This past weekend, the summer Xbox Games Showcase has attempted to reformulate gamers’ perception of Microsoft and Xbox. To do this, it has had some heavyweights from its catalogue, such as the future ‘Gears of War: E-Day’, it has made the odd announcement regarding exclusivity and has presented a new-old console: the Xbox Series X25 Limited Editionan Xbox Series X with a translucent casing in the green tone of the brand’s first console.
What’s inside. Technically, the X25 is an Xbox Series Accompanying the console is the Xbox X25 Special Edition wireless controller, also translucent, with the original ABXY buttons and some bumpers that replicate the black and white buttons of the one known as “Duke”, the bulky remote with which everything started in 2001.
The console plus controller pack will arrive in some selected markets in November, as a limited edition, and the controller will also be sold separately. At the moment nothing is known about the price. Microsoft has announced that we will have more information on pricing and pre-sales “soon.” Currently the standard 1TB Xbox Series
The hook is you two decades ago. Two years ago, Xbox began publishing titles first-party on PlayStation 5: games developed by studios that Microsoft owns, available on rival console. Phil Spencer enunciated the philosophy of that movement by saying that the future of Xbox is not in the hardware, but in the services and the catalog. The idea was that Xbox was, essentially, Game Pass. And although the strategy had its logic, the results have not convinced Microsoft, which has seen hardware sales sink and the brand was becoming less and less relevant.
Because if the games come to PS5, why buy an Xbox? With its new CEO, Asha SharmaMicrosoft wants to recover the brand’s personality, and the X25 is the first response in object form. Sharma wrote in X after the showcase: “That means giving you something made for Xbox. ‘Gears of War: E-Day’ and ‘Clockwork Revolution’ will be exclusive to the console.”
The topic of exclusives. Xbox has announced that many of the future Xbox releases will be absolute exclusives, not temporary. ‘Gears of War: E-Day’ and ‘Clockwork Revolution’ have been expressly mentioned, while it has also been confirmed that everything announced as multiplatform will maintain that condition: ‘Fable’, ‘Senua’ (the new Ninja Theory game announced at the event) and ‘State of Decay 3’, for example.
Each exclusivity will be discussed on a case-by-case basis, and when a release date is announced, it will also be announced which platforms the game will appear on. At the moment it is not clear what determines the exclusivity, although it is possible to think that games that make up the Xbox identity, such as ‘Gears’, will be. Or maybe not, because as far as we know, we will see the new ‘Halo: Campaign Evolved’ on PS5. In any case, the strategy is to gradually return to providing a touch of exclusivity to Xbox. This movement plays into that strategy, as does the launch of the Xbox Series X25, which returns to the time when the console’s catalog was overflowing with exclusive games.
What X25 actually is. It is a skin for a Series X openly aimed at those who have not purchased Xbox hardware in this generation. And for this we appeal to the times when an Xbox could be worse or better than a Playstation, but of course, it was something with its own identity. It is only the first step in a strategy that at the moment (two exclusive games) is advancing only lukewarmly. If from there we go on to experience a true identity battle, it is something that, of course, can pepper the next few years of console battles.
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