Topic: What's MS' next move with the XBox 360?

[NinGurl69 *huggles]

We've found the missing link.

[Caliban]

I'm amazed at how many people just POUR MORE MONEY into the MS machine because the products are bad. Is this a successful business model or something? Make a bad product, make twice as much sales?

Do you intend to say that the same could also be said on games?
Heck, we still buy Nintendo games even though we know they are sometimes faulty in design, or just plain bad decisions were made for the game.

You're right.  Gotta invest in EA now.

I meant it in the sense that we all take risks, and that even though we know the imperfections, it is inherent to our own nature to learn to compensate for those imperfections.

I just think that a company that lost 2 billion dollars to repent itself from such a crass mistake is something worth of note.

[NinGurl69 *huggles]

Not as noteworthy as the fact that MS somehow let a faulty design make it all the way to retail.  Games have faults, but when the console dies, you can't even play said games.  A tree trunk holds up branches, not the otherway around.

So take a risk.  Invest in EA.  The Future Market Leader(R).

[Deguello]

It all makes sense now, why the PS1, PS2, and now the 360 get the most third-party support: third party developers give the most support to the console that's most poorly built.

Makes sense, Nintendo first dominated with the faulty NES.

What was faulty about it?  Dusty cartridges that required a little elbow grease aren't the same as Disc Read Errors and piss poor design.

[animecyberrat]

It had nothing to do with dust, it was the poor connectors that would wear away after time and eventually stop working altogether.

[UltimatePartyBear]

A lot of people who have well used NESes have encountered the cartridge equivalent of the disc read error.  From what I understand, the pins that are supposed to squeeze down on the cartridge's connectors eventually wear out and become too loose to make connections.  The problem can be fixed with a cheap replacement part and a little soldering.  It's not a poor design problem really, but a consequence of the NES being insanely popular (i.e. used a lot) and now very old.  However, that doesn't stop people with no concept of time from saying it's faulty.

[animecyberrat]

It was a poor design flaw they even admitted that when they fixed the issue for the SNES and relaunched the NES with a remodel.

My NES, and everyone else I knew, had the problem mere months after getting the system.


Hey don't get me wrong I *LOVED* the NES, but the truth is they broke down pretty easily. Maybe you were older than we were when you got yours.

[UltimatePartyBear]

My NES and those of everyone else I know still work fine.  It was my SNES that broke down.  So there.

Anyway, my point is that these complaints seem to me to be a recent phenomenon.

[Ceric]

My NES and those of everyone else I know still work fine.  It was my SNES that broke down.  So there.

Anyway, my point is that these complaints seem to me to be a recent phenomenon.

Internet brings complaining power to a younger demographic and the gaming demographic itself has aged and knows better how to get its voice heard.

[DAaaMan64]

My NES and those of everyone else I know still work fine.  It was my SNES that broke down.  So there.

Anyway, my point is that these complaints seem to me to be a recent phenomenon.

Really?  Every NES I run into has the same flashing red light problems and BSOD and all kinda a stuff that you fix with little hand-me-down techniques.

[Plugabugz]

Put it in the fridge.

[animecyberrat]

My NES and those of everyone else I know still work fine.  It was my SNES that broke down.  So there.

Anyway, my point is that these complaints seem to me to be a recent phenomenon.

Internet brings complaining power to a younger demographic and the gaming demographic itself has aged and knows better how to get its voice heard.

and yet your only 4 years old than me.


It is not something I am making up and your the first person I have ever met who does not remember the flashing lights being a major issue. There was a lot more to it than that, I distinctly remember games would freeze up for no reason at all, sometimes when playing Super Mario Bros. the game would get all scrambled and the graphics would act funny like you could walk over pits in the ground or sometimes bricks would appear where they didn't used to be.

It was a lot more than just the stupid machines flashing off and on all the time. And I know I am not alone in these issue, hell Game spot even did a feature on this a while back. Everyone who remembers the NES remembers fighting with it to get them to work.


Hey if you had different experiences more power to you, but I know your   experiences are a rarity because every single person I know who had an NES had their own method of fighting they damn things to get them to work.

[Maverick]

We would always blow in the cartridge and sing "Home On The Range" to get our games to work.

[DAaaMan64]

We would always blow in the cartridge and sing "Home On The Range" to get our games to work.

We often pushed the NES cartridge downward over and over in the NES.

[animecyberrat]

I used to kick mine (no surprises there right) and it never worked.

[Maverick]

We would always blow in the cartridge and sing "Home On The Range" to get our games to work.

We often pushed the NES cartridge downward over and over in the NES.

Yes, before discovering the magical properties of Home On The Range, we used to use that and the Furiously-Attack-Reset-Button approach.

[Ceric]

We would always blow in the cartridge and sing "Home On The Range" to get our games to work.

We do the blowing thing and stick another cart in above the one we like to play and that normally fixed it.

We often pushed the NES cartridge downward over and over in the NES.

[UltimatePartyBear]

I don't remember how old I was when I got a NES.  I remember that it was a Christmas gift and the bundle included the grey Zapper and the single cart version of SMB and Duck Hunt, if that helps.  I'll also admit the possibility that I am more careful with my video games than most people, but please understand that from my perspective that makes all of you seem crazy. 

I still don't call it a design flaw.  It's not on the same scale as the Xbox 360's RROD or the original Playstation's warping spindle.  Those kinds of flaws can affect anyone regardless of how they treat their hardware, and that's a whole different league.

[Deguello]

I used to kick mine (no surprises there right) and it never worked.

The NES is of "low quality" and yet here you are admitting to kicking it.  I want you to think about that for a second, and then imagine yourself kicking a PS2 or a Wii or an Xbox 360.

[Deguello]

Anyway BACK ON TOPIC.

MS has problems, mainly because they've been trying to reach the market they see as "casual" and have been failing at it.  To the new Wii owners and activated gamers on Wii, they see the 360's stuff as cheap gimmicks, especially stuff like Scene it!, which is a $20 Board game MS wants the "casuals" to shell out $350 to play.

[Spak-Spang]

I just want to know what Microsoft's next system will be called since they have Xbox, Xbox 360...what is next?


As for what Microsoft needs to do now, I don't think it is a given that they need to do anything.  They have a strong core market that continues to expand, and continues to support both first and third party games. 

Since, they are still in second place in this generation, and I am sure they are either profitable or becoming profitable with Xbox 360, they really don't need to do anything.

[animecyberrat]

I used to kick mine (no surprises there right) and it never worked.

The NES is of "low quality" and yet here you are admitting to kicking it.  I want you to think about that for a second, and then imagine yourself kicking a PS2 or a Wii or an Xbox 360.

First off I was like 6 when we got outs, second off I wasn't being serious.

But I never had any problems with my SNES or Genesis, N64 or ANY other cart based system giving me that same problem the NES did. Hell event he Atari 2600 worked flawlessly every time I turned it on.

And ON TOPIC, I don't care what MS does until they show me they can go six months without having any major gaming sites reporting issues with them crashing or whatever it is they are doing these days besides playing games.

[EasyCure]

At one point i thought of buying a 360 when the price was low enough just to try a small handfull of games but after reading thru this thread almost in its entirety.. i still dont think i'd do it even if it dropped in price cheaper than a wii.

i dont get to play games much and when i do put quality time in.. i put looooong hours in. i feel like if i were to do that with a 360 i'd end up killing it faster. Whats the point? A handful of games isn't worth the headaches.

I guess what im saying is, take it from someone that doesn't have an xbox, knows a few people who have had a few problems with theirs, and reads things on the internet enough to know that maybe things really ARENT being blown out of proportion.. The only thing MS can do is ride it out until their next system and get their asses in line with quality hardware. They have a fanbase that'll buy the next xbox no questions asked but for everyone else (multi-platform users or 'casual' gamers that dont play for hours on end), the second they hear about a launch unit failing they'll doubt MS has solved any of its problems and will want to put their money into some other investment. I know thats what i would do.

[NinGurl69 *huggles]

3rd time will not be a charm.

[Luigi Dude]

I guess what im saying is, take it from someone that doesn't have an xbox, knows a few people who have had a few problems with theirs, and reads things on the internet enough to know that maybe things really ARENT being blown out of proportion.. The only thing MS can do is ride it out until their next system and get their asses in line with quality hardware. They have a fanbase that'll buy the next xbox no questions asked but for everyone else (multi-platform users or 'casual' gamers that dont play for hours on end), the second they hear about a launch unit failing they'll doubt MS has solved any of its problems and will want to put their money into some other investment. I know thats what i would do.

And that's Microsofts big problem with their next system is how are they going to sell it to the mass market.  Even if Microsoft says they've fixed the problem there's really no way for any one to know.  Since the 360's Red Ring of Death is very well known, how many people are going to be rushing to stores to buy the next one.  I can't think of anyone that isn't a Microsoft fanboy that's going to be willing to pay over $400 for a system that they think might have a 50% chance of dieing on them within the first few months.

And even then, I've seen some people that were Microsoft fans because of the original X-Box, buy either a Wii or PS3 because of the 360's horrible hardware issues, which makes me wonder how many true core fans does Microsoft really have now.  Besides the millions of crazed Halo fans.