Microsoft: Shane Kim Says If No Halo 3 Profit, Then When?

For as much as Microsoft has spent on its gaming division, it hasn't really seen anything back profit-wise. From what kotaku last heard, it had received exactly nothing. Good thing all the kids are snapping up that Halo 3! The console maker just *might* eek out a profit. Even Microsoft Game Studios corporate vice president Shane Kim is optimistic! Well, sorta. He recently told the BBC:

"It's far too early to say what the financial return will be for our investment... If we can't make a profit in the year Halo 3 comes out, then when will we?"

Um, never? No worries, Microsoft, just have Bungie make Halo 4, 5 and 6, and you're good as gold. Finish the franchise.

[greed]

man that's kind of sad that you relay on one game to change the fate of a console!!
but if that's the case hopefully the halo movie or what ever does good and maybe some halo action figures and how about a clothing line maybe just a few ideas.....

[marinelife9]

I hope MS finally starts to make a profit. If they keep going year after year without a profit they may pull out of the console business and that's bad for everyone.

[ISay]

the only reason their not seeing a profit is because they are throwing millions at buying off publishers, hard ware specs, and 3 year extension for RROD so don't feel so bad they got them self into to this mess

[Omegasyde]

Halo 3 Sold for $60.00 (US)
Per DVD for Micro ~<$5
----------------------------- --
~55 Total X (Current Sales) = A couple million, AKA Alot of "Scrilla".

Halo 3 Totals + Consoles sold because of Game + Merchandise
X
International
----------------------
More Scrill, at about A Kabillion.
- Advertizement and Media Account for the game.
----------------------------- ----------------
A couple bucks short of 0.00 (Factoring in Warranties...)

But...(Don't take the bubble away yet)
Carry the 4 million players...
= Alot of Happy gamers playing, who could care less.

"Finish The fight? Hell No. Its just begun."
-Master Chief, Halo 4.

[CyberSentinel]

From Kotaku. I wonder if this "Foreign" and culturally biased website has any "ulterior motives"?

http://www.n4g.com/NewsCom-...

[ud]

l0llo9ll0l0l xdroid!!! xdroid!! xsheep!!

That's what you sound like dumbass

[crck]

Kotaku is quoting a MS officer... BTW the managing editor for Kotaku lives in Colorado you moron. Just like most of their editors live in America. You're the racist, culturally biased one assuming its a foreign site because the website sounds like a japanese word. BTW as far as I know the word kotaku isn't even a japanese word. At least not the way they spell it.

[texism]

Hahaha Cyber you just got pwned! Check ur facts next time lol!

[MikeGdaGod]

even though i never really like the xbox brand, its no fun being the only kid on the block.

this competition is fun to me and i like coming to this site for news and debates. alot of people on here take this stuff so seriously that you'd think the consoles gave birth to them. i just do this for fun in between meetings, classes, and work.

i'm a very competitive person by nature and thats why i decided to pick a side to root for. but i enjoy this site, even the fanboys at times.

[tehcellownu]

THey will never make money..Halo 3 was another halo 2..the same amount of people bought it..they losing money on repairs and giving out games disks..dont know why they continue when they losing billons of dollar

[razer]

This dude right here ^^^^ I think takes the cake for Sony fantard #1.. He says just the same amount of stupid sh!t that Nasim does but he has been here a lot longer.. Just look at this guys post history, I mean what a sorry loser twat... Damn, dude I feel sorry for you that you spend more time hating on the 360 than you do playing your PS3.

[texism]

razer I feel even sorrier for you my friend...

[razer]

ultim8p00 I didn't mean to insult your boyfriend.. I didn't realize you were tehcellownu's little b!tch..

You feel sorry for me huh?? Save it! Do I go around to every 360 thread and make some off-topic comment about how I hate the system? This guy contributes 0 to this site beyond flaming.. If you support that well that's your problem.

[ghost305]

Omegasyde
that was a real dumb post, or did you forget that Microsoft Owns Bungie????

[goodganja]

Shane Kim just put it out there for all you xbots listening. Shane Kim basically admitted that Halo is the ONLY franchise that can move 360 consoles. It's the only leverage Micro$hit has on it's console. Shane Kim is saying that XBOX put all of it's cards out by releasing Halo 3 in the time that it did. Which was stupid because they think they're gaining an advantage by kicking the PS3 while it's down in it's first year.

The only game that Microsoft can counter with is Gears of War 2 and by the time that game is released, Sony will already have a slew of games that will pound that Trash in the dirt.

R.I.P Micro$hit how we hardly knew ye.

[sticky doja]

I think its your bedtime.

[sticky doja]

Didn't Microsoft say they would turn a profit in 2008? So what exactly is Shane Kim talking about?

[razer]

He doesn't want to directly answer the question but yes, all signs point to the Entertainment Division of MS turning a profit in 08. Nintendo is the only one of the 3 making a profit at this point. Sony is doing well with the PS2 but they are still losing on the PS3.

[SofaKingReetodded]

starting to set in for xbots out there??

we have been telling you this since early this year, MS is in deep doo doo with this console, nevermind the massive failures to the tune of 1.1 billion. That's ALOT of OOOPS if you ask me. Add to that the fact that the console has sold worse in it's second year than the gamecube did and this time next or the one after we may see alot of tearful teenagers being interviewed on tv after MS announced it can no longer continue to lose money on it's gaming division and closes their doors or HEAVILY downsizes them to a development studio.

[kn]

Or maybe a rhetorical question? I'm assuming he knows they are going to make money this fiscal year and was being dryly sarcastic by asking a rhetorical question.

Regardless, neither of the two next gen consoles are making money at the moment and if Sony cuts their price as is widely anticipated, Microsoft will match to some degree and the amount of bloodletting will only get worse.

[Ashta]

Considering that the repair issues of the RROD systems has cost them a 1.8 billion hit PLUS all of the development costs with Halo I seriously doubt that it is going to turn a profit. Even if it DID it would be a small one and it would only be profitable game wise. Not hardware.

The marketing campaign alone was around 300 million dollars. NOT TO MENTION the Halo 3 release is going to be extremely top heavy. Which means that most people are going to buy it within the first week it comes out. The sales after the first week will drop an almost unprecedented amount.

1.8 million the first day. 1.5 million of that were pre-orders and the only substantial gain after that was 400,000 copies sold. I forsee the first week being huge, but the second week we'll see it drop down to Bioshock levels.

[Gamespot-equals-EGM]

$300 million marketing campaign? I seriously doubt that. You have a link to back it up? I doubt the marketing campaign was even $100 million or even $70 million.

[Kenshin_BATT0USAI]

hmm if anything I would expect Microsoft to leave the console business soon, still not making even a penny is really bad.

[Itachi]

Can we please bring SEGA

[jazzmanb]

the marketing for halo3 was 30 million,not 300 million..it was also brilliant marketing,and is expected to win awards for best commercial as well as best game of the year...microsoft knows exactly what its doing...microsoft is also expected to tuen a profit OVERALL in 08,it well be the first time microsoft has made money on the xbox brand...on a side note the 1 billion cost of repairing the 360 is still nothing compared to what sony is losing on the ps3,especially if they decide to drop to 399...

[540damn]

best commercial. youre joking right? yeah maybe if the panel was made up of dorks. even then i think you could find a cooler dorkier commercial.

[SofaKingReetodded]

Sony broke even on the PS3 last june, this was announced to their shareholders and by law it has to be factual.

Everything after that has been butter for them. It is only now that xbots with even an inkling of intelligence are starting to realize that the student(MS) has sacrificed sure footing in order to land a killing blow but instead has left himself hopelessly vulnerable to the more experienced master (Sony)

I hope this soon to be second spanking in a row serves to humble some egos in redmond and they start thinking about customer satisfaction first and not how much you can money you can micro-transaction out of the gaming community.

[jazzmanb]

sony essentialy killed sega already..unfortunatly..because sony hype was so big,evetybody bought the crappy playsations and gave up on the superior dreamcasts,luckily for games microsoft and the 360 is the new dreamcast,and they have the games,money and resourses to take sony down..i dont like sony,because they lie....over and over and over

[Shankle]

Yeah, sony's such a nasty company. Microsoft is much better.

[540damn]

yes dreamcast was an awesome system (i still play mine). but way better than the ps2, i dont know about that. another reason it failed was the fact that you could easily bootleg games and most people I know didnt buy them.

how can you compare MS to SEGA when MS is the richest corporation in the world? acting like MS is the underdog and they deserve to win is ignorant.

[mikeslemonade]

Halo 3 will actually increase the red rings rate causing the potential of Halo 3 profits to not be as high. Halo 3 is the game where you can put in 6 hours everyday.

[ApocalypseShadow]

sony lied about making a 3D system,making it cd,and went to sell 102 million with tons of games.man did they lie.

or maybe when they lied about putting dvd in ps2 and selling 120+ million consoles and delivering all those games.and making gaming cool for everyone and expanded the market beyond just kids.that was a great lie.

or was it the psp,with it's ps2 like graphics in your pocket they lied about?and making it remote play with ps3.selling 25 million of them and allowing you to watch movies on it from umd or memory stick.

naw!had to have been making a next generation system built to last that is reliable with foreign tech inside.and making it be able to play ps1 and ps2 games,watch bluray and dvd,and putting everything in without you paying a premium if you bought it all seperately.

could the lies have been eyetoy and pseye,echochrome,flow,ico and sotc,motion control,buzz,singstar that bring in casual gamers?

boy sony lies delivering all that.

as for shane kim and microsoft,hopefully halo sells well.because going -7.0 billion dollars in the hole for your entertainment division that houses xbox must sting quite alot.but neosporin could help the irritation.

mag lev...................

[Xbox is the BEST]

Toy Story like graphics, PS2 graphics look better than Xbox and Game cube. That's just some of the things we lied about. Need me to continue

[Xbox is the BEST]

Toy Story like graphics, PS2 graphics look better than Xbox and Game cube. That's just some of the things we lied about. Need me to continue Sorry for the double post my computer is focking up.

[Ugly American]

How can you take a quote like that out of context and make an article out of it? Imagine the actual interview:

Interview Guy: So, is the games division at Microsoft expecting to turn a profit this year?

Shane Kim: It's far too early to say what the financial return will be for our investment... If we can't make a profit in the year Halo 3 comes out, then when will we?

So when you look at it that way, he is just being modest and positive about his expectations. I am amazed this article got approved.

All he is saying is that they ARE going to make a profit this year.

[540damn]

but hes also saying theres not a lot of hope for 360 profitability if Halo 3 can't get MSoft's gaming division out of the red.
Its good hes being honest though, most people in his position are usually blowing smoke up peoples asses.
I cant believe people actually take what these executives have to say seriously.

[Arkham]

Profit? Undoubtedly. But when we see the total of the game's almost unprecedented promotional budget, the total profit might surprise us.

MS certainly did what they had to do, and threw enough money at the game to ensure it's success. Sony will do the same for Killzone 2, though on a smaller scale. That franchise has nowhere near the broad appeal of Halo+Xbox (it's *the* defining franchise for the XBOX brand), despite how anxious we PS owners are to see the final result.

[jackdoe]

It seems like both Microsoft and Sony are not gonna be able to make a profit this generation. They're both selling their consoles below what they're really worth, Sony even more so, and Microsoft is caught up in the RROD. Seems like Nintendo is the only one making a profit right now. I hope this doesn't deter either Sony or Microsoft from taking part in next generation console development. That would suck.

[Arkham]

While both are public companies, and must at least appear to care about profit, this generation is the dirtiest war and I suspect they really only care about beating each other. The profits will follow (supposedly).

The difference is that MS still has a chip on its shoulder and has money to bleed in its war to usurp Sony. To a degree it has already done so, but with Sony they are in for a long, long hard battle. Sony is always more focused on the long-term, while MS is more smash&grab (or Shock & Awe, if you will).

So far it's paid off for Microsoft, but time will tell if this war turns into an end-game-only situation. I'm disappointed with Halo 3 in every aspect, except where it counts, obviously: multi-player. Some people believe MS has already shot their wad, and think the best from Sony is yet to come. At this point I believe MS has the stronger support, and the PS3 has more potential (though more difficult to unlock).

I'm hoping for a monumentally even split between the two, with everyone being happy with whatever the kcuf they own so they'll just shut up and play.

Sorry, I still believe the Wii is not technically part of this war. The two behemoths have overshadowed the public mind-share with their fanbases' spats. Both companies look at Nintendo as being a complement to this generation, not a competitor. And rightly so, IMHO. They've lead in total sales, but whether or not they can sustain a post-novelty, post-saturation lead is questionable.

[xionpunk]

i like this user comment on the Kotaku page (whether it was serious or not) "I don't think they even need to make a profit. Microsoft has enough money anyway."