Xbox

The Xbox is a video game console and brand developed by Microsoft. The first iteration of the console was released in 2001, placing it in direct competition with Sony's PlayStation 2 and Nintendo's GameCube. Microsoft was already in the video game industry with the personal computer market, and Microsoft's operating system was the most popular for playing video games in the personal computer market.

However, the company worried the PlayStation console would damage that market, as the games playable on PlayStation were often games originally developed for personal computers, and many games developed going forward would be developed for both (Nintendo has relatively few titles that are offered "cross-platform" and tightly controls on its major titles—such as Mario, Zelda, or Kirby).

The original Xbox launched in 2001.

The Xbox also offered Microsoft a chance to diversify its product line and capitalize on a growing video game industry. Originally called the DirectX-box (for its use of DirectX software), the console went through multiple delays and pricing adjustments and eventually landed on the name "Xbox," a contraction of DirectX Box.

The early console DirectX-box was expected to run the Windows 2000 operating system, as it was seen early in its development cycle as a way to show off a specific use case for personal computers while ensuring it was easy to create software for the console platform. It came with a custom operating system. More importantly, the Xbox entered into competition with Sony's PlayStation 2, Sega's Dreamcast, and Nintendo's GameCube and began what some have called the "golden era" of gaming.

The console launched with popular game titles, including Halo: Combat Evolved and Halo 2, but in 2005, Microsoft reported losses from the console system. This was partially due to the lack of software licensing benefits, which rivals Nintendo and Sony enjoyed, meaning the original early console lacked some popular titles (which can be important when consumers are making a choice of which console to purchase).

Despite that, the original Xbox model introduced superior technological features with respect to its console competitors, including Xbox Live, introduced in 2002, which offered an online gaming network that allowed players to play with or against each other over the Internet. Xbox Live would be one of the Xbox brand's biggest achievements, as more than two million players subscribed, and it pushed competitors to offer similar online features. Similarly, the original Xbox gained popularity, in part, because many people were able to exploit security flaws in the console to allow them to play pirated copies of the game, despite it voiding the warranty.

Xbox 360.

Following the launch of the original Xbox console, Microsoft refreshed the console in 2005 with the Xbox 360. The Xbox 360 failed to gain market share, with many players preferring to play on the original Xbox. Hardware modification and piracy continued to be a concern on the new Xbox 360, which led Microsoft to ban one million accounts from the Xbox Live network in 2009, considered a drastic move by many. Players were banned based on Microsoft detecting those players had circumvented the company's digital rights management protections.

The Xbox 360 continued to face pressure from the Nintendo Wii and Sony PlayStation, with Microsoft struggling to make consistent profits from its console, and seeing the Xbox 360 have its price cut by as much as 25 percent to increase market share. This would prove successful. By 2010, the Xbox 360 was the most-used game console in American homes, while Xbox Live boasted more than 20 million subscribers.

The Xbox 360 E removed the visual flare of the 360 to return to a flat rectangle.

The Xbox 360 also released two upgraded iterations of the model to fix some of the problems of the original console, such as the "red ring of death," which was rectified in later versions. The Xbox 360 S was released in 2010 as a direct replacement of the original Xbox 360, providing upgrades in design and hardware and offering a more sleek and slim look to the console with touch-sensitive buttons. In 2013, the Xbox 360 E was released as another upgrade on the Xbox 360 S in terms of hardware, returning to a matte finish design and minimized touch buttons, and removing the AV video plugin for HDMI support, but it would also cede the market share to the upcoming Xbox One.

The Xbox One continued the "box console" design language of the Xbox.

In 2013, Microsoft launched its next iteration of the Xbox with the Xbox One, the third official generation of the console. This console was designed to address one of the flaws of the Xbox 360: poor cooling. The Xbox One had larger, better-ventilated housing, which was combined with a responsive cooling mechanism, which solved the overheating issues that plagued the Xbox 360.

The controversial and unpopular Xbox Kinect system.

The Xbox One was launched as a direct competitor to the upcoming PlayStation 4, set to be released by Sony at the same time. The model came in two versions, with or without the Xbox Kinect. Kinect was a system meant to compete with the Nintendo Wii and its ability to make the player feel as if they were in the game. However, despite the popularity of the Nintendo Wii and its controls, the Kinect was never as popular.

The Xbox One struggled for a few reasons. One was the focus on the unpopular Kinect system, which would be discontinued due to its unpopularity. Further, there was limited backward capability, as backward capability was in part blamed for the slow uptake of the Xbox 360s market share, and Microsoft was trying to get the new console into people's homes. More people flocked to the PlayStation 4, as it entered the market at a lower cost.

The Xbox One S returned the white colorway to the Xbox while retaining its rectangular box design language.

In an emerging pattern, Microsoft refreshed Xbox One rather than replacing the struggling console. The Xbox One S was released in 2016 and elevated the console's ability to play at 4K resolution, as the resolution was gaining popularity in the consumer television market. This was not true 4K, but an upscaled 4K experience, but many players remained impressed at the console's display capabilities and the console's capability to outperform competitors at a similar markup price. The Xbox One S also offered a smaller console size and added 4K Blu-Ray capabilities.

The Xbox One X offered a slimmed down console while retaining the familiar design language.

The Xbox One X was released in 2017, a year after the S, and was a true leap into 4K gaming, offering an authentic 4K experience at or around 40 frames per second (fps). This console also improved the backward compatibility of the Xbox One series, allowing players to bring older titles and experience them on better displays.

The fourth generation of Xbox consoles offered two models at launch to compete directly with the Sony PlayStation 5. The two models gave consumers two choices: the Xbox X or the Xbox S. The Xbox X was designed as a square tower, allowing for efficient cooling, and enjoyed immediate popularity with gaming performance considered to be ready for playing at an 8K resolution, and offering 120 fps for most games, rivaling in many cases with high-powered PCs. The power between the Xbox One and Xbox Series X was almost doubled as well.

The Xbox Series X (left) and S (right) offer different packages for very different capabilities, while maintaining Xbox's design language.

The Xbox Series S was developed to offer a lighter and more compact experience, including a smaller box for the console and lighter hardware, allowing it to fit in that smaller footprint without concerns of overheating. It offered 120 fps gaming at a 1440p (2K) resolution, rather than the 4K offered by the X. Unlike the black box of the X, the Xbox Series S also came in a smaller body with a white finish that was built to allow users to travel with the console, with portability a key point in the console's design.

The Xbox Live service has been one of the biggest achievements of the Xbox console. Before Xbox Live came out, people were already playing games online through their personal computers or Sega Dreamcast. The Xbox became the first console to include a broadband modem into the module (the PlayStation would offer online play, but require an external attachment). The choice of broadband, in this case, was intended to push multiplayer capabilities as far as possible and ensure every Xbox owner would be able to take advantage of Xbox Live.

Initially launched in November 2002 with two servers for the two launch titles: MechAssault and Unreal Championship. The servers were flooded with eager players, and the service remained stable for the most part—a feat even for modern games, which often suffer server crashes at launch. Xbox Live was powered by data centers in London, Seattle, Tokyo, Redmond, and Tukwila.

However, beyond multiplayer, Xbox Live was also partially responsible for something else: downloadable content (DLC). DLCs are ubiquitous in the gaming industry nowadays, offering developers a chance to roll out new content to existing game titles and patch bugs or other errors in the original launch game. The first paid DLC also belonged to MechAssualt and offered players a chance to expand the game with two new game types and three new maps for $4.99, which also came with new mechs and modes for free.

While it started innocently enough, downloadable content continued to develop until it became controversial. Initially, the use of DLCs increased a game's content with time, allowing games to exist and remain relevant for much longer and enabling developers to continue to develop for a popular game with an active player base. However, almost right away, the potential for "abuse" (in the eyes of some) was shown as one of the earlier DLCs was cosmetic "horse armor" for the popular The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion. The armor was offered for $2.50 but offered nothing significant in game.

DLC has continued and become a subject of debate for gamers. In many cases, DLC is used to offer updates "over the air," keep games relevant, and offer expanded gameplay possibilities. There are as many cases where DLCs have been used to sell purely aesthetic items, lock down specific content, lock out specific game zones (to be later offered as an "expansion"), and the introduction of "play-to-win" games (where a player is "encouraged" to purchase specific items in order to progress in gameplay) have been enabled through DLC.

The Xbox 360 doubled the company's commitment to Xbox Live. In addition to the subscription service, which gave players access to multiplayer gaming (now called Xbox Live Gold), any user was now able to make a free "Silver" account. This profile could be tied to existing "gamertags" (profiles) from the original Xbox, offering more customization options and matchmaking. Further, the gamertags allowed users to customize with a thumbnail and allowed the player to choose their desired level of competition.

The new online service also came with "gamercards," where a user's profile was tied to a new achievement system, review rating, game zone, and geographic location. Players could use this area to message each other, rate recently encountered players, and purchase content from the new online marketplace.

In September 2023, after twenty years, Xbox Live Gold (the subscription online-multiplayer service) was retired in favor of Xbox Game Pass Core.

Launched in 2017, Xbox Game Pass was the latest attempt at a subscription service for gaming. Previous examples included Nvidia GeForce Now, Google Stadia, Ubisoft+, EA Play, Apple Arcade, and Humble Choice. Many of these services have suffered for various reasons, such as latency in games (due to streaming rather than downloading a game on a machine for piracy concerns), and have been criticized for potentially hurting indie games.

However, what set the Xbox Game Pass apart from competitor services, such as PlayStation Now, allowed subscribers to download the included games and purchase titles at a discount, not just play them while offered. Further, Microsoft announced the intent to add new sets of games to the Xbox Game Pass catalog each month and has largely maintained that promise. Further, from its launch, within four years of its availability, public perception of Xbox Game Pass cleared into a near-universal verdict that the service is a cost-effective, accessible alternative to game purchases for many. This pushed rivals Sony and Nintendo to develop and iterate upon their own services (PlayStation Plus and Nintendo Switch Online, respectively).

The success of Xbox Game Pass led to the retirement of the Xbox Live Gold subscription, which shifted to the Xbox Game Pass Ultimate as the primary subscription service for online gaming on Xbox consoles, highlighting the commitment to providing a more unified experience on the Xbox platform.