News & Rumors: Xbox One (codename Durango)

[Rangers]

I read it just the other day. Can't remember the source. Something like 60% of game revenues come from the USA. It could be very wrong. I don't know.

Probably not overall, because F2P and MMO's is pretty huge in China/Korea.

Just for consoles, it might actually be reasonable. Usually the USA is about as big as Europe combined as a console market if not frankly a little bigger AFAIK. At a wild guess I'd think sony's sales are like 40/40/20 USA/EU/Japan And MS's more like 65/35 USA/EU.

It will be interesting to see how this plays out. I doubt we'll ever be able to model anything but anecdotally we know if we hear people saying I bought XB1 bc my friend has it or bc I owned a 360... It could potentially have a meaningful impact on the choices consumers make which in part is why Sony really should have doubled down on free MP IMO.

I think I saw some analyst posted on GAF yesterday estimate PS+ brought in $140 million annually, vs $1.25 Billion for XBL Gold.

And now we all know why Sony put MP behind a paywall.

 

[Cranky]

I read it just the other day. Can't remember the source. Something like 60% of game revenues come from the USA. It could be very wrong. I don't know.

On revenue basis that very well may be true, probably even more so if you are speaking about profit. In all honesty, the only countries that matter are the English speaking ones. At this point, brazil is probably more important than the big EU countries.

MS seems to be in knife fight for the US early adopter market right now. There is no way that they want to miss ANY possible sales this holiday, especially if Sony had plenty of stock on hand. Take 8 countries with an average allocation of 25K, and you can get a nice extra 200K for black Friday restock.

 

[Cyan]

I messed up some minor things there, not understanding how the whole "Ireland/UK" thing works. Ireland is a separate market listed first wave by MS at 5m. Doesn't change much.

However thought it'd be fun to add up the total console market populations here as semi-defined by MS's first two waves of release nations (but fairly applicable to all). It's actually more than I thought (probably less than many of you thought)

391m for the EU markets MS is hitting in the first two waves.
143m Russia
192m Brazil
313m USA
112m Mexico
4m New Zealand
22m Australia
34m Canada

Total is 1,211 million, 1.211 billion.

A major market missing is Japan at 127m. Puts it over 1.3B. Actually quite a lot higher than I expected.

After that I'm not sure of various console markets and the state of them. I'm pretty sure there's some market in places like South Korea and Taiwan, although consoles mostly dont exist in a big way in southeast asia, it is all F2P PC/mobile there... How about a place like Argentina? Dont really know.

World population according to Google currently sits at ~7.1B. So the 1.3B console market is ~18%.

Obviously the big low hanging fruit if you wanted to get that up would be China (1.4B) and India (1.2B). However I dont think it's that easy.

Actually, the Xbox 360 was officially launched a year ago in Argentina, so you get the idea.

Besides that, Albert Penello said they missed certain markets because they are still implementing speech recognition into the dashboard.

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2013-08-15-microsoft-explains-how-xbox-one-importing-could-work

 

[eastmen]

Doesn't matter what ms says or does , it will allways be yield issues to console warriors

 

[Rangers]

Penello http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2013-08-15-microsoft-explains-how-xbox-one-importing-could-work

When a NeoGAF user postulated that Microsoft was discouraging importing because it wanted to make sure there were enough copies left for those in supported territories, Penello responded, "launch volumes are not really an issue. This was simply a software issue in terms of getting local language and voice support in the dash. It's pretty straightforward, but disappointing I know for people who are missing launch."

Not sure what was interpreted as "troll bait" about the last post on this matter . It's additional clarification I hadn't seen in a more explicit fashion by a different speaker.

Not sure how it isn't news either.

 

[Tap In]

Doesn't matter what ms says or does , it will allways be yield issues to console warriors

Yep... its a joke watching some of the people around the internets bend over themselves to make themselves feel better about their console of choice. by putting down ms at every turn

 

[BRiT]

Woops, I misread the original post without the link...

I thought the only item in that post was just "So MS says", and the quote was the post before it.

Sorry Rangers.



It also was updated with the following info [ http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2013-08-15-microsoft-explains-how-xbox-one-importing-could-work ]:

"Obviously, I support people waiting for the official supported launch in the affected markets for the best experience," he added.

He also noted that all games are "worldwide signed" i.e. region-free, unlike Xbox 360 titles, and "the console will work everywhere (keeping in mind power supplies)."

"You can use one of the 13 digital marketplaces corresponding to our launch markets, assuming you have a valid payment instrument for those countries. Lots of people in Europe specifically travel, move, and visit family," he continued before slyly adding "Now, of course, if you were using Pre-Paid cards..."

 

[XpiderMX]

Old?

Microsoft Corp. (MSFT), seeking to fend off competition for its Xbox game console by souping up the Kinect motion sensor, is tapping a new semiconductor developer: itself.


For the first time, the company will build its own processors based on an in-house design. The new chips will make Kinect more accurate and responsive using an imaging technology found in military gear, said Cyrus Bamji, who played a key role in developing the silicon architecture. Previously, Kinect relied on an off-the-shelf chip from Israel’s PrimeSense Ltd

The Kinect chips, designed by a team mostly based in Microsoft’s Silicon Valley office, use a technology called Time of Flight that will let the sensor track minute changes in a user’s body, like finger movements and facial expressions, a much more precise system than the earlier version. That lets Microsoft eliminate some of the failings of the first Kinect, Bamji said.


Time of Flight works by bouncing photons off a person or object, and has been used by military agencies for tasks like detecting a tank hiding behind tree cover, Bamji said. Texas Instruments Inc. and Infineon Technologies AG are also developing chips using Time of Flight.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-...-chip-brings-tank-finding-design-to-xbox.html

 

[Brad Grenz]

I think we knew there was custom silicon in Kinect 2 and we knew MS had hired a bunch of people from IBM and elsewhere for their internal semiconductor design group, but I guess we haven't had confirmation the new IC was designed totally in house.

 

[DuckThor Evil]

Prior to the 360 the PS2 to Xbox ratio was like 5:1 to 6:1. The 360 userbase is much larger so this gen MS is fighting on better footing.

Yes they are much better off in that regard, however they don't have a year in hand and instead of being significantly cheaper, they are quite a bit more expensive, at least initially and I don't ever see them having a means to gain similar price advantage they had during this gen.

We not talking about shelving the whole of europe for a subsequent launch, we talking about the smaller markets. I rather have ample supply in the biggest markets versus trying to spread that supply around to serve all markets.

World wide launches make sense when you have ample supply. But launch consoles are never in ample supply. The 360 world wide launch was more of a marketing stunt that was pretty wasteful. MS ended marketing a device that relatively few could buy and MS spent the first few months fulfilling preorders to those who were unaffected by marketing dollars spent over the holidays because those customers were already on the hook.

I don't think ignoring those smaller European markets matter that much, but the other stuff will. I remember 360 having pretty ample supply compared to it's demand after the first 2-3 months, leaving it plenty of time to capitalize on that early launch. They just weren't selling fast enough that MS would have gotten to that 10M mark without serious channel stuffing. At the very least the early launch helped them to have plentiful supply during the launch of PS3 and Wii.

 

[Deleted member 11852]

I don' think that is legal, I've never heard of such a thing.

Non-refundable deposits are certainly legal in the UK, as long as the consumer is made aware at the time of putting down the deposit. A wide variety of services or expensive purchases can only be initiated in such a way - this is protect to the provider.

 

[Rangers]

Albert Penello just tweeted "look what I got" and posted this


http://t.co/EBTltlIMtF

how long before hackers get ahold of one of these and uhh, you know, do hacker stuff or something.

 

[Deleted member 11852]

But i think MS strategy is try to protect the xbox strong market by having more units,as it is it has been say that they have a shortage of units and it appears to be the case.

Surely that's backwards? Strong territories should need less early support - if the market is yours, it can wait. Japan is a strong market for Sony, therefore PS4 may launch in Japan after North America and Europe.

Apart from Japan, I wonder if either manufacturer truly has any strong markets that they'd be prepared to pend the launch, safe in the knowledge the other guy isn't going to grab and dominate it early.

 

[3dilettante]

Albert Penello just tweeted "look what I got" and posted this


http://t.co/EBTltlIMtF

He's got some kind of discoloration at the edge of that thumbnail and dirt on the thumb. Did he just plaster or grout something? Maybe that tile in the background by the carpet that could use an extractor.

Also, I see a WiiU.

And some cut lilies.

I don't know why the Xbox planner wants us to know he has lilies.

 

[Silent_Buddha]

Also, I see a WiiU.

And some cut lilies.

I don't know why the Xbox planner wants us to know he has lilies.

Perhaps he's got a wife or girlfriend that also uses that room?

Regards,
SB

 

[Tap In]

He's got some kind of discoloration at the edge of that thumbnail and dirt on the thumb. Did he just plaster or grout something? Maybe that tile in the background by the carpet that could use an extractor.

Also, I see a WiiU.

And some cut lilies.

I don't know why the Xbox planner wants us to know he has lilies

.

Yes, the whole point of the picture was to create discussion of his wifes decorating tendencies.

 

[-tkf-]

Yes, the whole point of the picture was to create discussion of his wifes decorating tendencies.

His wife? I am sure he chose the games cabinet based of the color so it matches he micro carpet on the left hand..

ohh and envy.. he got the next generation.. we are now in the current generation land, and PS3+XBOX 360 is officially last gen..

 

[warb]

Is Kinect always lit up like that? There better be a dimmer button.

Most exciting console launch.

 

[eastmen]

He's got some kind of discoloration at the edge of that thumbnail and dirt on the thumb. Did he just plaster or grout something? Maybe that tile in the background by the carpet that could use an extractor.

Also, I see a WiiU.

And some cut lilies.

I don't know why the Xbox planner wants us to know he has lilies.

There is a fat ps3 in there , an xbox 360 fat and a TiVo premier

 

[JPT]

But he doesn't have a PS4 booo