I think most of us will agree that Gears was probably the first real next gen game on any platform this gen. It still holds up because of it.
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Rumor: Xbox 3 = 6-core CPU, 2GB of DDR3 Main RAM, 2 AMD GPUs w/ Unknown VRAM, At CES
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I think most of us will agree that Gears was probably the first real next gen game on any platform this gen. It still holds up because of it.
Personally i wouldnt mind to pay thatIt would mean that it would take longer before the graphics looks outdated. But no console manufacturer will launch a console for that price again.
I'm in the same boat. I wouldn't mind paying it as long as the system was legitimately worth it.
When PS3 launched, Sony was hemorrhaging money with each sale, but I see no reason why they couldn't come up with a fantastic system for $500-600 now that isn't selling at a loss. I could be wrong, but I assumed a large portion of the exorbitant cost to produce the PS3 was due to the inclusion of Bluray.
Some Gaffers seem to have this idea that every major peripheral must be built in to the base hardware at some point. The never think about it beyond cost, so as long as it seems to be possible economically, there's no reason it can't be done in their eyes. The Same goes for all of the "RAM is cheap!" posts, the people thinking a thinner, lighter 3DS with bigger screens, the second stick, four shoulder buttons, and more battery life will be announced in January, etc.
ThisWreckage
Banned
You're right. If you recall, the price of a Blu Ray player when the technology was new was through the roof.
Yeah it costed them 200-250 extra because of BR if I remember correctly
Proelite
Member
I don't think MS or Sony will launch consoles at $299 again. They've proven that they can move consoles at price over $399. With smartphones and tablets priced at often higher prices, they can certainly make the case for families to purchase an expensive high end entertainment system that does 3D, motion gaming, social networking, TV, movies, etc.
Personally I have no problems with shelling out $399-$499 for a All-in-One living room beast that does everything.
Personally I have no problems with shelling out $399-$499 for a All-in-One living room beast that does everything.
bgassassin
Member
Well even if they used DVDs their losses would have still been comparable to the MS's gaming division minus the RROD if they retailed the PS3 at the same price as the 360.
399-450 is max imo.
east of eastside
Banned
Just use a little imagination...In 2013 a 22nm 360 could be possible. Not only the Kinect sensor could be redesigned to be significantly smaller, but the 360 integrated with it as well, facilitating positioning and placement of the combo unit. Maybe make the Kinect portion detachable or extendable. Hardly impossible..
Captain Tuttle
Member
Isn't one of the reasons that the Kinect is so big is the placement of the microphones and the need to get accurate sound? I thought I remember reading that but I could be wrong.
DonMigs85
Member
Maybe $499 as the absolute highest for a premium SKU (bigger HDD or chrome trim or something).
Synth_floyd
Banned
I wouldn't mind $400 personally, but I'd rather them put as much stuff in it as possible, since they only launch one every 5-7 years.
agreed. now if next gen, they can go with bluray or something that doesn't mean that all 3 gears games have the worst looking compressed to fuck cutscenes; that'd be great. seriously the worst thing about the gears 1-3. Play through all the way to the end; get shitty compressed conclusion.
re
s3+bluray. yes it might have cost them at the headstart but I think ultimately the lively bluray trade; is something sony must be happy about. I'm happy to pay $500ish provided the specs are robust enough to hold up well down the line .
Psychotext
Member
Whilst they're probably happy about it, it'll never make those loses back (nor do they make much out of it because of the deals they had to make to kill off HD DVD).re
Their royalty situation isn't a particularly impressive one on blu-ray thanks to the BDA and some fairly cut-throat pricing.
Pretty different how? They would have sold less consoles by having to make it more expensive? The dvd storage space issue didn't really have much of an effect on them this gen.
Psychotext
Member
Plus they would have been forced to launch later. The tech wasn't ready for large scale production in 2005.
Plinko
Wildcard berths that can't beat teams without a winning record should have homefield advantage
Any system launching in this economy at $399 is going to be crushed until a price drop. That's insanity.
-ImaginaryInsider
Member
If it wasn't for Ipad sales and the fact MS is still selling a $299 sku for the 360, you might have had a point. Given the nature of early adopters, and that the Next-Box will more than likely have supply shortages (what new console doesn't), MS might as well charge $399 for it for the first year or so.
Hawk269
Member
No matter what, the new Xbox will sell at a loss for at least the first year. The only way this won't happen is if MS gimps the system to reduce cost to make a profit on day one with each console. I don't see that happening. If they have a stellar system, with a good price point with abundant quality software they can sell enough to begin to get price reductions on parts and possibly start making some profit after year 1.
herzogzwei1989
Banned
next-gen consoles arrive in 2012-2013. By 2014 we will be into next-generation by a year or more.
bgassassin
Member
Not really to the first and sort of to the second. We at least have Epic on record stating they are designing UE4 to be scalable for multi-core CPUs.
Aizu_Itsuko
Member
They were bleeding money but not just because of BR (it didn't cost THAT much); it was pretty much everything: the CPU, the motherboard, the hw based BC, the memory, all the little bells and whistles, etc.
It's as if Kutaragi made no manufacturing costs concesions and something failed along the way.
What BR did was delay the system's launch though.
Aizu_Itsuko
Member
Not really due to early adopters.
$349-399 for the base system at launch isn't crazy as long as prices can be scaled down easily later on.
The big three should plan reaching mass market prices as a mid term goal though.
Well, the xbox 360 has a Tri-core with 6 logical threads and is the target spec for most game nowadays. Games still run fine on a C2D with only two threads.
DonMigs85
Member
Probably because each 360 core is fairly weak and lacks Out-of-order execution.
Personally i wouldnt mind to pay that
No...no it doesn't.
-ImaginaryInsider
Member
I can't see MS going for less than $399, unless they completely change their approach and go full-on for the casual market. I think MS wants it all, hardcore, casual, and anyone in between...so they have to build a console that meets all of that. It has to be in the same ball-park as PS4, yet have a Kinect 2.0 to woo the casuals, so I can't see them squeezing all that in for less than $399.
We don't know how strong this six core CPU is. I'm willing to bet that isn't stronger than a current i7.
DonMigs85
Member
Hopefully it'll be at least as good as a hexacore Phenom II.
I doubt it's the final silicon of what the next xbox will get. They are probably using a hexa-core phenom II of something in the same range.
No. People gladly pay $300 for smartphones they toss in a year. Don't make the mistake of thinking people don't buy baubles. Look at the tablet market.
I think there are far more people spending $200 on phones every two years. Consoles aren't tablets or phones, it is a completely different market. Most people use those devices far more than consoles.
I do agree if either MS or Sony launch at above $399 they will fail.
Aizu_Itsuko
Member
Same for Sony, but at the same time no one wants to suffer the "$599" effect.
It took Sony several years to recover from the bad press.
charlequin
Banned
Yeah, $399 is entirely viable as a launch price at this point; people will pay that to the tune of 3-6 million units upfront and probably continue to buy it at least at moderately decent rates throughout the first year.
The issue is really that a $399 system needs to actually cost $399 to make and be designed with quick price drops in mind. They need to at least be planning a $299 pricedrop within the first year, with a roadmap that's chopping an additional $100 off the manufacturing price every year. Without that, they'll be right back in the situation from this generation where the price is killing them at retail while their excessive manufacturing costs keep them from dropping said price.
-ImaginaryInsider
Member
That is going to be interesting to see cause if the Xbox-Next launches at 32nm, they can go to 28nm and cost reduce...but if it launches at 28nm...there is plenty of speculation we'll be stuck at 28nm for quite awhile.
dr_rus
Member
28nm and 32nm are the same thing but at different foundries. The next step is 20nm and 22nm and it should happen in the first half of 2014 (well, obviously it'll happen in the first half of 2012 at Intel but that's Intel). So no, we won't "stuck" at 28nm. Current production roadmaps go as far as 10nm.
You realize that if the real system were to have dual GPU's (which it won't) ... having 512MB VRAM each means it actually only has 512MB of total usable VRAM (actually slightly less since one has to act as the controller and contain the final back buffer in most rendering modes).
I'm not sure that's true ... at least not to the level I suspect you mean.
They would have had many of the same problems as Sony. HD-DVD used the same blue laser diodes as BluRay. That means the 360 would have been delayed to a similar launch date as PS3, and would have also had a higher price tag. Basically 360 would have sold a lot worse than it did. And given how PS3 has been able to catch up, even at the higher price tag and later launch ... it's quite likely the 360 would be significantly behind PS3.
So in all likelihood, BD would have still won ... and 360 would be pretty far in 3rd place. Come to think of it, Sony actually got the majority of allocation of early blue laser diodes ... so 360 may have actually had to launch after PS3 and diode prices would have gone up even more.
But they also upgrade them more often than consoles. The amortized cost of a console - even a $400 console - is going to be less than phones and certainly tablets over the same time period.
I don't see how this is necessary.
How much are the PS3 and 360 selling for right now?
I see a $399 system launching in late 2012 with a goal of 10 Million first year units and growing each and every year after that. Microsoft can certainly sell 10 million units in the first year at $399 if there is compelling content. From then on $50 yearly price cuts or a $100 price cut for the 2014 holidays down to $299 is feasible.
Of course it all depends on Microsoft's strategy, for example
2012 Next XBOX Launch $399
2013 a. $399 b. price cut to $349
2014 $299
2015 a. $299 b. price cut to $249
2016 a. $199 b. added value $249 or new peripheral ala Kinect $299
2017 a. $199 b. added value/peripheral up to $299
2018 Successor to Next XBOX Launch a. $149 b. peripheral/added value $199
It's about the value proposition, not the ticket price. Consumers will buy the system if they believe the price is right. Similar to the 3DS, people who say the price was the problem are as correct as those who say it wasn't the problem. The reason is they are coming from different angles in their argument. $249 would not have been a problem had the features in the 3DS been up to scratch (online features, more 3D content, high quality killer app style software) and people saw a reason to buy one for the price. On the other hand, the value wasn't there so the price was not appropriate.
I think we'll see a situation where Sony and Microsoft will launch at around $399 and try to add value through firmware updates, bundling and peripherals in a similar way to this generation to preserve the higher price points for as long as possible and drop down to $149 - $199 by the time their next systems are launching.
-ImaginaryInsider
Member
The speculation I read (and like I said "speculation") noted that TSMC is still having trouble getting 28nm (32nm?) where it needs to be, and it was more than likely going to push everything back for a bit. I didn't mean that the technology couldn't or wouldn't exist, just that those process wouldn't be mature enough to be used as soon as originally thought.
Internet speculation is internet speculation though
You said Kinect integrated 360...
It doesn't make any sense. You are saying that MS will put two cameras and 4 microphones into the console. Next to the fact that disc drive noise will hinder the mics: Good luck positioning that thing on your tv or just below it.
It's like suggesting that the controller would be integrated into the console. Sure it could be theoretically possible. But it doesn't make any practical sense.
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