The most powerful Xbox, that can’t show its true potential. This of course is a very late opinion piece for the console, with the release being back on November 10th, 2020, but I wasn’t able to get my hands on one until Christmas.

I felt like a kid again opening up my first Xbox on Christmas day; with the box opening up as a present itself with the Xbox right in your face. This was by no means easy to get, but being as determined as I was, I was able to get 2 of them in one day for retail price and selling the other for retail price. Still to this day, stock is very limited and is hard to obtain one.

Let’s get straight to the point, the Xbox Series X is a beast of a machine but that does come with some drawbacks.

Technology news website, The Verge thinks, “Microsoft has built what feels like an exciting PC upgrade experience in a console form.”

One problem with this new piece of hardware is the lack of new games to show off its power. Sure, it’s nice to play older games at higher frame rate and better quality, but that doesn’t do justice to what it can really do. Moving forward there will be more games, but I do enjoy loading games much faster compared to that on the older consoles.

The Verge also commented on how fast the load times are. “Load times are incredibly good on the Xbox series X compared to what we’re used to on current consoles.” For example, GTA V, a game that takes ages to load on the Xbox One in roughly 1 minute and 30 seconds, loads more than a minute faster on the Series X.

I recently booted up my Xbox one to see if I can tell a difference with load times and overall better performance between the two. It is night and day with the two Xbox’s. The Xbox One is definitely showing its age, with simple things as bringing up the friends list or going to my game library being slow. The thing that excites me the most is loading into multiplayer matches just as fast as my friends on PC.

There are features I have yet to use, such as a quick resume, which allows players to play multiple games at once without having to close the game.

This time around Xbox decided not to change their interface or controller, making you feel right at home but with better performance.

IGN, a gaming and entertainment website say the new controller “doesn’t quite feel like a ‘next-gen’.” IGN does add that, “the subtle changes to the D-pad and the new share button have improved it in minor ways.”

For the last 7 years, Xbox has been tweaking and perfecting the Xbox interface. I don’t mind having the same interface I’ve had from the past, but I wouldn’t have minded if they made a new one either.

When it comes to the controller, I’d say it’s better than the Xbox One’s, with an updated D-pad, textured grips, and the addition of a new share button and a USB-C port, but with one major problem. Xbox wanted to make it easier for users to share their clips and screenshots without having to leave their game with the new share button. I find this feature useless and at times frustrating because now I have tons of random screenshots of absolutely nothing due to the fact that I accidentally clicked the button. Other than that, I am pretty happy with the controller.

Overall, I’m pretty happy with the Xbox Series X, it definitely is an upgrade that I needed and will continue to love, with better graphics and faster load times.

There are bugs with the console that need to be fixed such as games crashing, but that rarely happens. Usually, people ask what console they think is the best, but this time around both the PS5 and Xbox Series X are great consoles, and now with most games being cross platform, it really doesn’t matter what you get, it’s just up to preference.

The reason I get an Xbox is because that’s where my friends are and while some move over to PC, I can still chat with them using Xbox party chat, not needing a third-party app or use game chat.

Other than going on many wild goose chases to get my hands on this console, I give this console an 8 out of 10.