The Xbox 360 will launch in China in 2006
by Dan Choi 
{ Sep 29th 2005 at 7:15PM }
From
TeamXbox: "Tim Chen, chief
executive of Microsoft China, revealed in an interview with Reuters that Microsoft plans to start selling the Xbox 360
in China next year (along with other [sic] eight territories) but stressed that the timing of its launch was not set in
stone."
It's nice to know that the mainland will be joining at least
Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, Hong Kong, Korea, Taiwan,
Mexico, and Colombia in welcoming the 360 with open arms (and large wallets, though nothing's "set in stone") next
year.
How long did it take Sony to release the PS2 over there? Three or four
years? This isn't too shabby considering that the closest the original Xbox got to China was its
"special administrative region," otherwise
known as Hong Kong. (Of course, we have to wonder if MS meant Hong
Kong for the 360 announcement in the first place.)
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
1337Thespian @ Dec 18th 2005 9:36PM
How will anyone in China not in the communist party be able to afford that system?
Not to mention, if you want something pirated, send it to China!
klinko @ Dec 18th 2005 9:36PM
China's policies on letting in high end electronics are stupidly strict (part of the reason the PS@ took so long) so getting any gaming system there at all is a major acomplishment.
NergiZed @ Dec 18th 2005 9:36PM
I used to live in China and I doubt anyone will have enough money for it. And yes, it will definetly be pirated, China is one of the only places in the world where you can buy 50 PS2 games for $100 bucks. Although I've never seen a GC or X-box games in China yet. I highly doubt it'll be popular.
Scott @ Dec 18th 2005 9:36PM
The problem is not necessarily can people afford it -- I live in Beijing and have tons of friends with big-screen TVs, surround-sound stereos, etc. Yes, they are only a tiny portion of the overall population, but guess what? Even 5 percent of 1.3 billion is 65 million people -- double the size of Taiwan, Hong Kong and Singapore combined. People are already buying PS2s and Xboxes imported from Japan and Hong Kong, and they are buying them with sizeable markups.
The real challenge is getting people to pay for legit software. Go to any computer market in Beijing and you can find pirated PS2 and Xbox games for about $1 each. Sony tried to launch the PS2 here but it tanked because they were asking $10-$20 per game -- cheap by U.S. standards and not necessarily unaffordable by Chinese standards, but still 10x the price people were accustomed to paying.
The only workarounds I can figure is if MSFT will require a Live hookup so it can authenticate the games. Also, I wonder if MSFT feels that pirates will have a tougher time cracking the 360 given the higher complexity of it plus the higher degree of custom hardware.