GTA dev said no such thing, it was bs some tool xbot made it up.

 Ms needs to make a serious cut if they want their console to stay alive.

MS is long overdue on price cuts, and I think their momentum in the markets has been inconsistent because of it.

Cutting that extra $50 of the price (many would argue the first price cut should have been $100, but since you had Halo....) should have happened by now. I hope they do it.

Benefits will be high in America. Mediocre in Europe.

if it happened ANY minimal gains 360 would make would be wiped out by MGs4 come june & so on....

in EU I just don't see the 360 a viable platform in competition to Ps3...if it hasn't sold THAT WELL in 3 years, it's not suddenly going to start selling well with just a $50 dollar price cut & NO GAMES that interest EU, Yes GEOW 2 interests mostly only UK

but 360 has no GT 5 that mainland EU will gobble up

Yeah I dont see any chance for the 360 in Europe either. I mean its already sellin close to the Wii at that high price point, so I dont think they will bite on the 360 even with a price cut.

But NA is where the issue lies. You dont find many males ages 15-28 who dont own Madden and play it. If the 360 owns the GTAIV launch, they will own Madden this year. If Madden is solid, even with little innovation people will but a 360 for $229. If the 360 establishes itself as the Madden console it will pretty much be impossible to catch the 360 in NA.

Madden for the 360 would be like Blu-Ray for the PS3. Its a solid year long source of console purchasers. EVERYONE PLAYS MADDEN. The yearly releases somewhat waters down the software sales, but if you had one Madden released every 2-3 years, it would dwarf every other game in sales.

So thats why I think this March is very important for those two consoles. I dont think EA will mess up Madden again this year, so if its playable then people are going to flock to it. If the PS3 can remain in the limelight until the end of August, then I think the 360 can actually be passed in total sales this year.

I think that a $50 price cut will happen across the board in late March, and I think that the 360 will outsell the ps3 worldwide from then until the launch of MGS4, particularly during the week that GTAIV hits.

After that, the ps3 will be given a significant boost from it's Summer exclusives (MGS4, Socom: Conrontation, and probably Tekken 6), and the ps3 will only increase it's lead from there on out.

This price cut will be the last hurrah of the 360. 

Sony will probably drop the 40gb price soon before MGS release, with a 100$ difference between 40gb console only and 80gb that has Rumble and mgs. I'd bet 1 month before the release.

Or they may drop the price of 80GB with motorstorm to 500$ before MGS 4 release and 40gb to 350$. maybe soon after MS price cut, as a response.

Last hurrah?  You don't think the next two price cuts and it's big exclusive sequels this year and next might sell some consoles?

I think that for Microsoft to be guaranteed safety (in America), they need MGS4 to be announced for their machine IN ADVANCE of the Ps3 release (won't happen, if it happens at all.)

Either that, or, again, $50 off right before GTA, which didn't happen.

Microsoft is definitely thinking money over mindshare at this point, and its the wrong way to go about it. While it's great that they are (finally) making gobs of money right now, I think they are eroding their potential userbase 5-10 years from now, their image as the hardcore system of choice seems to be fading from where it was this time last year, which will cost them money long-term.
Sony basically gave them a massive opening with their variety of blunders early on, but MS didn't take as much of an advantage of it as they should have.

This is definitely Ps3's year to really shine, Sony is back on track.

MS last finicial report was 89 million. This includes all of their entertainment dept. including the zune and other products. Keep in mind the xbox division has lost at least 5 billiion dollars. The 360 is barely making MS any money at all really.