The Unlikely Game That Led Bill Gates To Create The Xbox
The original Xbox was a bit of an improbable product. In 2001, Microsoft barely built hardware at all, let alone anything resembling a game console. Even more than today, Gates-era Microsoft was a software company. As Protocol reports, the Xbox idea was met with considerable skepticism from industry observers and Microsoft staff.
Of course, the Xbox proved to be a major success, selling millions of units over more than 20 years, turning exclusive titles like “Halo” into household names, and generally carving off a generous piece of the video game console market. Even now, the question remains: back in the early 2000s, when hardware companies like Sony and dedicated gaming manufacturers like Sega and Nintendo controlled the marketplace and consoles in general were often marketed as niche toys rather than market-moving behemoths, what inspired Microsoft to go so radically off-book?
Appropriately, the answer appears to be that Bill Gates fell in love with a game.
The Unlikely Game That Led Bill Gates To Create The Xbox
