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Why is Xbox One doing so badly in Europe?
- Thread starter Game4life
- Start date
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I'd like to believe that here in germany, kinect alone managed to kill all potential. When internet security comes up somewhere, people are asking "wasn't there also a gaming console that spies on you?" they don't even know the name of it.
And that's only one reason of several others.
And that's only one reason of several others.
It is true that Xbox never really took of outside of the UK. They did gain some momentum in the beginning when Sony screwed up the PS3 launch, but it didn't take long for them to turn the ship around.
Exactly that is my understanding as well. So surely it is more of a marketing problem than a content problem
This kind of comment seems to crop up often.
Yeah I know not a single person who has a Xbox One.
YianGaruga
Banned
Xbox 360 wasn't able to crack the EU market the same way as the US for some reason, partly because PlayStation is still such a huge brand here. I think they could have built on what they had, but completely destroyed any goodwill they earned with the One reveal.
DRM + Kinect always listening which led to privacy concerns in the media + TVTVTVTV and services which were targeted 100% towards the US market showed that they either didn't understand and/or didn't care about the european market. Combined with the PS4 being cheaper and having a great marketing strategy means Xbox One is pretty much done here unless they can get FIFA exclusivity or something. PS4 momentum is too big.
DRM + Kinect always listening which led to privacy concerns in the media + TVTVTVTV and services which were targeted 100% towards the US market showed that they either didn't understand and/or didn't care about the european market. Combined with the PS4 being cheaper and having a great marketing strategy means Xbox One is pretty much done here unless they can get FIFA exclusivity or something. PS4 momentum is too big.
Also PS4 is cheaper and has more games.
What, did this really happen? Did MS actually called the "Eurozone" (the hell does that mean?) a country? Wow....
protomouse
Member
Apart from the UK, I think it's simply hard to penetrate Europe with a very American product. The fact that the Kinect/always-on PR fiasco came around the time of the Snowden leaks, surely didn't help. There was a huge debacle surrounding NSA surveillance in Germany, for instance.
Don't think it has ever been a popular brand in Europe outside of the UK.
Europe played a big role in the PS3 catching up to the 360 in worldwide sales even though the PS3 didn't get the best multiplats and had a worse start (one year after the Xbox 360); Xbox brand is simply "more American".
Europe played a big role in the PS3 catching up to the 360 in worldwide sales even though the PS3 didn't get the best multiplats and had a worse start (one year after the Xbox 360); Xbox brand is simply "more American".
Are you calling us thieves?
Frankfurter
Member
Eurozone is the official (?) name for the European countries that have adopted the Euro as their currency.
1.21Gigawatts
Banned
Yeah, in germany, too.
But I think its too late. People don't even care anymore. Many of their friends already went with Ps4 and I don't see a lot of people jumping onto XB1 now.
I'm in some german gaming forum and you see a real struggle there for XB1 users to find people to play with. Destiny is a good example because it requires you to find other players. Even here on GAF most people in the OT are on Ps4 and people on Xbox have a harder time finding people to play with. If you're not on an international forum you'll have a even harder time.
There are a lot of factors why buying an Xb1 in europe just doesn't make much sense unless you're buying it purely for the exclusives.
May this comes from the original XBOX.
Europe was the last place to launch one year later the American one.
Price was very high.
Fifa franchise doesn't appears until 2003.
And Pro evolution soccer until 2004.
I really think that first console made a lot of damage to the brand. The 360 was really awesome but playstation 3 got really good games and also blueray that marked the difference.
Europe was the last place to launch one year later the American one.
Price was very high.
Fifa franchise doesn't appears until 2003.
And Pro evolution soccer until 2004.
I really think that first console made a lot of damage to the brand. The 360 was really awesome but playstation 3 got really good games and also blueray that marked the difference.
SkylineRKR
Member
Price doesn't matter anymore. PS4 had become the consumers choice. They're not going to choose Xbox One just because its 50 cheaper or something. I know I wouldn't. PS4 is what most of my friends have, and what enjoys the most support.
100% of my RL friends have PS4. With PS3 -360 it was about 70-30, and until 2008 they favored MS. I'm not gonna lie, I've yet to play on an Xbox One. Never held the controller even.
But from 2005-2007 the Xbox 360 was a success. We all had one and ignored the PS3 until somewhere in 2008. The RROD contributed to this too.
100% of my RL friends have PS4. With PS3 -360 it was about 70-30, and until 2008 they favored MS. I'm not gonna lie, I've yet to play on an Xbox One. Never held the controller even.
But from 2005-2007 the Xbox 360 was a success. We all had one and ignored the PS3 until somewhere in 2008. The RROD contributed to this too.
Gravemind IV
Member
I wouldn't say necessarily suspicious, but you just feel completely passed on. Imagine watching the conference, all that cable tv integration, NFL, NBA, American football talk (features that you 1. Probably don't care about or 2. Can't even use). They brought it
on themselves by completely ignoring the potential for expansion or growth in the EU. They seemingly resigned to yet another let Sony dominate EU and we will take US.
The reasons for choosing Xbox in Europe generally sterm from better online infrastructure (although Halo 5 beta datacentres have made me worried) better controllers for FPS and certain franchises (e.g. something like Halo for me, or perhaps Gears of War if another one comes out). Sadly for MS, the One isn't what the 360 was, the multiplatform console of choice (where the PS3, barring some titles, dropped the ball).
it's been a while but i think this was the case back then
Princess Carl
Member
Because its worse in every way to the other two consoles and their first party titles are released broken.
And because Europeans tend to be much better consumers when it come to not getting fucked over by corporations; i.e. likely to pursue refunds and expecting strong pro consumer laws.
And because Europeans tend to be much better consumers when it come to not getting fucked over by corporations; i.e. likely to pursue refunds and expecting strong pro consumer laws.
It was one person, not "MS".
And as a European I can understand how Eurozone, European Union and Europe can be hard to grasp at first. I'm sure there are similar American institutions I have no idea exist.
That deal was more so about Mircosoft as a whole (and their surface tablets) -- not just Xbox.
__________
Wii U? Every way?
Both Sony and MS have had problems with their exclusives this gen.
Me neither. On the other hand, I know a bunch of people who own PS4s and even Wii Us.
i actually legit snorted laughing when i saw this. no offense op but its more a cultural thing i believe in europe and most of asia playstation is playstation. kind of like how nintendo was videogames then it became playstation .. its only in america where the xbox made headway (and uk) in general europe in general has always been ps country ... and as has been quoted xbox trying to make the whole of europe one country is geography fails on an epic level... i would actually be offended if i didnt think it was so funny the stupidity of it all
EDIT: nfl questoins. as ppl have pointed out overall ms deal not just xbox centric. Is it worth it? I would say probably ... i mean the nfl is using ms tablets and theyre all over the place so good product placement for ms overall. xbox oriented benefits maybe not... but that contract was overall ms oriented not just xbox oriented
EDIT: nfl questoins. as ppl have pointed out overall ms deal not just xbox centric. Is it worth it? I would say probably ... i mean the nfl is using ms tablets and theyre all over the place so good product placement for ms overall. xbox oriented benefits maybe not... but that contract was overall ms oriented not just xbox oriented
Stilton Disco
Member
It's a weaker machine with fewer games, particularly in the more varied genres Europeans like, it was more expensive at launch, built around ideas like HDMI in and English voice controls that are pointless outside the US, has bugger all in the way of European media apps, and is a generally a less respected and trusted brand.
Honestly, I'm amazed it's doing as well as it is, especially in the UK, but I guess that's due to the common misconception by a lot of Brits that they're more like Americans than mainlanders.
Microsoft made an inferior product, designed only for one country, and really only time will tell if it can sustain any real success even there. It's failure in Europe is just proof that competition is a good thing, because everyone had something better to buy instead.
Honestly, I'm amazed it's doing as well as it is, especially in the UK, but I guess that's due to the common misconception by a lot of Brits that they're more like Americans than mainlanders.
Microsoft made an inferior product, designed only for one country, and really only time will tell if it can sustain any real success even there. It's failure in Europe is just proof that competition is a good thing, because everyone had something better to buy instead.
Welfare
Member
Caayn
Member
Jup. He linked to a Wikipedia article and said that the 360 only had 11 launch countries, the Wikipedia article counted the entire Eurozone as one country
To be fair, the term Eurozone is used a lot, you should know as a European
But it's never used as a name for a country.Albert explained at the time that the delay was due to the deep intergration with voice that caused the delay.
That said, I respect him for taking his time to post here.
Mass_Pincup
Banned
The Xbox might as well be the US box, when you spend the better part of your console unveiling talking about NFL and Netflix, and when you don't even know that Europe is several different country no wonder people don't care.
And that's without Kinect, always only DRM and all that. The 360 faired better because it launched a year before the PS3 otherwise it would have been more or less the same outcome as now.
And that's without Kinect, always only DRM and all that. The 360 faired better because it launched a year before the PS3 otherwise it would have been more or less the same outcome as now.
Oh it's definitely a perception problem on top of other random things. Watch the reveals of the PS4 and Xbox One. The latter is clearly targeting the American market, while in contrast PS4 seems to be fairly neutral. People pick up on these things when watching, and they will to varying degrees get the impression that the console is not for them.
And there's the other thing that's brand loyalty. If you were a primarily Playstation gamerz then why switch? Obviously for someone like me I bought a 360 because I wanted it's excluisve games, but for the general consumer? They've been with the Playstation brand for a while and it's served them well. Why move over to another ecosystem when you're comfortable where you are? In that case you'd only transfer if the option was significantly better. Not just little bits here and there, but for large clearly defined reasons. Xbox may better at some things, but not by enough of a margin
PetriP-TNT
Member
I couldn't believe when the Bone launched like 13 months later in Finland (and other euro countries, of course). How... why?
The reason? Higher price maybe? That's what put me off the most in the beginning, also Kinect. The Kinect was made for living rooms with a lot of space, space that some Europeans don't have if they live in urban environments in apartments.
Then we have the whole TV thing. I don't know many tech interested people who have cable boxes here.
Another note would be the spec difference. I work in a really tech savvy environment, but if you're not a gamer you won't look into what really makes the hardware different other than what you can quickly skim through on the Internet or by just asking someone. People at work just ask me, "what should I get" and I say PS4, and I'm not really that interested in every buying a new console. So it's just a word-to-mouth thing
(EDIT 1) Also, Sweden didn't get the Xbox One until more than a half-year later! That was so bizarre.
(EDIT 2) Oh yeah, you could talk to Kinect. But only in English
No marketing for the Xbox One at all. And it's an inferior product, especially without the US only features (e.g. voice chat in a lot of EU countries.
Incredibly stupid of Microsoft to ignore the EU, with its population of 800 million and it being the richest region of the world.
Plus, PS3 was also more successful here than X360.
Incredibly stupid of Microsoft to ignore the EU, with its population of 800 million and it being the richest region of the world.
Plus, PS3 was also more successful here than X360.
More Fun To Compute
Member
XBOX is like Nickelback and Playstation is like Darude Sandstorm.
I don't know. I've never seen an OG Xbox in person (NO ONE had one, I remember it being part of Mc Donald's Monopoly Germany though) and everyone had an Xbox 360 when it launched. Not because Xbox was so great but because the PS3 was outrageously overpriced. They did build a lot of good will during those two years. And then... Xbox One happened.
SkylineRKR
Member
Usually this is true but I actually think Microsoft had better support. Ofcourse they had no choice with that fiasco back then.
We are Europeans, we are Legion, we do not forgive, we do not forget, expect us. (that's for their Xbone PR at "screw the consumer")
I'll talk about myself, i gave xbox 360 a chance last gen, it was my main console and bought tons of games, i paid 5 years of xbox live gold, just to see year after year apps and stuff available only in the US, got tired of paying for US getting new shiny things with my precious money and my country nothing, the xbox live was also a complete joke.
Would you pay $500 for a console, then $60 a year for a sub where services are not available in your country? Hopefully i woke up in time...
I really think Sony & Nintendo are smarter, proposing less services but when they do, it's available for almost everyone....Of course there's still things US only or JPN only but that's not their main marketing point to sell a console to their customers...unlike XBOX.
I'll talk about myself, i gave xbox 360 a chance last gen, it was my main console and bought tons of games, i paid 5 years of xbox live gold, just to see year after year apps and stuff available only in the US, got tired of paying for US getting new shiny things with my precious money and my country nothing, the xbox live was also a complete joke.
Would you pay $500 for a console, then $60 a year for a sub where services are not available in your country? Hopefully i woke up in time...
I really think Sony & Nintendo are smarter, proposing less services but when they do, it's available for almost everyone....Of course there's still things US only or JPN only but that's not their main marketing point to sell a console to their customers...unlike XBOX.
Princess Carl
Member
WiiU is a better games console with better titles by leaps and bounds.
Xbone tried to take advantage of consumers/go NSA in your living room/ENTERTAINMENT CENTER, and it failed on all fronts. There's barely a gaming console left at this point.
Infinite_Daremo
Member
I switched from 360 to PS4 this gen. The countless PR clusterfucks before release, always online, Kinect, no used games etc... Even though they back pedaled there's no way I'm getting the console when their first party output doesn't appeal to me and the multi plats will always be superior on PS4.
As a side note the majority of my play time nowadays is done via remote play so there's that too.
As a side note the majority of my play time nowadays is done via remote play so there's that too.
fredrancour
Member
Their initial multimedia marketing angle with things like massive TV integration probably hurt MS in Europe more than it hurt them in the USA. Media partnership deals like that frequently don't carry over to other countries, and the content Not only did they make games seem like a secondary feature to the role of general entertainment platform, but they did it in a way that Europeans were not guaranteed to ever see, and on top of that, IIRC, one of the bits of media advertised most prominently was the NFL? Which kind of does nothing at all to appeal to that market either. When then quickly flipped their marketing, they had an even deeper hole to crawl out of there, which they weren't able to do with things like the late launch for lower-priority countries.
Also, at the start of last generation, it sure felt like the 360 had all the shooter mindshare here in the US. Before Modern Warfare happened and became the biggest shooter as a multiplatform game, Halo and Gears held all the FPS brand strength on consoles. Things like Bioshock originally only coming out on 360 also helped that. The people who love shooters first and foremost wanted the xbox 360. I'd imagine that MCC, the promise of Halo 5, the assumption that there will eventually be another Gears game, and Titanfall have been enough to keep some amount of that fandom alive for Xbox One, even if people whose shooter demand is satisfied by the multiplatform shooters would be equally fine on the ps4.
(Anecdotal evidence, obviously. IDK how I'd attempt to find hard evidence on public opinion here)
They've treated EU market badly
- Tier 2 countries
- no 50 hz support for a long time
- NFL ads up the wazoo (I think there was a Euro-only ad that only focused on NFL)
- TV focused first impression
- Penello calling all of Europe a country
- Cutting EMEA Xbox team http://www.polygon.com/2014/7/18/5915167/microsofts-cuts-include-the-emea-xbox-team
- Tier 2 countries
- no 50 hz support for a long time
- NFL ads up the wazoo (I think there was a Euro-only ad that only focused on NFL)
- TV focused first impression
- Penello calling all of Europe a country
- Cutting EMEA Xbox team http://www.polygon.com/2014/7/18/5915167/microsofts-cuts-include-the-emea-xbox-team
the ..catastrophic initial presentation & "vision" ("we <<permit>> you", tv-tv, etc) , coupled with the 'always on line-always kinect watches' news at the same moment when security-gate happened, only served in widening the distance that playstation is ahead on perception in europe.
add to the above the 100e price difference, and the tier1-only availability and you got yourself a recipe to win
add to the above the 100e price difference, and the tier1-only availability and you got yourself a recipe to win
paradise_circus
Member
The awareness vanished by now, hence the price.
I think the kinect 2 campaign was one of the biggest fails they pulled.
It couldn't bait gamers and casuals while it was more expensive and less powerful.
They need to pull something out of their sockets like Sony in 2009.
It never really felt like a product for the european market. They didn't do a lot until Gamescom for Europe. That was a 3 month time period. And there was also the rest of the bullshit MS did
Playstation is a brand people knew from the past, so when Xbox wanted to screw them, they just went to their old playstation.
Playstation is a brand people knew from the past, so when Xbox wanted to screw them, they just went to their old playstation.
Difficult?
Europe is a geographical continent.
The EU is a federation of 28 nation States.
The Eurozone are all the countries which use the euro.
Not knowing that France, Germany, Spain etc are separate countries is inexcusable.
mcwizardry
Member
Xbox one regional settings are a mess, this is a huge problem in Europe. You still can't set the language independent from the region.
Your opinion then.
I like the Wii U (mainly for the new Nintendo games) but I don't see how anyone could say what that considering the Wii U's position in power, third party support, and online gaming.
Xbox 360 actually did pretty well early on, helped (obviously) by the fact that it launched over a year before PS3 and it had better pricing from the start. Towards the end of the gen PS3 had bypassed it easily in most countries but X360 wasn't completely dead. With Xbox One they launched nearly a year late at a higher price point without any killer games or features, with inferior hardware. Nothing was on their side unlike last gen.
It's interesting to see if they really can gain any ground because they still don't really have any advantages over PS4 and once your group of friends go for a console, it's really hard to do anything but follow their lead. Pricing-wise, Xbox is at least trying to compete now. Just today I spotted yet another great deal on Xbox One, 329 with Sunset Overdrive. PS4 doesn't have deals like that at least here in Finland, but it keeps dominating sales charts. So price alone doesn't fix the problem, they need a new Halo type game and it needs to be proper exclusive, not PC+Xbox. There's so many PC gamers in Europe that you don't win much with games like Titanfall launching also on PC. (That being said, I hope every game from now on is released on PC because I prefer PC over all the other platforms.)
It's interesting to see if they really can gain any ground because they still don't really have any advantages over PS4 and once your group of friends go for a console, it's really hard to do anything but follow their lead. Pricing-wise, Xbox is at least trying to compete now. Just today I spotted yet another great deal on Xbox One, 329 with Sunset Overdrive. PS4 doesn't have deals like that at least here in Finland, but it keeps dominating sales charts. So price alone doesn't fix the problem, they need a new Halo type game and it needs to be proper exclusive, not PC+Xbox. There's so many PC gamers in Europe that you don't win much with games like Titanfall launching also on PC. (That being said, I hope every game from now on is released on PC because I prefer PC over all the other platforms.)
I genuinely believe it's the Japaneese centric games that made a difference, I believe Xbox 360 started off rather well, not outselling PS3 good, but made inroads by quite a bit, then road on the coattails of that initial burst when those games dried up meanwhile Sony gets games like Ni No Kuni exclusively and also racing games like Gran Turismo.
Doesn't help that in markets like Germany where there is a PC presence in retail, Xbox One has the perception of either no exclusives, or the ones that are will eventually make it to PC (Windows 10 cross play will be interesting), I believe Titanfall on PC outsold the XB1 version for example.
Doesn't help that in markets like Germany where there is a PC presence in retail, Xbox One has the perception of either no exclusives, or the ones that are will eventually make it to PC (Windows 10 cross play will be interesting), I believe Titanfall on PC outsold the XB1 version for example.
Apple doesn't seem to have any problem selling their phones and tablets on mainland Europe.
And as someone that lives and traveled a lot within mainland Europe that sentence is actually quite baffling. The XBox brand isn't as popular here like it is in the UK or North America because people only care for stuff that they were given reasons to care. If you don't care marketing your console, buying shelf space on stores, offer the same services available everywhere else (one example: Portugal never got Indie section of XBLA for X360 but Live was more expensive than in North America) and keep treating Europe mainland like 2nd class citizens, you can't actually be surprised if those clients treat your product like a 2nd class one as well.
While Nintendo and Sony translate their 1st party output (Sony even does VO) to languages outside of EFIGS to cater to those "little" countries in Europe, Microsoft does nothing and put out the game on the main languages.
But yes it's because Microsoft is American. Clearly.
Microsoft totally fucking it up at the start cost them their lead from the 360 generation which meant all Sony had to do was play on the nostalgia people had for the PSX and PS2. See this commercial which, I'm gonna be honest, I absolutely love: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oCI-zfGat6M
YianGaruga
Banned
I was just going to ask about that. That this STILL isn't possible alone shows how much of a fuck they give.