The problem with Microsoft trying to push movie downloads in that a lot of people don't have a hard drive/don't have a big enough hard drive to do so.

As for what Microsoft needs to do this generation:

FIX THEIR DAMNED MACHINE. Was 33% rrod, now is supposedly around 16%, still way to high.

Keep pumping out shooters, that is what the majority of your fan base wants. They want Halo, they want Gears. Throw in some other stuff like Mass Effect and Blue Dragon to diversify a little bit.

Hold steady your position. You aren't going to win this generation. Nintendo has outsold you in half the time. You are finally making a profit in your gaming division though. Drop the price before the holidays along with the basic package which is crap for value. Keep going down the path and try to fix all your faults in the next gen.

Xbox 360 still has a huge software lead over PS3 so the console still has life. Now they need big guns... After Halo 3 and GTAIV, nothing really BIG is left.

On one hand Microsoft has clearly positioned themselves in a better place than last generation. That said, here are few things they could do to regain momentum-

release a new slimmed down hardware design within the next year with an error message that isn't visible on the front of the machine (even if the failure rate is high at least they'll be done with the rrod and can say they it's gone from the new model).

introduce this new model with a price drop to $200-250 and in the form of bundles with one year of free x-box live and/or a free game in the box (maybe the next Madden or Gears 2 in the states, Fifa or some racing game in Others)

things they shouldn't do- release a wii type controller to counter Nintendo (bad mistake in my opinion, I predict trying to change their marketing to the Wii's demo will fail miserably on both a hardware and software sales level and may push some potential buyers toward Sony.)

Good point jheco05

With Bungie going multiformat, Bizzare Creations being bought by Activision, Bioware being bought by EA and now that Crackdown developer also going multiplatform, they are setting themselves up for a beating at what was THEIR turf. GAMES!

Yes, most of the PS3 versions where crap in the past, but with Burnout, COD4, Assassin's Creed and a ton of other big games, that gap seems to have been closed.

If MS loses its edge on the multiplatform side, and has far less exclusives in the years to come, they are in real trouble. Because unlike Sony, they can't fall back on durable hardware and a multimedia options as the blu-ray player.


Thats why I posted this question. Not because I want to ignite some fanboy war, but because I realize that MS has to get its act together NOW, or it will not be able to cope with the troubles up ahead.

So all you MS fans, YES, Microsoft is still doing great now, and is selling tons of software, but on the software side, things look grim in the not too distant future.

^^We shall see.
I'm sure Microsoft will do anything to compete.

@Prodigy_BE & jheco05
Youre forgeting something called Gears of War which was the reason many people bought a 360, including me.

Also, MS owns the Halo IP, Bungie or no Bungie, its not very far-fetched to predict that MS will continue massaging this IP.

Mass Effect publishing rights is still owned by MGS, so unless some money changes hands, its still 360 exclusive. BioShock seems more likely to go multiplatform as with 2K, no one knows whats happening anymore.

And let me just say that at the end of amazing 2007, this same argument was put forward. Everyone said, oh look 360 has no more big guns after 2007, and then Gears 2, Fable 2, NG2, Banjo 3, Tales of Vesperia, Too Human have already set up 2008 for 360 owners. Its not going to stop anytime soon.

Lots of people don't like MS consoles for some different reasons: lack of HW quality, lack of glamour and excessive geekness, perceived closeness between XBox and PC games, making the former look unuseful for the owners of the latter, but also moral and psychological reasons, fear for the monopolies held by MS and its lust for power, but there is also the great appeal for Wii's novelties that makes it overwhelm its competitors.

So, to succeed, MS needs a lot of things:

1) Greater HW quality

2) Creating its own original and appealing style (this is difficult, they cannot be teached style, either you are born with it or you aren't and even if one must admit that Gates and Ballmer have their own peculiar style, we can't really say it'very appealing )

3) Doing something new (in fields different from sheer style), like Nintendo did: this can be done by good and creative designers and engineers. So they must not recycle those who did Zune, but fire them OTOH the first ad campaign (the "life is short" one) for XBox 1 was original and (black) humourous, they shouldn't have given in to priggish and squeamish people and drop it.

4) Losing their monopolies: people won't be scared anymore and they won't hate MS anymore   

5) Showing and demostrating less lust for power and more fair play: same reasons and consequences as above.

its very well saying that MS have game x, xx, xxx all coming out that will be great games, but that hasn't helped them much in the past, or now. The expensive PS3 is selling well with virtually no games at all, while the 360 has lots and is the cheapest machine on the market (in the UK at least). If it was purely down to price and quality of games the 360 would have a massive lead over its competitors.

I'm sure when MGS, FF whatever, LBP, Home and whatever else is due is released sales will see a significant increase, NOT a blip in sales which we have seen with the majority of major events in the 360's history.

MGS4 will sell machines to new customers (me being one of them), GoW2 will sell to the same people that already own a 360 for GoW1.

MS need to break away from the over saturated 'dude' market they have spent the last 5 years targeting and provide more than crappy cartoon licences for everyone else that has an interest in gaming.

Offering PC games on console is a good idea for a while, but I am currently playing Orangebox, COD4, Bioshock and GoW on my 2 year old PC, which can be built reasonably cheaply now and anyone with a PC already can upgrade very cheaply.
As a fps fan, these 4 games would be the 4 main reasons to buy the machine.

As a cheap way to get high end PC games, the 360 is too old to be an advantage for that, especially as the majority of those games play better on a mouse/kb (at least in my opinion).

 Sure, they still own the IP's, but you need a top of the range studio to develop the game. And MS needs AAA devs to make them exclusive games. If they don't get developers on Halo 4 and Mass Effect 2 NOW, then they can forget about releasing them in the Christmas '09 period.

And yes, Gears of War 2 is a big gun.

But Ninja Gaiden 2 and Fable didn't shift many units.

Banjo 3: Rare hasn't made a realy good game since its N64 days (the old Rare guys all work at Free Radical Design now, and are making Haze)

And seriously, if you have to use names like Tales of Vesperia and Too Human to prove  you got a good end-of-year line up,  you ARE in trouble.