9-year-old Xbox 360 case hits The US Supreme Court

It's easy to look back fondly at the Xbox 360 as the titan of last generation's console wars. In reality, it was on par with the PS3, and had a host of launch issues. The biggest issue that we all remember was the dreaded "Red Ring of Death." Personally, I only had to have two consoles replaced because of the RRoD. But today, the Supreme Court is preparing to hear a case regarding another of the Xbox 360's mechanical issues.

While the infamous Red Ring of Death made headlines everywhere, there was another, lesser-known mechanical issue, which is at the heart of the current lawsuit. The lawsuit claims that some Xbox 360's would scratch a circle into the discs of games on its own, effectively destroying games that were put into the disc tray. If this issue was a big enough deal for a lawsuit, why is it just now being looked at by the Supreme Court?

As it turns out, the lawsuit has been going since 2007. Originally started as a class-action suit, Microsoft was able to have it dismissed in 2012. The judge ruled that there weren't enough complaints to justify a class action suit, and stated that each complaint must have its own individual suit.

It gets a bit tricky after there, because it seems that the plaintiffs actually requested to have the suit thrown out on those grounds, specifically so they could seek an appeal. That appeal is what's happening now, though the judges are first going to have to decide if they can even review the case, since the plaintiffs requested it be dismissed in the first place.

It's a complicated matter, for sure. And to this day, Microsoft claims that only 0.4% of users were affected, and only those that actually moved their consoles while a disc was inside the console. Despite already going for nearly 9 years, it could be a while before we see the end of this case.

VIA: BusinessInsider