To start off the new year, Xbox Corporate Vice President of Marketing Mike Nichols published a post that detailed the strong year that the company had in 2016 as well as teased new announcements for the year ahead.
As Xbox celebrated its 15 year anniversary in November, Nichols stated that November and December saw Xbox Live engagement reach a staggering 3.9 billion hours, an all-time high. This was a 23% increase compared to the year prior. Windows 10 saw a huge increase in gaming hours as well, with 2.5 billion hours played on Windows 10 devices in just November 2016, a 127% increase from November 2015.
In 2016, nearly 400 new games were released for Xbox One owners to enjoy, including such games as Forza Horizon 3 and Gears of War 4. Forza Horizon 3 became the best-selling, highest-rated racing game of the year, and had the biggest Forza launch to date. The entire franchise has now seen over 14 million players across both Xbox One and Windows 10. As for Gears of War 4, its Versus Multiplayer and Horde modes are seeing tons of engagement with over 23 million matches played since launch.
Another huge release for Microsoft in 2016 was the launch of their Xbox Play Anywhere program, allowing players to buy games like Gears of War 4, Forza Horizon 3, ReCore, Killer Instinct: Definitive Edition, Everspace, and Astroneer once with the ability to play on both Xbox One and Windows 10 PC for no additional cost. These games also support cross-saves so players never lose progress.
Thanks to Xbox’s backward compatibility program, which saw the addition of beloved titles such as Red Dead Redemption, Call of Duty 2, Call of Duty 3, Call of Duty: Black Ops, Call of Duty: World at War, Mass Effect 2, Mass Effect 3, The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, and Skate 3, Xbox One owners enjoyed more than 265 million hours playing Xbox 360 titles in 2016.
Some other major milestones include Xbox Live being rated as the most-reliable and fastest gaming network by an independent study, and new monthly system updates that added clubs and background music. Because of the Xbox Design Lab, players created over 2.4 million personalized Xbox controller designs.
One of the biggest releases for Xbox last year was likely the Xbox One S, which delivered HDR support for games and videos, 4K video streaming, and a built-in 4K Blu-ray player. For months since its launch, the Xbox One S was the best-selling console in the United States and sold well over the holidays.
Looking forward to 2017, Nichols said, “We’re excited to show you more of what we have in store for 2017, including the much-anticipated unveil of Project Scorpio, in the coming months.” In addition to the imminent reveal of Project Scorpio, Xbox aims to bring numerous enhancements to Xbox Live and will continue to deliver fantastic games. Halo Wars 2, For Honor, Resident Evil 7, Tacoma, and Mass Effect: Andromeda are just a few of the titles coming to Xbox One in 2017.
Source: Xbox Wire
Jennifer is a games journalist, former games journalist and PR Manager at Gearbox. They contributed 234 articles to ICXM between 2015–2017, focused on opinion pieces, game reviews, Windows and PC, and Xbox news: went on to write for Windows Central and later managed PR for Gearbox Software.