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Xbox

Xbox is a video gaming brand produced by Microsoft Gaming. It consists of five home video game consoles as well as applications, streaming services, and online services. The original Xbox console launched in 2001 and reached over 24 million units sold. Subsequent consoles include the Xbox 360, Xbox One, and most recently the Xbox Series X and Series S in 2020.

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30 views2 pages

Xbox

Xbox is a video gaming brand produced by Microsoft Gaming. It consists of five home video game consoles as well as applications, streaming services, and online services. The original Xbox console launched in 2001 and reached over 24 million units sold. Subsequent consoles include the Xbox 360, Xbox One, and most recently the Xbox Series X and Series S in 2020.

Uploaded by

Florin Echo
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© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Xbox is a video gaming brand that consists of five home video game consoles, as well as applications

(games), streaming service Xbox Cloud Gaming, and online services such as the Xbox network and Xbox
Game Pass. The brand is produced by Microsoft Gaming, a division of Microsoft.

The brand was first introduced in the United States in November 2001, with the launch of the original Xbox
console. The Xbox branding was formerly, from 2012 to 2015, used as Microsoft's digital media
entertainment brand replacing Zune.[1][2] In 2022, Microsoft expanded its gaming business and
reorganized Xbox to become part of its newly formed Microsoft Gaming division. Under Microsoft Gaming,
Xbox's first-party publishers are Xbox Game Studios, ZeniMax Media (Bethesda Softworks), and Activision
Blizzard (Activision, Blizzard Entertainment, and King), who own numerous studios and successful
franchises.

The original device was the first video game console offered by an American company after the Atari Jaguar
stopped sales in 1996. It reached over 24 million units sold by May 2006.[3] Microsoft's second console, the
Xbox 360, was released in 2005 and has sold 86 million units as of October 2021. The third console, the
Xbox One, was released in November 2013 and has sold 58 million units.[4] The fourth line of Xbox
consoles, the Xbox Series X and Series S, were released in November 2020. The head of Xbox is Phil
Spencer, who succeeded former head Marc Whitten in late March 2014.[5][6]

History

When Sony Computer Entertainment first announced the PlayStation 2 in 1999, the company had
positioned the console as a centerpiece for home entertainment, as it not only would play video games, but
also could play audio CDs and video DVDs. Microsoft, whose business had been primarily in supporting the
personal computer (PC) business with its Windows operating system, software, and games, saw the
PlayStation 2 as a threat to the personal computer.[7]

Four engineers from Microsoft's DirectX team—Kevin Bachus, Seamus Blackley, Ted Hase and DirectX team
leader Otto Berkes, began to envision what a Microsoft console to compete against the PlayStation 2 would
be like. They designed a system that would use many hardware components in common with PCs,
effectively running a version of Windows and DirectX to power the games on the console.[8][7] This
approach would make it easy for developers on Windows to build games for their new system,
differentiating itself from the custom hardware solutions of most consoles.[9][10] Numerous names were
suggested for this console, including "Direct X Box",[11] and the "Windows Entertainment Project".[12]
Microsoft's marketing team conducted consumer surveys of the name, using the name "Xbox" as a control
believing this would be least desirable, but found that this had the highest preference from their tests, and
was selected as the name of the console.[13]

While the original Xbox had modest sales, Microsoft took a large financial loss to support it. However, its
performance was sufficient to convince the company to continue to produce the line. Since its release,
there have been four generations of Xbox, with the most recent being the Xbox Series X and Series S units.
The Xbox has become a direct competitor to Sony's PlayStation brand, both offering high performance
gaming systems at roughly similar specifications.
Future

Microsoft has been recently working to leverage the branding of "Xbox" beyond the console hardware but
as a general video game brand, reflected in the renaming of Microsoft Studios to Xbox Game Studios in
2019.[14][15] Phil Spencer stated in June 2019 that for Microsoft, "The business isn't how many consoles
you sell. The business is how many players are playing the games that they buy, how they play." which
journalists have taken as a route to de-emphasize console hardware and prioritize games, subscriptions and
services for players.[16][17] Later in February 2020, Spencer said that moving forward, the company does
not see "traditional gaming companies" like Nintendo and Sony as their competitors but instead those that
offer cloud computing services such as Amazon and Google. Spencer identified that Microsoft Azure is a
major component of their plans going forward, which powers its Xbox Cloud Gaming game streaming
service.[18] Spencer also cited mobile gaming as a potential area, and where Microsoft was trying to
position itself with its services should this become the more preferred form for gaming. Spencer said "I
don't think it's "hardware agnostic" as much as it's 'where you want to play'", in describing how Microsoft
was strategizing the Xbox branding for the future.[19]

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