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Next-Gen Gaming to be Uber Expensive
The CNN column Game Over is running an article discussing the costs associated with going Next-Gen. Using the Xbox 360 as an example, they calculate that to get the full next-generation experience would cost almost $2000. From the article: "The first test comes this fall, when Microsoft debuts the Xbox 360. The company hasn't announced a price for the machine, but several industry observers believe it could cost $399 -- $100 more than new consoles have traditionally cost."
The article makes parents think you have to get HDTV. You can play all platforms on a Standard Def TV. I think it is poor choice or price display.
"I cannot think of any need in childhood as strong as the need for a father's protection." -- Sigmund Freud
I might be wrong now, but I always believed that the largest demographic for video games and consoles were teenagers and college students who either rely on their parents to buy them or who don't have the money to buy them thanks to tuition costs etc.
.. what parent in their right mind is going to shell out this kind of money for their kids?!
.. as much as I may want a NextGen console .. and even if I could afford one .. I would never spend over $200 - $300 on a console.
If a console costs $500, doesn't include any games, and the games are $60 - $80
I realize that there are lot of hard core gamers who shell out $800 for the latest graphics cards and spend a lot on cooling and PC mods etc.. but I'd like to believe they are a minority.. I guess I'm wrong as it seems that's who MS and Sony are targetting now.
All I know is
XBOX 360 still does analog video out so there is no REQUIREMENT for HDTV. It is merely an upgrade path you can choose to follow if you want to.... as your finances allow.
To get the full PC gaming next gen experience (64 bit everything, SLI cards, etc.) it could cost me over 4,000 easily.
A cup of coffee used to cost about 25 cents, now they cost over $3.00... when will people realize this and stop supporting Starbucks? Seriously though, this is not meant as an attack... I agree to a point with your post.
I think this round of consoles is going to come down to the people and where they vote with their dollars. Either people are going to support the cheaper, more "fun" based Revolution or are going to be willing to buy expensive media centers that are also much more complex. Sure hardcore gamers will go for all three or their brand-loyal console regardless of price/performance/games but the average gamer and family I think will be voting on the Revolution.
I'm really hoping this is the case, and knock the rust off of the gaming industry and force companies to focus on the games and not the hardware and basically expensive tech. demos. This current trend needs to stop and now is the time to show it to the industry by supporting the one console with true gaming in mind and a reasonable pricepoint.
http://teasphere.wordpress.com - A little spot of tea
That's what you get for letting production costs run wild on everything from good games to crappy ones (a la Hollywood), for assuming that advertising the hell out of even shitty games that you shouldn't be making in the first place will help them sell (a la Hollywood), for paying out the ass to create games around licenses that ultimately nobody cares about (a la Hollywood), for bickering back and forth about and ultimately creating a regular business practice of obtaining outlandishly far-reaching exclusivity deals (thanks EA & sports leagues), for letting Microsoft gain any kind of leverage in the industry (a la every other tech industry), for insisting that console and PC gaming experiences are exactly the same (thanks MS & America), and overall for thinking that you're rockstars when you're really just geeks & PHBs in suits instead of real creative types that would be doing this stuff even without all the $$$ twinkling in your eyes.
This comment is targeted more at the American games industry, but with Europeans like Molyneux and Japanese like Kojima, there are signs that the aforementioned problems are unfortunately global trends. Even Nintendo has had to bend to these market conditions. (LoZ: Twilight Princess looks great, but not every game is destined for the same kind of greatness and guaranteed market success, so not every game should cost as much to produce or hype up.)
Katamari Damacy is an exception, not a rule as far as the cost:quality ratio goes. That is a shame. One can only hope that the portable market keeps great ideas alive (as is always the case with constrained platforms). Things look okay for now, what with Zookeeper, Meteos, Lumines, Puyo Pop Fever, a bunch of the upcoming immersive DS RPGs, and other inexpensive but creative and fun games around. But when every portable thinks that it has to be PS2 level or higher, I fear that even handhelds will have no respite from the Hollywood-styled creative rut that the big companies have imposed on us and themselves. $40 for PSP games (and even some DS games) is a very bad sign.
I mean how many times can you play Mario and Zelda!
More than I can stand to play Halo, at least.
There are more than just one "Mario" game rehashed over and over. Every Mario platformer adds something new, and there are the many many spinoffs. The only thing those share with the original are the character, Super Smash Brothers, Mario Party, Mario Golf, Mario Tennis, Mario Kart, whatever that new one is, they're all very different (besides the mascot) and always introduce new gameplay elements in each revision.
Compare this to several other console games that, while they might even be completely different titles, their gameplay is always the same and unfun.
The 360 might have more general purpose CPU power than the cell, but we don't want a PC, we want a games/media box, and the PS3 has oodles more ability there. Physics, graphics, AI, and sound all can be done highly effectively with the cell. MS is also spreading FUD when it calls the SPUs DSPs, they are a lot more flexible than that. In addition, the SPU's are much more integrated than the 360's 3 cores, with the ability to read and write each others memory.
The GPU is a tough call. Little hard info is known about either, but they are going to be in the same ballpark. I don't think a machine with dual 1080p output (the PS3) is going to lag too much.
Memory bandwidth is also a tough call. It used to be chip+cache+RAM+video RAM, but these designs are different. Again, a machine with the video output and storage of the PS3 is probably going to be able to make use of it.
I do agree with the quote at the bottom of that page, though; "However, hardware performance, while important, is only a third of the puzzle. Xbox 360 is a fusion of hardware, software and services. Without the software and services to power it, even the most powerful hardware becomes inconsequential."
"A language that doesn't affect the way you think about programming, is not worth knowing" - Alan Perlis
Last time around the dollar was considerably stronger than it is now.
If you compare against Pounds Sterling, for instance, One US Dollar back in 2001 would get you around 72p. Nowadays it'll only get you about 54p, so versus the Pound it's lost about 25% of its value, which coincides remarkably well with the $300 -> $400 change.
Of course, the Xbox isn't manufactured in the UK, so the numbers will be rather different with respect to whatever countries it is manufactured in, but it is a trend. The Dollar just isn't worth as much any more and although you are to an extent buffered by your sheer size, if the Dollar doesn't increase soon you will find things getting more expensive.
From what was shown at E3, and not taking into account all the theoretical pre-rendered b/s... it looks like the machines are damn near equal except for in the realm of shaders. The PS3 looks to be able to do twice as much if not more there, and shaders will make a big difference in image fideltiy...but only graphics whores like me will probably notice...The average Joe won't be able to tell the difference between the two, and probably not the Revolution either....but that's yet to be seen. Sony's spreading just as much FUD and Hype with the Cell as MS.
"A truly wise man realizes he knows nothing."
Microsoft has, on the other hand, shown running games and let people actually play those games.
The 360 is arguably as "powerful" as the PS3. It also has one thing that Sony either isn't interested in, or can't fathom how to produce....XBox Live. The new Live service alone is enough to make me consider a 360 before a PS3.
Believe the Sony "Umpteen million times faster" hype if you want, but please remember that they pulled the same bait-and-switch shenanigans before the PS2 came out. "Super computers!", "Export controls because they're so powerful!", "The dancing from Final Fantasy 8 in *real time*!", "Sadam using them for TERRORISM!", etc... ad infinitum. Did you ever see a PS2 game that came close to following through on all of the pre-release promises/specs that Sony was spewing? I never did.
That's only true if the console manufacturer has total control over the engineering of the hardware. Playstations and Nintendo consoles can be reengineered over the life of the hardware to maximize die space and minimize production costs only because Sony and Nintendo have total control over every transistor being used.
Microsoft, on the other hand, bought "off the shelf", so to speak. nVidia was never going to give Intel the designs for their GPU and motherboard chips. Likewise Intel wasn't going to share their CPU designs with nVidia. Microsoft had no way to get below the $180 price point because they couldn't combine any of the guts of the XBox to make it cheaper to manufacture.
The big question this leads to is, "Why doesn't Sony execute the knock-out blow and price the PS2 much lower than the XBox?"
Indeed
Why would they, though? If people are willing to pay $180 for an XBox then they are willing to pay $180 for a PS2. So, Sony probably isn't losing any money on PS2 boxes now. Instead they are probably laughing all the way to the bank with the (at least for consoles) incredibly high profit margins they are seeing....all thanks to Microsoft. This is probably why the PSP is $250 instead of a more reasonable $100 or $120. Why would Sony undercut the sales of their PS2s with a handheld when they can keep the price high (relative to the unwavering price of consoles over the past year) and rake in extra money.
Don't be so sure about that. The HardOCP article about the GPU (here) indicates that there are 192 separate FPUs built into the GPU's "Smart 3D Memory" subsystem. If nothing else, weird new features like that make it relatively pointless to "predict" relative capabilities of the consoles prior to release.
Slashdot quality declines as the number of hot grits posts decreases. - Provolt's Law, Apr-09-2005
Let me explain this the best I can.
Every console launch sells out. (Well, except the PSP). The colsole manufacturers know this, and take it for granted.
If they know for a fact that the next generation console will sell out at $199.99, then why not up the price?
Will it still sell out at $299.99? Yep. So what's it hurt to up it some more? Will it still sell out at $399.99? Yep. How about $499.99?
They extimate how high a yield they'll have for the initial shippments, and what demand will be. Then they price it as high as they think it'll sell out with the early adopters.
Once they start shipping them in more massive quantities, prices will drop, as the early adopters who are willing to pay $500 each will have all been sold a console or two.
Bottom line is, if the initial release is only 50,000 units, what does it hurt to launch at $400 and stay there? If it'll sell out, then they'd be foolish not to.
This is the most simple form of supply and demand, people. Come on!
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