So many are beating down on X1 for wrapping so tight around the TV, but I like it precisely for that.

1. If xbox can beat the inconvenience of multiple remotes - great!

Here, its all about performance. If Kinect 2 works the way Apple interfaces just work, then MS really will own the living room. I would be willing to pay ridiculous money for a TV interface box that also streams movies, plays games, and sells me shit.

2. I can play games on just about every other computing device I have: phone, pc, ipad.

I use the console less and less for gaming, as I am sure many do as well. I dont watch TV programs almost at all. In fact, I found myself wondering whether I need to have a TV at all or whether I need to move it from its central place in the living room. So MS is right to position xbox as an essential TV accessory that will make the TV easier to use and will attract people to actually use their TVs period. Networks and cable companies should be kissing MS' money-covered feet.

That's what I took away from the "Reveal". The TV is a dying concept, Xbox will give it One more chance to live.

Thoughts?

Fucking Apple TV, this is already a product.

Microsoft should've announced product that's just a kinect with an ethernet port. A tiny camera that upgrades any television to a voice-activated motion-sensing, Netflix Hulu streaming hub for a hundred dollars is a fun, accessible, innovative, affordable product with great mainstream appeal. Bolting $300 worth of premium computer games hardware around it is a LUNATIC idea.

Any person in my family would buy a "Windows TV". Only me would even think about buying a thing called "X Box" anything, and I'm not even gonna be using these features.

Indeed!!!! lol yeah people aren't really looking at the big picture. being able to flip between tv/movie/games in a flash with a command is a pretty big deal.... when I do that now with my pc/ps3/360/cable set-up on it takes a bit longer then I'd like and yeah it not mind melting but smartglass could be cool since I don't plan on getting a labtop or evil apple ipad to look-up/surf the web for a random google... I mean bing search on what I'm watching......

I think it's really weird that someone who doesn't watch tv or use a console for gaming, someone who might be ready to ditch their television entirely, cares at all about the new Xbox.

Then why would you buy them?

Yeah. Who plays video games anymore?

You don't watch TV or play games, but you want to buy one of these? What?

I'm sick of my console playing games, I'm all for buying a glorified set top box!

But will it play my VHS tapes?

If you're not playing games on it, just spend 99 bucks on a Roku. It's a million times better content streamer than any of the current consoles and has a simple remote that doesn't require you to shout at the TV like a lunatic or wave your arms around like you're mid stroke.

I'm going to have so much fun posting this image over these coming years.

There are better and cheaper ways to do pretty much everything that the Xbox One wants to do. Also keep in mind that those other ways aren't hidden behind a pay wall - most of the 360's features are currently hidden behind the Gold pay wall, and there's no reason to believe that the XBone (which is what I'm fucking calling it) will change that. The only thing that it could have going for it is a good collection of games, which Microsoft hasn't shown yet.

That is actually a really nice idea. I would buy one. Add the possibility to skype to the mix and this thing would be very attractive. I don't see the casual gamer/grandma/football dude bro shell out >$400 for a new xbox just for tv, kinect and skype. But for $100 they would. It is also in range for a casual present "here grandma I bought you this new skype machine you can hook up to your tv...". Day 1 purchase for me :)

I just have one question. How would you control the volume with kinect?

Yeah I'm moving to another country right now, so if I could just give my dad a box that I could video-call him on, that would be GREAT!!

I can't buy anyone like that a fucking"X Box One" with a computer games controller in the box!

@believer258 said:

I agree that there are better ways, but no one device does it all well, which is what Xbone is promising. Apple TV and Roku dont play games or show live TV.

I dont play or watch much because I am close to 40, have a busy job and 2 kids, which may be a more common situation than these forums would lead one to believe. MS knows the demographics - gamers are getting older and busier and pursue varied entertainment interests. So, that is whom the XBone is aimed at. Just fucking look at it - it doesnt look like a toy or a hip designer object - it looks like a A/V system component, all dignified and serious. I wont be ashamed inviting my colleagues to a superbowl party and watching it on MS XBOX One MediaCenter PC.

The console market is getting stratified with Nintendo going for the kids, Sony going for the younger adult "gamer" and MS shooting for the oldest (and richest) segment of the gamer population.

I'm sure there are some people out there who want an all-in-one device for their TV. If MS can actually deliver on that, it would be pretty cool.

If you're willing to pay $500ish for a slightly more convenient way to change channels, I envy your amount of petty cash.

the bar for innovation has hit a new low

the games will be there and I will play some. I just wont have to shuffle 5 remotes. I am willing to pay something for that convenience. But it better work like butter.

@firebirdinf: If you consider shouting "Xbox! AMC!" to be smooth like butter, you're probably going to get your wish. I've personally never been bothered by "all them buttons".

...this is all just hypothetical, anyway, as I don't pay for cable.

An awesome Logitech universal remote would be cheaper and better.

@firebirdinf: if only they made some kind of universal remote control...

Assuming I had cable (which I don't), I could very easily use either my TV remote or my Wii U Gamepad to navigate channels. I don't really want or need my TV viewing complicated by Minority Report interface design.

Why does everyone think it won't play games?

What if the Xbox One and the Ps4 have the exact same games, almost identical hardware, and the same price?

PS4 cuz its more games focused?

Isn't that the same thing as saying "does less"?

I have one of those. It doesnt work very well with Apple TV, which I also have, or with my 5.1. And I spent enough time trying to program it that I dont want to touch it again.

The more I think about it, the more skeptical I grow that XBox will actually be able to do what I think it promises. Its HDMI IN, so I am not even sure I can input antenna TV into it (I dont have cable). The only way I can see the Kinect delivering is if it is as better than Siri and I can customize the voice commands with my own phrases.

I seriously doubt that the Xbox One will "do it all well". But, hey, if you want to spend your money on it and are satisfied with it later, that's fine.

Me? Well, I'm a 21 year old on summer vacation, so yes we are two different demographics. That doesn't change the fact that I was looking forward to seeing games on my promised games console and I didn't see much of that. I just saw a glorified box that does things that so many other devices already do. Computers, iPads, Apple TV, and freaking cellphones all do sports, music, movies (both streaming and locally), and casual games well. With the exception of PC's, none of them can bring about something like Halo or KOTOR or Fallout or Dragon Age or Watch Dogs or InFamous, and something that can deliver those is what I was looking for.

Finally, I would be less ashamed of the Xbox 360's look than the Xbox One's. It kind of brings to mind a Betamax player.

fine get a roku and sell your apple TV. :)

Both Samsung and LG have voice command and gesture HDTVs out now. By the end of the year there will be more by other manufactures. Next year? Even more manufactures will be making such TVs and the people ALREADY in the voice command market like Dragon are producing systems for TV manufactures to licence. In two years, most good HDTVs will have voice commands, gesture tracking and will probably come with remotes that look like smartphones. If the goal is to have common people who might not be gamers to buy this - I rather doubt they will. Such people will probably need a HDTV first or be replace a old HD set, yet when they a buy a NEW HDTV...whoops they now own a voice-gesture-fancy remote tv.

The market Microsoft sees is an illusion. Their desire for the mythical family room TV and preparations to capture it are meaningless...its nice to want things...but nothing says you will get them for wanting.

Thats a really good point. Although I am not sure why X1 owners would need to replace their TV. Most people already have HDTVs, which X1 would work with. Then their choice is to get a new TV or X1: new TV is more expensive and doesnt play Bluerays or games. But really smart TVs (with cameras, voice and smartremotes) would definitely kill the X1 strategy if they are price competitive.

I have that, it's called my PC and a really clever home entertainment setup with servers and/or network drives.

So the X1 is a good deal because it saves the few seconds it takes to find the remote and change inputs on the TV? First world problems...

I can't really get into this whole "all in one box" design because it's not what I'm looking for in a video game console.

I've never had any luck with anything that uses IR blasters. If I got an Xbox One, I would not use the TV functionality. I'm perfectly fine with my Logitech remote and TiVo.

I don't watch live TV (except for sports) anymore. Maybe I'm alone in this but I also really don't care about 90% of my cable channels. If I want to watch TV it's going to be a specific show and it's going to be when I want to. Unfortunately, the Xbox One doesn't help me do this better than any devices I already own because it doesn't have a TV DVR. It might eventually but it looks like Microsoft will have a hard time getting that past the cable companies because many of them have their own DVRs that they want their customers to pay for monthly. So until Microsoft can deliver on that front, I can't justify any of the TV perks that the system offers because that simply isn't how I want to enjoy television now and in the future.

If I look at differences we already know about, Microsoft on the losing side of the hardware battle and from the looks of it they might lose developers as well with less interaction and more stringent policies for everyone involved. Thus, until Microsoft tells me more about what the Xbox One will bring to the table with games and development, it seems like an easy choice.

Like others have mentioned: Universal remotes have been around for like... forever.

They come in cheap but still working, or in fancy but still working. My Harmony One is an investment i haven't regretted ever for all these years. Even without that, there remains the simple fact that new Smart TV's do some interesting stuff with HDMI connectivity. My new Samsung TV has no trouble at all controlling my Yamaha AV-Receiver trough the TV remote, that's one remote saved without any additional spending. This goes as far that my Samsung TV even turns on my PS3 and switches the AV-Receiver to the according channel when i use my TV remote to switch to the PS3 HDMI Input.

Needless to mention that all those fancy things like Skype, Picture in Picture, App Support of browsing the Web can be done on most modern Smart TV's already. Heck there are already Smart TV's out that give you the option to connect an camera and use gestures to switch channels or do things, sure those probably won't work as great as Kinect, but that's also bound to change as time moves on.

And switching channels won't be any faster with the Xbox One, unless it has an build in TV receiver, which i highly doubt. So the speed at which you switch channels will still be limited by whatever TV receiver/set-top-box you are using now. Adding an Xbox One won't make that any faster, it only means that you gonna have just another device running (and sucking power) for doing the very same things you can already do right now.

Overall i'm puzzled as to what the Xbox One really has to offer, besides that "Fantasy football" stuff which also could be integrated into most Smart TV's without much trouble.

This thread certainly clarified some things for me. X1 will make my Dumb TV smarter, plus it will play games and bluerays. That's not a lot, unless the games are attractive. But assuming PS4 games are as attractive, will PS4 be as good a wrapper for TV as X1?

I keep asking this not because an additional TV interface is so important to me, but because MS seems to think that it should be.

Heh, making a Dumb TV smarter is a nice way to put it! The question remains if that's actually worth $500, for that same money one could buy an TV that's smart out of the box.

And to MS all this stuff is important, they've been trying to get a foot into the video/TV content distribution business for quite a while. The Xbox One will help them do that, now they have a fancy content distribution system that's build all around serving customers at home with enhanced TV content. Imagine, every TV channels who wants some fancy overlay support for the Xbox One is gonna pay Microsoft something to make that happen. Microsoft getting a cut from all the pay-TV content that gets streamed trough the Xbox One, additional room for advertisement, this whole thing is an goldmine for secondary monetization. Imagine what market researching and advertisement companies gonna pay just for a glimmer on all the data that MS is gonna collect on the TV/Multimedia consumption habits of it's customers, even Google can only dream about that kind of setup.

Sure at first this might only work in the US, because most of the offering MS is aiming/delivering are mostly US only or do only appeal to the US market. But that alone could be more than enough. It looks like this gen MS is doubling-down on their "Multimedia box", even more so than they already did with the 360. They've been thinking and working about this for quite a while, this becomes all the more obvious when you take a look at what MS has been doing these past years.

For example 2 years ago they already filed a pretty interesting/scary patent: http://tinyurl.com/asxchtd

Basically they patented the idea of "living room DRM", they want to charge you for content you stream to your living room based on the number of people watching it with you. Of course an Kinect that's mandatory and always turned on is the perfect tool for these kinds of ideas. The Xbox One seems like the perfect platform to realize the idea behind that patent. Sure it won't suddenly, they will make sure to sell it to their customers in some tasty way. But it's gonna happen sooner or later.

Hey guys, remember when you could put in a disk into a console and it immediately booted up a game within seconds without a bunch of bullshit getting in the way and bogging the system down? And also didn't cost a shitton more than it's worth? I wanna buy that version of Xone, plz micro, plz.

$700 for a remote.

It's your money.