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Games Entertainment

Why The X-Box Network Will Fail 453

Posted by Hemos from the battle-of-the-giants dept.
angkor wrote to us an article from The Register that looks at what Microsoft is planning for the X-Box Network. The factual information is educating on it's own - and the analysis of why they think it will fail is interesting as well.
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Why The X-Box Network Will Fail More

Why The X-Box Network Will Fail

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  • man.... (Score:2, Insightful)

    by npietraniec ( 519210 )
    We just want the X-box to fail soooo bad, don't we?

    yay slashdot

    • Re:man.... (Score:2, Troll)

      by LennyDotCom ( 26658 )
      I don't want it to fail sooooo bad

      I want it to fail super dooper sooooooo bad!!

    • Re:man.... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by quantaman ( 517394 ) on Wednesday May 22, 2002 @09:15AM (#3565109)
      The reason we want it so fail is because we fear it. We fear it is because if it becomes the dominant consol you KNOW Microsoft is going to use it as a lever to force themselves more and more into the home, that's why MS cancelled WebTV, this is a stronger candidate for getting MS into the living room. Also consider that so far Sony and Nintendo have played relatively nicely in the consol market (from a consumer rights point of view), just look at MS's track record and decide wether you want that company controlling the consol industry too.

      • Re:man.... (Score:2, Insightful)

        by dj28 ( 212815 )
        Are you on crack or something? Who says you HAVE to purchase their products? Do they "force" themselves on YOUR desktop? Do they prevent you from installing linux/freebsd/whatever on your hardware? How is that any different than the home entertainment area? A lot of people here forget that you don't have to purchase any of their products. Contrary to the prevailing thought here on slashdot, you DO have a choice. And if you "fear" a little plastic box, then you need some serious counseling. I personally don't think the people here "fear" it; you're all alone on that one.
        • So they have a right to manufacture and sell what they want, they have a right to set the price to what they want, they have a right to sell where they want, and they have a right to make any networks, accessories, games, etc. that they want.

          But we DON'T have a right to voice our opinions?
        • >>Who says you HAVE to purchase their products?

          You may as well. You've payed for it already when you buy your hardware.

      • Re:man.... (Score:3, Insightful)

        by Manitcor ( 218753 )
        Console systems play nice???

        Console gaming is one of the most cutthroat industries out there. If you think Nintendo and Sony play nice then you're kidding yourself. The difference is that Nintendo and Sony and the others have great PR control so you rarely hear about how crazy the market is.

        Honestly MS may be big and bad in the PC market, but I don't think they know thing 1 about the console market. They are also entering a market against competitors that have an entrenched user base and long term publishing agreements. Plus they have very deep pockets as well.

        I don't see Nintendo or Sony giving this market up without a massive battle. They have all the cards and MS is the young upstart and they have to learn the entire industry from scratch. They've already managed to piss off EA, big mistake.

        MS may fly or MS may fall but whatever the outcome I think we are going to see some serious sparks fly.
      • The one thing you can say about the X-Box, and I don't think there's any denying this, is that they did the hardware right. 8 gig hard drive, Dolby Digital sound, HDTV compatibility, broadband network port, DVD and audio jukebox out of the box.

        I'll be the first in line to bash them if they get something wrong with their OS and Office software, but MS can actually do things right. I use MS Office on my Mac and I couldn't be happier with it. It is a wonderful product, leaps and bounds above the PC version.

        MS is actually doing something right this time, so don't lump the X-Box strategy in with their OS strategy and bad-mouth them accordingly. If they can get the online console gaming thing right, they deserve to be in the living room. No one has been able to do it right, so let's hope they can pull it off. If will be masterful if it happens according to plan.
        • The one thing you can say about the X-Box, and I don't think there's any denying this, is that they did the hardware right.

          Sure that can be denied, quite easily, because they didn't do the hardware right and it's killing them. They grabbed nearly off the shelf parts and shoved them together to make basically a PC. This is expensive and inefficient. They don't make their own hardware, they have to pay someone else to do it for the, and they can't take advantage of any technological advances.

          Sony, on the other hand, has their own fab plant. They designed custom chips, and they recently miniaturized even more to cut costs. Sony and Nintendo are making money on their hardware, even after cutting prices. Nintendo has a similar arrangement. Microsoft is losing money, and that was before they were forced to cut prices to keep up. The X-Box division is hemorrhaging cash right now with that couple hundred dollar loss per box. Sure, they can afford it for now, but they have to keep evaluating how long it will take them to get entrenched in the console or set-top box market. They have to decide if it's going to happen at all, and if they need to stay in or cut their losses. They're playing a dangerous game, and it could go either way.

      • Wow, I thought Microsoft canceled WebTV because it totally sucked to use and nobody was buying the damn things.

      • Sony, Nintendo, Sega, they've all been in my living room. Personally, I hate (despise!) all three of those companies, but that's par for the course where large companies are concerned. BUT, their products do what they're supposed to, haven't attempted to "spy" on me, haven't tried to force entire industries down paths that leave the consumer and competitors out to dry(D3D?, etc..). Instead of concentrating on creating monopolies, these three companies have concentrated on making a better product than the others, and all three have done that in one way or another time and time again.

        Now we have Microsoft... I *DON'T* want them in my living room, EVER!

  • lock you in (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Jucius Maximus ( 229128 ) on Wednesday May 22, 2002 @09:05AM (#3565041) Journal
    It seems that this is conceptually similar to what they are trying with Windows Product Activation and the .NET subscription.

    They want you to get on the service and pay a fee per month. This way you are subscribed and you don't own the product. You are only "licensed to use it."

    The thing is that this is a proven profitable model. Look at Ultima online. It's pulling in a cool US$million every month with no signs of stopping. And Everquest is delivering on similar dreams of avarice.

    It seems to me like MSFT is trying to cash in in the same manner with using a proven business model.

    • Re:lock you in (Score:3, Interesting)

      by zerocool^ ( 112121 )
      It seems that this is conceptually similar to what they are trying with Windows Product Activation and the .NET subscription.

      They want you to get on the service and pay a fee per month. This way you are subscribed and you don't own the product. You are only "licensed to use it."

      While this may be true in this case, you really have to think: There are lots of online gaming arenas that are free (battle.net), but they are completely within their right mind to charge a monthly fee for it. The monthly fee goes to cover the cost of the equipment, which is already sunk, plus the cost of bandwidth, plus probably to subsidize the connection thingie that you have to buy to get it to work.

      As far as I see it, the recurring income isn't a cause for M$ conspiracy theory, the question just remains that if sony can do it for free, how much better does M$'s have to be in order to convince people to pay for it. Plus they're going to have to sell a LOT of subscriptions in order to make money, and the making money will only be down the road (note there's no monthly fee until after the first year). Plus if this does push XBox sales, is that really a good thing? Is the XBox still being sold under cost?

      Now, per the slashdot usual, I have to point out that M$ doesn't NEED the money, blah blah, $40 billion dollars blah blah. Still, I don't see a problem with asking people to pay every month for a quality service that costs them money every month, in addition to having a large sunk cost.

      ~Will

      • Re:lock you in (Score:5, Insightful)

        by sheldon ( 2322 ) on Wednesday May 22, 2002 @10:13AM (#3565512)
        the question just remains that if sony can do it for free, how much better does M$'s have to be in order to convince people to pay for it

        But Sony isn't going to do it for free. Sony is just not going to do it. That is, all Sony is going to sell you on your PS2 is a modem/network adapter to allow you to connect to your pre-existing ISP.

        From then on, whether you play a game online or not is entirely dependent upon your relationship with the software publisher of the particular game. So in the case of playing Everquest, you will pay $10/month to Sony. If you want to play some other game from Sega, you will pay $10/month to Sega and so forth. Now some games may sell so well that the publisher includes online play in the price of the box, like Blizzard does with Diablo, but I suspect most won't be like that. There will either be a charge to get to the Sega network, or per individual title.

        So the Sony model is actually going to be far more expensive per month in order to get access to the same number of games as the Microsoft model. I think this makes the Microsoft model far more compelling from a consumer aspect.
    • If Microsoft tries the same things as Everquest that would be truly bad for the U.S.A.. My roommate plays EQ. He just now went to bed (at 11:20am) because he stayed up all night playing the game. It is no problem though, since he already dropped all of his classes and is just living in the dorm room so he can have a faster internet connection for EQ. If Microsoft adopts these types of games, they cam make them mainstream, and that could be really bad for a lot of people.
    • The thing is that this is a proven profitable model. Look at Ultima online. It's pulling in a cool US$million every month with no signs of stopping.

      OK, how many XBoxes are sold? 3 million, 4 million?

      Let's assume that finally sometime there are 10 million sold. (optimistic)

      Let's also assume (also optimisticly) that 10% of XBox owners actually subscribe to the 10$/month XBox service, that would be 1 million subscribers or about 5 times as many as Ultima online has.

      Microsoft said they invest 2 billion in XBox live.

      With 10 million per month, (120 million$ per year) they are profitable by 2017, if we also assume that they don't have any costs.

      Keep in mind that my assumtions are pretty optimistic. There are how many PCs? 1 billion? 600 million? How many are primarily game systems? 200 million, maybe 300?

      From those huge number, only 250000 are subscribed to Ultima Online. That's less than 1%. Maybe if you add Everquest and all other games this number might go up to 2 or 3%, but still nowhere near the 10% I used.

      If I would hold Microsoft stock, I would sell them. Now.

  • Potential Reason (Score:5, Funny)

    by briggsb ( 217215 ) on Wednesday May 22, 2002 @09:06AM (#3565049)
    It could fail if the user base dwindles to 0 because of this accessory [bbspot.com].


    Seriously, why are we so fascinated with failure. It's like some gossip rag that's so excited by some movie star getting busted for drugs.

    • is that a healthy percentage of us hate Microsoft and their products. We especially hate the coercive element - the thought that we are "forced" to use them because all of society does.

      Because of this, any effort made by Microsoft to monopolize yet another market makes us feel nauseous. Thus, our desire to see Microsoft fail.

      D

  • Apostrophes count (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 22, 2002 @09:06AM (#3565051)
    The factual information is educating on it's own.

    Sheesh. Would you dorks learn the difference between the contraction it's and the possessive its? "The factual information is educating on it is own" ? Thppft.

  • The fate of XBOX Live (Score:3, Insightful)

    by dnaumov ( 453672 ) on Wednesday May 22, 2002 @09:06AM (#3565054)
    There are just 3 factors that will decide whether the XBOX Live Network will fail or not:

    1) The amount of playable games.
    2) The quality of the service (reliability, speed, etc).
    3) The price.

    XBOX does indeed have a very good amount of games coming, theres no denial for that. Unreal Championship is one, MechWarrior is another and more and more are being announced. However, the 2nd factor is what I think will decide the fate of this Network. If it's avaible to a lot of people, is relatively fast and is reliable, then you can count on a lot of people shelling out quite a lot for it.

    Yet somehow, I wouldn't count on the service actually being as reliable as they claim it to be.

    • Re:The fate of XBOX Live (Score:4, Insightful)

      by (trb001) ( 224998 ) on Wednesday May 22, 2002 @09:35AM (#3565234) Homepage
      There are just 3 factors that will decide whether the XBOX Live Network will fail or not:

      I disagree, I think there's at least a fourth. The thing about game consoles is, they're immediate. With the old Nintendo you put your cartridge in, hit the power switch and you were playing Mario Bros. in under 5 seconds.
      When the playstation came out, it had that stupid splash screen and took so long to load that you could run and get a beer, hit the bathroom and still make it back in time for the opening credits.

      If people want to play online computers games, they'll play them on the computer. Yes, yes, you'll have a certain percentage of the population that thinks computer games are stupid and only for the geeks. You'll also have the segment that really want to see how Halo does as a multiplayer game. It's kinda like the Star Wars phenomenon...even if every critic said the movie was a waste of time, you'd still have 100 people lined up opening night dressed as Jedis and Stormtroopers because they WANT to.

      Another item to consider is how updateable a game is. With computers, you download an upgrade, install it, you're done. But that's never been the idea behind game consoles. Games on game consoles were practically treated as hardware. They were physical objects that you could manipulate with your hands, making them much easier for non-abstract thinkers to handle. They were also standalone. Your copy of Duck Hunt was the same as his, and hers, and theirs. Now, you'll need to download patches onto the XBox hard drive in order to play games, a concept that was familiar only to PCs in the past and something that, IMHO, console gamers never wanted to deal with.

      Just my thoughts, but I kinda liked the idea of consoles games remaining consoles, disconnected form the world and FAST...Playstation made up for the speed with breakthrough graphics, but XBox is going to have to do one better, methinks.

      --trb
      • I dissagree, computer games have always been better than console games. Graphics and playability. Every major jenre out was started on computers. real time stratagy, first person shooter. rpg. Test drive on my old amstrad kicked outruns butt. What computer games lacked are 1.) good two player action. one guy joystic one keyboard. 2.) big screen. My computer is in my study, I have a 19" screen. I woudl much rather relax in my living room and play on a 32 inch screen with my friends. what i believe console companies need to not do is charge for provider service. why not just intigrate a tcp/ip protocal and let the game programer handle the rest. This way pc and console games coudl join together. and creat a much bigger user base.
    • If they end up competing with AOL/TW (or another broadband provider) - whose to say they don't fiddle with their broadband service to make MS online gaming "a hassle"?
    • There are at least two other factors to consider. The first, and probably most important, is "how easy is it to get this kit on-line?" That one factor may be the deciding factor for any console trying to break into the on-line market. If it's a beast to configure, only those willing and able to deal with configuration will do it.

      The second factor is 'redundant functionality.' The point here being that all the on-line services I've seen (excepting Saga's old Dreamcast network) assume some form of broadband connection and the console just being one more piece of kit hanging behind the NAT. The fact is, of course, you already have at least one real computer hanging off that broadband connection already, which seems to make your competition not other consoles - but multi-player PC games.

      I suppose you could get broadband (or an extra phone line for dialup) just to play console games . . . but why? And if I have my computer already, the Xbox game (or any console game, really) will have to be better or I'll just stay at the keyboard.

    • XBOX does indeed have a very good amount of games coming, theres no denial for that.

      GTA3 just got cancelled for the XBox, so was Doom3.

      People don't care about games that "are coming" if they get cancelled as when the real platform decision is made.

      Developers are jumping ship, I would be surprised if more than half of the "supposed be released on XBox" games are actually making it to the shelves.

  • M$ (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Datasage ( 214357 )
    The only way M$ will dominate the market is by a pyric victory, they will have to spend so much money it just isnt worth it in the end.
    • Pyrric victories only apply to war, where winning means losing so many of your workers, loved ones, etc.

      In business, it means you are the only one left standing to charge money for something. So what if you've nearly busted the bank, in 2 years you'll have recovered and own everything.

      • Re:M$ (Score:2, Informative)

        by the_2nd_coming ( 444906 )
        hardly. Pyrric victories can be applyed to any part of life. yes, the term comes out of war, but it means that you win at such a great cost that in reality you end up losing.

        you can not apply that term diffrently to diffrent situations. it is what it is.

    • Re:M$ (Score:3, Informative)

      by tommck ( 69750 )
      The only way M$ will dominate the market is by a pyric victory, they will have to spend so much money it just isnt worth it in the end.


      You know.. I congratulate you for using this word, and for using it correctly! But, I think people would be more impressed if you spelled it correctly :-) It is "Pyrrhic", not "pyric".

      Your thoughtful spelling police..

      T

  • no security? (Score:3, Funny)

    by jglow ( 525234 ) on Wednesday May 22, 2002 @09:12AM (#3565093) Homepage Journal
    Bech said the company was planning a service that he compared to Disneyland for its safe, wholesome environment - in contrast to the 'Coney Island' he said that the open Internet can sometimes become. 'Compare Coney Island to Disneyland,' he said. 'When you're at Disneyland, there's no trash, no violence and you never see security. That's what we have in mind.

    Come on... this is a gaming network, not a theme park.

    Kind of like a Microsoft OS, you never see security...

    • Re:no security? (Score:2, Informative)

      by yatest5 ( 455123 )
      Kind of like a Microsoft OS, you never see security...

      Yawn. Can't we just get some stuff implemented in the slashcode that posts the standard MS joke for each kind of story, so we lusers don't have to waste time with the SAME JOKES TROTTED OUT EVERY FUCKING TIME?

      Jesus, get some imagination.

  • "Sony...has more sense and fewer scruples. " (Score:5, Funny)

    by wiredog ( 43288 ) on Wednesday May 22, 2002 @09:13AM (#3565099) Journal
    Fewer scruples? Than Microsoft? <Bill_And_Ted>Whoa</Bill_And_Ted>
  • Wow, really? Because as we all know, The Register has never been anything but impartial and fair when dealing with Microsoft in the past...

  • What is the MS business plan for XBox Live?

    50 Bucks per user per year. 50 bucks per year isn't enough to cover basic infrastructure much less anything else. They are sinking money in data centers and support. Then they have to give a cut to the game makers.

    Lets say 10% (an overly hopeful figure) of XBox owners sign up. If we come up with another hopeful figure of 6 million total XBox owners in 3 months time.

    600,000 x $50 = 30,000,000 million revenue.

    Heh, that isn't even enough to pay for the yearly bandwidth costs. This is nothing but another giant earnings hole for MS. MS is going to put 2 Billion into developing this?

    Microsoft compares XBox Live to Disneyland? Microsoft is touting games such as counter-strike and halo and in the same breath comparing that bloody fragmire to Disneyland? The real counter-strike players of the world already have their playgrounds. Even though those playgrounds are frequently home to cheating, the advantages of open and player controlled servers far outweigh whatever disneyland-effect that MS is hoping for. That market is taken. And don't even get started on the hopelessness of playing FPS shooter with a console gamepad.

    Could MS have anymore disregard for the concerns of their stockholders? This is a pure financed by the desktop monopoloy blackop against Sony and Nintendo in a last ditch effort to save the XBox (2.5 million sold) which at this point has been outsold by the GameCube (4.2 million sold) nearly 2 to 1.
    • They are sinking money in data centers and support. Then they have to give a cut to the game makers.

      This is why EA aren't going to be releasing any XBox live games this year. With the PS2 and PC games they can charge the gameplayer a subscription for the months that the player wants to play that particular game. With Xbox live they would only a get a fraction of the cash the player pays, with their own games that get all the cash.

      Lets say 10% (an overly hopeful figure) of XBox owners sign up. If we come up with another hopeful figure of 6 million total XBox owners in 3 months time.

      I'd say that the 10% signup ratio is probably a slightly low estimate for North America. However it's probably too high for Europe where broadband internet access is not very common (i think maybe 10% of homes have it installed).

      Also the sales of XBoxes would have to rise to about ten times current sales to reach 6 million within 6 months, and I don't see any killer games coming this summer for Xbox, whereas the GameCube has a great lineup.

      As for the stockholders, you've got to ask when they're going to rise up and demand that Microsoft gets its act together and start actually innovating and introducing good products rather than bullying there way through business.

  • We don't need no steenkin internet (Score:5, Interesting)

    by rot26 ( 240034 ) on Wednesday May 22, 2002 @09:19AM (#3565132) Homepage Journal
    This looks to me more like an end-run around the internet itself. It will essentially run in a tunnel through the existing infrastructure, but at some point in the future, there's no reason that they couldn't migrate on to something else, say a wireless network that had its own protocols, address scheme, etc. Bill Gates has been kicking himself in the ass for the last 10 years because he didn't discover the internet soon enough to dominate it, and he's got to be salivating at the idea of an essentially private user space that he controls lock stock and barrel. If he pursued this for all it was worth, he could do it with his other $39 billion... I wonder what kind of return on his investment he would eventually get?

  • Maybe it will maybe it won't (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Aceticon ( 140883 ) on Wednesday May 22, 2002 @09:19AM (#3565138)
    It might fail, or it might not...

    Food for thought:
    1) Which is the strongest driving force for Console/Console-Accessories/Console-Games:
    a) Whinning kids.
    b) Grownups buying presents.

    This whole MS approach to selling a "clean" network for kids to play in will appeal to parents but not necessarily to the kids.

    2) Can/Will Microsoft buy legislation forcing ISPs/GameNetworks/etc... to "protect" children?

    If they get there first and then they buy the legislation, they will be first to market with a product designed to fit that legislation (actually it will be the legislation designed to fit the products, but in practice it's the same).

  • Who Wants Disneyland? (Score:2, Interesting)

    by aarona ( 562545 )
    What are the most popular on line games?

    First person shooters and RPGs.

    Why would anyone want a forum for first person shooters and RPGs to be known as Disney-esque in any way? These games are mainly about killing stuff and in many cases have extreme graphic violence. I think someone got their focus group polls crossed up.

    If the core of on-line gaming was 12 year olds they might have something, but if the core was 12 year olds then Nintendo would be the king of all gaming anyway.

    I'm fairly sure they will be dropping this comparison in the future, or at least trying to explain how it was not taken the way it was intended.
  • The problem with the piece is that John Lettice approaches the subject from an axe grinding position that blinds him to judging anything on its own merits. Microsoft? Ooh, it's just gotta be bad. The Xbox Live approach is thus far the only fully formed end-to-end solution for adding online to the console world in a way that delivers a consistent consumer service, minimizes the infrastructure requirements to developers, and insures a revenue stream to make this a worthwhile thing to do for both the platform company (Microsoft) and small developers who don't want to run a back end operation and the related hassles for billing and customer support. If it doesn't grow the market in a big way online is simply betterleft to the PC realm which is better suited to small but profitable niche markets. The companies like EA that claim MS want to control everything are blowing smoke up the public's collective hinder. What they're really saying is "WE want to control everything and most importantly not share so much as a penny of the revenue with anyone else." Considering that EA has managed to dump over $100 million down their online sinkhole I'm more than a little interested in seeing someone else take on the task. THe Xbox setup doesn't prevent a developer from going their own way on online activity. It would just be very stupid on their part to waste resources duplicating the work and facilities already built by someone who can afford to shoulder the long term risk in pursuit of developing a new market. At the other end of the spectrum it's easy to see why Nintendo is taking the approach of, "Here's the modem and Ethernet if you want to try something but don't expect any deeper involvement from us." Nintendo has been beating their head against the wall of online ventures for consoles since the mid-80's. Although I'm sure their management appreciates that it is an extremely different environment for such things today, especially the broadband aspect, it will be up to others to prove this is a worthwhile business. Even if they have to scramble to catch up later giving it a pass is a better thing to do right now while they have no shortage of opportunities to make massive sales intheir proven markets.
  • they don't want to believe?

    Sure, on technical merits, gameplay, any "quality" issue, I'll grant you that it's probably a flop. But no one seems to understand, maybe they're blinded by love for the gamecube or ps2.

    Microsoft is doing more than just trying to leverage into another hot market... this plan is so much bolder than that. They're out to chop the knees out from under Dell, HPaq, and Gateway.

    Xbox2, most likely, but possibly xbox3 will be the "home computer". It will be marketed as such, a computer that is "so much simpler to use" and never has compatibility problems caused by all sorts of 3rd party drivers. It will be cheaper too, loaded with software and still well under then $700 price mark that consumer pc's are shooting for. This too, will look like a failure

    But it will just be beginning. Next version will be the Xbox Corporrate edition, loaded with the new version of Office XP, cheaper, with no annoying expansion possibilities. Relatively nicer licensing... cheaper, easier for your bonhead MCSE's to administrate, and having the latest office software 6 months before it's released on the PC.

    And linux won't run on it, ever. They'll find some way, even if it means adding chips with no purpose other than to thwart it. And no matter how good at reverse engineering you are, what happens when you recieve the DMCA cease and desist?

    At this point, the Xbox family will be making serious inroads into the desktop PC market, without annoying competitor operating systems. Maybe 40% - 50%, which in an industry with razor thin profit margins, will kill Gateway. Hpaq will hold on, and Dell will license it... the Dellbox will debut. No, I'm not kidding.

    Also, at this point, the price starts to rise on bare mobo's even more, as the taiwanese manufacturers see the advantages of high volume manufacturing evaporate. These are the same people that make mobo's for Dell, and if they aren't making those, the cost slightly rises on *ALL* their products. And as someone that builds your own box, you are further marginalized... people laugh at you for spending that much more on a system that can't run Halo 5.

    Now, M$ starts to really drag ass with the PC versions of Office. Salesmen that arrange licensing with the Fortune 500 starrt pushing the Xbox 5: Professional Edition as the only real choice with a future, Microsoft may not be able to continue the cost of developing M$ Office PC edition, and you don't want to be stuck with 10,000 machines that won't be able to run the latest software.

    Market, better than 70% at this point. All the industry rags coo and blush, telling how M$ cleaned things up when customer service was in the toilet. The PR campaign is heavy duty now. Prices continue to rise, and HPaq gets out of the consumer PC market, content to sell servers and laserjets. Dell is licensing Xbox, but still retaining the PC line... but prices rise due to no serious competition.

    The DOJ initiates an investigation into further illegal monopoly practices, but this will take years, and M$ buys the right politicians. Whenever anyone important and unsilencable bitches, they hold up Dell like ventriloquists hold up the dummy and insist he really is real, and talking.

    The market share of Xbox hits 80%, with %5 for mac zealots (no offense, I have 12 macs myself guys) that only leaves 15% for the do-it-your-selfers and linux zealots (no offense guys, I have 5 linux machines, including Amiga Linux, on a 2k). At this point, Dell does a press release how there really isn't enough market to support selling general purpose PC's. There are lots of little 2nd and 3rd tier vendors... but none that make any inroads into the corporate or even medium sized privately owned businesses. Plus, the cost for general purpose components is now through the roof, and taiwan is bleeding hardware manufacturers left and right.

    I'm thinking Intel will be compelled to go along with it, knowing that they'll have exclusive for the Xbox cpu, and still retaining their server market. Places that need mid-range to high end rackmount servers, if they use x86, have always shrugged off paying $600 for a motherboard, $200 for a nic. They won't notice.

    At about this point, M$ will quit supporting mac, which may be the only viable alternative.

    And you thought it was just an ugly games machine.

    • Right, and thats when they TAKE OVER THE WORLD!!! MUHAHAHA!!!!

      Sorry man, but I have to take a more positive "it could happen" approach. How 'bout this:

      As soon as their network goes live the Xbox is hacked and is running apache on their OWN datacenters faster and more efficient then IIS. The MSFT lawers realizes the court battle is hopeless and quit and the court smacks down big daddy M$. It is ruled that proprietary protocols are a threat to national security and MSFT is outlawed from public sector use in the US. The PR is so bad for MSFT that there is a social stigma for even using it. The Tonight Show and others are constantly tossing out MSFT jokes (more then they do now) and Apple suddenly gains a significant market share. MSFT decides to totaly drop Apple. No more mac IE or mac Office. That is the final straw for the courts, and MSFT is de-regulated. They are split into a million pieces and FORCED to honor government regulated price caps, and to open up all their API's, document formats, and network protocols. Many of these become international standards, and Linux and Mac are now AMAZINGLY compatable. Meanwhile the Apple XServe has been gaining in popularity. Sun and Apple own the server market and practically drive intel out of business. Apple now totaly owns the market, and for fear of being a monopoly they decide to licence aqua for x86 and give intel and MSFT a subsity to keep them in business. *NIX is hands down the most common operating system in the world and the open source software community receives government funding in the interest of national security.

      The future is what you make of it. I'm not going to give up yet!

      • The parent scenario is much, much more likely. The XBox includes strong encryption designed to insure that only Microsoft software will ever run on it. A hardware hack around the encryption may be possible, but it will break compatibility with all XBox software and will be illegal to market, to boot.
    • Gracious, you are right, I did just think it was an ugly game console. Well, not really.

      You paint an interesting timeline of the future, one that I buy right up to the point where they invade corporate America with the Xbox(n). I rather suspect that M$ fears the content owners/creators ($ony, AOL/TW etc) as they are the companies rising like rancid cream to the top of the profit margin glass.

      Software is becomming a commodity, not Office and Windows, not yet, but they will. There are only so many bells and whistles one can add to the OS and office suite to persuade people to buy it, and only so much money that the M$ tax will bring in on new machines. Sure, corporate america will eventually lease it's software, keeping the revenue flowing on that end, but corporate america is canny with its money and will only part with sufficient to get the job done.

      Joe Q Public on the other hand is still a ripe and untapped market. He has lots of money (gaw bless America) and when he wants to be entertained, He Wants To Be Entertained!.

      As it currently stands, he has paid his one-off M$ tax on his Dell, pirated his copy of office (and if he has to pay for it due to WPA or whatever, he'll use something else, he doesn't write that many essays and office software isn't fun) and now he isn't really paying MS for anything. The people still getting his dollar are $ony, AOL et al because they are providing him with his ongoing entertainment. Why do you think $ony decided to get into music and movies? Because there is a vast pool of money to be slurped from, and M$ wishes, I'm guessing, to insert it's proboscis by hook or by crook into this pool. The Xbox is just the start of this attack, and more power to them I say.

      Don't get me wrong, M$ is somewhat evil, and a very evident evil in my life as a programmer who spends 8 hours a day in front of a Win2K box. They have a monopoly on desktop software and office software. However, the software I write never runs on MS operating systems, never hits MS databases and is interpreted by a non-MS runtime environment. I just use windows as my dev system because that is what my editor runs on, and for that purpose it does it's job.

      However, when I go home and turn on the stereo or the TV, I'm giving vast amounts of money to a multopoly of the most appaling sort.

      I regard $ony in much the same way I regard Exxon and DeBeers, truly evil multinationals who will do anything and everything they can to get to and stay on the top. MS bashing is very valid in the context of IT professionals, however, in the great big scheme of things, their evil mostly pales into insignificance when compared to what goes on elsewhere in the corporate world.

      In that context, if MS want to go out and build the best gaming system they possibly can, from the console to the network, to eventual PVR and other functionality, then go right ahead I say. They have plenty of competition, and frankly I like the competition a lot less. (It is worth noting that when MS actually has some competition, they can produce very good products, subjectively at least. You can have my iPaq when you pry it from my cold dead fingers, ditto my Xbox and my licence for Win2K)

      With that in mind, when they dropped the price on the Xbox, Beloved (who does indeed love me) went straight out and bought me one. It is my considered opinion that I have never had a more pleasurable extended gaming experience than I have over the last couple of days with RalliSport Challenge and Halo. (This is coming from someone who has the stereotypical fire breathing thunderbird/GF3/1GB-RAM box at home (It's like a tiny god) plugged into a cable modem just waiting to play what have you, if you can get the damn thing to run stably and free up enough drive space and sort out that weird conflict with the latest detonator driver and work out why the hell the latest 4in1 doesn't work as well as the last three etc etc ad nauseum). No muss, no fuss, no setup, no wondering how it will play on your machine. No hunting for memory cards. Listen to your own music. Nice big adult controller. Fantabulous graphics and sound (I'd rather TV resolution and predicatbly adequate frame rate, though I suppose I'm in the minority there, and all from a device whose total cost is significantly under half of what I paid for my last god damned video card. Shit, where is that receipt?)

      When the $50 online kit comes out, I'll be happily queueing with the spotty teenagers and early adopters. Frankly, I'm going to enjoy being able to let my 10 year old play online in a 'safe' sandbox appropriate to his age, and I'm going to get a hell of a kick out of UT against matched opponents (so I don't continuously get the crap kicked out of me by people who still have reflexes like I used to) and I'm going to enjoy the heck out of the headset too. I think it is a fabulous idea and I truly hope it all comes together, despite the fact that it will continue to line Bill's pockets. I don't mind lining them when he provides me with what I want. In terms of the future, if and when the product offends my ethics or morals, I'll stop giving him my money, as is my right.

      Damn it all, that was a long rant. I like my xbox a great deal. I dislike MS monopolistic practices. The latter only impacts the former for me in as much as I'm going to encourage MS to engage in business practices that are not monopolistic by supporting those products that are competing. Sony has done little to deserve my money with their current console on a technical level, and frankly I dislike the company enough to boycott it on a moral level.

  • Observe the trends (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Rupert ( 28001 ) on Wednesday May 22, 2002 @09:25AM (#3565179) Homepage Journal
    While El Reg does love to bash Microsoft (one of the reasons I read it!) they also have a point here about the various companies different strategies for online gaming.

    MS is building a theme park, and will charge a toll for players and (probably) for game companies too. Sony is staying out of the expensive business of physically connecting game players to game servers, and instead letting the game developers provide the servers. If the history of the Internet so far is any guide, Sony's approach is more likely to succeed.

    • Re:Observe the trends (Score:5, Interesting)

      by sheldon ( 2322 ) on Wednesday May 22, 2002 @10:06AM (#3565470)
      Setting up the online gaming infrastructure can be expensive. In the PC world there have been only a handful of success stories. Quake relied mostly on volunteers setting up servers. Blizzard is relying on sheer popularity of their boxed game sales to cover the cost. But others like UO, Everquest, and dozens of others charge $10/month to play.

      So Sony is leaving it up to the developers. Which means some games may be free to play online, and others will cost money.

      But the way game consoles work, a consumer buys many games and then might wish to play any given game at any time. This means that unless you are entirely committed to one game, you face the possibility of paying $10/month for half a dozen games, which is a signifigant cost. That means you probably only choose one game to play online, sort of a survival of the fittest. Everquest has become this way on the PC, whereas others like Subspace died from lack of subscribers.

      On the other hand Microsoft is taking a different tactic. They'll provide the infrastructure for all games. The developer of the game sells their box, and then turns over the server code to MS to maintain. MS in turn charges one price to the consumer(this might be $50/year, maybe it's $10/month, not sure yet) to access all games online.

      This means that popular games will drive XBox sales and sales of the online subscription. But less popular games will be able to share these infrastructure costs and as a result not disappear totally because they only have say 200 users instead of 200,000.

      I see Microsoft's model as clearly superior from the customer perspective. The only question is how much, if anything, they charge the game producers. If it's little to nothing, MS will clearly be in a better partnership position.

      BTW, Sony's model has been criticized by others a bit more knowledgeable and certainly less biased than the Register:
      http://news.com.com/2100-1040-855039.ht ml
      • I think the big problem this presents is the amount of power it gives Microsoft over the game companies.

        I certainly wouldn't feel comfortable with Microsoft running my game server code for me; as others have mentioned, they probably won't do that good a job. And who will the customers blame? Me.

        Microsoft's strategy is much higher risk than Sony's. Sony says "Let's put this out and see what people do with it." Microsoft says "Let's build an enormous system that hopefully people will use.

        According to an excellent Salon.com article [salon.com], the Xbox has little in the way of compelling games to differentiate itself from Sony or Nintendo.

        The Register is right about one thing: Salex of the Xbox have been dropping. That makes me give their opinions the benefit of the doubt. Just because they're biased doesn't make them wrong.

        D

      • I keep seeing people post that you only pay a flat rate fee and you get access to all of X-Box's online games. Why is it that in some articles [gamespot.com] about X-Box Live, there's also a statement like the following:

        "Microsoft has committed to assisting publishers in the hosting, networking, security, and
        billing for their online games."

        That seems to suggest that there will be the possibility of additional fees for some games. Online RPGs for instance are now expected to be updated regularly with new items, quests, etc., and I imagine that a static world would mean the death of the game. Yes, people would love to not download patches that fixes features that should have been in the game in the first place. However, people also love the dynamics of the game where the weapon you had last week may have been the best, but the new weapon drops on such and such mob is even better.

        Back to the original point, who is going to pay for those updates, as these updates will certainly not be developed for free? That $10 a month will probably cover the bandwidth and matchmaking services, but it's doubtful it will help cover developer expenses, and if it doesn't cover their expenses, why bother making an online game? Sports games are suppose to update their statistics and rosters (injuries) as the real life season progresses for a more "realistic" game, so it's not only RPGs that would require developer maintaince. Let's say MS is generous and gives a portion of that $10 to developers. But what if gamers play more than one online RPG with more than one sports game? Then that $10 is split so many different ways that it becomes insignificant. And if developers have to pay for hosting at MS's datacenters, that is a recurring monthly fee for the developers possibly, and I doubt that the $50 you paid for the initial game can pay not only for the development costs of the game, but also the recurring monthly costs to be hosted by MS. I just don't think people should get their hopes up that this is a $10 flat fee.

      • Re:Observe the trends (Score:4, Informative)

        by djbentle ( 553091 ) on Wednesday May 22, 2002 @12:08PM (#3566297)
        All good points. I would add a few other things. One, Blizzard is a good example of why Microsoft's strategy may be more successful. Battle.net may be free, but it is also buggy, overcrowded, laggy, and infested with cheaters. Blizzard lacks either the ability, or the desire to fix these problems. With Microsoft's strategy there is one system to police and maintain. If it works well, all the games on it will work well. With Sony's strategy each game will be a crapshoot. Some companies will get it right, others will be abysmal failures whether they charge or not.

        Battle.net would not be successful on a console. There environment it too hostile for casual gamers. The console market is different from the pc market. PC online gamers are mostly hardcore gamers willing to fiddle with stuff to get it to work. Consoles like the playstation 2 are so successful (>30 million world-wide) precisely because they don't limit themselves to hardcore gamers. Microsoft's system will present one unified, homogenous, well maintained destination for all gaming. On Sony's system you will have to deal with 10 different companies and their separate bills, servers, interfaces, matchmaking systems and quirks. Plus, with the XBox you can find your friends and talk with them anywhere on the network, anytime, no matter what game they are playing.

        p.s. If you like subspace, it is far from dead. It is now called Continuum, but it is the exact same game. Check out www.subspacehq.com. That game ate my life when it was in beta years ago. It is a perfect example of a game that would have succeeded with Microsoft's system because they wouldn't have had to pay for servers. There are many great games that will never be popular enough to pay for the infrastructure investment necessary to make them online. The only way around this is user hosted servers (the common pc model) and this won't work with consoles.

        David
  • Microsoft's attempts to present itself as the safe, wholesome Disyneyland of software. Sony, we would estimate, has more sense and fewer scruples.

    Fewer scruples then MS? And this is coming from the Register? Those guys really know how to insult Sony.

  • What is to hinder anyone to provide their own network? Note that MS doesn't just want to provide the network to drive sales of games, they're looking for a source of income too (if we accept [slashdot.org] that MS is actually loosing money on the consoles, and has a hard time making up for it in sold games, let alone making some actual profit).

    But if online networks are profitable, then the software publishers will want their share in that and won't [slashdot.org] leave it all to microsoft. Microsoft has not yet the leverage to dictate software publishers too rigid conditions, especially if they want said publishers to produce interesting online games for the Xbox, even more so as the puplishers could as well partner with Sony if they don't like MSs conditions.

    So since Microsoft has no leverage to press their contracts on publishers like EA, what is to hinder them to draw up their own gaming network and compete with Microsoft? This could become even funnier if MS then got to be at the recieving end of the "being screwed by badly documented and slightly changed protocols" tactics: it's the publishers and programmers of the game that control its interfaces, and they could just do the very same thing to microsoft, that microsoft did to others with the "standard" for "Word".

  • Interesting? Hardly... (Score:3, Informative)

    by stubear ( 130454 ) on Wednesday May 22, 2002 @09:39AM (#3565264)
    The factual information is educating on it's own - and the analysis of why they think it will fail is interesting as well.


    Factul information? Where? Interesting? About as interesting as your commentary Hemos. You should get out more if you thought that article was enlightneing and factual.

  • microsoft != microsoft (Score:5, Insightful)

    by sluggie ( 85265 ) on Wednesday May 22, 2002 @09:42AM (#3565285)
    Yes, it's true.
    Just because they developed a kinda unfriendly OS there is no reason to hate the whole company and predict failings and spread bad mood.

    The gaming sector of Microsoft has nothing in common with the part of the company that produces the OS, except the name.
    Take a look at Microsoft hardware, the controllers, the joysticks, the mice. They deliver rock steady quality for a fair price.

    And I think it's the same thing with gaming here. The guys responsible for that DO have the balls and the money to pull this thing off.

    Why do we always have to bitch about EVERYTHING that MS does? Why can't we just be grateful that they give us more freedom in choosing our online/gaming console?

    More drivers just improve the quality of the race.

    So, let's see how they do, and hey, if it's cool don't be ashamed to use it.
    • you really don't understand...

      microsoft is a monopolistic giant. by itself, this means nothing and there is nothing wrong with it. the problem with microsoft is that they use the power they have in one area (e.g. OS, office suites) to force customers to use their products in other areas. e..g all those pop-ups and "wizards" that guide you from the OS to use MSN.

      i for one have forsaken all purchases even associated with microsoft because i know that the money i spend on one thing will be used to give them a monopoly in some other field... a field i probably like ms-free.

      to paraphrase you, microsoft == microsoft
      • no, I think you didn't get my point.

        forcing the user to use something else from the company ONLY appears on the software side.
        I never saw a MS Mouse that only works with a MS OS, or vice versa.
        I never saw a MS game that only works with MS controllers, or vice versa.

        So, gaming, hardware, and OS are SEPERATED. This was my point.

  • Strength and Weaknesses (Score:4, Interesting)

    by alen ( 225700 ) on Wednesday May 22, 2002 @09:47AM (#3565318)
    Microsoft's partners will be LucasArts of course and a bunch of small developing houses that don't want to invest tons of $$$ they don't have into their own datacenters. Since they don't have the cash they will be too happy to let MS handle the server side. Powerhouses like EA know all to well what happens when you give some control to MS and since they have the cash they can build their own datacenters. And most likely they already have some kind of infrastructure in place for PC gaming online. Why cede control to MS when you can write a soccer game and have PC players and X-Box players play on your own network? The downside to the Sony approach is multiple billing. With MS you have one bill for all your gaming needs. With Sony you have to worry about budgeting and if you can afford a fifth subscription. And if you already have subs to some online games will you want to set up more? With MS you have one account you can use for all the games you want.



    As far as kids tehy have their own credit cards these days and will be able to set up their own online accounts. So parents may be out of the picture in some households.

    • ...With Sony you have to worry about budgeting and if you can afford a fifth subscription...

      You make some good points. But to be honest, if the games that come out for consoles are anything like EverCrack (which apparently FFXI, and Everquest (duh?) will be) then I can pretty much guarantee that I won't be playing more than one game at a time anyways! :) Has anyone here that played EverCrack played *anything* else during their time with this addictive game? No, I didn't think so! :) I could hardly find enough time for the 1 game. On the other hand, if Nintendo jumps in with Online versions of things like Mario Cart, Tennis, Golf, Party etc. Then yes, I see the benefit of having a single billing point for all of these services. But these games are more for jumping in and out of then EverCrack was. Kinda like Quake (I/II/III) or CounterStrike vs EverQuest or Ultima Online. They are different types of games that require different amounts of attention. I think there's room for both. I think I'd like Nintendo to have a server for their Nintendo games (as mentioned above) so I can jump in and out with or without friends and pay them a small monthly fee, AS WELL AS, have bigger servers for the larger more involved games like Phantasy Star Online. Do you think the M$ centres can support both?! I don't know about that. I'd pay for PSO seperately from the Ninendo services, because they are much different. Just my $0.02.

  • Why is everyone missing the point? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by donnacha ( 161610 ) on Wednesday May 22, 2002 @09:48AM (#3565327) Homepage

    I'm amazed that I have yet to read a single article that draws together the most obvious strands of Microsoft's Xbox strategy.

    1. It has nothing to do with the old razors/blades chestnut, whereby companies exclusively focused on gaming subsidized the hardware in order to make money on the software. Most commentators are so dazzled at their own brilliance in understanding that rather simple business strategy that they've failed to notice that the market has moved on, increased it's complexity and now has substantially expanded ambitions.

    2. MS might be saying that their only focus is gaming but you'd have to be retarded to believe it. Their major international investments in cable companies make it obvious that some sort of Personal Video Recorder and possibly also basic decoder capability will work it's way into the next Xbox.

    3. The current iteration of the Xbox is all about establishing it's credibility as a consumer device. They will achieve this because they have to and that sort of acceptance absolutely CAN be bought. I'm not saying that MS would madly throw money at this regardless of eventual profit but you have to realize that the eventual market they're aiming for is FAR larger than gaming.

    4. Apart from PVR, Gaming, DVD and cable TV decoding, there's also the fact that the Xbox will be the hardware incarnation of MSN Messenger and THAT'S the biggest game in town. An often overlooked part of their upcoming online gaming package is the headset communicator that they're bundling with it. Stated purpose of this device: to allow gamers to lambast eachother while playing. Actual purpose: to allow millions of people to chat. THAT's why they're building data-centres with such massive capability. Think about it, they become the world's defacto IM service with no Yahoo or AOL to compete with them.

    Let me just make this clear: the Xbox is going to be the world's telephone/watercooler/flirtation device. Your sister will buy one.

    The proof: MS aren't going to reduce the Xbox's retail price any further but, by Xmas, they WILL add the headset communicator and a years subscription to the bundle. Seriously, this will happen.

    Next, expect to see the introduction of a non-gaming based chat service by next summer.

    5. MS don't have to keep lowering the Xbox price. In fact, a major sales channel that Sony and Nintendo don't have is the cable companies. Expect to see the Xbox offered as a rental item, for about $15 per month along with Xbox Live subscription and stripped-down broadband Internet Connectivity (i.e. Xbox only).

    I'm not for or against MS, I'm just calling it as I see it. Personally, I might buy a GameCube when Pikmin is released. I might also buy an Xbox when it's functionality stretches, as I've predicted, beyond just gaming.

    • Pikmin was released on the same day as the GameCube. What are you waiting for? :)
      • The above poster probably lives in Europe or Australia, where the Cube has only recently been released, and Pikmin is not yet released.

        Mind you, if thats the case then Super Monkey Ball, Rogue Leader, Waverace, Luigi and ISS2 are already out, so I'd say get one anyway.
    • Usually I try to stay away from completely dorking out, but...

      Microsoft is building the infrastructure to support the Metaverse. In snow crash it was a cable company, because they had the time and the money.

      But in this case the metaverse is owned and by Microsoft.

      Microsoft writing, owning, and patenting the street protocol scares me.

      And if Microsoft fails, Sony will end up owning and patenting the strret protocol. Which honestly, could be much much much worse.

    • I think you've hit on most of the major points. I'm not quite sure I'd go quite so far as to claim MS plans on re-incarnating the telephone with a new X-Box that everyone will buy just to chat with their friends/relatives.

      More likely, they realize X-Box gaming will be one step ahead of everyone else's gaming offerings if the players can yell at each other through a headset and/or type to each other. By merely offering this capability, a 3rd. party will surely come along and say "Hey, I can make this thing work as a voice over IP free telephone device too!" and add that functionality. (Following usual MS trends, they'll wait and see how well it works, and if it's promising - buy it out from whoever developed it.)

      In the end, you'll have just one more tool for communication - but nothing earth-shattering. At the end of the day, the X-Box is really just one more attempt to sell an inexpensive computer to people who might not own one otherwise. Those who already do own computers won't find the X-Box much more attractive than, say, owning another spare computer.
  • 1- XBox Live online with the communicator will cost $50 for the first year and $10/month afterward, for all the online games.
    2- PS2's strategy is to allow publishers like EA to create there own online network and charge a monthly fee per game. Has anyone tried EA's online service yet? We all know how awfull it is.

    Here's a video preview [xboxmaniak.com] of what XBox Live is all about.

  • What a horrible conclusion they've made! (Score:4, Insightful)

    by morhoj ( 573833 ) on Wednesday May 22, 2002 @10:01AM (#3565434)
    Based off of ONE quote from the NYT where MSFT describes the experience as a digital "Disneyland", the Register goes out and makes some crappy conclusions about how it will fail because its difficult (near impossible) to govern such an environment on the web.

    Personally, I think the analogy wasn't meant to mean that the X-Box Network will function technically like Disneyland, but more of that it will function like Disneyland from an "ease of use" perspective (i.e its easier for the general masses to understand how its easy to have fun in Disneyland than throwing out some complex technical jargon).

    The move from online gaming for the computer whizzes to the public masses is a HUGE jump, and I'd rather see MSFT (with their financial stock-piles) take the losses from trying to bridge the gap. Do you honestly think the average game player is astute enough to setup dedicated servers, install mods, and monitor the systems required for massively-parallel online games?

    Some of the best on-line games now (Counter-Strike for example), require server admins with knowledge of setting up the server piece, connecting it to the web, and managing it to prevent cheating--not to mention keeping it clean for the general public. Do you honestly think Joe Schmoe can do this himself on his X-Box at home? A large infrastructure like this is a REQUIREMENT to move the medium to the next level.

    Really bad interpratation of an entire network that has a minimum of technical specs available so far. I personally can't wait to try it out.


    • Online gaming is alive and well. Your post completely fails to understand that. You simply have zero understanding of how the current laissez faire gaming communities work. For a game like Counter-Strike there is no need to "move the medium to the next level." Furthermore, a game like Counter-Strike, developed, enhanced and served by its user-base doesn't need a Microsoft disneyland.

      Counter-Strike is the anti-thesis of a Microsoft Disneyland online gaming community. It is also a game that will be unplayable and probably un-evolvable in the static world of pristine Microsoft online gaming.

      Furthermore, the public masses don't want to play online. They don't have the time. They don't have the patience: they don't want to deal with online gaming idiots that permeate online game. They just want to sit down in front of their TV for perhaps 30 minutes at a time and play a few single player games. ALL statistics of console gaming shows this.

      Except for MMORPGs, there is no need for a large infrastructure for online gaming to flourish.

      Microsoft has designed the world's most perfect wombat-trap. They must no pray for an increase in the wombat population.
  • That seems like more of a comparison of equals because Coney Island's popularity peaked before WWII.
    And, Magic Mountain does have the better rides just like PS2 has better games --or so I've gathered. And it fits the theme still because Magic Mountain also has some brutal security that hides behind some pretty well concealed hideouts but isn't afraid to make a scene.
    Disneyland on acid isn't too bad, but Magic Mountain security is just itching to screw with people with dialated pupils and they used to have the occasional gang shoot outs in the 80s. Oh well, they should have consulted with a Californian before using amusement park metaphors.

  • I do not know if the Xbox will fail or not, but the register article is just wishful thinking. For example:

    That's not to say the stated billions are correct of course, but if this one flops it'll still cost Redmond a pretty penny. In the event of failure Microsoft would be left clutching four datacentres, a sophisticated broadband voice, data and messaging network waiting for clients that aren't coming, and - bizarrely - some kind of online Disneyesque experience.

    Microsoft can easily off-load this risk. I can think of at least three companies who have such infrastructure already built and sitting idle. M$ does not hav to invest on this.

    Plus, the historical record says: don't bet against Microsoft. Usually when they screw up (which is often) they learn from it, and go at it a second time, with a much better product. After two-three iterations they end up dominating the market space.

  • Xbox already lost (Score:2, Interesting)

    by evilned ( 146392 )
    And its the games that lost it, Sony just locked up GTA till 2004, and EA decided that its online components for its games will only work on PS2 (they had some problems with xbox live), and the FF series is only on ps2 (or pc for 11). Stick a fork in it, its done.
  • Yeah, yeah, yeah, this article is taking the Microsoft Domination angle. Sony is going to take the domination route too, of course. Console makers want tight control over everything (Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo can reject games because they don't like the concept), and naturally that includes networks. But this is ignoring the bigger issue.

    Console gamers have gotten used to lightning fast games with no slowdown. PC users halfway expect bugs and long load times and frame rate stutter--or even frighteningly bad frame rates--from PC games. And so when they deal with the inherent unreliability of playing networked games, with all the joy of lag and dropped connections, they're used to it. But this isn't going to fly well with console gamers. There's no 100% bulletproof way to make a 60fps game play over the internet. No matter what you do, you're either going to get frame rate stutter (because the clients are in-step with the server) or phantom hits and misses (because the client is extrapolating to make things *seem* smoother). And this is goimg to be a mess. As it is, most PC gamers don't have a clue about what lag really is, and they seem to think that it's the fault of the developer. Heck, now the term "lag" is applied to non-networked situations: "Black & White lags on my Pentium II."

    Developers would best steer clear of the whole mess, unless they're going to write low-latency games like The Sims. But that's not what the console market wants or is expecting.
  • The Voice over IP (if it really works) will be the killer app for the XBox. You'll see people paying $19.95 a month to log in to Everquest or whatever Microsoft's equivalent will be to talk to mom in Bangalore or their online Japanese girlfriend. Expect the voice scrambling to go quickly.
  • They are quite capable of losing millions of dollars, perhaps hundreds of millions of dollars a year for the next five or ten years, or more. All it would be for them is a tax-loss write off. I do not doubt that they would be willing to LOSE as much as Sony has ever made on the Playstation, if it meant that there was a "TV in every house, all running Microsoft Software" in 20 years time.

    Give the devil their due, the Information Superhighway is littered with the corpses of companies and products that were technically superior but underestimated Gates and Co. Who *EVER* thought that Word stood a chance against WordPerfect? How many of us laughed at Runtime Windows 1.0, or 2.0? And of course Novell had a much better product and was earlier to market to boot.

    I'm no real fan of Microsoft, but IMHO nearly everyone is seriously underestimating the amount of money and effort they will put into this; I also bet that they are currently 'playing nice' due to being under a lot of legal scrutiny; once the various attorney generals' attention is elsewhere, the gloves will come off and people who do NOT release for Xbox first, or exclusively will find their "air supply choked off".
    • ...granted, I agree that M$ would happily lose $100 million next year to monopolize the market (they probably paid at least that to own the Justice Dept after all...oops).

      But it's not for a tax break: they certainly don't need it. YOU probably paid more in taxes than they did last year.
      "a Microsoft spokeswoman would not say whether that firm did or not [pay any taxes]. But its annual report for fiscal 2000, which ended June 30, shows stock option income tax benefits of $5.5 billion, exceeding its $4.85 billion provision for income taxes. (Its actual federal and state tax liability for 2000 was $4.74 billion.)"

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