5 Bad Precedents set by the Xbox 360

Shamoozal.com lists 5 bad precedents set by the Xbox 360, from multiple SKUs to rushed hardware issues.

[ShiftyLookingCow]

let the killing of brain cells begin........

[marinelife9]

He had a pretty good line about people lapping up $#!t. I was laughing out loud when I read that.

[Nameless]

Such a biased site

[snoop_dizzle]

i hear it coming

[razer]

It's ALLLLL MS's fault..

MS put a gun to Sony's head and said YOU MUST HAVE MULTIPLE SKUS!

I do however agree with #3 and #5. But MS is in a business to MAKE MONEY, if the market will bear a price point that is what they will charge. It happens in all business!

And this article makes it sound like MS wanted to put out a buggy 360. It cost them dearly in PR and money, it was a mistake and nobody is perfect and they are paying dearly for it. But the PS2 had it's share of problems and it didn't set the precident because the Xbox1 was great hardware..

This person sounds more like a 360 hater than anything..

"I’m not implying that the Xbox 360 is the only system to set bad precedents this generation. I may write up a similar article for the Wii and PS3 as well because they’ve both had their share of crap."

Yea I'm sure you will get right around to that won't you?? pftt..

[MikeGdaGod]

still got my working ps2 from 2000

[Lucidmantra]

really I went through 4 PS2's ... tit for tat my friend.

And what about the dozen games that were damaged from spin around on the PS2.. all that and I still loved my PS2. Imagine that.

[MikeGdaGod]

sorry to hear that but, before i came to this site, i actually never knew anything about the ps2 having problems.

all my buddies stil have their ps2 and as far as i know they haven't had any trouble. i'm not doubting your issues but considering the amount of ps2's out and the number of 360's out, there's no comparison.

in the one year i had my 360 it broke down twice, to me thats unforgivable. i wish i was as forgiving as you, but as i've never had to deal with console hardware problems, i won't accept this from them or anyone else.

[snoop_dizzle]

they definetly could've done a lot more.

[Rims]

Article speaks truth.

[PimpHandHappy]

in fact he said he has friends that have owned more then one! Its not like you dont know MS rushed a faulty product out to market just so they could get the sales going b4 the monster Sony got into the game! Are u saying the guy is wrong to hate on paying for DC when the rest of the gamer world gets em for free, most times. I payed for new maps on socom! Didnt like it and even if some of those maps where fun it still wasnt worth the money spent.

If he wanted to spit some flame on PS3 we all know what he would say. Lack of games and not lack of hardware power and hardware build! If he wanted to spit flame on the Wii i guess he could say lack of games for the hardcore gamer! There isnt much more u can say about Wii and with the PS3 having under a 1% fail rate lack of games or the only problem with it!

and if u look at the history of new conseles u will see no nextgen system had many games in the first year!

[HyperBear]

and this is why, although many people, including me, are not to impressed with the way M$ is handling the 360, esp. high price for accessories, and too many fukin sku's, but the fact is, what would you rather have. A system, with a slightly higher than average chance of failure with a 3 year warranty, and has all the great next-gen games anyone would want to play, which is Xbox 360?, or would you rather have a very high priced system and a very low priced system, with a lesser chance of it failing, and all it does is sit in your room, collecting dust, cause of lack of any good games to play on them, which are PS3 and Wii?.

Me personally, I have all 3 systems, and am getting the Halo 3 360 as well, but in my mind, I see myself and many others willing to take the chance and go with Xbox 360, simply put, If it fails, theres no worry, cause you just get it fixed for free anyways, plus, something Wii and PS3 don't have very much of is GREAT, EXCELLENT GAMES.

[ALIEN]

My first question is, Who is this guy?

The article is very interesting, but it's based on his opinion. And like "razer" said, "This person sounds more like a 360 hater than anything"

[MikeGdaGod]

either that or someone tired of MS bullsh!t

[beavis4play]

his "opinion" is based on fact. tell me what he said that wasn't true. i'm not knocking ms but they have had some issues. what did he say that wasn't true

[beavis4play]

he didn't sound like a hater. he had five topics. and he was able to substantiate each topic pretty well. 180 dollars is high for a 120 gig hard drive. sub par hardware being rushed out?who can argue with the 360s' high failure rate. bringing out multiple versions of the console, each with one addtional add on? that's milking the consumer. telling their loyal pre-order fans that hdmi and hard drives aren't necessary and now making them standard in their new versions of the console? that's being dishonest to the consumer. these are the kinds of things he touched on in the article and that doesn't make him a hater. he's just presenting facts on what ms is doing. and i think he's right. ms has been screwing over the consumer.

[DJ]

Completely true.

[Boon Tarkas]

I do own a 360 and I love it.

However, neither M$ nor Sony should be seen as bullet-proof.

This author makes some valid points, whether it further incites the flame-wars is irrelevant.

[persian_prince]

i agree 100% with this article...and it pisses me off to think about all this...hence why i didnt buy xbox live gold and why i limit accessory buying to just controllers for friends. I dont believe in having to pay extra for anything (controllers are other vitals excluded) after purchasing a game or console. Charing $ for gamer pics and maps? forget that...

[Mr Murda]

One thing horribly wrong with this article (and would be the case if it was for the PS3 or Wii too) is that everything is assumed to be planned to happen in order to set a precedent, and the overall tone of the article dismisses any credibility in my eye. Still worth commenting on.

Obviously MS didn't want faulty system hardware or to later apologize for that by extending everyone's warranty. So, when you say "set a precedent" for these specific issues, it implies that it's going to happen in the future and almost expected to be accepted. Well, it would be ignorant to think that MS would "accept" the same hardware issues that they've had this generation, and so would any company. Also, to say it's a negative thing to have a company apologize for it's mistake and come up with a solution later to help fix it, well that's just stupid. So, it was sh!tty for MS to have such hardware issues, but to fault them for trying to make up for it is dumb.

Multiple SKU issues could be argued either way, for or against... I personally like the multiple SKU idea, and it is the obvious trend of hardware products (TV's, cameras, mp3 players, computers...). So, this personally doesn't bother me at all, and I think it will be a good thing for console choices in the future as more and more "extra" features are available.

Overpriced 1st party peripherals is pretty sketchy, and I agree with this point from the article. I fully understand why MS wants control over their 1st party accessories, and in particular the hard drives, but they are obviously not competitively priced compared to their competitions accessories. Yes, I would love to put my own HDD on my 360, like I do the PS3, but I do understand why they don't want that in order to protect from hacking/modding. However, $180 for 120 GB is out of line.

Overall, some points made sense, but he's definitely a fanboy.

[tplarkin7]

I agree about the multiple SKUs. And I also don't like the Microsoft Points since I don't earn MS Points at work. I earn dollars and cents.

His other points are off target. 2 of them are actually the same point (better hardware). You can thank Nintendo and Sony for expensive 1st party peripherals. Both of them did not include a memory card until this generation.

[bym051d]

The article is 100% true. Microsoft released badly designed hardware and a somewhat incapable SKU just to gain market share. They didn't care how many times the equipment broke or the number of people who couldn't play all the 360 games as long as they sold systems.

Sony released the 20GB SKU only because the Core 360 existed. They had to have a product to sell that was at least somewhat closer to the low mark the tard pack created.

I just can't believe the sheep who have bought multiple XBOX360s just to upgrade some hardware.

[Lucidmantra]

So now all of a sudden MS releases a console that doesn't come with a form of memory built into the system and it is gimped and incapable?

[dreams back to the days of needing to buy memory cards for PS1, PS2, Game Cube]

irony is ironic isn't it???

Sony didn't have to release a 20 GB SKU... THEY did it. They could have ignored the lower pricepoint and stuck with the we want one console and one console only... if you want a bigger HDD the system is built be be able to put a bigger HDD into. See sell it with a 40 GB HDD and if you want a 60,100, 1160, 250, 500 gb HDD go out and buy it and install it.. It is a no brainer i think.

[remembers back to Sony bashing multiple SKUs a few years back]

its true... irony is really ironic...

and yes I own playstationS and play them but you know what we have to call it as we see it.

[Double-Edged]

break dance now

[Owner360-PS3]

Why do people always post the same sh1t ? All these negative post get repeated over and over that its so stupid.This kinda post has been done idk how many times for idk how many months.This site has alot to do with it,kids moderating the site or whatever is letting multiple post of the same sh1t over and over.

[stunt213]

yeaya totally agree with this article.

[wicked]

What rubbish; my son and I have had lots of fun with our UK launch 360, never had a problem. Gets used every day for about 5-8 hours. Thanks MS for not keeping us waiting

[WilliamRLBaker]

1. Multiple SKUs
First done by sony in the ps1, and ps2 gens, let alone that after about a year they released ANOTHER version of the current console then phased out the old one, Ps1 had over 7 revisions of the console released.

ps2 had over 6.

A sub part of the multiple sku's.
""They either had to alienate some players with “HDD Required” stickers or dumb down aspects of their game so that all players get the lowest common denominator experience.""

Yeah ok they've had to dumb down *laughs hard* if they dumbed down why is it EVERY GAME so far has looked better, played best on 360?
all so REquired HDD...hmmmm lets see final fantasy 11, Resident evil outbreak...........well thats it in america all required hard drive to play on the ps2, And then sony dropped all HDD support alienating the users that had purchased the HDD when they released the PStwo!!!
The only games so far that have required any HDD on the 360 are MMORPGs...of which there is....OH MY GOD! 1!

2. Wait longer, better hardware

See number 1, Sony revised and bettered their hardware, not giving you a complete system till the end of its life with revisions and updates, As well with the ps3 we get 5 billion firmware updates a month..we get 3-4 a year for the 360, the 360 getting better stuff then the ps3, the ps3 mostly has fixes because stuff messed up with the last firmware update.

Oh and last i checked....yeah SONY is the ones that changed their layout, and system upgrades first on the ps3. not 360.

3. Overpriced Proprietary Accessories
Lets see, Memory cards (over priced created first by sega,ninty, and ps1) Multitap (first created by sega and ninty, first made over priced by sony) Need I say more?

4. It’s okay to rush sub-par hardware onto the market and apologize later

Last I checked during the ps1 generation something over 20% of ps1 consoles died, Any one remember how the ps1 was the birth of the Lay your console on its side to get it to work? lie it on its top?
Ps2 had a recall of over 50,000 lasers within the first year or 2, and IT WAS THE BIRTH OF THE Disc read error.

5. People are willing to pay too much money for digital downloads
This is CAPITOLISM!!! if you dont like it leave, You only have the opinion that each game should be filled with gamer pics...ect that is not fact, Because gamer pics are not needed or a must have thing, you want them, they are not intigruel to the game play...ect

Every thing you've listed has been done in past gens, and in this gen FIRST by someone else.

[stunt213]

lmao this idiot above me is living in the past and we're talking about this generation if you want to argue y dont u argue about the ps3 and dont bring all the stuff from 10 years ago.

[heroman711]

he does have a point guys. the 360 is a good console like the ps3 ( wii sucks ) but like ps3 it has its bad parts too.

[DrPirate]

I don't agree or disagree with any of the comments here.

Just want to say everything he wrote was correct: But they weren't precedents set by Microsoft.

I do agree charging for Gamerpics and Backgrounds is a bit much and punishable by testicular electrocution though...

[ShiftyLookingCow]

yeah esp since they dont come with proper preview. Like 300, what a piece of sh!t theme

[Itachi]

WOW some people love getting mugged off

seriously some people should stop the idle worship your giving your money to microsoft not to god or a church

sheesh

this whole console war is which company makes the most money not a feud between two countrys

be a consumer not a fanboy that way everyone wins

[ShiftyLookingCow]

idle worship or idol worship, giving money to God or church, you would make a good republican I guess

[Covenant]

Some of these issues are new to games, and some have precedents:

Multiple SKUs? Sure, there have been too many in the first two years, but also look at the PS3: 3 different SKUs in less than a year, and rumors of more. I'd say that both PS3 and 360 are guilty here.

Defective hardware? DEFINITELY a problem, and one that has (finally) gotten the attention it deserves. IF--a big IF--MS is able to fix those issues and produce a more reliable console, this will be a non-issue. But they have to rebuild the public trust lost to defective consoles.

Precedent: Defective PS2s that Sony refused to acknowledge for far too long. Sound familiar?

Microtransactions: Get used to them. MS may have started the ball rolling here, but make no mistake: Nintendo and Sony will quickly follow suit. Nature of the beast, folks.

Overpriced accessories: Again, they're not the only ones.
--Sony PSP: $15-20 for a cloth accessory pouch. $30-40 for a 32 MB memory stick. And so on.

--PS2: Network adapter for online games. Multiplayer adapter if you wanted to use more than 2 controllers. A hard drive that was useless outside of one game and memory backup, keeping you reliant on memory cards.

--Nintendo Wii: Those Wiimotes seem a little pricey at $40.

Agree? Disagree? Rational flame-free replies appreciated.

[DrPirate]

Very well written post, I agree with alot of things but I'll tell you where I see discrepancies.

"Multiple SKUs? Sure, there have been too many in the first two years, but also look at the PS3: 3 different SKUs in less than a year, and rumors of more. I'd say that both PS3 and 360 are guilty here."

However, the PS3's SKU's differed in hard drive space, and at launch date: Memory card readers and Wireless. The 360's SKUs differed in Outputs and optional Hard Drive, and the amount of hard drive space. Now with the possibility that some games require a HDD (still under speculation of course, I don't wish to incite anything), a gamer looking for a cheaper alternative may have to pay for the optional hard drive when he could have saved money and bought the Premium. This isn't a case yet, but it may develop into a problem later on.

The Precedent for this was PS2: The slim version didn't even have a hard drive bay, you couldn't play FF 11 on it. Also, it lacked backwards compatibility with something like, .01% of the games...

"Microtransactions: Get used to them. MS may have started the ball rolling here, but make no mistake: Nintendo and Sony will quickly follow suit. Nature of the beast, folks."

Microtransactions as in: Buying additional content, buying Arcade/PSN titles, I'm fine with that. Everyone is fine with that and it's a fantastic way to get additional content without having to buy expansion packs. Where Microsoft sets the precedent is in it's unnecessary charging department. I don't wish to get derogatory, but charging for avatars and backgrounds is rape.

However, please do not get me wrong. I think Sony charging for furniture, bigger apartments, better clothes in Home is rapage too...

The Precedant here would have to be: Every free MMO that charges for better equipment, but the core game is free to play.

"Overpriced accessories: Again, they're not the only ones.
--Sony PSP: $15-20 for a cloth accessory pouch. $30-40 for a 32 MB memory stick. And so on."

You are correct....However the cloth/pouch and the 32 MB stick was free. If you need to really enjoy the PSP as an MP3 player and movie machine, paying the 100 bucks for a 4 gig memory stick on top of the unit price is an unnecessarily large cost to further enjoy a machine you already spent alot of money on.

Then you have to have a defintion of overpriced. When I bought the SuperScope for SNES, I thought that was expensive for what was a cheap plastic cylinder... The 100$ I spent on 4 gigabytes lets me enjoy movies I rip to my PSP on the train going to work/university.

[Covenant]

Good points. A few more comments:

"However, please do not get me wrong. I think Sony charging for furniture, bigger apartments, better clothes in Home is rapage too..."

Another very, very good example of microtransactions. Games and new maps do not bother me...it's horse armor, themes, and EA cheats that really p!ss me off, and I think we'll see many more examples going forward.

"You are correct....However the cloth/pouch and the 32 MB stick was free."

True, when the system first debuted. But when they began offering the system w/o included accessories, those prices became ludicrous. A 32 MB card was really only good for gamesaves, so if you wanted music, another card was a necessity. And, for a while the Sony brand Pro Duo sticks were a LOT more than the 3rd party ones (Sandisk, etc.). That has finally changed, too.

Plus, let's not forget the prices of UMDs when they first came out.

I'm also surprised that Sony didn't include at least a set of component cables in the PS3...for all their emphasis on HD content, that seems shortsighted and exploitive. But no more so than a $100 wireless adapter.

Thanks for the feedback.

[DrPirate]

"I'm also surprised that Sony didn't include at least a set of component cables in the PS3...for all their emphasis on HD content, that seems shortsighted and exploitive. But no more so than a $100 wireless adapter."

....Or a wireless headset...Grrr!!!!

Also: I wasn't aware of that PSP issue. Charging for a 32 mb card? lol, thanks for the heads up, I had no idea.

[djt23]

People are willing to pay too much money for digital downloads and then when they get on the forum they complain about it i dont get it

[Xbox is the BEST]

RROD and more bad press won't stop the 360.

[tfur]

I too agree... I hate the noobish "SKU" term, as much as I hate the "AAA" term. I have been gaming for decades without those stupid terms...

[DrPirate]

I agree. I still don't even know what SKU stands for...

Stupid
Kids (are)
Ubiquitous.........

I dunno...

[Testo]

"First done by sony in the ps1, and ps2 gens, let alone that after about a year they released ANOTHER version of the current console then phased out the old one, Ps1 had over 7 revisions of the console released. "

Could you list these system updates with the time / update please?

"See number 1, Sony revised and bettered their hardware, not giving you a complete system till the end of its life with revisions and updates, As well with the ps3 we get 5 billion firmware updates a month..we get 3-4 a year for the 360, the 360 getting better stuff then the ps3, the ps3 mostly has fixes because stuff messed up with the last firmware update. "

Yet again please list this MASSIVE upgrade...

"This is CAPITOLISM!!! if you dont like it leave, You only have the opinion that each game should be filled with gamer pics...ect that is not fact, Because gamer pics are not needed or a must have thing, you want them, they are not intigruel to the game play...ect"

What no sly remark about how the PS2 and N64 started to rip you off with this one??

I like how you say "Capitolism" only in America is it ok for a huge company to rip people off and the peons defend it.

[WoundedMoon]

I would ask anyone who says the author is a 360 hater to be intelectually honest, and identify which of the 5 things he has listed you would like to see continue in the future?

Someone shows up and says "My 360 gave a red ring, and no longer works, I didn't want that to happen!" and we swarm from every corner to identify the XBox hater, afterall, we love it when OUR systems fail.

I belive it will be back to PC gaming for me, come next gen in 2010. We got mods, user created content, more free content, better graphics (disagree? it shouldn't be to suprising that a 4000 dolar gaming rig out performs your 400 dolar consol by every standard). More expensive, but think of how much more you can do. Right now I'm too poor though.

[CRIMS0N_W0LF]

Multiple SKU: I bought Core now I'm literrary screwed with saying games needs HDD.

Wait longer, better hardware: HDMI Port even on core. Falcon Chip.

Overpriced Proprietary Accessories: No one can disagree with this. A few more HDD Space doesn't cost that much. Same goes for HD player etc.

It’s okay to rush sub-par hardware onto the market and apologize later:
I don't accept the apologie. I gave you MONEY not cookies. I want a good product. My PS1 from 1996 still works. Fvck even my Commorod64 still works!

People are willing to pay too much money for digital downloads:
I have no online on my X360 I cannot comment on this