Xbox Live for Original Xbox Shutting Down

Those who whine and hate on MS are morons. The console was released almost a decade ago. I'm surprised they supported it to this day.
 
Another vote for soft-modding your old XBOX, installing XBMC, and setting up XLinc on your PC or router so you can play online again :D
 
People saying the 360 is a failure are delusional. Microsoft has been able to rip away, right out from under them, developers who were once loyal to Sony. How are any of you sure that the reported number of Xbox 360's that were SOLD includes replacement units that were given for "free" under warranty? How do you know this? Are there any documents supporting that claim, or is it BS hearsay? To me, number of units SOLD means just that.

...I ask those questions without bias, too. I have had 5 Xbox 360's due to the RROD, and I don't plan on getting another one until I know the hardware issues are resolved. I game happily on my PC. I am honestly having trouble, though, grasping my head around the concept that the 360 is a failure by ANY means. It sells more than the PS3, it has more exclusive games, cross-platform games are ALWAYS superior for the 360 (in the graphics department), Xbox Live is a major success, etc.
 
The X-Box 360 hasn't been selling at a loss since Nov. 2006. At least not much of one, if any. Its BOM is 323.30 (not including freight and shipping, which is probably <$20 a console) Thats 75 dollars less than the retail price of the machine back in 06/07. And I would be willing to bet the cost of the hardware has gone down even more since then. While they dont make much on the consoles, they are least pay for themselves, which for MS, is fine, because they get 50 dollars a year from 9.5 million of the 17 million XBox live users.

$50*9.5 = 475

Thats 475 Million dollars yearly. Pretty sure running the Live datacenter doesn't cost nearly that. So.. consoles = break even, + subscriptions = Lots of profit + software royalties (between 7 and 9 dollars) = lots and lots of profit

I'm pretty sure MS sees the 360 as a major success for them.

BOM Data from iSuppli
XBox live numbers from Joystiq

minor note - my data may be a little outdated, it seems like there are now 20 Million XBox Live members, 12 Million of which are Gold subscribers, on 30+ Million consoles. Numbers go up.. a Lot.
 
jrdonnaruma said:
minor note - my data may be a little outdated, it seems like there are now 20 Million XBox Live members, 12 Million of which are Gold subscribers, on 30+ Million consoles. Numbers go up.. a Lot.
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So let's see, 12 million people paying 50 bucks a year = 600 million bucks.

Even if those console purchases are from RROD's, you also have to remember the huge influx of people who get console-id banned from Xbox Live and run out to go get another 360 too, every single time they get banned.

Don't forget the money from purchasing points and various purchases on the Marketplace. I'm sure all the DLC's and what not have churned out a couple mil here or there to cushion any losses from RROD's/E74's, or any consoles/titles being sold at a loss.

Yeah, total and utter failure. Microsoft should just chalk it up to a loss now and scrap the whole thing.
 
Pretty Much. Even if their overhead in revenue for Live servers is 70% (which i highly doubt), they are still making 180 Million a year, just from the live subscriptions. I'm willing to bet the overhead is more like, 30-40%.
 
WOW, I have been playing halo 2 for 5 or so yrs on live, don't play anything else. the community has dwindled from millions to nothing though, sad really. I hope cutting off all the original xbox live users won't make me wait dozens of minutes for live matchups to start in the middle of the night.
 
general tso said:
WOW, I have been playing halo 2 for 5 or so yrs on live, don't play anything else. the community has dwindled from millions to nothing though, sad really. I hope cutting off all the original xbox live users won't make me wait dozens of minutes for live matchups to start in the middle of the night.
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Sounds like you think old titles like Halo 2 will still have online play on the XBOX 360...sorry, but no. You won't be able to play Halo 2 online, even on the XBOX 360.

The only option you'll have is xLink, which re-routes system-link over the internet. It works really well, give it a try.
 
Nemesis999 said:
VGcharts puts Wii's game sales at 450M, compared to 340M for the 360 and 211M for the PS3. There's isn't the slightest chance in hell that either MS nor Sony is anywhere near Nintendo on profits this round.
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Sorry for the late reply... But could you please quote my first sentence of the paragraph next time, it really changes the whole point I was making if you exclude it and then reply within the changed context of the shortened quote.

Derfman said:
The Wii is sort of fad, sales numbers of some great exclusive titles pretty much put the Wii at the bottom of the list for Software profits.
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Third party developers have had horrible sales on the Wii, most of the sales have been on Nintendo's software, considering the number of Wii's out there it isn't hard to believe that Nintendo's software and sells the most...

I will use the one example that comes to mind though it's not the only one that I have read in articles where third party developers take a stance of "I don't think she should touch it with a 10 foot pole".

Mad World...
 
jrdonnaruma said:
Pretty Much. Even if their overhead in revenue for Live servers is 70% (which i highly doubt), they are still making 180 Million a year, just from the live subscriptions. I'm willing to bet the overhead is more like, 30-40%.
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Nobody makes money on online services just yet. iTunes, despite all of the music and app sales they pull in, run it at just over break even, about 10% profit after the cost of running the service, bandwidth, paying the RIAA, paying the artists, paying app developers, etc etc. Even though Microsoft is subsidizing their service with Gold subscription fees, I reckon that they are still making minimal profit on XBL as well.

The point of these services is not to make money, it is to keep users hooked into those devices and ecosystems. The real profit comes from where it always has: license fees collected on every game (one of many reasons why Microsoft doesn't really care about PC gaming), and selling high-margin proprietary accessories like controllers and hard drives.
 
It's amazing how so many people start talking numbers, and business outlooks when most of you have never looked at MSFT's balance sheet or would even know what you were looking at it if you did.
 
Wii is the only console I own...and I have exactly 2 games. Wii Sports and Wii Fit. Rented a couple of games from the video store once but trying to play a FPS with that god aweful remote is horrible.

It's great to play golf with the wife/friends though!
 
Derfman said:
Sorry for the late reply... But could you please quote my first sentence of the paragraph next time, it really changes the whole point I was making if you exclude it and then reply within the changed context of the shortened quote.
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I don't really see how the first sentence, or any of the unquoted content, changes the context of what you said. Really, it just reinforces what I said...

You stated that the Wii is at the bottom for software profits. That is clearly not true, the Wii has sold, by far, the most software, and has the simplest development cycle. The fact that it IS mostly Nintendo software just makes it even more profitable, since the development cost for Nintendo is going to be lower then any other studio since they have the expertise and no royalties or licensing.

Third party software profits may suck for the Wii, but that doesn't mean much when Nintendo is raking is massive amounts of profit.


JayteeBates said:
Wii is the only console I own...and I have exactly 2 games. Wii Sports and Wii Fit. Rented a couple of games from the video store once but trying to play a FPS with that god aweful remote is horrible.

It's great to play golf with the wife/friends though!
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I've found a good use for all 3 consoles. :D

Single Player Gaming -> PS3
Multiplayer Gaming -> 360
Bunch of friends over getting trashed -> Wii
 
XamediX said:
It's amazing how so many people start talking numbers, and business outlooks when most of you have never looked at MSFT's balance sheet or would even know what you were looking at it if you did.
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My thoughts exactly
 
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