Game consoles are irrelevant from point of view of gaining/retaining big chunk of consumer market. There is a reason why Apple avoided this market (instead of focussing on music, then phone and of course tablet), while Microsoft was busy competing with Sonys and Ninentendos in early formative years of Xbox. In less than five years, this whole game console thing will be a feature in TV/tablet etc.
Stupid, Stupid xBox
121–130 of 185 posts
Re: Stupid, Stupid xBox
#122Re: Stupid, Stupid xBox
#123"how it is crushing its original console competitors" Previous gen: > Xbox sales: 24 million > PS2 sales: 153 million Current gen: > Xbox 360 sales: 76 million > Wii sales: 100 million > PS3 sales: 70 million (all data from each console's respective Wikipedia) How is it "crushing" its competitors? Otherwise, I bought an XBox360 recently to get the Kinect for openFrameworks hacking and played a little bit with the con…
*77 million for the PS3
Re: Stupid, Stupid xBox
#124I see a couple comments here, including the highest voted top level comment, questioning how the xbox can be "crushing" their competition given that a straightforward reading of console sales indicates things aren't so cut and dried. However, the xbox is crushing its competition, in several ways, and let me explain why a naive reading of unit sales is misleading. Many consoles sell at a loss, especially initially, or…
Totally anecdotally, as cliche as it sounds I feel like what my parents (and other people who don't care about games) mistakingly call video games is a good indication of the current market.
When I was a kid, every video game was "Nintendo"
During the PSX/PS2 era, every video game was "Playstation"
Now, every video game is "xbox"
(Also a PSP is a "DS")
I imagine they pick up the words unconsciously over time from TV/news/papers/passing conversation, which could be a pretty good indication of where the brands stand next to each other.
Re: Stupid, Stupid xBox
#125Having recently fired it up again the xbox experience (outside of xbla) remains decidedly old school:
- You still need the correct dvd inserted to play.
- You can't turn the xbox off and expect it to save your progress.
- Some games are tightly integrated with xbox live, good luck not paying for it.
- It takes forever between the xbox boot time, initial game load time, copyright notices, in game menus, and save game load time to actually start enjoying a game.
- Installing games to the hard drive for a slight load time bump is very, very slow.
Since picking one up I've been really spoiled by the ipad mini. Just pick it up and play, don't sweat the details.
Re: Stupid, Stupid xBox
#126Re: Stupid, Stupid xBox
#127I have heard people still there arguing that the transition of the brand from hardcore gamers to casual users and tv-uses was an intentional and crafted success. It was not. It was an accident
Oh common man, YES it was intentional. MS worked its ass off on transitioning to casual users. Changing the ENTIRE UI, the addition of Avatars (MS's version of Nintendo's Miis), the advertising and marketing.
Re: Stupid, Stupid xBox
#128The console industry used to sell high-end wedding cakes. Now they sell wedding cakes, some sheet cakes, and occasionally a pre-boxed slice if there are leftovers. These are your only options for snacking in the living room. You order a wedding cake, go pick it up in a few days, and hope it tastes good.
They are about to find out what happens when piping hot cookies are hand-delivered in 30 seconds or less to the living room, for free.
The only thing Microsoft, Sony, and Nintendo have going for them right now is that the iPhone and iPad are drawing away virtually all of Apple's not-inconsiderable attention.
Here's how it will work: Apple will release a $99 controller. It'll look like a SNES controller mated with an iPhone 3GS: 4" standard-resolution multitouch screen, D-pad, four buttons, two shoulder buttons, and a Lightning port. (Inside is NOBODY CARES. gyro, bluetooth, Wifi, iOS SOC, battery.) And, naturally, it will be the least embarrassing looking item in your living room.
You'll take it out of the box, type in your Wifi password, log in to iCloud, and THAT IS IT.
The Apple TV (of which there are millions already installed) leaps into action. All the plumbing is silently set up, the App Store icon appears, a free showpiece game immediately offers to install itself, and Apple connects a half billion users to the television overnight.
Most of the Wii U's best controller ideas are co-opted, the overall controller complexity is a scant third of anyone else's, it retains all the power of touch controls, it requires no complicated setup whatsoever, all the game state is cloud-backed, dozens of touch-resistant game genres suddenly find a home in the lowest-walled garden of any shipping console, customers can add more controllers if desired, and the whole panoply of mobile software can infiltrate the last screen standing.
The Apple TV is a freaking trojan horse, if Apple wants it to be. Nobody else has the UX to stave them off, or the ability to hit the price points Apple can, or their sheer distribution power, or their sheer brand power, or anything.
Free cookies. Not nut-and-raisin filled wedding cakes. Which one is your kid going to reach for?
Re: Stupid, Stupid xBox
#129I see a couple comments here, including the highest voted top level comment, questioning how the xbox can be "crushing" their competition given that a straightforward reading of console sales indicates things aren't so cut and dried. However, the xbox is crushing its competition, in several ways, and let me explain why a naive reading of unit sales is misleading. Many consoles sell at a loss, especially initially, or…
I am just curious - where are you getting the console costs from? From what I know this information is highly sensitive and even most insiders don't have an access.
Also, what scale do you use to compare costs? From the fact that you call Kinect (sold ~18M [1]) "one of the most popular consumer electronic devices in history" and Move (sold ~15M[2]) "has not taken off" it appears that either you are using some kind of highly non-linear measure or are better informed than almost everybody else.
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kinect#cite_note-18-million-1
[2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PS3_Move#cite_note-15_million-4
Re: Stupid, Stupid xBox
#130This is a very revealing article: - It gives official confirmation of the (somewhat obvious) idea that the XBox was a defensive move against general living-room entertainment boxes. - It shows that he has a very distorted view of the gaming landscape, if the truly thinks that the XBox is the dominant platform, or that mobile games are a genuine threat to console gaming (they most certainly are not). - He singles out…
Apple wasn't at all interested in cell phones either, in case you don't remember.
Ask Blackberry how far not worrying about Apple got them.