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The Xbox 360 was the most gamer friendly console (play your open music during games?!?) but one feature i loved was the battery packs. Your controller died? Just swap a pack - two seconds. And the packs could be rechargeable or AA so you could have a bunch of rechargeable AA for a fair price and never get bogged down waiting for anything to charge.

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Series X controllers still work this way. Takes standard-ass AA batteries, including rechargeables; or you can buy a bespoke charge pack[1] which actually supports charging while in the controller.

[1] https://www.xbox.com/en-US/accessories/batteries-chargers/pl...

I really wish more devices went this way. In devices these days the thing that will fail first, long before other components, is usually the battery. It seems disingenuous of manufacturers to claim that rechargeable batteries are good for the environment and then ship devices without user replaceable battery packs.

> I really wish more devices went this way.

It's a shame Xbox Game Studios is run so badly, because pretty much everything else about Xbox is genuinely better & more consumer-friendly than what PlayStation & Nintendo are doing. But the main thing that matters is the games, and they just don't have 'em over at Xbox. Oh well.

Hey, they're just as good for the environment as all that plastic that we can, "honestly, for sure, 100%, totally" recycle almost all of it. /s

And, if you use good quality 2500mAh rechargeable AAs, those controllers go forever between charges.

> those controllers go forever between charges.

In my experience - about a month. Less if you play more often.

Ditto for the Nintendo Wii Remotes and the Balance Board --- I still have a set of rechargeables from that setup.

I believe some 8bitdo controllers have this as well.

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