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[Tookay]

MS is known to "miss" every now and then but they aren't idiots.

They're not idiots; I'm sure they've balanced the temporary backlash they'll face with the possible future gains if they're successful and decided, ultimately, that being less consumer-friendly netted them something in the long-run.

We'll see if that pans out.

 

[CouldBeWorse]

Man, I hope not. As much as I like seeing Sony get their act together, if Nintendo and MS both flop hard, Sony will inevitably go back to the arrogant assholes they became in the past. I always welcome competition to keep things even. The competition from the 360 is the only reason the PS3 became as great as it did IMO.

Very true. I'm not sure why so many people almost seem to be celebrating the failure of Wii U and leaked negativity of Durango.

Competition improves the industry for all of us.

 

[spwolf]

He also reported on ms working on a 7 inch gaming tablet and says this leaked doc is accurate:

May 21 will be interesting indeed.

whoever thinks anyone will put 2.5" HDD into an tablet is not credible at all. Let alone SCSI 10K drive.

Might be the stupidest thing I have seen this year.

 

[hydrophilic attack]

WHAT?? SOUTH AFRICA? --- AFRICA
BRAZIL --- SOUTH AMERICA

Isn't Africa part of Europe??

Did someone up above just Call Australia part of Europe????

Do you mean Austria???

Australia is a continent unto itself. You know the place Crocodille Dundee and Yahoo Serious comes from...

Wow...

Well, they have kangaroos and elephants and stuff.

Definitely sounds like Europe to me?

 

[Lyriell]

Did someone up above just Call Australia part of Europe????

Do you mean Austria???

Australia is a continent unto itself. You know the place Crocodille Dundee and Yahoo Serious comes from...

Wow...

 

[ThoughtsOfSpeaking]

employees got a gentle internal reminder after those comments that details of the next console must remain confidential. If those details weren't accurate, Microsoft wouldn't have gone to the effort of releasing a statement and reminding employees internally. It's just a question of how the always online feature works.

If this is true this, the strongest piece of evidence shown so far. so strong I feel it should be put in the OP.

 

[Jea Song]

I now have no interest in xbox if these rumors turn out true.

The stupidity of having to be connected online to even launch a game.

I always have Internet. I don't plan to not have Internet anytime soon. But what if it does go out? I can't play my single player game either?

 

[BluePigGanon]

Aren't most of their hardware products failures? At least in comparison to the competition?

Sounds about right. Xbox 360 was the odd one.

How are we defining hardware being a "failure"? If you mean by sales, sure. If you mean the quality of the hardware itself, then I dunno about that - I think the Surface is pretty neat. And the Xbox didn't finish first but it was still great hardware.

I feel like if all the rumors are true, this will be the first time MS puts out a really clunky product with unappealing features and services.

 

[enzo_gt]

whoever thinks anyone will put 2.5" HDD into an tablet is not credible at all. Let alone SCSI 10K drive.

Might be the stupidest thing I have seen this year.

Wow, I didn't even see that :lol

 

[creamhackered]

whoever thinks anyone will put 2.5" HDD into an tablet is not credible at all. Let alone SCSI 10K drive.

Might be the stupidest thing I have seen this year.

Should have gone to specsavers. Read over the document properly. There's a tablet device and then a base unit.

 

[sunnz]

Very true. I'm not sure why so many people almost seem to be celebrating the failure of Wii U and leaked negativity of Durango.

Competition improves the industry for all of us.

That is true and why I don't want/hope the ps4/durango stay close in terms of sales, last thing we need is companies ripping us of.

BUT, if some of this is true, like always online, continue to make XBL a ripoff, no used games ( and if SONY are the opposite) then honestly I would want MS to fail, to teach them a lesson/sho that consumers dont give int BS features like these ( same applies if it was the other way around and SONY pursued always online etc)

 

[Colonel Nasty]

The biggest problems with surface, w8 and wp8 is third party support. This isn't a problem for xbox.

 

[kittens]

Did someone up above just Call Australia part of Europe????

Do you mean Austria???

Australia is a continent unto itself. You know the place Crocodille Dundee and Yahoo Serious comes from...

Wow...

No, you're thinking of Luxembourg.

 

[MYE]

So the Wii U and 3DS are the only next gen systems with BC?

 

[FordGTGuy]

Windows 8?

Windows 8 was a deliberate move and not out of idiocy.

 

[pswii60]

MS aren't idiots? Have you missed almost every new initiative in the last decade? 500 million down the drain on Kin alone is enough

The Xbox division has been commercially smart in recent years, as shown by the NPD results over the last two years. GAF might not like Mattrick, but he understands business. He's doing to Xbox what he did to EA. It'll be mainstream and profitable and have lots of haters.

 

[Tookay]

Very true. I'm not sure why so many people almost seem to be celebrating the failure of Wii U and leaked negativity of Durango.

Competition improves the industry for all of us.

The point of competition is that we get a better product, not make everybody a winner through form of video game affirmative action.

If companies fail to deliver a better product, you reward the one that does.

Nobody's cheering bad news about MS; it's bad for the industry that one of the big three is turning out this way. But that doesn't mean that we should take it either, especially if accepting it leads to bad precedents.

 

[CLEEK]

Windows 8?

Off the top of my head:

WebTV
MSN Music Store
Windows Mobile (all versions)
Microsoft Kin
Tablet PC
Windows ME
Windows Vista
Windows 8

MS have a history of bad/failed products. Just like they have a history of hugely successful ones.

 

[Justzisguyukno]

Man, average consumer will probably see that $300 price point and eat it up...

It also can't be good for M$/Sony to release at practically the same damn time either.

 

[Lyriell]

No, you're thinking of Luxembourg.

My mistake. I didn't realize it was on the Venezuelan border.

 

[Anton668]

wah? are you on flaky dsl or something? most people on cable internet should have 99.99~% uptime unless there's something wrong with your local node

Hell, im on cable and unfortunately I live in a rural area(less that 6000 pop). and of that rural area, it seems im in the worst part of it, as it seems the company does not want to spend any money to upgrade the infrastructure. they regularly shut net off in the eves to run "tests" and any sign of bad weather means my net may go out.

I swear this company is so fucking cheap they must go around to other companys yard sales to pick up "new" equipment!

 

[RavenH2]

The most recent rumor is that the always online requirement is an OS level feature and that the console will not function after three minutes without an internet connection.

Yeah I read that, but I've read a lot of "our sources tells us" from many sites, that don't always seem accurate...

The OS level can always be connected a la Windows 8, but games? Not so sure...
I've also read somewhere that they are planning it as an entretainment hub... and somewhere in this thread someone mentioned the possibility of online game rentals through the console...

So, I'm kinda torn on this one...

 

[KAL2006]

Very true. I'm not sure why so many people almost seem to be celebrating the failure of Wii U and leaked negativity of Durango.

Competition improves the industry for all of us.

True I agree 360 helped Sony sort out their OS and online infrastructure. And being more developer friendly with third parties and indies. However I think we are at a point where we have hit a ceiling and there isn't much I can think of that we can improve. PS4 vision press conference hit everything bang on with social features, better faster OS and etc. I wouldn't mind if PS4 had a monopoly, it would make third parties focus on the system more, kind of like PS1 and PS2 where they were the clear winners of their gen with tons of third party support.

 

[U n i o n 0015]

Sony is going to kill it next-generation. MS is already fighting negative public reception and they haven't even revealed their console. I've seen that before (Saturn before PlayStation, Dreamcast before PS2) and it's never worked out.

 

[J-Rzez]

Of course you need to be online all the time. How else will MS take care of DRM, used games, and especially pump more ads than ever? That's one of my biggest suspicions, ads. They'll throw them in there more than ever to help subsidize their contracts. And these ads will probably be more intrusive than ever. And ppl thought ads were bad now?

Just wait until " while your system is booting up and connecting, enjoy these ads"..

 

[Whiteshirt]

How are we defining hardware being a "failure"? If you mean by sales, sure. If you mean the quality of the hardware itself, then I dunno about that - I think the Surface is pretty neat. And the Xbox didn't finish first but it was still great hardware.

I feel like if all the rumors are true, this will be the first time MS puts out a really clunky product with unappealing features and services.

We define failure by gaining no ground and losing money. Most of their efforts have been horrible. Xbox is pretty much their only real success and I believe none of the old guard are still around with the original vision since Ballmer pushed them all out.

 

[Ding-Ding]

How would that work for publishers though? Customers pay MS a sub fee to access all these games, what's in it for the publishers? When they could be making around $50 per new release at retail.

Honestly, I have no idea. I'd image though that MS may try to copy the PS+ model but I dont know how Sony deals with the publishers for that.

However, I just dont know how a PS+ model will start of next gen. 3rd parties only tend to release games on it which are already past their sales peak.

Also, I am not sure of the breakdown but the last I heard, from along time ago (PSOne era) the take of retail games was something like 10% console manufacturer, 15% developer, 25% publisher with the rest split between retailers, distributers etc

Its probably a hell of alot different now.

 

[travisbickle]

So what do you get for the $200 difference on the premium product?

You're not tied into a subscription to Xbox live?

Ok, sounds like a deal.

 

[teiresias]

I suspect the dev units have this 3 minute restriction in place, but that doesn't mean retail units do. I don't know either way.

I've never understood this "maybe it's just the Dev units that disconnect after three minutes" rationale as if that's any better.

Dev comes in to work and told to go home because no work on the 720 version of their game can be done since the office network is down.

 

[CouldBeWorse]

That is true and why I don't want/hope the ps4/durango stay close in terms of sales, last thing we need is companies ripping us of.

BUT, if some of this is true, like always online, continue to make XBL a ripoff, no used games ( and if SONY are the opposite) then honestly I would want MS to fail, to teach them a lesson/sho that consumers dont give int BS features like these ( same applies if it was the other way around and SONY pursued always online etc)

The market will decide. It always does.

 

[AniHawk]

i think microsoft would be wiser than that. $499.99 is essentially guaranteeing a wii u-like start in the market, except with fewer sales in japan. unfortunately, $399.99 is the expected price theses days, and i think microsoft should hit that number. the same is true of sony.

however, if microsoft has to launch the new xbox at $500, then i can't see the ps4 coming in much cheaper.

 

[KAL2006]

Man, average consumer will probably see that $300 price point and eat it up...

It also can't be good for M$/Sony to release at practically the same damn time either.

Sony can easily undercut Durango. If Durango only functions with Kinect, Sony can sell PS4 without PSEye as well as subsidise it with PSN+.

 

[pswii60]

whoever thinks anyone will put 2.5" HDD into an tablet is not credible at all. Let alone SCSI 10K drive.

Might be the stupidest thing I have seen this year.

The stupidest thing I've seen this year is you not actually reading the document you quoted. Note 'Stationary Computing Device'.

 

[RavenH2]

Isn't Africa part of Europe??



Well, they have kangaroos and elephants and stuff.

Definitely sounds like Europe to me?

Please, tell me you are kidding...

Five Major continents:

AMERICA (NORTH, CENTRAL AND SOUTH)
AFRICA
EUROPE
ASIA
OCEANIA (STILL UP TO DEBATE BY SOME)

 

[Tookay]

Yeah I read that, but I've read a lot of "our sources tells us" from many sites, that don't always seem accurate...

Besides, a somewhat strange strategy to protect your DevKits after de DAE incident would be to require them to be connected to a MS network...

The OS level can always be connected a la Windows 8, but games? Not so sure...
I've also read somewhere that they are planning it as an entretainment hub... and somewhere in this thread someone mentioned the possibility of online game rentals through the console...

So, I'm kinda torn on this one...

Do you seriously think devs would be confusing an integral aspect of the main philosophy of the console for a a devkit limitation?

 

[Orayn]

Sony is going to kill it next-generation. MS is already fighting negative public reception and they haven't even revealed their console. I've seen that before (Saturn before PlayStation, Dreamcast before PS2) and it's never worked out.

From the likes of GAF and Reddit. The vast majority of Xbox owners haven't heard any of the FUD, or perhaps know that some guy was a jerk on Twitter.

 

[Impeccable]

I can't wait either way though. I just want to know what always-on entails.

If it's not as bad as we hoped then "everyone" will have to "eat crow" even though most of us will just not care and be happy the worst didn't happen.

And if the worst happens and it's as bad as Kotaku's rumour then we're all fucked.

 

[super-heated plasma]

I wonder if they pushed back the reveal to May because of the whole Adam Orth debacle.

 

[ThoughtsOfSpeaking]

This is a crazy thought, but what if the plan is that Durango has an HDMI input to control this new $99 Xbox 360 and that is how you can have backwards compatibility on the new console. Basically the new console can take control of either your old Xbox 360 or say your cable box. If it takes control of your cable box the new Xbox can stream the content to any SmartGlass device in your home (iPad, Android, Windows 8). Microsoft did hire the creator of the Slingbox, Blake Krikorian, and give him a lead position on the Xbox team.

*squints*

hmm.......


that's a very bizarre suggestion to think up on your own.

 

[Rad-]

Please, tell me you are kidding...

Five Major continents:

AMERICA (NORTH, CENTRAL AND SOUTH)
AFRICA
EUROPE
ASIA
OCEANIA (STILL UP TO DEBATE BY SOME)

lol

 

[Kimawolf]

What I've heard is that Sony is targeting $300-$400. And as such, that camera they spent a whole bunch of time showing off, isn't in the box anymore.


I think microsoft, with a kinect in the box, needs to be $400. Maybe like $429.99 or something. That is... if Sony hits their goal. But that's also why I'm skeptical of price talk yet, because from what I understand about the PS4 they have targets they are going for but even at this stage they can't exactly project a price.

Yeah no way Sony gets to 300. I'm guessing the price will the only downer. another 499 system with PS3 selling for 199 as there cheap option. and I can believe it, MS believes what they have to offer with Kinect and all the online media stuff will be worth it.

 

[dragonelite]

? It was a try at the tablet market. They gave it a shot, it failed but it was hardly idiotic.

Microsofts problem with hardware is they are always the ones bringing out good enough hardware way to late like they run behind one or two hardware iterations in the specwars.

Surface was good enough when it was announced but when it released 1080p and high res tablets were on the rise.

Microsoft is to reactionary if you ask me and not the one going into the unknown like apple did with the iphone and tablets. Every other company could do it but didn't. Uugh feels dirty now praising apple for it

 

[Rösti]

I wonder if they pushed back the reveal to May because of the whole Adam Orth debacle.

That "rumor" came earlier than Adam Orth's infamous tweets: http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=531252

 

[CLEEK]

Please, tell me you are kidding...

Five Major continents:

AMERICA (NORTH, CENTRAL AND SOUTH)
AFRICA
EUROPE
ASIA
OCEANIA (STILL UP TO DEBATE BY SOME)

Pro-tip: before you try and school someone in geography, read a book or something.

Unless you're from some backward, god forsake country that groups Asia and Europe into one, there are seven continents. Asia, Africa, North America, South America, Antarctica, Europe, and Australia.

So the guy was right. South Africa is part of Europe.

 

[U n i o n 0015]

From the likes of GAF and Reddit. The vast majority of Xbox owners haven't heard any of the FUD, or perhaps know that some guy was a jerk on Twitter.

A good point, but early adopters are who sell the system to the masses. It's not looking good that the our sentiment is so negative with no official reveal yet.

 

[Vyrance]

Please, tell me you are kidding...

Five Major continents:

AMERICA (NORTH, CENTRAL AND SOUTH)
AFRICA
EUROPE
ASIA
OCEANIA (STILL UP TO DEBATE BY SOME)

Wrong.

USA
Rest of Americas
Europe (includes Africa/Australia)
Asia
New Zealand

On topic: I've never been much for the Xbox, but I have a hard time believing they'd go for an Internet-required system. Just seems odd.

 

[Uno Venova]

From the likes of GAF and Reddit. The vast majority of Xbox owners haven't heard any of the FUD, or perhaps know that some guy was a jerk on Twitter.

With how far reaching the story was, early adapters probably do know.

 

[hydrophilic attack]

Wrong.

USA
Rest of Americas
Europe (includes Africa/Australia)
Asia
New Zealand

Yeah this is what my mama told me

 

[Orayn]

A good point, but early adopters are who sell the system to the masses. It's not looking good that the our sentiment is so negative with no official reveal yet.

A good portion of internet sentiment is always negative, that's a given. When the majority is positive, it doesn't necessarily translate into real world success. (Remember the Vita at E3 2011?)

With how far reaching the story was, early adapters probably do know.

Possible. I'm still not convinced that this will make a big difference in the long run.

 

[shinra-bansho]

How reliable is Thurrott generally?

Because I can't see how this happens unless Kinect 2.0 is prohibitively expensive.

Also, why does no one seem to know any basic geography.