The Inquirer reports:
"Shortly after our Xbox 360 went to the mass-grave of RROD failures, when playing the mediocre Halo 3, we sent it off to Microsoft for our free repair. We packaged it nicely. Dusting off the original retail box from storage we carefully placed the 360 in, coupled with the PSU and a substantial amount of original packaging.
We also left the chrome 360 plate on the DVD drive - this was a Core unit which we had customised with a chrome DVD tray to make it appear to be a Premium SKU - Core units were the only consoles available in shops on day one. We finally received our repaired 360 unit back in the post today. But things were slightly amiss..."
This could be fun as they make great tables. Go big or go extinct. Prime your senses for a neural handshake and step into the cockpit of a Jaeger. It is on you to cancel the apocalypse when Pacific Rim Pinball comes to Pinball FX on May 16.
Microsoft just posted the third quarter of its 2024 fiscal financial results. The software maker made $61.9 billion in revenue and a net income of $21.9 billion during Q3. Revenue is up 17 percent, and net income has increased by 20 percent.
Xbox content + services up 62% while hardware down 31%... seems about right with the way they tout you don't need the hardware to play. People can play on their phones or smart tv or other means. I don't hardly play on my consoles directly since getting devices like the logitech g-cloud and ps portal. Which is to also say I have been playing more digital than physical because of these devices.
Too expensive hardware when others offer the same or more for less? Good work, Green Team.
"Despite some early successes for Xbox games on rival platforms, Xbox hardware is down by a massive 31 percent this quarter."
"Without Activision Blizzard, Microsoft’s overall gaming revenue would have actually declined this quarter."
"Xbox content and services would have only been up a single percent without Activision Blizzard..."
"It looks like next quarter is going to be a similar story for gaming at Microsoft, too."
That is crazy... so A/B/K is carrying the whole Xbox gaming.
Oh and Microsoft will be fine. Windows, Office and Cloud are growing with each pc purchase.
As of right now, there are no monopolies in the games industry, and for the sake of the medium as a whole, they never should either.
And yet the biggest tech companies in America are essentially that. They buy up all the small comps only to kill them off and steal what they have, and if they can't buy em they bleed them to death.
They buy IPs not talent. That's why these buyouts never work and the IPs die. Right now it's too expensive to develop games - but I expect that to shift maybe as AI tools can make it easier. The best games have been indie games for awhile as big developers fuck their ips to death with "games as a service" -
"when playing the mediocre Halo 3"
roflmao
This sounds like a fake, made up story. Why? Lets break those points down:
"First, the console came packaged in a cardboard box. Gone was our original retail box and packaging, instantly removing a substantial amount of resell value."
Microsoft advices to pack the console in another box then the original packaging. If you put it in your original retail box you're retarded. You're double retarded if you think you're getting paid extensively more by having the original cardboard box. 2nd hand people buy a working 360, not the box.
"Secondly we noticed our beloved chrome DVD tray had disappeared in favour of an original off-white plastic plate. The swines!"
The 360 core is registerd as a core. And thus you get a core. You should have replaced the chrome DVD tray by the original white one before sending in. Who is so retarded to let a self plaeced tray on the console?
"Most importantly though, our heavy, expensive Xbox 360 power supply was nowhere to be seen."
The power supply is the first thing they test over the phone. Do you see a orange light if the 360 is off, do you see a green light when the 360 is on. If thats alright you don't have to send in your power supply.
I call bullsh!t on this article.
I do have a close friend who send in a broken (RROD of course) 360 core system in for repairs, and got it back a few weeks later where it immediately RRODed upon powering on the system.
That said, this article sounds pretty biased/flamebait, if solely based on the phrase "mediocre Halo 3".
Halo IS mediocre, it's a 10 year old PC game under the guise of a 2 year old (visually) shooter.
The Mart you sound like you've got burned a few times with the RRoD :( it must be painful not being able to play all of those great multiplatform games and all of those great exclusives like Mass Effect and erm... erm... eh...
A friend of mine had trouble with his Xbox and sent it in, and he got a broken Xbox back. It was still in the same box and they returned it. He just bought a new one no big deal...