X1 will never catch or match PS4 sales, it is a misfired product.

[Eddie_Raja]

Jereel Hunter said:

Eddie_Raja said:

Something that annoys me is people keep saying "I don't know, I wouldn't count MS out yet!" and then they give no reason for why we shouldn't.  I am not singling you out, and I am not necessarily saying we should 100% forget Xbox already, but seriously why shouldn't we.

Let's have this discussion people!  Forget marking BS from both sides!  The Xbox One is a little more than half as strong as the PS4, MS has way fewer first party studios and IP's than Sony, and the Playstation brand has more staying power.  How in the hell could MS dig themeselves out of this hole?

The answers why we shouldn't, should be obvious. This is a profitable part of Microsoft, a company with almost limitless resources. Why would a profitable product, on decent track, by a AAA company be counted out? The X1 is in a way better position than the PS3 was. It was a company who's stock had been in freefall for years, was in the red constantly, and was billions in the hole as a product, and receiving similar poor sales. It recovered from a much worse position than the X1 is in at present. Especially since MS could absolutely afford to tank the price, if necessary to keep the brand alive. Sony would have a tough time following suit. 

1) The Xbox division is not profitable.  They still have yet to make a net profit with their division as has been pointed out dozens of times.  Also, MS doesn't make lots of money so they can throw it way at money-sucking division.

2) The X1 is in a terribly worse situation than the PS3 was.  The PS3 was hard to program for, and cost too much for most people.  However its features did justify purchasing it, and it had a lot of things that could be stripped off to make it cheaper (Did it really need 3 different memory card readers?!).  The PS3 was also coming off of a generation of dominating EVERY market.

The X1 costs roughly the same to produce as does the PS4 even though it is substantially weaker (This is even without Kinect).  This wouldn't be the end of the world if it wasn't primarily a gaming machine, but now it is.  On top of that the 360 was their second time in a row coing in third place.  They did well in the US/UK but didn't dominate ANY market.  Now the X1 is losing as badly to the PS4 in the UK as the 360 did to the PS3 in Europe, and Europe is all but outright rejecting the X1.  In fact, the PS4's lead in the US is climbing at an accelerating rate.

3) MS will not just throw money at the situation.  I would eat the loss and drop the price to $300 this holiday, but what if that doesn't work and the PS4 keeps winning at $350?  MS has just about no real cards left to play and it is gameover.  Keep in mind the weaker PS2 was eventually selling for more than the Xbox was, and yet the PS2 still kept dominating due to its established mindshare.