Alot of the talk in the recent weeks about Microsoft's still codenamed Project Natal is that it will be priced high. So high that most people that have been following the developments of the motion control wars over the past six months or so, think that this peripheral will fail at such a high price point. But with the talks of an Xbox 360 slim in the works, and a Project Natal bundle all but imminent if the slim is announced, is it all that hard to imagine Microsoft pricing the Natal at a point which makes gamers ponder whether purchasing the unit standalone is worth it? Why not take the opportunity to up sell the consumer to a redesigned Xbox 360, an expanded HDD, and a motion controller. It's not that hard to imagine and heres why.
Xbox boss Asha Sharma has discussed how component shortages will impact the company's plans for Project Helix.
This kind of proves this is an after thought product, most products like this are in r&d 5 years before they start mass producing. So they typically have the cost of components and things worked out long before assembly starts.
This is an assumption still, but I wouldn’t be surprised if project helix is similar to Scalebound,perfect dark and sod3. They had an idea but no actual execution other than concept stage. Being impacted by the ram shortage likely would also put this device 3-4 years out.
I’m not even sure MS has that endurance with Xbox yet
I mean.... what?
We're at a point that Samsung wont even provide their own phone department ram because they can sell it at higher prices to 3rd parties (AI). Its more profitable to sell the ram than make their own devices with it.
You think because R&D starts 5 years ago the 3rd party component manufacturers will honour that price? They'll sell it to whomever is paying the most today, not some gentlemens agreement they made years ago. AI farms will buy more volume at higher prices than any console manufacturer will. It'll be the same for Playstation.
Helix is going to be stupidly expensive
Instead of leaning into smarter upscaling techniques they're brute forcing hardware that will cost them dearly and it remains to be seen if it's genuinely going to provide a meaningful differential
I know in the oc.doace people like to brag about not using frame gen or dlss to get to high on a game but for the majority of players they happily use those technologies without a second thought
That's going to be ps6 vs Helix
It's called systematic inflationary. Yes we get it Microsoft, keep raising in the name ofall kinds of stuffs
Honestly if there was thing I learned from this generation is that new consoles arnt day one anymore.
I can wait 1-3 years.
Another important lesson from this generation: while Nintendo showed us that prices don't necessarily need to ever drop, we've now learned that waiting 1-3 years does carry some risk that prices increase. This generation is just bizarre in all the wrong ways.
In an exclusive interview with Game File, new(ish) Xbox boss Asha Sharma and Xbox chief content officer Matt Booty explain their vision for Microsoft’s gaming division
A good start would be to release games to go with the console. My Xbox Series X has gathered dust virtually from launch. My advice would be to ditch a next console and release games on PC, PlayStation and Switch. Another idea would be a hybrid console based on Xbox Series X tech and go the same route as Nintendo. Another idea would be to pull out of gaming altogether. Plenty of options there.
Starting today, Game Pass Ultimate drops from $29.99 to $22.99 a month. PC Game Pass will also drop from $16.49 to $13.99 a month. Prices may vary by region.
Beginning this year, future Call of Duty titles won’t join Game Pass Ultimate or PC Game Pass at launch. New Call of Duty games will be added to Game Pass Ultimate and PC Game Pass during the following holiday season (about a year later), while existing Call of Duty titles already in the library will continue to be available.
Its nice there is some kind of drop... but is that all they really value CoD to be, a lousy $7 a month?
I was hoping it would drop by $10.
That $7 equates to $84 per year - which is more than COD new ($69.99 + tax).
So - you can get the exact same thing - and save a few bucks - or you can skip COD and pocket the savings or use toward another game - or games if on sale.
That’s how I’m taking it - and is enough for me to sign back up after canceling the day it went to $29.99.
It's unlikely that COD is going to be the only title they stop offering day one, but we'll see how they play their hand.
Including Call of Duty in Game Pass is just leaving money on the table. When the Elder Scrolls VI releases hopefully Microsoft doesn’t launch it into Game Pass. Then it can make more profits and use it give more value to Xbox console owners!
Can’t wait to hear how this will be spun extremely positive. 🤣
I wonder why knowing Microsoft thick head something must has happened in the background in the levels of Xbox one and Kinect 🤷🏿
Any price cut is a good thing in this day and age, but it also reveals a flaw in GamePass' design that we've all been calling out for years... it's unsustainable, especially with day and date releases on new games. COD won't be the only game they exclude, they're setting a precedent with it that they'll likely expand upon in the future.
At least they're being realistic about it now. I bet in the future we're going to start seeing them try to subsidize the high price of new consoles by making you buy 2-3 years of gamepass with it to get the console cheaper. I'm still not sure that'll be enough to save either the hardware or gamepass, but we'll see.
price cuts are good, the removal of Call of Duty is clearly something they are planning to leverage. But considering everyone around N4G claims Call of Duty sucks, it's not a big loss now is it?
Well, they're removing their biggest game from being Day 1 on the service so GamePass users can buy it instead. That's the intention.
They increased the price to $30, then removed COD and dropped it to still be above the old price.
It's an understandable compromise but the consumer Ultimately is getting less.
Think the calculation is that *most* COD users don't play that many games and aren't interested in GamePass. The GamePass users who do like COD would just buy it anyway. MS reportedly lost out a lot of money last year putting COD on GamePass.
Well Call of duty could just be the beginning. What other games can they trim from the service to get the price down? How long before it's just the Xbox core first party studio games and not the one to everquired?
Create an interesting scenario with Call of duty as well. Will people wait a year to play it? Does that split the fan base? Will it hurt to Call of duty more than a benefits Game pass? These are all legitimate questions which we will find the answers to in the coming years
And I don't consider my post negative spin just realistic observation. At the very least this backtracking can be seen as an admittance that the previous strategy of gamepass was not sustainable as most of us said.
I'd get rid of the EA and Ubisoft+ too. That should bring the price down more. The only game from either of those parts of the service i played was jedi Fallen order / survivor. both of which i also bought on disc so it was more of a convenience i didnt have to put the disc in to play when i was playing them via remote play. And really that is why i still use GPU and PS+. its the convenience of having the games ready to play from a remote location. I havent picked up my consoles controllers in at least a few years. I guess that makes me a bad gamer, but so what. i'm still playing the games, just not physically on the machines themselves. GCloud and Portal are my go to now.
They’ll say no one is buying game pass so they had to drop the price , even though it’s been extremely profitable.
Why remove CoD if it's *extremely* profitable then? Why even increase it to begin with?
Always funny seeing those that defended the price hike go "how you gonna spin this now!" after the price drops.
You should be thanking those that called it out. Obviously this is a good thing especially with everything increasing nowadays.
Also, what happened to the reason why that the Activision acquisition was good for gaming was that CoD would be day one on GamePass? Another backtrack on that I guess...
What removing CoD on GamePass shows, is that it's not sustainable for for the more popular and/or bigger budget games because of the sales you lose out on like people have been saying since inception. It never made sense to put CoD on there unless you thought it's popularity would draw in a lot of subscribers which it obviously didn't. And if it was as sustainable as people claim they wouldn't have increased the price while putting it on there in the first place.
In my region, it’s still more expensive than it was before the last price hike, but it’s a far more viable price point.
Losing Call of Duty from the service, honestly, has zero effect on me, and given they chose to make it so, it’s probably not the big seller they originally thought. Overall, it’s really good news, but I still think they have work to do on the tier structure, having Premium and PC at the same price point with different features feels odd.
Yep take COD out. Them waiting a year is interesting but it make sense. They don't want certain ppl waiting 4 to 6 months they want fomo and maximum sales. Wait a year while the new one releases.
Ok so far so good.
I still thinks it's gonna be under 100
I was not even aware people other than Pro Sony groupies took the high price rumor seriously. I'm willing to bet no one outside the pro Sony group believes the rumor nor do they assume Natal will fail because of the rumor. Stop with the camera being as expensive as the console itself BS hating. The only people talking about the "supposed" high price are the people using the price to try and shape popular opinion against Natal.
I have not heard any 360 fans or media talking about the rumor out side of places PS3 fanboys troll. The only media still making articles about the rumor are the ones trying to get hits or are hating on the tech.
I think product X will cost X amount and will fail! because I read it on the web as a rumor from a supposed inside source we can't name lol. Only PS3 fanboys.
The rumor pops up just after SDF started speculating on its price to tarnish Natal. LMAO
Nitrowolf says:
"there is no way of knowing the price
whether it will be high or low"
^^Yet Microsoft said they wan't to sell 5 million and tap into the casual market. Looks like PS3 fanboys are starting to retract from the price being very high for ((((SURE))))), now they are saying "there is no way of knowing" when they were the ones trying to push high price speculation and rumor as fact. LOL
We're a couple of days before E3 and ALL the focus is on Natal...and the thing doesnt even have a freaking name lol.
@below: a second after you posted you got a disagree, some crazy fool in here lol.
no chance it's gonna be under 100,project natal isn't cheap addon,and you will see that soon enough
If people pay $99 for a Balance Board I dont see why they wouldn't buy Natal for $150