It would be easy to think that Microsoft’s veritable army of developers would be targeting the Series X’s launch day. But Booty agrees with us when we propose that this will be a very different kind of console launch, with first-party games being compatible across all Microsoft’s hardware, existing and new, ending the usual platform reset we’ve seen in the past with such launches.

“As our content comes out over the next year, two years, all of our games, sort of like PC, will play up and down that family of devices,” Booty explains. “We want to make sure that if someone invests in Xbox between now and [Series X] that they feel that they made a good investment and that we’re committed to them with content.”

And that means it’s also unlikely that there will be much pressure, from Microsoft at least, on third-party publishers to turn out hardware-exclusive titles for the relatively small day-one audience of Xbox Series X owners. In short, Microsoft is rewriting the rules of the console launch.

Of course, the company will still be wanting to show off its new hardware to best effect. “Our approach is to pick one or two IP that we’re going to focus on and make sure that they’re there at the launch of the console, taking advantage of all the features. And for us that’s going to be Halo Infinite, which is a big opportunity.

“It’s the first time in over 15 years that we’ll have a Halo title launching in sync with a new console. And that team is definitely going to be doing things to take advantage of [Series X].”