i think 360 has achieved its goal. the 360 is a big improvement from the orginal xbox. but if the next xbox wants to dominate it really needs to perform betetr in japan and europe.

sony for some reason is so popular in europe. ps3 has only been put for a year in europe and it sold 4.5 million or something like that.

if microsoft doesnt sell well in japan, thats a problem because japan can push 4-10 million consoles. if MS dsnt sell well in europe, well the only m arket it has is USA.

sony on the otehr hand has a worldwide audience.

The Xbox brand has grown ALOT this gen, and Nintendo has once again regained the crown it has always desserved. Sony won last gen because tey had a console that was casual and, relatively, cheap. They are selling tis gen for two things: One, brand (old PS2 owners) and two, Blu-Ray, nothing more. Without the two, I believe they wouldn't be near the sales they currently have.

As for the Xbox, they need to fix just three things, and three things they need to work on their next generation of console making (its foolish to think that they won't make another console next gen), those things are:

1 - Expand the market to Japan! They are missing potential sales there. Seriously, ery high sales are missed in Japan because of the lack of game support given there.

2 - Hardware issues! MS needs to stop and test... and I mean REALLY test out their consoles before they leave the factory. While the Wii and PS3 had a under 1% failure rate, the X360 has what, 38%? (I dont know the number really, just THINK its 38).

3 - Focus on hardcore gaming! The 360 is a HARDCORE console, they don't need to be focusing on defeating the Wii or any othe more casual console. What defines the Xbox is its gaming line-up and online. MS needs to focus on the hardcore audience, that is where their money is at. They are on the right track, but need to focus more on what they do best. Hardcore gaming.

Make no mistake every Wii bought is a 360 microsoft has lost. they are competing for the same person or person's. Video games are video games. if you are looking for a game system its a wii, 360 or ps3. every wii bought is a 360 download LOST, a game sell LOST. If microsoft did not care about nintendo they would NOT be so amped on getting the price down and getting lots of "casual" games on their system.

Microsoft did not enter the market to win downloads. they entered because the playstation was making millions and it could take over microsofts bread and butter in the living room which is windows. they wanted a spot in the living room not to enter the downloading market. (or the 1st xbox would of had movie downloads.....). they entered to make money.

The way I see it all three have some degree of success and some degree of failure:

360 - Good: Increased marketshare (but can it keep it?). Increased 3rd party support. Made online a standard of the industry. Made a successful downloadable content model and distribution model others are copying. Stopped Sony from dominating. Is making a profit on paper if not in reality.

Bad: Failed to take 1st place. Likely will fail at keeping 2nd. RRoD. Failed to be truly profitable (at least so far) due to RRoD. Likely will not earn enough profit to significantly offset massive losses incurred by Xbox and 360. Failed to make Xbox a compelling brand outside of NA (and maybe Britain/Australia). Allowed Nintendo to dominate market.

PS3 Good: Won HD format war. Earning back marketshare from 360. Maintained key exclusives (mostly, at least so far). Converted Playstation from just games income to games/movies/downloadable content income.

Bad: Gave up market leadership. Stuck in a bloodletting battle with 360 for 2nd. Incurred far greater losses than predicted and may not be fully able to recoop those losses. Tarnished their own brand with their own arrogance. Focused on core market and allowed Nintendo unchallenged access to the larger casual market. Lost Japan to Wii. Lost NA to both Wii and 360. Still losing Europe to Wii, but it has a chance at 1st there at least. Failed to make a profit thus far.

Wii Good: Hell, 1st place in all markets, and mega profits are pretty damn good. Increasing not only market share but market size. Increased 3rd party support. Made a profit from day one and showed the big boys how it's done.

Bad: Vastly underestimated demand and throwing untold millions out the window by being sold out for 17 months after release (in NA at least). Failing to win over many core gamers or maintain many that originally purchased a Wii (although Nintendo assumed the Wii as a 2nd console for the core crowd was acceptable from the get go). Reggie did not convince Rockstar to bring GTA to Wii. Graphics are too different from 360/PS3 to allow (cost effective) multi-platform games resulting in Wii not getting many key franchises despite being market leader. Struggling to supply both old market games (SMG, SSBB, MP3, Etc.) and new market games (WiiFit, Brain Academy, Endless Ocean,etc) in satisfying amounts/frequency.

Microsoft's main goal was to stop sony from getting too big, they knew if they captured a significant amount of the hardcore market, and turned them against playstation, sony's chance of being console king would be lower.

Microsoft suceeded in stopping sony from being the true console king permenantly.

Um... DVDs came out in what 1997... and its 2008 and DVDS sell in the millions..... not one console has lasted for 11 years.... so umm.... what?

Every 5 years a new console is made... blu-ray can last for like 10 years without R&D.... whereas as soon as a console  is made they start R&D for the next one because the life is only 5 years.

The Game industry is like what... 25-40% of he movie industry. more people watch, buy,  and own lots more movies then games......

I think people need to remember why Microsoft was profitable last year, 7 million copies of Halo 3. Other than that Microsoft has lost money every year from the xbox and that division also has the Zune in it to try to artificially inflate the numbers to make the xbox look a little more successful than it is. Even though I can't find the post, someone posted money made from the gaming divisions of all three companies a little while back since the PS1 entered the market and Microsoft was 6 billion in the red, Sony with a 3 billion dollar loss form the PS3 is still 2+ billion in the black and Nintendo is 10 billion in the black and never posted a loss.

Other than that I think, keyword think meaning this is an opinion, Microsoft is going to the be the only company that is wanting to release a new platform anytime soon. It is going to take a while for developers to learn and then maximize the PS3 and with Nintendo making so much money off of the Wii and with them trying to expand the market with nontraditional gamers, why would they want to try to push out a new system as frequently as "normal" that these new customers are not going to be used to? Hardware wise Sony is in a good position because of blu ray giving them a lot of space, Nintendo's only limiting factor is space but because they don't have the graphical specs they don't need as much space (look at how much they were able to put in for Twilight Princess), but Microsoft has similar graphical capabilities as the PS3 but with 1/5 the disc space.

Exactly what did you disagree with me about in that post? I keep reading your post and you're just repeating what I said.

Exactly!

Take the games away and look at the PS3.  It can run Linux.  It is a good media center.  It could completely replace the home PC if Sony stepped up.  Of course Microsoft is threatened by that.

Imagine if Sony had released a fully supported Linux package for PS3 (Ubuntu perhaps).  They could sell it with a keyboard & mouse for $20.  People could use it with their printer, camera, MP3 player.  They'd never need to buy another copy of MS Office.  They'd never need their desktop PC again.

Imagine if Sony had brought the PlayTV unit to North America by now.  TiVo would be out of business.  Nobody would buy a PVR from their TV provider anymore.  Now imagine if Sony had rolled out a music and movie store on PSN at launch.  AppleTV and XBLM would have been stillborn.

By cutting Sony down from a 120 million to a 25 million player, MS has successfully mitigated the biggest threat to their core business.  Who really cares how many units XB360 sells?  The dreaded "living room Linux box" and "no-PC media center" sides of the PS3 haven't materialized, thanks largely to the XB360, and people will go on buying PCs with MS Office and Vista for the next 5 years. 

Put this another way.  Sony got Blu-Ray victory thanks to 10 million PS3s.  This is the least of MS's worries.  If the PS3 had sold better, it could have been the springboard for a lot of worse things for MS.  Imagine if 120 million people discovered that you don't need to pay for MS Office or Vista or Media Center to get basic computing done at home!

In this sense Microsoft has definitely achieved its goal.

the fact that u said microsoft does not care about nintendo..............................................................................................

and the fact that microsoft only cares about downloads.........................................................................

you no that stuff lol.