The Next Year Won’t be Pretty for the 360, According to Analysts
By Chris on Monday, June 9th, 2008 at 4:06 PM PST In Game Companies, Game Consoles, Game Platforms, Games Industry, Microsoft, Microsoft
At last month’s Nordic Game 2008 conference, industry analysts discussed the future of the Xbox 360, and if you put any stock in what they have to say, things aren’t looking good.
“When you look at an installed base basis, the Xbox 360’s going to come in third place when all’s said and done,” said David Cole of DFC Intelligence.
“The concern I would have with a company like Microsoft is, one of these days they’re going to have to make a profit on this business otherwise why are they in it?”
Both Cole and analyst Nick Parker talked about the image problem Microsoft has with its system, which Parker explained as having never faded away after the original Xbox’s focus of blood and breasts. (I think it’s a fine focus, assuming the two don’t have to go together.)
“The trouble with Xbox 360 is it hasn’t managed to shake off this urban, irreverent adult male feel; so it hasn’t gained traction in the more casual gaming markets of mainland Europe such as France, Spain and Italy, where it’s stalled,” said Parker. “And there are already rumours of Xbox 360 being delisted from certain retailers.”
“I think they started off badly with the Xbox itself: blood and breasts. This alienated it immediately to a lot of consumers around Europe, and they never got over that. The brand image never went away. And although Halo 3 is a big game, it just emphasises again what the Xbox is all about,” he added.
“If you go talk to people in Seville, in Rome, they’re not interested in that. They’re much more casual gamers, they don’t want to have such competitive games.”
Cole shared his prediction that “the Xbox 360 [will] start to struggle in the market” over the next 12 months, but also noted that Sony may find it difficult to turn a profit with the PS3, as well.
You can read more about the analysts predictions over at Eurogamer.
As a competitive gamer i see the “blood and breasts” as a dive into the heart of gaming. As a businessman i would see it as a downfall if only one section of consumer wants that…and every other section wants something nintendo or sony has to offer, im speaking in microsofts case ofcourse.
Ya, I really don’t know what to think. I own a wii myself, and I love it. I hope the 360 doesn’t fail though.
I don’t even own any of the current consoles at all and this article annoyed me. “This system is made to much for adult males” I agree that Competitive gaming can be annoying but that is usually not the consoles fault but the idiots who take gaming to serious. Each system should be aimed at one certain market at least. Games like Grand Theft auto are something to me that make games shine, the ability to create something that you can’t or should not do in real life, to break the mold so to speak.. So basically these guys seem to keep the worst stereotype for gaming there is “Gaming is for kids only”
Also did it occur to these guys that maybe one reason country like France don’t like the xbox is because Microsoft is American company? Even though I really like the Japanese they do for a fact pull this crap a lot, they really did so on the first Xbox. Read articles where basically they would pick up an xbox see it wasn’t made in another country and automatically consider it to be crap..
So these guys basically want all consoles and probably PC games to because Emo lets all love each other crap? No thanks
Bah didn’t proof read enough of what I typed but when I get pissed… lol
These “analysts” talk out their backsides an awful lot.
These’ll be the same people that said the PS3 was going to take to world by storm, and that PC gaming was dead.
Utter bollox, all of it.
Yes, 360 and ps3 will struggle to shift units next year, but thats f**k all to do with image, its more to do with the fact that the people that they are aiming at getting one…….. already have one by then.
Its why Wii’s sales have slumpted too.
Not cus its “failing” but because you reach a peak in sales whereby the mass flux of buyers have the machines, so theres only other people picking them up as the deals start appearing.
“As a competitive gamer i see the “blood and breasts” as a dive into the heart of gaming”
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^^^ No offense but as an old school gamer that begun playing since the NES era, this statement sounds a bit idiotic. The heart of gaming was never blood or breasts but always was GAMEPLAY. The blood and the breasts were simply hooks employed in certain games to get teens and young impressionable adults (the type that had yet to see breasts in real life) to play such games. But it was the gameplay that actually kept them hooked. I mean if the game sucked, no matter how much blood they throw at you, that game would fail. The same rule applied to any other type of game.
I just find it annoying that both analysts and some gamers seem to believe that core gamers play FPS/Third person shooters all the f’ing time. In all my years of playing videogames, FPS have not been my main source of entertainment. I loved Doom and Quake. But those titles took a back seat to platformers, adventure games, rpg games and puzzle games. Thing is, there is more to us gamers than Halo and GTA. So much so, that we can even find entertainment playing some of those “casual games”. Some find that hard to admit, as if their nutsacks would fall of or something. They’re just games dammit.
Oh comon, the 360 has some seriously awesome games. If they continue that, then wala.
ya totaly nonsence. Microsoft are in it for the race aswell, a game or system sold is money in their pockets, DLC, movies etc, its a business, just like sonys and nintendo.
It’s probably not much of a stretch to say that the 360 has done better than the original XBOX and it’s no stretch at all to say that the PS3 will not be as big a success as the PS2. Bearing this in mind I can’t see how the 360 has ‘failed’