Analyzing the console subsidization strategy

Sony fanboys, please refrain from using MS with the dollar sign as in M$. It makes you look like a fool and nobody will take your opinion seriously because you are anti-MS right from the beginning. Write intelligently so that people actually care what you say. Trust me on that.

BTW, "M$" is so 2000!

I'm anti-Sony (pro everything else), but i wouldn't write $ony or P$3.

I disagree with the 10 year cycle. I think Sony has been riding a wave of long cycles, that I don't believe will last forever. I know right now it's hard to imagine, but it's possible for Sony to someday be eclipsed in technology if they wait too long to introduce a replacement console. Now with the PS3, they've invested so much money and technology into the product, I can't imagine them NOT wanting to wait 10 years until the PS4 is released. In the past it was a matter of wanting to extract as much revenue from the product. Now it's a matter of have to.

Microsoft on the otherhand, made some bad decicions with the original Xbox, which I believe left them with no other choice to end the original cycle. It's not a matter of becoming profitable. The way the Xbox is manufacturered and how components are supplied (which are NOT owned by Microsoft), I don't believe the original model can ever be profitable.

Enter the next generation. They learned from mistakes made the first time around. Hello? Microsoft is built on a history of not being profitable until the 3rd of later version of products. It took Windows 10 years to achieve profitability. Microsoft, despide what people want to believe, is not a short term player in anything they do. But anyway, now they own the components. They're receiving additional licensing fees for accessories. And they have an online system that generates revenue.

I can't imagine Microsoft not achieving profitably on the 360. It won't happen in the first two years, I guarantee you, but it'll happen over the life of the console.

i appologize in advance if someone already said this, but lets not all forget so quickly where companies that lose money on a cocsole at launch make up for it, the software, the xbox just plain old didnt sell as many games. you know those 3 cent disks that microsoft sells for 50$? every person i know dosent have an xbox, but a "super xbox" with a full 20 or 30 gigs of downloaded games. the fact that you cant do this on the 360 YET could be one of the reasons that they will pull a larger profit. mattel dosent release its barbie sales figures because there a little or no investors wondering " hmm should i support the barbie doll, or the bratz doll?" whereas in the videogame industry showing strong sales figure puts your investors, at ease and makes them not feel so uneasy about supporting you through your losses, somthing microsoft dosent have to worry about.

o yeah wii=penis lol haha im so clever

The funny thing is that we have had this argument before (except for the Wii part) ...

...back then it was the overpriced, bleeding edge PS2 launching an entire year (+++) behind the almighty Dreamcast ... which some people argued was rushed to market and was crippled by not having a next gen. optical drive..which, WHICH by the way sold more units before the launch of the PS2 than 360 has sold before PS3 ..hmmm . yea . PS3 has no freakin chance right?

Back to WiiCube .. you can look up the CPU/GPU references yourself (whoever asked for them)...

>The only way nintendo is able to make money off Wii is simply because it is a repackaged gamecube. Its ridiculously cheap to manufacteur at this point.<

It's funny: no matter how many times people point out that it's not, you guys just stick your fingers in your ears and sing "Yankee Doodle Dandy".

Metaphorically speaking.

>25. Mull, as i said, dont take my word for it. Shiggy himself has come out and said that Wii is bascially a gamecube. While you're googling that; also google the Wii CPU and GPUs .. they're the same thing as the GC.<

And then there's the context of the statement, which you ignored completely. Miyamoto-and I challenge you to find any other execs who said the Wii was basically a Cube-was referring to the software base. Not the hardware. You also ignored another translation, where it came out as "based on". But, nope, ambiguity is the fanit's ally. Pay no mind to that pesky "logic".

The Wii is not a repackaged Cube. New chip, new controller, new components, new wind, new buzz, new attitude. The only thing reused is the Cube's software architechture, accoring to Miyamoto. M-I-Y-A-M-O-T-O. Got it memorized?

"Total losses to date on the 360 are FAR more than $1.26B, but M$ tries to obfuscate this number whenever possible. Personally, I think it's more informative to add the $4+B lost by the original Xbox"

This makes little sense. Microsoft is carrying NO debt right now on their balance sheet. So why would you add debt lost by another product over the lifetime of that product to a new product that didn't incur the debt? How long do you hold onto this number? Forever?

But if you want to talk about FINANCIALS, let's do it then

Microsoft lost 4B on the Xbox. Now they released a new product, which is known as Xbox 360. They're debt free, have over 30 billion in cash, and the company is worth 244 billion.

Sony is 9 billion debt, but highly successful with the PS2 and is about to release the PS3. They have 3 billion in cash and they're worth about 43 billion.

Oboy here we go, here we go...ZOMG, PSthree iz gonna pwn all!!!!! LOL @ douche MS fanboy b1TCheS!!1


First of all for anyone that says financials has no bearing on the gamers, they have no clue. Example:

Sega

Dreamcast

Awesome Console

Failed

Why?

Because Sega was broke.

Why?

Terrible Financials

Get a clue. If companies are losing money hand over fist, there's a good chance at some point they are going to pull out of the business or restructure in some way that may not be good for the gamer.

Can you say Clover Studios? What happened to them? Cost saving move spelled doom for the team.

@nick

Agreed! I believe MS will turn a profit at some point in the later lifespan of the 360. The original xbox had to be discontinued looking from a business standpoint. As a gamer....that sucked ass. A current gen console that ran Doom 3 and Republic Commando beautifully. Imagine what xbox could do if given another year or two.

@ Lekko

Good point but cutting edge technology has never been a winner in the console market. "Future Proof" has yet to be a feature that the masses are openly willingly to support. If that were the case Xbox would have crushed everything else in the sales figures. Joe America isn't going to pay for future proof, because joe america is broke. I see your point though but the old model of "loss on hardware profit on software" is getting VERY risky in the next gen. Subsidy is a cool counter measure it might not be enough. Software drives hardware sales not the other way around. A better balance between cost and technology has to be found.

I'm going to have to smack on Blake here for his phrasing in this article.

" its $1.26B in losses on the Xbox 360" < - Incorrect quote. Original article - > "home and entertainment division... lost $1.26 billion"

Now - this points out a glaring error in the original article, which makes the whole thing suspect to me. As of five months ago, Microsoft no longer HAS a home and entertainment division. Microsoft did some internal reshuffling and it's now called Entertainment / Devices division.

To some of you that may sound like a quibble - but you're not the ones who had to get a new name badge, change all of your paperwork, etc. What this also means is that someone didn't do his homework.

The other problem is, of course, that the E/D division is NOT just the Xbox 360 console. And by the way, M3mnoch was VERY close in his figures earlier - just a bit high. It was announced internally that the console production itself was profitable at the end of August.

My whole issue with the way Blake and NextGen are phrasing things is that they are lumping the whole division - which includes ALL devices, whether it's the new Life Cams for the PC, keyboards, mice, and - oh, yeah, that little product coming out in November named Zune - under the Xbox 360 label. And then you've also got development costs for the HD-DVD player, wireless racing wheel, wireless headset - you know, all of those accessories that help make the gaming system better to play.

Also, Microsoft has doubled their presence at retail each year since the launch of the original Xbox. Think about that for a second - other than your operating system and some PC games, had the average consumer really paid much attention to Microsoft prior to the launch of the Xbox? But in those intervening years, you've had even MORE PC's come into homes - you've got a choice WITH the Microsoft name on it for your gaming console, and now you're going to have a choice WITH the Microsoft name on it for your music.

If the division continues - and posts $10 billion in sales at retail FOR THE ENTIRE DIVISION (not just the Xbox 360) for calendar year 2007 with a loss of $1 billion for the whole year - that's a WIN for Microsoft. That will again double their presence at retail, which is the whole point of the exercise.

Good grief...

#49 - A 10 year cycle doesn't mean that the PS4 won't come out until 2016, Dumas. It means the PS3 will probably still be relevant in the marketplace with games supporting it in 10 years, like the PS2 will continue to exist alongside the PS3 for those that wish to continue using it. The contrast with the Xbox couldn't be more clear, to all but the most biased observers.

#54 - Play with numbers all you want - when they serve your purpose. If you wanna throw the entire Microsoft empire into the equation, go for it. No one will deny that the company as a whole makes money. But surely even with their deep pockets, their management and investors are eventually going to demand that the business break even at the very least, hence the relevance of the cumulative losses for both the Xbox and the 360. But the handwriting is on the wall with the 360: it MUST survive in the marketplace long enough to start reversing losses. This was the point of the original post.

It's hard to imagine how M$ could again short-cycle the console in order to compete, and incur yet another round of development and losses. But hey, maybe they've got a lot more rabid fans out there than it seems, who are willing to pay for just that.

Everyone is wrong, the Xbox saw black back in February:

http://www.mobygames.com/game/xbox/black

BMWM3P

"Xbox will never see black."

I just want to know one thing did Sony kidnap and brainwash you or were you just hit on the head one too many times. I have paid attention to your posts and all you have to say is "your just a ms bitch" and then go on a rant with no freaking logic to backup your claims, in the end all you do is talk out of your ass. You may not like it but MS is on the right track to becoming profitable. And with Sony having trouble producing the PS3 and the wii appealing to mostly kids MS will have a great sales this holiday season. After all it will have great games and will be easily available to anyone.

ha! awesome! lt made a joke! i don't think i've ever seen you bust out like that. i literally laughed out loud when i read that.

dude. you rule.

m3mnoch.

I dunno why people say that Nintendo lost last generation. Yeah,they came in a close third place in terms of market penetration, but they also came out profitable (unlike Microsoft). The DS is also kicking ass sales-wise, and for the past few years they've been making more profit in the handheld division than the console division. Financially, they beat Microsoft...hard.

@LaughingTarget

Awesome joke...

Anyway whenever I hear about a company future proofing their product, it just means to me that spent way too much in R&D

Wow. Good Thread.

Optimus Prime, you got absolutely owned and you didn't even realize it......hilarious.

"Dont take my word for it, even Nintendo execs have come out to say that Wii is basically a gamecube."

i havent seen that ANYWHERE. i have on the other hand read that it is a SUPER CHARGED gamecube, or something like that. and seeing as the gamecube had better graphical capabilities than the ps2, thats pretty good.

and the graphics STILL look pretty solid. seen any call of duty 3 screens?

"48. Sony fanboys, please refrain from using MS with the dollar sign as in M$. It makes you look like a fool and nobody will take your opinion seriously because you are anti-MS right from the beginning. Write intelligently so that people actually care what you say. Trust me on that.

BTW, "M$" is so 2000!

I'm anti-Sony (pro everything else), but i wouldn't write $ony or P$3."

agreed, though the ps1 and 2 were pretty good systems, i have gained a hte for sony. from the lack of good multiplayer, forcing us to buy an adapter if we want 4 people on the same screen, then you have their SOE, their online computer games such as everquest where they release a freaking expansion like ever 6 months. i view sony as a money sucking bitch just as much, if not more than microsoft, so its really stupid to put the $ in there.

Man, I've never seen so many flawed and incorrect logic in comments before.

Anyways, I'm not going to go in-depth with finances here, but it's pretty logical. Just because Microsoft is rich and can easily take the losses from the XBox doesn't mean it can ignore it. The XBox division has lost over $4 billion dollars since the original XBox was released. That's a lot of money. That's also a lot of money that's not going to investors. And that makes investors unhappy. Not to mention management. Sure, Microsoft can last longer in the game industry with losses than Sega or Atari, but they'll pull out if they can't make any profit in continuing generations. It's just not smart to keep remain in a business if the only thing you can do is incur losses.

I have to chime in quickly. #56 tried to explain that MS is not worried about the losses on the Xbox. And lost in the first 50 comments, someone explained XNA to you guys. Even if 360 is not profitable as a console, it is making MS money. Ok, lets play the what if game... when PS3 comes out, lets say in it's first year, it sells 10 million consoles (lol... sorry, i had to laugh out loud at that cause they may not be able to produce that many :p), then there is the xbox 360, which noone else buys after the 10 millionth unit. Ok, I am a game developer, and I want to create a game for some console... I look at PS3... 10 million units in homes and more coming soon. If 10% buy my game, I sell 1 million units. Nice. Ok, look at 360. 10 million units. But wait... My game will port directly over to Vista/XP PCs at almost no additional cost? How many homes have PCs? Holy crap! What was that? Reduced license fee (aka increased profits) per unit sold if I make it exclusive? You got it!

This is how XNA is making MS money. Even if they took a much larger loss on hardware, they will get it back on software. And doesn't XBL have like 50% of console owners subscribed? That is a lot of money, even without the microtransations. I wouldn't be surprised if they are in the black already.

Where the Digg commenter isn't simply wrong he contradicts himself.

1) There is no huge advantage to in-house production. Many very profitable products come out of factories operating under contract to the company under whose brand the product will be sold. It doesn't matter if a production engineer's paycheck shows a Microsoft or Flextronics logo. That person is equally motivated to deliver improvements in production efficiency and other areas. The issuer of his bonus check matters far less than the potential to earn that bonus.

If an engineer employed by my production contractor has a clever idea that knocks 45 cents off each produced unit and I intend to sell millions more of that item, well, you can bet he is going to be rewarded and encouraged to keep it up. Dropping a $10K bonus on that guy is huge for him but a tiny portion of the long term benefits of the change.

The contractor is motivated in turn, because every cost reduction it can pass on to the contractee and either reduces the loss per unit or is passed on to consumers in the form of lower retail pricing, increases the viability of the product and the likelihood of continuing orders for more units to be produced.

The problem with the original Xbox is that Microsoft outsource the wrong areas of the product in their pursuit of a very short time to market and a hoped-for improvement to the business model. The idea turned out to be a disadvantage in practice. While using a slightly modified design from Nvidia's ongoing PC GPU design work allowed for a very short development cycle for the console, it also create a situation where Nvidia became a merchant middleman, adding a layer of cost between the chip foundry and Microsoft.

This more than anything else was the Xbox's greatest handicap. Nvidia was used to enjoying high margins for what was then a cutting edge product but the console market demands low margins and high volume. Any chip foundry understands this but Nvidia did not at the time and shot themselves in the foot. PC GPUs start out with high margins but drop off quickly and most models of an architectural generation go out of production far faster than a GPU for a game console. The margins starts low but the product remain unchanged (except for die shrinks) for several years and can reach production levels in the tens of millions.

Nvidia was just getting their first PC motherboard chipset together at that time (using most of the same IP in the XMCP) and should have understood that the XGPU and XMCP products needed to be treated more like that market than the high-end PC gaming video card market. But even if Nvidia had made that realization the problem still remained of them acting as a middleman rather than handing off the finished design to Microsoft and leaving MS to deal directly with the chip foundry.

(In fact, the Digg commenter could look to Nvidia for an array of successful products that are outsource in part or whole. Nvidia has no chip manufacturing capacity of its own.)

Which brings us to:
2) There simply was no way to fix the Xbox's cost issues. The same choices that made it possible to bring a highly refined platform to market in very little time was also the downfall of that product. Using a mainstream x86 CPU meant rapid exploitation of their massive existing codebase from their OS business, especially the kernel and DirectX APIs, but this also meant buying into a major chunk of functionality that had little to offer a game system. Neither Intel or AMD has much to gain from producing a cutdown CPU for a game console. It's just too little revenue potential for the resources used. The producers of other CPU architectures need to be more accommodating to such interests. Once the Xbox was launched, there was no getting around the use of the P-III with substantial amounts of silicon real estate for things an Xbox would never need to do. (Intel was able to cut the L2 cache to 128K to reduce the cost. Contrary to what some may believe, this did not make it a Celeron. It still used the more powerful cache addressing while P-III based Celerons used a simpler structure drawn from the P-II.)

For the most, this aspect wasn't crippling. The P-III continued well after the Xbox launch and so directly compatible chips were available in the more cost efficient .13 process node. One of those P-III versions could have been underclocked to allow for an Xbox redesign that would require no more CPU cooling than a small heat sink, thus allowing for a much small overall console package and costs.

That wa hardly worth pursuing though if Nvidia couldn't be induced to produce a die shrink of their two chips in the system. Since their immediate revenues from the Xbox were far less than they'd desired, they had no interest in assigning engineers to the die shrink. Without the reduced chip cost a die shrink would allow, along with the linked benefits in reduced cost of power and cooling components, the Xbox was never going to do enough software business to make up the difference. "Money is made towards the end of a console's lifespan" only applies if costs are under control. If Sony had been unable to reduce the PS2 chipset to its current form they would have missed out on a big chunk of the market they've achieved. If they had not been able to launch the PS2 with full confidence it would eventually cost a small fraction of its initial production, they would have had no choice but to place a break even or higher price tag on the console or not produce it at all.

Microsoft didn't cease production of the original Xbox too soon. If anything, it stuck with it far longer than some other companies would have been willing to do in the face of the losses incurred. For Microsoft the establishment of the brand in the consumer sector mitigated a great deal of the losses. The losses are also far smaller from Microsoft's perspective because they know what can be blamed on the Xbox alone and what expenditures were for other entirely separate products under the same division heading.

The vast difference its predecessor in how the Xbox 360 design was produced, especially in the partner relationship and IP ownership, make the cost control issues for the new effort a night and day difference. The Xbox 360 is poised to receive regular chipset revisions to allow cost reductions throughout the machine. It starts with less expensive chips but carries through to reduced power appetites and less demand for active cooling. Which means those components can also be reduced for lower cost. In turn the entire console can be redesigned for a smaller physical volume and greater market appeal.

The Xbox 360 should easily outlast the Xbox. The Xbox never saw a single one of its major semiconductors get a die shrink but the 360 is already underway with its first, reducing the CPU to 65nm and the GPU likely to follow. 45nm and 32nm versions are likely if the demand for a lower priced Xbox 360 is believed to be much greater than the engineering costs.

Microsoft's real blunder with the 360 was making the CPU too fast. Graphics are not the reason the system is so expensive. Compare the size of the GPU heatsink to that of the CPU. Enough said.

Microsoft's [massive] blunder with the XBox was that they are not a hardware company, and screwed up their supply contracts, also ensuring that backwards compatibility was screwed. Boy, did MS ever alienate their exising fan base, and you can't run a business by constantly seeking new customers (this might bite Nintendo, eventually). Thankfully, MS got it right this time, but they can't keep depending on rediculously overpriced accessories to make money in the long run. It's too early to tell, though. Losses are to be expected through much of next year.

In short, console subsidization is not the problem in the gaming market. Microsoft's inexperience in this market is the problem for the 360, and only seems to be a long-term problem in Japan, anyway.

@Mullinator: PCs built in 1996 and 2006 have massively different architectures. They just use the same low-level BIOS calls to start up the OS. Then, the real drivers take over and make the BIOS pretty much worthless.

PCI Express = ISA? Don't make me laugh. Legacy support is simply a priority in the PC industry, so it only seems like it's the same architecture to old OSes that will never get new drivers.

*The1: "My issue is why do people hate MS?"

Easy scapegoat. Prices asside, I think MS is doing a very good job with the 360 -- especailly with advertisement. XBox 360 commercials rule.

*John: "The Wii is not a repackaged Cube. New chip, new controller, new components, new wind, new buzz, new attitude."

Nintendo does not want people to know anything about the architecture of the Wii. Saying it is an all-new machine is as stupid as saying it is just an overclocked Gamecube. Nobody knows anything but Nintendo, and the Big N wants it to stay that way as long as possible. Not making a big deal out of tech specs is fine, but I don't respect companies that go out of their way to hide what's in the box. There be dirty secrets within.

All I know is Wii doesn't really look that much better than Gamecube, so how "new" the architecture is does not matter -- at all. It is a serious disappointment that doesn't even come close to satisfying Moore's Law, plain and simple. A controller alone does NOT justify that price.

Besides, fanboys had been speculating for a long time that sub-$200 prices were possible, maybe $170, possibly even $150. Once the $250 price had been announced, did support wane? Nope, despite the fact that the fanboys estimated the value to be far lower than the actual selling price, they loudy shouted that they would buy it anyway -- even without having tried the Wiimote! Both manufacturing costs and architecture are irrelevant (except to the people who know they would be getting ripped off).

Hey, they just completely re-designed my favorite car! It's hardly an improvement over the previous year, but it's all-new, more than twice as expensive, and has handlebars instead of a steering wheel. That means it's awesome, of course.

I'm not happy with the way the 360 and PS3 have been developed, but going in the complete opposite direction doesn't really signal an improvement. Nintendo will make a fortune on the Wii, but will it benefit the end-users, or any companies besides Nintendo? Probably not.

BTW, I'm mostly a PC gamer. I plan to buy a 360 for some exclusive games, and have never owned an XBox. I have a PS2, and I might buy a PS3 three or four years from now if the games are good. I have no interest in the Wii, and was sorely let down by Gamecube. Dreamcast rules, and was really disappointed that Dreamcast 2 never made it.

Microsoft's losses with the Xbox 360 are NOTHING compared to Sony's losses with the PS3. Sony is going to lose more money on PS3 in the first year than the original Xbox lost in 4 years. MS is waiting for Sony to go bankrupt, that is their underlying strategy. Do you really think Sony would have spent billions on the PS3 if they didnt see MS as a threat? Hell no.

I'm not sure why you are all concerned about the profits and losses of a company that can drop a few million and not even notice.

Neither will it make any difference to the xbox 360 that I have hooked up in to my TV. it works, there are games that are landing on the shelves and that's what should matter to you all as consumers. You should just worry if you've killed 53,594 zombies at the mall and let bill gates and his CEO's care about his profit loss margins. It won't stop you enjoying the delighful little box that they have given us.

" There most be something wrong with half of you that are posting on here. What do you really care how much the xbox360 division at Microsoft has lost? Is this in some way a shot at why Sony or Nintendo is better? Microsoft has more money in its "rainy day" fund than Sony and Nintendo are entirely worth. When you look at it that way, Microsoft can easily take WAY larger losses before it needs to worry about anything. Sony on the other hand, they need PS3 to be a huge hit or they're going to possibly face bankruptcy. Microsoft isn't going to back out of the console market even if they don't turn a profit on this version of the xbox (even if they said they'd pull the plug on it after this version) because their main goal is to become a major player in your family/living room. Just as they took over the PC market, they want to do the same with every other market that they can. Also, Microsoft "pulled the plug early" because they wanted to get what they saw as an advantage by being the first. I really don't think there would be as much ps2 support as there is right now if Sony released the ps3 a year ago. Just use your brains people."

First of all we are all passionate about games. You search the net and every forum you go to there are usually posts about peoples passions. Gamse Just happen to be ours.

With that being sad, Most hardcore gamers know Microsoft has really brought nothing innovative to the industry;not even one periphial. Only thing I can come up with is a beak-away cords on the first X-box. Other than that, Xbox was an easily modded pc that could be run on linux. They were selling modded X-box's in flea markets/swap meets. With so many third party games available, That had to hurt not only Microsoft but the whole industry. These games were not sold on either system cause you could rent it and rip it or share it online.
Also if it weren't for the short lived Xbox and MS forcing the 360 on us, we wouldn't be making this too soon jump to the Next Gen, Sony wouldn't be forcing a to expensive PS3 on us and Nintendo would have more than likely added the wii-mote as a gamecube periphial.
Last time I checked PS2 still has a pretty good Christmas line-up of games when you consider titles the likes of God of War and Finanl Fantasy XIII. Also, all the Wii games would just be gamecube games. All we've seen on 360 was a bunch of over-rated first person shooters and overhyped games such as Dead Rising (which actually is a good game but only when compared to all the trash on 360,it is obvious the expectations have been lowered.) As for Gears of War, we seen the same amount of hype if not more with titles like Perfect Dark Zero,and we all know how that turned out.
One more thing, The last thing us hardcore gamers want to see is Microsoft rule the gaming industry; think Windows.

I don't think Sony is in danger of going bankrupt, but if for some reason the PS3 is not as successful at the PS2, it could certainly hurt Sony. There's actually two major pushes here, the PS3 and Blu-Ray. It's a risky strategy and it's perhaps the most costly effort Sony has assumed to date. It's intriguing that Nintendo is taking the complete opposite approach.

Regarding the comment on Microsoft investors and losses in the Entertainment division. If you look at Microsoft financials, they're far healthier and have offered better returns for your investment than Sony over the last 5 years.

LaughingTarget: ROFL!

Steps up to fanboy platform:

People think M$ will be the fall of Sony?! Sony has been self-imploding all on its own. XBR, WalkMan, DiscMan, CLIE, VAIO. All well respected gadgets. Where are they today? Ego is bringing down Sony (ATRAC anyone?), not Microsoft.

On the flipside, if only 10% of PS2 owners upgrade to PS3, PS3 will still outsell 360. And PS2 games will probably still outsell 360 games for a long time. If Sony loses $3 billion doing it and Microsoft loses $1 billion doing it, is there really a winner here?

Do manufacturers even care about the games anymore or is this just a pissing contest? I think Nintendo already figured that out. They've stepped out of the match while the other two piss all over themselves. I'm not saying Nintendo is going to win -- They've alienated many fanboys with game delay after game delay (and the color-phobics).

I think Square-Enix and Rockstar will determine the winners this time. Not Sony or Microsoft or Nintendo.

It's a real shame that every post related to the 360 has the same group of stupid asses(BMWMP, AZN,etc) posting their worthless, pointless and uneducated comments. Don't you have some Sony knob polishing to do?

I think the biggest single mistake M$ made was phasing out the 'loved and faithful old black Xbox', they not only lost a revenue stream but also neglected an entry point for 360 'to be' gamers, not saying that also waved good bye to an installed base, and buried a way to compete with Nintendo Wii, a console that is going to be very popular with the casual gamer. Again, M$ is making the same mistake over and over again, not applying the golden rule of consumer business : segmentation. May be M$ needs some lessons from Apple and even from Nintendo :-)

Besides, the 'fate' that M$ is putting on Zune looks out of context, is just another defensive move, that BTW, is poorly aligned with is core business. Buying a Zune is like going to Wall-Mart and buying a 'white brand' Cola, instead of a Pepsi or a Coke, that's only justified if you are saving pennies, and believe me, that's not the case of an iPod buyer (did I say iPod or mp3 player ? I just want to see a rep showing a Zune to somebody who asked for an iPod...)