Major Nelson Unveils Secret, Employee-Only Xbox 360 “Launch Team ’05” Edition

Microsoft’s second gaming console ever launched, the Xbox 360, celebrates its 20th birthday this month. Larry “Major Nelson” Hryb took this as an opportunity to show for the first time the exclusive “launch console” that the members of the Xbox team received back then.

Xbox team received launch edition as a gift

The Xbox 360 was first released on November 22, 2005. The device began an era in which Microsoft achieved some relevance in the game console market, especially in the USA. The Xbox 360 was also special for Larry Hryb, who worked as “Major Nelson” for Microsoft’s Xbox division for many years as Director of Programming Xbox Live.

In a post at X/Twitter he has now published images of a “Launch Team ’05” variant of the Xbox 360 for the first time. This is a special edition of the Xbox 360 with a special front cover and the respective employee’s name, which was distributed to the members of the Xbox team on the occasion of the market launch.

Some concept graphics can be seen on the front, which probably show the design process for the Xbox 360’s appearance. You can also read “I Made This” on the cover for the front ports. The typical Xbox neon green color is used on the housing of the hard drive dock at the top of the second generation Xbox, which is usually operated upright. The silver-colored insert on it is also labeled with the name of the respective team member.

For him, it was a special time before November 2005 when the Xbox 360 was built, delivered and ultimately presented. “It was one of the most magical professional moments of my career,” Hryb said in his post.

The former Microsoft employee also claimed that he had never turned on his “Launch Team ’05” console. Maybe the latter was better that way, because the Xbox 360 became known for its “Red Ring Of Death” (RROD), which was able to paralyze the first edition of the Microsoft console, which was launched at a price of at least 299 euros, due to overheating due to design errors.