Most press conferences at E3 end with some kind of exciting, beautiful-looking, not-yet-released game developers can’t wait for you to experience.
Microsoft ended their joint Xbox / Bethesda showcase with a mini fridge.
In Microsoft’s defense, the gorgeously coiffed (did you see that Black woman’s hair! Finally!) Redfall was probably the announcement it intended to whet our appetites with but still, Microsoft’s parting E3 gift wasn’t Halo Infinite’s release date but a dang fridge.
The mini fridge is shaped like an Xbox Series X—so a black rectangular box, like most fridges. According to the teaser, the fridge features “Xbox velocity cooling architecture,” suggesting there might actually be console tech keeping your Monster Energy drinks cool.
Back when the Series X was revealed in 2019, fans observed that the black, rectangular, and uncomfortably holey console wouldn’t look out of place super-sized and next to a dishwasher. Microsoft would have us believe that the shape was a design feature rather than a flaw because apparently the fridge-like configuration was the most efficient way for the console to disperse heat.
Microsoft leaned into the joke in tweets and a contest that awarded one lucky(?) winner a full-size Series X-styled fridge.
So how did we get from a one-off joke to having a mini fridge close out one of the biggest video game showcases of the year?
The answer is—and believe me, it pains me to write this next phrase because it is just so asinine— Microsoft got into a Twitter brand war with Skittles.
Yes, really.
Back in April, Twitter hosted a March Madness-esque bracket pitting different brands against each other to see which company had the best, “How do you do fellow consumers?” tweets. After beating out questionably-good-at-Twitter brands like Wendy’s and Mr. Peanut, (I don’t know how you can have a Best at Twitter tournament and not include Steak-umms), the finals came down to Skittles and Xbox. Aaron Greenberg, the general manager of Xbox marketing, tweeted that if fans helped Xbox win the title bout against Skittles, he’d make the Series X fridge real (albeit smaller).
Xbox won the fake poll by a razor-thin margin and Microsoft, true to its word, put the mini fridges into production. This energy drink storage case is scheduled to hit stores just in time for Christmas, because why wouldn’t Xbox want to take advantage of a meme during the most important spending time of the year. That’s capitalism for ya baby!
