Microsoft celebrates the 10th anniversary of its Xbox game console. In 2001, The Pentium III-based Xbox has quickly conquered a place in living rooms of millions of gamers worldwide but was discontinued soon. In 2002, the company launched Xbox Live followed by the ‘DirectX Box’ or Xbox 360 in 2005 that 5 years later was redesigned again to become a Kinect technology-supported console.
Photo: Xbox console, from www.engadget.com
The 2010 release of Kinect has challenged the gaming world with unprecedented technology that allows interacting with a console using gestures. Microsoft is expected to unveil its next generation console in about 4 years. Meanwhile, the Kinect technology is spreading with lightening speed to other spheres, not only gaming.
The Xbox name originates from the initial Microsoft’s idea of creating a DirectX Box, DirectX being the name for a set of APIs used on computers. So, ‘DirectX Box’ was shortened to ‘Xbox.’
The system was capable of playing DVDs in addition to games. The Xbox made a revolution in the gaming industry with such benefits as an ability to save games without a memory card and rip music from CDs that could then be listened to as a soundtrack in certain games. Later it made possible to play downloadable content in games like Halo 2.
According to statistics provided by the company, the Xbox has sold over 24 million units worldwide, including more than 16 million in North America alone.
