Consoles Sluggish To Get Online In Europe

Thanks to Evil Avatar for pointing to a Reuters article discussing the relatively slowly developing online console gaming market in Europe. According to the article, "Since launching in mid-March, [Microsoft] has signed up to Xbox Live 50,000 European gamers across much of Western Europe." As a comparison, "Microsoft and Sony Corp have.. [signed up] over one million subscribers between them in the U.S. since launching services in the second half of 2002." Although it's early days for Europe, will the many separate markets/countries and varying broadband penetration help or hinder the big console manufacturers?

Comments

I don't think there's *any* service here in Oz

[Kris_J]

Remember that earlier article about slow boardband pickup in Australia? Well, because of it on-line gaming on the whole is pretty quiet here. As far as I know, since the Dreamcast on-line experience was ballsed-up so badly, no one has dared try again with consoles.

Credit cards

[SmallFurryCreature]

In Holland at least credit cards are not nearly as widespread as they seem to be in the US. We have an excellent free debit card system in place. Of course this cannot be used with any of the online style systems (games or consoles). They all require a credit card. I suppose a simple bank tranfer (cheap safe and secure) is to difficult by them.

Why pay for a credit card then pay intrest when you can get better service (protection against theft) for free?