Activision CEO Worried NextBox, PS4 May Have "Slow Start"

[Colt47]

The thing that is hurting the WiiU is the naming convention and the major audience that bought the original Wii. That and the fact the Wii U is still using IBMs powerPC architecture. Then again, the original Wii and Gamecube both ran off PowerPC architecture and PowerPC isn't nearly the nightmare Cell architecture is to develop for.

 

[Zanderinfal]

I agree with them, they might. Still, I don't think it will be slow on the scale of the Wii U, the slowpoke of this generation. The PS4 may do pretty well overall, but just kind of slow to start. I dunno, I'm not an expert on this but that's just how I see it.

 

[Lord_Gremlin]

New console need either a library of couple hundreds of games or full backwards compatibility to sell well.

 

[oliver.begg]

people seem to miss the fact that the reazson the PS3 launched so high was becuase it also had a PS2 inside it for backwards compat.

since they are not putting a ps3 inside the ps4 it should be ~400-500USD, which is reasonable if you account for the USD's devualtion over the last 7-8 years (which cannot be denied, i mean the AUSD is stronger which was unthinkable)

 

[Vivi22]

I would have thought that there's a combination of things that's going to lead to slow sales for the new consoles.

Firstly, there's the fact that there's very few killer apps for the new X-box, I don't really know about the PS4, but I'm trying to stick to what I know here. I suppose there's Call of Duty, but I've noticed that people in general aren't as stoked about Activision's latest cash grab. CoD fatigue is well and truly upon me.

Secondly, there's the price - the new consoles are rather expensive.

Finally, they're riddled with DRM and presumably over priced games with bits cut out of them only to be sold back as DLC. From what I've seen, there's a lot of folks getting sick of being well... ripped off left, right and centre.

You do realize that almost nothing you've said here is based on actual facts right? Let's break it down point by point:

Few killer apps for the next Xbox? It hasn't even been officially announced so we don't have any way of knowing what is specifically in development yet.

The new consoles are expensive? No prices have been announced for the new Xbox or the PS4 so this is based on absolutely no facts.

Riddled with DRM? What DRM? The PS4 has been confirmed to not require a constant online connection and if I'm not mistaken Microsoft has denied that the new Xbox will be always online. But even if they haven't denied it, it hasn't been confirmed either so this assumption would still be mere speculation at best. There's also no confirmation of game prices so again we have something you made up.

Now scrolling down a bit and seeing your next post, you mention the DRM you were talking about is the no second hand games type of DRM. Something which hasn't even been rumored to be in the next Xbox, and which we know isn't in the PS4.

My point being, how about you stick to discussing facts about new consoles instead of a combination of rumours and stuff you just made up? None of the points you made are at all relevant since none of them are based on actual facts. In fact, it's worse than your points simply being irrelevant. Attempting to pass off rumours as 100% confirmed fact could even simply confuse people who don't follow the new console news that closely into making decisions about them based on utter bull and continuing to pass along that information as fact.

 

[Vivi22]

people seem to miss the fact that the reazson the PS3 launched so high was becuase it also had a PS2 inside it for backwards compat.

since they are not putting a ps3 inside the ps4 it should be ~400-500USD, which is reasonable if you account for the USD's devualtion over the last 7-8 years (which cannot be denied, i mean the AUSD is stronger which was unthinkable)

That's bullshit. True, they cut out the PS2 processor in a desperate attempt to control their manufacturing costs early on, but do you know how much it cost to stick the PS2 chipset in there? About $20 were the estimates experts were coming up with. An extra $20 chipset did not make the PS3 cost $600. You can chalk that up to sticking a Blu-Ray drive in there and spending years and millions of dollars in R&D on the Cell processor. The Blu-Ray drive alone would have been a huge part of the cost when you stop and realize that at the time, comparable Blu-Ray players were selling for double the price of a PS3.

The PS4 will probably be cheaper than the PS3, not only because they won't be putting the PS3 chipset inside, but because Blu-Ray drives are cheap and they didn't spend ungodly amounts of money developing the CPU themselves this time.

 

[Something Amyss]

(Source: http://www.expertreviews.co.uk/games/1296739/xbox-720-release-date-specs-news-and-rumours)

So you're ranting based on baseless rumours?

 

[Strazdas]

Hasn't Microsoft actually denied that always-online rumor?

If memory serves me correctly, it was SONY that officially said PS4 wont be always online (thus winning the utter escapist support it seems), No official word from MS yet.

 

[Steven Bogos]

Hasn't Microsoft actually denied that always-online rumor?

If memory serves me correctly, it was SONY that officially said PS4 wont be always online (thus winning the utter escapist support it seems), No official word from MS yet.

I don't care for either consoles. I do my gaming on a TI-85 Graphics Calculator

 

[Strazdas]

Hasn't Microsoft actually denied that always-online rumor?

If memory serves me correctly, it was SONY that officially said PS4 wont be always online (thus winning the utter escapist support it seems), No official word from MS yet.

I don't care for either consoles. I do my gaming on a TI-85 Graphics Calculator

And you are quoting me saying this because?

 

[SonOfVoorhees]

Hasn't Microsoft actually denied that always-online rumor?

If memory serves me correctly, it was SONY that officially said PS4 wont be always online (thus winning the utter escapist support it seems), No official word from MS yet.

There was an email from MS on kotaku. But then with the internet, who knows what is real or fake. But MS wont make it always online apart from the tv watching part. It would be the death of xbox being that the machine isnt ready for digital downloading like the PC. Look at the puny little hard drives on consoles.

To be honest, i wonder if MS are just letting these rumours build and piss gamers off. An then to a fanfare on May 21st they will state "Not always online to game" "can play 2nd hand games" "No DRM also" and the fans will go mental with joy. An thus a ton of free positive publicity has been created.

 

[Strazdas]

Hasn't Microsoft actually denied that always-online rumor?

If memory serves me correctly, it was SONY that officially said PS4 wont be always online (thus winning the utter escapist support it seems), No official word from MS yet.

There was an email from MS on kotaku. But then with the internet, who knows what is real or fake. But MS wont make it always online apart from the tv watching part. It would be the death of xbox being that the machine isnt ready for digital downloading like the PC. Look at the puny little hard drives on consoles.

To be honest, i wonder if MS are just letting these rumours build and piss gamers off. An then to a fanfare on May 21st they will state "Not always online to game" "can play 2nd hand games" "No DRM also" and the fans will go mental with joy. An thus a ton of free positive publicity has been created.

A mail from MS is not an "official announcement" though. and without that we really can claim either way.
I do agree that hard drives on consoles and haldhelds is a joke. i mean this is 2013 and you still get phones with no internal memory (or 256mb one) and you want hard drives on a console.... so yeah. I was actually laughed at at phone shop when i said i want at least 4 gb internal memory and told they dont exist..... you cant put anything decent into less nowadays anyway. heck excel files i work with takes over 100mb.

As for the buildup - could very well be. and its working. i mean, look at PS4. people are going to buy it "Because no always online". they are selling consoles for not including DRM. you know, something that should be a default state to begin with. so it coudl very well be a nice marketing campaign.

 

[SonOfVoorhees]

WiiU has no good games, i personally dont like Nintendo games anyway. But it sells on Metroid, Mario and Zelda and those games are never launch titles. Plus, apart from those main titles, there are many games not being made for it eg Watchdogs. I think they tried a copycat the Wii fame but i guess lightening doesnt strike twice.

PS4 i fear, from what im hearing, may charge to much again and stall. The PS3 sold well when the price went down, but at the start it was to costly. An they have money problems, and did say this is the first time SOny was in profit in 5 years. Except most of that was laying off staff, closing companies and selling property.

Nextbox i think will do well if they show amazing games and the rumours around it are not true. Also it has to be at a good price point, around £300 would be fine. This goes for PS4 as well, £300 and great games shown at E3.

I think launch dates, well apart from PS2, will be slow. I think the hardcore fans will buy it day one. Every one else will still enjoy there PS3/360 games for maybe 6 months to a year and buy next gen then when there is a more built up library of games. If you look at the PS3, really slow start, but once they were realistic with the price of the hardware and the amazing games started to be released/previewed that machine sold loads.

 

[faefrost]

Huh. Kotick's right for once.

The continuing poor economy combined with increasing prices, decreasing product quality, a focus on entertainment and social media rather than game development, and a general distrust of the market are going to hurt this generation quite a lot.

The new consoles offer *nothing* that the old ones didn't already offer at a lower price point and with more games to back them up. Hell, the PS4's "exclusives" (the titles meant to sell the new console) are all going to be available on PS3.

Actually what MS did was try to shift blame. The "Always Online" is a FEATURE that the developers can choose to use (So your games don't necesarily need to be calling home constantly, but probably will anditsalltheirfaultswejustgavethemthetech!). But basically yeah, the Console itself is looking for the internet. Otherwise how would all of your wonderful social media work?

Idiots!

 

[Marowit]

Well, if the PS3/360 launches are any indication of how the prices on the new consoles are going to be it's going to be a few years till I pick one up - just as good ol' bobbie is worried about.

Like one of the earlier posters said, I can't see them being sold for less than $400, and at that price I'll just stick with the current gen and pick up their games, I haven't played, as their prices inevitably drop. Sure I'll be envious of the new shinny graphics, but meh.

It's too bad the hardware on the current gen can't just be upgraded, *grumbles about why he prefers computers*, because it would make so much more sense to sell a $100-150 thing you can plug into your current gen console to beef it up...daydreams of the Sega 32x & n64 expansion pak. I know those weren't huge upgrades, but still seems like a missed opportunity for these companies as they wring-their-hands over whether someone like me is going to buy a new console.

 

[King Kazma]

Wow PS3 is 7 years old. They could of kept it kicking for another 3 and waited for the economy to pick up before rolling out the new one. Could probably catch the wave of Xbox hate if they did.

 

[spartandude]

Hasn't Microsoft actually denied that always-online rumor?

If memory serves me correctly, it was SONY that officially said PS4 wont be always online (thus winning the utter escapist support it seems), No official word from MS yet.

i could have sworn a month or so ago MS came out saying that individual publishers/devs could decide if the game was always on or not but the console by default wouldnt, but im not sure if its official or not but it is the same as the PS4 in that regard

 

[Clovus]

I hadn't really thought about an aspect of this before. I'm mainly a PC gamer (I own a PS3 and Wii), so when the PS4 was announced I was happy that this console gen was finally coming to an end. I was hoping that within a year or so we'd start seeing more games on PC that actually used the power that's available there since they wouldn't have to make sure that the game ran on the older consoles.

But, I guesss it'll probably be more like 2 years. After the new consoles are released there's probably a good chance that most games will still have to work on the old consoles because the install base there will still be so huge. This generation's just never going to end ...

 

[medv4380]

WiiU has no good games, i personally dont like Nintendo games anyway. But it sells on Metroid, Mario and Zelda and those games are never launch titles. Plus, apart from those main titles, there are many games not being made for it eg Watchdogs.

Watchdogs has been confirmed [http://www.polygon.com/2013/2/20/4011334/watch-dogs-wii-u] by Ubisoft as coming out on the Wii U, and everything else. What's in question is EA titles, and I can live without EA.

 

[AbsoluteVirtue18]

I just don't see the point in buying a new console. It's like, you have a car, and it's a good car. It runs great, has enough room for your family, etc. Then this guy comes up to you, and he's like "Hey, if you liked THAT car, wait till you see THIS car!" But it's almost the exact same car. Why do I need another car? I already have a good one!

I'll wait and see, maybe once they formally announce the PS4/Xbox Whatever-They're-Gonna-Call-It I might change my mind, but it doesn't really matter to me.

[sub][sub]To me...[/sub][/sub]