The
Xbox One had all of the hype in world going for the it .Its predecessor the
Xbox 360 Dominated the North American market aside from the Wii; but, when your
comparing it to its competitors (PlayStation, Wii),the Xbox 360 was king. The
Xbox 360 on a consistent basis doubled the sales of the PlayStation 3. It
seemed Microsoft had its next console success story in the bag but in the video
game industry, there is something called the Third Console curse[2]
where a company that does well with their third entry into market gets to high
and mighty for their own britches. This happened with the N64 going with
cartridges instead of the more institutive and efficient CDs and Nintendo
giving third parties[3] to
the wolves. Nintendo has a problem of thinking it can supply all of the games
for its own console. Sure there games are great but when games like Call of
Duty, Grand Theft Auto and Assassin Creed come out and it doesn’t land on a
Nintendo platform, it makes them look like
a joke. This also happened with the PlayStation 3, it officially was
priced at $600 and that was absurd at the time. When one considers that the
Xbox 360 was equivalent, if not better hardware wise and it was only priced at $300.
The
“Reveal” of the Xbox One, was a huge a bummer for me. It was terrible amount of
time spent on TV, Sports and NFL partnership, it was absolutely
ridiculous. I am a huge Xbox fan but
this made me distraught as a fan and a gamer. This was the future of Xbox? There
was even a rumor going around after the reveal that Microsoft was going to sell
Xbox Brand, I was worried. The reason I care so much about Xbox was because it
was my first console and Xbox was my escapism from my parents’ divorce and all
the other bad events that happened. Then just to see, the first steps of Xbox
One be such a failure. I see more games on a commercial, then I did on the Xbox
Reveal and it was an hour long. Then here are my sources about how terrible the
Xbox One[4]
Reveal[5]
was[6]. The
sources are to prove, I’m not just a loner complaining.
Aftermath,
this was the worst public relations damage control, known to man. Here was one
of the conversations between the press and a Xbox One representative . Press
said “I was wondering, a lot of soldiers overseas want to play Xbox One but
they don’t have a reliable internet connection, what do you say to our active
duty soldiers”? Xbox One Rep said, “We have a product for people overseas it
called a Xbox 360”. This was offensive because it implied that the serving
troops aren’t good enough to play on Xbox One and it also proves that Xbox is being
represented by a bunch of twerps. A lot of people blame Don Mattrick for
leading Xbox into a full blown nose dive. Xbox fired over 40 people for the
Xbox One reveal and public relations disaster.
There
is one, a true savior and that is Phil Spencer. Is someone who I have immense
respect for. He took over Xbox when it seemed like, it was a lost cause. It had
already looked like a failure and it hadn’t even hit the market. Phil Spencer
took over between the reveal and E3. Now what is E3 one asks themselves? Wells
it’s the super bowl for video games. This is where all of the new games, get
gameplay shown and new games are announced. Phil Spencer proceeded to go on
stage and show a hour and half of video games straight. I was in bliss and I
later went out that day a got a job at the grocery store. The reason this was
important, at this point was that the Xbox One was totally a buzz kill and this
was the first time that gaming was the priority of a gaming console. He gave me
confidence in the Xbox Brand again, I can’t thank him enough. Phil Spencer
cares about games and he understands games, not like Don Mattrick. Phil Spencer
isn’t a corporate suit, he’s gamer.
So
how is Xbox One doing two years later, well its sold over 10 million consoles
and its already outsold the Wii U. It has allowed for games to be made that
would not have been made without the Xbox Ones existence and it provides
thousands of American jobs and millions of people’s enjoyment. So next time, you slander a nerd for crying
about how his favorite game company closing, just remember how you felt when
Friends ended.
This
editorial had a lot of lessons, that we take for granted such as leadership and
getting through a rough spot. It shows that, sure we shouldn’t be defined by
the stuff we own but I do think there is something to be said about being
attached to something we have. So the next time, you look at that plastic
machine they call a Xbox and remember it is much more than a machine that plays
games.
[1] As of April 7th,
2015
[3] Third parties: games that
are not made by Nintendo but still go on a Nintendo consoles. Such as Madden,
Grand Theft Auto, and Call Of Duty
