When you're rolling out a list of names for your console, there are a couple of names you deliberately avoid at all costs: Super Kinetic Optics X, Panasonic Universe Box, Uranus Spitfire, and of course... the Xbox One. Just to let you know how out of touch and rushed Microsoft's latest console was: when they came up with the name no one saw “Xbone” as a shorthand version of “Xbox One”.
The thing is, if you're naming something you have to find something that both sticks and sounds cool. If it were real, the Panasonic Universe Box could be shortened to the P.U Box, and that's a flame-thread waiting to happen (if it ever did get a fair share of fanboys on board). If your console is called the “Uranus Spitfire”, you can bet your anus there's going to be a ton of anus jokes about your console, and when you cleverly come up with a name where it sounds like your console is a porn star and can bang (or bone) people, well you need to go back to the drawing board.
Now I understand they probably had Xbox Infinity reserved for the console after this next one, but the Spark, the Lancer, the Titan, the Nova, and about a dozen other names could have been used to specify how cool the console was without it referring to something, in their mind, they feel is derogatory.
Well, Lazygamer picked up quotes from an interview with Gamespot, where Microsoft's studio head Phil Spencer let loose the following bit about the Xbox One's unsavory nickname...
"At first, I guess the thing that bugged me the most is I didn’t see it," ... "I’d been looking at the name for Xbox One for months, and I wasn’t clever enough to merge them and come up with Xbone.”
I don't know, I mean directly after the May 21st reveal and all that DRM nonsense came spewing out like a teenager vomiting after binging on jägermeisters for the very first time, the “Xbone” moniker was quickly developed as the perfect representation of what Microsoft had planned with the original policies of the Xbox One. Loyal Xbox gamers felt like they were getting boned.
The name picked up steam rather quickly (alongside “Xbox Done”) and the memes came flowing in like Charlie Sheen showing up at a party scene to epic win. The name resonated some ill feelings from the Microsoft camp, with Larry “Major 'Flip Switcher' Nelson” Hryb commenting on a Neogaf thread that the “Xbone” appellation was disrespectful to everyone on the Xbox team.
Well, Spencer has decided to roll with the community boning and instead of fighting it, he's just going to let it happen...
You know, I think it’s going to stick. I think we can say we don’t like it as much as we want, but it’s a clever use of the name. Probably not the most flattering name, but I think it’s going to be there."
Well it sure beats “X-Suck” and “X-Fart” and a certain other name. But let's be honest, Microsoft has been boning and screwing their customers for years... is it not so far-fetched that they subconsciously came up with a name that they actually felt represented their treatment of their brand-loyal customers? I mean, it's not like Windows 8 is so great, even Microsoft didn't want to use it to showcase games at E3. And all that Kinect listening/watching crap on the Xbox One was shadier than a Baptist church selling lottery tickets across from a liquor store.
Embracing the “Bone” is probably best for now because most customers still feel like their privacy and financial buttholes would have been tore out from the Xbox One after a major boning from Microsoft. Until they can win back trust and respect by earning it legitimately (and not by cheat-voting on polls) then and only then will the “Xbone” nickname retire and gamers will start calling it by its other ridiculous name... the Xbox One.
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