11 Fascinating Gaming Moments That Almost Happened
6. Xbox One's All-Digital Future
Microsoft
Although it's a distant memory now (a testament to just how well Phil Spencer and his team have righted the ship in the last six years), the original Xbox One launch was a disaster. Not learning from the same mistakes Sony made a generation prior, Microsoft's new vision for consoles was destroyed by their own hubris, as they arrogantly told concerned customers that if they didn't like the direction they were going in, they could happily stick with their 360.
But customers did have the right to be concerned. At the time, the Xbox One was being pitched as an all-in-one entertainment system focused as much (or arguably, even more) on TV than actual video games. Not only that, but it was striving for an all-digital future, loaded with DRM that would require the machine to be online at least once a day, a Kinect 2.0 that needed to be plugged in for the console to work, and a new licensing model which locked players out from sharing their games.
Not every idea was sound, but the company's approach could have been salvaged with more consumer-friendly messaging. After intense backlash, Microsoft changed their tune, but it is remarkable how much the industry has veered towards their original vision recently - a future which could have been kickstarted far earlier had this marketing campaign been successful.
WhatCulture's very own resident movie guy, Ewan has been working in the content creation biz for over 10 years now, having started as a freelance contributor to WhatCulture Gaming all the way back in 2015. After graduating with a First-Class Honours in History from Northumbria University in 2017 (where he won a prize for a totally killer dissertation on the Watergate years), Ewan took on the role of Comics Editor at WhatCulture and quickly developed WhatCulture Comics into one of the biggest superhero-focused channels on YouTube. He followed this with a brief hiatus at Screen Rant in 2021, where he worked across the Gaming and Film sections as a writer and editor, before returning to WhatCulture as a Senior Content Producer / Presenter in 2023. He started his own podcast, We Love Dad Movies, in 2022, and has contributed several written pieces to the Eisner-nominated comics website Shelfdust as well.
In his current role, Ewan incorporates his love of cinema, comic books, and history into written pieces and video essays for WhatCulture's Film & TV channel, as well as WhatCulture Gaming and WhatCulture Horror, with a particular focus on nineties-era Dad Movies, old school Westerns, and Golden Age Hollywood Noir. John Carpenter is his fave, and he thinks Batman Beyond should never have been cancelled. If that's your vibe, you'll probably like his stuff.
Josh has over 11 years of experience as a published writer, having worked nine of those years as a full-time content producer at WhatCulture. In that period he has created hundreds of articles, videos and podcast episodes for multiple WhatCulture channels, specialising in gaming, horror and film & TV. He now primarily works as a senior content producer and presenter on WhatCulture Gaming where he co-hosts the WhatCulture Gaming Podcast, a top 3 UK most listened to gaming podcast that he co-created in 2018. Over the years he has reviewed several high-profile gaming releases, covered industry events with on-site reporting, opined on breaking news, and even kicked off his interviewing career by chatting to childhood hero, Tommy Wiseau.
