Xbox and Playstation have been the main rivals in the world of games’ consoles ever since the release of Xbox around the same time that Playstation 2 was released. The difference between the two of them has always fairly distinct, with each having their own sets of pros and cons.
Xbox was first released at the same sort of time as Playstation 2 was released, hence why they are often compared to each other. At the time of Xbox’s release, many people felt that the Playstation 2 was superior. This was due to a variety of factors, of which the difference in controller quality was often the most pointed out. Xbox’s controller was clunky and unintuitive when compared to the PS controller, at least in the minds of many (there are certainly a group of devoted Xbox controller fans).
There was also the present reality that more games came out exclusively for Playstation than they did for Xbox. Because Playstation 1 didn’t have any Xbox rivals either, all of the Playstation games were solely playable on Playstation 2, which added another advantage to owning a PS 2.
The thing that really gave Xbox an edge over Playstation 2 was the release of Halo, which was one of the most popular games ever. While Playstation had games like Final Fantasy, Xbox had Halo exclusively, and that proved to be a major selling point for the console.
Since then, we’ve had the much more balanced comparison between Xbox 360 and Playstation 3, although many actually feel like Xbox edged out ahead with this generation. It had a lot to offer; more exclusive games and generally of higher quality, better servers for online gaming, a better Xbox live community, and a more powerful gaming system. While most of the differences between the two didn’t really amount to much, it provide a bit of a distinction in terms of quality.
Xbox 1 (Microsoft’s sense of naming showing through) and Playstation 4 are the newest gaming consoles. Since the initial release of the Xbox, the whole gaming environment has changed massively; more people are now using their PC’s as gaming devices than ever before, and this is a trend that is only set to continue. As PC’s and Xbox are usually made by the same company, Microsoft, you can see how Xbox 1 can have a massive advantage over their rivals.
Even when you take account of this, the answer isn’t necessarily as clear cut as this fact would indicate. One of the biggest complaints people had about the release of the Xbox 1 and PS 4 was how much worse the hardware of the Xbox 1 was compared to its rival. The reality is that the Xbox will always have an inferior level of graphics, both in terms of resolution and FPS (frames per second) than the Playstation, which will have a real qualitative impact on gaming experience.