XBox 360 - 40M Units Sold by the End of Next Year!!!

[thx1139]

Paul_Warren said:
"360 had no Halo or Gears as a launch title so claiming NextBox needs one is foolish."

This statement can only be made by people that don't know the history of xbox consoles. If you go back to December 2004 when information about the 360 came out, you will see that almost at the exact same time that information on the 360 started to come out information on Halo 3 started to come out as well including the Official XBOX Magazine's first cover picture and story for Halo 3, followed by the first Halo 3 videos on the next issue's demo disk. The only reason that most people bought the 360 in its earliest days and the reason that it was sold out during Holiday '05 was because Halo 3 was going to be on the system. If you watched a program like Entertainment Tonight prior to the release of the 360 when they were talking about Halo parties, all the celebrities featured were saying, "I have to have a 360 now because Halo 3 is going to be on the system in two years."

Microsoft took the extra time between the launch of the 360 to work on bringing the console's price down for the release of Halo 3 and to bring out a new franchise in Gears of War (which debuted on the MTV special prior to E3 2005).

The only game that could create equal fervor for the next XBOX is Gears 3.

Halo 3 was not unveiled until E3 2006.  Yes I have been a subscriber to OXM since the first XBOX came out.  Sure there were articles about what people hoped/wanted for Halo 3, but nothing from Bungie.  Sure we knew Halo 3 was coming. We also know Halo 4 is coming.  Certainly over the next 3 years MS is going to be trying to create the next big franchise before a 2011 or 2012 NextBox release.

Look MS wants to be profitable with the Xbox 360 and any thought of a 2009 release of a new consoles is foolishness. The 360 is entering its prime profitablity wise and MS is not going to end that prematurely. Particulary with a bad economy.