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Microsoft's Xbox 360 - Coming Soon

Moore: "We're going to rent every 747 we can find."

The seven day countdown for the North American Xbox 360 launch just began. This will be a very demanding job for everyone involved in the project, starting from the project managers to the transport and logistics crew and even the support teams.

The primary concern is getting ready for the three launches - in Europe within a week and in Japan no later than two weeks after the US launch.

"There's a reason no-one has done this before and we are figuring that out," Xbox Marketing official Peter Moore.

"If we knew what we were getting into, we might not have done it," he admitted at a recent Xbox event in Amsterdam.

Nobody ever tried this before, and Microsoft has 2,500 employees determined to show the world that it's possible.

If they delayed the Xbox 360 launch too much, Microsoft would lose potential customers - as Sony announced its PlayStation 3 console for next year.

"We're going to ship all around the world; how we're going to do that, I don't know," said Mr. Moore.

"We're going to rent every 747 we can find."

"No matter how big the number is, we are going to sell out," said J. Allard.

"We are going to have some disappointment with retailers and consumers."

Microsoft needs to convince its own fans, as well as PlayStation fans that their upcoming Xbox 360 is worth $299 to $399. They also have to convince them their console will have games at least as interesting as the forthcoming's PlayStation 3 games.

At the recent X05 event in Amsterdam, Microsoft showed off a couple of games, including its three own creations: "Perfect Dark Zero", "Project Gotham Racing 3" and "Kameo".

"These games are not far from being done, and if they're three weeks after the launch or they're on launch day I don't think it makes a significant difference."

"Games will arrive with a thousand bugs and get into the certification process," said Mr. Moore.

"They make it or they don't. It's no big deal if a game takes another week. The consumer will get a strong line-up."