Solve for Xbox: Discussing the Past, Present, and Possibility of Xbox

Phil Spencer speaking on stage at the 2017 Xbox E3 Briefing

I remember sitting down on the floor of my friend Henry’s house some summer in the mid-2000s, the four or five of us neighborhood kids gathering around his television armed with a controller.  I pressed that ridged circular power button on the Original Xbox and readied myself for the coming tournament.  Throughout the earlier part of the day, we had been trying to figure out the bracket’s logistics - You see, we had to find the right balance of skill levels, while also trying to keep it fresh with novel pairings of players.  Ultimately, we settled on a logical order: I would play Miles, Henry got Jonah, and my sister Erin would figure in somewhere along the line.

We each chattered and barked at one another as the logos appeared on the screen.  But then it happened, like so many times before. We each grew silent:

A ring world appeared, turning in the void of space as a Gregorian choir’s vocals eclipsed our collective ears.  Soon, the chanting gave way to a pulsing combination of drums and strings – beating deep into our bodies.  We began to hum and jump along to the melody – we all knew the song by heart.  And we knew the fun experience that awaited us after.  It was the main menu for the game we could not get enough of, and its logo adorned the top of our view.

HALO

When this raucous jam session ended, we clicked into the multiplayer menu and began our adventure.  And from there, we were all hooked. For years, we bounced between entries in the franchise. We dueled one another on the mysterious dunes of Sandtrap, raced our warthogs around Coagulation, and made our stands on the fallen planet of Reach.

For all of us, Halo multiplayer was an extension of our friendships with one another – a medium for us to play, compete, have fun, and tell stories. Blood Gulch, Battle Creek, and Sidewinder were transformative spaces where the glory of slaying an entire enemy team could be realized. Where we hid in fear as our rival swarmed our position with the rocket launcher and overshield combo. And where we collectively lived out the heroism of the Master Chief as he battled to save the galaxy from complete annihilation. Halo was a place of wonder. It was this sense of community and interconnectedness. And it was unabashed joy. And the Xbox was our teleportation device.

I had been a gamer before these experiences on the Original Xbox, playing my brother’s hand-me-down SNES cartridges and what N64 games I could get my hands from the local video store.  But nothing engaged me like that green and black behemoth.  The Xbox is where I fell in love with video games and the gaming industry.  I mean this plainly: I would not be where I am today without Halo, Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, or ESPN NFL 2K5. They revealed the near limitless possibilities that existed within this medium. No other art form could combine interactive storytelling with such rich worlds to explore at your own discretion. No other form of media could so fundamentally empower us in our battles with friends and family.

My friends and I transitioned our gaming onto the Xbox 360 as soon as Halo 3 was released.  After months of re-watching the Announcement trailer I had from a magazine demo disc, I jumped into perhaps the best singleplayer and multiplayer suite in a video game ever released.  For years, we would hop on after school to play Halo 3 on Xbox Live. The “360” was a console that I owned at perhaps the perfect time in my life: There were so many excellent new games coming out, and I had all the time in the world to play them.

It was glorious.

Nothing will ever top those endless nights spent playing the “Fat Kid” infection mode on Foundry where the human players attempted to make their way through a tunnel all the while a horde of infected chased them down.  Or trying to be the last person standing in “Jenga”, as the infected player would attempt to massacre the survivors by launching a whole host of vehicles, items, and fusion coils.  To those full days watching Halo 3 machinima – player created movies filmed in the game using Theater mode – as we attempted to recreate their various map glitches or unbelievable tricks.

Eventually, we each moved on to new games – Modern Warfare 2, or Gears of War, maybe even Left 4 Dead.  And eventually, we all grew up as well: We went off to Middle school – and graduated from Middle School.  We went to High School. 

Even though those experiences ended, I remained enamored with my Xbox 360. It   As the console generation came to an end, you would think upgrading to the next Xbox iteration would be an easy decision.  But that was not going to be an easy choice for many Xbox gamers this time around.

A Decade of Challenge

I just remember being bewildered at what had transpired around the announcement of Microsoft’s highly anticipated successor to the Xbox 360.  In May of 2013, we finally had an official name for the new Xbox – and no, it was not the “Xbox 720”.  Microsoft had elected to name their new device, the “Xbox One”, with the “One” moniker attempting to convey the firm’s intent on making this new console your living room’s central entertainment hub.  In theory, it would be our main access point for streaming videos from apps like Netflix and YouTube, accessing our cable TV boxes within an integrated Xbox guide powered by a brand-new Kinect camera, and of course, playing video games.

And make no mistake – my ordering of the above features was very much deliberate.

Compared to the games-focused Playstation 4 similarly announced in Spring 2013, the unveiling was an unmitigated disaster. The overwhelming majority of the reveal event seemed to linger on everything but video games. If you were interested in how the new Kinect handled your body’s movement during exercise or an integrated fantasy football experience, though? Yeah – this was an hour-long event for you. Even Xbox’s fan favorite IP, Halo, was largely relegated to an announcement of a cross media partnership with Steven Spielberg. For a young Eamon watching, the deep disappointment was palpable. It felt like this essential element of my gaming identity had abandoned the experiences that had so shaped my life and those of so many other gamers around the world.

Here was a clear case of a company ignoring what seemed to me to be common sense wants and needs of its core audience in favor of what they believed would make their product more appealing to the more general customer.  But in a more niche and hardcore market, like gaming, the enthusiasts are who lined up to buy your $400-500 machines at launch – and who then go on to evangelize its merits (or flaws) to anyone who will listen.  And this is exactly what happened with the Xbox One.  Gaming media outlets, influencers, hardcore gamers, and essentially everyone else would go on to indicate their disapproval towards the Xbox One, and it led to a cascading abandonment of the platform by most customers.

How could a multibillion dollar company misread the room so poorly?

Why “Solve for Xbox”?

I took this question with me as I went off to college and began to engage with subjects of management and marketing.  All the while, a similar reevaluation was taking place in Redmond, WA.  After the disastrous Xbox One rollout, Don Mattrick indicated he would be resigning from his role as the Head of Xbox.  Appointed by new CEO Satya Nadella, Phil Spencer would eventually assume the mantle of reworking the entire division.  Spencer spearheaded the acquisition of mega gaming IP, Minecraft, later in 2014. In 2015, the oft-requested feature of backwards compatibility was introduced for the Xbox One – enabling users to play through Xbox 360 titles (and later, Original Xbox titles) via disc or digital purchase.  The prospect of being able to replay the Mass Effect Trilogy, or Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic made me ecstatic – it was a sign that Xbox was dead focused on rebuilding trust with its core community.  By 2017, Xbox had unveiled the next step in its journey to reinvigorate its platform with the introduction of Xbox Game Pass – a subscription service that enables users to subscribe for unlimited access to a library of Xbox games, including day one access to all current and future Xbox Game Studios titles.  It was the capstone manifestation of Xbox’s reworking and an essential piece of putting “the gamer at the center of everything [they] do”.

We now find ourselves in Xbox’s 20th anniversary year. They have released the next iteration(s) of Xbox consoles: the Xbox Series X and the Xbox Series S. These console rollouts stood in stark contrast to the Xbox One. After a surprise unveiling of the Series X design at the 2019 Game Awards, newly acquired Ninja Theory unveiled the first trailer for Hellblade II: Senua’s Saga. Power and compatibility for each of the systems was paramount within the marketing, while extraneous media features were left to blog posts and tweets. It was a refreshing return to a gamer-centered rollout when compared to the botched marketing of the Xbox one.

The ups and downs of Xbox over the better part of the last decade were the catalyst for much of my focus in college.  I knew that I wanted to tailor my education around better understanding what underpins the decisions made by large organizations like Microsoft.  More specifically, I wanted to be able to understand why the frustratingly avoidable Xbox One launch period ever came to fruition, and how Xbox was able to transform its image to where it stands now. 

I ultimately graduated from American University with a degree in Business Administration, with specializations in Public Management and Information Technology – and have gone on to work for a large insurer as a Product Strategy Analyst. I have gotten to use these analytical skills in my day to day, but I have always wanted to find new ways to apply these to this passion for gaming.  Around the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, I began thinking of outlets for better understanding the business side of the video game industry, and my fascination with the Xbox brand & story.  And an idea (and pun!) came into my head:

“What about ‘Solve for Xbox’?”

The name encapsulated the fundamentals of what I aspired to do: As a fan and as a critic, I wanted to bring business case discussion, data analysis, and informed commentary to the areas of Xbox, Xbox Game Pass, and the current events affecting the Xbox Game Studios portfolio.  From what I could tell, not many other podcasters or bloggers were looking to focus on this approach in great depth – and it seemed like a perfect fit for what I wanted to do.  Obviously, I’m going to write and talk about fun topics just as much as the next guy – but I genuinely believe bringing these tools into discussions will only benefit the overall discourse.  I also hope to engage with folks within the industry, including those that are often on the periphery – financial analysts, accountants, and others who are on the front lines of grappling with the financial, strategic, and data-related questions at the center of these discussions.

Xbox has gone from the highest of highs, to the lowest of lows.  There is so much to parse from this history, so much to engage with in the present, and even more interesting subjects to discuss for the future. Ultimately, I want this to be a space where we can speculate and theorize openly on subjects we are deeply invested in.  With this in mind, I want to bring energy and fun to those that read, write, and listen alongside me.  And I hope I can live by a standard of credibility in these conversations on Xbox and the industry we love so much. 

So, let’s Jump In.