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Forums - Gaming Discussion - MS preys on Consumer Ignorance with Xbox 360/One

iron_megalith on 20 March 2014
crissindahouse said:
When will people stop this “Xbox One costs more with weaker specs“ crap to prove how evil Microsoft is when it is well known that Kinect 2 is very expensive and the reason why Xbox One doesn't cost maybe 150 bucks less?

Sony and Microsoft make probably around the same profit per sold console and not simething like “Microsoft takes 100 more for something which should be cheaper“



I do agree with the whole Kinect thing being the real reason why X1 is more expensive. However Microsoft did try to be very restrictive when X1 was announced. We all know how that went.



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Shaunaka on 20 March 2014
g911turbo said:

You're talking about people.  I'm talking about corporations.  To be successful they ARE all about the bottom line (meaning money) - it's not really a bad thing, its just how it works.  They employ THOUSANDS of people, so at the end of the day the decision they make are about what can be profitable and therefore keep the company afloat... everything else is secondary.  

 

They only reason they want bold and brilliant products is because that means they are more likely to sell said products.  Theses decisions are made by committee, and even at the highest level there is a board of directors.  Meaning not just one person.  Sony, just like other corporations, is trying to make money by offering products that they think people want.

Corporations are made up of people. Nothing more, nothing less.

The fact is that anybody working at MS or Sony would feel personally insulted if you called their respective company a greedy, corporate pig. 

You should go check out what it's like to work at Google or even Apple. Since ALL companies are like this in your opinion, then that extends to these as well. It seems like an awesome thing to be part of Google for instance.

There is nothing to gain by coming into threads and using the "their evil" card. Nothing at all. Best you not do it at all and let the people here make justifiable criticisms based on the company's actions instead of blind negativity like you are. It's not constructive and it isn't in sync with the reality.

Some of the products available to consumers these days are truly incredible - especially considering how little we pay. Go and see how much tech stuff cost in the 80s, 90s etc. to realize how fortunate we are. No need to call the  manufacturers of these products greedy pigs.



BMaker11 on 20 March 2014
EpicRandy said:
BMaker11 said:
EpicRandy said:
forevercloud3000 said:
EpicRandy said:
Seems to me that the writer prays more on reader's ignorance than Ms prays on consumers' ignorance.

care to elaborate?


Because it is full of twisted and/or nitpicked pieces of information that do not show the big picture. Opinion stated as a fact does not make a truth. and the article is based on the concept that the reader will not look further for more information that will debunk many if not all its point. That's why I said that the writter prays more on reader's ignorance thant ms prays on consumer's ignorance.

So, was it not true that the 360 had a "fake" cheaper price? You either had to replace standard batteries over and over or get a play and charge kit. You had to get XBL to play online. HDDs became a necessity and 20GB just weren't cutting the mustard, so you needed bigger ones....but they were proprietary and cost $100+ instead of a replaceable SATA for less than half the cost for the same amount of storage. I paid $400 for a PS3 in 2007. If you got a 360 at the same time, you paid, bare minimum, $300 for the core model, $100 for the HDD, $50 for XBL, either an uncountable amount of money (not because it was astronomically high, but there's no solid figure on it) on batteries or $30 for the play and charge kit, and if your router was in a different side of the house, you needed wireless to get online, and that peripheral cost $100. So the "real" entry price for a 360 was at least $400 at the minimum for just a Core and an HDD and one set of batteries worth of playing. But up to $480 to actually enjoy the console and as high as $580 if your Xbox wasn't close enough to your router and you needed to use WiFi.

Is it not true that the 360 was able to be cheap (other than literally being cheap, hence why the hardware failures were so prevalent) because it didn't standardize HDDs and have a next-gen media interface, which is now standard across the board?

Is it not true that MSs 1st party support has been pretty paltry throught that generation? Other than Gears, Halo, Fable, and Forza, what else was notable? The last 3 years have been a majority of Kinect games.

Is it not true that MS spent more on ads instead of building studios? Moreover, is it not true that they spent a crap ton of money focusing on getting multiplatform content on the console for a short period of time instead of making fully exclusive IPs? Was it really that important to throw millions of dollars at Activision to get a "Jump In" at the end of a CoD commercial, only to get a few percent higher sales overall? Was it really so important to give Take Two $50M to make people think 360 was the "home" of GTA4, when PS3 got the content anyway and GTAIV sold essentially the same on both consoles? Did MS not just axe a new IP in order to rehash Gears...by an untested studio?

And is it not true that they rushed the console to the market in order to beat Sony out the gate, ignoring the need to do final QA testing on the system in order to get a few million in consumer's hands first....resulting in one of the largest, if not *the* largest, hardware failures of all time?

Preying on reader's ignorance? What could the readers of this article look up to "debunk" many or all of these points? The post may seem "angry" or "bitter", but each point was valid

The Xbox 360 was like Spirit Airlines (maybe you've heard of them): they're advertised as the "cheapest way to fly" because you only "pay for what you need". In this case, flying from Point A to Point B (popping a disc into the tray and playing a game). But if you need to have some bags brought onto the flight, they charge you crazy fees for it. If you want a seat that's not necessarily 1st class, but better than the crappy ones in the back of the plane, you pay a fee. They only go to a select few destinations, and if you have a layover instead of a direct flight, the price skyrockets. They just nickel and dime you repeatedly. All of this is comparable to XBL, HDDs, batteries, etc. for 360. If you just wanted a better experience with no hiccups, why not just fly Delta or Southwest (get a PS3, or PS4 now)? Their tickets may be a little higher, but in the end, everything is cheaper than what you get from Spirit, to get an enjoyable flight experience.


Fake cheaper price... false it was cheaper. I bought an 20gb model back in 2007 and never feel the need to upgrade it. I'm a casual gamer but I still have 20+ games for the 360. Hdd space was not necesary since game did not required install (very few did later in the gen but they added support to usb drive). Batteries, rechargeable battery existed way before the xbox 360 released and you could buy a wired controller as a second controller so you would have need batteries only when you played multiplayer game. for the Xbox live, I bougth it 2 or 3 year and it has always been a quality service but I never felt the obligation of having it (Sony is now charging for online gaming because that was holding them back through all of last gen, each upgrade cost and maintenance fee was directly cutting in their profits, and because they think gamers are willing to pay for quality).  I never needed wifi so why would I have wanted the 360 to be more expensive to include something I did not want. All your argumentation is based on your will that every one should believe that anyone that bought 360 cannot had enjoy it without buying all of this things which is simply a lie.

I love Halo and Gears but I also loved many kinect games so for me Ms supported the 360 in a way I liked, like probably the vast majority of other Kinect enthousiast. And let me remind you that the first 5 years have been awesome and by far the greatest experience I ever had out of a video game system (ps. propose me 2 system, one that will be supported the first half of its life and the other that will get interesting the second half of it's life and I will choose the first one all the way, why the hell would I buy a video game system to play on it in a couple of years )

Yes it is true that Ms have spent more on ads than on building gaming studios. but like I said by saying that you would want others to not recognize that Ms over the last few years have buid way more studio and teams than the other two. So you're saying look at what they've done but do not look at what they do right now. And buying exclusive content and third party support is a way to support the gaming industry overall by helping studio through there long investement before getting there project ready to be sold. The only sad part in this is that Ms did not do enough, with all those studio closing without seing their project released or by lacking some publicity it needed for their projects to be profitable.

Hardware failure was obviously Ms biggest misstep in gaming, but still you want the reader to be ignorant that Ms did take measure that are still unprecedant spending billions of $ and retarding the 360 profitability to fix the situation. It does not excuse Ms to have denied the problem in first place but there are reasons behing it such as evaluate how big was the problem, what was needed to do etc...

You would want everyone to believe that only ignorant's buy Ms products but that can't be in any logical way true, and is in itself a statement only ignorant will accept without question.

If you really are the "casual gamer" that you say you are, then no, I wouldn't expect you to know just about any of those things you just said. You wouldn't care. You wouldn't look up how MS is spending their money and how it went to ads instead of studios. You'd just see a CoD commercial and think "sick! Glad I got a 360. I get the best content". You wouldn't look up how much the failure rate was and that MS spent billions to fix it. You'd just know that you got a free replacement if your Xbox broke. so on and so forth.

But why are you damage controlling the nickel and diming? "Oh, you can just get a wired controller"....ok, so what about 4 player local multiplayer? I'm sure Halo just be awesome if only one other player could play locally (just from personal experience, I had a much better time when we had 4 on one screen going online). "Oh, I never needed WiFi, so why would I need the peripheral"....not everyone has the luxury of the house router to be near the game system. Most people have the modem next to the computer. If you have a modem/router next to an entertainment center in the front room because the computer is right next to it....good for you. But don't undermine the fact that millions of people don't have setups like that. More and more people have laptops nowadays for a reason, and I guarantee you it's not so they can be wired in when they go on the internet. Gaming is the same. I know I want to be able to plug my system up anywhere in the house and be able to get online, not be limited to wherever the router is.

I'm not saying that the 360 cannot be enjoyed without buying all those extras, but that's because "enjoyed" has to be looked at really subjectively here. But let's just ignore all that and go with you being the "casual gamer" who got to enjoy his system. You bought a 20GB in 2007 and 3 years of Live? You just nullified the very first statement in your response. And btw, you said Sony now charges for online because they think people will pay for a quality service, after looking at the XBL model. Understand that XBL isn't a "service"; it is a "fee". A "fee" to play what you already own. Games come with an online portion and you couldn't play that portion, that is on the disc, unless you paid the fee. That's ALL XBL is for, to pay for things you should already be able to do (Netflix, Hulu, Internet Explorer, game online....you have to pay for it). PS+, on the other hand, I'd call a "service", because you get compensated for your money: free games, massive discounts, etc. The fact that multiplayer is now behind a paywall (for PS4 at least) is kinda crappy, and I would consider that portion a "fee" now, but other than that, what else is a PS+ subscriber paying for that they should just be able to do? Use the internet browser? Watch Hulu, Crackle, WWE Network, Netflix, CrunchyRoll, etc? Have ads everywhere (lol)? No. A "service" is the something you pay for and get something in return. A "fee" is just annoying. And having to pay to play your is not "getting something in return" when playing online is just part of the $60 you already paid for the game. And that's all XBL is for



EpicRandy on 20 March 2014
BMaker11 said:

If you really are the "casual gamer" that you say you are, then no, I wouldn't expect you to know just about any of those things you just said. You wouldn't care. You wouldn't look up how MS is spending their money and how it went to ads instead of studios. You'd just see a CoD commercial and think "sick! Glad I got a 360. I get the best content". You wouldn't look up how much the failure rate was and that MS spent billions to fix it. You'd just know that you got a free replacement if your Xbox broke. so on and so forth.

But why are you damage controlling the nickel and diming? "Oh, you can just get a wired controller"....ok, so what about 4 player local multiplayer? I'm sure Halo just be awesome if only one other player could play locally (just from personal experience, I had a much better time when we had 4 on one screen going online). "Oh, I never needed WiFi, so why would I need the peripheral"....not everyone has the luxury of the house router to be near the game system. Most people have the modem next to the computer. If you have a modem/router next to an entertainment center in the front room because the computer is right next to it....good for you. But don't undermine the fact that millions of people don't have setups like that. More and more people have laptops nowadays for a reason, and I guarantee you it's not so they can be wired in when they go on the internet. Gaming is the same. I know I want to be able to plug my system up anywhere in the house and be able to get online, not be limited to wherever the router is.

I'm not saying that the 360 cannot be enjoyed without buying all those extras, but that's because "enjoyed" has to be looked at really subjectively here. But let's just ignore all that and go with you being the "casual gamer" who got to enjoy his system. You bought a 20GB in 2007 and 3 years of Live? You just nullified the very first statement in your response. And btw, you said Sony now charges for online because they think people will pay for a quality service, after looking at the XBL model. Understand that XBL isn't a "service"; it is a "fee". A "fee" to play what you already own. Games come with an online portion and you couldn't play that portion, that is on the disc, unless you paid the fee. That's ALL XBL is for, to pay for things you should already be able to do (Netflix, Hulu, Internet Explorer, game online....you have to pay for it). PS+, on the other hand, I'd call a "service", because you get compensated for your money: free games, massive discounts, etc. The fact that multiplayer is now behind a paywall (for PS4 at least) is kinda crappy, and I would consider that portion a "fee" now, but other than that, what else is a PS+ subscriber paying for that they should just be able to do? Use the internet browser? Watch Hulu, Crackle, WWE Network, Netflix, CrunchyRoll, etc? Have ads everywhere (lol)? No. A "service" is the something you pay for and get something in return. A "fee" is just annoying. And having to pay to play your is not "getting something in return" when playing online is just part of the $60 you already paid for the game. And that's all XBL is for

Damage controling... no I'm not. I give Ms a slap where it is due, just like you. But I also give Ms merit where it is due unlike you.

Every action as two side, you would want me to look only a the bad one and say look Ms is pure evil, nothing they do is right, and that is simply not true.

You said that I call myself a casual gamers but I ain't cause I know to much. I refer myself as a casual gamer based on the time I play, yes i'm hyped on some games and products related to gaming and i'm well informed but I do not play enough to call myself a true gamer.

You reprehend Ms for removing 4 player split screen and I agree with you on this point, it would have been great, but let me remind you that four player split screen have been lacking on many title released by competitor and yes it shows Ms will to push their online platform but that is not the sole purpose of it.(killzone 2 did not have split screen support ether)

"And btw, you said Sony now charges for online because they think people will pay for a quality service, after looking at the XBL model". No i Said that Sony now charge for online gaming because they looked back at there own mistake not because they looked at Ms model.

You reprehend Ms for not including a wifi adapter. yet How many system did have a wifi adapter before 2006? Should we look at the problem the other way and say that Sony included a wifi adapter to justify the higher price point? It is true that the separate adapter was expensive, too expensive yes and I agree but should Xbox 360 had a bundle with wifi adapter and charge and additionnal 50 bucks I would not have bought cause, like millions of others, I did not care about wifi.

"You bought a 20GB in 2007 and 3 years of Live? You just nullified the very first statement in your response." you're completely ignoring "I never felt the obligation of having it" which prove my point of it not being a fee but a service.

"But don't undermine the fact that millions of people don't have setups like that." Yes I agree but the others millions would have paid for nothing.

You want to point out that everything Ms has done is in a way to get more money in their pockets. But if we look back at the previous gen, the one that was literaly printing money was Nintendo. You would have liked the Xbox 360's business model to be more like the ps3 one, but the ps3 was a financial disaster. Ms did overall barely made profit if any at all mainly because of the rrod fiasco but even without, their profit would not as good Nintendo or Sony with the ps1 or ps2 because they reinvested more than the other.



sales2099 on 20 March 2014
S.T.A.G.E. said:
sales2099 said:
 

Never said that and that wasn't the point at all. I commend MS for securing the 1st game, and 3rd party exclusives in general like Ryse and Dead Rising 3. The point I was making was that Sony isn't on that level of 3rd party commitment and MS's effort deserves credit.

Keep your blind faith in MS. No ones advocating it or putting it down but rather talking about Microsoft as a corporation and their practices which ARE detrimental to the industry (which can affect consumers). Once the paid exclusives dry up just like the 360 and MS is expected to have creativity of their own just like the last three years when confronted by the media on a drought of exclusives they'll say... "We're focused on quality over quantity" when really...they mean, "We dont know how to finish the top notch game outside of that which has already been made for us. Microsoft, much like AT&T, Comcast and more are bad examples of what large American mega corporations represent in a capitalist society. Doesn't stop me from getting and Xbox One eventually, but my point stands about Microsoft. My feelings about them and being a gamer are two separate things.

And I am sure you just condem Sony for their controversal practices of securing exclusive content for many multiplats like Destiny 3, Diablo 3, Assassins Creed and Watchdogs. This ain't timed exclusive DLC, this is permanent content exclusivity.

But I suppose it is ok because only PS gamers deserve the best over others....



Xbox: Best hardware, Game Pass best value, best BC, more 1st party genres and multiplayer titles. 

 

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EpicRandy on 20 March 2014
sales2099 said:
S.T.A.G.E. said:
sales2099 said:
 

Never said that and that wasn't the point at all. I commend MS for securing the 1st game, and 3rd party exclusives in general like Ryse and Dead Rising 3. The point I was making was that Sony isn't on that level of 3rd party commitment and MS's effort deserves credit.

Keep your blind faith in MS. No ones advocating it or putting it down but rather talking about Microsoft as a corporation and their practices which ARE detrimental to the industry (which can affect consumers). Once the paid exclusives dry up just like the 360 and MS is expected to have creativity of their own just like the last three years when confronted by the media on a drought of exclusives they'll say... "We're focused on quality over quantity" when really...they mean, "We dont know how to finish the top notch game outside of that which has already been made for us. Microsoft, much like AT&T, Comcast and more are bad examples of what large American mega corporations represent in a capitalist society. Doesn't stop me from getting and Xbox One eventually, but my point stands about Microsoft. My feelings about them and being a gamer are two separate things.

And I am sure you just condem Sony for their controversal practices of securing exclusive content for many multiplats like Assassins Creed and Watchdogs. But I suppose it is ok because only PS gamers deserve the best over others....


Destiny and Diablo 3 also. Many like to think ms is pure evil and Sony can not do bad things. They are simply in denial.



sales2099 on 20 March 2014
EpicRandy said:
sales2099 said:

And I am sure you just condem Sony for their controversal practices of securing exclusive content for many multiplats like Assassins Creed and Watchdogs. But I suppose it is ok because only PS gamers deserve the best over others....


Destiny and Diablo 3 also. Many like to think ms is pure evil and Sony can not do bad things. They are simply in denial.

What exactly does Diablo 3 and Destiny have exclusive to Playstation? Destiny has a exclusive beta, but anything beyond that?



Xbox: Best hardware, Game Pass best value, best BC, more 1st party genres and multiplayer titles. 

 

LiquorandGunFun on 20 March 2014

Damn so much drama over playing a damn video game.
All systems are fun, all with hooks. get over yourselves.



 

EpicRandy on 20 March 2014
sales2099 said:
EpicRandy said:
sales2099 said:
 

And I am sure you just condem Sony for their controversal practices of securing exclusive content for many multiplats like Assassins Creed and Watchdogs. But I suppose it is ok because only PS gamers deserve the best over others....


Destiny and Diablo 3 also. Many like to think ms is pure evil and Sony can not do bad things. They are simply in denial.

What exactly does Diablo 3 and Destiny have exclusive to Playstation? Destiny has a exclusive beta, but anything beyond that?


Destiny will also have exlusive content for ps3, ps4. And diblo 3 will have exclusive feature on ps4 if not exclusivity on next gen system (we still do not have any official anouncement for the Xbox One).

http://ca.ign.com/articles/2013/11/09/blizzard-explains-diablo-iiis-exclusive-ps4-features

http://www.polygon.com/2013/2/20/4006990/destiny-ps4



Pezzilla on 20 March 2014

My launch Xbox 360 cost me €308 with no games or hdd and a wired controller in 2005.

Memory card 256meg €25 (Couldn't afford a hdd at the time)
Wireless adaptor €120
20 gig hdd €130
Xbox live €60
Wireless controller €65

Total money spent €708

The xbox 360 was cheaper if you didn't plan to play online or have any desire to watch HD discs.