The Dark Age Of Xbox (2010-2015)

A Fall Fuelled By Motion Controlled Gimmicks

Despite the Xbox 360's strong success, the Wii was still very far ahead of it in sales and this compelled Microsoft to pursue their own take on the motion controller scene. The result was Project Natal, announced in 2009 with a technical showcase. Gamers saw a family controlling the action with their body and another player scanning his skateboard for virtual use. It seemed like a great idea at first; taking away the controller entirely and creating new innovation for the motion gaming space. It would only take one year for the vision to collapse...

For the first half of its life, the Xbox 360 was comfortably settled, but E3 2010 was the moment things started to go wrong. Project Natal had morphed into the Xbox Kinect. Fans new and old looked on with horror as the games they were looking forward too were bombarded with painfully forced Kinect demonstrations. At that moment, Microsoft turned their back on the community that had supported them since 2001 in favour of chasing the casual market. Their press conferences over the next couple of years became infamous for their cringe-worthy content.

Thanks to Microsoft's massive marketing campaign, the Kinect launched to great commercial success, but all that money and that effort would ravage the Xbox brand. In the years that followed, the American corporation shoved the device down consumers' throats, insisting that the Xbox couldn't live without it. All the while, games like Star Wars Kinect, Steel Battalion: Heavy Armour and Fighters Uncaged were all demonstrating how inaccurate and useless the technology really was. Outside of the enjoyable Dance Central, Kinect was an utter waste.