Back in the late ‘90s and early noughties, the video game wars were fought by Sony and Nintendo on the battleground of living rooms around the world – and the chance of competing with the two Japanese giants seemed impossible, even for Microsoft.
Bill Gates had spurred the quest for a console of Microsoft’s own in fearing the video game market’s rise would threaten Microsoft’s PC success, leading Xbox developer teams down a turbulent path of trying to merge the worlds of software and hardware with an Xbox that could run Windows.
But in the end, the Xbox that launched on markets managed to cut through because of its creativity, boldness and vision for the future of gaming – something that can often feel lost in today’s churn of consoles that barely make it to shelves.
