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Dvorak On The Future Of The Xbox
Thanks to PC Magazine for its John Dvorak-authored editorial discussing his view of the present and future for Microsoft's Xbox game console. Dvorak rages: "Microsoft has over $56 billion in the bank and should be dominating the console market. Unfortunately, the company's overall strategies have failed and may continue to fail, leaving the Xbox in the dustbin with the last great American hope for a super game machine, the 3DO box from circa 1993", before continuing: "I think it can be argued that high-expectation syndrome was partially responsible for the deaths of both the 3DO machine and Sega. It definitely plays into the Xbox story... Compare this rollout to the original Sony PlayStation 1's debut... it just kind of appeared and worked its way to the top by attrition." He ends by musing: "Keeping the Xbox alive is important to Microsoft. Its pride and prestige are at stake... We will see an Xbox II. Whether it fulfills Microsoft's dream or becomes a collector's item remains to be seen."
What color is the sky in Dvorak's world? The Xbox is outselling the Playstation 2. Xbox parties have quickly replaced LAN parties, and the fact that you can mod the hell out of it has almost turned soldering into a fad. The only place I can see the Xbox as hurting Microsoft is that PC gaming may suffer as a result. But what does Microsoft care if they already control most of the PC world through Windows anyway? If anything, the Xbox is increasing Microsoft's stronghold in the home.
This written from a Gamecube fan.
The World is Yours.
As a self-proclaimed Apple expert, he:
- Predicted the death of Apple for years and years,
- Predicted that the stratospherically successful iBook would be a disaster,
- Most recently, he predicted in March of 2003 that Apple would move the Mac to Intel in the next 12-18 months. Apple's got 3 months left to do it... what do you think the odds are?
The guy should change his name to "Anonymous Coward" for the amount of trolling he does. So now he's an Xbox "expert," eh?Dvorak?
"It is our blasphemy which has made us great, and will sustain us, and which the gods secretly admire in us." - Zelazny
Dvorak is slowly becoming the Nostrodamus of the high-tech industry. I think it's about time he started writing apocalyptic theories in book form and sold them through thinkgeek. Meh, he certainly doesn't deserve space on any part of slashdot.
schild
editor, f13.net
the company has not been able to get worldwide sales, especially Japanese sales [..] but it still has not been popular enough to become a profit center for Microsoft.
I never remember Microsoft stating that they intended to make a profit on the first Xbox. It was their introduction to the market - and for a debut product they've done remarkably well. They've done better than Sega and (arguably) better than Nintendo.
The product itself is rather good for a first effort (controller slip-ups excepted). It's definitely the platform with the most longitivity due to the superior hardware specifications.
All this has recently been compounded by Microsoft's decision to cancel or delay the release of its online game True Fantasy Live Online.
A game company cancelling a game is not a big deal in the industry. Heck, I've worked in the games industry for 6 years - and been working on 2 titles when they were killed in various stages of development. Cancelling a title isn't a death-blow to a company as large as Microsoft.
Microsoft has over $56 billion in the bank and should be dominating the console market. Unfortunately, the company's overall strategies have failed and may continue to fail
They're doing very, very well. Their main competitor is Sony. Sony is not going to take competition sitting down and has been fighting just as dirty as Microsoft, especially on their home turf in Japan. Microsoft has made impressive headway - done well in the US and Europe, but absolutely slaughtered the competition in some markets like Australia.
It's not like Sony hasn't made some mistakes - the PSX (Playstation 2 media center) pre-emptive strike against a possible Xbox 2 based "Media Center" was a disaster for Sony. There's no reason at all to doubt Microsoft's future in the console market.
The 3DO machine was the first 32-bit console; there were great games for it and it had powerful underpinnings. Its $700 price tag was probably the main thing that killed it, but it also suffered from the same problem that the Microsoft Xbox has suffered from: high-expectation syndrome.
Huh? 3DO comparisons aren't valid. 3DO was DOA because it wasn't marketed towards kids (who couldn't afford it), adult gamers weren't interested because there were no games (and Sony hadn't yet created the adult gaming market) - AND the 3DO didn't live up to the hype. But by all accounts from a consumer and developer perspective, the Xbox hit all expectations placed on it. I certainly have no regrets about my purchase, or about developing for it. I've played some great games, have some great games, had 2 titles published - and there are a number of games that I'm looking forward to.
I had experts come on my radio show and tell me flat-out that the Xbox would become the number-one gaming console, with Sony number two and Sega and Nintendo probably dropping out. [..] The relative lack of hot games reinforced the negative attitude, as did the promises that many of the hot games on the Sony platform would be "ported"--and when they were ported, they'd somehow be better. Some were marginally better, but not enough to change anything.
So somebody in marketing exaggerated a product's claims to a member of the mainstream media. Yawn. Really, were you born yesterday? Calling yourself a "journalist" would be some sort of exaggeration, but I don't blame you for trying.
However, you seem to forget that there weren't many good games when the Playstation 1 launched either. Sure, there was "Wipeout", but the PC version (or "port" as you seem to think that's a dirty word) looked much better. The killer Playstation 1 game, "Metal Gear Solid" began development when the machine was being designed. According to lore, they had a prototype running when the hardware was only at 30% of it's final speed. It was *several years* after the launch of the PS1 until that game eventually came out.
And it's the same situation on the Xbox - only last year and this
You know you're wrong when even Slashdot doesn't agree with your anti-ms bashing.
And considering how much money Microsoft is losing now, I don't think Microsoft will wait 12 years and will almost certainly give up before then.
I'd like to draw your attention to this Cringely article. It's a (long) opinion piece on MS' business model. Two points are made about the way MS works: 1) MS has incentives to increase losses. Yeah, you read that correctly. Without losses to balance off their massive growth in the Office/Windows department, they'd plateau and go nowhere. 2) Microsoft has basically saturated the PC market, and sucked as much profit as humanly possible from computer sales. Thus, they have to move into new markets.
Keeping the top two points in mind, the X-Box seems to be doing a perfect job of what MS wants. Now, I certainly don't expect you to whole-heartedly agree with the above article, but do at least read it...
--LordPixie