Xbox will catch up to Playstation this generation

[DonFerrari]

shikamaru317 said:

I see a scenario where it's possible that they make up alot of ground this gen, if they make all the right decisions, but I would say that it's more likely that they will gain ground but still be behind by at least 20-30m at the end of the generation, it likely won't be until gen 10 when they have an actual chance of catching up or passing Sony, they were just in too weak of a position gen 8 to catch up this gen. The right decisions they need to make to gain alot of ground this gen and surpass Xbox 360 sales by the end of the gen, setting them up for a stronger gen 10:

• They need to do something about their current production issues asap. Sony is currently producing more than twice as many PS5 units on a weekly basis as MS is producing Series S|X units, presumably due to a better contract with TSMC. MS needs to make a deal with another foundry besides TSMC to get additional chip production going (Samsung and IBM are capable of producing chipsets on the proper node), unless they want PS5 to already have a huge lead by Summer 2022 when this chip shortage is rumored to be ending.
• They need to launch in more markets soon, as PS5 is currently available in about 20 more markets than Series S|X, and they need better marketing across all of their more niche markets.
• Price cut Series S and Series X well throughout the generation. Series S needs to drop to $250 Holiday 2022, Series X to $450 Holiday 2022. S to $200 by Holiday 2024, X to $400. One final price cut to something like $170 S/$350 X by Holiday 2026. Temporary price cuts with even better deals on Black Friday/Cyber Monday weeks.
• They need to make smart bundling choices throughout the generation. They need bundles for big AAA 3rd party multiplat games each year that they get the marketing rights to, as well as their biggest exclusives like Halo Infinite, Starfield, Elder Scrolls 6, Gears 6, and more. Gamepass bundles would also be smart, especially close to the Holiday season, bundling say 6 months of Gamepass with the already cheap Series S could be huge with budget conscious gamers.
• They need to keep acquiring independent AAA studios (Avalanche and IO Interactive seem like good targets since they are already doing 2nd party exclusives for MS according to insiders), maybe even another mid size publisher like Bethesda (Capcom, Sega, Koei Tecmo, or WB Interactive from Discovery, all seem like viable targets for MS acquisition). And they need to make sure those studios' games are exclusive to PC and Xbox, just like Bethesda's games.
• They need to take more time on their exclusives, focusing on quality over quantity. 
• They need more AAA story driven exclusives, like Sony specializes in, they can't steal any of that fanbase from Sony unless they have big AAA story driven releases of their own. 

Nope, nothing to do with better contract or selling in more countries.

The actual reason is that MS didn`t had the confidence they would sell the same level of Sony so they contracted half as much. Nothing prevented them from signing double amount except their own lack of confidence. The markets that sell the lion share are already being attended by MS.

Xbox HW is more expensive to make than PS5 so MS cutting Sony by 50USD all the time would just mean extra 50 loses and well Sony can match that anytime their own sales curve is below their wishes. Reason they didn`t cut PS4 much was exactly because during the whole gen it was selling at target or above even without price cuts, while Xbox even with cuts didn`t really accelerate the sales.

The rest sure can help they sell more HW. But keeping most going to PC won`t help them.