A Look Back at Xbox One’s Turnaround Year

The Xbox One didn’t have the smoothest transition out of the gate when it was released at the tail end of 2013. Here was a platform that was following up what was considered to be one of the best home consoles ever released. It smashed all of the original Xbox’s records and made a name for itself by aligning with some of the biggest video games in the industry.

The Xbox One had some big shoes to fill but most had faith that it could do so with no problem. Not a single fan in the world wanted to see a repeat of the PlayStation 3, a prime example how a company can fall from greatness (even if it was only temporary). Unfortunately the green machine never learned from its competition and 2014  was not a good year for the Xbox One. A struggling message, and the PS4 capitalizing heavily on their faltering made it very difficult for the Xbox One to recapture that momentum that the brand had held for so many years. But then 2015 came along.

Phil Spencer had a plan. He was going to do his best to give the Xbox One the best damn year he could. It would require a re-cementing of the platform’s message (with a touch of rewriting of course). Then he would need to create a line-up that no other platform could match which would take a lot of deals, and some serious posturing. But in the end, it may have just paid off. 2015 showed a turnaround for the struggling platform and it all began with a Windows 10 event.

It was during the Windows 10 event that Phil Spencer expressed his plans for combining the Xbox One and Windows 10 devices. It was a way to put gaming at the forefront of his message instead of him just pushing a single platform onto prospective fans. That message of gaming first was initially introduced during E3 2014 and the head of Xbox wanted to make sure that he carried it throughout the entirety of 2015 in order to give the Xbox One a leg to stand on. Of course, it would take some time for everything to come to fruition, so Team Xbox kept their heads down as they focused on other ways to make their platform shine.

The step to doing that was showing off some new and exciting content that players could expect in the near future. This was eventually called the ‘best lineup in Xbox history.’ E3 2015 kicked this off with games like Rise of the Tomb Raider and Halo 5: Guardians along with 2016 newcomers Scalebound and Quantum Break. There was also the reveal of the Xbox Elite Controller (one of the best gaming peripherals you could get your hands on at the moment) and a very huge announcement that nobody was expecting: the folks over at Microsoft figured out how to make the Xbox One backwards compatible.

This sent a wave through the industry, as some people were still wary about upgrading due to the large library that was available on the last generation of consoles. While there were many individuals who claimed they didn’t need the feature, it was admittedly a very big deal. The Xbox One was finally able to offer something that its primary competition could not, and it was something that fans didn’t mind having (unlike the once mandatory Kinect). Both digital and disc games would be able to be played later in the year with an initial supported library that would be expanded on in the coming months.

Then Gamescom came along. The Xbox conference during Gamescom 2015 was the first time gameplay for a large number of these games that everyone wanted to see was shown off. Scalebound’s frenetic, dragon-powered action was revealed,Crackdown 3 got a gameplay trailer and the ‘power of the cloud’ that had been touted for months was finally shown off in complete world destruction. The highly elusive Quantum Break finally got a release date, as well as some new details as the game moved closer to its final form. All of the dominoes were falling into place. Helping Spencer and company out a bit more was the fact that both Sony and Nintendo decided to sit out for the conference allowing Microsoft to soak up all of the limelight. Now all they had to do was execute.

The beginning of the year was a bit slow. Ori and the Blind Forest was an early exclusive that showed that the Xbox could still provide a more than perfect platform for amazing exclusive indie games. But it wasn’t until late in the year that the AAA exclusive train got the ball rolling.

Some may try and say ‘too little, too late,’ but when you stop and look at the competition you’ll realize that nobody else was putting out anything exclusive. The PlayStation (both Nintendo and Xbox’s biggest competition right now) had a couple of re-releases in the same window, and the last great, new exclusive from Sony was Until Dawn and that released in the late summer. While the Xbox has the same solid AAA line-up closing out the year for them, that line-up was bolstered by some heavy hitting exclusives.

Rise of the Tomb Raider was a great grab, even if only temporary. It gave the console an action adventure game with a recognizable name and a huge following that couldn’t be found anywhere else for the holiday. Then you had Halo 5. Even if you aren’t a fan, there is no denying that it is one of the largest franchises in gaming, and one of the reasons many people buy a Microsoft console to this day. The train of exclusives will continue next year with numerous potential heavy hitters lined up.

These were all very smart moves that are starting turn heads and provide the Xbox One a much more even playing field as it goes into its third year against the PlayStation 4. It is still trailing quite far behind Sony’s platform, but there is no denying that it’s using its underdog status very intelligently. Phil Spencer knew that the Xbox One had a lot to prove, so he wasted no opportunity in shining a much more flattering light on his team and product as he consistently put pressure on the opposition.

There were a few hits to the brand, namely major franchises that were once part of the Microsoft advertising stable switching sides. PlayStation became the competition platform for Street Fighter, and even took the lead for Call of Duty: Black Ops III securing early DLC and advertising rights. That may not seem like a big deal, but it is something that the Xbox had to deal with as one of it’s money makers shifted over.

The platform also struggled heavily in territories outside of North America, namely Asia. The Xbox brand has never been big in that region, so it wasn’t expected to break records, but it has been doing very poorly. It has been selling less than every major platform in that market and hasn’t shown any signs of doing better any time soon. Microsoft’s commitment to trying to make it a success in that area is admirable, but they wouldn’t be blamed if they gave up altogether.

Delays also hit certain highly anticipated titles, both exclusive and third-party. The Division would’ve been huge, and many fans of Remedy’s lamented the delay of Quantum Break. That’s not to mention some of the other AAA games that were pushed from 2015 into the future. But, Microsoft has been dealing with the shifts and changes quite well and see well situated for the coming months, and that’s probably the biggest takeaway from 2015.

2013 was spent trying to force a vision without testing it out yet. That made 2014 an incredibly tough year. 2015 proved to be a year of proving the Xbox brand by having a game plan that allowed a bit of flexibility while never skimping out on quality. It might not have been the year where they made up for all of those lost sales due to a confusing message, but it was a turnaround for the company in its entirety. A complete commitment to the player and the player experience and that leaves the Xbox One and all of Microsoft wrapping up the year on a high note.