s HD DVD player completely useless.
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Highlight: Halo: Combat Evolved
There are plenty of iconic Xbox franchises we have fond memories of, but no title was as important as Halo: Combat Evolved. The game has almost singlehandedly turned the launch of Microsoft’s first console into a success and has changed first-person shooters on consoles for good. No, Halo was not the first fps on consoles, but the title the controls finally perfected thanks to the use of a second analog stick. Fire up the game today and Halo plays just as well as any modern shooter.
But that’s not the only reason why Combat Evolved is considered a masterpiece. The campaign – which made Master Chief an icon – has a fantastic pace, revolutionary enemies, great environments, fantastic environmental storytelling and timeless, varied music. In addition, the campaign can be played in split screen co-op, something that became a characteristic and much loved feature of the gigantic franchise that the game spawned. Halo and Xbox are therefore inextricably linked.
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Lows: Red Ring of Death
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The Xbox 360 was a beautiful device, but the console has been plagued by major hardware issues several times. The best known is the Red Ring of Death, a red ring around the power button that notified owners of a defective copy. The ring was usually indicative of a defective part or overheating and meant that the console got stuck or hung during gameplay. The problems stemmed from Microsoft’s haste to release the console and an excess of parts from more than two hundred different manufacturers in a very compact package. This also meant that the problem per copy was not easy to locate.
It wasn’t initially clear that the Red Ring of Death was such a big deal, but a year after its release, it turned out that Microsoft should finally acknowledge and fix the problem. In 2007, the console’s warranty was extended to one year – later up to three years later – and the company pledged to repair any broken Xbox free of charge. How many consoles were defective is still not entirely clear, with claims ranging from five to 16 percent of all copies sold. In addition, a source involved in the production that as many as two thirds of all consoles produced were faulty and could not be sold. According to Peter Moore, then director of Interactive Entertainment Business, cost the Red Ring of Death Microsoft $ 1.15 billion.
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Low point: The new Rare
One of the lows in Xbox history is the closure of prominent Xbox studios. For example, the doors of Age of Empires maker Ensemble closed in 2008 and Microsoft closed Fable studio Lionhead in 2016. Perhaps the biggest blunder the publisher made was the acquisition of legendary developer Rare, which included Goldeneye 007, Diddy Kong Racing, Donkey Kong Country, Battletoads, Perfect Dark and Banjo-Kazooie. After the acquisition by Microsoft in 2002, the method of working became the studio Reportedly a lot more commercial and a lot of talent was lost. Although the “new Rare” with Sea of Thieves has delivered an excellent title, some say the magic of the studio has disappeared because of the takeover. Perhaps with the upcoming Everwild, the studio can appeal to its older fans again.
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Highlight: Steve Ballmer
The latter is more a highlight of Microsoft’s history, but the enthusiastic, former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer should not be missing from this list. Ballmer was known for his very eccentric and energetic character that he liked to show on stage. The video below is a compilation of his best performances, including during Microsoft’s twenty-fifth anniversary. It is so bizarre that you hardly believe it is real, but it is so!
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