Robbie Bach, President of Microsoft's Entertainment and Devices division, (he's a step above Peter Moore, and is the head of the "tri-force" [wink wink] that brought together the Xbox and 360), recently made this statement on being questioned about the undisputed success of the Wii
"I'm actually not–the product has gotten more broad-base acclaim that I would have expected. It's a very nice product, but it actually has a relatively specific audience and a fairly specific appeal, frankly, based on one feature, which is the controller itself. And the rest of the product is actually not a great product–no disrespect, but…the video graphics on it aren't very strong; the box itself is kind of underpowered; it doesn't play DVDs; there are a lot of down-line components that aren't actually that interesting"
"While Xbox prints money, while it spends $75 billion on acquiring Activision, while it aggressively cuts into its profit attempting to corner the market with Xbox Game Pass, and while it does little to curtail bloat and overspending at its studios, it wants you to give it more money. And you shouldn't."
"Rather than absorb the cost of inflation, tariffs, and other costs, Xbox is passing along the cost to its consumers. This is an odd decision to begin with"
When US-based fake-journalists don't know at all what they're talking about.
Nintendo's listing games at $80 after their most successful console generation in their history. They even increased the price of the Joycon 2 mouse strap One Freaking Dollar because they can. Sony has said the PS5 generation is their most profitable generation so far and also has their own international console price increases and even increased the controller price stateside.
This isn't an Xbox problem, it's a games industry problem.
What business in this world is *not* going to pass an increased cost onto the customer in some way?
@Tyler... that MS is only the latest in the trend of companies not wanting to absorb the cost of inflation. That XB is but the latest platform to pass along the cost to its customers. If both Nintendo and Sony (which also made $$$$$) did not find it an odd decision... why would you think MS would?
Finally someone bringing up inflation instead of simpleton golden book stories of greedy CEOs and their yachts
The problem is gamers. They indulge in a luxury industry and live in a bubble where they think prices should remain the same for four decades. What other industry keeps their prices the same for four decades? None. Price rising is the norm.
The problem here is entitlement. Microsoft just spent 100 billion dollars trying to better their platform and they pull in 20 billion a year in revenue not profit. How long do you think it's going to take before they make their money back? What did you think they were going to do with their prices?
...MS already made that $$ back the first year. And i think there was a piece about it when it happened. I guess you can search for it.
It's not just a games industry problem it's a global economy problem everything is going up
Just stop buying at launch and wait. Also this price instead kind of tells the consumer if you want to spend less sign up for gamepass. I always wait 6-12 months before buying. This way I get a game after a multiple patches and pay most half of not less price. There are very very few games which are worth full price at launch
Whether we like it or not guys prices gonna go up. Will anyone really be surprised if next playstation and Xbox launches at 699 (with disk drive sold separately) , $99 controllers, 80 for digital and 90 for physical
I’m not a Doom guy lol, so no I’m not buying that one. If anything I’ll demo it on Game Pass, someday. 🤷🏻
Yeah I'm definitely not buying that one. I'm only interested in Perfect Dark and Fable but I'd never buy at MSRP. I'm the consumer who plays the games when you can get the Director's Cut with all DLC on sale for $10.
The last five years all I've done is purchase games during the spring and fall sales. Saved so much money and played the same games with all the patches/DLC.
The brought up some of the biggest IP's in the industry for a reason, and that reason is f**k you pay me if you want to keep playing.
This is where industry consolidation leads, three major publishers are no longer competing. More and more owned by fewer and fewer means price rises.
That's how businesses work they don't absorb costs unless they have to.
They don't owe us anything and neither do we same goes for Nintendo and Sony
I even expect valve to increase the steam deck price
Looks like the Australian price for the series X is up to $849 for the base model bit the 2tb one which is now near the 1k mark.
849 for a console that cost 749 on launch 5 years ago is just Wild it's crazy how bad the economy is tanking right now.
I've never seen a price increase since the Jaguar and that was a while other dumpster fire
For fans of games that involve shooting down hordes of zombies, The House of the Dead 2 Remake will be something to look forward to.
Microsoft is currently working on three new Xbox controller prototypes, each offering a unique feature set, according to a new rumor.
Agreed
I hope they're also designing some larger controllers for those with larger hands
Based on the info in the article, I see haptic feedback being mentioned and features to further reduce latency on PC and console but no mention of hall effect.
Sony, Nintendo and Microsoft must know something we don't about hall effect to make them not want to use it in their controllers.
Rough guess, but if controllers have a longer life span because these sticks won't fail, they potentially miss out on new controller sales.
Yes Hall effect would be nice but the things that really failed in me this generation where the buttons me die bumper and face buttons on series X and Switch Pro controller got sticky or broken.
If a controller is not attached to a console from the beginning, nobody will use its "advantages". No new console, no new experiences for Xbox owners... But Microsoft can replicate Dual Sense and then... magic could happen and PC players could have more desirable options to connect to their systems, not only for PS5 conversions.
I really hope they include string HD rumble like in PS and Switch 2 controller. But really stronger. I could barely feel Hd rumble from Switch 1.
The lackluster of the Wii in the graphics and processing department has been the favorite attacking ground for the opposition - or is it the only attacking ground they have?
They don’t have the graphics Horsepower that even Xbox 1 had. - Hey he just lost all credibility with that one folks!
Plus it's his job to look down on the competition so it's hardly an unbiased look at the Wii. Like one of the posts on the link said. PS3 and 360 are looking to far ahead. It takes way to long for a game to come out and their resorces are streched out so far just to make it. While the Wii is in the here and now. It's very easy to make a game on the Wii and very cost effective.
@gta_Cb
over 5 years from now technology like "cell" will cost way cheaper.
now if Nintendo makes their new console slightly better then the 360 and PS3, i dont think anyone should complain, the power 360 and Ps3 are able to achieve are amazing.
and of course the console will cost between 200 and 250. like always.
"the other hand The Godfather on the Xbox looks miles better than the Wii edition, why are there such discrepancies in the games being developed."
Scarface looks best on the wii, maybe developers just have to learn the system.
I'll save everyone from a long winded discussion, lets just say that this comparison was poorly done/written.
"Well, the verdict is that the Wii has more processing speed than the original Xbox"
"A Wii is technically 1.75 faster than a GameCube."
Thats all you need to know. If a game looks bad on the Wii, it is because someone didnt put the time into it that they should have. End of story.
Besides, if you're "porting" a game over using a "converter", the converter might not be perfect, lets say it reproduces everything, but it is only 95% efficient(Just look at the difference when you write HTML by hand/with frontpage for example). That means that EVERY game that is ported from, say, XBox will look 95% as good unless you update the graphics.
Try porting Super Mario Galaxy to the XBox and see how good it looks.
you just gatta give the WII a year or 2.. when some good games will be available..
I mean when the PS2 came out i had a PS1 and i coulda swore that some PS1 games looked better then the first batch of PS2 games..
the so right now we're getting bad ports and RED STEEL was pretty rushed in my eyes cause there were some obvious glitches to be found while playing (and i finished it)
so bash away but NINTENDO is the only company thats in the black..
"HAHAHA IT PRINTS MONEY"
Well, what did you expect people? He isn't going to go out and say "Holy mother of Jesus, that thing is friggin' awesome, buy my competitor's product instead of mine."
He's not after friendship points, he's after cash. Microsoft isn't a charity. Even in the face of sales that completely shatter all expectations, he still has to say that it targets a specific audience.