Yoshihiro Maruyama, general manager of Microsoft Japan’s Xbox division, told reporters that the Xbox 360 will launch in Japan sometime in December. Numerous unofficial reports - including a listing from MTV’s special, to some executives – has the North American release sometime in November, but this marks this first official announcement of any release timeframe for the Xbox 360.

The official Xbox 360 website still lists the products release date as “Holiday 2005″ for North America, Europe, and Japan, and “calendar year 2006″ for Asia Pacific and Latin America.

“We believe we have a chance of winning,” Maruyama commented on the next-generation console wars.

The Xbox will be the first of the next-generation consoles to hit retail shelves, followed by the Playstation 3 in early 2006, and the revolution sometime in late 2006.

Provided by Geekstreak