The 360's Towering Pricetag Explored

Last week Gamasutra had up a call for commentary on the revelations about the Xbox 360's pricing structure. This week, comments are available on the groaning pricetags gamers will have to endure if they want to jump on the next-gen bandwagon. This commentary is especially well seen, given that Gamestop has just come out with a 360 Bundle that clocks in at a whopping $1,199.83. From the article: "I don't think the prices for the $300 or the $400 bundles are unreasonable, but anyone who buys the $300 bundle is going to end up paying more on expensive accessories. $99 for a 20 gig hard disk? You can get a 250 gig hard disk for less than that! If you don't want to get the hard disk, you have to pay $39.99 to save your game."

Comments

Re:Heh. The Circle is Complete

[Txiasaeia]

Show me a high-end gaming PC with 11 titles for $1,200. Geez. You pay that for an average PC without any good software.

Do I detect a CHALLENGE???

DFI nF4 Ultra-Infinity Socket 939 - $98
AMD Athlon 64 3000+ Venice - $146
Samsung Spinpoint SP2014N 200GB ATA133 - $86
MSI NX6600GT-TD128E Geforce 6600GT 128MB - $169 (comes with XIII, so there's one game)
CORSAIR ValueSelect 1GB (2 x 512MB) 184-Pin DDR SDRAM Unbuffered DDR 400 (PC 3200) - $90
Seasonic S12-330 PSU (22a on 12v channel, 330w max) - $59
In-Win S508T case - $53 (includes okay power supply for backup)
Logitech MX510 mouse - $28
Logitech cheap keyboard - $8
NEC DVD Burner - $50.

(I'm assuming that, since the 360 doesn't come with any way to watch/listen to games, that this computer doesn't come with a monitor or speakers.)

Total cost: $787, including one game. That leaves $413 for ten games (from ebgames.com), so here we go:

Guild Wars: $50
Advent Rising: $30
Madden NFL 06: $40
Battlefield 2: $50
Doom 3: $30
HL2 - GOTY: $50
C&C Generals Deluxe: $30
Empire Earth II: $50
Rome: Total War: $50
UT2004: $30

Total cost for games: $410. Leaves you $3 for a snack while you're assembling your system. So, instead of bitching and moaning about which component doesn't work, or this and that game sucks, can you see that, in theory, it's perfectly possible to spend $1200 on a better-than-average PC system with eleven games?