Business Approach Comparison Sony PS4 and Microsoft Xbox

[wco81]

I think they were hoping to win not just gaming but the living room. They missed out on smart phones and tablets so they wanted a home run of their own, thought they could expand the appeal of the Xbox brand beyond gaming with the initial emphasis on TV.

Someone did a compilation video of all the mentions of "TV" in that first presentation. Funny and scary at the same time, how out of touch they were.

They really thought voice commands and waving at the TV and snapping little screens of Internet next to the TV picture (as if people didn't have tablets next to them when the TV was on) was going to be some new paradigm and something that would make even non-gamers buy a $500 console and pay $60 a year for the service.

Did they not notice that Siri and Google Now do not require paying ongoing fees to use those features?

So when the backlash to the TV-centric presentation came, they pivoted back to gaming at last year's CES. However, the integration of Kinect made for a costly design which delivered lower performance than the main competitor's product, which was priced lower.

Remember, MS was talking about not only doubling the total units of the X360 with the X1, they were talking about 300 million units possibly, as they targeted a market much greater than the games console market.

Only chance they had to do that was to deliver something like a la carte programming, not merely changing channels with voice and gestures. Pretty soon, there will be other products offering voice control over video programming and those will be $100 or less, with no ongoing service fees.

 

[McHuj]

I look at the Amazon deal with HBO for their (old) back catalog. And too me those are the deals and things MS needed for the TV initiative to be successful, a streaming service with unique and premium content, and not a paywall to other's services.

 

[joker454]

If they lock you into using their software then you'll have no way out when a better opportunity presents itself.

Isn't that the definition of consoles? They all lock you in because their software is incompatible with any other device out there. When I buy Tomb Raider I can play it on any device be it pc, laptop, tablet or whatever. When you buy it on console you are locked to that console, you have no other opportunity to use it. Microsoft at least is trying to alleviate that with universal apps, but generally speaking if you are on a console your software is locked in and you have no way out when a better opportunity presents itself. You're stuck unless you want to throw all your software away, unlike most every other platform out there that lets you take advantage of better opportunities that present themselves. What you are describing is not a Microsoft limitation, it's a console limitation which has been that way for many years now.

 

[Deleted member 11852]

Isn't that the definition of consoles? They all lock you in because their software is incompatible with any other device out there.

There are exceptions like Sony's Cross-Buy. I have games I've bought on one platform then got the other two (PS3, PS4, Vita) without more $$.

 

[joker454]

There are exceptions like Sony's Cross-Buy. I have games I've bought on one platform then got the other two (PS3, PS4, Vita) without more $$.

Ok but generally speaking if one wants to complain about software being locked down, then the console model represents the worst possible offender out there today. The last thing you would expect is one console brand telling another console brand that their software is locked down. For the most part all consoles are a software prison, it's definitely a situation of the pot calling the kettle black.

 

[BoardBonobo]

Isn't that the definition of consoles? They all lock you in because their software is incompatible with any other device out there. When I buy Tomb Raider I can play it on any device be it pc, laptop, tablet or whatever. When you buy it on console you are locked to that console, you have no other opportunity to use it. Microsoft at least is trying to alleviate that with universal apps, but generally speaking if you are on a console your software is locked in and you have no way out when a better opportunity presents itself. You're stuck unless you want to throw all your software away, unlike most every other platform out there that lets you take advantage of better opportunities that present themselves. What you are describing is not a Microsoft limitation, it's a console limitation which has been that way for many years now.

Obviously the console ecosystem is going to be locked down. You have custom software running on custom hardware, though the PC like architectures we have now mean that the lines there are becoming softer.

MS would, it seems, like to lock the XB1 into the Windows ecosystem which for years has been unassailable from the outside world. But as the PC market declines and the customer base stops upgrading, and gets their technological progress through devices outside of the Winworld, such a lock down seems counter productive.

They should leave the gaming to the games console and if they want to attempt to challenge the CE market with me too boxes then that should be a separate product.

Universal apps are a little of a misnomer anyway, they aren't exactly Universal unless you restrict you Universe to Windows.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Isn't that the definition of consoles? They all lock you in because their software is incompatible with any other device out there.

Their software. Not open services. PS3 is not locked down from using Netflix or the myriad of free, open services on it. Perhaps you missed the context that BoardBonobo is talking about the Netflix paywall?

A worthwhile example is BBC iPlayer on XB360. It is on every device out there, but wasn't on 360 for ages because MS wouldn't let it be available without a Gold membership as was their policy. It took some 3+ years after it released on PS3 to arrive on 360. Just because MS were, quite frankly, being asses. You don't get Samsung charging a yearly fee to watch Sky or the BBC on their TVs.

For the most part all consoles are a software prison, it's definitely a situation of the pot calling the kettle black.

Again, I think you've missed the context. The discussion is fairly open services, Netflix et al, being free to watch on every device out that (free excluding service subscription, natch) except Xbox. Even consoles. That places XB in a unique position. There's no pot calling the kettle black because there's only one platform in the world that operates this way.

 

[-tkf-]

Isn't that the definition of consoles? They all lock you in because their software is incompatible with any other device out there. When I buy Tomb Raider I can play it on any device be it pc, laptop, tablet or whatever. When you buy it on console you are locked to that console, you have no other opportunity to use it. Microsoft at least is trying to alleviate that with universal apps, but generally speaking if you are on a console your software is locked in and you have no way out when a better opportunity presents itself. You're stuck unless you want to throw all your software away, unlike most every other platform out there that lets you take advantage of better opportunities that present themselves. What you are describing is not a Microsoft limitation, it's a console limitation which has been that way for many years now.

And I can play my Android games on any android device.....

What apps is it Microsoft plans to support?

 

[blakjedi]

In all the years that MS has been functioning with money in the bank they have never really viewed anyone as competition. They just make their stuff confident in the, slightly deluded, belief that people will just buy it because it's an MS product.

It's no different with the XB1 as is was with the Zune, RT, Winows ME etc etc.

The products they have that are successful are because people are trapped in the rut of all their data being locked into that software be it Windows or Office. Any alternatives have either been bought or put out of business.

What you wrote is absolutely not true. There are plenty of people who choose MS products because they end to be better than what is available.

The rise of tablets only proves that most people don't have a need for all the functionality that MS provides in their platforms not that they are trapped in the platform. Most people are simply consumers. Trying to do work on a tablet is bollocks whether it be programming, architecture, graphics work etc etc... Apples and Androids's IDEs are on PC like hardware...

Excel is by far the crown jewel of the Office suite and nothing else on the market comes close... Azure is rising versus EC2, etc etc...

The fact that MS can compete with free products and win like Google docs, libre office etc shows a lot about the quality of their staple products... Kin was killed early, ZUne was a much better product than ipod with better management software than itunes... but they missed the boat as by the time they prepared Zune, iphone had overtaken ipod sales...

Android is virtually a monopoly in the phone space on a global scale yet you dont have petulant governments stalking them like MS did in the 90's. That antitrust period scarred them psychologically.

Without iPhone, Apple is dead. Microsoft has 13, billion-dollar businesses that they can grow. This is all really silly.

 

[Dave Baumann]

And I can play my Android games on any android device.....

And you can play any Windows Phone games on any Windows Phone device....

 

[Deleted member 11852]

Without iPhone, Apple is dead. Microsoft has 13, billion-dollar businesses that they can grow. This is all really silly.

O/T but no. The last quarter (three months) showed $7Bn in revenue from iPad and $5Bn in revenue from iPad with Apple's hardware margins at 37-38%.

 

[Dave Baumann]

17% is just a absolute number. Is 17% low or high relative to their expectations? PS+ went up 98% during the PS4 launch - if I remember correctly.

Isn't Sony going from a non-pay to pay model from PS3 to PS4? In which case, you'd expect a lot additional revenue. Almost certainly the majority of XBOX One users are carrying over from 360 and most will likely have carried on with their same Live subscription.

 

[blakjedi]

O/T but no. The last quarter (three months) showed $7Bn in revenue from iPad and $5Bn in revenue from iPad with Apple's hardware margins at 37-38%.

relative to Apple's overall revenue... thats nothing... Apple is iPhone. full stop.

 

[Jwm]

And you can play any Windows Phone games on any Windows Phone device....

No, there are low memory devices etc. But all my games that i created on WP7 work fine on WP8.1, so I have not had to mess with them.

 

[BRiT]

And I can play my Android games on any android device.....

No, there are low memory devices etc.

Exact same thing with Android devices. Some devices can not be upgraded beyond the old version of the OS they're running, etc. So no, one can not play every Android game on every Android device. And not every game or app has been patched to run on newer versions of Android too.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Heck, many games aren't even compatible across modern Android device. XCom has got an Android release and it runs on 1 of my 5 Android devices!

 

[Deleted member 11852]

relative to Apple's overall revenue... thats nothing... Apple is iPhone. full stop.

You must be mathlexic. iPad + Mac = 33% of Apple's hardware revenue. iPod is nothing, a mere $461m.

 

[joker454]

Their software. Not open services. PS3 is not locked down from using Netflix or the myriad of free, open services on it. Perhaps you missed the context that BoardBonobo is talking about the Netflix paywall?

Ah so it's another selective outrage argument. So online locked down is ok, netflix locked down is outrage, software locked down is ok, blah blah, insert more very selective criteria here just to make one's argument work. Nevermind then, these are not the types of arguments I have any interest in being a part of especially since the goal posts move seemingly at random.

 

[-tkf-]

And you can play any Windows Phone games on any Windows Phone device....

His point was he can use windows apps on windows software/hardware.. I got a Nvidia Shield, 2 Tablets, on my 4th or 5th Phone and they all run my Android software, which shouldn't be a surprise.

Now if the XB1 starts running every Windows application then we can talk groundbreaking news, but afaik that is not what we are talking about (and i am not even sure what i would mean in the long run).

The unified App thing is neat, but i am not so sure it's going to move anything special for Microsoft on the Console side. It will surely be a nice thing for those already invested in their wider platform. Maybe there will be some actual worthwhile Apps that can used for something. Do we have any hints on how open they will be? Would something like VLC work? Network Access, Harddrive Access? Blocked if you dont have XBOX Gold?

 

[-tkf-]

Ah so it's another selective outrage argument. So online locked down is ok, netflix locked down is outrage, software locked down is ok, blah blah, insert more very selective criteria here just to make one's argument work. Nevermind then, these are not the types of arguments I have any interest in being a part of especially since the goal posts move seemingly at random.

Rather another Selective picking on a argument about something else than what the argument was really about Not that BBO helped since i think he was talking about the way their PC software business has traditionally worked, though that has been changing over the past years.

They just missed the board on what to keep behind the paywall, nothing else, they simply carried on from where they left off. They didn't notice that the world had moved on, and that a new Console would have to correct itself accordingly. It's turning out to be the history of the XB1, losing touch..
On the other hand it would be extremely easy for them to fix this problem, copy Sony's offering. Unless their stats shows them something we don't know, i would guess they aren't making a lot of money on subscribers that doesn't play online.....