I never owned an Xbox myself, though I was fortunate to play off from others, especially when I started going crazy playing Halo. I guess what others have stated already is that being part of that stage where console wars were clearly prevalent contributed to the novelty if you had the chance to experience it.
I remember in middle school where my friends would start going off on each other on which console was better, and a few that were PC elitists saying they’ll probably never have to worry about upgrading their PCs. It’s just being able to get into that experiential nostalgia where ideas and potential led to optimistic thinking.
Now, if you research a few articles on developers, CEOs, and such, you’ll see most of the “console wars” are literally feeding off of each other’s ideas. Heck, it wouldn’t be too surprising for some to have all of the main next-gen consoles because they realize each have their own strengths and weaknesses (i.e. Nintendo’s neutrality that’s allowed them to reach a broader audience).
It’s just that technology in gaming took a huge jump in such a short period of time, but that’s if you exclude looking at it from a PC gamer perspective. So the only thing you would really miss out on are obviously the hype, the experiential novelty with the console wars, and being part of the gregarious spirit with others that talked so much about which console was better than the other.
