No Right Answer Greatest Console Blunder Ever

NO, the Virtual boy doesn't count, because it was a conspiracy to give people eye-cancer. That being said, which gaming console tripped over it's own two feet the hardest?

[Geekman]

The Xbox One is not a blunder. Selling weakly compared to competition is not selling badly. This is coming from someone who owns ever console but an Xbox One. It was the ANNOUNCEMENT that failed.

[jts1891]

Agreed. Honestly, people seem to forget that last gen, the Wii massively outsold both the PS3 and the Xbox 360. Yet no one considers either of them to be failures. When you compare the sales of the 360 to the X1, the X1 is actually doing better than the 360 despite MS's early screw ups.

[DeadRabbits]

Just as the monster was created by Dr Frankenstein we can not be angry with something that did not choose to exist! But it will ultimately have revenge on its creator and destroy it!

[NewMonday]

@jts1891

nope!

since April comparing timelines the XBone is doing worse than the 360

[Eonjay]

@New Monday

For April and May, the 360 sold more in those months its first year.

[Hitman0769]

LoL @DeadRabbits

What!!! I'm still trying to decipher that.

[AngelicIceDiamond]

Started as a blunder when Don Mattrick was in charge.

What do you know things look and sound better for X1 now that Phil is in charge.

[Darkstares]

It started off as a blunder though. They managed to change some things for the better and they did it quite early so it still has a chance to recoup itself with sales. The PS4 by comparison has all the momentum right now and doesn't seem to be slowing down. That is also without much in the way of big games that can only be played on the PS4. So what happens when Sony starts to release the big games next year?

The good thing is Microsoft is on there heels and that means they will have to try harder. That's a win win no matter how you look at it.

The Wii U on the other hand isn't making much revelations to change its future other than Nintendo releasing there own games to build hype. Problem is they can't do it alone and the Gamepad much like Kinect isn't exactly something gamers are clamoring over.

[LazyGoron]

Don't hate me for being the devil's advocate, but I believe success/failure is/"can be" determined by how well something does relative to a similar product.

Compared to 360 = X1 massive success

Compared to PS4 =
I could argue failure b/c:
1)how quickly they lost customers (something like 30% of PS4 owners used to have 360
2)a failure by how immediately they were so far behind and the gap grows steadily
3)Early adopters were lied to and deceived (not going to post the thousands of "never bundled without Kinect" articles)
4)Performance-wise, only a ignorant person wouldn't say the PS4 (currently) has some type of edge in this department (it's there)

There a lot of reasons why I could say it's a failure. I don't think it is in and of itself (because if there was no PS4 it WOULD BE a success), but I do think the perform and look so bad in the market/media is nothing to be proud of and nothing to consider a "win".

[jts1891]

1. The actual statistic is that 30% of PS4 owners had a 360 OR a Wii last gen. Also keep in mind that the 'study' in question was done by Sony itself.

2. Far behind? The X1 had sold around 5 million units as of April, while the PS4 was at 7 million in the same time frame. While the gap is significant, I wouldn't call it 'far behind', especially when you consider the fact that the X1 was $100 more expensive.

3. If you call altering your marketing strategy in response to feedback and criticism 'lies and deception' maybe. I don't know of anyone who didn't expect MS to drop the Kinect eventually, regardless of what they said.

4. It does. The same could be said for the 360 and the PS3, however. The PS3 was substantially stronger than the 360, and most games looked better on that console.

[rdgneoz3]

@jts1891 A little correction in what you said.

"Far behind? The X1 had sold around 5 million units as of April, while the PS4 was at 7 million in the same time frame."

With the PS4, the number was sold "through" to customers. With the xbone, it was sold "in" to retailers. Every console sitting on a store shelf counts as sold "in" for MS, which is why they said they were sold out of day 1 editions while months later there were some sitting on shelves.

http://practicalstockinvest...

As for #4, The PS3 was a lot harder for devs to work with thanks to the cell. A lot of multiplats looked better earlier on for the 360 due to being easier to work with. The ones that really showed how powerful the PS3 was tended to be first party devs like Naughty Dog.

[Bzone24]

@rdgneoz3

If Sony knows exactly how many consoles they've sold to the actual customer, why do they subscribe to NPD?

[Utalkin2me]

@Bzone24

Cause you can base off supply and demand. If you are not shipping to retailers then that means your product is sitting on shelf. If when you make a shipment and the retailers put in another order for the following week you assume they sold out. Simple logic really.

[Anon1974]

@Bzone24. Are you implying that Sony doesn't know how many units are being sold in what stores? Of course they track that information. Don't be ridiculous.

And the very question you're asking belies that you actually don't know what the NPD group does. NPD tracking store sales from samples in North America is just the tip of the iceberg, and information that manufacturers like Sony don't even need. NPD product reports break down consumer behaviors and that's more important to companies like Sony and Microsoft, not product numbers.

NPD reports cover things like consumer buying habits and trends, key factors driving purchasing, who the customer is, what channels are growing, what else is the customer buying, conversion, demographics, market size, key price points, store level media options, forecasting, economic factors affecting future performance, etc...etc.

Sony doesn't need NPD to tell it how many units are leaving their warehouses and where they're going. That's not what companies like NPD are paid tens of thousands for per report.

On topic. Of course the Xbox One has been blunder followed by blunder. It's irrelevant to the conversation that they've backtracked now. They were discussing the biggest console blunders and you can't look at the past year and disagree that Microsoft has badly mishandled the Xbox One on multiple fronts. They're making up for it, but fixing a blunder doesn't suddenly erase the initial mistakes from history.

[LazyGoron]

@jts1891

I wasn't trying to proclaim the study showing the 30% change over was the Next Gen Bible, but there definitely are a number of people who owned a 360 who now own a PS4 and don't own a X1.

I also believe the PS4 has announced sales to customers of 8.1 million. X1 only ever announced "shipped" figures. Let's take the 5 million as sold to customers, the PS4 is still out-selling the X1 by 60%. For every 1 X1 sold, 1.6 PS4's are sold. That means every time X1 sells 5 consoles, PS4 sells 8 and gets an additional 3 consoles ahead. When X1 sells 10, PS4 is now 6 (an additional 3) consoles ahead. This is significant.

I think it's smart financailly to change with the market. But I think it's dumb to not commit to an idea/strategy. It is better to fail (for a company as big as Microsoft) and see the idea into the ground than it is to negatively affect your customers (remember those 5 million the X1 has "sold"?) who bought into the idea that you abandoned. I personally do not buy Microsoft products because if they won't stand behind their products 100%, why would I?

[Bzone24]

@darkride

defensive much? How does Sony know of every single purchase? That is the question I'm getting at.

[Anon1974]

@Bzone24 said "How does Sony know of every single purchase?"

They're the ones making them and tracking what's going out their doors and what's sitting on shelves. Stores keep inventory data which is relayed back to Sony.

Companies take their Beginning on Hand numbers, factor in inventory received, take their End of Month stock, report it back to Sony and boom...you've just figured out your sell through figures. Retailers and manufacturers have been doing this for years. That data isn't usually public knowledge because really, what business is it of anyone's but the parties involved?

There's no mystery here. Ask anyone that has worked inventory for a retail chain and they'll tell you stock levels are often communicated back to manufacturers.

And I wasn't defensive. You asked a question regarding NPD. I answered it as you seemed to be confused as to what NPD reports entailed. If you didn't want an answer, why did you ask the question?

[uth11]

I wouldn't say the console itself is a blunder, but the name of the console is!

[Pogmathoin]

This should get me lots of bubbles..... Will just post this in anything where Xbox is mentioned.... I see it working for some.....
- Sells more hardware in North America
- Sells more hardware in Europe
- Sells more hardware Worldwide
- Sells more software in North America
- Sells more software in Europe
- Sells more software Worldwide
- Runs all multiplatform games better
- Has more games displaying in 1080p
- Has more stable framerates
- Has more games in development
- Has more exclusives being developed by 1st party
- More F2P
- More Indies
- More Interest
- Highest rated games in 2014
- Most games releasing in 2014

[LazyGoron]

Well it makes sense in an article that speaks unfavorably about an X1, but if you posted that in a FH2 or Sunset Overdrive article, it would be kind of... douchebag-like

[Pocker]

they never said xbox one was a blunder because it isn't selling well. They were just saying that they backed down on many features they said were required. It is a very good point that it hurt the game developers who have used kinect as a major feature in their game.

[SkullBlade169]

I think that the Atari Jaguar has to be one of the worst ones. It could hardly even compete against the 32x when it comes to graphical quality.

[Halcyon14]

The Sega Dreamcast, simply because it was so easy to pirate games on it.

[hankmoody]

The PS3 coming out at the price that it did was pretty bad. And then the arrogance behind the price reveal, where they basically said that people will get a second job to pay for it... I know they turned me off to it and a few other people.

[jts1891]

This. The PS3's release was one of the biggest blunders ever. Sony went from selling 146 million units with the PS2, to 82.5 million units with the PS3. For all the people who rag on the X1, it will probably maintain Microsoft's share of the market at the very least.

[DeadlyOreo]

I agree with the fact that Sony dropped the ball on the PS3's release.

Microsoft will certainly not maintain it's share of the market that it gained with the 360. 360 came out strong, a lot of interest and a year before the PS3 released, I believe the Xbox One will struggle to sell even half as well.

[hankmoody]

Anyone who doesn't see that as a blunder or misstep of some sort... has already given us disagrees! Woohoo!

[Why o why]

Maybe some disagree because you made false statements which tie in neatly with your, lets say, dislike or apprehension towards sony. The ps3 was dumb expensive but it had a blu ray drive built in along with mem card readers, hdmi and 5.0 wifi increasing the cost. Lets not forget the ps3 was the cheapest br player available for quite a while.

The 'two jobs' thing will never be let go by the misinformed. Instead of quoting the full statement you've used tabloid type paraphrasing. His actual statement suggested he wanted people to desire the product that much that they would want to get a second job to pay for it. Ill thought through all the same but not as stupid as some continue to project.

Although I hear what you're saying about the price, I wouldn't call it bad because we now have proof that it sold faster than the 360 since it clawed back a 8-10 million deficit from the year + headstart it gave the 360. In comparison to the ps2 it was less than great, definitely but in the grand scheme of things it was ok and from all accounts its still selling.

I believe the wii u fudged it up worse than sony did with the ps3. Now if you want to compare the success of the previous to the current, then there's your ultimate fumble.

The x1's reveal must also go down as a major c*ck up. The deception, the silence, adam orth, the policies, mandatory kinect, us only centric services, that arrogance. C'mon now. They're still trying to recover and run the risk of losing their 1 main region to their competitor. Despite that I've gotta give it to ms though....nintendo fell off without any of the dramas ms had to deal with and seem like they'll be surpassed by microsofts console. Madness

Do you own an x1, I ask because if pr statements and the price of the ps3 turned you off, I can only imagine what drm, always online, mandatory camera, higher price and weaker hardware done for your libido.

[morganfell]

If anyone chose the Xbox 360 over the PS3 because of price, please tell me since launch what you have paid to own your 360 + play multiplayer on the 360 for the past 8 years. Have a nice day.

[Utalkin2me]

All i have to say to people saying Ps3 was a blunder cause of price.

Blu-ray
Hdmi
Wireless
Rechargeable controllers
Bigger HDD

We all know that the 360 was the biggest tech failure in history with it's 50%+ failure rate.

[SolidDuck]

I understand why people say the ps3 launch was bad. I also think those same people forget how expensive blu ray players were at the time. I was looking into to getting one at the time, the cheapest one at the time was $700, and that was a bare bones no wifi or apps like netflix blu ray player.

[Hercules189]

I wouldn't call something like bluray a must have product at the time it came out.

[Spotie]

Excellent failure, hank.

How about looking up the actual quote, which tells nobody to get a second job?

How about looking at the price of comparable devices when the PS3 launched?

How long are you and others gonna keep trying to rewrite history to suit your tastes?

[hankmoody]

Yeah, okay. So, let me guess... you and everyone else were thrilled when they announced that street price, correct? It's literally amazing how defensive some of you people get when it comes to Sony. Unlike most of you, I can talk objectively about MS or Sony because I don't feel the need to take sides. I'm not going to sit here and tell you everything MS does is like The Lego Movie where everything is awesome. I too, groaned aloud when Mattrick told gamers to just buy an Xbox 360 if they didn't want to deal with an always online system. I will however continue to stick by my initial comment, where again, Sony releasing the PS3 at the price they did hurt them. Not just at launch but during the long run. As successful as the PS3 wound up being, you always got the feeling that the console never quite did the business it was expected to. Hell, even one of Sony's own guys remarked that they didn't want a repeat performance of last gen in regards to how the Xbox 360 caught them off guard. I wonder, did any of the more die-hard Sony fans on here call the guy at his house to tell him how wrong he was? Sheesh.

[Why o why]

The logo movie was kool. . . Please refrain from using it in such a disparaging manor.

Stop calling out one side too. All sides are defensive but your preference obviously blocks your peripheral line of sight of the people standing right next to you.

In terms of being caught off guard. . Well that could have something to do with releasing a year, year and a half later than the cheaper competition more than the price ALTHOUGH the cost and price definitely had an influence.

[Anon1974]

Turned out the PS3's price point wasn't really a blunder at all. They were still selling PS2's like hotcakes at the time and the PS3 from the moment it launched, despite the higher price point handily outsold it's closest competition. And Sony was selling the console at a huge loss! Oh yeah...that's real arrogant.

And no one ever said "Here's the price. You want one, get a second job." That was nonsense spin from the media. How dare those bastards put out a high end product, eat a huge chunk of the costs themselves and then have the arrogance to say that if you can't afford one and you want one, maybe you should find ways to get your hands on more money...even though that's COMMON BLOODY SENSE.

And at the time Blu-Ray's were new tech, and the PS3 was one of the better Blu-Ray players AND a helluva game console. It wasn't targeted at regular consumers, it was targeted at more high end, home theater enthusiasts. Sony makes all sorts of products targeted to different demographics. If you can't afford a $10,000 TV and the company says of the price "Umm, we make other TV's in different price ranges. If you want a more expensive one, I guess you'll have to get the money from somewhere?" is that arrogance? Of course not.

The PS3 was never initially supposed to sell the same as the PS2, it was supposed to sell alongside the PS2, just like Sony markets high, mid and low end products all across the board. And still, consumers opened their wallets despite the high price shelling out for the PS3 and for the PS2 for years after the PS3's release.

[Outside_ofthe_Box]

Don't get upset and cry about bias/being defensive when people correct you lol.

PS3 was super expensive sure, but it's not like it was waaaay overpriced due to arrogance or something. And of course people weren't thrilled about the price tag, hence the slow adoption rate early on until the price was lowered.

Just because people don't agree with you doesn't mean that they are biased or being defensive. Sheesh.

[BlackTar187]

Hank,

The real problem is why you fail to actually use the real quote?

Why won't use use the real quote and it's context?

At this point people repeating that line out of context have chosen to be ignorant to the truth. That is way worse then open fanboyism as it display a complete lack of personal growth.

[hankmoody]

It doesn't really matter what I say, does it? I don't mind using my last bubble to say that much. If you want to sit there and believe that the PS3 launch was a smashing success rather than a miscalculated blunder, changing your mind on the matter means little to me. It's your opinion just as much as it's mine. It's just kind of crazy what kind of responses you get around here if you say ANYTHING that is perceived negatively towards Sony. I know that not all Sony fans are this deluded but the more hardcore of you lot really kick it up a notch with your zealotry.

Sony introduced the PS3 at a price point with which they were absolutely positive the gaming public would eat up and THAT DIDN'T HAPPEN. And the quote may not have said specifically, "people will go get a second job" but did infer that people would be willing to work some OT to get it. Isn't that more or less the same thing?

[Outside_ofthe_Box]

***"It's just kind of crazy what kind of responses you get around here if you say ANYTHING that is perceived negatively towards Sony."***

So because you say something negative about Sony nobody is allowed to make any sort of counter response to your post without being labeled a fanboy or a die-hard fan or being defensive?

People rather you use the actual quote is a defensive/wrong response to have?

People saying that the price is not all that bad when considering the features the PS3 had and considering the prices of other devices with the similar features is a crazy kind of response to make?

I just don't get it. Nobody is trying to say that the PS3's launch is the best launch ever or a smashing success. The PS3's price was bad not because it was arrogant or that it wasn't worth the asking price, but because anything over $400 for the console market regardless of the features it has is just too damn expensive.

[fonger08]

Biggest console blunder ever between the wii u and xbox one? I can think of about a dozen other better examples; there's along list that inclues atari, sega, and phillips. Now current generation blunder... would Ouya count?

[SliceOfTruth888]

There is no doubt Microsoft couldnt have botched the way they explained the way Xbone was going to work. The bigger problem is that their original plan was amazing you just had to figure it out for yourself.

1) All games would be digital including your disc based games. No need to put discs in the system after the initial install

2) Share your FULL game, the demo timer was proven false, with 10 of your friends over xbox live. You would be able to group with 10 people and all of your games would be shareable. So if 6 out of 10 of your friends owned halo 6 out of 10 would be able to play at any given time....AMAZING

3) You were STILL going to be able to trade in your games. Gamestop had to deactivate the game from your gamertag which caused the reason for the check in. Once Gamestop would deactivate your game you would still own that game until the next check in. Which was confirmed to be a file in KILOBYTES which means even a 56k AOL modem would perform it in seconds. It would have done this every 24 hours not constant like many fanboys reported

4)Lockdown mode. This was lightly touched on but from what it seemed to be was a mode that if you were going to be without internet for a while on a trip of something you could install your games and put the system in lock down mode. Which would cause your gamertag to stop shareing games and you wouldnt be able to install any new games until internet is restored. But all games currently on the system would be fully playable.

For me this was amazing i loved the idea of shareing my games digitally and the 24 hour check in was not "DRM" it was needed for Microsoft to know what games you still owned. The people complaining are going to realize their fight for discs was worthless when every game starts to need internet for even single player modes. It was all a waste of time.

[Naga]

A model like that was simply too radical for the masses to accept. I would personally like to see that original vision brought back as an optional arrangement alongside what we have now.

[Godmars290]

What we "have now" is what we had before. What MS wanted to introduce gave more than an appearance of giving them too much control and because they either didn't see a problem with that or present a proper counter argument, "the masses" weren't willing to accept it. Did not show willingness to buy a product.

[Sayburr]

I have a disagree with you there Naga. It was not that it was too radical, it was that Microsoft didn't explain it like SliceOfTruth888 did above.

If Microsoft could have actually expressed their vision instead of saying, "if you don't like it you can buy a 360", things might have been different.

[Naga]

@ Sayburr

That's certainly fair. I wouldn't disagree with that. Perhaps there's a middle ground to be had between our two comments wherein the original vision was such a departure from the norm that it made things more difficult to explain.

Granted... comments like Mattrick's were unquestionably retarded and basically just poured gasoline on an already growing fire of discontent.

[Dark_king]

I have to think the main reason that MS pulled the game sharing feature was publishers would drop support.Most would kill the used game market if they could.They are very greedy and were complaining about the PS3's gamesharing.If left up to many of them a game would only ever work on one console.

[Losso-Oso]

When was the demo timer proven false? Last I heard, it had actually been proven to be what we though it was from the beginning, a way for your 10 friends to try a game in your library.

I have a very hard time believing that a company that nickels and dime's you around every corner, put things and apps behind a paywall that should not be, would all of a sudden become so generous with something like this.

They would have killed, or at the very least seriously crippled the used games market by only allowing certain retailers the ability to accept used games for the Xbox one, and driven oh so many small mom and pop shops out of business, pretty much only allowing gamestop to be the only game in town, no pun intended, and this is the company that you think would let you share your library with up to 10 people? Your full library, no strings attached?

If you believe that my friend, I've got a bridge I would like to talk to you about.

[OC_MurphysLaw]

The escapist trying to do a Steven Colbert Word of the day spin...but it just isnt that funny.

[S2Killinit]

the messaging of xbone was definitely a bad job. but i think people give it too much significance. I think Sony's stellar job of catering to gamers throughout each generation while the other console makers slowly dwindle down their games from the middle of each generation is also a contributing factor. I know it was in my book, and i had all three consoles last gen.

[Godmars290]

Policy wise it has to be the XB1. Aside from its hardware coming in under par compared to its competition, it had no other issues.

[Whore_Mouth]

Sega Dreamcast had to be the biggest blunder. When they unveiled it at conference, they said it will be out in a month.

They didn't even notify stores that they had a console coming out until then.