Det tiltrak stor opmærksomhed i amerikanske gamingmedier, at Xbox Series X/S under Black Friday ikke kun blev slået af Playstation og Switch i USA, men også af Nex Playground. En konsol, som mange sandsynligvis aldrig engang har hørt om.
Det er en Kinect-lignende enhed uden controllere, som sælges til en mere spiselig pris på 249 dollars (ca. 1.590 kr.). Efter salgssuccesen blev Nex's CEO David Lee interviewet af The Game Business (via Pure Xbox) og delte sine synspunkter om hardwaren og dens plads på markedet. Han sagde:
"We are not going to compete with high-end graphics. Our graphic capabilities on Nex Playground are roughly similar to PS3. But we can create great games on PS3. The graphics are not bad. It's 10x the Wii. It's not that it hasn't improved [over Wii], it's definitely improved. And it allows us to create immersive games."
Der findes masser af spil, ofte baseret på populære mærker som Bluey, Care Bears, Peppa Pig og Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, samt fitnessspil som NHL Puck Rush og Zumba Fitness Party. Men der er også en abonnementsmodel, som Nex ser som en nødvendighed for, at konsollen kan få succes:
"Nintendo expanded the audience with Wii. When you expand the audience, and they want different things, and they only buy Wii Fit, Wii Sports and not many others... that's a bit of a problem. Who am I to speak for Nintendo? Nintendo obviously has a really great strategy on how they want to serve the audience. But, from our perspective, we want to build something sustainable. And if we build a platform and people come in and buy a couple of games and that's it...the whole system is not sustainable. It's just not. It's very important that we set ourselves up to serve our customer continuously with new innovations, that is how the whole system can sustain."
Nex Playground er i øjeblikket kun tilgængelig i USA, og der er alene i år solgt over 600.000 enheder. Den vil også blive lanceret i andre dele af verden i fremtiden, så det virker sandsynligt, at vi vil høre mere om Nex Playground i 2026.
