Good to see MS doing a 180 on the One and have it work like the 360. And they had Don "You Can Buy a 360 Instead" Mattrick himself break the news, which is nice 'cause we get to see him (and MS by extension) having to eat crow after nearly a month of bad PR. Considering how MS has been almost universally savaged (and rightfully so) for the anti-consumer policies they had announced for the XBO and how the XBO is currently getting its ass kicked in terms of preorders, I can't say I blame them. It's possible that the eight generation could have been MS's "Saturn Moment," with them going the way of Sega. Alternately, they would have ended up like Nintendo was that generation; they survived and carved out a comfortable niche, but lost a massive chunk of their market share, with the PS1 outselling the N64 by a 3:1 margin. In any case, I did not see MS's policies working out well for the system, especially not when gamers could get the PS4, which does not have any restrictions on used games, no online requirements, and costs $100 less. But now the eight generation will be a fairly competitive one, and the PS4's victory is no longer guaranteed.

For nearly four decades console gamers have enjoyed the right to lend, resale, or gift games at their own discretion under the First-sale Doctrine. For nearly four decades they have been able to utilize the property they paid good money for at their own whim, without having to ask for "permission" to be "allowed" to play their games as if they were kids with heavily restricted TV privileges who must beg their parents to be able to watch their favorite cartoon. You cannot upend that and not expect to suffer for it. MS backtracking on their policies and deciding to maintain the status quo is good for gamers everywhere and it will be good for MS as the Xbox brand will live to fight another day. Consumer rights win in the end so long as we make our voices (and our wallets) heard.

Since MS is basically doing an about-face on their online requirement and second-hand game policies (though I did notice that the XBO still needs to connect to the internet during its initial setup, but that's trivial compared to requiring a daily check), I too am doing an about-face. Barring any possible fine print that makes today's news less good than it sounds, I will get an XBO, my boycott of the system ending before it ever could effectively begin. However, I'm going wait a while as I've already preordered a PS4. Before we learned any details about the XBO, I was originally going to get both it and a PS4, with my final decision being their launch window lineups. The game lineups shown at E3 were a tossup, but since the PS4 is still $100 cheaper (which is important because I'm getting a Wii U in a few weeks and it has several huge games coming out this holiday season, so I need to cut costs) and because apparently the PS4 version of Destiny will be better supported, I'm gonna stick with getting the PS4 first. I may end up waiting until either the XBO gets a price cut or until Halo 5 comes out, whichever comes first.