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Lorne Lanning: Munch’s Oddysee was an Xbox exclusive because Microsoft considered giving the console away

Speaking with Games Industry, Oddworld Inhabitants’ founder Lorne Lanning revealed that Munch’s Oddysee was an original Xbox exclusive because at one point Microsoft had considered giving the console away free of charge.

The lure of Microsoft giving away its console was enough for Lanning to jump ship from PlayStation and make Munch’s Oddysee exclusive he explains, “At the time, Xbox thought that the core market was going to be casual. They were going to be the casual gamers’ machine. Now, that’s why they approached us because they said ‘we think you’ve got something that competes in that Mario space and we think Mario’s the thing to kill … We see that space. We want that audience. We love Oddworld so why don’t you get on this bandwagon? And we might give the box away’.

“So now you’re like, ‘look, if you’re going to give the box away, you’re going to win. If you’re going to win, we want to be on board’.”

Obviously Microsoft didn’t end up giving away the Xbox free, but it’s interesting that at one time they considered it. What’s even more interesting is that Microsoft thought the major market would be casual gamers. Imagine a world where the Xbox One was considered the casual machine. Madness.


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