oXbox Turns 17 Years Old Today: 11/15/01 to 11/15/18

[Jagosaurus]

I broke out the ol' modded oXbox today & couldn't believe it's been 17 years.

To put that timeframe into perspective, the NES was 16 years old in the States when the oXbox released in 2001. Didn't it the NES seem ages ago then...

Some fun memories from me:

- We had many Halo LAN parties... lugging around a CRT!
- I remember just being floored by Halo 2s graphics.
- XBLive changed the gaming scene. I'd been playing games online on my PC for years (Delta Force!) but it was cool to see this catch on like wildfire with the console scene.
- I was VERY surprised to see Shenmue 2 localized & fortunate to have a buddy who was a huge Shenmue fan. I watched many hours.
- I bought a Dreamcast on launch and while I'll never regret that, I did covet my friends' xbox systems a bit . I blamed the PS2 for the DC failure anyway
- We had a 360 throughout college & I got some major use out of backwards compatibility then seeing as I was broke!
- It's been fun going back over the past couple years & enjoying titles I missed.
- Got really into the mod scene for the system
- I got Halo 2 back online in 2018 with Xlink Kai!
- I just DLed several titles on XBL playable on One; MX Unleashed,
Destroy All Humans, & Jet Set Radio.

Still living on for me 17 years later!

Have some memories?

[JoeAwesome]

You know what the crazy thing is? I don't feel the jump from Xbox to now is as impressive as NES to Xbox.

[Xeogred]

The beast.





My history with the XBOX:
- First console I ever bought with my own hard earned money actually.
- The default console name for mine was "The Bear", hah.
- Also lugged around a CRT (which I still have! bit beat up though) for legendary Halo LAN's. We even got 4xXbox's a few times for 16 people.
- I still didn't have a good family or personal PC around its time, so the Xbox was my powerful console where I first experienced Deus Ex Invisible War, Half-Life 2, Doom 3, etc, before being able to finally play them on the PC later. I have no idea how well these ports hold up but it's impressive they got them on there.
- Started getting a bit into WRPG's with the likes of KOTOR2, still prefer some of it over the Mass Effect games even honestly.
- Ninja Gaiden Xbox is definitely one of the best games of all time.
- I didn't mind the hamburger DUKE controller, but I have an S too.
- Splinter Cell was pretty cool.
- I played MGS2 to death on Xbox. Didn't know until years later the PS2 version is actually superior and worked with its hardware better.

I was such a diehard Halo fan I actually didn't care for 2 much. Didn't like the campaign nearly as much, the dual wielding, new maps, and I didn't get Xbox Live so I never played online. I dominated with the Halo 1 pistol so I was sad to see that weapon wasn't in either, the new pistols sucked! In retrospect 2 is still great and I still had some LAN fun with it, but I still like the first game the most from the franchise.

[Jagosaurus]

@Joe, agree with you there. Everyone always brings up the jump from 16bit to 3D. I agree the leap was a game changer. I also think that 5th to 6th gen jump was HUGE. Many oXbox/PS2/GCN games still hold up today, especially if HD & widescreen. It was a massive improvement over the jaggies & visible polygons from early 3D. The gains since have been marginal in comparison (textures, FPS, 4K) to either of those progressions above.

@Xeo, it is such a beast!

I loved the LAN parties. We got 8 to 16 going at least once a month for a few years. At one of my buddies' house we were running a cat 5 cable through the house & upstairs for the 4th xbox. Had to be a 150 foot cable .

Our group gravitated more towards Halo 2. We continued playing it even after the 360 & eventually Halo 3 were released. I loved Halo 3, but we still kept revisiting 2... until the oXBL servers shut down in 2010 . That's what, 6 years of active play... 2004 to 2010.

What was cool was I a junior in high school when Halo 2 dropped. We still had LAN parties as several of us had slow internet in a rural area. Life moves on & we split ways moving off to college. Come Halo 3, we were all still playing together remotely via XBL. Interesting to see that progression over time & still getting to enjoy the "new Halo" with my "old Halo buddies."

Fun times when we could play all night & sleep through college classes

[casterofdreams]

I never owned an Xbox when it was first released but I took advantage of the backwards compatibility of the 360 to play some, what is now considered, classics.

Halo series, Fable, the two KOTOR games, Morrowind, Jade Empire, and Forza.

Forza. Now that is a racing game. Sure I’ve played GT but Forza was it man. Glad the series developed into a staple of the racing community as a whole.

If a recall, GTA San Andreas had the better version outside of PC on the Xbox.

[nightrnr]

Oddly enough, I was more interested in arcade compilations and ports when I got an Xbox.
Capcom Classics, Taito Legends, Metal Slug 3, Samurai Shodown V (and a handful of other fighters), etc. PS2 had as much and more, but I didn't own one yet.
Now that I have a Magicbox controller adapter (Saturn gamepads, oh yeah!) and coinops/finalburn, my Xbox is used for even more arcade games.

I guess I also looked at it as a Dreamcast/Sega successor with Shenmue II and Panzer Dragoon Orta. Of course, Sega was scattered across all 3 competing systems at the time.

Also still like the PC components setup inside. Only system that came with a HDD. Hacking scene would (and still does) greatly benefit from that.

I'm just glad the systems hold up so well (despite weak/faulty disc drives). I trust oXbox more than 360's.

[Jagosaurus]

I think Sega announced 11 exclusives for the oXbox before launch. Can you imagine if the Dreamcast backwards compatibility had actually gone through...

Here's a list of the eventual Sega games on oXbox:
https://segaretro.org/Xbox

Impressive... and don't forget about this beauty!

[noiseredux]

That Dreamcast compatibility would have made it one of the best consoles of all time! Oh what could have been. Still an impressive machine and that start to something that still exists thanks to backwards compatibility now. So cool.

[samsonlonghair]

Dreamcast compatibly would have been amazing! Maybe that’ll be the next big announcement for the Xbox one: Dreamcast compatibly!

[casterofdreams]

Since Microsoft made the push to make original Xbox games backwards compatible on the One, they released a lot of original Xbox titles on the marketplace that can be purchased and played on the 360 as well. Games such as Jade Empire, the two KOTOR games, Morrowind, and a bunch of others were added this year.

That’s awesome in my book.