A Few Thoughts on Xbox 360
I’ve thought a little more about the MTV launch last night and the deluge of coverage that followed, and I’m still amazed by that “show.” I know it was meant to appeal to other people, not us, but are there people on this planet who are that stupid and shallow? Would ANYBODY think that show was cool? Okay, besides Paris Hilton, the infamous pre-achievement celebrity.Here are a few more questions/comments on the console. First, I saw several notes last night that the CPU’s are liquid-cooled. I was wondering when I looked at the specs how they were going to keep that system cool, and I guess that’s the answer. There’s also some kind of flow control system that increases circulation of the cooling fluid as system temperatures rise. Again, that’s a remarkably high level of design for a video game console.
I think the general consensus (and I would agree) is that the system specs are beastly. People are freaking out because the screenshots they saw aren’t impressive enough, or the two seconds of game footage last night didn’t look fantastic, but that doesn’t mean anything. Those specs all but guarantee that the games are going to look phenomenal, and everyone with dev kits who’s e-mailed me has said that their internal footage of games is nothing short of incredible.
I’ve seen a few people talking about the Dreamcast (because the Xbox is launching before the PS3). Stop already. There is nothing, absolutely nothing, to suggest that this is a Dreamcast replay. Sega had to depend heavily on themselves to produce content for the system. That console was dead the day it was launched (even though I really enjoyed it and have nothing but fond memories of the games). Xbox 360 has a huge amount of third-party developer support. It’s not going anywhere.
And I’ll tell you something else. There was no price announcement last night, and I speculated that $399 was likely, but if they put out this monster at $299, Sony is going to pee all over itself. Sony has to have significant cost issues with their console, given the complexity of the architecture. If Microsoft comes out at $299 in November, then Sony can’t come out at $399 next June. Forget it—no matter how dominant Sony thinks they are, that’s suicide. Microsoft could cut to $249 by then. So the price-point is going to be very, very interesting, and I assume it will be announced next week at E3.
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