A new console generation is something of a right of passage, out with the old and in with new as they say. From the days of the 16-bit Super Nintendo to the dawn of the HD-era with the Xbox 360, every few years everything from the look and feel of hardware that connects to a display, to the controller, the interface, and of course the games -- transforms. New, shiny, fresh, and a lot of it building on what has come before.

That is, until now.

Like the mid-generation refresh that was the Xbox One X, the new Xbox Series X (and the digital-only Xbox Series S) swaps out the regular next-gen playbook for one of those sets of books you’d find in places that used to house such things. Encyclopedias. Libraries. With full backwards compatibility with the entire Xbox One library playable on day one (Xbox 360 and original Xbox games are supported too), the same UI and overall feel found on current Xbox consoles, and a bunch of peripherals and hardware from years ago still ready to perform as intended -- it’s not so much out with the old as it is ‘let’s have everyone and everything come along for the ride’.