Slashdot Mirror
Xbox Price Cuts Confirmed
Kotaku notes that the suspected price cuts to the various Xbox 360 systems have been confirmed. Xbox Live's Major Nelson posted the new prices ($199 for the Arcade, $299 for the Pro, and $399 for the Elite) and pointed out a BusinessWeek story discussing the changes. The price cuts will take effect on September 5th.
"Here's to hoping that helps Microsoft's recent hardware sales woes." - Kotaku
Hardware sales woes? Its the summer season, a time that has historically shown a decline in sales due to the fact not many publishers release at this time. September through December are the hot months for releasing a game and a perfect time to lower a console price to make the system more appealing.
I love this argument. I have both a Wii and a 360, and the 360's been played during exactly three weeks in the last six months. Once for Viva Pinata, once for GTA4, and again for GTA a few months later. Compared to that, the Wii is in constant use. I'm still playing through Mario Galaxy and Metroid Prime 3, I've recently beat Lost Winds, and Smash Bros is a constant obsession, especially when anyone comes over. Boom Blox gets played every time there's anyone over as well. My wife uses My Pokemon Ranch to store excess Pokemon from the DS games every single day.
So there's my anecdotal evidence. My 360 has a thick layer of dust on it; my Wii is played regularly and even comes with me when I visit my friends. It's possible that the reason I still have so many games left to play is that I have maybe 2 hours or so per week left over for single-player gaming, but this whole "Wiis just sit around gathering dust" bullshit is really baffling to me.
In my opinion, the only thing the Wii is lacking is a good splitscreen shooter. Red Steel is crap, and Metal of Honor: Heroes 2 dashed my hopes by being online-only. I hate this stupid online-only trend this generation.
You can mod your friends, you can mod your nose, but you can't mod your friend's nose.
I get that /. is home to those who might be considered (or even consider themselves) "hardcore," but I'm still perplexed by the characterization of the Xbox 360 Arcade as "stripped down." That version includes everything needed to start playing 360 games including a memory card (256MB), and they've even been packing in a wireless controller; the original no-hard-drive unit had no memory card and a wired controller. And this price cut isn't insignificant - the drop from $280 to $200 is 28.6%, which is huge and makes the 360 - even if one goes out and buys new video cables for high-definition - cheaper than the Wii. So, Microsoft is including more stuff than they used to and charging significantly less money. That seems more like "a good deal" than "stripped down."
:)
Disclaimer: I love the Wii, respect the value of the PS3 for those who want Blu-ray and sold my 360 last year.
That's some shoddy logic there. Extreme oversimplification. The 360 has lost a lot of money due to the technical problems. The logical conclusion there is to fix those problems and not make the same mistakes, yet you seem willing to declare a microsoft console as fundamentally a bad idea that can never work. Tell me it's not just because you're upset about the state of PC gaming.
PC gaming is dying out because people like to play games rather than wasting time on computer maintenece. I know what your opinion of us must be, but I get no joy out of installing new software or hardware so I can play the latest game. I could definitely learn how to do that, but I much prefer plugging my console into the TV, putting the disc in, and playing immediately. I play games to relax, not to do work. MS spending money on the PC market would be a waste.
I also have to point out that the PS3 is not doing great either. You'd have me believe that the next console is going to be just nintendo out there alone?
That's the sad thing about the Wii, it's in a small slump because developpers laughed at it (now the assholes are paying with blood), and Nintendo can't release smash hits every year.
The Wii's been out for almost 2 years, which is longer than the development cycle of a game, so I don't think that's it. And Nintendo has a 30 year history of screwing over developers, so I think there's a natural resistance to develop for them on the part of some people. There's also the problem with the Wii being underpowered in terms of hardware, which discourages multiplatform development.
I think this is more important than you are giving it credit for...
Most of us still have not moved on into HD. For those of us looking into it (like me), we know it's more than simply buying an HD TV; without a useful HD source (over the air is nice, but I doubt it's compelling enough to invest in the television). In other words, what's the point unless you get a blu-ray player?
Sure, you can upscan your old DVDs, which we'll do a lot of, I'm sure, but when I'm adding up the total to buy a complete HD system, I'm including the blu-ray player as well as the TV and a I know I'll need a new entertainment center to fit it all.
The reason I'm going on about it is because every review of blu-ray players seems to come to the same conclusion: the PS3 is a better blu-ray player than the standalone units, and it's cheaper, and on top of that... it's a PS3, so you get a gaming system, too!
I wasn't even considering it; I'd have gone right ahead and sunk $300 or $400 on a standalone player when I can get an 80GB PS3 for that amount (plus $20 for a remote) and people are saying it's actually a better player than the standalone units (starts up faster, for one thing).
So it's not just gaming; people who might not otherwise have gotten one (me) might end up getting it just for bluray; and since I do play games, I'll use it for gaming, too.
Win-win.
Stupid sexy Flanders.