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Xbox Losses Double, Xbox Shrinks
seldo writes "According to ITWorld, losses in the last quarter at Microsoft's Home and Entertainment segment have doubled. From the article: 'The segment, which also includes Microsoft's TV platform and PC games, posted a quarterly operating loss of US$348 million, compared with $180 million in the same period a year ago.'" An anonymous reader
points to similar coverage at news.com, pointing out that the company also reports "profits for Office, and one small note about an undisclosed presumably Japanese company that Microsoft if propping up. So, the big question on my mind is, who is Microsoft secretly holding above water, and why? The fact that they are presumably Japanese, seems to point towards an XBox partner. Could this explain the sudden flood of Sega exclusive games?" Another anonymous reader writes "Microsoft will be showing a smaller sized Xbox at E3 this May. In addition to the smaller size of the hardware, the Xbox Lite will also be integrated with Media2Go allowing Xbox users to download digital content such as music and movies. Wonder what this means for all the current Xbox Mod Chips?"
I think Microsoft has to learn that they can't just make incremental additions to their hardware, or current customers will feel cheated. Although I don't personally own an X-Box, I know someone who does, and if Microsoft doesn't offer this Media2Go service to current X Box users, I know he'll be angry (What they're describing is actually pretty much what he wants, he has broadband, and wants to be able to get things like music and movies, but still pay for them, etc)
Small typo in your link. The correct link is here
Things you think are in the Constitution, but are not.
You do realize that MS sells each one of these systems at a loss
Contrary to popular belief, the console makers do not sell the consoles for less than their marginal cost of production and distribution. The "loss" lies mainly in the expenses of product development and promotion.
Will I retire or break 10K?
Dude. Completely untrue. You may very well hate Bill Gates and Microsoft, but do it for the right reason.
Bill and his wife have donated tons of money to shelters/cancer treatment centers/fine arts, etc.
You may hate his company, but he's donated a helluva lot of his loot.
Sent from your iPad.
Can you name the game that has true 5.1? The last game that came close was Pirates that I tried with a semi-DTS 4.0. In any case, the point was ALL games on xbox do 5.1, only a handful of games on PS/2 attempt to through a custom design developers have to code in ala EA sports games or SSX trickery---we're not talking about DVD 5.1, we're talking about games. And uh, xbox has 2 memory slots on each controller.
just like Iraq is using PS2 for their SCUDS
...but no PS2 has ever been or will ever be used for missiles. There was an export restriction put on the hardware (as with all computers of that class/speed, AFAIK) because of it's ability to crunch numbers, but any rumors of military applications are nothing more than sensationalism at it's finest.
Okay, I'll take what you say at face value about your position at Nintendo, and etc...
Everyone seems to be assuming that those losses can only be attributed to selling a ton of xboxes (at a loss.)
0 0. html
http://news.zdnet.co.uk/story/0,,t269-s2129749,
says differently.
Osha now expects Xbox-related revenue for Nvidia's fourth quarter, which ended 26 January, to total $40m on 800,000 units, down from previous estimates of $85m on 1.7 million units.
According to that, they shipped less than *half* of the number of xboxes they expected to ship in the 4th quarter.
Xbox is the #3 system.
Sony Playstation: 50 million units
Nintendo GameCube: 16 million (or 10-12 million depending on who you believe)
Microsoft Xbox: 8-9 million
Microsoft is not doing so well. Microsoft says sales of Xbox are on track. Yet what did Microsoft project they would sell? 9 million to 11 million. How many did they sell? 8 million, and they hope to sell 1 million more by June 30. Therefore Microsoft might possibly meet the low end of their projections.
Sources...
CNet: PlayStation 2 shipments top 50 million
CNet: Microsoft says Xbox sales on track ("We expect to finish our fiscal year with just over 9 million units sold worldwide," Koch said.)
And finally, for the Microsoft shills that think Xbox will take the world by storm...
Suppliers dim Xbox sales picture
Those who would give up liberty in exchange for security and DRM should switch to Microsoft Palladium!
First off, I want to say I agree the XBox is a technically superior system. But this doesn't matter for the following reasons.
All the other systems have Dolby 5.1 capability, it just depends on if the games support it.
The network adapter and built-in hard drive don't mean swat because nobody will be taking full advantage of them until the other two consoles get them. Hold on, I'll justify why.
It is because XBox is no where near #2 -- worldwide. It may very well be #2 in the USA, but with Japan's big gaming market, that doesn't mean dick. Take a look at the hardware console charts half way down the page.
http://www.the-magicbox.com/topten.htm
XBox is holding less than %5 the total market. And remember the GameCube came out 5 or 6 months after the XBox and holds around %15. Not many gaming companies are going to develope a game that utilizes the hard drive and network adaptor exclusively for the XBox. The market just isn't there.
Hell, last year somewhere around 300-400 games came out for the PS2 -- remember all the Japaneese stuff we don't see. And only 68 for the XBox. Not to mention all the PS1 games that are still being produced.
If you still don't believe me on the numbers search for the lastest sales annoucements from Sony, Ninetendo, and Microsoft on last years consoles. I don't remember Ninetendo's but Sony was around 50 million units and Microsoft around 8 million.
Hell, most developers still make XBox games that look like ass and by the time they figure out how to take advantage of that hardware, the PS3 will be out.
You missed the point. If you rip music to your X-Box HD, you can use that music in games that support that feature. For example, I've got NIN when playing Project Gotham Racing.
it's that Microsoft has repeatedly exhibited expansionist tendencies, and it's been pointed out [slashdot.org] that the very name "Xbox" is intended to mean "Anything Box" (ie. the "X" is a cheeky metasyntactic variable [tuxedo.org]).
:-)
This is true, but not in the way you think. It's because of DirectSound, DirectVideo, DirectInput, etc. being then refered to as DirectX. Then MS decided to build a console that used DirectX to make it easier to port to PCs and back, so the obvious name would be DirectXBox, or XBox for short.
So it does mean everything, but in the DirectX sense, not in the monopolistic sense.
But of course you can expect MS to try to take over the world anyway
The PS2 is a remarkably inferior platform, but it does have a very large number of very high quality games. I will immediately be one of the first to point out that the PS2 lacks a great RATIO of good games vs. bad games, but that's a universal complaint anymore.
I have several pretty good games for the PS2, and several really good PS1 games. I havea lot of crap for the system, too... but at least I can say I have that many great games for the PS2.
For the XBox, I only have a few that I can honestly say I like. I've rented several, and the better ones weren't exclusives. I've even given away XBox games that I thought were total trash.
Halo is fab, and Buffy is neat. DOAX is neat. But overall the system IS lacking in great games. I mean to pick up Panzer Dragoon sOrta, since it'll be worth it. But c'mon, the systme has been out this long and the good games are only now starting to really trickle in, and the best ones are cross-platform.
That hardly says good things about the XBox.
The Gamecube is doing marginally better, since I can honestly say I only have one Gamecube game that I would honestly say I think sucks. Not that there aren't shitty games for the Gamecube, too, but most of those are obvious trash. The Nintnedo first party titles have all been top notch, and even ANIMAL CROSSING (as strange and childish as it is) has been a greater source of amusement to me than anything on the XBox.
Oh, and yes, I do have all three systems.
"Everything you know is wrong. (And stupid.)"
Moderation Totals: Wrong=2, Stupid=3, Total=5.
Hell they have sold 8 million units when essentially in competition with a system that had a year+ head start. Not to Mention Xbox figures to have a longer life than PSII and is in a great position to provide the higher value second tier system when PS3 hits the shelves and PSII game development falls off. Rough guess is at that point X-Box will be selling for 150 or less with a number of PC game ports hitting hard and heavy with alot of first efforts by primarily PC developers at the second teir game prices.
I think PSII is going to have a rough second tier life... I think they really goofed not having more memory or making it upgradable and the lack of an intialy integrated hard drive. Hard drive space is likely going to be very very necesarry in the console market before long and Xbox will be sitting pretty as a value system while it will cost to upgrade PSII and its system memory is fixed with less than Xbox.
Step two after PSIII hits the market they again hit the bleeding edge market late but this time with a system designed with all of their lessons learned ( IE better controller, smaller footprint ). They hope to break even but don't care if they take an ultimate loss again and take direct aim at whatever sony offers after the 3erd generation play station. The goal the next time around is to establish the system is worthy. Not to mention folks Xbox is not a garounteed loss yet, it may well break even or proove profitable in the long run.
Frankly I think MS could deal without penetrating the Japanese market so long as they can garner game design support for US titles or generate a stronger console content generation industry over here. My guess is they are after making the US market able to stand on its own feet in competition. at that point its anybodies game... however penetrating Japans very protective domestic market in an area with so much domestic pride is to me is a very very very difficult.
I am no Xbox fanboy.... my console system is a PSII and I love it... but it has its limitations and by all accounts it is a far more difficult system to develop for. X-box by contrast represents a set PC type of environment with similar development needs where you don't have to account for widely varying consumer hardware choices. This means given time and users the ease of porting PC titles will lead to more content from US game designers that have largely kept to the PC to date.
It will be interseting to see what Sony does to pre-emt these strengths.... a late market PSII with budget price ( no more than Xbox), upgraded memory, and with the hard drive/ network card included might deliver a real coup de grace to Xbox sales of any sort and put M$ at a severe disadvantage with Xbox V2 if they don't launch with PS3 in the battle for the next genration whether its worthy or not.
I hate M$ and little annoying things in their Xbox release like extra $$ on top of a too expensive release price to unlock DVD playback and an utter crap controller design seem to doom their venture. However, M$ is in it for the long haul and regardless of the people who back it I would love to see a stronger US console development market develop.
I don't ask you to be me. I only ask you not expect me to be you.
Completely false. The GameCube doesn't even have a digital audio out. The best it can do is ProLogic II. The PS/2 can do pre-encoded Dolby Digital 5.1, good for cutscenes and DVDs, but nothing in-game. A (very) few games do in-game encoding to DTS, but this requires dedicating one of the two vector processors to sound encoding.
With the Xbox, the Dolby 5.1 encoding is done by two dedicated DSPs on the sound chip, and is automatic for all games. It's the only one with the grunt (and the licence from Dolby) to do it.
The network adapter and built-in hard drive don't mean swat because nobody will be taking full advantage of them until the other two consoles get them.
There are ports of PS/2 games that have had custom soundtrack playback added, from the hard drive. There are a number of games that require the hard drive on the Xbox, Morrowind and Project Ego being a couple - PC ports may well require it. And of course, there are still Xbox exclusives that use it to good and occasionally innovative effect, such as Blinx.
XBox Live is making very good use of the ethernet port. So are tunneling apps like XBConnect that let you play peer-to-peer online multiplayer Halo/Mech Assault/Tony Hawk/Unreal/whatever. Can't do that with just an iLink connector.
Hell, most developers still make XBox games that look like ass and by the time they figure out how to take advantage of that hardware, the PS3 will be out.
And I suppose developers will instantly know how to use the (considerably more complex) PS3 hardware to best effect? Quite the opposite - look at how long it took before the PS2 hardware got used properly. Xbox has a big advantage here, with its far easier/more familiar dev environment.
Most PS2 games look like ass too. It depends on the quality of the game, of course. Halo is very nice looking, Rallisport Challenge looks superb, Splinter Cell is amazing and Halo2 is looking awesome. PS3 is still a while away, and Xbox2 is also scheduled for that timeframe.
Why would anyone engrave "Elbereth"?
It was out 3 days after the Xbox in the US, but 5-6 months *earlier* than the Xbox in Japan. That's where it got its lead from.
Why would anyone engrave "Elbereth"?
Just not true:
"November marked the seventh consecutive month in which Xbox console sell-through outpaced that of Nintendo GameCube." GameZone.com
This was also confirmed by the author of "Opening the Xbox" Amazon who was interviewed on TechTV not too long ago who stated that total Xbox sales were significantly higher than the GC. BTW, the PS2 had an 18 month lead on Xbox and GC. A huge amount of time to build a game and player base.
Try supporting your "facts" next time.
Dewey, you fool! Your decimal system has played right into my hands!
I find these prospects very alarming, and thus the news of the Xbox's impending failure can't help but be a little bit of a relief.
Who said anything about impending failure? It has been speculated widely that Microsoft is taking at least $100 loss on each XBox, aiming for market penetration, so they can earn the money on game purchases. Even losing 300 million in this particular segment, Microsoft made nearly 3 Billion in profit from Office and Windows. Microsoft is in this for the long run, they are not going to shutdown XBox just because of a growth in operating loss. As a previous poster said, the only thing this points to is an increase in sales. If you are losing $100 per item, and you sell 100 items then you have a loss of $100,000. If you are losing $100 per item and you sell 1,000,000 then you have a loss of $100,000,000. I realize that is overly simplistic, but the point is that I think Microsoft probably views this increase in operating loss as a good thing.
Linux User #296508 Get Counted!
It would seem to me that they lose even more on an unsold unit.
/. logic quite a few times. So here goes my karma to offtopic.
OK. I've seen this kind of
Basic economics people. This kind of logic assumes that they have already built and purchased all of their units. Don't you guys think that Microsoft has some sort of inventory control? They don't build millions at a time and leave them sit around waiting for a sale. They build enough at a run to cover their projected inventory needs for Time Period X. If they had built all of them already, there would have been no shortage around the Christmas when they came out.
You're talking about two different things, and you're both right.
Gamecube is ahead of X-Box worldwide.
X-Box is ahead of the GCN domestically.
When one wants to make the X-Box look good, they quote US sales. When one wants to make the GCN look good, they quote worldwide sales.
I found GT3 to be severly lacking in any sort of collision engine. Not to say that the XBox's counterpart, Sega GT, is any better in the same department. When I can race around at near full-throttle cornering-by-wall, it's just not very good. Either way, if you are a fan of car/racing games, then XBox is the way to go. I don't know what titles are exclusive but currently I have played MotoGP, Project Gotham, Burnout, NFS:HP2, and they all look and play great, IMO.
I realize that there is less aversion towards Xbox here than there is towards their PC software, since most people can respect the fact that it's a great console, but I saw some people voice concern about how "the Xbox isn't stopping at videogames, they plan on having Xbox 2 be a multimedia center that would give them control like in the PC industry, scary".
What do you think of the alternatives though? By that I mean Sony, who have openly stated they plan on doing the very things MS wants to do. Allow me to showcase their current product:
-Far weaker system that doesn't even include basic graphical features like anti-aliasing and proper textures
-It doesn't support any internal save slot, so you're forced to buy a memory card
-It had no hard drive, and the fact that the upcoming one is an add-on (historically, not a single add-on EVER was a success) means that the amount of developers who will make their games utilize its features is about the same as that of PC developers who port their games to Linux
-It has no network port, so for online play you're forced to buy it seperately
I can't help but feel that Sony is holding the gaming industry back, while Microsoft gives gamers more than they've ever received from any manufacturer. Whatever happened to supporting the best product?