While the launch of the Xbox Series X is preparing, Microsoft is cleaning up the vacuum in its range of game consoles. To begin, the publisher / manufacturer stops production of Xbox One X and Xbox One S All Digital. Only the Xbox One S will continue to be produced and sold, has indicated a company spokesperson at The Verge.
The Xbox One X (not to be confused with Xbox Series X), launched in November 2017, was touted as the most powerful console in the world. As for the Xbox One S All Digital, its career will have been even shorter since its launch dates back to April of last year. Its particularity is its absence of optical drive, which gives it a softer price (currently less 200 €).
But the future is obviously the Xbox Series X, which Microsoft should moreover assist with a less powerful and more affordable model, the Xbox Series S, with a presentation that could fall next month. The other legacy of the past that will completely disappear is the Kinect. It was at the bend of a sentence that Phil Spencer, the great manitou of the Xbox, confirmed : « All Xbox One games that do not require Kinect to run will be playable on Xbox Series X as soon as the console launches ».
This is not really a surprise, knowing that the motion recognition bar has not been produced since 2017. The accessory started its career in tandem with the Xbox 360, at the end of 2010, then version 2 had been delivered necessarily in the box of Xbox One, which contributed to lead the launch of the console sold more expensive than the PS4.
Microsoft ended up decoupling the accessory from the console, thereby reducing the attractiveness of the Kinect (read: Microsoft’s Kinect is dead, but it’s still moving). The Xbox Series X does not include the proprietary port required to connect the accessory; it had also disappeared from Xbox One S and Xbox One X, but at least Microsoft offered a USB adapter until 2018. Accessory manufacturers have taken over, but designing a dongle for the Series X will certainly be too expensive, especially for the few dozens of compatible Xbox One games.
The last fans of the Kinect will be able to console themselves by saying that it survives a little of their favorite accessory in Apple devices. In 2013, the manufacturer bought PrimeSense, the company that developed the Kinect on behalf of Microsoft (read: PrimeSense acquisition: what is Apple preparing for?). The technologies developed by this company must have been used to design several functions related to depth sensors – even Face ID, for example.
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