Xbox Scorpio is now Xbox One X—launches November 7 for $499

Xbox One Project Scorpio is no more. Introducing the £450 Xbox One X, Microsoft's stab at bringing 4K HDR visuals to console gamers with six teraflops of graphical grunt and a sleek design similar to the Xbox One S dubbed "the smallest Xbox ever." It's due for worldwide release on November 7, 2017 for $500/£450.

Xbox One X pre-orders aren't quite available yet (pending FCC accreditation), but some retailers will let you "register your interest," such as Game in the UK, or Amazon in the UK and Amazon in the US.

Microsoft chose Turn 10's Forza 7 as the first game to showcase on Xbox One X. Alongside "super high-resolution assets," Forza 7 will feature the Porsche 2018 GT2 RS supercar, a car as yet not available to buy for real. Countering criticism that few compelling games have launched on Xbox One, Microsoft promises that 22 console exclusives will launch on both the OG Xbox One and Xbox One X.

Following Forza, Microsoft debuted Metro Exodus, a sequel to 4A Games' Metro Last Light that's due for release in 2018. This was swiftly followed by a 4K demo of Assassin's Creed Origins. Hit PC shooter PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds will launch exclusively on Xbox One and Xbox One X later this year. The list of games showcased, most of which sport 4K and HDR support, is as follows:

• Forza 7 (Xbox exclusive, October 3)
• Metro Exodus (2018)
• Assassin's Creed Origins (2017)
• State of Decay
• PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds (Xbox Exclusive)
• The Darwin Project
• Minecraft (with a new 4K "Super Duper Graphics Pack" update, 2017)
• Dragonball Fighter Z (Console launch exclusive, 2018)
• Black Desert (Console launch exclusive)
• The Last Night (Console launch exclusive)
• The Artful Escape (Console launch exclusive)
• Code Vein (Console launch exclusive, 2018)
• Sea of Thieves (Xbox exclusive, 2017)
• Tacoma (Xbox exclusive, August 2)
• Super Lucky's Tale (Console launch exclusive, November 7)
• Cuphead (Xbox exclusive, September 29)
• Crackdown 3 (Xbox exclusive, November 7)
• Life is Strange Before the Storm (Episode One, August 31)
• Shadow of War (October 10)
• Ori and the Will of the Wisps (Exclusive, TBC)
• Anthem (2018)

Microsoft also featured a slew of indie games, boasting that over 500 have been released via its ID@Xbox developer scheme. Continuing its backwards compatibility program, which allows Xbox One players to play Xbox 360 games, Microsoft is bringing original Xbox games to Xbox One. That includes fan favourite Crimson Skies.

While Microsoft is primarily pitching the Xbox One X as a 4K console, those with 1080p televisions will see graphical improvements. It's not yet clear whether that's via supersampling or higher frame rates, but more details are expected during E3. Those with an existing library of games will be pleased to hear that Microsoft is providing Xbox One X patches, which introduce 4K support and improved visuals.

The likes of Gears of War 4, Forza 3, Killer Instinct, Halo Wars 2, and Minecraft will get 4K enhancements for free. Over 30 titles from third-party publishers will also offer free updates as part of an "enhanced" program. Games include FFXV, Resident Evil 7, Ghost Recon Wildlands, and Rocket League.

As revealed earlier this year, the Xbox One X features six teraflops of processing power—more than the four teraflops of Sony's PlayStation 4 Pro, which also plays 4K games. Unlike the PS4 Pro, however, the Xbox One X's extra processing power allows for a wider range of games to played in native 4K resolution, instead of via a variety of clever upscaling methods.

Powering the Xbox One X is an all-new AMD GPU, which features 40 "customised" Radeon compute units (compared to just 12 on the Xbox One and Xbox One S) clocked at an impressive 1172MHz. By contrast, the original Xbox One GPU is clocked at 853MHz, and the PS4 Pro's is clocked at 911MHz.

That's paired with 12GB of GDDR5 memory on a 384-bit bus for 326GB/s of memory bandwidth, which is again substantially higher than the 204GB/s of the Xbox One and the 218GB/s of the PS4 Pro. It's even higher than AMD's own RX 480, and Nvidia's GTX 1080.

An image of the back of the Xbox One X shows that the new console still has an HDMI input, so it will still be able to do cable-box HDMI passthrough.

	Xbox One X	Xbox One S	Xbox One	PS4 Pro	PS4
CPU	8 "custom" X86 cores @ 2.3GHz	8 Jaguar cores @ 1.75GHz	8 Jaguar cores @ 1.75GHz	8 Jaguar cores @ 2.1GHz	8 Jaguar cores @ 1.6GHz
GPU	40 "customised" compute units @ 1172MHz	12 GCN compute units @ 914MHz	12 GCN compute units @ 853MHz	36 AMD Radeon GCN compute units @ 911Mhz	18 AMD Radeon GCN compute units @ 800Mhz
Memory	12GB GDDR5	8GB DDR3/32MB ESRAM	8GB DDR3, 32MB ESRAM	8GB GDDR5 (plus 1GB DDR3)	8GB GDDR5
Memory Bandwidth	326GB/s	68GB/s, 219GB/s	68GB/s, 204GB/s	218GB/s	176GB/s
Hard Drive	1TB 2.5-inch	1TB/500GB 2.5-inch	1TB/500GB 2.5-inch	1TB 2.5-inch	500GB 2.5-inch
Optical Drive	4K UHD Blu-ray	4K UHD Blu-ray	Blu-ray	Blu-ray	Blu-ray

The Xbox One X originally debuted at Microsoft's E3 2016 press conference as Project Scorpio alongside a slimmer Xbox One called the Xbox One S. Months prior, Sony had unveiled the PS4 Pro, a 4K-capable console with four teraflops of processing power. While Sony got the jump on Microsoft with both the announcement and release date of the PS4 Pro—it launched in October of 2016—the Xbox One X is substantially more capable graphically.

Now read about how the Xbox One X and PS4 might be the beginning of the end for the PC gaming master race...

This story has been updated multiple times with more images and details.