The Xbox 360 is the successor to the original Xbox console by Microsoft. It is the second console of the series and belongs to the seventh-generation of video game consoles, competing against Sony’s PlayStation 3 and Nintendo’s Wii. While it wasn’t the most successful console of all time, the Xbox 360 strengthened Microsoft’s title as a formidable force in the video game industry.
The Xbox 360 was notable for many of its innovations, particularly its use of online gaming, streaming and subscription service. The Xbox Kinect, while not the first of its kind, was also praised for its effectivity. The development of the Xbox 360 was interesting, to say the least, and given the arrival of Microsoft’s next console, it’ll be interesting to take a look at the history of the most commercially successful Xbox consoles so far.
10 Various Development Codenames
While the Xbox 360 was still in development back in early 2003, its working title wasn’t exactly Xbox 360 yet. Around this time, the console had many different codenames and working titles.
The reported names that were considered for Xbox’s successor are Xbox Next, Xbox 2, Xbox FS, Xenon, and NextBox. The team behind the console at Microsoft finally settled with Xbox 360. They initially considered Xbox 2, but given the PlayStation were already at their “3” subtitle, Microsoft felt going with Xbox 2 would only mean their console was behind. They went with 360 to imply that the gamer is at the center of the experience.
9 The Secrecy Around The Xbox 360
When the Xbox 360 was developed, Microsoft assigned IBM to design a Xenon processor for the console. The cores of this processor would be very similar, and a slightly more advanced version, of the PlayStation 3’s Cell Processor PPE architecture.
While the IBM employees were working on the processor for the Xbox 360, they essentially had to “hide” their work and continue moving forward in secrecy. This was because IBM at the time was in partnership with Sony, Microsoft’s direct competitor, in developing the Cell Processor.
8 Notable Recruitments
In February 2013, Microsoft held an event in Bellevue, Washington for over 400 developers. This was done in an effort to recruit skilled and abled individuals to work on the system of the Xbox 360. Heading the development of the console was Microsoft’s then vice-president J Allard.
F0llowing this event, Microsoft was able to gather a couple of notable recruits as well as assign various components to third-party companies. Peter Moore, former vice president of Sega of America, signed on to join Microsoft and assist oversee the production of the console. Microsoft also assigned ATI to produce the graphics card and IBM to produce the processor.
7 The Xbox 360 Controller
The difference between the Xbox controller and the Xbox 360 controller seems non-existent physically, but in terms of ergonomics and overall quality, Microsoft upped their ante to provide a quality gaming experience to its gamers.
The controller for the Xbox 360 features a much more ergonomic design to make it feel more comfortable to the player’s hands. It also had wireless capabilities and was powered by two AA batteries or a rechargeable pack. The button layout, considered to be the most perfect aspect of the original controller, remained unchanged.
6 The Console’s Hardware
The hardware of the original Xbox was considered to be very powerful for its time. Its IBM CPU featured three symmetrical cores running at 3.2 GHz each, six hardware threads, three VMX-128 vector units, 128 VMX-128 registers for every hardware thread, and a 1MB L2 cache.
Its GPU is also remarkably impressive. ATI’s graphics card featured a 500 MHz processor with 10MB of embedded DRAM. It also had a unified shader architecture to provide a much more realistic graphical design. The exterior design featured matte colors that came in white.
5 Xbox Live
The Xbox Live was first introduced with the original Xbox console and was re-integrated and improved upon for the Xbox 360. When Microsoft initially dove into the video game industry, they wanted online service and online gaming to be one of their key pillars. The Xbox Live service was borne out of this mission.
During the run of Xbox Live with the Xbox 360, many new features were added in and old ones were updated. With the new console, players could now watch other gamers compete against each other using this service. Many of the old services were also integrated into the console straight out of the box.
4 Multiple New Features
The Xbox 360 was widely marketed as something more than a video game console. Microsoft believed this console was capable of being the living room’s center multimedia platform. To incorporate this, the Xbox 360 included a number of new features and add-ons. The console had the ability to stream music, play television programs, and films through Xbox Music, Xbox Video, and other third-party content services.
The Xbox 360 also introduced the Xbox Kinect, a wireless motion-sensing input device that could be used and integrated into gameplay. The wireless capability of the controller was also a new feature for Microsoft.
3 E3 Announcement
The Xbox 360 was initially unveiled on MTV in May 2015. It was famously announced by actor Elijah Wood and musician ‘Lil Jon. While the MTV showcase was very memorable, the console wasn’t fully explained in detail until the 2005 E3 which happened later that month.
At E3 2003, Microsoft went toe-to-toe with its direct competitor Sony who also showcased their upcoming console PlayStation 3. During the event, Microsoft announced some of the big games that would be played with the Xbox 360 such as Gears of War, Half-Life 2, King Kong, and Perfect Dark Zero. It also showcased how integral the online service is for this console.
2 Xbox 360’s Release
The Xbox 360 was finally released on November 22, 2005 in the U.S. and in Canada. It was released in Europe and Japan in just a couple of weeks later, followed by a subsequent release in Mexico, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Hong Kong, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, India, and Russia.
The console had a notorious shortage of supply upon release. It had not been able to create enough supplies to meet the demand from the U.S. and Europe. During its first week of release, 10% of the overall supply was sold on eBay. Unfortunately, many of the initial consoles suffered the infamous “Red Ring of Death” which essentially killed the console.
1 Various Retail Configurations
The Xbox 360 had a wide array of various retail specifications players could choose from at launch. The console was initially sold in two different bundles, the Xbox 360 Pro o Premium and the Xbox 360 Core. The former bundle was considered the higher-end version and costs a hundred dollars more than the latter. It came with an included 60GB external hard drive.
Two years after the release of the original console, Microsoft released the Xbox Elite. This version of the console came with a 120gb hard drive already installed in the console. This console also featured a matte-black design instead of the traditional matte-white.
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