History of video games/Platforms/Xbox

Internal Affairs
Development of the original Xbox was started in February 1998 as the DirectX box by a four person team at Microsoft. The announcement that the PlayStation 2 would attempt to double as a personal computer which could run an optional Linux based operating system was a potentially galvanizing factor for Microsoft to pursue game console development. Though this stance would soften over the following decade, at the time Microsoft leadership considered Linux based operating systems a serious and significant threat to Microsoft's place in the market. Though ultimately relatively few users of the PlayStation 2 would attempt to do this, it would be a crucial factor that lead Microsoft to enter the market.

Development teams for the console were very competitive with one another, and some working on the console called the project the "Coffin Box" as they assumed it would fail. There was significant friction between other divisions of Microsoft and the Xbox team at the time, and the Xbox team would work outside the primary Microsoft Campus. Though internal politics nearly sunk the console, Steve Ballmer, the newly appointed CEO of Microsoft, would save the project from being shuttered. This would prove to be something of a trend, as Ballmer would spend significant political capital as CEO to save the next two following Xbox consoles from being shuttered or otherwise ruined by internal decisions.

Because other colors designers markers were commonly borrowed, the logo was sketched with a green marker, leading to the green color identity of the console.

Promotion and Partnerships
Launching a major new console successfully required significant investments and partnerships, which the software giant Microsoft was able to muster. A budget of $500 million dollars was set up to promote the Xbox. Microsoft acquired Bungie in 2000 for $30 million dollars, including projects in development such as Oni and future system seller Halo. Isao Okawa, the chairman of Sega, petitioned Bill Gates to add Dreamcast compatibility to the Xbox as Sega prepared to leave the hardware business, though this functionality was ultimately not added. Still, Sega and Microsoft became strong partners, with Sega agreeing to produce several games as Xbox exclusives. Microsoft also attempted to partner with Nintendo, who's American offices were also based in the Seattle metropolitan area, but these talks did not go far. Additional partnerships attempted included Midway and Square. An interesting partnership was attempted to acquire the Bleem! Emulator, which would have given the Xbox the ability to play PlayStation 1 games through software emulation, though this deal fell through.

Early publications speculated that AMD would likely supply the Xbox CPU, before Intel was announced as the supplier.

Prototype Development
The prototype Xbox hardware was vastly different from the production console, and is notable for its bold futuristic design which was unlike any console seen before it. The prototype demonstrated at GDC 2000 was actually shaped like an X with a silver colored metallic milled aluminum. Mainly due to the expense of the case, each of these functioning prototypes cost $18,000 USD to manufacture. Prototype Xbox controllers included a screen, similar to the Sega Dreamcast but distinct in its own way.

Not all the futuristic touches of the prototype Xbox units were discarded on production. The unique dashboard of the original Xbox used public domain sounds from the Apollo 11 mission to the Moon as background noise.

Launch
The Microsoft Xbox was released on November 15th, 2001 at a cost of $299. Over a million Xbox consoles sold in the first three weeks on the market in North America, though the system struggled in Japan and Europe. The Xbox Live online gaming service was launched nearly a year later in November of 2002.

By 2003 the Xbox was struggling so much in the Japanese market that it was being outsold by the previous generation PlayStation 1.

Legacy
The Xbox was followed by the Xbox 360, which was first released in late 2005. At launch the Xbox 360 supported limited backwards compatibility with original Xbox games via software emulation.

The Xbox was discontinued in 2009, having sold 24 million consoles. Shortly afterwards, on April 15, 2010 support for Xbox Live on the original Xbox ended. The last multiplayer game of Halo 2 on the original Xbox Live service actually ended some time later, as a group of players known as the Noble 14 continued to game on as one by one their connections were slowly severed. Nearly a month later, on May 10th, 2010 just before 11PM in the Pacific Time Zone, the final member of Noble 14 was removed from the game.

The Kodi Media Player was originally created as the unofficial Xbox Media Center (XBMC) for the Xbox in 2004. By the late 2010's Kodi was a significant media player in its own right, and its popularity attracted significant media attention. In 2018, Kodi would see an official release on the newer Xbox One console.

Technology
When looking at specifications alone the original Xbox is deceptively similar to a standard PC of the time. Yet in practice the Xbox has notable architectural differences from a standard PC, especially in regards to software.

The original Xbox uses a modified Intel Pentium III CPU clocked at 733 megahertz. An Xbox NVIDIA GeForce 3 derived GPU clocked at 250 megahertz is integrated into the northbridge. The Xbox has 64 mebibytes of shared RAM. As a result of it's compute resources, the original Xbox was quite powerful for its time and was capable of 20 gigaflops of performance.

The internal IDE hard drive of the original Xbox held 8 gigabytes of data. No major console before the Xbox had such a massive included storage drive, and following consoles would often follow by including large internal storage as standard. The Xbox also had an IDE interface DVD drive.

Xbox Controllers connect over USB 1.1 with a unique physical connector. The Xbox has a built in 100 megabit ethernet port for high speed networking. This was not a standard feature this generation, and gave the Xbox an edge when rolling out online services.

2001

 * Halo: Combat Evolved
 * Fuzion Frenzy

Shrek
Shrek for the original Xbox is notable for it's use of deferred lighting, being among the first games to do so.

Read more about the video game Shrek on Wikipedia.

2002

 * Jet Set Radio Future
 * Blinx: The Time Sweeper
 * Panzer Dragoon Orta
 * MechAssault
 * Steel Battalion
 * Shin Megami Tensei: Nine

Whacked!
Party game.

Read more about Whacked! on Wikipedia.

ToeJam & Earl III: Mission to Earth
Read more about ToeJam & Earl III: Mission to Earth on Wikipedia.

Gunvalkyrie
A game that had initially been planned to launch on the Dreamcast.

Read more about Gunvalkyrie on Wikipedia.

2003

 * Crimson Skies: High Road to Revenge
 * Grabbed by the Ghoulies

2004

 * Halo 2
 * Fable
 * Ninja Gaiden
 * Blinx 2: Masters of Time and Space
 * MechAssault 2: Lone Wolf
 * Metal Wolf Chaos

2005

 * Conker: Live & Reloaded
 * Psychonauts
 * Forza Motorsport
 * Stubbs the Zombie in Rebel Without a Pulse

2006

 * Dreamfall: The Longest Journey

External Resources

 * Video Game Console Library - Xbox page.