Well, I hope you ungrateful bastards are happy. We’re getting some peculiar commercials which Microsoft dumped a whole bunch of money into for free and now they’re canning it tomorrow because of you. You know who you are.
I hope you’re happy.
On the upside, the “I’m a PC” campaign has started. I’m a PC too.
Update: Here’s part four.
Peter Moore is quite the storied individual. He was the head of Sega of America and responsible for the Dreamcast’s launch. He was head of Microsoft’s Xbox division and now he’s the head of EA Sports division.
Well he had quite an interview with the Guardian’s Games Blog. The interview was so grand, it was split into three parts, here, here and here. However, let’s just grab the quotesthat made headlines (again):
Dreamcast was a phenomenal 18 months of pain, heartache, euphoria… We thought we had it, but then Playstation came out, that infamous issue of Newsweek with the Emotion Engine on the cover… and of course, EA didn’t publish which left a big hole, not only in sports but in other genres. We ended up that Christmas period not being able to get to where we needed to be – we weren’t far short, we just couldn’t get that critical mass…
Bless the Dreamcast and its short, but awesome life.
Part two of Jerry Seinfeld’s and Bill Gates’ adventures through unorthodox Windows marketting continues! It’s better than the last which to some isn’t saying much. I don’t mind it and I certainly don’t get worked up about it.
Remember the article which detailed the reasons why Xbox 360’s were dying? Well, one of the only people who let his name be publicized was fired by Microsoft. He violated terms of employment, but he did help shed light on the issues.
Now it’s him versus Microsoft’s lawyers and I doubt he has much ground to stand on.
Guess what Microsoft released? A mix of ten screenshots and art from one the most colorful games to be released this year. I never played a Banjo game, so hype is virtually non-existent. However, I do like what I see and I do appreciate the lower price point of $39.99 USD/CAD.
Shock and awe! A real price cut equates to a real sales boost? Microsoft is claiming up to 100% increase in sales across all Xbox 360 models.
Hopefully, this means a massive boost for Microsoft’s U.S. NPD numbers. Are these new comers? Or current users upgrading to newer models? Hmm…
Update: Looks like the rumor turned out to be true. Ensemble Studios will close after Halo Wars.
According to Shacknews, Age of Empires and Halo Wars developer, Ensemble Studios have laid off non-essential employees. Apparently, Microsoft is shutting the studio down.
Employees who’re involved with the development of Halo Wars are being given incentives for sticking around and finishing off the upcoming 2009 console RTS.
If this is true, I can’t find any reason why Microsoft would shutdown such a successful studio. Was it because they’re late with Halo Wars? Come on, they’ve delivered plenty for Microsoft in the past, though.
If you could recall, I read Dean Takahashi’s The Xbox 360 Uncloaked. It shed some insight into why the Xbox 360 hardware was dying so frequently, but nothing remotely concrete. Well, Dean’s got the “final chapter” to his book written up in an article called: Xbox 360 defects: an inside history of Microsoft’s video game console woes
It’s written in the same style as his book and it can be digested independent of it.
The article details a myriad of mistakes Microsoft made including:
The rumored price cut was all, but confirmed. Finally as of September 5th, 2008, the Xbox 360 can be found as low as $199.99 USD/CAD. Well, the Arcade SKU can. Here’s the official breakdown:
Arcade (no hard drive) to $199
Pro (60GB) to $299
Elite (120GB) to $399
Great news for those of you who’re itching to jump in. As for the Jasper model with the die shrunk GPU and CPU? Not confirmed as of yet. Most units being sold are still Falcon based. Jasper models should be marked lower than the Falcon’s 175 Watts.
Why is Jasper so important? Falcons are still susceptible to the ‘Red Ring of Death’ and I certainly don’t want that to happen on my fourth Xbox 360. So I’m going to wait and wait until somebody posts up proof of a Jasper unit.
Will Sony respond? Doubtful. They’ve been adament about making a profit, but that hasn’t stopped them from rejiggering the hard drive size and value angle of their current $399.99 and $499.99 price points.
These were resized from 5120 x 2880 - so no, they’re not 100% authentic. However, I am still impressed by the E3 2008 showing and thus I have some degree of hope for this real time strategy take on the Halo franchise.
Halo Wars is slated for sometime early next year.
