I've been kicking around the idea of next gen consoles and I have to say Microsoft has their work cut out for them. There are only a few ways that Microsoft even has a chance in this next round of console war(Nintendo is out for the count at this point IMO).
Xbox Live- You're kidding right? I have to pay to use anything on the console? Granted, I've been a Halo fan since the dawn of the franchise, so I'll pay that sub to get to play Halo online. The older I get, however, the more I'm seeing the absolutely pointlessness of requiring people to pay for a service that the either already pay for or can get on another device for nothing. YouTube, Netflix, Hulu Plus, and all of the apps on the 360 are inaccessible without a Gold sub. Add to that the absolutely lack of parity between PS Plus and Live Gold. Where are my free games to play for a month on a large rotating schedule? Oh they're on PS3, not 360. The "sales" they have are barely up to snuff with what PS Plus has. Mind you, I don't even own a PS3 I'm just well read in the ecosystems features.
Breaking Xbox Live into separate memberships ala PSN will go along way to ingratiate players to the XBOX, along with bringing the service up to par with Sony's offerings. To allow stagnation in this area is a death knell for the XBOX as a platform.
Games- Yeah, this is sort of a massive problem. Halo is great and all, but most people refer to Halo as COD with lasers and while that isn't a correct statement the point can still be made that in the 12 or so years of Halo, the biggest changes between Halo:CE and Halo 4 is... the um... Forge? Oh that came out in Halo 3. How about Armor abilities? Oh... also Halo 3. Ok I got one: The Mantis. There needs to be some serious innovation on the Halo front for the NextBox to be successful out of the gate. Fable as a series is dead in the water and is about as boring as eating a sandwich made from two slices of bread and sawdust. And Forza just doesn't scratch my racing itch the way the Burnout 3 and GT2 A-spec did. Gears of War is most suitable for people who don't enjoy deep game mechanics other than sticking to a wall to shoot a bunch of aliens coming out of a hole in the ground, so that's out for me. Oh and bonus points for another Xbox launch without a Halo present seeing as Halo 4 dropped in November.
Microsoft's only choice here is to release new IP and re-invigorate the fan base with some great new features in their first party offerings. Fable needs a reboot about as bad Tomb Raider did. Gears needs a new cast of characters in a world that is a bit more relatable, but since that series mantra has been "Over the Top Shark Jumping" from the word Go, I don't see any real innovation happening here. There are rumors of a new Forza, which would be great if it wasn't pushing so hard to be the Grand Turismo of Xbox and tried some more interesting things. Also there is a Zombie game apparently happening at launch that is probably the successor to State of Decay, a title that's dropping this spring/summer based around surviving the zombie apocalypse rather than just killing zombies. And then there is Halo. I don't know what 343 is doing. I like Halo 4, don't get me wrong, but it came out in November and I have little reason to play it after they nerfed the crap out of forge in terms of what you could do that isn't technically allowed. This has caused the amount of variety in forge maps to be severely reduced, especially since the removal of the Race game type, which I played a lot with friends via Rocket Hog Race which is also absent. I would love to see more diversity in the Halo universe. A cover based tactical 3rd person shooter ala Ghost Recon: Future Soldier would be right up my alley. I've grown a bit tired of being a badass space marine. I love Master Chief, but the adult side of me needs a character that develops, has weakness, and grows along their journey.
Kinect- Oh Kinect! You sure did position yourself as a shining star to guide the 360 into the stratosphere. But when you released, we realized that you weren't good for much more than cutting fruit, working out, and ordering food while standing. I was really hopeful that the Kinect could deliver on something that no other peripheral has: immersive gameplay. I long for the day where I can feel as though I am in a game's universe and observe it as I would our own. Even with a controller, such interactions could be superb, but alas we are shown that the technology was not up to part with the imaginations of developers. I feel as though Rise of Nightmares and Steel Battalion: Heavy Armor are clear indicators that the tech wasn't ready. I don't blame Microsoft; nothing they could have done would have satiated players desires because the tech was simply not there yet.
Kinect 2.0 has it's work cut out for it because it needs to make up for its younger sibling. I've seen some leaked details stating that it can track more limbs on more people and read your lips and tell if your eyes are closed or not, but numbers don't mean anything without the actual ability to back them up. Just look at the Emotion Engine for the PS2 and how well that worked out. So for the Kinect 2.0 to be a real success, it needs to deliver in all the places Kinect failed. It needs to be an adult tool as well as a child's play thing. It needs to enhance our play experience, not encroach upon it. This, for some, will boil down to immersion, where the Kinect deeply integrates the player into the game world. This could be achieved with support from the Occulus Rift and possibly the development of a pair of gloves with rumble pads to give that sense of physical feed back that tells you you're actually in that world. This is the Rise of Nightmares 2 example, if you will. Then there are those who simply want the Kinect as an accessory to use along with their controller, like a steering wheel, to enhance their controller based experience. The improved tracking could allow this to happen and the promises made with Steel Battalion: Heavy Armor could be kept.
Integration, Integration, Integration - Microsoft cannot afford to screw this up. Rumors are going around that the Windows 8 core is at the heart of this system. With this comes the tantalizing features that could come to fruition.
Remote play- Lets say I'm on my desktop and I want to play Halo. Maybe someone is watching TV and they don't want to switch off. Maybe they're even watching a movie on the console. I should be able to plop down at my desktop, boot up smart glass, and broadcast Halo to my desktop and play it with a USB 360 controller. I should also be able to do the same on my Windows Phone with a compatible controller like the MOGA.
Reverse Remote Play- Lets say that my desktop has a small monitor or there is a game on my desktop that I cant get on the 720. I should be able to broadcast the game from my PC to my 720. If it works one way, it should go both.
Full Codec Support- There have been numerous times where I cant play a file from my PC because the 360 doesn't support the file format. MS needs to make sure that people can play any file at any time, even if its not .wmv or .wma (shocking I know). This way, my PC library of DVD's I've ripped from my personal collection are synced and ready to go, regardless of what file format I chose at the time.
Windows Store- I'm hesitant to even include this, but it needs to be said. If the core of the NextBox is indeed Windows 8, the windows store is the new Live Arcade in many respects, replacing the slap dash set up the 360 currently employs.
Windows Phone/RT- I know that Smartglass is the second screen and all, but it can't reach WiiU levels of operability without more coaxing from Microsoft. There are features of the WiiU that can be implemented via Smartglass and it needs to be pushed harder by Microsoft to gain that adoption. I personally feel that having to look away from your main screen to manage inventory in a survival game is pretty damn immersive and I have considered buying a WiiU just to play ZombiU for that reason.
Talk about a rant! Those are my feelings on the NextBox. Lets hope some of this becomes a reality on the 21 or at E3. Last thing I want to see is the XBOX fail.