When was the Xbox first introduced?
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Xbox is a video gaming brand created and owned by Microsoft of the United States. It represents a series of video game consoles developed by Microsoft, with three consoles released in the sixth, seventh, and eighth generations, respectively. The brand also represents applications (games), streaming services, and an online service by the name of Xbox Live. The brand was first introduced in the United States in November 2001, with the launch of the original Xbox console.
Xbox
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When the Xbox launched on November 15, 2001, the as-yet unnamed online service was destined for a Summer 2002 deployment. Xbox Live was finally given a name at E3 2002 when the service was unveiled in its entirety. Sound-dampened booths and broadband-connected Xbox consoles—featuring an early version of "Unreal Championship"—demonstrated the service on the show floor. The Epic title was one of the flagship titles for the service, which was slated for a debut on November 15, 2002, marking the anniversary of the Xbox launch. Microsoft announced that 50 Xbox Live titles would be available by the end of 2003. Utilizing the required broadband bandwidth, Xbox Live featured a unified gaming "Friends List", as well as a single identity across all titles (regardless of the publisher), and standardized voice chat with a headset and communication, a feature that was still in its infancy.
Xbox Live
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The original Xbox was released on November 15, 2001, in North America, February 22, 2002, in Japan, and March 14, 2002, in Australia and Europe. It was Microsoft's first foray into the gaming console market. As part of the sixth-generation of gaming, the Xbox competed with Sony's PlayStation 2, Sega's Dreamcast (which stopped American sales before the Xbox went on sale), and Nintendo's GameCube. The Xbox was the first console offered by an American company after the Atari Jaguar stopped sales in 1996. The name Xbox was derived from a contraction of "DirectX Box", a reference to Microsoft's graphics API, DirectX.
Xbox
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Released in 2001, the Xbox control pad was the first controller made for the original Xbox. The Xbox controller features two analog sticks, a pressure-sensitive directional pad, two analog triggers, a Back button, a Start button, two accessory slots and six 8-bit analog action buttons (A/Green, B/Red, X/Blue, Y/Yellow, and Black and White buttons). The standard Xbox controller (originally nicknamed the "Fatty" and later the "Duke") was originally the controller bundled with Xbox systems for all territories except Japan.
Xbox
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The Xbox Controller is the primary controller for Microsoft's Xbox console and was introduced at the Game Developers Conference in 2000. The first-generation Xbox controller (nicknamed "The Duke") was the first controller bundled with Xbox systems for all territories except Japan. A smaller and redesigned variant, called "Controller S", was sold and bundled with the console in Japan. It was later released in other territories and by the end of 2003 had replaced the first-generation controller worldwide. The larger original controller remained available as an optional accessory.
Xbox controller
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Prior to and after the mandate, all Xbox One consoles initially shipped with the Kinect sensor included. On June 9, 2014, cheaper Xbox One bundles were introduced, which did not include the Kinect sensor. Microsoft stated the decision to offer Xbox One bundles without Kinect was to "[offer] a choice to people that would allow people to buy an Xbox One and then ramp up to Kinect when they can afford to", while also allowing games to use processing power that was previously reserved for Kinect. An updated Xbox Development Kit issued in June 2014 allows developers to explicitly disable motion tracking functionality in games, allowing access to additional system resources that represent about 10% of the GPU processing power. These resources were previously reserved for Kinect skeletal tracking, regardless of whether the Kinect sensor was attached or in use.
Xbox One
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A closed beta of Community Games was introduced on May 21, 2008, limited to Premium members of the XNA Creators' Club. Community Games were introduced with the New Xbox Experience on November 19, 2008. Upon the release of XNA 3.1, Microsoft changed the games to "Xbox Live Indie Games" with hopes that it will help increase the "understanding and discoverability" of user-created games. After the fourth quarter Dashboard update in 2010, the Indie Games tab on the Marketplace was moved to the "Specialty Shops" section of the dashboard, away from where regular Xbox Live Arcade titles would be shown. Independent developers that published through the Indie Game service were concerned that this move reduced the visibility of the games, leading to lower sales and fewer incentives to develop for the series. Microsoft stated that the move was designed to benefit independent game developers, highlighting such games through the Specialty Shop tab. However within a week, Microsoft quietly reverted this change, moving the Indie Games tab back to the main "Game Marketplace" section. Currently, the most successful game on XBLIG is DigitalDNA Games' "CastleMiner Z", which was the first title on the service to reach one million paid downloads.
Xbox Live Indie Games
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The official unveiling of the Xbox 360 occurred on May 12, 2005, on MTV in a program called "MTV Presents: The Next Generation Xbox Revealed." The special was hosted by the actor Elijah Wood and featured a musical performance by the band The Killers. The Xbox 360 was also featured on the cover of "TIME" Magazine's May 23, 2005 issue with an article written by Lev Grossman. The cover shows Microsoft CEO Bill Gates holding up one of the units. In the article he says "It's perfect... The day Sony launches (PlayStation 3), and they walk right into "Halo 3"." "" Microsoft executive Robbie Bach later clarified this statement, saying "Philosophically the point Bill was trying to make is that we're not just going to ship and not have great stuff coming up." Gates himself later clarified that "Halo 3 will ship when Bungie is ready." Microsoft chose a November 2005 release date not because they wanted to be first to market but because they thought Sony would ship their PlayStation 3 at that point.
Xbox 360 launch
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The Xbox's successor, the Xbox 360, was officially unveiled announced on May 12, 2005 on MTV. It was the first next generation system to be announced. It was released in North America on November 22, 2005. Nvidia ceased production of the Xbox's GPU in August 2005, which marked the end of brand-new Xbox production. The last Xbox game in Europe was "Xiaolin Showdown" released in June 2007, and the last game in North America was "Madden NFL 09" released in August 2008. Support for out-of-warranty Xbox consoles was discontinued on March 2, 2009. Support for Xbox Live on the console ended on April 15, 2010.
Xbox (console)
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Leading up to the launch, Microsoft enlisted several waves of beta testers to improve the service and receive feature feedback. The first wave of beta testers were given "Re-Volt!" (which never was released officially) and "NFL Fever 2003" to beta test. Once beta testing concluded, Microsoft sent these beta testers a translucent orange memory card, a headset carrying case, and a beta tester tshirt with the slogan "I have great hands". When the service debuted, it lacked much of the functionality that later titles included, but Xbox Live grew and evolved on the Xbox and many aspects of the service were included with the Xbox 360 console out of the box, rather than through a later update. Microsoft's 5000th patent was Live-related and gave Xbox 360 users access to watch other gamers compete against each other over Xbox Live.
Xbox Live