Slashdot Mirror
Project Natal Pricing and Release Date Revealed
tekgoblin writes "According to Edge-online.com, their source says that we can expect Microsoft's Project Natal to cost around $149. 'The figure for the standalone unit is significantly higher than a previous sub-£50 estimate, but less than pricing recently suggested by European retailers. It’s also more expensive than Sony’s Natal rival, Move, which will be available later this year with a game for less than $100.'"
not (as it might have been, for all I knew) a new compiler, for example.
Slashdot summaries have this annoying habbit of assuming that because the author is thoroughly familiar with the technology, everyone else is too and you can just reel of project names with no further explaination.
Quattuor res in hoc mundo sanctae sunt: libri, liberi, libertas et liberalitas.
This pretty much sums it up:
http://www.xbox.com/en-us/live/projectnatal/
Basically body mapping with face recognition. Quite sweet, but the devil is going to be in the software written for it and unlike the Wii, it isn't part of the 'base' system, so software that is written for Natal will have a smaller user base and will probably cost more.
xbox - $199
xbox-live - $50
game - $60
game-pack - $15
controller - $50
(pre)natal - $150
This is why I only play chess. Chess is always the latest version, and you can't get fucked pricing. There use to be a time where almost every game was amazing( Think Dreamcast. Powerstone 2 anyone? ) and it wouldn't hurt your wallet too much if the damn thing were to stop working.
The Xbox 360 Arcade is $199 with two games.
This is the same source that (accurately) tipped them off about Gears of War 3. Edge has a history of only running very robust leaks. They broke news of a clamshell, rechargable, light-up GBA several months before the GBA SP was revealed.
No kidding!!! What do you say at this point?
A camera? In your house? Connected to a computer not controlled by the owner? That can do individual facial recognition? No fucking way.
This is going to be a massive hit with the "privacy, that's for squares who don't use facebook" crowd, though.
Car analogies break down.
From the article regarding the European retailers' rumoured price tag:
At least three Swedish retailers – including Game - have attached a 1,499 Swedish Kronor ($197 / £133) price tag to the standalone version of the Xbox 360 product, reports Kotaku.
With the current follow up from TFA:
The figure for the standalone unit is significantly higher than a previous sub-£50 estimate, but less than pricing recently suggested by European retailers.
So, I'm gonna throw it out there and suggest that none of these people are close to journalists. If they were, they would know that these products are often a lot more price-y in Europe than in the United States. Add to that, Scandinavia has the highest cost of living in the world on average. So that would make sense for the Natal to cost $197 in Sweden.
So how in the hell did anyone think that the price tag of this product in Sweden would have anything to do with its price tag in say... the United States? If this is the journalism rising in the place of newspapers, then I want print back!
Clicked pie.
I'll wait for the second or third iteration. Never buy a Microsoft product at version 1, nobody here could probably forgotten that, right?
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
The previously-leaked pricing has nothing to do with the estimate they're reporting. They're mentioning it because it's background for the article. Journalists often report the background on a story when writing an article to provide context for the particular news item they are reporting. While this may be a mind-blowing novelty for you, it's actually a component of the journalistic style which has been around for quite some time.
Edge is a print magazine which has been running since the early 1990s.
No kidding!!! What do you say at this point?
If it costs $149 in the U.S., it's going to cost £140-£160 in the U.K.
-- 'The' Lord and Master Bitman On High, Master Of All
"The last foray of MS into this trying to sell games to "casual gamers" was in holidays 2008 IIRC, and it was such a huge failure everybody in the game industry just do as if it never happened."
What exactly are you referring too here? About the only real serious foray into casual gaming Microsoft has made so far with the XBox was with the 1 vs 100 release which was a resounding success with millions of unique players having played and over 100,000 people in a single game. There have been a few casual games released, but they were never done as part of any full blown casual gaming strategy. The major interface change the console saw might be seen as a step towards the casual market I suppose, but again it only ever seemed intended to lay the groundwork for future attempts at pulling in casuals (i.e. 1 vs 100).
"A killer app like Wii Fit isn't even at 50 % of Wii sold, and it's already selling at amazing levels. That's the apps Natal needs to succeed, not just say "it has this and that and can do that"."
Yet your entire argument is based on mere speculation that Microsoft doesn't have any such killer app.
The fact is, anything regarding what will/wont be a success with regards to Natal is mere speculation right now and nothing more. Again, E3 in a few weeks will be the real test for MS to show whether they actually do have something people will want or not. It's only after that point any serious discussion can be had about how worthwhile and succesful Natal may or may not be. Of course, even then the real test wont come until the post release sales figures start rolling in.
Why is the parent post flamebait? It's a very well known phenomenon that when US products go on sale in the UK, the exchange rate may as well be 1:1.
Does Natal burst into flames if you stand in front of the camera with a controller in your hand? Maybe that's why the price is higher than expected.
Whether or not there is some sort of god, I'm not supposed to say/god is a word and the argument ends there-Smog
At that kind of striking distance, I can see the possibility of a Wii price drop to $150 for epic marketing potential. Why pay $150 for just the motion controller when you can get a whole motion-controlled console for the same price?
I'm not saying Nintendo will necessarily drop the price in response to Natal, or even if it should. But the price will come down eventually -console prices always do- and when that happens, expect marketing like this.
The problem Natal has (and Sony's Move) is that the vast majority of 360 and PS3 owners will not have it. It didn't come with the system originally and many aren't going to be willing to pay $100 or $150 to add it. As a result the market, already smaller then the Wii, is going to be infinitesimal. Sure, 3rd parties often produce crap for the Wii, but if you think it's bad there, just wait for the 3rd party games for Natal and Move. Only the most foolhardy of game developers will put any substantial amount of money toward Natal or Move games. These add-ons shouldn't have been add-ons, rather they should start shipping all 360's and PS3s with the respective technology. You shouldn't be able to buy one without Natal/Move. Then at least all new buyers would have it. As it is, they might as well give up now.
--- What?
Is that the $149 will be good for all users of natal's functionalty WHile multiple players for the wii or the ps3 move may require multiple hardware purchases. Once you start pricing out 2-4 players playing simultaneously, then the prices aren't that different.
I could swear I heard bitter complaints about being forced to buy a bunch of functionality all at once vs parts at a time somewhere at some point even though "the prices weren't all that different."
I just can't recall.