Thursday, February 29All That Matters

9 years ago, today, Don Mattrick revealed the Xbox One and it’s always online functionality. For people without online access he suggested to keep playing the Xbox 360.


9 years ago, today, Don Mattrick revealed the Xbox One and it’s always online functionality. For people without online access he suggested to keep playing the Xbox 360.



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31 Comments

  • moeriscus

    I owned a 360, and this is one of the primary reasons why I went with a PS4 rather than Xbone in the next console generation. Yes, MS reversed course, but the knowledge that they *would* have done this if they had been able to get away with it was reason enough (love my PS, but still prefer the Xbox controller).

  • SirLoinPotato

    I was PS3 all the way, just cause it could play Blu rays and shit.

    But I was considering the Xbox one just cause of the social aspect of the 360. But the e3 reveal and price(and Sony opting for payed online) I stuck with the PS4.

    That e3 really cost them.

  • ReichRespector

    Yes I remember getting my Xbox One and Master Chief Collection for Christmas and then finding out the game wasnt actually on the disc and the Xbox servers were getting so hammered it took three days to download it.

    Oh yeah and when I did download it the game was a broken mess.

  • pfury

    My mate who lives middle of nowhere only plays games offline. it’s a struggle today as well having limited access to internet and poor smartphone signal.

    Every few months I take his console and update and install few new games for him. Everything requires being online on Series X. Can’t install new games of discs.

  • SweetCosmicPope

    I remember being pretty steamed about this. It pushed me toward PS4. Particularly the comments about how if you didn’t like it you could just keep playing Xb360. It just felt like a big FU to the community.

    And then on top of it, after they reversed course they were like “we were going to let you share games with family members but since you want to be little bitches about it we’re taking that away…”

    Eventually I did get an XB1 anyway, but my primary was PS4.

  • PalpyTime

    Don’t forget that they also wanted to lock the disc to the machine, and then “sold” it as a “feature” that you could share the disc with your family!! Wow!! Thanks Micro$oft!

    360 was an utterly awesome machine, and this was the biggest fall from grace. I was so disgusted that I decided to boycott MS consoles for 10 years. 1 year to go.

  • Chessh2036

    The Xbox Documentary on YouTube from Xbox goes over this pretty well and they admit it was an absolute disaster and ruined all the good will they had gotten from the 360.

  • Steven_Randallson

    It was this and the threats about not letting folk share physical copies of games that made me buy a PS4 instead of an Xbox One after having owned a 360 since 08

  • MauriceAlain

    I still remember when the game studio I worked for back then, got all the details early because we struck a deal with them. When they announced that the console would shut down when you lose your internet connection for more than 10 seconds even when not using any online features but the Kinect scan and listen in to your whole room even when turned off, we told them: “this will not fly in Germany. We have laws against this.”
    They said until release those laws would change and every western country would have perfect Internet connection 24/7.
    LOL

  • tehnibi

    I still laugh they really thought people would call it “the one” like we called the xbox 360 “the 360”

    fucking hilarious and huge miscalculation on M$

  • JMTann08

    I remember reading leaks about the Xbox One months before it was revealed. Even before we knew it was called Xbox One. I read them all and couldn’t believe any of it was true. It all sounded horrible and I didn’t think a company could be so dumb. All of the leaks ended up being true. I was a massive Xbox 360 fan boy at the time and I was disgusted.

  • DrScrambles

    I’m convinced that Mattrick was trying to tank Xbox and Microsoft. Everything he did was so ass backwards and made less than zero sense. I remember after all of this he moved to Zynga which was making money hand over fist at the time.

  • Dalek_Genocide

    I worked at Xbox as a contractor at the time and I felt like I was on a different planet. I thought the idea was absolutely fucking terrible but 98% of the campus thought it was the best thing ever. We called it the Redmond bubble. Basically meaning that a lot of the full time employees are well off and don’t know/remember what’s it’s like to be lower income and don’t think about rural areas or other countries. If it works in Redmond they think it’ll work everywhere

  • Tvilantini

    Welcome to 2022 where some developers are actually doing this even for single-player games just to prevent “pirates” from cracking it. It’s a sad reality

  • xZeroXz

    Talk about a PR disaster. This announcement did irreparable damage to their brand and was one probably one of the pitmary reasons they lost that generation. Completely fumbled the lead they had gained from the 360 generation and let Sony comeback and clown them.

    I knew people who dropped Xbox and never looked back even after the change because they didn’t know any better and didn’t bother checking if it ever got removed. Hell, for the longest time I would immediately dismiss anything Xbox because I had no idea they reversed course. Also, don’t forget the iconic *Xbone* nickname they hated.

  • MrrQuackers

    I remember them saying it’s built in and we “can’t simply flip a switch.”

    Then after the **huge** backlash they indeed simply flipped a switch.

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