Pachter: Project Natal will cost $50, 'Sphere' no more than $100 [update]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SffMdXoBHy8

do you know what a Wii is? how would this possibly compete with the DS?

The coffee is free?

joke
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kojo's head

@kojo87: Oh, I forgot most people wouldn't get jokes, forgot the html tag.

/sarcasm

Jokes are usually funny.

it was funny after kojo commented. haha...

wow. i never pick up sarcasm is text form. it actually cost me a relationship once. true story

i hate this douche he thinks he knows it all...all his prediction are stupid and never come true

That's a pretty clever joke. My clever joke was going to be more about Pachter along the lines of, 'Come on how Pachter. You've been working in the industry how long? You've saw the wireless N adaptor price? the hard drive prices? and you expect a glorified web-camera + software to be only $50.00? A good web-camera alone is nearly $50.00 so this should be ..x6-8 the retail price for the pc equivilent. Yes, around $300.00-$400.00, minimum.

So Pachter and a Green Bay Packer walk into a bar. I don't know the rest of the joke but I'm pretty sure it involves fudge.

Patcher is a Grade A Certified Dumbass. If Sony prices the globe thing or whatever its called at over 100 bucks it better be compatible with Demon's Souls or Im not buying haha.

Fudge Patcher?

@I Al2x I :
I think he mean that sony is trying to compete by using an similar approach (the Sphere is similar to the Wiimote) and microsoft attempt is something different.

Of course sony and microsoft are trying to compete with nintendo for the motion control...but sony solution is just another wiimote in the eyes of the general consumer.

Pachter should just quit his job and become a palm reader. After all he's a failure to games.

That's not a HTML tag. you didn't put the opening tag and forgot the closing brackets on the

@ TypeF , you have got to be kidding me this guy knows his shit you can be all be jealous but he's *always* right.

so yall think natall will be more then 50 whell is the ps eye more then 50 no so y would natal be more its the same thing as the ps eye so its nothing enovative as for the sphear or wand is i like to call it if you have a ps eye alredy it wont cost more then 50 60 cus thats how much a controler cost and if you dont have a ps eye it will cost 90 to 100 cus you will need a ps eye and a wand and if thy bundle them with eye pet it will cost about 140 to 150 cus it will have a ps eye a wand and a game so in conclushon natal is a ps eye and nothing more and the wand is sonys anser to the wii

Remember it's Microsoft you are talking about! They want everything that is in your pocket. The cost of Natal maybe $50 but MS will charge you double for it and they will introduce platinum live to make you pay extra to use natal online. Probably natal will kill of 50% of sold 360's due to a bug or something.

@Sebastien,

Oh to be young and a fanboy... I envy you, young lad.

Natal

Oh my, I seriously doubt Natal is going to go for $50. I'm sure it will be cheaper than Sony's option, but $50? Have we seen the price of Xbox accessories recently? It'll be at least $100.

yea that would be the cheapest accessory for the 360 ever.

which is why its freakin' impossible. I refuse to acknowledge a price point for Natal that's less than a damn 360 hard drive.

Very true, no way that it's going to be $50. Just not happening. And for Sony's sake, I hope that "Sphere" isn't $100, don't think they'll move much at that price.

tl;dr - Could be true, i guess?

yeah i could definitely see it costing them under $100 to manufacture one, but they've overcharged a lot for every other accessory, and i'm not convinced this one will be different. i know most consumers aren't as knowledgeable as the average joystiqer, but i think most consumers would compare it to the price of the wifi adapter and go "what?"

@Swagman
Wow long post man..... where do I begin. Ok your first comment actually supports a Higher price point... the fault is in looking only at production costs. When Pricing Microsoft needs to also take into account operating costs. When You look at total cost for Natal the $50 price point really begins to make less and less sence.
1. They had to Purchase 3DV
2. They had to spend money to develop the product
3. They have Marketing cost
4.They may have even stopped the product from Launching to further develop the product holding off revenue that would make them need to support a division of their company (3DV) that was not profitable
5. added on to this you have the logistics costs of manufacturing which normally don't get baked into manufacturing costs.
Even if it cost them $50 to build they would still loose millions on marketing alone. I don't see this happening unless they bundle that I could see although I see them packaging this in with the Elite bundle so that they can better compete with the PS3 as opposed to dropping the elite price again.

By the way I love how you kept comparing the 360 Arcade price to the PS3 ahhhh way to show a bias. The Arcade will stay at Wii pricing to compete with that and the Elite will stay around the PS3's pricing to compete with that...(although it should be cheaper due to WiFi not bias I'm just pissed that I have to use my Laptop to get wireless on my 360).

Microsoft is a Business they'll price Natal at the HIGHEST price that the demand will support. This is Economics 101 and the reason why microsoft will also Hipe Natal as much as possible so that they can raise the price and people will still buy it. As someone else pointed out Microsoft has already said this to some extent. They said that the pricing would start at a higher point giving them room to drop over time.... a $50 price point doesn't really give them room to drop. Also I think Prachter isn't giving us enough info here because I could see Sphere at $100 if it was bundled to be 1 Playstation Eye and 2 sphere's That would make perfect sence considering PSEye is at $40 now and $30 per sphere. but if he means $100 per Sphere there is NO way that is a rediculous price point and I don't think Sony is that stupid. They priced themselves out of the market once but that was due to the Tech that they were providing they wouldn't just do it for fun.

I wonder if I'm the only one who didn't take the time to read Swagman's post or Victoryismine's reply...

I'll go back and read them after I move my schedule around ;)

People have really short memories, it wasn't but 9 days ago Microsoft themselves said: http://www.joystiq.com/2009/10/07/project-natal-price-to-launch-with-room-to-drop/

It's hard to drop the price from $50 in any meaningful way on any peripheral. I think Pachter forgot a 1 on that price, or even a 2.

Man I must say he has to be smoking some potent stuff this go-round. I'm really interested in natal but I can't see it being 50 bucks.

i gotta agree with Victoryismine on this one. sure i haven't seen schematics and stuff for the Playstation Motion Control but from what i can understand from watching the videos and stuff, it pretty much uses existing tech. it seems to me to be essentially a PS3 controller in a Wii like form factor (with a better accelerometer) with a sphere shaped light on top to make it more visible to the camera. this thing uses the regular PSEye, which has been out for a couple years now. maybe if the bundle the camera it could get more pricey, but as is, i'm just not seeing $100 worth of tech in there, especially since we're talking about existing products that have just been enhanced and repurposed.

now Natal is essentially a camera too and since the rumor is that PSEye (going off that old tech video) is capable of similar stuff now, i feel like his Natal price would be pretty accurate. only thing that makes me shakey on that is that MS has made public their "wiggle room" strategy for the pricing.

i feel like these products will both be priced competitively with each other. and for him to say that MS isn't going after the Wii too is crazy. Nintendo found black gold with their demographic bending Wii and MS and Sony are both salivating to get a piece of that action.

since their little wireless internet adapter is $80 I see no way they will sell their hot new wii competitor for only $50 geeez

@Monica:
The Wireless-G is $80 whereas the Wireless-N is $100.

gaming blog comments: more insightful than game analysts since forever.

Uhm, I am sorry... but when the fuck is natal coming out??? oh yeah, thats right no1 knows... and we're talking about price??? why? oh yeah cuz fuck shit head pachter?


meh....

I don't remember where, but I swear I just read an article last week that said MS was hinting at a pretty high price for Natal. Like, somewhere in the range of the cost of the 360. Am I nuts? Did I completely misinterpret what I read? Or is Pachter really just THAT misinformed and full of shit? Anyone have some clarification (on what I read, I already know Pachter's full of shit)?

@swagman: you're nuts.
No way you can suggest that MS is making money on the 360 without a LOT of creative accounting. The refurbish program they have in place will not allow for a profit. It's just moved to a different balance sheet. With a 30+% failure rate it's simply not possible. Don't buy into the hype, like you are.

@Zampano
Please read the comments this has been mentioned and even linked to by Burns11

@warlock7
Wow well put I hadn't even thought of that will all of the operating costs for Customer service MS may not actually be making a profit on this console if it weren't for Xbox live....(I'm thinkin that's REALLY why they charge for Live they have to support the cost of their Customer Support and repairs somehow)

How about everyone's favorite video game moron?

Soothsayer.

The price is a guestiamte, same as the $50 for Natal.
Neither company has outed a price for their motion set ups.
Though to think Natal will be that cheap you have to thin its April 1st.

If your referring to the PS3, I really don't think the pricing was harsh, considering how they were selling it for less than the manufacturing cost. However it was definitely pushing what is an acceptable price for a console.

Kinda reminds me of Chris Tucker in 5th Element...