Kinect-less XB1 fallout thread *spawn

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this often repeated "less powerful, same price, who will buy it" meme is silly.

The games are nearly indistinguishable to most peoples' eye outside of forums such as these. The power gap is hardly noticeable yet some seem to want to compare it to the Wii U. :LOL: There are also many other compelling reasons, services, games friends features etc. To buy an Xbox over a Ps4.

Not to mention the Kinect is still available as an input device for controlling your media center and it works damned well. Even better over the past couple of updates. It may not be a gaming revolution but it is still an impressive piece of kit and many people own and will continue to choose it going forward.


This move now just allows MS to compete with price parity and to send Xbox into other international markets where Kinect and its language interface and media barriers make it harder to implement or less compelling.


All the chicken Little rhetoric is amusing though. :LOL:
 
Now that they are redesigning the whole interface to be controller friendly the value of Kinnect is going to diminish even more. They should just save themselves the money and take it off the market until it has a reason for existing.
 
Now that they are redesigning the whole interface to be controller friendly the value of Kinnect is going to diminish even more. They should just save themselves the money and take it off the market until it has a reason for existing.
I don't see statements saying they are going to redesign the interface to make it less Kinect friendly, just add elements to make it more controller friendly (i.e. access to some sub menus etc.). Improving one does not automatically predicate that the value of one is less.
 
I don't see statements saying they are going to redesign the interface to make it less Kinect friendly, just add elements to make it more controller friendly (i.e. access to some sub menus etc.). Improving one does not automatically predicate that the value of one is less.

But as soon as people can navigate using a controller the Kinnect will be forgotten. Its nature for the path of least resistance to be followed.
 
That'll still come down to user preference. Its not as though the controller functionality is forcing people to use Kinect for the UI (I don't, for instance).
 
Pretty much the only thing keeping on me on Sony consoles is their first and second party studios. If those studios were with Microsoft, I'd own an Xbox One now. It's a crazy notion, I know, but I go where the games I like are ;)

How can you possible buy (insert one console brand here) when (insert other console brand here) is the same price? You are mad I say, mad! Don't you know that your console is inferior at (insert useless metric here) and that no real core gamer would ever do what you do? I mean who buys a console for games anyways when (insert another useless metric here) is better on the other console?


...
But how many people buying a gaming console live in such a gaming news vacuum?

Ok so assume everyone is informed and everyone knows that the xb1 is weaker. Strange how for example my bro-in-law's family have no clue about any of this since they don't read any of this stuff as they are busy with life and kids, but let's just assume it's true for the sake of argument. If that's the case then why is anyone still buying an xb1 at all?


This often spouted data comparing the One to 360 from eight years ago has to be the most useless metric I have seen in a long time.

I don't get this at all. Why is it useless? They sold their product at the maximum price they could and have a profit from day one, something that is so rarely ever done in the console world. That's a victory and let them outpace their previous console sales as well. Now that sales drop, simply drop price. Are people really suggesting they should have instead sold the first few million consoles at a loss at $399 instead of at a profit at $499 as they did? They did the right thing and priced it right, resulting in the first time a console has been able to launch without a loss in years. They tried a new idea by bundling an expensive item, sold it at a profit, sales slowed down and/or 3rd party support was nil, they changed plans and dropped price and that expensive item, now we see what happens. Goodness it's not over, it's been only 6 months!


Sony lost their audience. Why do you think MS won't lose theirs?

Because they moved quickly on price when it was needed, and because their product isn't crap to begin with.


The launch number are nigh meaningless. I can't believe this needs to be reiterated. Wi U sold way faster than XB360 and PS3, yet that 6 month total launch number wasn't any indication that it'd sell as well as them. The trends after launch sales are what matters, and XB1 isn't in a great place, selling at least 3:1 down worldwide against PS4 and with few arguments to sway non-partisan consumers in its favour.

Speaking of meaningless, Wii U are meaningless as a basis for comparison because the market for Wii U has moved on to other devices. It would be like saying look that manufacturer of the car that runs on steam had poor sales. Well yeah, because people moved on to gas powered cars. Wii U was doomed from the start.


Brand loyalty and 100 lines of resolution is not the issue. Brand loyalty means people will buy a console irrespective - nothing much Sony nor MS can do about that (loyalty is theirs to lose). The issue is the mainstream looking for a COD box, who doesn't give a shit about brand. The sorts of people who buy a TV on price and looks and what the salesman tells them and what the picture looks like, and not whether its an LG or Panny or Sony or Sammy because of brand loyalty. The sorts of people for whom the 'console wars' don't exist. Their major influences will be media and word-of-mouth, price and obvious features, every one of which PS4 is generally stronger on and can only get stronger on if sales snowball.

Sure, so why is this all negative for the xb1? You guys act as if everywhere you go there's people hiding around the corner warning people to not buy an xb1. I see lots of positive articles, and lots of articles on cool games coming out for it, I mean do articles on games not matter anymore? On websites that are not strictly about gaming the news is far more positive about the xb1 than it is for the ps4 because the ps4 ultimately is viewed as just another boring game box whereas MS are going for more with the xb1. Things like future unification of apps and services across all MS devices is seen as a huge positive on such websites although largely ignored on gaming websites and forums like this one. Why does that not count?


The problem is, Joker, is that you're effectively lumping in all gamers outthere into a singular entity called "core-gamer". They are not. The market is big and diverse. Not everyone buys a console for the same reasons.

Right which is why when someone posted "Why would you buy a $399 xb1 over a $399 ps4", I replied that was silly. That's how this all started. A comment like that implies people buy a product purely on stats alone, and we know that's not the case, it never has been in the console world.


...but we still ended up getting a PS because we like the games the platform has always offered. I think there's a strong tie between many PS owners and the games that have been offered generation after generation.

I'm simplifying your quote to the above, because I'm struggling to see why the above doesn't apply to Xbox. Again when someone posts "Why would you buy a $399 xb1 over a $399 ps4", why does everything you said not apply to xbox and only apply to playstation?


...2 products were released simultaneously and people had a choice and they chose

They chose the cheaper one, not exactly a huge surprise when one product was touching the $500 mark which for consoles is extremely high. Ps3, 3d0 and Neo Geo showed us that there is a price limit the average user is willing to pay for a console. In any case now they are priced the same. So once again when it's said "Why would you buy a $399 xb1 over a $399 ps4", how does that make any sense? Yeah MS tried something new when they launched, sold millions at a profit but they can't get the price down low enough and it seems like support is lacking so it's time to eject the expensive part. Now you have two largely similar machines at the same price, each with their respective brands and some unique future features but apparently I'm to understand that no one would buy one $399 model over the other $399 model. I still think that line of thinking is silly.
 
Fwiw, according to NPD there are 34 million core gamers ...
 
If that's the case then why is anyone still buying an xb1 at all?
For the same reason I bought a PS4 first. The Xbox exclusive games because they have different game preferences and/or values to me. Or because all of their friends have them. Or because they bought into, and valued, the vision of having a relationship with your TV with Kinect.

The exclusives, the perceived gaming performance, the friend/social angle, the cost, the controller, the extra non-gaming features and the fanboy-factor are all factors they will sway and weight a decision.
 
I agree with your conclusions, but not your basis. I don't think the paywall matters a lick and that there is a single person actually purchasing a PS4 over a Xb0x using that as a factor in the decision.

The PS brand is still far stronger than I imagined through 3/4s of this generation, I didn't think there was anyway they were going to catch the 360 based upon all the problems at launch and the inevitable reality that the PS3 wasn't "magically" more powerful than the 360.

Yet, they did. Sony comes into this generation on the heels of a PS3 that was gaining steam and marketshare, with a more powerful console at a lower price.

This is a horrific spot for MS to be in to begin with, let alone with their inconsistent vision for the console that alienates even their staunches supporters.
Reading your posts, I wonder how you could be happy this generation if you purchased one of the consoles.

I know you were in favour of the original Xbox One vision. I am fine with that, but if you purchased the console as it was and that vision was realised, you'd have to deal with the constant criticism from almost everyone. This leads to poor sales in the end, especially when journalists are involved, or Gamestopt, Game, etc.

You lived something similar in the previous generation having people trying to sell the idea that the PS3 was more powerful 'cos... PS3 they just said exclusives allegedly looked better -but RDR, Call of Juarez, etc, were X360 games that looked as fine as those to me-

It posed a problem when a few fans tried to shove that idea down your throat, with endless discussions. It gets tiresome after 9 years hearing the same.

The question would be, could you handle replying to those people trying to defend the console in that uphill battle? I don't know you personally, but it'd be admirable if you can pull that off.

Now some of those people feel beyond good and bad, and say whatever floats their mind, sometimes mock about those who chose the Xbox, 'cos X1 is the easy target no matter what.
 
Whether it flops or not, it's generating buzz. It's a positive differentiator, encouraging people into the PS brand.

Spell it out for me with an example. Joe Consumer goes into a retailer wanting a next-gen console. What's the advice from the independent sales person?

"Okay, you've got two choices, unless you want a Wii U (ha ha ha). XBox One and PS4."
"Tell me about XB1."
"It's got Live internet gaming so you can play with friends online. It's got media services so you can watch Netflix and the like. It's got Kinect voice control and skeleton tracking..."
"Yeah, I don't want that one. I want the cheaper box without. Not into all that motion gaming."
"Okay, looking at the Kinect-free box, it does everything the other one does just without motion. You can Skype people and you can also run apps alongside your game. MS has some strong exclusive games like Halo and Sunset Overdrive which you can only play on Xbox."
"Sounds good. What about PS4?"
"It's got PlayStation Network internet gaming so you can play with friends online. It's got media services so you can watch Netflix and the like. Sony has some strong exclusive games like Uncharted and The Order 1886 that you can only play on PS4."
"Does either play DVDs and Blurays?"
"Yep. They both do."
"They sound pretty similar."
"Well, they're pretty much the same computer inside."
"Which is cheaper?"
"Both the same price."
"Okay. Is one better than the other?"
"What do you mean by better? In what way?"
"You know, play games better."
"A lot depends on the controller and stuff. Some people find the PS controller a little cramped. Others don't like the XBox controller much. PS has a touchpad and XB has rumble triggers."
"I mean, does one of them play Call of Duty better?"
"Oh, yeah. PS4 tends to play games a bit better at the moment. They are higher resolution or a bit smoother."
"So it's the same price, does basically the same things, and plays games better. What about the future. Any upcoming plans for PS4?"
"It's getting a VR headset next year that puts you inside the game."
"Wow. What'll that cost."
"We don't know yet."
"What about XBox? Is that getting VR or anything?"
"You'll be able to buy apps on your PC or phone and run them on Xbox."
"I can play my iPhone stuff on Xbox?"
"No, Windows phone."
"Oh, I don't have a Windows phone."
"But you could buy a game on Xbox and run it on PC."
"Okay. If I'm honest I hardly touch the PC these days!"
"You and me both!"

That's obviously my take on a hypothetical conversation with a non-partisan consumer wanting an independent choice weighing up the pros and cons. Feel free to present an alternative that I'm missing. I can't see a strong argument for XB1. Everything thus far has been really wish-washy and based on dependent benefits like owning a Windows phone. For a vanilla consumer that is making a simple comparison, how is XB1 going to be presented as the better choice? I'm not seeing it. For those who get to see both boxes in operation, the way XB1 works may appeal to them, but I'm talking about the wide sales and marketing strategy which is trying to win 100+ million consumers.
joker454, as usual, is right. The key is not the diehard fans of a company -let's say Sony-, or some of those who act like stockholders in the firm, and seem to be all day preoccupied by the NPD data and a few extra pixels...

Your sample conversation sounds way too hardcore, rather than representative of the whole spectrum, btw.

Imo, the key... It's the journalists! What the media says, it's the turning point for Xbox One to have a chance to become a solid 2nd at least.

This is from my real life experience. :smile2:

I told a friend of mine who is a total casual, and played sports games with me on the X360 for the entire generation, and music games like Rock Band/GH, that I had gotten the Xbox One.

My real life conversation on the phone (we live afar now) went like this:

Me: Are you going to buy a console? :smile2: Buy the X1 so we can play online!

His reply: Not for now, my girlfriend says there is no console.
They talk very well about the PS4.

He knows very little about consoles. And he read about the positive vibe around the PS4, on some gaming site or in mainstream media, wherever he did.

That "they" meant the journalists. :) We talked about consoles a few times in person.

One of his typical sentences is the ever present amongst the casual crowd: "Final Fantasy VII is the best game of all time". (place a similar and typical sentence here) :)

He doesn't know what a pixel is and always told me that he preferred Nintendo, 'cos "they make games to be fun, to laugh", :smile2: and (despite playing constantly with me on the X360) that "Sony and Microsoft are two companies only worried about showing spectacular games, and make them look too good, rather than fun", :smile2: mentioning that with a hint of disdain in his tone.
 
They chose the cheaper one, not exactly a huge surprise when one product was touching the $500 mark which for consoles is extremely high. Ps3, 3d0 and Neo Geo showed us that there is a price limit the average user is willing to pay for a console. In any case now they are priced the same. So once again when it's said "Why would you buy a $399 xb1 over a $399 ps4", how does that make any sense? Yeah MS tried something new when they launched, sold millions at a profit but they can't get the price down low enough and it seems like support is lacking so it's time to eject the expensive part. Now you have two largely similar machines at the same price, each with their respective brands and some unique future features but apparently I'm to understand that no one would buy one $399 model over the other $399 model. I still think that line of thinking is silly.
you are just proving my point.

The value proposition at that price was not appealing enough. The market was not there to say "oh my I want to pay more for kinect and TV"

MS's strategy and vision was wrong. It caused delays in many territories, it was expensive, people dont want to pay extra for the other "features", "features" that came at the expense of performance

They are left with two choices. The original bundle with limited appeal due to price and features people dont care enough for, and another at the right price but with nothing to compensate for the other drawbacks or anything to differentiate from competition.

No matter how you see it the original vision screwed them. Only game exclusives and other evolving and upcoming features can save it. Areas where they compete head on with Sony
 
you are just proving my point.

The value proposition at that price was not appealing enough. The market was not there to say "oh my I want to pay more for kinect and TV"

MS's strategy and vision was wrong. It caused delays in many territories, it was expensive, people dont want to pay extra for the other "features", "features" that came at the expense of performance

They are left with two choices. The original bundle with limited appeal due to price and features people dont care enough for, and another at the right price but with nothing to compensate for the other drawbacks or anything to differentiate from competition.

No matter how you see it the original vision screwed them. Only game exclusives and other evolving and upcoming features can save it. Areas where they compete head on with Sony
I think they studied the market and thought that people want to look the TV on the console a lot.

I have a few friends who use the Xbox 360 just for Netflix or similar services, and play very little, if anything.

Why it did work then on the X360 and not when it was one of the key elements of the Xbox One? :smile2:

Dunno, tbh, but my guess is that people prefer to find things that work for themselves and not when you force them down their throat like the TV idea on the One.

Maybe you are pushing people out of their comfort zone. Maybe it's just that they love to boast about their console and how it plays Netflix and people love being surprised at the unexpected. :)

They found out that X360 could be a great platform for Netflix apart from playing their games, and loved that. Just a theory, but that's what I've seen in life when it comes to those things.

Gotta say that I hate the unpredictability of the technology market. :smile2:

If you told me back in 2004 that PS brand would sell 70-80 million less consoles after PS3 was released, or that the Xbox One would have a rough start coming from an almost perfect execution in the X360 generation, or that the X360 was going to be a hit after the original Xbox generation, I'd say you were out of your mind.
 
joker454, as usual, is right. The key is not the diehard fans of a company -let's say Sony-, or some of those who act like stockholders in the firm, and seem to be all day preoccupied by the NPD data and a few extra pixels...
That's what I said here.

Me said:
Brand loyalty and 100 lines of resolution is not the issue. Brand loyalty means people will buy a console irrespective - nothing much Sony nor MS can do about that (loyalty is theirs to lose). The issue is the mainstream looking for a COD box, who doesn't give a shit about brand. The sorts of people who buy a TV on price and looks and what the salesman tells them and what the picture looks like, and not whether its an LG or Panny or Sony or Sammy because of brand loyalty. The sorts of people for whom the 'console wars' don't exist. Their major influences will be media and word-of-mouth, price and obvious features, every one of which PS4 is generally stronger on and can only get stronger on if sales snowball.

Your sample conversation sounds way too hardcore, rather than representative of the whole spectrum, btw.
Of course it's not representative of the entire spectrum. How could any one conversation between two people be fully encompassing?! ;) It was there as an example of Joe Consumer looking for a console and someone spelling out the differences. How is it possible to spell out the differences in a very generic, low level way that Joe Consumer will appreciate and make the XB1 look better? If you know a way, please present it! Otherwise, XB1 is dependent not on great market forces and being a potent product, but a few recommendations here and examples there.

This is from my real life experience. :smile2:

I told a friend of mine who is a total casual, and played sports games with me on the X360 for the entire generation, and music games like Rock Band/GH, that I had gotten the Xbox One.

My real life conversation on the phone (we live afar now) went like this:

Me: Are you going to buy a console? :smile2: Buy the X1 so we can play online!

His reply: Not for now, my girlfriend says there is no console.
They talk very well about the PS4.
Right. You prove the point. His un-gamer take is 'they talk well about PS4'. He already hearing and 'learning' PS4 is very good even without trying to learn about the consoles. So now you have to present the case in the favour of XB1. It has Kinect. Does your friend like that? If so, XB1 is the console for him. However, current sales suggest the masses aren't won over by Kinect, so it's not a great selling point. What other arguments can you present in XB1's favour? Does he like Halo? Get XB1. Does he not care too much for Halo? - then it doesn't matter which console. Tell him both consoles are the same price but PS4 plays the same games better, and see which console he prefers. As long as someone buying doesn't know the difference, they won't factor it into their choice, but otherwise on a tick-list of features were both machines have remarkable parity, how do you argue in favour of the less capable machine at the same price?

That's not to say no-one anywhere is going to buy XB1, in case some people are misunderstanding. Only that without a clearly defined USP with mass consumer appeal, XB1 will be marginalised to a small niche. Some will get XB1 because it allows Skype while gaming. Others will get it for Kinect still. Some more might get it for the exclusive TV programmes, while others, the exclusive games, and others still the app integration with Windows. For the major part of the market though, there's no strong USP to drive the product. There's no clear message (there was with Kinect). Meanwhile, the mainstream press and gamer friends will be quietly educating Joe Consumer that both machines are the same price but PS4 is more powerful and sales will show it as the more popular machine.
 
Reading your posts, I wonder how you could be happy this generation if you purchased one of the consoles.

I know you were in favour of the original Xbox One vision. I am fine with that, but if you purchased the console as it was and that vision was realised, you'd have to deal with the constant criticism from almost everyone. This leads to poor sales in the end, especially when journalists are involved, or Gamestopt, Game, etc..

I disagree, would have been happy in any of the following circumstances:

1) MS stuck to their original vision of a cloud based all DD console. I've got the bandwidth and don't need another BR player.
2) MS stuck to their revised vision as demonstrated at the reveal with all their convoluted DRM to try to merge their original vision with the use of physical media. It wouldn't have impacted me, as my purchases would have been DD anyway.
3) MS stuck to what they actually released and I was left to believe in their promise that they had games in the pipeline that would offer amazing experiences only available with Kinect.

Instead, we've got a console now that has Zero of their original vision left and is merely a weaker performing PS4.

Now, sure. Sticking to their original vision would have left their possible customer base to max out at hardcore 360 Live Gold members.

But considering the only reasons anybody can provide as to why a customer would purchase a less powerful Xb0x at the same price as a more powerful PS4 is because they are hardcore 360 Live Gold members leads me to believe they'd have been no worse than where they are now after they've step by step removed every differentiating factor from their competition.
 
That's not to say no-one anywhere is going to buy XB1, in case some people are misunderstanding. Only that without a clearly defined USP with mass consumer appeal, XB1 will be marginalised to a small niche. Some will get XB1 because it allows Skype while gaming.

It does? How does it do that without Kinect?

(I'm asking because this is twice now you've stayed "skype" and "kinect" as two different possible selling points for those still favoring the Xb0x over the PS4.)
 
And what is my basis?

You began by making a point about Netflix and the paywall and I disagreed with that as a basis for your conclusions.

MS wouldn't have changed the paywall for Netflix and Hulu if it wasn't an issue.

I think all this netflix/hulu paywall discussion is missing the fact that MS needed to move those things from behind the paywall not because of the Xb0x and its sales targets but because they want to position the 360 to compete with Boxee and Roku and the WD Players, etc.

We know by now MS will react to people being vocal about these things. In the end it did give PS4 better value proposition but I still don't think it effected sales one bit considering early adopters.

The difference here is that "the end" is still on-going, and the early adopters were those who were going to buy the Xb0x anyway, and all those who were so vocal that MS kept altering their vision to please weren't going to buy an Xb0x anyway.
 
I agree that a lot of complaints about Xbox One were coming from people who would probably never buy it, but it was fairly obvious there were a lot of 360 gamers that were also displeased with Kinect and Xbox One, and Microsoft is now trying to make sure they don't all switch over to PS4.
 
3) MS stuck to what they actually released and I was left to believe in their promise that they had games in the pipeline that would offer amazing experiences only available with Kinect.

But now that the kinect is optional, those games havnt been canceled, they will still be released, what are they ?
 
Scott_Arm I agree that a lot of complaints about Xbox One were coming from people who would probably never buy it, but it was fairly obvious there were a lot of 360 gamers that were also displeased with Kinect and Xbox One, and Microsoft is now trying to make sure they don't all switch over to PS4.

I agree. I also agree that they are doing it under clear budget constraints because otherwise the best option would have been a price reduction with Kinect still included. So they are left with trying to salvage a product that is now relatively crippled based upon what was originally envisioned for it and what choices they've made along the way try to expand their user base within a strict budget.


But now that the kinect is optional, those games havnt been canceled, they will still be released, what are they ?

Honestly, I don't believe there are any games. If there were any games in the pipeline that would have fulfilled the promise of Kinect they wouldn't have removed it. They would have stayed firm (this is a down time for sales anyway), until those games could be shown and would market the console accordingly. Those games would have demonstrated the value of the $100 premium.

But they don't exist.
 
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