Microsoft’s Great Run Of Conferences Show They Are Serious On Fixing Past Problems With Xbox One

Back in 2013 when the Xbox One was announced there was a mixed reaction from fans worldwide. We started off by seeing that Microsoft were going for more of a casual living room console that really would fit in well and centre your home entertainment centre, it was marketed as the Xbox all-in-one. A lot of gamers were upset that Microsoft were seemingly trying to push them away from their console in favour of a more entertainment system. There was also controversy surrounding the always online state of the console and a lot of people were unhappy when pairing this with the Kinect, worrying that they would be watched by the system and “monitored” in a way.

These anti-consumer moves led to a lot of bad press for Microsoft, which may have ended up losing them this console race. They are currently being outsold by almost 2:1 by the PS4. But under new management, the Xbox division of Microsoft are making huge leaps towards being a fantastic console for gamers no matter what you choose to play. Let’s take a look at how their most recent run of conferences specifically have looked to push Xbox into the future!

While the conferences of 2014 were a good base, the 2015 E3 and Gamescom conferences are the ones I want to focus on as this is the year they seem to have learned their lessons and are really pushing the Xbox brand in a way that the competition should be worried about.

Microsoft started off E3 with the explosive announcement of backwards compatibility, allowing Xbox gamers to play our old Xbox 360 games on the Xbox One for free, which really set the tone for the whole conference. While we then sat through an amazing amount of new games and content coming to the console over the next 6-12 months, everyone had in the back of their mind the absolute hype that they felt when the backwards compatibility announcement happened and it really made for a great conference. We then went on to see games like Rise of the Tomb Raider, Halo 5: Guardians, Gears of War 4 and exclusive mod support for Fallout 4 after release, showing us that Microsoft are now all about the gamer.

There were so many games at E3 in fact, that they had to push 3 big games to Gamescom so they got the attention they really deserved. These games were Crackdown 3, Scalebound and Quantum Break, all with incredible gameplay reveals and fantastic trailers. Much like E3, there was a lot of talk about improvements coming to the console itself, which I am always a huge fan of including the new chat adapter with keypad, more games from Xbox’s Games with Gold service coming to backwards compatibility at launch and finally a showcase of Windows 10 on console and a demo of just how much of a game-changer DirectX 12 will be for the Xbox One when Windows 10 launches this fall.

Microsoft’s E3 and Gamescom conferences this year have been what we have asked for from Microsoft since their disastrous showing at E3 in 2013. We want to see games and tech that will make our experience with your console better. We want you to use the money that we invest into your online service to make Xbox a better place for gamers and we want to see your conferences, whichever convention you go to, be an hour of well put together content that feels like a pleasure to experience. They’ve nailed it so far, but let’s hope they are going to carry on with this success far into the future.

What do you guys think? Is the Xbox a more attractive console now, than it has been in the past and have Microsoft learned from their mistakes? Let us know in the comments below!