Microsoft: Xbox One ‘is More Than a 10 Year Journey’

Microsoft's Phil Harrison has said that for Microsoft the Xbox One will be "more than a 10 year journey" at the Eurogamer Expo today. 

He added that the console will be improved upon and updated over the course of its life cycle. 

In an interview with Eurogamer Harrison said that the core gamers who buy consoles upon release will be attracted by the system's launch titles. 

"It's all about the games. It's about having the strongest lineup of franchises that players love and also some new experiences we think they will love that perhaps they haven't yet played.

"Of the 23 games we have coming out for Xbox One in the launch window, I was looking at this the other day and I think there are 10 billion dollar IPs in that launch lineup. It might be 11, but it's definitely 10.

"A game like Call of Duty. A game like FIFA. A game like Forza. A game that has cumulatively sold over a billion dollars in its history."

He said that the Xbox One has the most "powerful" launch lineup of any console in history. 

"These are powerhouse franchises, household names, games players want to play, and games players have a rich history of playing with their friends, which is very important on Xbox Live. No console in history has ever launched with a lineup of IPs that are that powerful. That's great for Xbox One.

"But, there are also some new games people haven't had the chance to play before, which will be showing up uniquely on the console, like Ryse, which just looks amazing and has beautiful graphics.

"Also, somebody who's buying into an Xbox One at launch is not only judging the launch lineup, but they're also thinking about what's coming around the corner. And it's games like Titanfall that will be hugely motivational for players to buy into the Xbox One. We know they have a choice, but it's the games that ultimately what cements that choice."

Elsewhere in the interview Harrison commented that digital is an "unstoppable force". He said that Microsoft's cloud based technologies place the company at the forefront of the digital space. 

"I'm not going to make any speculation on future hardware, but the general trend of the world is to be more digital and less physical. That is in our opinion an unstoppable force. Depending on where you live on the planet, that transition has already happened. Some parts of South East Asia, Korea for example, don't have a physical disc or media-based games industry anymore. It's all digital.

"The world is clearly moving into a connected, digital world in all devices in all functions, and Microsoft is clearly at the leading edge of many of those innovations and many of those investments, whether it's our Azure cloud business, or the investments we're making in Surface or phone or other technologies."

The Xbox One is set to be released on November 22nd in 13 countries for $499/€499/£429.