Microsoft's decision to dive into the game console market with the original Xbox shocked the industry. Why would a company that made its billions by selling software on an open platform decide to make a proprietary box? The original Xbox was put together in record time, leveraging existing PC technology (an Intel Celeron 733 CPU, an NVIDIA graphics card, and a hard drive) to create a new gaming platform, one that leveraged the Windows XP kernel and DirectX technology. Was Microsoft's goal simply to battle Sony and Nintendo for the gaming console market?
If so, it was an uphill battle. Microsoft spent billions of dollars building and marketing the Xbox, and although the console has sold over 24 million units, it still struggled to equal the GameCube (also over 24 million) and could come nowhere near the PlayStation 2 (over 100 million). The new Entertainment division at Microsoft lost money in every quarter except for one: the quarter when the massively popular Halo 2 was introduced.
Still, Microsoft is legendary for their ability to stick at things. Most people laughed (and rightly so) in 1985 when Windows 1.0 was introduced, but the program went on to become the best selling operating system of all time. Fortunately for Microsoft, the original Xbox was not nearly as dysfunctional as Windows 1.0-it was a solid (if somewhat bulky) performer, and features such as Xbox Live put it technically ahead of the competition.
Now with the massively redesigned and more powerful Xbox 360 released, many people are wondering what the future has in store for Microsoft's gaming efforts. Arstechnica.com recently had the opportunity to chat with Matt Lee, a software developer who works at Microsoft in the Xbox division. He had some fascinating things to say about the console, the games market in general, and the future of the Xbox 360.
Salman from Tech4Gamers writes "Mortal Kombat 9 revived the series from a low point after bringing it back to 2D combat. It marked a new high-point for the franchise due to its incredible roster, exciting cinematic story mode, and high-octane combat."
Shaolin Monks is a forgotten gem. I would love to see a new one, or a remake of the old.
That game was actually goated. It was the first time ever that I actually tried to get good at a fighting game. Unfortunately the online connection was so dogshit it made it hard to enjoy and eventually I gave up. Haven't really played much fighting games since.
Microsoft has slashed the prices of games across the Xbox 360 store in preparation for its July 29th closure.
The Dishwasher
Vigilante 8
Two non-BC and no-PC-version Arcade titles I downloaded recently. Dishwasher's sequel is on Steam at least.
I've also downloaded Ninety-Nine Nights II (shame the first wasn't available). I still want to download Burnout 3: Takedown before the weekend's up, though that is still the full $9.99 non-discounted price
Burnout 3 not available in modern times is a crime to humanity.
I know it’s probably due to the music licensing-though they can simply add other music as Burnout 3’s biggest flaw to me personally-is the music!!!
The Xbox 360 Marketplace is officially shutting down in three days, which means dozens of exclusive, digital-only 360 games will no longer be available to purchase anywhere else once it does.
The Xbox 360 will be almost 20 years old next year, and to celebrate this milestone Microsoft have decided to obliterate all of its online functionality.
Replies(7)
Technically, the games ARE preserved... they are just removing the ability to purchase new games through the 360. They have to keep a full backup of every title (even delisted ones) because they will have to offer the ability to redownload purchased content to users.
I had deleted some games a few years back that had become delisted. I was able to get them back by going through my download history. The games in question were TMNT (classic and re-shelled), afterburner climax and outrun online. Im glad I was able to get those back as they are some of the best on the service.
Well The Ultimate Alliance games have been delisted. I dunno how many old Activision games have been Delisted but MS needs to remake or remaster old Activision games and release them on Xbox and PS. I. Hope that's what they're doing right now.
They can't reserve everything but they 100% can reserve what they got or own.
Fortunately, the X360 was jailbroken a long time ago, so a good part of its library is available for download from 'alternative' sources. Still, it's a bummer to see the store going away.
Dawn of The First Day
-72 Hours Remain-
Also they can keep the store up for life if they wanted.
Series X for the back compat titles, and OG Xbox and X360 for those not on BC. I pretty much bought all of the digital games I want for the 360 so I am good.
No, not telling you would be sleazy. I have a few more games to buy then I'm good. 360 was and still is a great console. Xbox is the best place to play!
This was a good read for 360 fans.
That is a good read for anybody.
Nice to hear from someone at the top of the their industry that clearly loves what they do.
"I think porting from Xbox 360 to PS3 will be reasonably difficult, since the Xbox 360 has a lot more general purpose processing power that can be flexibly reallocated, and all of the Xbox 360 CPU cores have equal access to all memory. The asymmetric nature of the Cell could easily lead to situations where the game has too little of one type of processing power and too much of another. And the content might suffer as well, since you'll never see a PS3 title with more than 256MB of textures at any given time, due to the split graphics and system memory banks. When we announced 512MB of unified memory on Xbox 360, I think all of our game developers (and the artists too) did a little happy dance. It's easier to use and gives developers much more flexibility in how they allocate memory for various resources.
In terms of performance, I think that the PS3 and the Xbox 360 will essentially be a wash. We ran the numbers a while back and the two systems come up surprisingly close in theoretical peak performance, despite the one year difference in release dates. However, I know for a fact that we have a great advantage in software and services—our development environment and tools are years ahead of the competition, and this will ensure that Xbox 360 game developers can easily realize all of this performance and make superior games. Xbox 360 is a great system to develop on, a real pleasure—and I believe our developers agree."
i don't care if the 360 has better graphics. it's all about the games. and the 360 has more games for me coming up.