Depends on our definition of success. The Xbox should have 10 million consoles sold by years end (source TeamXbox)
That's their goal, anyway. But really, even if they made it, the winner in any console generation is the one that sells 100+ million consoles. 10 million just doesn't mean much, and nearly all analysts predict that its not a matter of whether the PS3 passes the 360, but when and by how much.
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The PS2 is going to sell well because it's a hundred bucks nows and cheap and plentiful trumps almost all.
Yep. That and the absolutely enormous games library it has.
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One thing Sony is not prepared for is the online stuff.
Not really. Sony's 'Playstation Network' initiative looks fairly exciting. I'd expect Sony to match Xbox Live feature for feature going forward. And unlike Live, its... FREE? Whoa.
Yes and we know how accurate Analysts can be</sarcasm>
The problem with "free" is that in many cases it's worth what you paid. Xbox Live Gold is superior and with the new Marketplace it's a no brainer which platfrom is mature in htis regard.
Add in Media Centre features and you have a potentially superior platform with Microsoft. I really wish Apple had the same strategy here. Their lackadaisical attitude towards gaming is going to cost them in this arena.
Luckily Sony owns Columbia so they have the content ready for a better "paid" online service.
Yes and we know how accurate Analysts can be</sarcasm>
Sorry, but I know a lot of folks IN the gaming industry (helps to live in the SF Bay Area), and I can't find anyone who's been willing to bet $$$ that the 360 is going to win this gen of consoles. A lot of the prob is that the Xbox and 360 are regional, not worldwide phenomenons. They do pretty well in the US, but mediocre in Europe and terrible in Japan. This pretty much cripples their chances for outselling the PS3, right from the get-go. No one serious predicts that 360 will outsell PS3 worldwide.
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The problem with "free" is that in many cases it's worth what you paid. Xbox Live Gold is superior and with the new Marketplace it's a no brainer which platfrom is mature in htis regard.
Most reports say that PS Network closes the gap very considerably, to the point of, "Why would I pay for Live?". I don't have too many doubts it'll be the equal of Live before much longer. It's MS's own model, turned against them- copy the leader and shout "Me too!!!" at the top of your lungs.
MS may very well have to cut prices on Live to keep things humming, if Sony keeps PS Network free.
I'd agree. I think Europe will do much better but Japan will offer very little. Japananese love gaming but they are also very "Japan centric" for products.
We'll I'll keep my eye on Live vs PS Network. It should be interesting.
The gaming market has been a fiasco for a decade, as MS and Sony duke it out ? not worrying about how much money they lose.
Look, here's the fact: Microsoft has lost a ton of money on XBox...and has lost a ton more on XBox 360. The cheering about MS coming close to manufacturing cost forgets one minor issue: retail margins. Is GameSpot selling these things out of charity?
No, obviously. Even if MS were to get manufacturing down to the cost of the unit, they'd still be losing at least $100 per unit in retail margin. Plus marketing. That's a lot of money to make back in software.
Whatever Apple has planned, it's not as mundane as "a gaming console." Steve Jobs isn't a moron.
There is an opportunity for some sort of device that manages and guides content to TVs ? and maybe plays or downloads games ? DVDs, movies from iTunes, and other net-based video content. And maybe, down the road, full-on IPTV, with the right partner to compete with cable and satellite, once more content shifts to the Internet.
Jobs doesn't look at the playing field as it exists now, instead he looks five years down the road. He's smart and knows video/movies/music/gaming will all be 'Net driven at some point. The company that figures out a: how to make it consumer easy, and b: gets a piece of every transaction, will make a ton of money. I like Apple's chances at that.
Sorry, but I know a lot of folks IN the gaming industry (helps to live in the SF Bay Area), and I can't find anyone who's been willing to bet $$$ that the 360 is going to win this gen of consoles. A lot of the prob is that the Xbox and 360 are regional, not worldwide phenomenons. They do pretty well in the US, but mediocre in Europe and terrible in Japan. This pretty much cripples their chances for outselling the PS3, right from the get-go. No one serious predicts that 360 will outsell PS3 worldwide.
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I wouldn't exactly predict that MS will win. But I'd be prepared to wager that Sony will not win either.
Thc collapse of E3 seems to be a taste of things to come. E3 worked like this. Companies brought huge piles of money. Then set them on fire. The one with the biggest pile of money won. ... sort of.... Suddenly everyone has realised that this is a dumb way to do business.
The games industry is similar. With console manufacture and associated marketing losing money - only massive attach rates can turn console sales into actual profits. MS have screwed-up by not buying key oriental developers (like Square) and wasting cash on turkeys like Rare. But the 360 is a reasonable machine - and avoids many of the design flaws of the original Xbox.
Wheras Sony is a company who suddenly can do nothing right.
The film people and the games people should have enormous synergy. In fact the two divisions are in open conflict. Notice that there never is a Sony game based on a Sony movie.
The core electronics division is reeling from not understanding why people prefer iPods to Walkmen. PSP has floundered. The rootkit debacle shows precisly why Sony should not be allowed out till all senior management are shot. And the Japanese term "loss of face" applies quite literally to anyone who looks too closely at a Sony-made laptop battery.
The PS3 is a quite staggeringly terrible design - Better suited to cracking codes than running actual game code.
Of course Sony could make it a success. Their ace marketing machine made the PS2 successful (in the face of zero opposition.) The PS2 was a hardware so bad that even Sony engineers could not make the interface work without a video glitches. Fire up a PS2 to see what I mean.
So they might make money on the PS3 - but jeezy creezy - they deserve to fail so badly I can taste it.
C.
Oh and ask some actual non-japanese Asians what their favourite game is. And they tend to cite examples based on some obscure Microsoft based hardware/software platform called a XPPC or something.
Sony's having some problems, yes... but so what? So is Microsoft. The Zune is flopping pretty badly. Vista is... several years overdue, to put it nicely, and has had a LOT of the features that made it worthwhile stripped out to make even its current belated release date. Internet Explorer is losing marketshare to Firefox. Talent is fleeing Microsoft and heading over to work at Google, an archrival. Bill himself is leaving to focus on his foundation. And perhaps most of all, the image of the company has steadily eroded over the past few years, to the point where few people see anything that MS does as 'innovative' or cutting-edge anymore. MS is the new 'old IBM'... big, boring, and having problems executing or turning out anything particularly innovative or exciting. A lot of folks view MS as simply a 'fast follower' of whatever Google, Apple, and even Sony does, the masters of 'me too'. And I can't really argue with them.
So by that standard, Microsoft 'deserves to fail' too. Perhaps the Wii should be the sleeper hit? 8)
But no... I'm old enough to remember that Nintendo, back in the day, used to strongarm and bully its dealers like no one before. A lot of retailers positively HATED Nintendo and its gestapo tactics back when Nintendo was in the driver's seat in the console market. So who you gonna root for? They're all corporations, and they all aren't terribly pretty when you check them out up close. \
The biggest question in my mind is what is inside the iTV box.?
Educated guesses would suggest....
* a processor. Prolly an x86.
* Some ram. Some storage - probably a small hard drive.
* A fast network connection to a Mac and then on to the internet
* a media processor / GPU possibly Nvidia based.
* a connection to a TV and sound system
Now this sounds almost identical to a MacMini. Except it has a dedicated GPU (including component out), and doesn't have a Combo drive. Why would it be half the price of the MacMini?
My educated guess at what's inside the iTV...
* a graphics card like ATIs stuff that is also a processor. Basically a media processor / GPU with 512MB of ram, and a bit more brains.
* some storage - probably 2GB of flash memory to cache streaming or downloads.
* wired and wireless network connection to the internet and to your local iTunes (on Mac or PC)
* a connection to TV and sound system.
What they demonstrated doesn't need more, does it?
Unfortunately, it won't play sophisticated games.
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Originally Posted by Carniphage
But here is the unique feature - the Front Row interface allows you to browse the games store, preview, select and download a game without leaving the couch. A model of distribution which is quite different from the boxed-goods model favoured by MS, EA and Sony.
I don't think that's a unique differentiator. MS and Sony can easily sell games online same as they sell movies online.
However, I do think games & any software being sold online is a natural step in the Internet.
edit: ... I guess a MacMini has a GPU integrated onto the motherboard.
What they demonstrated doesn't need more, does it?
Unfortunately, it won't play sophisticated games.
Not sure what you mean by sophisticated games.
With a current low-end CPU and a current low-end GPU you'd end up with a machine that is more powerful than the original Xbox and certainly more powerful than the (300Mhz 28Mb) PS2.
So Half-Life2 would be a struggle, but Halo2 would be a easy. Something like Shadow of the Colosus would be a breeze. Creating such games is much less easy. Porting them, not so much.
That said, I think going after hard-core gamers would be a mistake. (at least at first).
If Apple were to get serious about gaming, the best move they could make would be to buy transgaming. They specialize in porting titles to both the Mac and game consoles. Having cider be some kind of OSX tool would help Apple a lot and that could be translated to the game console should it be partly based on an OSX/Intel combination.
That being said, the game console idea is not smart to say the least. Microsoft had the money to be very patient. Apple doesn't. Xbox lost a lot of money because they didn't understand that PC gamers and console gamers are different. It took a generation for them to figure that out. I see Apple making the same mistake as well as applying its pricing model which gamers are not likely to pay. Apple does not have first party game studios either. Steve Jobs does have a tendency to go over his head when things are going good and, if true, this could be an example of that.
No. Because that (or an option to upgrade) would be logical.
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No - that would simply eat into their high-end sales. There is an option to upgrade, it's called the MacBook Pro.
Apple probably determined that the number of casual gamers bothered about having a dedicated GPU, and the number of hardcore gamers who a) buy a Mac for gaming and b) can't afford to buy a MBPro is too small to be worth worrying about.
I think it's also worth pointing out the the Intel integrated graphics chip is still a very powerful GPU compared to the dedicated cards that Apple were putting in their high end machines only a couple of years ago. My Core Duo Mini can actually play Quake4 quite acceptably (with some of the effects turned way down obviously) whereas the Radeon 9600 in my 2yo PowerBook struggles with Halo.
When you consider the paltry 4 or 8MB Rage 128s that Apple put in the original iBooks and PowerBook G3s, the new consumer machines actually compare quite favourably as gaming platforms. They're faster than their predecessors, and slower than the pro machines - what more can you reasonably expect?
If Apple were to get serious about gaming, the best move they could make would be to buy transgaming. They specialize in porting titles to both the Mac and game consoles. Having cider be some kind of OSX tool would help Apple a lot and that could be translated to the game console should it be partly based on an OSX/Intel combination.
For Mac OS to be taken seriously as a gaming platform, they need to do more than just faciliate ports of PC titles. We only accept half-assed ports of crappy PC games at the moment because we are so happy to receive even these crumbs of support for our platform, and we know that anything more is too much to hope for.
But the message Apple want to be pushing is that Macs should be the primary development platform. We want games to be written specifically for OS X - which are optimised for it, and which make use of the great technologies such as OpenGL, Core Image and Video, Quicktime, etc.
All Cider does is use Mac OS tech to emulate inferior Windows gui functions, so that at best you end up with a tacky looking Windoze style interface running at Rosetta-like speeds on a machine with higher spec than the original PC it was designed for.
Apple cannot ever conquer the gaming market in this way - certainly it may help them to get a foot in the door, but to win that battle they will have to get things to the point where more games are written exclusively for Mac than for Windows, and where Windows users are being given 2-year-old, rough-around-the-edges ports of popular Mac titles, and moaning about all the cool effects and features that had to be cut because their platform doesn't support them.
A good starting point would be for Apple to invest a few million in optimising their OpenGL drivers, ensuring that there are decent ports of middleware technology such as Havoc (buying them if necessary), and buying up some great independent gaming houses from under Microsoft's nose, much as M$ did to Apple and Nintendo when they bought Bungie and Rare.
Apple could probably afford to buy a few of the main game development and middleware technologies, and then make them available for free to Mac developers whilst charging through the nose for Windows and XBox developers to use them. That would go a long way towards leveling the playing field.
For Mac OS to be taken seriously as a gaming platform, they need to do more than just faciliate ports of PC titles. We only accept half-assed ports of crappy PC games at the moment because we are so happy to receive even these crumbs of support for our platform, and we know that anything more is too much to hope for.
But the message Apple want to be pushing is that Macs should be the primary development platform. We want games to be written specifically for OS X - which are optimised for it, and which make use of the great technologies such as OpenGL, Core Image and Video, Quicktime, etc.
All Cider does is use Mac OS tech to emulate inferior Windows gui functions, so that at best you end up with a tacky looking Windoze style interface running at Rosetta-like speeds on a machine with higher spec than the original PC it was designed for.
I think the game ports would be enough. Reports suggest that the speeds via Cider are not lower than the PC couterpart. As for technologies like Core Image etc, they are fine for the likes of Photoshop but are next to worthless in a game. In fact those technologies are like mini game engines that specialize in doing one task. Full blown game engines handle video, images, audio and 3D. In no way does having the game engine do it all make for tacky stuff. The games that I've seen that used any Mac frameworks looked tacky IMO because for setting some options, they would drop out of the game into an aqua setup window and it looked very out of place.
But I read Cider lets you use Apple technologies anyway.
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Originally Posted by Socrates
Apple cannot ever conquer the gaming market in this way - certainly it may help them to get a foot in the door, but to win that battle they will have to get things to the point where more games are written exclusively for Mac than for Windows, and where Windows users are being given 2-year-old, rough-around-the-edges ports of popular Mac titles, and moaning about all the cool effects and features that had to be cut because their platform doesn't support them.
Never going to happen. DirectX is too ingrained in the industry now. What needs to happen is for OpenGL to look far more appealling to developers than DirectX. Not just a little better but significantly better.
It will also never happen because of market share. Developers go where the audience is and this was noticeable when you see the number of games for the PS2 compared to the XBox and Gamecube.
It will also never happen because PCs will always be more cost effective for games, supporting more cards and other upgrades.
Now you've also got Windows and the XBox360 linked together and games are simultaneously going to both platforms. Trying to gain a majority over that is near impossible for Apple and most certainly unnecessary. Most Mac users just want to get close to the number of titles on a PC - they don't need to dominate.
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Originally Posted by Socrates
A good starting point would be for Apple to invest a few million in optimising their OpenGL drivers, ensuring that there are decent ports of middleware technology such as Havoc (buying them if necessary), and buying up some great independent gaming houses from under Microsoft's nose, much as M$ did to Apple and Nintendo when they bought Bungie and Rare.
For Mac OS to be taken seriously as a gaming platform, they need to do more than just faciliate ports of PC titles. We only accept half-assed ports of crappy PC games at the moment because we are so happy to receive even these crumbs of support for our platform, and we know that anything more is too much to hope for.
But the message Apple want to be pushing is that Macs should be the primary development platform. We want games to be written specifically for OS X - which are optimised for it, and which make use of the great technologies such as OpenGL, Core Image and Video, Quicktime, etc.
Apple had original content once. They let that company fall into the hands of the dark lord instead of buying Bungie themselves.
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All Cider does is use Mac OS tech to emulate inferior Windows gui functions, so that at best you end up with a tacky looking Windoze style interface running at Rosetta-like speeds on a machine with higher spec than the original PC it was designed for.
You'd think, but the Mac gaming experts who have seen cider in action say it works as advertised. I think someone who the game companies trust with unreleased products is a pretty credible source. It has only about a 5% penalty off the windows version while being able to use basically the same codebase as the PC version. If Apple were to offer this for free the way they do xcode, it could be having the Mac version in box with the PC versions.
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Apple cannot ever conquer the gaming market in this way - certainly it may help them to get a foot in the door, but to win that battle they will have to get things to the point where more games are written exclusively for Mac than for Windows, and where Windows users are being given 2-year-old, rough-around-the-edges ports of popular Mac titles, and moaning about all the cool effects and features that had to be cut because their platform doesn't support them.
Apple needs to reach parity in both games and hardware first. Apple does not take gaming seriously at all.
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A good starting point would be for Apple to invest a few million in optimising their OpenGL drivers, ensuring that there are decent ports of middleware technology such as Havoc (buying them if necessary), and buying up some great independent gaming houses from under Microsoft's nose, much as M$ did to Apple and Nintendo when they bought Bungie and Rare.
Personally If I were Apple, I'd start by acquiring Wideload Games and paying whatever ever it takes to get the Marathon rights from Microsoft. I don't care if another Marathon is made, but as long as Microsoft holds the rights to the most historic Mac gaming franchise, it's a slap in the face to all Mac users.
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Apple could probably afford to buy a few of the main game development and middleware technologies, and then make them available for free to Mac developers whilst charging through the nose for Windows and XBox developers to use them. That would go a long way towards leveling the playing field.
I agree. That's why I want them to acquire transgaming.
No - that would simply eat into their high-end sales. There is an option to upgrade, it's called the MacBook Pro.
No, there is another. It's called fark Apple and get a PC notebook. THEY will let you buy a MacBook-priced notebook and upgrade the GPU for moderate added cost. \
Its not a good idea for Apple to be inflexible in this competitive a market. There's more and more people taking a peek over the Apple fence and considering switching, but they'll tend not to if Apple pricing and BTO options aren't conducive to it. Apple's just starting to make some good inroads in marketshare, but they could be doing even better.
Also, its worth pointing out that Apple ALREADY offers an option to upgrade the GPU in another consumer line of computers they make- the iMac (20-inch and up). So the whole 'if you want to get a better GPU than stock, go Pro' line of reasoning doesn't really hold.
Apple just needs to extend what they already do with the consumer iMac line to the consumer MacBook line. That would be cool, and helpful to both Apple and the consumer. 8)
Any chance they're hiring game developers to assist in the creation of a DirectX competitor? OpenGL is ok as a graphics API, but DirectX does far more than graphics. If Apple improved their game writing APIs, they might generate some more interest in the Mac as a gaming platform. Maybe not as much as increasing their market share, but the former is easier to fix than the latter.
PS, I am not a game developer. I've dabbled in OpenGL and found it passable as an API. I know DirectX handles other things like input very well, but for all I know, Apple's offerings in this category could be on par.
"No, there is another. It's called fark Apple and get a PC notebook. THEY will let you buy a MacBook-priced notebook and upgrade the GPU for moderate added cost. \"
Not this again... the consumer who decides between Mac and PC based on price is a myth. The only people who complain about Mac prices are Mac users who wish their machines were cheaper, and the PC user who wouldn't buy a Mac anyway and is trying to come up with a simple explanation why. Only Apple makes Macs so they can charge what they want for them.
"Its not a good idea for Apple to be inflexible in this competitive a market. There's more and more people taking a peek over the Apple fence and considering switching, but they'll tend not to if Apple pricing and BTO options aren't conducive to it. Apple's just starting to make some good inroads in marketshare, but they could be doing even better."
I don't buy it. Informed consumers will switch if the Mac meets their needs and the PC doesn't. Everyone else will buy what their more informed friends or family tell them to. The price differential is largely irrelevant, which is just as well because Apple cannot possibly compete against $500 PC notebooks and still retain the same reputation for quality.
"Also, its worth pointing out that Apple ALREADY offers an option to upgrade the GPU in another consumer line of computers they make- the iMac (20-inch and up). So the whole 'if you want to get a better GPU than stock, go Pro' line of reasoning doesn't really hold."
The iMac is not an equivalent product. There are plenty of reasons to buy an iMac rather than a Mini or a Mac Pro that have nothing to do with price. They have a different purpose, and so Apple needs to make the options more flexible. There is no real reason to buy a MacBook instead of a MacBook Pro if you can afford it.
"Apple just needs to extend what they already do with the consumer iMac line to the consumer MacBook line. That would be cool, and helpful to both Apple and the consumer. 8) "
And how would they benefit from doing this? Would it make any difference to which machine you buy? Will it make more money for them? Or will you just gripe a bit less? The only possible consequence I can see is that this would mean you buy a MacBook instead of splashing out on the Pro.
Don't get me wrong - I agree that it would be nice if the MacBook had a better GFX chip, but I can't see how it would be in Apple's best interests from a business standpoint, (other than the fact that having better products make their customers happier).
Clearly it cannot be defintively stated as Apple is developing games for the iPod.
But it is clear Apple does not take hardcore gaming as seriously as Microsoft. Once you come to that understanding it would answer a lot of question and conjecture over Apple's decisions.
That seems to be controversial. Blizzard use it apparently, but it has been sited as the reason why the latest Myst release and Half life 2 weren't ported:
Not this again... the consumer who decides between Mac and PC based on price is a myth. The only people who complain about Mac prices are Mac users who wish their machines were cheaper, and the PC user who wouldn't buy a Mac anyway and is trying to come up with a simple explanation why. Only Apple makes Macs so they can charge what they want for them.
I'm afraid that's archaic, 'bad old Apple' -thinking. It's what Apple used to tell themselves when trying to justify their overpricing and sky-high margins while selling to a fixed base (and they still think this way to some extent, though they've gotten lots better about it).
Apple's making some pretty nice strides in marketshare of late. Not as good as they could be, but there's a significant increase. It's obvious that SOMEONE's switching. Do those folks sound like 'Mac users who wish their machines were cheaper' and 'PC users who wouldn't buy Macs anyway'? Nope. Its folks who looked over the fence and saw something that would work better for them. And we could get even more of those people if Apple showed more flexibility in BTO options, hit more pricepoints in the notebook line, and did not repeat some of the mistakes of the 'bad old' arrogant past.
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I don't buy it. Informed consumers will switch if the Mac meets their needs and the PC doesn't. Everyone else will buy what their more informed friends or family tell them to. The price differential is largely irrelevant, which is just as well because Apple cannot possibly compete against $500 PC notebooks and still retain the same reputation for quality.
Wow. Your 'price differential is irrelevant' statement is definitely not realistic. Yes, Apple can command a premium over Windows PCs, but only to a limited extent. In the bad old days, Apple charged tremendous premiums over PC, and while it got them fat profits, it also really contained their marketshare. Jobs understands that, and has learned some from the past, which is why you see such 'price is irrelevant (Not)' products as the $999 iMac and the Mac Mini. 8)
That said, NO ONE reasonable is suggesting that Apple drop down into eMachines territory- that isn't Apple's strength (for a variety of reasons), they need to be midrange and above. But to say that price doesn't matter is a bit ludicrous. It isn't a coincidence that we're getting as many switchers as we are now- Apple is actually hitting (some) pricepoints and is making switching more reasonable and affordable. That's been smart- and successful. So, let's get even smarter.
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The iMac is not an equivalent product.
Yeahhh, I'm afraid it is. Consult 'Stevie Job's Magic Square'. MacBook is a consumer laptop. iMac is a consumer desktop. They both target... gasp... consumers.
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And how would they benefit from doing this? Would it make any difference to which machine you buy? Will it make more money for them?
Oh, this is pretty obvious. The market is moving increasingly towards notebooks. If Apple had a well-priced notebook and more BTO flexibility, that would be attractive to even more switchers. And Apple would be doing even better marketshare-wise than it is now. We need to get away from the old mentality of trying to milk every last drop from a fixed base, and look at expanding the user base- by a lot. (Without going low-end, if you're worried).
This is the most vulnerable the PC side has been in a long, long time. Apple should take every advantage of it... and then some.
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Depends on our definition of success. The Xbox should have 10 million consoles sold by years end (source TeamXbox)
That's their goal, anyway. But really, even if they made it, the winner in any console generation is the one that sells 100+ million consoles. 10 million just doesn't mean much, and nearly all analysts predict that its not a matter of whether the PS3 passes the 360, but when and by how much.
The PS2 is going to sell well because it's a hundred bucks nows and cheap and plentiful trumps almost all.
Yep. That and the absolutely enormous games library it has.
One thing Sony is not prepared for is the online stuff.
Not really. Sony's 'Playstation Network' initiative looks fairly exciting. I'd expect Sony to match Xbox Live feature for feature going forward. And unlike Live, its... FREE? Whoa.
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The problem with "free" is that in many cases it's worth what you paid. Xbox Live Gold is superior and with the new Marketplace it's a no brainer which platfrom is mature in htis regard.
Add in Media Centre features and you have a potentially superior platform with Microsoft. I really wish Apple had the same strategy here. Their lackadaisical attitude towards gaming is going to cost them in this arena.
Luckily Sony owns Columbia so they have the content ready for a better "paid" online service.
Yes and we know how accurate Analysts can be</sarcasm>
Sorry, but I know a lot of folks IN the gaming industry (helps to live in the SF Bay Area), and I can't find anyone who's been willing to bet $$$ that the 360 is going to win this gen of consoles. A lot of the prob is that the Xbox and 360 are regional, not worldwide phenomenons. They do pretty well in the US, but mediocre in Europe and terrible in Japan. This pretty much cripples their chances for outselling the PS3, right from the get-go. No one serious predicts that 360 will outsell PS3 worldwide.
The problem with "free" is that in many cases it's worth what you paid. Xbox Live Gold is superior and with the new Marketplace it's a no brainer which platfrom is mature in htis regard.
Most reports say that PS Network closes the gap very considerably, to the point of, "Why would I pay for Live?". I don't have too many doubts it'll be the equal of Live before much longer. It's MS's own model, turned against them- copy the leader and shout "Me too!!!" at the top of your lungs.
MS may very well have to cut prices on Live to keep things humming, if Sony keeps PS Network free.
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We'll I'll keep my eye on Live vs PS Network. It should be interesting.
Look, here's the fact: Microsoft has lost a ton of money on XBox...and has lost a ton more on XBox 360. The cheering about MS coming close to manufacturing cost forgets one minor issue: retail margins. Is GameSpot selling these things out of charity?
No, obviously. Even if MS were to get manufacturing down to the cost of the unit, they'd still be losing at least $100 per unit in retail margin. Plus marketing. That's a lot of money to make back in software.
Whatever Apple has planned, it's not as mundane as "a gaming console." Steve Jobs isn't a moron.
There is an opportunity for some sort of device that manages and guides content to TVs ? and maybe plays or downloads games ? DVDs, movies from iTunes, and other net-based video content. And maybe, down the road, full-on IPTV, with the right partner to compete with cable and satellite, once more content shifts to the Internet.
Jobs doesn't look at the playing field as it exists now, instead he looks five years down the road. He's smart and knows video/movies/music/gaming will all be 'Net driven at some point. The company that figures out a: how to make it consumer easy, and b: gets a piece of every transaction, will make a ton of money. I like Apple's chances at that.
Sorry, but I know a lot of folks IN the gaming industry (helps to live in the SF Bay Area), and I can't find anyone who's been willing to bet $$$ that the 360 is going to win this gen of consoles. A lot of the prob is that the Xbox and 360 are regional, not worldwide phenomenons. They do pretty well in the US, but mediocre in Europe and terrible in Japan. This pretty much cripples their chances for outselling the PS3, right from the get-go. No one serious predicts that 360 will outsell PS3 worldwide.
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I wouldn't exactly predict that MS will win. But I'd be prepared to wager that Sony will not win either.
Thc collapse of E3 seems to be a taste of things to come. E3 worked like this. Companies brought huge piles of money. Then set them on fire. The one with the biggest pile of money won. ... sort of.... Suddenly everyone has realised that this is a dumb way to do business.
The games industry is similar. With console manufacture and associated marketing losing money - only massive attach rates can turn console sales into actual profits. MS have screwed-up by not buying key oriental developers (like Square) and wasting cash on turkeys like Rare. But the 360 is a reasonable machine - and avoids many of the design flaws of the original Xbox.
Wheras Sony is a company who suddenly can do nothing right.
The film people and the games people should have enormous synergy. In fact the two divisions are in open conflict. Notice that there never is a Sony game based on a Sony movie.
The core electronics division is reeling from not understanding why people prefer iPods to Walkmen. PSP has floundered. The rootkit debacle shows precisly why Sony should not be allowed out till all senior management are shot. And the Japanese term "loss of face" applies quite literally to anyone who looks too closely at a Sony-made laptop battery.
The PS3 is a quite staggeringly terrible design - Better suited to cracking codes than running actual game code.
Of course Sony could make it a success. Their ace marketing machine made the PS2 successful (in the face of zero opposition.) The PS2 was a hardware so bad that even Sony engineers could not make the interface work without a video glitches. Fire up a PS2 to see what I mean.
So they might make money on the PS3 - but jeezy creezy - they deserve to fail so badly I can taste it.
C.
Oh and ask some actual non-japanese Asians what their favourite game is. And they tend to cite examples based on some obscure Microsoft based hardware/software platform called a XPPC or something.
So by that standard, Microsoft 'deserves to fail' too. Perhaps the Wii should be the sleeper hit? 8)
But no... I'm old enough to remember that Nintendo, back in the day, used to strongarm and bully its dealers like no one before. A lot of retailers positively HATED Nintendo and its gestapo tactics back when Nintendo was in the driver's seat in the console market. So who you gonna root for? They're all corporations, and they all aren't terribly pretty when you check them out up close.
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The biggest question in my mind is what is inside the iTV box.?
Educated guesses would suggest....
* a processor. Prolly an x86.
* Some ram. Some storage - probably a small hard drive.
* A fast network connection to a Mac and then on to the internet
* a media processor / GPU possibly Nvidia based.
* a connection to a TV and sound system
Now this sounds almost identical to a MacMini. Except it has a dedicated GPU (including component out), and doesn't have a Combo drive. Why would it be half the price of the MacMini?
My educated guess at what's inside the iTV...
* a graphics card like ATIs stuff that is also a processor. Basically a media processor / GPU with 512MB of ram, and a bit more brains.
* some storage - probably 2GB of flash memory to cache streaming or downloads.
* wired and wireless network connection to the internet and to your local iTunes (on Mac or PC)
* a connection to TV and sound system.
What they demonstrated doesn't need more, does it?
Unfortunately, it won't play sophisticated games.
But here is the unique feature - the Front Row interface allows you to browse the games store, preview, select and download a game without leaving the couch. A model of distribution which is quite different from the boxed-goods model favoured by MS, EA and Sony.
I don't think that's a unique differentiator. MS and Sony can easily sell games online same as they sell movies online.
However, I do think games & any software being sold online is a natural step in the Internet.
edit: ... I guess a MacMini has a GPU integrated onto the motherboard.
What they demonstrated doesn't need more, does it?
Unfortunately, it won't play sophisticated games.
Not sure what you mean by sophisticated games.
With a current low-end CPU and a current low-end GPU you'd end up with a machine that is more powerful than the original Xbox and certainly more powerful than the (300Mhz 28Mb) PS2.
So Half-Life2 would be a struggle, but Halo2 would be a easy. Something like Shadow of the Colosus would be a breeze. Creating such games is much less easy. Porting them, not so much.
That said, I think going after hard-core gamers would be a mistake. (at least at first).
C.
That being said, the game console idea is not smart to say the least. Microsoft had the money to be very patient. Apple doesn't. Xbox lost a lot of money because they didn't understand that PC gamers and console gamers are different. It took a generation for them to figure that out. I see Apple making the same mistake as well as applying its pricing model which gamers are not likely to pay. Apple does not have first party game studios either. Steve Jobs does have a tendency to go over his head when things are going good and, if true, this could be an example of that.
No. Because that (or an option to upgrade) would be logical.
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No - that would simply eat into their high-end sales. There is an option to upgrade, it's called the MacBook Pro.
Apple probably determined that the number of casual gamers bothered about having a dedicated GPU, and the number of hardcore gamers who a) buy a Mac for gaming and b) can't afford to buy a MBPro is too small to be worth worrying about.
I think it's also worth pointing out the the Intel integrated graphics chip is still a very powerful GPU compared to the dedicated cards that Apple were putting in their high end machines only a couple of years ago. My Core Duo Mini can actually play Quake4 quite acceptably (with some of the effects turned way down obviously) whereas the Radeon 9600 in my 2yo PowerBook struggles with Halo.
When you consider the paltry 4 or 8MB Rage 128s that Apple put in the original iBooks and PowerBook G3s, the new consumer machines actually compare quite favourably as gaming platforms. They're faster than their predecessors, and slower than the pro machines - what more can you reasonably expect?
If Apple were to get serious about gaming, the best move they could make would be to buy transgaming. They specialize in porting titles to both the Mac and game consoles. Having cider be some kind of OSX tool would help Apple a lot and that could be translated to the game console should it be partly based on an OSX/Intel combination.
For Mac OS to be taken seriously as a gaming platform, they need to do more than just faciliate ports of PC titles. We only accept half-assed ports of crappy PC games at the moment because we are so happy to receive even these crumbs of support for our platform, and we know that anything more is too much to hope for.
But the message Apple want to be pushing is that Macs should be the primary development platform. We want games to be written specifically for OS X - which are optimised for it, and which make use of the great technologies such as OpenGL, Core Image and Video, Quicktime, etc.
All Cider does is use Mac OS tech to emulate inferior Windows gui functions, so that at best you end up with a tacky looking Windoze style interface running at Rosetta-like speeds on a machine with higher spec than the original PC it was designed for.
Apple cannot ever conquer the gaming market in this way - certainly it may help them to get a foot in the door, but to win that battle they will have to get things to the point where more games are written exclusively for Mac than for Windows, and where Windows users are being given 2-year-old, rough-around-the-edges ports of popular Mac titles, and moaning about all the cool effects and features that had to be cut because their platform doesn't support them.
A good starting point would be for Apple to invest a few million in optimising their OpenGL drivers, ensuring that there are decent ports of middleware technology such as Havoc (buying them if necessary), and buying up some great independent gaming houses from under Microsoft's nose, much as M$ did to Apple and Nintendo when they bought Bungie and Rare.
Apple could probably afford to buy a few of the main game development and middleware technologies, and then make them available for free to Mac developers whilst charging through the nose for Windows and XBox developers to use them. That would go a long way towards leveling the playing field.
For Mac OS to be taken seriously as a gaming platform, they need to do more than just faciliate ports of PC titles. We only accept half-assed ports of crappy PC games at the moment because we are so happy to receive even these crumbs of support for our platform, and we know that anything more is too much to hope for.
But the message Apple want to be pushing is that Macs should be the primary development platform. We want games to be written specifically for OS X - which are optimised for it, and which make use of the great technologies such as OpenGL, Core Image and Video, Quicktime, etc.
All Cider does is use Mac OS tech to emulate inferior Windows gui functions, so that at best you end up with a tacky looking Windoze style interface running at Rosetta-like speeds on a machine with higher spec than the original PC it was designed for.
I think the game ports would be enough. Reports suggest that the speeds via Cider are not lower than the PC couterpart. As for technologies like Core Image etc, they are fine for the likes of Photoshop but are next to worthless in a game. In fact those technologies are like mini game engines that specialize in doing one task. Full blown game engines handle video, images, audio and 3D. In no way does having the game engine do it all make for tacky stuff. The games that I've seen that used any Mac frameworks looked tacky IMO because for setting some options, they would drop out of the game into an aqua setup window and it looked very out of place.
But I read Cider lets you use Apple technologies anyway.
Apple cannot ever conquer the gaming market in this way - certainly it may help them to get a foot in the door, but to win that battle they will have to get things to the point where more games are written exclusively for Mac than for Windows, and where Windows users are being given 2-year-old, rough-around-the-edges ports of popular Mac titles, and moaning about all the cool effects and features that had to be cut because their platform doesn't support them.
Never going to happen. DirectX is too ingrained in the industry now. What needs to happen is for OpenGL to look far more appealling to developers than DirectX. Not just a little better but significantly better.
It will also never happen because of market share. Developers go where the audience is and this was noticeable when you see the number of games for the PS2 compared to the XBox and Gamecube.
It will also never happen because PCs will always be more cost effective for games, supporting more cards and other upgrades.
Now you've also got Windows and the XBox360 linked together and games are simultaneously going to both platforms. Trying to gain a majority over that is near impossible for Apple and most certainly unnecessary. Most Mac users just want to get close to the number of titles on a PC - they don't need to dominate.
A good starting point would be for Apple to invest a few million in optimising their OpenGL drivers, ensuring that there are decent ports of middleware technology such as Havoc (buying them if necessary), and buying up some great independent gaming houses from under Microsoft's nose, much as M$ did to Apple and Nintendo when they bought Bungie and Rare.
Havok has already been ported I think.
For Mac OS to be taken seriously as a gaming platform, they need to do more than just faciliate ports of PC titles. We only accept half-assed ports of crappy PC games at the moment because we are so happy to receive even these crumbs of support for our platform, and we know that anything more is too much to hope for.
But the message Apple want to be pushing is that Macs should be the primary development platform. We want games to be written specifically for OS X - which are optimised for it, and which make use of the great technologies such as OpenGL, Core Image and Video, Quicktime, etc.
Apple had original content once. They let that company fall into the hands of the dark lord instead of buying Bungie themselves.
All Cider does is use Mac OS tech to emulate inferior Windows gui functions, so that at best you end up with a tacky looking Windoze style interface running at Rosetta-like speeds on a machine with higher spec than the original PC it was designed for.
You'd think, but the Mac gaming experts who have seen cider in action say it works as advertised. I think someone who the game companies trust with unreleased products is a pretty credible source. It has only about a 5% penalty off the windows version while being able to use basically the same codebase as the PC version. If Apple were to offer this for free the way they do xcode, it could be having the Mac version in box with the PC versions.
Apple cannot ever conquer the gaming market in this way - certainly it may help them to get a foot in the door, but to win that battle they will have to get things to the point where more games are written exclusively for Mac than for Windows, and where Windows users are being given 2-year-old, rough-around-the-edges ports of popular Mac titles, and moaning about all the cool effects and features that had to be cut because their platform doesn't support them.
Apple needs to reach parity in both games and hardware first. Apple does not take gaming seriously at all.
A good starting point would be for Apple to invest a few million in optimising their OpenGL drivers, ensuring that there are decent ports of middleware technology such as Havoc (buying them if necessary), and buying up some great independent gaming houses from under Microsoft's nose, much as M$ did to Apple and Nintendo when they bought Bungie and Rare.
Personally If I were Apple, I'd start by acquiring Wideload Games and paying whatever ever it takes to get the Marathon rights from Microsoft. I don't care if another Marathon is made, but as long as Microsoft holds the rights to the most historic Mac gaming franchise, it's a slap in the face to all Mac users.
Apple could probably afford to buy a few of the main game development and middleware technologies, and then make them available for free to Mac developers whilst charging through the nose for Windows and XBox developers to use them. That would go a long way towards leveling the playing field.
I agree. That's why I want them to acquire transgaming.
No - that would simply eat into their high-end sales. There is an option to upgrade, it's called the MacBook Pro.
No, there is another. It's called fark Apple and get a PC notebook. THEY will let you buy a MacBook-priced notebook and upgrade the GPU for moderate added cost.
Its not a good idea for Apple to be inflexible in this competitive a market. There's more and more people taking a peek over the Apple fence and considering switching, but they'll tend not to if Apple pricing and BTO options aren't conducive to it. Apple's just starting to make some good inroads in marketshare, but they could be doing even better.
Also, its worth pointing out that Apple ALREADY offers an option to upgrade the GPU in another consumer line of computers they make- the iMac (20-inch and up). So the whole 'if you want to get a better GPU than stock, go Pro' line of reasoning doesn't really hold.
Apple just needs to extend what they already do with the consumer iMac line to the consumer MacBook line. That would be cool, and helpful to both Apple and the consumer. 8)
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PS, I am not a game developer. I've dabbled in OpenGL and found it passable as an API. I know DirectX handles other things like input very well, but for all I know, Apple's offerings in this category could be on par.
Not this again... the consumer who decides between Mac and PC based on price is a myth. The only people who complain about Mac prices are Mac users who wish their machines were cheaper, and the PC user who wouldn't buy a Mac anyway and is trying to come up with a simple explanation why. Only Apple makes Macs so they can charge what they want for them.
"Its not a good idea for Apple to be inflexible in this competitive a market. There's more and more people taking a peek over the Apple fence and considering switching, but they'll tend not to if Apple pricing and BTO options aren't conducive to it. Apple's just starting to make some good inroads in marketshare, but they could be doing even better."
I don't buy it. Informed consumers will switch if the Mac meets their needs and the PC doesn't. Everyone else will buy what their more informed friends or family tell them to. The price differential is largely irrelevant, which is just as well because Apple cannot possibly compete against $500 PC notebooks and still retain the same reputation for quality.
"Also, its worth pointing out that Apple ALREADY offers an option to upgrade the GPU in another consumer line of computers they make- the iMac (20-inch and up). So the whole 'if you want to get a better GPU than stock, go Pro' line of reasoning doesn't really hold."
The iMac is not an equivalent product. There are plenty of reasons to buy an iMac rather than a Mini or a Mac Pro that have nothing to do with price. They have a different purpose, and so Apple needs to make the options more flexible. There is no real reason to buy a MacBook instead of a MacBook Pro if you can afford it.
"Apple just needs to extend what they already do with the consumer iMac line to the consumer MacBook line. That would be cool, and helpful to both Apple and the consumer. 8) "
And how would they benefit from doing this? Would it make any difference to which machine you buy? Will it make more money for them? Or will you just gripe a bit less? The only possible consequence I can see is that this would mean you buy a MacBook instead of splashing out on the Pro.
Don't get me wrong - I agree that it would be nice if the MacBook had a better GFX chip, but I can't see how it would be in Apple's best interests from a business standpoint, (other than the fact that having better products make their customers happier).
Apple does not take gaming seriously at all.
I think there is some truth in this statement.
Clearly it cannot be defintively stated as Apple is developing games for the iPod.
But it is clear Apple does not take hardcore gaming as seriously as Microsoft. Once you come to that understanding it would answer a lot of question and conjecture over Apple's decisions.
Havok has already been ported I think.
That seems to be controversial. Blizzard use it apparently, but it has been sited as the reason why the latest Myst release and Half life 2 weren't ported:
http://www.macworld.com/news/2004/11/24/uru/index.php
Not this again... the consumer who decides between Mac and PC based on price is a myth. The only people who complain about Mac prices are Mac users who wish their machines were cheaper, and the PC user who wouldn't buy a Mac anyway and is trying to come up with a simple explanation why. Only Apple makes Macs so they can charge what they want for them.
I'm afraid that's archaic, 'bad old Apple' -thinking. It's what Apple used to tell themselves when trying to justify their overpricing and sky-high margins while selling to a fixed base (and they still think this way to some extent, though they've gotten lots better about it).
Apple's making some pretty nice strides in marketshare of late. Not as good as they could be, but there's a significant increase. It's obvious that SOMEONE's switching. Do those folks sound like 'Mac users who wish their machines were cheaper' and 'PC users who wouldn't buy Macs anyway'? Nope. Its folks who looked over the fence and saw something that would work better for them. And we could get even more of those people if Apple showed more flexibility in BTO options, hit more pricepoints in the notebook line, and did not repeat some of the mistakes of the 'bad old' arrogant past.
I don't buy it. Informed consumers will switch if the Mac meets their needs and the PC doesn't. Everyone else will buy what their more informed friends or family tell them to. The price differential is largely irrelevant, which is just as well because Apple cannot possibly compete against $500 PC notebooks and still retain the same reputation for quality.
Wow. Your 'price differential is irrelevant' statement is definitely not realistic. Yes, Apple can command a premium over Windows PCs, but only to a limited extent. In the bad old days, Apple charged tremendous premiums over PC, and while it got them fat profits, it also really contained their marketshare. Jobs understands that, and has learned some from the past, which is why you see such 'price is irrelevant (Not)' products as the $999 iMac and the Mac Mini. 8)
That said, NO ONE reasonable is suggesting that Apple drop down into eMachines territory- that isn't Apple's strength (for a variety of reasons), they need to be midrange and above. But to say that price doesn't matter is a bit ludicrous. It isn't a coincidence that we're getting as many switchers as we are now- Apple is actually hitting (some) pricepoints and is making switching more reasonable and affordable. That's been smart- and successful. So, let's get even smarter.
The iMac is not an equivalent product.
Yeahhh, I'm afraid it is. Consult 'Stevie Job's Magic Square'. MacBook is a consumer laptop. iMac is a consumer desktop. They both target... gasp... consumers.
And how would they benefit from doing this? Would it make any difference to which machine you buy? Will it make more money for them?
Oh, this is pretty obvious. The market is moving increasingly towards notebooks. If Apple had a well-priced notebook and more BTO flexibility, that would be attractive to even more switchers. And Apple would be doing even better marketshare-wise than it is now. We need to get away from the old mentality of trying to milk every last drop from a fixed base, and look at expanding the user base- by a lot. (Without going low-end, if you're worried).
This is the most vulnerable the PC side has been in a long, long time. Apple should take every advantage of it... and then some.
8)
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