Microsoft's Xbox One is seeing strong sales after a long awaited $100 price drop, according to Microsoft itself.
Originally retailing for $499 ($100 more than Xbox's chief competitor PlayStation 4), Microsoft on June 9 brought a $399 Xbox to store shelves, one without the camera-based Kinect.
Now Microsoft is saying that move paid off, writing in an Xbox Wire blog post that after the price drop, coupled with a strong Xbox E3 showing, sales for Xbox One in June doubled that of the console's sales in May. Microsoft also reports "solid" Xbox 360 sale growth, though what that actually means is debatable. The sales figures are based on internal Microsoft data based on sold through numbers, which means actual console purchases and not just units shipped to retailers.
Microsoft undoubtedly needed the boost. Since Xbox One and PS4 launched, Sony's gaming brand has continued to pull ahead, with more than 7 million PlayStation 4 units sold through in March compared to 5 million Xbox One units shipped to retail.
The non-mandatory Kinect is just the latest in a string of policy reversals on Microsoft's part. At E3 2013 Xbox One was almost an entirely different console: an always-online, Kinect required, used game blocking machine that gamers instantly cried foul on. Now that Microsoft has done a complete 180 with the Xbox One it looks like sales are finally picking up, though this holiday season will be the real contest for Sony and Microsoft as each consoles heavy hitting games arrive on store shelves.
In the months leading up to and after the launch of the Xbox One Microsoft continually emphasized that the Kinect and Xbox would never be separated. Talking to CVG in August, Microsoft corporate vice president Phil Harrison when asked if Xbox One and Kinect would ever come separately said it would never happen.
"Xbox One is Kinect," Harrison said. "They are not separate systems. An Xbox One has chips, it has memory, it has Blu-ray, it has Kinect, it has a controller. These are all part of the platform ecosystem."
Lackluster sales ultimately undid that commitment, as an additional $100 for a feature most gamers were less than enthusiastic about was putting Microsoft firmly behind Sony. The Kinect, which isn't required for most games and is primarily used for voice navigation purposes, concerned many gamers with its need to be always connected, bringing up privacy concerns. Microsoft too addressed this issue shortly before launch by stating that the Xbox One would indeed work without a Kinect plugged in, paving the way for the $399 Xbox One to be released.
