Reckon Microsoft’s naming system for its next-generation consoles is confusing? Josef Fares certainly does.
The outspoken chief creator of Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons, A Way Out, and the upcoming It Takes Two – infamous for this “F**k the Oscars” speech at during the 2017 Game Awards – had some choice words about the Xbox Series X and S in an interview with IGN:
“That’s a f**king confusing name,” he said. “What the f**k’s going on with Microsoft? They’re losing it, man. What the f**k is going on? Like Series S, X, Mex, Next. I mean, who knows this? Come on. Madness. Call it the Microsoft Box and that’s it. I don’t know. It’s a total f**king mess. Trust me, even them, they’re confused in their offices. What is this X, S… I don’t know, what the f**k.”
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Fares certainly isn’t the first person to call the Xbox Series naming convention confusing – although few have gone on the record to talk about it in quite the same way.
For the folks arguing last week that the Xbox naming is absolutely not confusing and everybody calls it Xbox Series X and Xbox Series S and the game developers who trip up are incompetent: this was the immediate *trending* response to the Xbox Series S and Series X announcements. https://t.co/Wn160O8VX5
— Rami Ismail (????) (@tha_rami) September 8, 2020
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Thinking Xbox’s current naming strategy might be bad. pic.twitter.com/oJItFucgGg
— KZ ?? (@KZXcellent) September 8, 2020
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And if I?m a bit confused, imagine the average punter. There?s something to be said for a simplified product line and a straightforward pricing strategy.
— Shahid Kamal Ahmad (@shahidkamal) September 8, 2020
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Microsoft has a fair few Xbox consoles it releases games for currently: the Xbox One, Xbox One X, Xbox One S, Xbox One S All-Digital Edition, Xbox Series X and Xbox Series S. Phew!
In an interview with Kotaku from autumn 2020, Phil Spencer commented on the subject:
“On the pronunciation capability of S and X, I kind of agree they’re not the easiest words to enunciate or letters to enunciate completely, but I think it’ll be pretty obvious when someone goes into the store.”
Spencer added Microsoft is relying on the different prices of its consoles to help people shopping online or at the store to tell them apart (the Xbox Series X costs £449, the Xbox Series S costs £249).
What do you think?
