Microsoft’s initial goal for the Xbox One might be considered overly ambitious to some. The company was originally hoping to sell 200 million consoles.
“The goal that the team had was to figure out how could we sell 200 million game consoles,” Head of Xbox Phil Spencer said, in an interview with Stevivor. “We’ve never seen a console sell that many units.” As of June 2016, the current best-selling console of all-time is the PlayStation 2, according to Statista.
Spencer’s vision for the console was to expand their audience in reaction to the changing habits television viewers by offering a more versatile entertainment device.
However, Spencer did acknowledge an emphasis on gaming at the console’s core.
“When we came in after two-and-a-half years ago and started running the Xbox program, I centered us back on not trying to become something other than a game console. You don’t earn the right to be relevant in other categories of usage for the console until you’ve earned the gaming right, so let’s go make sure that’s what we deliver,” he said.
“I still think that we have to succeed with gamers first before we get any permission to go do anything else,” Spencer said.
Stay tuned for more updates on Microsoft and their upcoming Xbox One Scorpio console coming in 2017.