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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?"
In Japan, they probably use the XBOX as a room divider.
Nice Engrish
I like big butts and I cannot lie.
Wonder what this means for all the current Xbox Mod Chips?
:)
It means that MS profits for next quarter will be higher from all the people flooding the market buying old XBoxes.
Obvious. The current mod chips are doomed, of course.
If Microsoft goes through the trouble of reconfiguring the case, then rejiggering the motherboard is trivial. Wouldn't be surprised if they put a bullet-proof kryptonite cover over the chips or soemthing.
Now what will I use to crack open coconuts?
It would have been much cheaper for Microsoft to bundle some of their own games, like Halo, with the Xbox. Instead they chose to bundle two games which Sega made exclusive to Xbox, and which didn't sell very well in their own right: Sega GT and Jet Set Radio Future.
My guess is that Microsoft did this to appease Sega and boost sales of their titles, in order to keep Sega making Xbox exclusives.
Increase the size of your XBOX in 10 days with our Herbal XBOX Viagra!
Trolling is a art,
The only logical answer is Sega. There is no other developer out there that is giving the Xbox any kind of serious support in JPN. Xbox is only getting games from them that are on all three systems or nothing much at all. MS needs to figure something out with the JPN market if they hope to really fight in the Consoling gaming market. I don't see them getting any major head way though (but that doesn't upset me at all) due to these already tight partnerships: Nintendo has Capcom, Namco, Square, Sega (amusment vision) Sony has Square/Enix I know I am not listing all the JPN developers..but those are the big buys (for the most part)
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MS bought Rare in late Sept. for $375 million. I wonder how much of the $348 million reported as losses can be attributed to that acquisition.
Like them or not, MS is in the console business for the long haul whether they turn a profit within the next 3 years or not.
It doesn't say XBox per se, but the division that makes XBox, along with other products is losing more money. For all we know, they're developing all kinds of crazy stuff, which is why losses are larger.
Microsoft's Home and Entertainment segment, which includes the Xbox, PC games and the company's TV products, posted an operating loss of $348 million in the quarter on revenue of $1.28 billion. A year earlier it had a loss of $180 million on revenue of $833 million.
MS has a history of going long-term with high-profile products, and it's paid off for them. This venture was no different, and losses were expected. Maybe if this story was posted say, 3-4 years down the road, it'd be newsworthy, since that's when MS is expected to BREAK-EVEN with the Xbox.
This sounds like editor & zealot bait - fanning the flames of hate. Woo-hoo, MS is losing money?
Woo-diddley-hoo, they knew it before we did. Get a grip.
i'm amazed that i survived - an airbag saved my life.
Coming from a big PS/2 background and advocate, I was converted to the Xbox from my brother. For the same price of a PS/2, I got Dolby 5.1 in all games, network adapter, built-in hard drive, etc. The Xbox is very cool, and from what I've read, the #2 console. So despite the current losses, I think there is a lot Sony has to live up to in its next gen console to even catch up to what the Xbox now offers. And #2 ain't bad for a 15 month console life span!
Not necessarily-- could be spending more on R&D.
You mean giving more money to Apple?
Trolling is a art,
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.
I hope not.
While I am not one to engage in schadenfreude for its own sake and I certainly support people's efforts in the area of embedded technology in certain parts of the home, I think these losses are good news on the whole. It's not that Mr. Gates's presence in the video game console market is itself really that important in real life - it's that Microsoft has repeatedly exhibited expansionist tendencies, and it's been pointed out that the very name "Xbox" is intended to mean "Anything Box" (ie. the "X" is a cheeky metasyntactic variable).
Not to be a conspiracist, but to me this implies that they have much more on their minds than video games. Imagine if their intention is to further expand beyond the digital media space they've so far occupied and on into real-world objects? Imagine if they make something that could be used to (mis)create toast? 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.
Could I interest anyone in some toast?
Help, tell me what to think!!!
It's Monday, so we like video games, so this is bad news. But it's February, so this is good news. But the day of the week is odd, so we're supposed to only bash Sony and Blizzard. But the day matches the 2-digit year, so we only especially make fun of Macintosh users. But it was posted AFTER lunch, so this is good news.
Got it?
I bet you when the Xbox2025 comes out and is the last console on the market, MicrosoftAolTimeWarnerDisney will jack the price up to $2500. Which should just about offset the AOL losses...
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
Are you kidding me? If MS legalizes the mod chips then the Linux folk would completely abandon interest. They're only into it because they think they're thwarting "The Man".
This isn't a troll either-it's the truth. I hope the system succeeds (I think it has, to a large degree) well into the next generation.
As much as people love to hate on MS, they've changed the console world forever. There won't be any more consoles released without a hard drive-it changes everything once you've used it. The same thing applies to the network jack-plug it in and you're off and running.
I know it's been said time and time again, but we play the games. Not the consoles.
If you could be anything you want, I'll bet you'd be disappointed.
I thought you worked at Sega?
How's your Smell-o-vision project going?
Your educational background is pretty impressive too.
What about Super Marx Brothers?
(Thanks Klaruz.)
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!
Slashdot LOVES articles that cast the Xbox in a poor light.
Here's my take:
Let's just say they 'cut bait' and stop production on the Xbox. What happens?
My 8-10 games continue to function.
The 6-8 games I'd like but don't yet own get CHEAP. (we have an Atari 2600 and 80 odd carts that we bought for pennies on the dollar in garage sales)
My Xbox still makes a killer DVD player.
I dunno 'bout you, but I feel I got my money's worth. On a dollar per hour basis, it's been a pretty good purchase.
And yet, I doubt it's future is in jeopardy less than 4 months after announceing Xbox Live.
"Draco dormiens nunquam titillandus."
The version 1.1 XBOX that started shipping in September of 2002 was hacked in about 1-2 weeks. This means that unless MSFT has really upped the ante with security, it will be more of a fun challenge to the MOD community, rather than a deterrent.
It's been 6 months since they've changed anything significant on the XBOX, so I'm sure the MOD community is waiting for a new challenge.
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.
"You mean giving more money to Apple? ;)"
Man, I had this vision of a white XBOX controller with only one action button. *shudders*
Oh, yeah (almost forgot)...Micro$haft SUCKS!
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.
I'm sorry, but this is more than $500 million MS has lost so far on Xbox, and that is big news no matter how you slice it. Does anyone honestly think MS got into this business in order to lose money? What would be the point? There are two possible reasons for MS to have gotten into the video game business, and only two:
1. To make profits. This is self explanatory.
2. To use the system to leverage their Windows business somehow, selling the system at a loss in order to eventually put some modified version of Media Center in your living room.
They're failing at #1, and as far a I know, #2 would be illegal - it's basically exactly what they were found guilty of in court already.
No company can continue to lose money at something forever. I'm sorry, but this is a publicly traded company and if I were holding MS shares there's not really anything MS could do at this point to convince me that getting into this business has been a good idea. Sony's profitable, Nintendo's profitable, MS is losing *large* amounts of money. What's wrong with this picture?
Almost lost in this story is that MS is now saying they're barely going to hit the low end of their sales forecasts. You think they expected to lose $384 million? They probably wouldn't have if they'd sold as many consoles as they'd hoped - this means less software sold, and fewer royalty payments. The fact is the Xbox is not doing well, however MS wants to spin it.
And regarding this Japanese company they're "propping up" - I would honestly doubt it's Sega, though it's possible. However, all of Sega's recently-released Xbox games were announced over a year ago (at the E3 prior to the Xbox's launch), and the only recent Xbox game I can recall being announced by Sega is Virtua Cop 3. That's honestly not a lot of support. More likely, the investment is in Tecmo - which has been devoting almost exclusive support to Xbox ever since its release, and which has two of the highest-profile titles ever released for the console - Dead or Alive 3 and Dead or Alive Extreme Beach Volleyball, not to mention the recently announced Dead or Alive: Code Cronus and the hinted-at Dead or Alive 4. All Xbox-exclusive. Sega, by contrast, hasn't released any million-sellers for Xbox, not even close, and hasn't announced much for the system lately.
This could actually be a good thing for two reasons:
1) Game makers would make games that are actually worth playing. Nothing's worse than shelling out $50 for a stinker and being stuck with selling it back as a used game for $15 if you;re lucky.
2) Making games with longer playing times and/or high replayability. As you said, a 20 hour game can be beaten easily within a rental period. This is not so with longer, more involved games that have a lot of hidden content in addition to the main story, such as Grand Theft Auto. (Companies like Gamefly.com that offer unlimited game rentals for $20 a month change that argument though, it's still cheaper to rent two games and keep them for 2 months than it is to buy both and then resell them)
I dont see Blockbuster putting anyone out of business until they can a) offer a monthly unlimited rental plan and b) keep games that are actually worth playing in stock. (And don't forget that there are like 2000+ blockbuster stores un the US, with each of them buying 50-90% of the games for every available console...that's a pretty good subsidy, many of those games are awful and wouldn't have sold near that many copies)
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imagine... imagine. Let me explain in clear terms. I worked in the game industry for 6 years, during the 3dO times, for example.
There is NO DOUBT. The industry thinks that desktops are not the true consumer device and suspect they never will be! The true consumer general purpose computer is expected to be a console, it has to look right for the Stereo/VCR rack, it probably can't have a keyboard shipped with it because people fear the keyboard, but it will probably have to have a way to sneak one on (USB, etc).
This is strongly believed and the only question is When, and What Price Point Wins. 3DO was an early bet, proven too early.
Anyway, there is NO doubt (in my mind at least), that the Xbox is a specific attempt to use the Wintel platform to fill that imagined role as the ubiquitous "general" computer. It's also an attempt to own this platform, which so far they have just taken part in (a major, but not controlling, part), that is to de-commodotize it.
Further, it's the smartest thing about the Xbox. Having to enter through the gaming industry is rough, however, very rough. It might have been easier to just sell the Xbox as a cheap PC to begin with...?
-pyrrho
Man, I had this vision of a white XBOX controller with only one action button. *shudders*
Yeah, but at least it matches my shoes and my VW.
"If he thinks he can hide and run from the United States and our allies, he's sorely mistaken." Bush on bin Laden