Feature By

Dale Weir

With contributions from Chi Kong Lui, Brad Gallaway,
Thom Moyles, Mike Bracken and Mike Doolittle

When a company with the reputation of Microsoft's decides to test other markets, people take notice. Microsoft surprised a few people when it was announced a deal with Sega to use the Windows CE operating system in the 128-Bit Dreamcast console. However in hindsight, its clear that the console industry had become far too lucrative for a corporation like Microsoft to ignore for too long. In 1999, rumors began to make the rounds that Microsoft was going to step out of the background. Some reports said that Sega and Microsoft were collaborating on a follow-up to the Dreamcast that would use more advanced PC technology while others had Microsoft going it alone with a "dumbed-down" PC.

Whatever opinion one may have held towards Microsoft, it was hard to dispute that such a move would have great repercussions on every segment of the industry. The story of Microsoft's entry into the console arena grew quickly and raised expectations to a level that was only surpassed by the unprecedented amount of media coverage and industry buzz afforded to Sony and its PlayStation 2. Getting the real story behind the Xbox would have been quite a coup for any writer, but since this was Microsoft—a company known for being especially tight-lipped—there was little in the way of an insiders take on the new technology. Thankfully, Dean Takahashi, a writer for Red Herring magazine, got "inside" the company and was able to chronicle the journey of the Xbox and Microsoft from early conception to its ultimate launch in the Fall of 2001. His book is called "Opening the Xbox: Inside Microsoft's Plan to Unleash an Entertainment Revolution" and GameCritics.com is pleased be able to talk to Mr. Takahashi about this breakthrough book.

Let's begin the interview by getting to know you a little better. Please tell us about Dean Takahashi the gamer. What videogames originally got you hooked and what are some of your all-time favorite titles? Do you still find time to play games?

I played the original Pong with my brother for the first time while on a family vacation to Las Vegas. It was at the indoor tennis courts at the Tropicana Hotel. We played it and thought it was the greatest thing. We went on to become arcade rats, playing games like Space Wars, Gun Fight, Coleco's handheld football games, Galaga, Ms. Pacman, Zaxxon etc. We had some early consoles like the Odyssey and Intellivsion. During college, I budgeted about $30 a month to play games in the arcade and found I was in the minority among my friends by going to the arcades so much. I dropped out of the console and game scene for a while and returned when I got my first computers. But I really immersed myself in gaming again with the original Wing Commander for the PC. I played that game until my arm got sore and I would have to switch to my left hand to control the joystick. I loved the original Doom and its offspring.

In the last decade or so I've been a big computer game fan, playing war games like Talonsoft's West Front and Combat Mission, as well as real-time strategy games like Age Of Empires and Close Combat II, III and IV. I love innovative games like The Sims and Black & White and SimCity. Liked Shogun a lot. I enjoy business simulations like the original Capitalism. Among the console games, I like Motocross games among friends and for solo I've played through Halo on the normal mode. The worst thing about writing a book was that I had to give up playing games for about 18 months. Now I'm gradually getting back into it with games like Medal Of Honor: Allied Assault and Battleground 1942. Sorry to go on for so long but you asked.

There are only a handful of respected journalists that are renown for covering the videogame industry for major publications like MSNBC, The NY Times and Red Herring. How did you get to be one of them?

Respect is a funny thing. If you mean my work is read widely in the mainstream press, then I'd agree. I write about gaming as a business, and games as they can be understood by the mass market. I wouldn't say, on the other hand, that I'm completely respected by gamers and by game companies. I don't play nearly as much as some of the enthusiast press plays, and I'm not particularly skilled in tournament play. But I love what I write about and I think that is how I got my reputation. I played for a long time and started writing about games at the Wall Street Journal around 1997. The beat was open and nobody in the office wanted to cover it. In fact, I was the youngest guy in the office and probably the only one that understood gaming. So I picked it up and have happily covered it for six years. I wrote the first review of an electronic game that appeared in the Wall Street Journal's weekend section. But many mainstream publications still don't cover gaming like they should. I'm glad to be going back to a job at the San Jose Mercury News, where they do get gaming. I have been a journalist for 15 years and have only written about games for six. I guess you could say I established my reputation as a tech journalist first, then switched into a focus on games when I had a following.

Let's move on to your recent book "Opening the Xbox". How did this project come to be?

I was chasing the original rumors of the Xbox while working for the Wall Street Journal. Tom Russo of Next Generation beat me to the first story. But I stuck with it. I reported in October 1999, that Microsoft was prepared to spend billions on the Xbox. Then I wrote a story in March 2000, on the four renegades who proposed the Xbox to Bill Gates. I had also met Seamus Blackley while he was doing Trespasser and followed his career. I thought the Xbox genesis was a natural book, something as fun to write about as The Soul of a New Machine. I left my job at the Wall Street Journal to join the Red Herring in June 2000. I was thinking I would do a book on the Xbox while I was at the magazine. But I didn't truly get started until I visited Redmond and Microsoft's PR people asked me if I wanted to do it. I said would do so, but only if it was an independent journalistic effort, not paid for and endorsed by Microsoft. I proposed the book in August 2000.