Average Joe's criteria when buying a console

[RancidLunchmeat]

I think i'm missing the point you're trying to make, even though i keep repeating mine and you keep missing it.

Because you aren't alone. In case you haven't realized it, you and Darkblu are a tag team in this debate. And while you have slightly different position than Darkblu, you are being debated as if your positions are identical.

Scooby/Powderkeg's disagreement isn't really with your statements. They are with Darkblu's.

..or so it appears.

 

[Tap In]

what the hell? this thread hit the skids

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Second.. when did MS stop manufacturing the Xbox? For the past six months, the Xbox has been just a rarity.. if not moreso.. than the 360 in my area.

I don't think they have. There appears to have been no such announcement. But nVidia were supposed to have stopped producing chips last year, so either there's a massive stockpile or MS are running out of components.

 

[darkblu]

good day, Rancid.
first off

The xbox outsold the GC because of that little baby called Halo. And even then, it's not like it outsold it by much.

I disagree with that.

First off, only about 20% of Xbox owners have Halo. 22-23% have Halo 2. So 75-80% of Xbox owners weren't influenced by Halo.

bullshit. starting from the attatch rate - it' should be a statistical miracle for halo to a have an actual attach rate of 25% - do the math. the subsequent "proofs" of holidays'03 vs holidays'04 were as bogus, as nobody really knew exactly what they're meant to prove.

but wait, there's more!

End result is about a 20% difference, which ironically is right in the middle of my 25% estimates and your own 15%, making me no more wrong than you. And as far as I'm concerned 20% better sales still doesn't classify as "not outselling your competition by much" which was my original point of contention.

so in one case 25% attach rate (that in practice is way higher) is negligible, but when it comes to outselling the competition 20% all of a sudden become crucial? give me a break! this deservers to go in my signature!

 

[RancidLunchmeat]

I don't think they have. There appears to have been no such announcement. But nVidia were supposed to have stopped producing chips last year, so either there's a massive stockpile or MS are running out of components.

All I can find are rumors that MS stopped manufacturing the Xbox late January 06. MS didn't confirm or deny any of the rumors saying only that they were going to 'continue to support' the Xbox, and that they had plans to 'sell all they had manufactured'.

Sounds to me like they stopped making new units around January.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

All I can find are rumors that MS stopped manufacturing the Xbox late January 06. MS didn't confirm or deny any of the rumors saying only that they were going to 'continue to support' the Xbox, and that they had plans to 'sell all they had manufactured'.

Sounds to me like they stopped making new units around January.

Which would tie in with nVidia stopping produciton a couple of months earlier. And maybe why there's been no XB sales figures for the past 6 months? Maybe there haven't been any new ones shipped, and the current stock selling is the last stock? Amazon and Play seem to have sold out. Anyone in the 'biz' able to comment on what stocks they're getting?

 

[London Geezer]

22-23% have Halo 2. So 75-80% of Xbox owners weren't influenced by Halo.

See that's the statement i can't handle. 100% of Xbox owners were influenced by Halo even though not all of them bought it. Heck, most gamers were in some form influenced by Halo accross all platforms, even if they didn't have Halo or cared for it!! Halo was what put the Xbox in the map, and it's a shame MS couldn't repeat the same feat in 5 whole years.

 

[scooby_dooby]

No i didn't, you keep missing that point.

What point? That a brand new system/brandname needs a huge game to make a name for itself? Well no kidding! Stretching that into the 'only' reason XBOX sold well is ridiculous.

Would they?? You just said that GT (all the games on PS2!) sold to 1/4 of the PS2 userbase. How is it not a big deal that a launch game sold as much as bloody GT on PS2, with just 2 instalments!

You asked 'what game sells to 1/4 of the userbase'? Well there's your answer. Using your logic: "the only reason ps2 sold 100million units worldwide was Gran Turismo" Pretty ridiculous statement don't you think?

Yes, so why keep arguing??

Because that's not what you initially said, you can adopt my outlook if you like but it's a far cry from your original statement.

A huge selling point to people who cared about that, which as we are discussing, is obviously not such a huge number of people.

What we're discussing is reasons the original XBOX sold well, power was a very big reason it did so, considering the majority of western 3rd party titles came to XBOX (in the later years). You could just as easily say "The only reason XBOX beat GC is because it was more powerful than ps2" or you could say "The only reason XBOX beat GC was because it had Live!" but what's the point? The system is what it is as a whole, Halo is just a single first party title, it would never have made it to 24million without much more than that.

 

[DuckThor Evil]

I think it's well worth noting that Xbox sold more units in two markets than GC in three and that is a big deal, newcomer outsold cheaper Nintendo in fewer markets and as most of us live in these western countries those are the main market for us. Of course more support from Jap developers is welcome, but Xbox is not nearly as dependent on Jap-market than the other two manufacturers.

 

[OtakingGX]

What point? That a brand new system/brandname needs a huge game to make a name for itself? Well no kidding! Stretching that into the 'only' reason XBOX sold well is ridiculous.

I think the reasoning was that Halo helped the Xbox to outsell the Gamecube. Which, judging by the percentage of Xbox owners who bought Halo and the margin that the Xbox leads the Gamecube by, I'd say that's a pretty valid conclusion. Halo lent a certain credence to the Xbox being the console of hardcore gamers. That attracted more of them. College students played it for hours in their dorms. After they moved out of the dorms and had no roommates with an Xbox, they'd go get one of their own to play Halo.

 

[RancidLunchmeat]

Well.. If you take London's argument to it's natural conclusion (or maybe just restate it?), that maybe it wasn't Halo specifically that sold Xbox's, but Halo "branded" the Xbox in a certain manner that lead to its sales.

That is what I would agree with. Halo made the Xbox the console version of PC gaming. It demonstrated that the console was essentially the console platform for 'hardcore' NA gamers.

People love to talk about Goldeneye and what a great FPS it was and how the game itself was better (according to a lot of people) than Halo was.. but it was Halo that brought FPS excitement off the PC, into the living room, to the masses of the NA audience. And then MS and third parties kept 'feeding' the Xbox those types of titles.

The reason the Xbox outsold the GC isn't just because of Halo.. but Halo branded the console as appealing to a certain demographic.. just like MarioKart branded the GC as appealing to a certain demographic.

(And of course, the opposite is also true.. that branding of the Xbox hurt/crippled it in Japan, and that branding of the GC hurt/crippled it among a certain demographic of NA gamers.)

 

[Shifty Geezer]

You asked 'what game sells to 1/4 of the userbase'? Well there's your answer. Using your logic: "the only reason ps2 sold 100million units worldwide was Gran Turismo" Pretty ridiculous statement don't you think?

From LB's followup comment, I say I might agree with him. Did I buy GT? Nope. Did I buy PS2 in part because of GT? Yes. We played GT2 on a friend's PS and GT3 was the first game I saw on his PS2. It looked so much better than any other computer game we'd seen before then, and definitely generated. Eventually I got a PS2 to play other games with these friends and share titles. This is an example of where one person buying a PS2 for one game can generate interest amongst others that result in sales of the system, even if not for the game.

As others have said, Halo put XB on the map, and without it, MS wouldn'y have got so much attention and sales. I can see that reasoning.

 

[London Geezer]

What point? That a brand new system/brandname needs a huge game to make a name for itself? Well no kidding! Stretching that into the 'only' reason XBOX sold well is ridiculous.

And for the 4th time, you keep repeating that, which is not what i said. Beats me, everyone else understood what i said. As usual you're the only one with salami in front of his eyes when a discussion about the Xbox is on.

I'm off.