Microsoft made 75 Xbox One prototypes before settling on the one we have today. Some of those prototypes included an Xbox One with a Kinect permantenly built into the system, Xbox industrial designer Car Ledbetter told Develop.
"We actually built models of that," he said. The problem however, was that putting hte Kinect into the Xbox One directly made the system too large.
"We pushed ourselves, can we put it all in one? Is that going to work? And the technology just isn't there yet," Ledbetter concluded. "As soon as you have something much bigger than the Kinect sensor people don't want to put it by the TV, it's too big."
I think many of us would agree the Xbox One is already massive on its own. I can't imagine storing some much bigger.
Microsoft recently announced a new Kinect-less Xbox One for $399. Though Microsoft will now sell the system without the peripheral already included, the company maintains that the Kinect is an important part of the Xbox One's platform strategy.
[Develop]
