Nintendo should probably counter sue since they had patents on the N64 long before those patents existed(those patents are from 1999). The technology mentioned by those patnets were in use during the N64 days. Idiots.
I can answer that question easily enough J. Goodwin. My guess is that someone jury rigged a wii controller or similar device to test these games and probably found them to be vastly superior products with enhanced control schemes warranting a rerelease. Kind of like driving a lexus as opposed to a Hugo....
Microsoft is going to come in third this generation, that seems pretty obvious to me. The lackluster sales(a good deal less than the original xbox), no japanese market penetration, less expressive european showing, being an inferior machine technically to the PS3(in the long run it is going to show) and a strong lack of broad genre support(sports + fps aren't even the biggest selling games in the industry). And don't even get into calling me a fanboy, I have a 360. Just calling it as I see it. The big ???s now are:
a. If they'll turn profit on the 360 eventually? How are they going to do this when the manufacturing cost for the 360 is going up instead of down? Ouch.
b. If they'll widen console support for their aquired developers(like they did to the ds with age of empire and diddy kong racing)? Probably the only way to keep their in house development teams afloat over th next 4 years.
c. If there will be a third xbox console? With the 360 faring much worse than the original xbox at this juncture, one has to wonder at the future of the franchise. Microsoft would obviously make a lot more money supporting Sony and Nintendo.
d. If the live service will become free in order to compete with the free wii and ps3 free internet gaming? Live is already crawling with advertisements, there is no validation for charging for such a service. If anything, 3rd party developers have often criticized the forced live experience as too heavyhanded and the network as being too constrictive for complex online gaming. In paticular large MMO makers like Blizzard, Sigil and NCSoft have criticized the funtionality of the network.
e. Will hd-dvd be supported by anyone at all? Lets face it, noone is going to make games for a peripheral with a 60% adoption rate(which is an awesome adoption rate for an expensive gaming peripheral) when they can target a larger audience in the non hd-dvd gaming arena. And 80% of the movie companies are already behind blu-ray. The rest will follow suit.
f. How soon will they drop the price? The sooner the better for the consumer but it will bode ill for the company, the 360 has actually gone up, not down, in respects to how much they cost to make now as opposed to in last September. If they lower price, they'll be doing it to move units because of poor sales, not because the system is cheaper to make.
g. How many of the development companies they aquired as subsidiaries(most as hostile takeovers) over the last 3 years will they shut down over 2007? If they push Vista with the ironfist, I don't see Microsoft keeping open all of these developing houses that are going to be spending more money making games that will sell to even less people.
Some of this stuff I think I know the answer to. The sheer amount of money Microsoft has spent on advertising should have them doing really well at this juncture. That's how things work in politics, popularity and pretty much everything else under the sun. But it isn't and that has to be firghtening for Microsoft. Microsoft has probably spent more money on advertising alone in the past year than Nintendo and Sony will spend on their consoles todgether over the next 5 years. I'm looking for a bright side to the 360's future but I do not see it. All I know for certain is that I'll play some pretty good sports games on my 360, outside of that...the future is dim.
You think 50 bucks a year isn't too much(by the way, that is the cheapest price plan)???
Lets assume that the 360 sticks around for 5-6 years(the standard) before the next incarnation. That's 250-300 bucks.
Add that to the price of the 360 and tell me what it comes to...
The fact is that joe schmoe nongamer looking to buy a new system doesn't know he needs that hard drive or that live service when he goes out shopping for his kid's 360. But when his kid tries to go online with GRAW or play the next madden game that requires a hard drive, joe schmoe has to shell out more cash. It's a smart marketing trick to leave out features on a system to lower the price then make people pay more than the competition charges for the full package in order to upgrade. It's ethically unsound but it rakes in the dough. Heck, the great innovation of the Live service that Moore was talking about was that they took what pc users have had for free for over a decade and charged money for it. And this micro content crap that they are really pushing is gonna hurt us gamers in more ways than just the wallet. They are going to gut games of content that should be there originally in order to make more money.
Well if you want a system that is not online capable and lacks high storage media then an xbox360 is the better deal. If you do want to go online and have the high storage media, the ps3 is a better deal. In actuality, the live service alone(for your console's lifespan) will put you over the ps3 pricerange. But in order to get roughly the same experience I felt like I needed to attach hd-dvd on there anyway.
Ultimately it's going to be about the games though. And neither system seems to be doing to well in that area. Even with a year headstart, the 360 only has a handful of truely awesome games and the rest of 2006 looks like meager pickings. Most of the good 360 stuff is slated for a 2007 release. There weren't too many PS3 games to get excited about at E3 either.
Don't get me wrong, I have an xbox360, I'm just pointing out something that seems to be overlooked with the pricing. Microsoft likes the hidden costs. Gets the 360 in a lot of homes and then people realize they can't play online without paying more money. The adoption rate for the live service is very high(wasn't it ~80%+) for 360 users. How many good single player games are on the system or set to come out on the system? All I know is when I look over my 360 collection of games, I don't have a single game not designed with multiplayer in mind. Oblivion seems like the only contender and I have the superior PC version.
The stores were restocked late march witht he 1.2 million resupply. These numbers are from the whole of april with business as normal(if you don't count the 5 month overflow).
May will give us a more accurate view of the sales but I seriously doubt the handful of faboys swayed into picking up a 360 because of E3 is going to make up for 5 months of pent up demand. Maybe I'm being too pessimistic, I'd love to be suprised by ~300-400k sales for May. Logic, experience and my gut tell me that's not going to be the case and the future for my shiny 360 is looking really dim, dreamcast dim.
Normally, I'd agree that feb->may is usually a slow market but it's different when there is a demand that wasn't met. Which is what happen with the original 360 supply failing to meet demand and therefore the shortage. That means there was a consumer demand holdover, people who wanted one originally who still didn't have one. The 300k you see is comprised of regular april buyers in addition to the holdover demand from the past 5 months. Unless you want to say that Microsoft absolutely hit the saturation point with the original supply/demand stock which would probably bode worse for the console.
If this had been a product that had been on the shelf and available since launch these numbers would be ok. That's not the case though and Microsoft put a lot of money into making sure people knew that stores were restocked. There was even a billboard in my town and I saw commercials by most retailers trying to move the units.
If demand overflow can only push 300k, it's a bad thing. Furthermore, stating that it is a good momentum that will do microsoft well if kept(as per the article) is wrong because it would put them at only 40% of their goal.
In otherwords, that 300k isn't just regular april consumers. It's april +most of december+january+febuary+march. It's a bad thing the numbers are this low. I don't want them low, I want my console to succeed but this is far from success.
Microsoft only shipped 1.7 million worldwide to start with. I had the resupply number wrong in my post though. It was 1.2 million. They only moved 300k of the 1.2 mil ressupply. And that's not just april, it's april +1/2 march. Assuming that demand did not die down or increase it would put microsoft at 4 million by 2007. That's not even half of their goal. WE'll see what sales figures look like for may to see if things are gonna get better as a reult of E3 or worse as a result of the fact that 4+ months of 360 less fans just got their machines. Commonsense says the latter is the case. This is really bad news for Microsoft. There is no reason why it should be competing in sales with a machine 5+ years older than it. How many people are truely investing in new machines instead of holding out for the current gen? Microsoft had a decent showing at E3 but that's only watched by the hardcore set and most(not all but most) have already made up their minds in that respect. The demand is just not there for the 360 right now, maybe after a price launch or a more casual gamer marketing campaign. As for parents buying 360s for their kids...the 360 will have to compete with the wii and ps3 come Christmas time and that's gonna put a hurt on their goal.
Unless may moves more than twice as many units and the momentum stays at 200%+ Microsoft cannot hit their 10million mark. I have a 360 myself but I'm dismayed by these numbers. They are not good not matter how you spin it, developers are going to stop supporting it by 2007 if this is what the suits see for numbers.
That's not good and certainly not what I'd call momentum for a system with an install base of less than 2 million 6 months after release.
So Microsoft projected that they would have 10 million by November eh?. 300kX7 =2.1 million. Assuming the keep up the same pace as the resupply month....
That's not even going to put them over the 5 million mark. And I am pretty sure that things are slowing down.
Those are not good numbers, is the as good as dead?
Microsoft, Nintendo taken to court over controllers
Aug 4th 2006 1:49PM (Joystiq)Wii Wii, Prince of Persia coming to Wii
Aug 3rd 2006 10:39PM (Joystiq)DS Lite trumps Xbox 360's trade-in value in Japan [update 1]
May 23rd 2006 7:36PM (Joystiq)a. If they'll turn profit on the 360 eventually? How are they going to do this when the manufacturing cost for the 360 is going up instead of down? Ouch.
b. If they'll widen console support for their aquired developers(like they did to the ds with age of empire and diddy kong racing)? Probably the only way to keep their in house development teams afloat over th next 4 years.
c. If there will be a third xbox console? With the 360 faring much worse than the original xbox at this juncture, one has to wonder at the future of the franchise. Microsoft would obviously make a lot more money supporting Sony and Nintendo.
d. If the live service will become free in order to compete with the free wii and ps3 free internet gaming? Live is already crawling with advertisements, there is no validation for charging for such a service. If anything, 3rd party developers have often criticized the forced live experience as too heavyhanded and the network as being too constrictive for complex online gaming. In paticular large MMO makers like Blizzard, Sigil and NCSoft have criticized the funtionality of the network.
e. Will hd-dvd be supported by anyone at all? Lets face it, noone is going to make games for a peripheral with a 60% adoption rate(which is an awesome adoption rate for an expensive gaming peripheral) when they can target a larger audience in the non hd-dvd gaming arena. And 80% of the movie companies are already behind blu-ray. The rest will follow suit.
f. How soon will they drop the price? The sooner the better for the consumer but it will bode ill for the company, the 360 has actually gone up, not down, in respects to how much they cost to make now as opposed to in last September. If they lower price, they'll be doing it to move units because of poor sales, not because the system is cheaper to make.
g. How many of the development companies they aquired as subsidiaries(most as hostile takeovers) over the last 3 years will they shut down over 2007? If they push Vista with the ironfist, I don't see Microsoft keeping open all of these developing houses that are going to be spending more money making games that will sell to even less people.
Some of this stuff I think I know the answer to. The sheer amount of money Microsoft has spent on advertising should have them doing really well at this juncture. That's how things work in politics, popularity and pretty much everything else under the sun. But it isn't and that has to be firghtening for Microsoft. Microsoft has probably spent more money on advertising alone in the past year than Nintendo and Sony will spend on their consoles todgether over the next 5 years. I'm looking for a bright side to the 360's future but I do not see it. All I know for certain is that I'll play some pretty good sports games on my 360, outside of that...the future is dim.
Sony clears up some PS3 confusion
May 19th 2006 12:07PM (Joystiq)You think 50 bucks a year isn't too much(by the way, that is the cheapest price plan)???
Lets assume that the 360 sticks around for 5-6 years(the standard) before the next incarnation. That's 250-300 bucks.
Add that to the price of the 360 and tell me what it comes to...
The fact is that joe schmoe nongamer looking to buy a new system doesn't know he needs that hard drive or that live service when he goes out shopping for his kid's 360. But when his kid tries to go online with GRAW or play the next madden game that requires a hard drive, joe schmoe has to shell out more cash. It's a smart marketing trick to leave out features on a system to lower the price then make people pay more than the competition charges for the full package in order to upgrade. It's ethically unsound but it rakes in the dough. Heck, the great innovation of the Live service that Moore was talking about was that they took what pc users have had for free for over a decade and charged money for it. And this micro content crap that they are really pushing is gonna hurt us gamers in more ways than just the wallet. They are going to gut games of content that should be there originally in order to make more money.
Sony clears up some PS3 confusion
May 19th 2006 11:45AM (Joystiq)Well if you want a system that is not online capable and lacks high storage media then an xbox360 is the better deal. If you do want to go online and have the high storage media, the ps3 is a better deal. In actuality, the live service alone(for your console's lifespan) will put you over the ps3 pricerange. But in order to get roughly the same experience I felt like I needed to attach hd-dvd on there anyway.
Ultimately it's going to be about the games though. And neither system seems to be doing to well in that area. Even with a year headstart, the 360 only has a handful of truely awesome games and the rest of 2006 looks like meager pickings. Most of the good 360 stuff is slated for a 2007 release. There weren't too many PS3 games to get excited about at E3 either.
Don't get me wrong, I have an xbox360, I'm just pointing out something that seems to be overlooked with the pricing. Microsoft likes the hidden costs. Gets the 360 in a lot of homes and then people realize they can't play online without paying more money. The adoption rate for the live service is very high(wasn't it ~80%+) for 360 users. How many good single player games are on the system or set to come out on the system? All I know is when I look over my 360 collection of games, I don't have a single game not designed with multiplayer in mind. Oblivion seems like the only contender and I have the superior PC version.
Sony clears up some PS3 confusion
May 19th 2006 11:21AM (Joystiq)A lot less.
Stealth Ninja Hidden Costs will own you and your puppy.
I just hope Sony implements a decent online gaming system.
Xbox 360 is April's top selling console
May 17th 2006 1:49PM (Joystiq)The stores were restocked late march witht he 1.2 million resupply. These numbers are from the whole of april with business as normal(if you don't count the 5 month overflow).
May will give us a more accurate view of the sales but I seriously doubt the handful of faboys swayed into picking up a 360 because of E3 is going to make up for 5 months of pent up demand. Maybe I'm being too pessimistic, I'd love to be suprised by ~300-400k sales for May. Logic, experience and my gut tell me that's not going to be the case and the future for my shiny 360 is looking really dim, dreamcast dim.
Xbox 360 is April's top selling console
May 17th 2006 1:31PM (Joystiq)If this had been a product that had been on the shelf and available since launch these numbers would be ok. That's not the case though and Microsoft put a lot of money into making sure people knew that stores were restocked. There was even a billboard in my town and I saw commercials by most retailers trying to move the units.
If demand overflow can only push 300k, it's a bad thing. Furthermore, stating that it is a good momentum that will do microsoft well if kept(as per the article) is wrong because it would put them at only 40% of their goal.
In otherwords, that 300k isn't just regular april consumers. It's april +most of december+january+febuary+march. It's a bad thing the numbers are this low. I don't want them low, I want my console to succeed but this is far from success.
Xbox 360 is April's top selling console
May 17th 2006 12:56PM (Joystiq)Unless may moves more than twice as many units and the momentum stays at 200%+ Microsoft cannot hit their 10million mark. I have a 360 myself but I'm dismayed by these numbers. They are not good not matter how you spin it, developers are going to stop supporting it by 2007 if this is what the suits see for numbers.
Xbox 360 is April's top selling console
May 17th 2006 11:58AM (Joystiq)That's not good and certainly not what I'd call momentum for a system with an install base of less than 2 million 6 months after release.
So Microsoft projected that they would have 10 million by November eh?. 300kX7 =2.1 million. Assuming the keep up the same pace as the resupply month....
That's not even going to put them over the 5 million mark. And I am pretty sure that things are slowing down.
Those are not good numbers, is the as good as dead?