Microsoft will offer a $499 Call of Duty Xbox One bundle with 1TB of storage, but no Kinect
New Xbox One bundles include two new designs and more storage — Microsoft is preparing two new Xbox One bundles ready for the holiday season. A white Xbox One console, previously reserved …
Context & Ripple Effects
Call of Duty bundles are a recurring holiday play for Microsoft: back in September 2009 it shipped an Xbox 360 Modern Warfare 2 bundle with a 250GB drive at $400, and the 2014 edition repeats the formula with twice the storage at a higher price. What is genuinely new this time is what has been removed — Kinect, which launched in 2013 as the Xbox One's mandatory, identity-defining accessory — and the fact that the white console, previously reserved for select buyers, is reaching general retail.
The story travelled widely on the day, picked up by Engadget, IGN, The Next Web, Geek.com and others, which reflects how much weight analysts put on holiday-bundle lineups as a signal of each platform holder's pricing posture against Sony's PlayStation 4.
First-order effects
- Holiday shoppers get a new top-tier SKU: a $499 Xbox One with 1TB of storage and a white shell previously limited to select buyers, doubling the drive size of the original launch configuration.
- Kinect drops out of the flagship bundle, so the $499 outlay now buys console, controller and game rather than the sensor Microsoft originally positioned as inseparable from the platform.
Second-order effects
- With Sony undercutting on base price, Microsoft's competitive ground shifts to storage-per-dollar and bundled software, pressuring it toward finer SKU segmentation through the holiday season.
- A smaller share of new consoles shipping with Kinect erodes the sensor's installed-base argument, giving third-party studios less reason to invest in Kinect-specific features.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds, the console business consolidates around annual flagship-game bundles and storage tiers as the main merchandising levers — the same structure Microsoft used for the 2009 Modern Warfare 2 bundle — while bundled peripherals lose their guaranteed slot in the box.
- A Kinect-free default configuration points toward a future where Microsoft sells the sensor as an optional add-on, restructuring how the platform's living-room ambitions are priced and marketed.
The trend: Holiday console merchandising is converging on flagship-shooter bundles and storage-tiered SKUs, with once-mandatory peripherals like Kinect slipping out of the base package.