Too expensive so yes

In terms of sales they are not, since I understand they are still outselling the xbox 360. But in terms of profit while they are still no doubt making a profit every year, their profits are much lower than with the x360. So in this regard they are a failure.
I have no doubt that Ms considers itva failure. The X360 was much more dominant and revolutionary in its era. Still I am sure the xbox is profitable enough for Ms to make another xbox for the next gen.

What firesales? There's never been a huge difference in the price of the PS4 and Xbone. Right now for the base bundles they retail within $30 of each other thereabouts? The Xbone has weaker hardware, it should cost less. What it "took" for them to potentially get those numbers is turning around a console that was DOA to most of the market thanks to a shitty reveal and some even shittier policies. Part of that was removing Kinect and pricing more in line with their competition. That's not a "firesale". $500 for the Scorpio is not a "firesale", lol.

Budget "significantly slashed", and yet theyre about to launch the most powerful console ever, which wouldn't be cheap to R&D or build. They showcased plenty of AAA exclusives at E3. And funny to see you say "downgrade" in regards to indies, I don't remember you being so dismissive of them when Sony would showcase them all over their presentations.

I have to give a deep, hearty chuckle to the idea that games like Fable Legends or a Phantom Dust reboot were two of their "larger" first party games. I assume you're also including Scalebound, which was a third party moneyhat like Bloodborne, but also looked like gutter trash, but I'll allow it if you want to cling to it to make your case about larger titles being canceled. But that's still only one, which was canceled out of pity, not any sort of budget issue, lol.

The identity of the Xbox brand is just fine now that Phil has turned it around. Regardless of what you'd prefer to believe, most people don't give a shit about games being on PC and a console. That's why Sony makes sure every copy of SFV says console exclusive. They want you to know you can't buy it on Xbox, they don't give a shit if you know it's on PC, they know the overlap there is not big enough to matter. Also I'm shocked to see that advertising took a hit, seems like every day we have a thread on here shitting on MS advertising of some sort. It got so bad that we got a thread complaining that they advertise their contollers too much.

I have to fail your post, but I give you credit for finally making it through a post about MS and Xbox that included your hypothetical and theoretical financials and didn't include a remark about how maybe potentially this could possibly be the last Xbox console from Microsoft if it doesn't potentially generate possibly enough theoretical revenue to satisfy your guesstimated margin MS is looking for.

I think if you look historically, it is considered a failure at least imo if it continues at this slow pace in sales and doesn't pick up before the next generation.

When I look at the chart http://www.vgchartz.com/analysis/platform_totals/ I see a line between what is considered a 'failure' and the 'success' in consoles at least perceived by at least imo.

The line is between the SNES and N64 for me, where consoles including the SNES and above are considered at least moderate successes, while consoles below the N64 are considered at least moderate failures (outside of the just released Switch).

I don't know it's complicated. They didn't stick to their original vision even though they swore up and down that it was a true vision of theirs that would not change. Maybe it's what gamers wanted, but it wasn't very artistic in my opinion. I don't know if I can trust a company that would flip-flop that easily under pressure. That alone makes it a failure to me.

Nintendo didn't ditch the Gamepad when the Wii U didn't fly off shelves. They were like hey, we created this thing, so we're going to stick with it. I really respect that.

I don't just look at sales and profits. I look at the whole picture, the whole vision, the whole message they send out with every decision they make. But hey, that's just me.

Different guy in charge, different vision. Wii-U was a lot harder to "change" since they sold the gamepad as hardware where xbox was underpowered but capable enough to fix many of its flaws with just software, wonder what nintendo would have done if they had a desision like that. The support in software from nintendo on the Wii-U was actually rather weak, I would have perfered the support xbox one owners got in the end over what I got on my Wii-U

Anyway, there are many things microsoft and xbox failed at with the Xbox One its original messaging was the worse it can be considered a failture in so many ways but also a success in many others.

Its a hard question but in the end sales so tell a pretty decent story, its failed and succeeded and ended up somewhere in the middle because of it.

Nope not a failure.

Unless you are chanting USA,USA,USA number 1!!!!!

Then yes it is a failure, since Sony is selling more.

But XB1 is selling more than 360 did so that's no failure.

If it's doing less than 360. Yes it has failed.

Time will tell.

?

Perhaps he was saying it is selling better than 360 at the same amount of time.