Xbox One X Review Impressions

The Xbox One has walked a rockier road than most consoles dare to tread, but the fact that Microsoft has offered up another addition to the hardware family shows just how robust the community is that has built up around the Xbox brand. Sure, the platform has seen better, more popular days, but Microsoft is still in there and competing with Sony and Nintendo, and it's making a good fight of it despite both Japanese companies returning to top form with the PS4 and Switch respectively.

As just about everybody knows the launch of the Xbox One was a total wreck. The unfortunate decisions made around the release of Microsoft's 360 successor have been well documented and we'll not rehash events here, but suffice to say Don Mattrick's team dropped the ball on more than one occasion, and it wasn't until the appointment of Phil Spencer and the abandonment of the Kinect (among other things) that the Xbox One really started to find its feet. Maybe the damage done by that point will ultimately prove terminal when events are viewed with more distance than we can muster here, but Spencer's friendly and open approach and some well-made strategic decisions have at least corrected the company's course and, if there is to be the kind of turnaround that'll see a future Xbox console repeating the success of the 360, it'll be because of the changes made since Mattrick left the building.

Part of Spencer's vision for Xbox One included some big policy shifts, including the abandonment of the generational cycle. By ramping up backwards compatibility with more 360 games and now Xbox originals, and by introducing early access, Windows 10 play anywhere, and cross-platform play, the Xbox family is more expansive and inclusive than ever before. Ironically, we're edging ever closer to something akin to Mattrick's original vision, but now it's refined, honed, and feels less corporate and more consumer-focused.

However, these days vision will only get you so far, and you've got to deliver on that vision if you really want to take over the world. The question is therefore whether or not Microsoft delivers with the Xbox One X. The answer is actually a lot more complicated than the question would have you believe, but over the course of the next few paragraphs we'll attempt to untangle that conundrum and come to some sort of conclusion.

There are two sides to the Xbox One X, although, given the fact that this is an incremental upgrade and that all Xbox One games will run on the platform, the software half of the equation isn't as clear-cut as it would be if this were a standard console launch. Like the PS4 Pro before it, the Xbox One X takes a selection of existing titles and retrofits them with super-detailed 4K textures, improved frame-rates, and general performance boosts, adding a final layer of polish that elevates the games and, for slightly older titles like Quantum Break, brings them bang up to date from a visual perspective. The other side of the Xbox One X is the hardware itself. That's probably the best place to start in terms of this evaluation, so let's get to it.

The console itself looks fantastic. When compared to the original Xbox One, which people mocked for looking like a VHS player back at its reveal, the X is an elegant device. It's not dissimilar to the PS2, which in itself evokes memories of one of the most beloved consoles of all time. The matte black casing and solid build makes this the best-looking Xbox since the second generation of the Xbox 360, and when viewed alongside its stable-mate the Xbox One S, it's hard not to be impressed by the cohesive vision that Microsoft has now put in place. It's even easier to be impressed when you consider just how much they've packed into the box (the smallest Xbox yet), including the infamous power brick that pumped electricity into first-gen Xbox Ones.

In fact, the technicians at Microsoft need a pat on the collective back for their work in building the Xbox One X in general. Everything from the 8-core custom-built AMD CPU (clocked at 2.3GHz) through to the whopping 12GB of GDDR5 graphics memory points to a machine built with the express purpose of delivering high-quality graphics balanced against rock-solid performance. On that front, and when considering the price point of the Xbox One X, it's hard to fault what Microsoft has delivered; this is the closest you're going to get to high-end PC gaming at a reasonably affordable price.

For the most part you won't consciously notice a massive improvement, because the Xbox One was already a capable machine. The load times are generally faster, the visuals are certainly crisper, but otherwise the big picture remains largely the same. However, when you delve a little deeper, it's then that true power of the X begins to reveal itself: it's all in the detail. The 4K textures are, at times, jaw-droppingly gorgeous. Playing Assassin's Creed Origins on a big-screen 4K HDR-ready television is a sight to behold, for example, and even flicking the HDR (high dynamic range) on and off reveals just how much extra pop the image now has. That's not even a new feature, you can see that improvement on the Xbox One S (which is when Microsoft launched HDR), but when you're marvelling at how much more golden the desert is on the X, you'll probably also notice just how gnarled and lifelike your camel is, marvel at some completely unnecessary particle effects off in the distance, or spot a little touch of detail on Bayek's back that you'd missed before.

We've played a selection of games since the console arrived at the office, a greatest hits look at the console's back catalogue, along with a sprinkling of the latest third-party titles. The file sizes of the games are huge now, and most of the big budget games we've wanted to look at clock in at around 100GB each. Many are less, some are more, but the 1TB hard drive on the console is already starting to feel quite small, and we can imagine it won't be long before people start looking for external solutions, especially when the lengthy download times mean that you can't simply play something you don't already have installed on your hard drive without having to wait.

This means that, at the time of writing, we've sampled a mix of games of varying size. Assassin's Creed Origins has impressed us greatly, but we've also looked at Quantum Break, ReCore, Elite Dangerous, Halo Wars 2, Forza Motorsport 7, and Minecraft. Call of Duty: WWII's opening mission was a pulsating experience in 4K, and Star Wars Battlefront II might take a while to load, but makes good use of the extra power under the hood to deliver one of the most eye-pleasing video games we've ever seen. Gears 4 looks great, FIFA 18 is as sharp as a tack, and even some old Xbox 360 titles have been given a fresh lick of paint. We took a look at Halo 3, Skate 3, and Gears of War 3, and while these games all showed their age to an extent, keen eyes will spot refinements all over the place.

So far, across all titles, we've noticed just one notable negative performance spike, and that was stuttering the frame-rate during the in-game cutscenes in Remedy's time-bending action game Quantum Break, but otherwise the performance of each title has been great, with snappy load times and eye-popping visuals across the board. Performance boosts can be more subtle than that, though, and something like scrolling around the map on Halo Wars 2, for example, is smooth and responsive, even when done at speed.

Forza Motorsport 7 is obviously one of the key titles for the Xbox One X at launch, especially given the proximity of its own release. Turn 10's arcade-edged simulator looked pretty decent on our Xbox One S, but on the X it looks simply sensational. The load times are also shortened (which, if you've played on Xbox One, you'll know is a godsend), making for a more accessible and user-friendly experience overall. Microsoft has made a case for this to be the console of choice for dedicated enthusiasts, those who want the best console experience that money can buy, and that's basically what they've delivered, as long as you've got the screen to showcase the experience that the box can provide.

The one and possibly only thing that you could say against the Xbox One X, and hold against it as a reason not to buy one, is the number of big new exclusive games coming to the platform. Forza went early, Super Lucky's Tale landed bang on time, and Crackdown slipped and fell into 2018, leaving the Xbox One X feeling very much like what it is: an incremental upgrade on existing hardware, and not the dawn of a new generation. For all that power under the hood, there's no statement game, no system-seller, and the X is very much left to defend itself on the same terms as the Xbox One S when it comes to its library of games. Of course, that's not to say that there aren't some brilliant games on the console, it's just that when it comes to platform-exclusives, it doesn't feel like Xbox is holding as many aces as it did in the past.

Given the number of titles we wanted to see in action, now more than ever we appreciated the ability to play games before they're finished downloading, especially when you consider the files sizes we mentioned earlier. Having said that, the initial wait to get playing gave us the chance to explore the new-look UI, which has been updated across the whole Xbox One family. This latest update means that it's easy to get from your game into the menus to make changes, or flick between one of the many streaming and subscription services that are now available. Perhaps it could be a touch more intuitive at times, but generally, it's a bold and accessible setup.

For all of our positive experiences with the Xbox One X, there have been a couple of blemishes. At one point we had to restart the console to get rid of some serious screen flickering that started in-game and then followed us into the dashboard. Another time we had to perform a hard reset to get the console back up and running after we were greeted with a dreaded black screen. Once fixed neither problem persisted, but we did exchange some worried looks when a normal restart didn't fix the black screen. Other than that, you could point out that some loading times are still pretty long for the more GPU-intensive titles, but when the visuals are as stunning as they are in some of the 4K-ready games, it's hard to begrudge them the extra time spent crunching the numbers.

We loved the inclusion of the Ultra HD Blu-ray drive, and generally speaking the console itself is pretty quiet when running, even with a disc in the machine and after playing games for an extended period of time. Beyond that the X is well-built and aesthetically pleasing, and overall we think that it stands as a fitting symbol of Microsoft's revised vision for the Xbox One. Now the company needs to keep building on what they've got; expanding and growing the ecosystem around this now open-ended console generation. This expansion needs to come in the form of more big-budget crowd-pleasing exclusives, extensive third-party support, a stocked roster of indie darlings, and, further down the line, even more hardware updates. The Xbox One X might not be the dawn of a new console generation, but it might be the start of something else; the realisation of an era where players are no longer locked into the generational cycle of consoles. That alone makes this a noteworthy launch if that turns out to be the case.

Microsoft sees a future where we'll subscribe and download and upgrade, existing in the same ecosystem for as long as is feasibly possible, and that may well be how this plays out. If the PS4 Pro is the next step towards the PS5 (although who knows what that console will allow; no doubt Sony is watching what happens here with great interest) then, according to the plans outlined by Spencer and co. last year and this, there will no such numerical step for the Xbox family. What we'll get instead is a successor to the Xbox One X that comes with hundreds of original and 360 backwards compatible titles, and the entirety of the Xbox One catalogue, all fully intact and ready to play straight out the gate. That alone is a tempting proposition, and Microsoft should be applauded for the being the first platform holder to wholeheartedly try and unify its console family. Whether that's going to be enough in the long run remains to be seen, but when it comes to its commitment to hardware, Microsoft has done everything that could be expected and more with the Xbox One X.