Xbox Series X Doesn't Look Like Any Xbox Design Before It

The Xbox Series X (the official name of Project Scarlett, which was revealed at The Game Awards) is not shaped like any Xbox before it--or any previous game console, for that matter. In fact, especially in its vertical orientation, it looks a lot like a PC desktop tower. But like the Xbox 360, Xbox One S, and Xbox One X before it, you'll be able to orient the Xbox Series X horizontally or vertically, depending on your preference.

"A lot of times when you're building hardware, you can get limited by some of the traditional tropes of what a game console looks like, plays like, or feels like," Xbox head Phil Spencer told GameSpot. "And we wanted to design a console where the form was driven by the function, and the function was to really play the highest power, most immersive games possible."

Xbox Series X Specs Quick Look

• CPU: AMD Ryzen Zen 2 CPU
• GPU: AMD Navi-based GPU (~12 TFLOPs)
• RAM: GDDR6 SDRAM (capacity not confirmed)
• Storage: NVMe SSD (capacity not confirmed)
• Max Output Resolution: 8K
• Max Refresh Rate: 120Hz

When designing Xbox Series X, the hardware team designed it to, at least aesthetically, match the Xbox One X. In this regard, Xbox Series X is a quiet machine--it's intended to run games silently and figuratively blend in with the overall look of most tech, like TVs and monitors. As Spencer puts it, the Xbox Series X doesn't take your attention "away from what's happening on screen."

"We gave our hardware team some real design opportunities to say, 'Think about how you could design something that could fit this level of performance, and let's be bold in what we're trying to do to ensure that we [aren't] going to have to take limitations in what we want the console to go do, to fit the form of the console and how it was going to play,'" Spencer said. "And I'm really impressed with what the team came back with. I'm probably biased, but when I look at [Xbox One] S and I look at [Xbox One] X in the generation that we're in, I think the hardware team has done an amazing job landing those designs. And the same team led to the stuff that you're getting ready to see for [Xbox Series X]."