To the gaming community, the Microsoft Xbox console has a lot to offer and promises even more in the future. But the company has not been able to get worldwide sales, especially Japanese sales, to the levels it hoped for. Depending on whose report you read, the Sony PlayStation is outselling the Xbox at a 4 to 1 pace, and that's an optimistic ratio. The Xbox has become the number-two platform in the USA, ahead of the Nintendo GameCube, but it still has not been popular enough to become a profit center for Microsoft. All this has recently been compounded by Microsoft's decision to cancel or delay the release of its online game True Fantasy Live Online. What's wrong with this picture? Microsoft has over $56 billion in the bank and should be dominating the console market. Unfortunately, the company's overall strategies have failed and may continue to fail, leaving the Xbox in the dustbin with the last great American hope for a super game machine, the 3DO box from circa 1993. The 3DO machine was the first 32-bit console; there were great games for it and it had powerful underpinnings. Its $700 price tag was probably the main thing that killed it, but it also suffered from the same problem that the Microsoft Xbox has suffered from: high-expectation syndrome.