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XBox (Games) Entertainment Games

Microsoft Announces Price Cut For Xbox 36

Posted by simoniker from the more-box-for-your-buck dept.
fjord66 writes "Effective immediately, Microsoft's Xbox videogame console will retail for $179 in the United States." This wasn't the 50 buck price drop expected, but comes hot on the heels of Sony announcing a new bundle for $199 with an updated PS2 and the network adaptor, and $179 for disposal of the current PS2 stock.
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Microsoft Announces Price Cut For Xbox More

Microsoft Announces Price Cut For Xbox

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  • Has Nintendo announced anything? Otherwise I feel they will be rapidly losing out of the three. GBA aside...
    • But the gamecube is cheaper than the other 2 and includes a free game...
    • Why are they losing out? They have great original games, which is what a console should be all about.

      I don't see what the XBox is good for, but making a small standard pc, which can be used to run Linux on ;). The games will get on the pc anyway. And on my pc I can play online games as well, and I can do my work on it too. What's so special about the XBox? Halo?

      Well I don't really see a disadvantage at PS2, but for the fact I just like Nintendo games better, and I can play the ps games on my computer

  • Will a $20 cut matter? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Tom Courtenay ( 638139 ) on Wednesday May 14, 2003 @04:01PM (#5958146)
    Does any body have data on what kind of effect a price cut this small will have on sales?

    I would think that Microsoft would do well to stand their ground at $199. There's a certain appeal of seeing a system that's more expensive than the 3 year old PS2. A $20 price cut makes them look somewhat desperate. Regardless, a price cut this small seems pretty meaningless when you're dealing with something upwards of $175.

    I could however, see this working if they did a pack in with an extra controller & a grade A title. Heck, even bundling under-performing titles like Orta & Muto would help out.

    • It will matter, particuarly if they hold steady at that price point after the current PS2 stock is sold out and all that's avaliable is the $199 set.

      Though, it's hard to find a bare X-Box system, normally all I see is the bundles...
      • I don't know if I agree that it will matter. If I'm considering buying a console and weighing my options between the XBox and the PS2, a 9% difference isn't going to be a huge consideration. I'd be much more apt to look at game libraries, support, and expected lifetime of the system.

        If I were already willing to spend $180, I don't think $20 more is going to sway me a lot. Maybe you're right - I'm talking from my own personal vantage point. I just didn't think that consumers were so fixated on price and savi

    • I think this is more of strategic pricing aimed squarely at making the XBox + Halo 2 bundle hit the $200 mark when it`s released. And hey, any more buyers of the hardware meantime means more sales when the next round of AAA titles are released...
    • Microsoft isn't being aggressive enough.

      Instead of simply matching Sony's price cut, they should either drop to $150, or announce a bundle deal consisting of the DVD remote, a starter kit for XBox Live all for $180. THAT would begin to make XBox competitive.

      Right now, Xbox's biggest edge is their online play capability. They have more online titles than PS2, and they should be exploiting this edge!
      • I don't know if price will make that much of a difference at all. I chose PS2 because of GTA and GTA3. Since most sports games (the biggest console sellers) are available on all 3 consoles, it doesn't make sense for me to get an XBox, considering I already have a library of games and most games will be on all systems. Even at $150, I would choose PS2 because of its superior library. If MS really wants to be competitive, they have to get some HUGE exclusive releases. If EASports were to become MS exclusive,
        • At this point in this generation of consoles, it's clear that the PS2 is the clear winner based on its library. That's not really the point, though.

          However, that doesn't meant that Microsoft should just back off altogether, especially if they intend to release XBox2.

          This is why just dropping the price $20 isn't enough. As another poster pointed out, if I'm going to spend $180 anyways, going up to $200 isn't a big deal. However, dropping the price to $150 - now that's different. It's a sort of psycholo

      • Re:Will a $20 cut matter? (Score:1, Interesting)

        by Anonymous Coward
        microsoft isn't being aggressive enough.

        say wha?! they've spent tons of money marketing the thing and you are saying they aren't being agressive enough?

        half of that marketing money goes to surreptitious campaigns like getting stores to put bigger ads in their catalogs and flyers for the xbox, getting retailers to make more room in their gaming areas for the xbox and highlighting it over its competition, incouraging retailers to have their sales staff sell xbox over the other consoles, giving spiffs to t
        • Marketting only goes so far.

          I see far more PS2 related ads on TV than XBox ones.

          The area dedicated to the PS2 at my local store is 3x larger than the area dedicated to XBox.

          Let's face it, by now, if you're interested in gaming, you already know about the 3 consoles. Having them push their names in your face isn't going to convince you to buy a console. I don't see guys rushing out to buy Maxipads after one of THEIR ads, do you?

          No, Microsoft has to do something to get people's attention, maybe give the
      • "Microsoft isn't being aggressive enough."

        There's only so much you can cut before you hit bone, even if you're Microsoft. Some would say that they had already hit bone at the $200 mark.

        "Right now, Xbox's biggest edge is their online play capability."

        How big of an edge is that, though? Is it something that's here to stay, or more of a fad that will burn out in a year or two? Let us not forget the wisdom of Penny Arcade [penny-arcade.com] when it comes to playing on-line.
        • Considering how badly the XBox is doing against the PS2, I would think that *any* sort of edge would be pounced upon.

          I don't know if online gaming is going to truly be the wave of the future, or just a fad that dies out.

          Either way, people do agree that online gaming will see an increase over the next few years. Even if it dies out, if Microsoft is the leader in that area, I'm sure they're not going to be too upset...

          But right now, all I hear from Microsoft about Xbox is "Yeah! What Sony said, only buy

    • Re:Will a $20 cut matter? (Score:2, Insightful)

      by torpor ( 458 )
      It will have a big effect on sales, for the simple fact that announcing *any* price cut into Press-Release land will put give favourable "Impressions" (marketing speak) to thousands and thousands of potential customers who may be tipped over the edge by the notion of 'XBox is cheaper now, maybe its time to buy'.

      Never, ever forget that the Press Release Machine is why companies do things like this.

  • It did drop by $50 (in Canada) (Score:1, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    No account, thus the AC posting

    FWIW, in Canada, the PS2 and Xbox both dropped by $50 CDN as of Tuesday night and currently both sit @ $250. If you factor in the sales tax on the difference, thats works out to a total savings of $57.25 (in Vancouver, BC).

    That ain't chump change, and represents a much larger drop than $20 USD drop in the US (* currency exchange).

    Still waiting to see if Nintendo will make any price adjustments on the Gamecube (still $230 CDN)
    • "That ain't chump change, and represents a much larger drop than $20 USD drop in the US"

      But all that does is bring it in line with the pricing in the US. 250.00 CAD is ~181.35 USD at the end of the last trading day. And also remember that the USD is still slipping slowly, which will make the CAD price more expensive again. The yen is heading south as well.

      "Still waiting to see if Nintendo will make any price adjustments on the Gamecube (still $230 CDN)"

      They have room to cut. That's about 166.84 US
  • $20 is enough to pay for my copy of 007 so I can run Linux without a modchip.

    Now I need something worthwhile to do with it using Linux.

  • Disappointing (Score:3, Interesting)

    by AvantLegion ( 595806 ) on Wednesday May 14, 2003 @05:54PM (#5959306) Journal
    A price cut that small is definitely disappointing. Better than nothing, sure. But a $50 price cut would probably have sparked a LOT more consumer activity. Obviously, it wasn't going to match the first PS2/Xbox cuts last Memorial Day ($100 cut down to $199). But a $50 cut would have created a good buzz - especially since retailers and consumers were buzzing in anticipation of it. This wimpy $20 cut is just a disappointment to both.

    Time will tell, but I doubt we're going to see much of a spike in sales for either the Xbox OR the PS2.

    • There'll probably be a small spike in PS2s, but not for the reasons listed here...

      Sony is releasing a new hardware rev of the PS2 which allows the PS2 to use progressive scan for DVD movie playback. Current models can use progressive scan for games that support it, but cannot play movies in this mode.

      This new model, bundled with the broadband adaptor, even at $200, will be attractive enough to get people to buy a PS2, or in some extreme cases, buy this model to replace their older model at home.

      As for X
    • I think that cutting the price to lower than the PS2 would indicate desperation. Also, is it possible that Microsoft is trying to avoid anything that looks like "dumping"? IANAL, so I don't know the answer.

      Personally, I think the better choice would have been to go the Nintendo route by leaving the price the same and giving away one game (from a selection of 5-10) of the buyer's choice with the system.

  • Sod the deck, reduce the games (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Kris_J ( 10111 ) on Wednesday May 14, 2003 @07:59PM (#5960142) Homepage Journal
    Why bother with incremental price drops on the console when most potential purchasers are balking at the price of the games? The first company to halve the price of their games will probably lead the pack to the next generation of consoles.
    • "Why bother with incremental price drops on the console when most potential purchasers are balking at the price of the games?"

      Not someone who remembers what the prices of Final Fantasy "III" or Phantasy Star IV were when they were first released, are we?
      • Also: You need to remember that the ratio of quality to crap games was alot better than it is today. I paid, I think $55 for FF "III" (FF6) when I was about 12 or 13 years old, and I'm still getting replay value out of that game.... most games released today, aren't worth the difference between what you paid for them and what gamestop will give you for it.
    • Actually I don't believe this is true. Most Gamecube games, atleast the hot titles you could buy for 20$ brand spanking new. I don't know if you still can, but I think at blockbuster you still can. And these were the big titles, like RE0, Metroid, Starfox. And as far as I know it didn't cause a huge buying spree of gamecubes.
      • Well, it hasn't happened in Australia. All new release consoles games are A$99 unless discounted by the store/chain. For the price of two games I can get the entire season 1 box set of Andromeda (or whatever).
    • I guess the main issue is that if they sell the console, the games will sell as well. The costs of developing a game is quite high as well, where reproducing is peanuts.
      However I think the regular console buyer (addicts excluded) buys 1 or 2 games. For them it won't matter how much the games costs, they just buy a console for a short period of time.
      The players in this market all try to get their console in people houses cause they won't get another console most likely if they don't like it much afterwards
  • I've downloaded the ISO but not yet had a chance to burn. So, with that disclaimer (that is, I have not yet used it), I would like to point out that the dyne::bolic Linux distro [dynebolic.org] is alleged to run on Xbox. (Modded only -- "of course," says the lead developer ;) -- oh well, no Xbox prize!)

    If it works well for me on a standard PC, I might buy an Xbox as an in-car audio / video player :)

    timothy

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