This week, we go over the history of the Xbox 360. Join us for all the laughs, the sales, and the history behind things. We also round out the month's HOG updates: Congrats to Jake for NUDE Hog, and Ryan for Super Hog. Also, special shoutout to Truehoax for winning the drawing. Make sure to vote on the Forced Entry title!
The History of the Xbox 360
Kaleb Schweiss
The Xbox360 is a home video game console developed by Microsoft. It competed with the Playstation 3 and the Wii during the seventh generation of video game consoles. It was officially announced on MTV on May 12, 2005. The console was released on November 22, 2005, and has sold 84 million units as of June 9, 2014. The console didn’t win the great war of the 7th, but it is praised via TechRadar to be the most influential through it’s emphasis on digital media distribution and mutliplayer gaming on Xbox live. But of course, the thing I feel like they did the most right is the achievements. The console is the highest selling console originating from America, the greatest country ever, and is the sixth highest selling console of all time, behind The Playstation 2, Nintendo DS, Game Boy/Game Boy Color, Playstation, and Wii. The initial release was plagued by a high failure rate, otherwise known as The Red Ring of Death. The console initially had a 54.2 percent failure rate according to a Game Informer survey of 5,000 readers. This is more than five times the failure rate of the PS3. The console began production a mere 69 days before launch, and Microsoft was unable to supply enough consoles to most regions, selling out everywhere but Japan. The original Xbox didn’t sell very well in Japan, 2 million units, but the 360 would sell even less at 1.5 million from 2005-2011.
The 360’s advantage over the Playstation 3 was great. The pricepoint was two hundred dollars less, and they had plenty of third party support behind them. The console also featured much better cross-platform capabilities. Five years into it’s lifespan, the Xbox 360 got the Kinect, which became the fastest selling consumer electronic device in history, and effectively extended the console’s lifespan. In April of 2016, Microsoft annouced the end of production for the system, but they will still support it.
-Talk about Xbox live
-Talk about UI
-Exclusives