At Gamescom, Sony announced that the PS4 would launch on November 15 in North America. We were hoping for a similar announcement from Microsoft at Gamescom, but nothing came. Instead, Microsoft chose today as the time to unravel the final Xbox One mystery.

Microsoft announced today that the Xbox One will launch in North America and 12 other markets on November 22. That’s one week after the PS4 launch, and one week before Black Friday. That gives retailers a week to move units before any new system launch is drowned out by people picking up PS3s and Xbox 360s on the cheap during Black Friday sales.

Here’s a short video of Microsoft’s Yusuf Mehdi discussing what the Xbox team is doing as it prepares for launch:

The launch date isn’t the only thing Microsoft announced today regarding its new console. The company also announced that it was able to squeeze a little more power out of the CPU. It’s now clocked at 1.75GHz instead of the original speed of 1.6GHz. Coupled with the minimal increase in GPU speed from last month, the Xbox One is just a little bit better today than it was at E3.

Late last month, Microsoft announced that the Xbox One would launch with 23 games. That doesn’t seem to have changed since then so games like Crimson Dragon, Dead Rising 3 and Ryse: Son of Rome should all be available at launch.

So, are you on the Xbox One bandwagon now? You could pre-order one, but that’s currently impossible as the console is sold out at retailers across the nation. Microsoft says their working to make a few more Day One Edition consoles available for pre-order this week, but retailers are still saying they’re sold out. If you’re that adamant about getting an Xbox One this year, you’ll want to check in with your favorite retailers to find out when new stock is coming in.

[Image: Xbox Wire]