Nice post Matt. I think people are discounting XBO too early (just because we love to hate ;-) ).
Right now the polling booths are about 4 to 1 in favor of the PS4 (meaning 80% of pollers say they would buy a PS4 over an XBOX One). By the time the holidays roll around, that poll will probably end up running where about 60% of people *say* they are going to buy PS4, but my gut says that the actual sales of PS4 to XBOX One consoles will be slightly in Microsoft's favor. I think people will *say* that they want to buy a PS4 in the polls on-line, only to change their minds when they actually go to the store to purchase the console.
The PS4 is $100 cheaper. So what? The industry tries to make way too many parallels to the PS3's high initial opening sticker price. The fact of the matter is, for whatever reason, people have "warmed up" to the idea of paying $400 or even $500 for a console. Way back in 2006 it was unheard of to pay $500 for a gaming console. Historical launch prices of consoles (no adjustment for inflation):
N64 - $199
Dreamcast - $199
Wii - $249
XBOX (original) - $299
PS (original) - $299
PS2 - $299
XBOX 360 - $299/
$399
PS3 -
$499/$599 OMG what??!
As you can see the PS3 was the highest price of a console with the exception of two consoles from the old era - sega saturn (total flop in the US) and hardly known systems 3D0 and Neo Geo (these systems are older than most of the people reading this post). Sony's initial price for the PS3 couldn't have been more ill-timed. Even though, in my opinion, the PS3 console was superior to the XBOX 360 console, $599 just simply scared the **** out of the market and that price was the single largest factor that secured XBOX360's domination in N. America in the 2000's.
Now here we are, PS4 is priced at $399 PLUS a $60 per year subscription for on-line play, XBOX360 is priced at $499 PLUS what I am assuming is subscription fee for on-line play. Microsoft is smart in that 1.) they are NOT offering any "Deluxe" packages at this time so as not to give us even worse sticker shock and 2.) this time around the console comes packed with kinect and a hell of a lot more tech for the dollar. Make no mistake, the $399/$499 console of today kicks the **** out of the $399/$499 console from a couple years ago.
As the year goes on this $100 price difference, at the checkout stand, is not going to make that big of a difference. People rack up credit card debt around the holidays and so what is another $100 for little Johnny's Christmas present?
Moving on to XBOX One's draconian digital rights management (DRM) system, connection requirement, etc. Microsoft is creating subtle ways that developers can make a little more money for their efforts. In turn I'm sure Microsoft is hoping there will be more exclusive content for the XBOX One system, in turn making it a better system and gaining more subscribers. Also, for the N. American market, XBOX 360 has had more popular games than PS3. I'm not saying PS3 games are bad, I'm just saying that out of 100 N. American gamers, 2/3 of those gamers prefer to play on XBOX 360 partly due to the exclusive content. Microsoft is banking that this will hold true once again for XBOX One. In fact they are betting the whole **** farm on the idea that exclusive content is going to make the difference. The only way to get developers to do exclusive for XBOX One is to dangle a carrot which in this case is very restrictive DRM which gives the developers additional possible revenue streams for their efforts.
At the end of the day this is more than likely going to come down to fanboy vs. fanboy. If you owned an XBOX360 console you'll probably own the XBOX One. If you owned a PS3 console you'll probably own a PS4. For crying out loud, XBOX 360 outsold PS3 even though XBOX 360 didn't even have a blu-ray drive! Heck, for all we know the whole reason XBOX One is $499 and PS4 is $399 is that Sony (who owns Blu-ray rights mind you) is "sticking it" to Microsoft by charging them a high price for the luxury of installing blu-ray players in the XBOX One consoles. Other than possibly the improved HD kinect (and the R&D money Microsoft wasted designing it) I don't see what could make the XBOX One cost another $100 more. Maybe it will accept 'cable cards' and turn your XBOX into a bonafide cable TV receiver? Anyway, the pricing isn't about the hardware, that cost is a "subsidized" cost as they say, none of you will ever know the true cost of these boxes especially when produced by the million.
And another thing. Anyone who actually believe that the XBO is not thinking about gamers should unsubscribe to whatever tech blogs they are reading. XBO does gaming any way you cut it. In conclusion, people are going to get over the price tag, and the strict Microsoft DRM, and Microsoft could still easily end up having the more popular console. Only time will tell and Microsoft's marketing team definitely has their hands full packaging the information in such a way to make the XBOX One only look subtly different when compared to the PS4. (And of course only subtly in a good way
)
FYI this may sound like a Pro-Microsoft rant; it is not, I've always rooted against Microsoft. I'm just writing a little prophecy here so that in 6 months when XBO and PS4 are neck-and-neck I can look back at my forums post and say "I told you so". Or even, take what I said, add what Matt said, and you've got a strong case that suggests Microsoft is actually go to win this next gen console war come Christmas.
