Comment by georgemcbay | Hacker News Reader

Comment by georgemcbay | Hacker News Reader

These are basically random thoughts spurred by the points the article makes as opposed to direct statements about the content of the article...

Microsoft always intended to use games as a stepping stone to becoming a broader entertainment play. They were talking about this publicly as far back as the Xbox 1 (the former Xbox 1, now known as the Xbox 1 that isn't the Xbox One) in the 2001 time frame.

I'm fine with that strategy and even encourage it, but as a gamer I'm distraught with other decisions they seem to have made (it is impossible to tell what decisions they've actually made from rumors or misreporting because they are failing on the PR/messaging for specifics of the Xbox One on a spectacularly epic scale currently).

In the long run, the Xbox 360 is kind of the odd duck of the Xbox line in terms of hardware architecture considering the old Xbox 1 was x86 based and basically a closed PC, just like the new Xbox One. Of course, the 360 happened to occur over the time period that Live proved that a full online experience for a console should be considered an essential component. (I just wish they'd stop raising the cost of Live while also increasing the amounts of ads it throws at you (without raising the value to suit), and stop charging for things that are free elsewhere (eg. Netflix, etc), and start using some of the mountains of money they earn from Live to provide dedicated gaming servers, etc).

The Wii U is actually a pretty nice device. I have one. I'll buy pretty much any system Nintendo puts out just to play their first party games, at least until they're forced to go the route that Sega did. But anyway, the remote touchscreen gamepad "second screen" thing is pretty cool I love using it for Hulu, Netflix and Amazon Instant. Being able to redirect the video play to the gamepad device's screen when the TV is otherwise in use is really nice, and it really makes things like searching a breeze compared to using a more traditional remote. Yes, you can achieve the same basic sorts of things with other consoles plus an external device like a tablet via things like SmartGlass, but with the Wii U it Just Works without having to dick around with anything.

Nintendo's success has always been driven by games, not hardware. While much of the punditry surrounding the U has legitimacy, it's failing mostly due to a lack of compelling first-party titles.

There was never a chance that the U would sell in the same numbers as the first Wii; the "non-gamer gamer" moment has come and gone. But if it had launched with a new Zelda, a new (real) Mario, Mario Party, Mario Kart, Smash Bros. (the list goes on), they'd be selling moderately well, with the game revenue as the cherry on top. Hopefully it won't be too late by the time those titles trickle onto the platform over the next year or two.

The non-gamer gamer moment didn't pass. It moved from consoles to smart phones, tablets and Facebook / online gaming (which had a mere 10 million users at the time of the Wii's release).

The non-gamer gamer market is bigger than ever before, and will continue to expand.

Yes, this is what I meant; it's not that the market disappeared, it's that they moved on from the couch+TV setup.

all of nintendo power WAS in games. for a long time now, it's on TV series and Mangas/movies adaptations.

If it wasn't for pokemon and such titles, they would be long gone.

They tried the same model in the west trying to license every movie game, but it never caught on. You still can see them trying with a few disney titles.

anyway, i'd say the ONLY thing killing nintendo is their closed grasp of their developer program. If they were more open, they would have lots and lots of great innovative titles for the wiiU launch, and people would actually know the wiiU is a console, and not another weird controller such as the balance board thingy.

When the original xbox (no gamer call it xbox 1, at least before the current xbox one) was launching, microsoft released the development framework to everyone and their mother! heck i even was invited by a group that was going to show microsoft some game ideas and get $100k scot free! Think they ended up launching a minor puzzle game (their FPS idea was rejected, obviously)

Nintendo thinks it won the last round and developed the Wii U in a vacuum, expecting success only to find out the world had moved on.

Sony thinks it was robbed of victory (or at least it's usual dominance) by MS in the last round and is eager for a straight up rematch.

MS has all the momentum so at least they can pretend they won the last round and seem primarily worried about competition from other entrants (mainly Apple, Google and Samsung).

Yes, this is certainly the popular wisdom, but the numbers substantially disagree. Nintendo did win, at least numerically. It didn't win by PS2 margins, but it won. Microsoft does not have the momentum; they narrowly edge out the PS3 overall, and that's down from the clear dominance they started this generation with. (Yes, even allowing for the PS3's later start.)

(If you don't personally like the Wii, hey, great. Neither did I, really. But it did win on most objective measures. Even the much-ballyhooed "attach rate" seems to be have been only slightly worse than the XBox360 & PS3, certainly not enough to make up for anything.)

Microsoft is currently a narrow 2nd out of 3, in imminent danger of becoming 3rd of 3 in a year or two (in a parallel world with no new consoles), but common wisdom would seem to have them outselling everybody by 4 to 1 or something, which isn't even close. At least when Sony acted like masters of the universe with the PS3, they actually were the masters of the universe. Microsoft's attitude has me very confused.

I can't find anything concrete, but I think it's fair to say that the attach rates for the 360 and PS3 are similar, and as you say, Microsoft is only narrowly 2nd out of 3rd in terms of consoles sold.

I think a case can be made for the 360 being more valuable than the PS3, though, just because of the online service offered by Microsoft. They had at least 20 million users paying for gold in January of 2012, which comes to around a billion dollars a year for Microsoft. Who knows what the operating costs are, but I'm sure they're doing well, especially considering that they show advertisements on top of the subscription revenue.

I can't find any numbers for PS+, but I'd be shocked if it's anything comparable to what Microsoft has going.

A new (real) Mario?

Are you serious? Do you mean a 2D Mario with actual effort put into it? Because that's Nintendo's biggest series in the ones you listed. Also, all of those games were available on the Gamecube (excepting 2D Mario), and Wii U is basically selling at Gamecube levels. I think it's important to note that the philosophy Nintendo has with the Wii U is more their Gamecube philosophy than Wii philosophy. Look at what Iwata had to say during the respective console cycles. I agree that it's the games, but more specifically it's their lack of interest in focusing on the games that sell systems (hence their horrible treatment of 2D Mario).

I'm inclined to believe that after three years of the Wii being sold out in stores, Nintendo went straight back to the strategies that led to the abysmal sales of the Gamecube. This led to significantly lower sales for the rest of the Wii's life and led to Gamecube-level sales for its successor, the Wii U.

Anyone who describes GameCube as a failure without saying the same of the Xbox is either being intentionally dishonest or smoking crack. The GameCube wildly, wildly successful like the PlayStation 2, but it sold something like 22 million units versus 24 million for the original Xbox; critically, I’m pretty sure Nintendo at least made money on it, versus Microsoft apparently still showing a loss for the Xbox division overall, over a decade after the first Xbox was released: http://www.vg247.com/2013/01/07/xbox-360-and-ps3-losses-tota...

Can you imagine what pundits would say if Apple released a new product that didn’t immediately make money hand over fist, let alone pissed away this much money over more than a decade? Sales are emphatically not what matters here.

I have no idea what you’re talking about when you say Nintendo’s returning to the “Gamecube philosophy” with the Wii U. The GameCube was a relatively powerful (more powerful than the wildly successful PS2, and pretty close to the Xbox) system that had a pretty standard controller, used (mini) optical discs, which was a first for Nintendo. It didn’t fail miserably like the Xbox and Xbox 360 have (the Xbox 360 hardware having had a special problem with failure), unless we’re still smoking crack, but it also didn’t sell 100 million units like the Wii or PlayStation 2. The Wii was not very powerful for the time, but had a unique controller and otherwise appealed to casual gaming, and has now sold about 100 million units. Nintendo has undeniably won this generation in the marketplace, even if the Wii doesn’t appeal to hardcore gamers with inflated perceptions of self-importance. There’s actually kind of a pattern: the most powerful system never sells the most units (e.g., Wii vs PS3/Xbox 360, PS2 vs. GameCube/Xbox, PlayStation vs. N64, SNES vs. Genesis I think), so while this seems like a risky strategy, it probably isn’t really.

I think the Wii U exactly continues the “Wii philosophy”. The problems Nintendo is having so far with Wii U sales probably stem from a combination of poor marketing, to the point where people don’t even realize it’s a new system because Nintendo has gone too far trying to tie it to the Wii brand, and a lack of titles for their loyal audience who buys Nintendo’s systems to play Nintendo’s games. I own a Wii U and not a 3DS, but it seems like the 3DS is getting a lot more first-party titles than the Wii U has so far. Once Nintendo starts getting out stuff like Pikmin 3, a new Super Smash Bros. game, a new Mario Kart game, an HD Zelda game, a hardcore 3D Pokémon adventure, game or whatever, I think the system will start looking a lot more attractive. It’s kind of too bad they just released a Luigi’s Mansion sequel, a Paper Mario title, and an Ocarina of Time remake for the 3DS because they probably could’ve used some of that for the Wii U.

I prefer Siracusa's original article. It's wider-spanning, less dismissive, and a perspective that is informed by tech, hardcore gaming, and gamers' Nintendo sentimentality.

the former Xbox 1, now known as the Xbox 1 that isn't the Xbox One

Huh?

Ok, I know I'm out of touch with console gaming ... but ... Huh?

He's just making a joke about the naming of the Xbox consoles. What would you call the original Xbox (that came out in 2001)? Some might have called it the Xbox 1. But now Microsoft decided to call the new console the "Xbox One." So, what's the proper name of the Xbox that came out in 2001?

>So, what's the proper name of the Xbox that came out in 2001?

I'd say Xbox, as no other console is named the Xbox except for the one that came out in 2001.

Great, have fun going around saying "Xbox" and having almost everyone assume you mean the current model, the 360.

Of all the crazy hills to die on in console fandom, this has to be one of the most bizarre.

Exactly!

But to clarify:

In 2001, Microsoft released a game console known as the "Xbox".

In 2005, Microsoft released a follow-up game console known as the "Xbox 360". To differentiate the original "Xbox" from the "Xbox 360", it was common for console gamers to call the first "Xbox" the "Xbox 1". As in, "Remember playing Halo LAN on the Xbox 1? Good times!". "Xbox" alone generally meant you were talking about the current "Xbox", the "Xbox 360". Adding the "1" made things clear that you were talking about the original.

In 2013, Microsoft revealed (but hasn't yet released) another follow-up game console known as the "Xbox One".

Neither me nor any gaming folk I know have ever called the original Xbox, "Xbox 1". Everyone just calls it the "original Xbox".

Funny how language evolves in microcosms. In my circle of friends it's the Xbox 1, and the original PlayStation is the PS1. "Original Xbox" sounds a little unwieldy to my ear.

We do say PS1. And just "xbox" means the 360 now. I guess for us, PS1 made sense, since its 1, 2, 3, where the xbox doesn't follow any numerical order. Plus, the mini-version of the PS1 released after the PS2 came out was actually called the PSone by Sony themselves. I still have one, plus the screen accessory you could dock it into[1]. Add in a cigarette lighter adapter, and it was great for long car trips.

[1] This shows the PSone and the screen http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/64/PSone.jpg

FWIW I think "Xbox One" is a really dumb name. I would have liked "Infinity", "720", "3", "-NG", "Mark III", etc way more. Calling it "Xbox One" reminds me of Pandora One and RealOne Player :)

It seems like an oddly -aughties convention for something coming out in 2013. Even Apple just stuck with numbers and a simple designation for the iPhone line, though they did something similar to MS with "The New iPad" groan

First came the Xbox, then the Xbox 360, and the last Xbox is called the Xbox One. Hence the confusion. :P

The 360 was a completely reasonable step for the series--at the time, recall, there weren't really many x86 chips at the price/performance/power spot that was needed for a gaming rig.

Microsoft went to IBM and shopped around for cores, and got a bastard chip spinoff of the Cell PPEs--one with six logical threads of execution and a fairly normal programming model. This gave good vector performance and had many threads--at launch, there weren't cheap x86 chips that could do that.

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