Happy 20th anniversary Xbox! Talking Tech podcast

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Hey there listeners. It's Brett Molina. Welcome back to Talking Tech. This month marks a huge milestone for Microsoft and its Xbox video game console. Twenty-years ago, this month, Microsoft launched the original Xbox. You may recall way back in 2001 during the consumer electronics show, both Bill Gates and The Rock, back when The Rock had hair and Bill Gates was still CEO Microsoft, hopped on stage and introduced everyone to the Xbox. It felt like a pretty big leap for Microsoft at the time. There were already a lot of different rivals out there between Sony, and Nintendo, and then Sega had just bowed out of making consoles. So now they were coming in and it's this upstart. People weren't sure what to expect, but obviously here we are 20 years later, they're still going strong and we've seen a lot of great games and a lot of great experiences come out of Xbox.

Joining me now to talk about the 20th anniversary of Xbox, is Mary Clarke. She's a staff writer on USA Today's For The Win. Mary, thanks for joining us.

Hey, good to be here, Brett. How're you doing today?

I'm doing great. Let's start with memories. Share some of your first earliest memories of Xbox and playing it.

It's got to be playing Halo with friends and stuff. That's the quintessential Xbox experience, is playing Halo with friends... Squatting up, just enjoying my time with my friends. That's what video games are all about. Enjoying time with friends, at least for me. A lot of single-player experiences are great and all but you can't recapture that feeling, sitting on the couch with your friends and playing Halo and just shooting things up and enjoying the feel of the games because there really is nothing like it. We'll talk about it, I think, in a little bit with the upcoming Halo release, but that's the big memory for me; is playing those games just with my friends and having a great time. We did them all through college too. We brought our Xboxes to college and just had a good time with it. So those are the memories that really stand out for me, at least growing up with these consoles.

Yeah. The thing that jumped out to me with Xbox is I felt like it took a lot of stuff that people were doing on PC and made it much more accessible to you through a console. That's always been the benefit of having a console, right? Is that it's just you plug it and play. Like PC, at least back then, I think it's gotten a little bit better now, but 15, 20 years ago, you had to really build out a PC in order to get what you wanted. And there were also a lot of luxuries there too, like chat, and stuff like that.

And Xbox really opened the door for it. When you talk about Xbox Live and... I still remember playing Halo 2 and a lot of those early Halos. Call of Duty was another big one. Call of Duty really took off thanks to Xbox, just because of Chat. And a lot of those other social features that it had at the time that PlayStation was still trying to catch up on.

But yeah, like you said, playing with friends and playing Call of Duty, getting used to that environment too because it can get... When you first start with Chat and stuff, especially if you just have it open to the masses, it gets a little weird and it gets a little intense sometimes. Once you get your friends in the mix, it's just so social. It's so fun. There's just a lot to really enjoy about it.

Yeah, exactly. It really is the quintessential social experience and whatnot.

So you mentioned Halo as one of your first memories. What are a couple of your favorite games on Xbox that you played?

Ooh, this is actually going to be kind of out of left field. I loved Ori and the Blind Forest. I don't think it's a niche pick. Is it?

I don't think so.

It's one of those things where I actually also played it with friends. My friends got together and we passed the controller around and just played until we died. And the atmosphere in that game is fun. The platforming was really cool. The music was great. I remember the level where I think you're trying to climb through giant trees, it's exploding all around you and falling apart and just the frantic pace of all that. That's actually one of my favorite games ever. The vibes are immaculate basically, and it's such a fun game. And obviously, as you can tell, a lot of my video game memories revolve around my friends.

So just being able to pass the controller between us and if we'd lose house or just died and we'll reset and try again in a different run. That's one of my favorite games, just the memories I have and just overall, that game, it just felt so good to play.

Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. My roommate had the first Xbox and that one didn't really jump into the online stuff yet, but I remember he had Counter-Strike and I remember the first time I played and I thought it was cool just because I liked the game, but also you could play your own music in the back background, which none of the other consoles did. And it was a very new thing. And I thought it was really cool. I guess he must have had an Eminem CD or some kind of mix or something in there because every time I would play it would be the same Eminem song over and over again. Which probably for some people, might be a little bit torturous, but for me, it was just a fond memory of playing it, hearing the song and then playing Counter-Strike.

And that was my first ever Xbox experience. But the other game I really liked from Xbox too and I don't know if this is out of left field, but it's one of those original Xbox games that I think is a love-hate... I really like fable. I love those games. I just loved all the RPG stuff you could do. But then also what I really liked is all the random side stuff. You could start a family and so you're doing adventures but then you have to stop and check on your wife and kids or your husband or... All this stuff. And I just thought that element was really fun and it was just a really different kind of role playing game where it wasn't just about fighting and combat. You had to do a lot of other stuff too.

And you don't think of Xbox as the role-playing console. I guess it's more known for its shooters and racing games and stuff like that. But Fable was really cool because it was something like that and it had those different things. And I think we're going to talk about what's coming up next for Xbox and it seems as if they're leaning back more towards the RPGs and stuff like that with their acquisition of Bethesda. So, that is really something to look forward to, I think, for a lot of people who want to return to that.

Yeah, absolutely. Well, let's look ahead. We've had 20 years of Xbox and obviously this device has had a ton of staying power and we know that they have the Bethesda deal, so we're going to see all those games come through there. We also have another Halo coming out, lots of stuff happening.

Is there anything you're most excited about or something you're most intrigued about seeing from Xbox in the next couple years?

Starfield has to be one of them. I know it's a Bethesda title. It's wrapped up in a lot of mystery though, but I really am intrigued to see what they're doing there. It seems like a very ambitious project and I really want to see how it works and just what they've got in store.

I'm also a big Elder Scrolls fan. I know this is Bethesda again, but Elder Scrolls 6 is basically all but confirmed to be an exclusive Xbox title. And I'm a huge fan of Skyrim, loved playing that back in the day. So that's definitely something I'm looking forward to as well.

And even like I said, returning to the RPG roots, the game Avowed, I believe from Obsidian, also looked really neat. I don't think we've heard from it in some time, but I'm a big RPG person. So, Xbox moving towards more RPGs and more stuff like that, that all is really exciting to me. And I'm definitely looking forward to those games, especially Avowed because Obsidian's put out so many good games. It seems like a really fun time for Xbox coming up in the future.

Yeah. A lot of the Bethesda stuff I'm really thrilled with. I feel like Bethesda has the funny reputation of these great games, but then they're also super buggy when they come out initially like Fall... I think of this every time I think of Fallout 76, because I remember playing that and, I think, within the first couple hours I had to restart it because there's like a crate that's critical to the game; and it dropped in a place that I couldn't get to it; and I couldn't open it; and I couldn't advance if I didn't open it. So I had to start over and it's like little things like that where it's... Like Bethesda, I love their ambition, but I always try to be hesitant.

But Xbox is interesting because like you said, they were just a shooter/racing console for the longest time and that's why a lot of people played them. They didn't have the diverse lineup that a PlayStation did. Back then you still had Grand Theft Auto, you had Final Fantasy, you had a lot of those platforms and once they moved over, then you saw Xbox really broaden its portfolio of games. They really do have something for everybody. It sounds like a cliche to say that when it comes to video games, but they do have a lot of different games to choose from.

Yeah. I think that's really cool and I know everybody's all big on the console wars, but we didn't even mention that Xbox is a great tool in Game Pass, which is just a phenomenal service that you can just play games and just for a super cheap fee. It's really great. It really does seem to be the console for... maybe not like niche picks... but it has something for everyone and it has so many options.

And I'm really looking forward to the future because like I said, it seems as if they're really diversifying what they're doing. And I think that it'll only bring good things because I know people talk about console wars, but competition is good. Competition is healthy. It makes everyone strive for bigger and better things and more ambitious projects. It's all good things in my opinion. It's really exciting times.

Yeah, absolutely. Well, Mary, thanks for being here. It's great having you.

Yeah. Thank you for having me on. Love to come back anytime.

Great! Listeners let's hear from you. Do you have any comments, questions, or show ideas, any fond memories of Xbox you want to share? Maybe we'll share a couple of those on the next episode. You can find me on Twitter. I'm @Brettmolina23. Also Mary, where are you on Twitter?

Marycclarke and that's Clarke with an 'E' on Twitter.

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