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An Original Xbox Designer Talks 360

Posted by Zonk on from the new-and-improved dept.

Peter Moore talks to the folks over at Spong.com about what it was like to make the original Xbox, and how those lessons now translate into work on the 360. From the article: "We've built from scratch a brand, I think we've built credibility in the marketplace and I think we've built our ecosystem, be it our relationship with publishers, with retail. We have a hugely positive relationship with developers, something we are extremely proud of here. The DNA of Microsoft is building platforms. Creating something and then inviting everyone to come and play with it and come and make money on this stuff we have. Xbox is no different. You hear us talk a lot about it as a platform and it's this combo of hardware, software and services that all come together to create this platform."

42 of 71 comments (clear)

  1. He must be happy with this design too by muyuubyou · · Score: 4, Funny

    Wow just check out those pics... either the guy is tiny or the thing is huge!

    I will need a bigger cabinet to hide this other one.

    1. Re:He must be happy with this design too by Neon+Spiral+Injector · · Score: 2, Informative

      They've done everything they could to make the 360 look smaller: make it a ligther color, make the side of the box convex. But when it comes down to it, the overall dimensions are almost the same as the original Xbox. So yeah, it's huge.

    2. Re:He must be happy with this design too by tktk · · Score: 1

      I also suspect that the 360 he's holding is empty. In 2 of the interview pics, it looks like he's holding it 1 handed and he seems to like talking with his hands.

    3. Re:He must be happy with this design too by ZephyrXero · · Score: 1

      Someone's probably already said it, but Peter Moore was NOT one of the original designers of the Xbox! lol... he didn't join in the team till right after it launched. He was still working at Sega while the Xbox was being designed ;)

      ...and go set an Xbox besides the original NES, it's not much smaller ;)

      --
      "A truly wise man realizes he knows nothing."
  2. Calm down Zonk... by Doom+bucket · · Score: 1, Offtopic

    Look at every article in games.slashdot With the exception of two by timothy, every article is posted by Zonk This may be the worst games.slashdot article day ever...

    1. Re:Calm down Zonk... by KDR_11k · · Score: 1

      Erm, on normal days ALL games.slashdot.org articles are by Zonk.

      --
      Justice is the sheep getting arrested while an impartial judge declares the vote void.
  3. well this is new by FidelCatsro · · Score: 4, Insightful
    A person speaking on behalf of Microsoft talking in circles ,Now there is something unusual *cough*

    Anyway..

                      Reading through the interview , He does take great pains to rubbish Sony .
    "We've been making games for two decades as a company and that's something people often forget. We're far more experienced at making games than Sony ever was"
    Sony also did have a good amount of experience acquired from their partnership with Nintendo
    (The SNES's dropped CD add on) Which allowed Sony to pick up quite a bit of knowledge and eventually resulted in the Playstation .They also acquired a lot of very talented people for the development of their consoles .Exactly what MS did when they started to muscle into the console market

    That aside , the Dreamcast was a great console(though it did have a few problems ) . It was reasonably compact , quite quiet and well designed. The man worked on it .. so my main question would be , What exactly happened with the design of the original Xbox. The Xbox is large , noisy , heavy and (this is just my opinion) not terribly attractive from a design stand point .It was one of the largest consoles to date.
    I see they are taking pains (at least at face value , I have no idea how noisy the box will be) to correct the issues of the origional design

    --
    The only things certain in war are Propaganda and Death. You can never be sure which is which though
    1. Re:well this is new by MilenCent · · Score: 2, Funny

      "We've been making games for two decades as a company and that's something people often forget. We're far more experienced at making games than Sony ever was"

      Wow. Does Solitaire even count?

    2. Re:well this is new by FidelCatsro · · Score: 2, Funny

      Maybe not , But they seem to Be quite experienced at playing Monopoly

      --
      The only things certain in war are Propaganda and Death. You can never be sure which is which though
    3. Re:well this is new by defkkon · · Score: 2, Insightful
      A person speaking on behalf of Microsoft talking in circles ,Now there is something unusual *cough*

      I know that the usual thing to do on /. is to immediately start trashing Microsoft. But, c'mon. The guy is trying to drum up good PR for the Xbox and Xbox 360. I read the entire article, and he's not talking in circles - he's giving a nice spin on the entire Xbox experience. I actually found the interview interesting. He gave some solid answers and opinions. Even though he doesn't give any dates or numbers (we all know damned well that none of the companies would do that this early) but he doesn't ignore the questions either.

      Besides, as if Ken Kutaragi is the most believable, reliable, reality-based person on the planet. He is one of the most aggressive hype-mongers I've witnessed. I think he's great for Sony, but don't start trashing Peter Moore just because he's from Microsoft.

    4. Re:well this is new by Rethcir · · Score: 1

      I would DEFINITELY not say the Dreamcast is quieter than the Xbox... do you even have an xbox?

    5. Re:well this is new by badasscat · · Score: 1

      I would DEFINITELY not say the Dreamcast is quieter than the Xbox... do you even have an xbox?

      I have three Dreamcasts and one Xbox, and the Xbox is by far the loudest console of any that I own. The Dreamcast is quiet by today's standards.

      There may be some variation between Xboxes because it's pretty clear that the hard drive and DVD drive are the two main culprits in my machine. They may have quieted those down in later production runs (I have a launch system).

      But I actually have to have a separate fan on when playing my Xbox just to drown out the whine of the drives or I can't even concentrate enough to play.

    6. Re:well this is new by jackbird · · Score: 1
      Microsoft Flight Simulator does.

      In fact, at one time the definition of "100% IBM-PC Compatible" was that it would run Flight Simulator.

    7. Re:well this is new by apoc06 · · Score: 1

      solitaire was written by an unpaid intern working for MS. so that one is out. he did it himself; didnt have any staff, no development schedule, etc etc etc... that doesnt count.

      does anyone realize that this guy is an evangelist for microsoft? a paid employee. his only job [which hes recieving a hefty six figures at least for...] is to develop fanboys. say whatever is necessary to get people to love the xbox. you cant take the guy all too seriously.

    8. Re:well this is new by dootbran · · Score: 1

      Don't they say that the definition of stupidity is to do the same thing over and over expecting a different outcome?

      Well, it looks like he tried something new. Apparently small, attractive, inexpensive hardware doesn't sell... so he went with the opposite :p

      I see nothing wrong with that approach.

    9. Re:well this is new by apoc06 · · Score: 1

      i didnt read the article similarly. i found that he avoided some of the more difficult questions. he is being smart, and i cant fault him for that. thats what he is supposed to do.

      all im saying is that like anyone doing pr for either company, he took a few jabs at sony too. they werent overt, but they were jabs nonetheless. and he danced around in his statements. "hey, why dont you bash sony over the same thing you bash us for...?", "we have been in the game longer than sony", "those pictures were okay, but dont criticize them because the game looks better than that", "the brand is worth billions already...", "yeah halo looked bad at e3 at first... so thats what is going to happen with our launch games now". hes just doing his job too.

      whats the opposite of FUD? HFO [hope, forgiveness and optimism]

      just because hes alot less arrogant than k kutaragi, doesnt mean he doesnt have the same goals.

  4. Decoder Ring by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

    ""We've built from scratch a brand, I think we've built credibility in the marketplace and I think we've built our ecosystem, be it our relationship with publishers, with retail. We have a hugely positive relationship with developers, something we are extremely proud of here. The DNA of Microsoft is building platforms. Creating something and then inviting everyone to come and play with it and come and make money on this stuff we have. Xbox is no different. You hear us talk a lot about it as a platform and it's this combo of hardware, software and services that all come together to create this platform.""

    Stuff you say after you were given a GIANT PUBLIC ASS REAMING by Sony in the marketplace.

    After five years of failure, MS is left with endless talk of huge gains in unmetered areas. Listening to these clowns from the xbox division has become just too painful. Five years ago it was amusing to listen to them try to convince people that slapping together a bunch of commodity x86 parts in a big ugly black box was going to take over the console market and have Sony and Nintendo on their knees.

    I remember when these clowns made their rounds to the various console dev houses, including my own, looking for support for the first xbox. It was difficult to contain our laughter sitting there meeting with these nimrods. They told us how we had better hop on board with them right now because MS was going to destroy Sony and Nintendo because MS "is always teh winner!" and so on.

    And now five years later...yeah right you dimwitted clowns. You were just doing 'brand building' or all the other bullshit you are spouting to try to spin your marketplace fiasco.

    Although I am shocked at what a fiasco the 360 is turning out to be. No really I am. Just shocked...

    1. Re:Decoder Ring by rufo · · Score: 1

      Erm... You think with Kutaragi running around like a madman shouting things like "It's perfect! Nobody would dare criticize it!" and "You'll want to work yourself to death to save up and buy one!" and "It's not a game machine, it's the home entertainment supercomputer!" and "120GB of space isn't enough for gamers!" and "It'll age your content in an online digital vault like fine wine so it'll turn into HD!", that the Xbox 360 will be more of a fiasco then the PS3?

      Please, pray tell, how so?

      --
      My English teacher once told me that two positives don't make a negative. Two words for her: Yeah, right.
    2. Re:Decoder Ring by KDR_11k · · Score: 1

      Wow, a convincing argument.

      --
      Justice is the sheep getting arrested while an impartial judge declares the vote void.
    3. Re:Decoder Ring by dr.banes · · Score: 1

      Interesting..they did make Nintendo 3rd place and no one could've caught up to Sony because of the huge head start,installed base and superior marketing. I'm curious, what dev house do you work for?

    4. Re:Decoder Ring by phxbadash · · Score: 1

      Really...you're a dev are you....what games have you helped make?

      I'll believe these posts when someone has the balls to admit what game they made with proof to back up their claim.

    5. Re:Decoder Ring by amliebsch · · Score: 1
      Do not mod parent up. He is a Sony astroturfer. He posts the same reworded BS on *every* *single* story remotely related to the XBox. He is not a developer because no developer could possibly spend so much time monitoring Slashdot and composing posts while still staying employed.

      End of transmission.

      --
      If you don't know where you are going, you will wind up somewhere else.
  5. Say that again? by Seumas · · Score: 3, Funny

    globally-by-regionally

    What the fuck does that mean?! Is that like "way over right here"?

  6. Good to see by Sv-Manowar · · Score: 2, Interesting

    As much as people dislike Microsoft, they have a good thing with the Xbox. Although the first one lost out on market share to the PS2 in the beginning, people have now realised that the Xbox can handle a lot more graphically and may (arguably) be the better console out of the two.

    If they can get the xbox360 out there fast enough before the ps3 is launched, and show people that it is a great console, they will have no worries about it being beaten like some say the xbox was.

    --
    Business Voyeur
    1. Re:Good to see by CoderBob · · Score: 1

      As over-stated as this is, that entirely depends on the software available at launch. It doesn't matter how great the console is, if they can't get 3rd party support from the beginning, they won't have a leg to stand on.

      It's a similar problem to what happened to the 'cube and the original XBox. Not enough opening day software caused diminished sales. I worked opening night for the XBox release, and it wasn't that they didn't have a good system, and it wasn't that they didn't advertise- there weren't enough decent games at release time. Many of the ones that were there were pathetic, simple-minded, boring as hell games.

      Here's to hoping that the system gets some 3rd party support before release. I own both an XBox and a PS2, and I'm probably going to own both new systems as well. I'm not going to a 360, however, until there is a decent library for it. At least the specs on the PS3 say it is backwards compatible, instead of mostly backwards compatible.

    2. Re:Good to see by buffer-overflowed · · Score: 1

      Wait, what? Like some say the XBox was? It was beaten, badly AND it lost Microsoft the GDP of several african countries. The PS2 outsold it by a factor of FOUR. It outsold the Gamecube only by a slim margin. It was such a joke in Japan a good week for it was breaking 3-digit sales.

      --
      The key to the enjoyment of pop music is to replace any instance of "love" with "C.H.U.D."
    3. Re:Good to see by Saige · · Score: 1

      Remember that Sony owned the rights to everything they used in their previous consoles. Microsoft, on the other hand, used chips from Nvidia that they aren't going to be using in the 360, and they can't just toss in there to make things compatible easily.

      So what are they doing? Writing an emulator. They are doing MORE work to get backward compatibility than Sony has to do - and they're doing it. I just played Halo 2 on a 360 yesterday. 100% emulated, not a single speed issue anywhere. It's really a technically impressive feat, and it's being done NOW.

      Given that I'll be able to play my old games on it, with new and better controllers, and experience a much improved Xbox Live, and with the games I've seen are coming, I know for a fact I'm getting a 360.

      --
      "You know your god is man-made when he hates all the same people you do."
    4. Re:Good to see by CoderBob · · Score: 1

      I'm more concerned with non-MS titles. Halo 2 was not that impressive. In fact, I play the original much more than I ever touch Halo 2. Neither game is why I bought an XBox, and if my 3rd party games don't work correctly, no 360 for me.

  7. Designer? by MadMoses · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Is this the same Peter Moore that was once president of Sega before he was hired by Microsoft? If yes, I don't think that he counts as a "designer" of the XBox, because IIRC, at the time he switched companies, the XBox was already out some time.

    Slightly OT, from personal experience, Peter Moore is a very nice man (despite working at MS ;) - I once sent an email to peter dot moore at sega dot com (which I just made up), when he was still president of Sega, and somehow the email reached him and he took the time to write a friendly response. That's what I call dedicated customer service.

    --

    Do not be alarmed. This is only a test.
    1. Re:Designer? by Serapth · · Score: 1

      Was the email response something like this?

      From:autoreply@sega.com
      To:madmoses@somewhere.com

      RE: Sega is the suxxor!!!

      Dear Sir or Madam,

      Please pissoff and stop wasting our executives valuable time with your meaningless emails!

      Yours truly,
      The office of Peter Moore

    2. Re:Designer? by MadMoses · · Score: 1

      Nope, not at all. It was a personal reply (on topic) to my email, "signed" with Peter Moore, and it also had a reasonable personal email address of Mr. Moore (not the one I made up for contacting him). I doubt that someone else at Sega would sign an email with the name of the CEO (in that case I would expect something like in your example). Of course, it was only two or three sentences long, but that was more than I expected, considering that I was wasting his time, like you wrote. That's why I'm giving him kudos.

      For the record: I'm not an XBox fanboy (i.e. I own another console).

      --

      Do not be alarmed. This is only a test.
    3. Re:Designer? by Serapth · · Score: 1

      Don't worry, was just joking :)

      And for the record im no fan boy either... I have Dreamcast, Xbox and PS2. Would have a gamecube too, but im a little to image consious to have the fisherprice looking contraption in my entertainment system.

    4. Re:Designer? by KillShill · · Score: 1

      is that the same peter moore who sank sega into the depths of financial despair?

      --
      Science : Proprietary , Knowledge : Open Source
  8. from scratch? by justforaday · · Score: 5, Insightful

    We've built from scratch a brand...

    Yes, it's amazing how you can build a brand from scratch when all you have to work with is an essentially unlimited marketing budget...

    --
    I'll turn into a supernova and burn up everything. Well I'll turn into a black little hole and you'll turn into string.
    1. Re:from scratch? by Evro · · Score: 1

      an essentially unlimited marketing budget... ... and a willingness to sell your product at a significant loss to establish that brand.

      --
      rooooar
    2. Re:from scratch? by JFMulder · · Score: 1

      If the Xbox didn't have good games and a good track record in the heart of gamers, it wouldn't be a brand.

      The fact that it comes from Microsoft and that they have a lot of money has nothing to do with it. What made the Playstation brand popular is by getting exclusive support from Square and a few other companies (via shelling out a few millions), people bought the Playstation in masses and the rest is history.

      Bad products sometimes have an incredible brand (See Canon Powershot G4), good products can have good brands (all the iPod line), but I can't think of a single good product that has a bad brand.

      Actually, I know one. The Xbox. Great product, but the Microsoft name attached to it make some people itchy.

  9. Coming Soon by Gogo0 · · Score: 1

    Next on Slashdot: The Guy Who Designed the Xbox Controller

    "Microsoft is all about innovation, so we made the memory card first and then built the controller around it..."
    "...wanted to make the logo in the middle a button to launch Word..."

    Subscribe now!

    1. Re:Coming Soon by Saige · · Score: 1

      Then after that...

      Slashdot Readers Make Up Microsoft Insults

      Read comments made by clueless readers, most who have absolutely no idea what they're talking about, as they make up random reasons to insult Microsoft to be part of the "cool Slashdot crowd".

      --
      "You know your god is man-made when he hates all the same people you do."
  10. Missing part by amendol · · Score: 1

    "Creating something and then inviting everyone to come and play with it and come and make money on this stuff we have." He left out the final part: "Creating something and then inviting everyone to come and play with it and come and make money on this stuff we have. That's when we steal everything that everyone else made, claim it as our own, and lock out everyone. That's how our monopoly works."

  11. Fan boys by Is0m0rph · · Score: 1

    Gotta love all the fan boys coming out to defend and attack consoles that aren't out yet. I especially like the ones that pretend they are developers. I'll be buying a 360 for sure since it's coming out in a few months. Revolution or PS3, one or the other depending what games are out for them that I want to play.

    1. Re:Fan boys by badasscat · · Score: 1

      Gotta love all the fan boys coming out to defend and attack consoles that aren't out yet. I especially like the ones that pretend they are developers.

      What makes you think they aren't?

      I don't anymore, but I used to work for one of the largest publishers in the United States, in the marketing department. I'd be on here posting all the time from work. I never said where I worked (and I still won't publicly; no point), I rarely even said what field I was in unless it was absolutely necessary to make a point, but the bottom line is you never know who you are talking to online. You could be talking to the CEO of Namco and not even know it. (Even Bill Gates admitted reading the Engadget blog comments every day a while back!)

      Just because you're unemployed and living in your parents' basement, don't assume everybody else is. Some people lie online, but that just makes it all the easier for us people who actually want to stay anonymous, because even if we come right out and say what we do, nobody believes us :)

      (btw, I used to love it when people would write about games I was involved in and then tell me I "didn't know what I was talking about" when I replied... gave me a good laugh!)

    2. Re:Fan boys by Saige · · Score: 1

      That's the best part of Slashdot! The people here are so intelligent that they know more about every subject than the people who actually create/work with/develop those items for a living.

      For example, imagine a security hole is found in your product. Don't worry, the 13-year old slashdotter who's entire coding experience in writing "hello world" in VB will explain why the entire staff of the company whose product it was in has no clue about security.

      But there are plenty of trolls out there who know they have no clue and just make stuff up anyway.

      --
      "You know your god is man-made when he hates all the same people you do."