Once upon a time, in a magical kingdom far away, there lived a kindhearted toy-maker. Children from across the land would line up to see his wonderful craftsmanship. He always worked very hard to make the little children happy. One day a prince passed by the shop and marveled at the long lines of children. He was touched by the faces of happy children and set out to make his own toys. However, the prince’s toys would constantly fall apart and give splinters to the poor children. The kindhearted toy-maker gave this advice to the prince: "Prince, you must be willing to put your heart into your work. A toy that was hastily put together cannot compare to one that you carefully and thoughtfully make." The prince stopped what he was doing and pondered over the toy-maker’s wise words. The next day, the prince bought out the toy shop, sold the toy-maker’s children into slavery, and had the kindhearted man beheaded. The end.

Ah how I love that old fairy tale. Especially since I just made it up 2 minutes ago. One must ask oneself: "Self, why in hell would the Microsoft Corporation get into a field which it has zero experience in?". Answer: to better the lives of countless young children by providing top-notch entertainm. . . .BWHAHAHA, sorry- I can’t type that with a straight face. The answer is, of course, MONEY. I guess Bill Gates needs more stacks of 100 dollar bills to beat homeless people over the head with.

And thy name be Xbox. Why there isn’t a hyphen between the "X" and the "Box" is beyond me. I think a much more appropriate name would be the "Give-Money-To-Your-New-God-Bill Gates-And-He-Won’t-Murder-Your-Dog Box". I guess that name was taken by another company. However, I digress. No matter how you feel about Microsoft, the once rumored Xbox is a reality.

The first thing you realize when you look at this Samsonite Suitcase. . . . err, game console is how unwieldy and gaudy it is. I know looks have nothing to do with its performance, but just look at it! As seen in these pictures that were borrowed (i.e. stolen) from planetn2000, you see that the Xbox is two times bigger than a PS2 and approximately four times bigger than the Gamecube. Try ramming that into your entertainment deck! Bill Gates must have an inferiority complex or something.

To make sure that you remember what you blew last month’s paycheck on, there resides a giant neon green orb in the center of the system with the Xbox logo on it. A matching orb is also on the controller. There is much speculation as to what this orb actually does (see below). One thing is sure: you’ll be able to see the system at least 23 miles away.

Enough of that- let’s move on to the controller. What the?!! THEY JUST MASHED THE DREAMCAST AND GAMECUBE CONTROLLERS TOGETHER! I suppose they also added a hint of "Sidewinder" for taste. We all know that Microsoft is a powerhouse of originality, but this is ridiculous.

Ok, that’s all well and good, but what about games? After all, a videogame console is supposed to play games (it’s a stretch, I know). Well, the Xbox has Halo, Metal Gear Solid X, Oddworld, some EA Sports games, and. . . Wait a minute!!!! All of those games are ports of either PS2 or computer games! Which leads me to another point: THE XBOX IS A COMPUTER!!! I can just imagine all those frustrated souls who are banging their Xbox shouting "Dammit, my Xbox crashed again!" I fear that all computer developers will jump ship to the Xbox (a la "Halo" and "Obi-Wan") and stop developing their current projects. This means that if you want the latest and greatest of computer games, you will have to buy an Xbox. I’m sure all of those computer gamers who just purchased their shiny new 1 GHz processors to play Halo will be happy to hear this.