I have never had an Xbox of any kind

[thanonyx]

I have never had the pleasure of owning an Xbox console of any stripe. So I ask you Xbox owners what are the Xbox consoles like, how are their games, and what is it like growing up with them?

 

[Yousef]

Xbox is good. I like it.
Xbox’s great point is reliability.

Xbox OG was way stronger than PS2 and had built-in play which was important, Halo was the biggest 6th gen online multiplayer game. I don’t think there was any competition. Your Xbox OG had a decent shelf life.

360 was even better with the Xbox arcade stuff, cheap and small games and just really easy to collect for. Having a 360 back then almost meant you were set for life.

Xbone was even better. Tons of unique options. Some were short lived like PiP which is a shame. Could’ve been useful but you could so much with it.

Series is interesting. I think both series consoles rock. Both a flawless emulation machine, to the point you can hack your series to play bloodborne. Dev mode is incredible. You can theoretically play almost any disc on your series x.

 

[davshap]

Man, Halo 1 and 2 were pure masterpieces that smashed all games of the same genre on the PS2.
It was Halo that made me love FPS, 3D games and non-Japanese games.
And since the X BOX was more powerful than the PS2, games released on both supports and on GameCube looked better on the X BOX.

 

[Patches]

The original as good as it was for the path to modern online console gaming also introduced double paying for your internet. If you didnt mind double paying for your internet the xbox 360 was a very fun online experience. Now the servers are all turned off and the only customers xbox still has is the folks who are nostalgic to those times. The xbox one and series may have fancy spec sheets, but pale in comparison. Now we double pay for our internet on every console.

 

[Waffles]

The Xbox is like the freak accident of the gaming world for me: I didn't even know it existed until its second or third installment.

 

[Skeetos]

I have never had the pleasure of owning an Xbox console of any stripe. So I ask you Xbox owners what are the Xbox consoles like, how are their games, and what is it like growing up with them?

I love the first two Xbox consoles. They had killer games and killer support in their heyday. I never was able to play online until the One though. The Xbox One was kinda bad at first but was decent up until recently where the new firmware kinda lags the system. Haven't touched a Series but I think the Series S among a few other key points is why this current console gen has been underwhelming.

 

[χKai]

I've been an avid Xbo hater since it was the new thing.

But I had a friend who owned one, we played a lot of Conker Live and Reloaded and Halo 2. It was good.

The controllers are a godawful bigass hunk of junk, and the system itself is like a giant cinder block. Other than that, it's okay.

 

[Somnia]

The original Xbox was such a special system. Its controller, its size, its UI and its library were all so unique in terms of style and vibe. Truly felt like a next-gen system to lil ole me. Halo CE was the first FPS that clicked with me enough to make me a lifelong fan of the genre and as a Sega kid I got tons of goodies that kept me glued to the system. Felt like nearly every game came with a demo section full of trailers and playable snippets that helped clue me in on games to actually seek out and ask my parents for since I didn't have magazines growing up. With other systems I had no idea what was coming out until I'd see it on a store shelf, but with Xbox I was actively looking forward to new releases for the first time ever! Halo 2 was the first game I ever pre-ordered and I still remember how exciting it was walking into EB Games to snag my copy.

Microsoft being willing to throw a stack at just about anyone who promised them exclusivity led to a lot of junk but it also led to plenty of gold. It was also the first system to really get me into big western RPGs with games like Jade Empire, Morrowind and Knights of the Old Republic. Was also the first time I got to really experience just how different the same game could be on multiple systems, since I'd play games like Sonic Heroes or Star Wars Battlefront 2 on my Xbox only to be let down whenever I'd go to a friend's house and have to deal with such blatantly inferior versions.

Phantom Dust also remains one of the most unique and stellar games of all time. Forever sad that Microsoft opened their Japan game studio, let them make 2 amazing games (one of which they never localized) and then shuttered them before the 360 even launched. Sadder still that the remake got canned

God, I also remember spending hours slowly burning tons of CDs to the system to use it as a makeshift CD player, only to discover that some games let me play the tunes in-game! Blew my mind as a kid and made Burnout 3 go from excellent to un-fucking-touchable.

I'm also just a fan of the Duke to be honest. I totally respect that both the Duke and the S revision controllers are unwieldy and that things like that black/white buttons were half-hearted attempts at a 6-button layout that didn't work, but to this day I prefer playing my OG Xbox games and even modern Halo on a Duke.

 

[Boo Man]

i remember when Xbox first came out the rumor was it was made with radioactive material and thats why it glows green
probably true tbh

 

[YuriSukiSan]

When it first launched in my area there was a general feeling was that it might be another Dreamcast in the bad sense, even my dad was a little wary because he didn't want my brother to waste his birthday money on something that might be a failed experiment. My older brother decided he wanted to get one for his birthday and since we all shared consoles it was essentially ours as well! It was pretty surreal honestly, I wasn't sure what I expected but when we booted up Halo (the game it was boxed with) I knew it was special! The xbox and the 360 left a great impression on me, everything nearly always ran very smoothly, they had great libraries, the online was incredibly easy to use and there was a free form of membership in the early days. Xbox silver I think it was? The closest I've ever felt to that unique online experience was the brief lived community that the Wii U wiiverse had which generated all those memes because of it's eccentricities. I really miss when consoles didn't ask you to pay to use your own internet!

I say this as one of those people that loves all consoles, if the game was ported to xbox back in the day it was almost always a much, much, much smoother experience. Very smooth! Great frame rates and generally a higher fidelity. As much as I liked our other consoles we occasionally got to compare the same game and they were typically worse. The frame drops were dreadful in some games! In particular I remember Bayonetta and Dark Souls really dropping frames on our No Games 3. The only reason I had to play the other consoles is their unique gimmicks like the Wii remote and obviously their exclusives. If it was a multiplat it was almost always a better experience on xbox! And xbox isn't even my main console!

 

[moonbits]

Xbox from 2004 to 2009 was peak gaming.

 

[rosemarymenace]

the original Xbox experience is basically just getting to play higher fidelity versions of some of my favorite PS2 titles plus Halo and Forza
I'm mostly kidding, without an Xbox I would've never gotten into the MSR/PGR games

 

[Somnia]

When it first launched in my area there was a general feeling was that it might be another Dreamcast in the bad sense, even my dad was a little wary because he didn't want my brother to waste his birthday money on something that might be a failed experiment. My older brother decided he wanted to get one for his birthday and since we all shared consoles it was essentially ours as well!

It is so funny to think about how much of an unknown the Xbox was at the time. I was just old enough to not really understand or care that the Xbox was this new thing with the potential to instantly flop since I was 6 when my dad got one around launch. About a year and some change later I lost contact with him and his girlfriend at the time stole the systems he was gonna give to me, the Xbox being one of them.

My stepdad ended up buying an Xbox off of one of his coworkers when I was about 8, though he didn't get any games with it... Or so we thought. He brought the system home and I was excited to plug it in and just look at the UI again, only for Dead or Alive Xtreme Beach Volleyball to accidentally be in the disc tray. It was an eventful day to say the least lol

I wouldn't find out that the Xbox was a sort of middling system sales-wise until much later because both owning an OG and seeing the 360 just be an undeniable success gave me the illusion that Xbox was just some big brand right out the gate.

 

[YuriSukiSan]

It is so funny to think about how much of an unknown the Xbox was at the time. I was just old enough to not really understand or care that the Xbox was this new thing with the potential to instantly flop since I was 6 when my dad got one around launch. About a year and some change later I lost contact with him and his girlfriend at the time stole the systems he was gonna give to me, the Xbox being one of them.

My stepdad ended up buying an Xbox off of one of his coworkers when I was about 8, though he didn't get any games with it... Or so we thought. He brought the system home and I was excited to plug it in and just look at the UI again, only for Dead or Alive Xtreme Beach Volleyball to accidentally be in the disc tray. It was an eventful day to say the least lol

I wouldn't find out that the Xbox was a sort of middling system sales-wise until much later because both owning an OG and seeing the 360 just be an undeniable success gave me the illusion that Xbox was just some big brand right out the gate.

Oh.. I'm sorry that happened. Some times I forget how sheltered I am!

And it was strange for sure, there was a lot of uncertainty until certain games on the system made it blow up or at least that was my perception of the events. I remember a lot of different children (small village school) only really wanted to get one when Halo became so popular it was like a miniture pokémon craze for us.

 

[Somnia]

Oh.. I'm sorry that happened. Some times I forget how sheltered I am!

And it was strange for sure, there was a lot of uncertainty until certain games on the system made it blow up or at least that was my perception of the events. I remember a lot of different children (small village school) only really wanted to get one when Halo became so popular it was like a miniture pokémon craze for us.

I've often wondered if the Xbox would have even lived long enough to have a successor if Halo hadn't become the biggest thing in gaming for most of the 2000s. The system outside of Halo is still full of wonderful oddities so I'm sure it would have gone on to be a cult classic system akin to the Saturn or Dreamcast, but without the killer app to end all killer apps it's debatable if the OG Xbox would have done well enough to ensure Microsoft would remain an important player within the console space for generations to come.

Also love your anecdote about your perception being driven by local thoughts on the matter. Growing up I was surrounded by kids with N64s and Gamecubes so I just assumed Sony wasn't a very popular console manufacturer. Imagine my shock when I finally discovered that both the PS1 and PS2 were as uber successful as they were! Pre-ubiquitous internet days certainly had some charm to them in that way lol

 

[YuriSukiSan]

I've often wondered if the Xbox would have even lived long enough to have a successor if Halo hadn't become the biggest thing in gaming for most of the 2000s. The system outside of Halo is still full of wonderful oddities so I'm sure it would have gone on to be a cult classic system akin to the Saturn or Dreamcast, but without the killer app to end all killer apps it's debatable if the OG Xbox would have done well enough to ensure Microsoft would remain an important player within the console space for generations to come.

Also love your anecdote about your perception being driven by local thoughts on the matter. Growing up I was surrounded by kids with N64s and Gamecubes so I just assumed Sony wasn't a very popular console manufacturer. Imagine my shock when I finally discovered that both the PS1 and PS2 were as uber successful as they were! Pre-ubiquitous internet days certainly had some charm to them in that way lol

I'm not well read on it but I know the xbox was selling at a loss to get people to adopt it! I'm sure someone more knowledgable will be able to tell us the exact figure but just at a glance at the best selling games compared to the likes of PS2 and what it actually sold, it does look like from my own ignorant perspective that the Halo franchise carried the console pretty hard! Despite that I really don't think the xbox team at the time were incompetent, in fact they seem quite the opposite! It's sad to think the people that made those decisions aren't working on it anymore. I know the xbox was eventually mismanaged by Don Mattrick but that was a very different era of Microsoft and Sega from what I know were mismanaging their consoles very early on. Arguably as far back as the Mega Drive! They were constantly countermanding intelligent decisions being made by Sega of USA all of the time! I think the Saturn launching like it did, at that price, with that library of games was very telling. I'm not saying I don't love the Saturn but as time drew on from that launch onwards it seems like the leadership at Sega of Japan were terribly out of touch with reality. And how badly the Dreamcast and their IPs were mismanaged, it was bad!

.. And yeah! They were, I had the opposite experience. Country wide the N64 did well but where I was in Cicada country just about everyone I knew had a Playstation, myself included! My brother was the one that wanted an N64, he was pretty much the odd child out when it came to his and my friend group. I loved the N64! And my friends liked it too when they tried it but I remember a lot of people that thought it was cheap because it was running cartridges instead of discs, that's something young me remembers very well. "It's still using cartridges like the old Sega did, that's awful!" I used to hear that a lot from adults and older boys. I'm not saying the N64 flopped in Europe -- I remember the GoldenEye64 launch at my local game store, it was packed! It just wasn't as big as the Playstation. The general kind of perception seemed to be that it was an outdated console for younger children. I even knew one girl that spent more time listening to CDs on her Playstation than playing games! It was the 'cool' console.

 

[Varyag]

I also completely missed all sorts of XBox back in the day. Ended up strongly preferring it's controller (XBone) layout many years later as it fits better in my hand compared to the Dualshock that I grew up with in the PS2.

That also meant I completely missed Halo, and the cultural phenomenon that came with it. Some other games too, like Ace Combat 6 and Armored Core 4, but Halo was the big miss for me. Only got to play those recently with the MCC on Steam, and now I can say I get it. Halo 2 and 3 are particularly great games.