It is a flop from the software point of view... less bad from the Blue-Ray player ... .euh ... console point of view.

you have no clue don't you.

MS said so many times, xbox is sell at a loss just like PS3 nowadays, and because most of it chip are from NVIDIA, NVIDIA won't reduce it price at that time, and MS don't have any right to produce it's own chip at that time.

so better for them to cut xbox, rather that give them more looses.

this time is different, MS has any right to manufacture the xbox 360.

even if xbox 720 is released, Xbx 360 still being produced as long there is demand.

and remember MS will perfected software emulation so transition to xbox 720 will be smooth.

not like PS3, they made a huge noises about 100% BC, but right now it is 0% BC, only PS1 titles.

only old PS3 model, and several model supporting BC, and they don't even bothered to create software emul

they have to concentrated on Home , again another failed product from Sony, 2 years and we dn't know when

home will be released.

dejelek,

Yeah, I have a clue. Gears of War 3 will be the flagship title for the next MS console. I know that a lot of you are saying, "The next XBOX won't be out until 2012 or 2025." But the truth of the matter is it has to release in a timely fashion for Epic and Gears of War 3. Microsoft doesn't have a bigger franchise headed into the next gen and they don't really have another system seller at this point in time because the Fable series isn't popular enough and Halo is losing steam. The latest the next 'box can be released is 2011, the earliest is 2009. And 2010 is probably the right year.

lol, you lost all your credibility in one sentence. September 2007, that's all I say. 

multiplatform is the key, why MS have to rely on 1st party, if every multiplat will be better on xbox 360, and better on sales too.

2008, Sony already releasing 1st party, LBP, R2, MGS4 , Socomm, do you pleased with sony software sales from 1st party titles ?

i bet as soon as COD hit sale on PS3, it will have better sales than R2

if MGS4 sales is not that high , what made you think KZ2 will made it any better,

i also think, the way they made it to beta, long way from released, will have negative impact.

the hype after the beta will going down, just like R2, people Hypeing R2 to the roof, then bam

the sales not as good as expected.

without 1st party titles, there will be Rock Band, Guitar Hero, Sport titles, there will be COD 6

there will be F.E.A.R, there will be RE5, there will be STAR OCEAN , Lost Planet 2 etc, many many more games

and flood from PC developer that will happily to ported game for Xbox 360, but not for PS3

You concentrate too much on flagship titles. If this generation proves anything it is a problem for exclussive titles.

Multi plattform games reduce the risk for developpers and they can earn even more money, as COD, GTA or Assassin's creed demonstrated. The next move will probably be even more compatibility friendly and allow the support for the old and new plattform. At least for the Xbox720 this probly will not be an unfeasable feature, while I don't have a clue how a PS-4 should emulate the old cell.

Such plattforms would probably have FULL HD capabilities and simpler, earsier to use interfaces, to simplify develoipment on the new plattforms. So you could implement the development environment to allow the compilation for the old and new plattform ahnd you could fine tune from this stage on. This would allow a pretty smooth transition anhd while you put more and more money into the support of the new plattform you could still support the old plattform.

Add some money for timed exclussive releases and you have everything you need.

You can look at it as you like, but the push to multi plattform games shifted a lot of power from the hardware production to the software developers. The hardware only a plattform but for the software producers there are three important values: 1, how much does the development cost on this plattform, how many possible customers do I have on this plattform and how much money can I ask for the game.

The big problem for the PS-3is really that you can't use the count of available consoles as the user base for game developers. I use my PS-3 in most casers for BluRay only. I don't really have so much time for games.

On the other hand are the SPUs a big problem in the development process, because they need a totally different code base and they are integrated in a manner that makes it pretty hard to use them in reactive real time applications. Furthermore the normal system RAM is always a limiting factor Especially the time to market is the week point of this plattform.

The Xbox360 is a bit easier because the three basic cores can use the same code base and load balancing is included for free.  And multi cores are standard feature of todays PCs, so the co development for the PC is easier.  Its biggest problems are Resource conflicts. Especially the very fast video RAM is to limited.

From a development standpoint I would say the Xbox 360 is in a better position. Even if it would be in third place most games will be mult plattform based (the HD graphics and animations can be used on both plattforms. Furthermore: to use the SPEs effectively you should use the PPU only. This is nearly exactly the same unit as it is used in each of the thrree cores on the Xbox360 (they have each an additional Altivec Unit).). Even if Microsoft would have to switch to Intel or AMD based chips this difference is manageable as Apple demonstrated with its switch to Intel based machines.

It will pürobably achieve a software compatibility for some games, while other games could be recompiled with slight changes and rereleased at cheaper prices with enhanced capabilities. It should be no problem to release such a plattform between 2010-2012, but it would not mean the end of the Xbox360.

But how would you mange a compatible PS-4? IBM and Toshiba switched their chip developments according to their needs. Game development is not on their aggenda. Everything elsse is based on multi cores, while streaming calculations are more and more exported to the GPU. This is a complete switch from the PS-3 and a complete different plattform.

With such a different transition it is pretty easy to guess which plattform would attract more developers.

While the current PS-3 pushes the BluRay market it also strangles the market for BluRay players, which can be a pretty severe problem in the long run. And every price drop will increase this problem. More and more Hardware developers leave this market, because there is nothing to gain for them.

kars,
The problem with your comment is that you are assuming that just any old games will sell consoles. There are more factors involved than just its quality in determining how well a piece of software will sell. And that has been Sony's problem as of late. Even though Little Big Planet is considered to be the fourteenth best game ever made according to Game Rankings, it isn't selling like Halo or Gears because it is in an unpopular genre. And even though Resistance 2 is as good as Gears 2 according to IGN, it isn't selling at a Gears 2 pace because it never gained the same size fanbase through hype and marketing.

So Microsoft knows that they have a bonafide seller in the next Gears game and they will use that to move their next console. And they will need it do so as the next Microsoft console with all of the tech it will have under the hood wll probably cost at least $500.00 at launch.

Could not have said it better myself so why try

The only console that flopped this year was the Wii. Oh wait we are not talking about games we are talking about sales. Nevermind.

One game? What is this abomination of a fanboy post. Lets just say PS3 and 360 have both delivered quality exclusive and multiplat AAA titles. Stop being such fanboys. If you look at the library of games over the months, Ps3 and 360  are pretty much neck and neck, you can't go wrong with either this year. And even salewise there isn't much in it. PS3 may outsell 360 by next year, but the difference in sales at the end of this gen won't be significant.

In fact i'm pretty sure 360 would have been a more succesful console at the end...360 will outsell Xbox1...PS3 has no chance of going anyway near PS2's sales.