Poll: How well do you think the Xbone will sell? (Especially considering DRM scandal)

[Pebkio]

I have very little faith in my fellow gamers. The Xbox One will get millions of sales on the first day. Microsoft will come out and express how they're not getting the sales they thought they were so assholes like us can feel vindicated for being so cynical. Meanwhile, at least half of everyone on the Escapist is going to buy it despite the general mood of disgust.

I am so sick of this rigamarole. Gamers do not know how to vote with their wallets. We saw this with the Battlefield micro-transactions thing. Everyone acts all indignant about the horrible business practices but yet they still fork over all their cash. This is going to be no different.

This is why, to me, console gaming is dead. Not because people aren't going to buy it... it's because people ARE going to buy it no matter what shady things go down. They will always be supported and they're going to just get even worse from here on out.

 

[Erttheking]

I have very little faith in my fellow gamers. The Xbox One will get millions of sales on the first day. Microsoft will come out and express how they're not getting the sales they thought they were so assholes like us can feel vindicated for being so cynical. Meanwhile, at least half of everyone on the Escapist is going to buy it despite the general mood of disgust.

I am so sick of this rigamarole. Gamers do not know how to vote with their wallets. We saw this with the Battlefield micro-transactions thing. Everyone acts all indignant about the horrible business practices but yet they still fork over all their cash. This is going to be no different.

This is why, to me, console gaming is dead. Not because people aren't going to buy it... it's because people ARE going to buy it no matter what shady things go down. They will always be supported and they're going to just get even worse from here on out.

Gamers aren't some hive mind that all think in unison.

 

[Avalanche91]

An escapist who'se name eludes me mentioned what he dubbed; a little timmy scenario. And I can see it. Obviously not the verbatim theory but:

Step 1) Parents who are less console savvy will buy their child a shiny new toy to distract him from microwaving the cat

Step 2) A lot of parents will be surprised when they see all the requirements, restrictions, or when they Xbone turns into a brick after a few hours.

Step 3) Consumer Outrage/Mainstream Media Attention

Microsofts console will sell incredibly well untill stage 3. There will be quite a few little timmy's but it is a calculated risk Microsoft made, and they are willing to bet the outrage wont be bad enough to cause significant losses.

So yes, I begrudgingly think the Xbone will sell well......Just not with the hardcore/console savvy crowd.

EDIT: Also; how well do you think the XBONE will sell: yes/no? Dafuq?

 

[Demandred20]

My worries are that Xbone might be declared the winner by default with Sony being in the gutter with their finances. The lifetime of the PS4 might be short if people and devs abandon it. Assuming the rumours about their financial viability is true.

 

[Entitled]

IF, and ONLY IF the average Escapist sticks to their word regarding not buying it. It's fairly common in gaming to scream "Boycott" and then buy it quietly anyway.

My friend's list if full of such hypocrites regarding Call of Duty, Mass Effect, and Dragon Age.

For this reason alone, I think the Xbone will sell well.

This goes both ways, there were plenty of games that's direction the average hardcore gamer was pretty cynical about, that indeed ended up selling below expectations, like Resident Evil 6, Dead Space 3, Syndicate, or Warfighter.

Even if someone on an online forum crying "boycott" would be an ineffective way of predicting failure, it would hardly be a countereffective way, so that you can use it as an inndicator predicting success.

This is like saying "Last time my magic 8 Ball said that the Republicans would win the election and they still lost, and this time it says the same that they will win, therefore I think that they will lose again."

No, it's not even really like that. A magic 8 Ball is entirely random, while whether or not hardcore gamers like a game is indeed the indicator of a corporation failing to appeal to a certain audience. Maybe it's sometimes a weak indicator, as hardcore gamers can be circumvented, but it's still a bad sign, and it needs proof of WHY another audience would like the Xbox One.

 

[Entitled]

Of course it will sell - it's a fucking Xbox. 90% of the people will buy it simply because it says "Xbox" on it, not knowing or caring about the DRM, and the remaining 10% will be the "Well my friend has one so even though I don't like the DRM I got one to play with him" crowd.

The other Xbox 1 also said "Xbox" on it, and it sold one third of the 360.

The word "xbox" is not a magic spell, it's a brand name that worked well on exactly one product.

The WiiU also had a brand name. So did the Playstation 3, The Sega Dreamcast, and The Atari 7800.

 

[Entitled]

People on this site are gamers (obviously) so will not like the way the XO is going, but Microsoft is aiming at a huge demographic and I wouldn't be surprised if it outsold the PS4, which isn't really aiming for any demographic.

If only business success would be as easy as deciding to aim at a large demographic...

The Zune was also aiming at a large demographic. So was the Segway. And the Virtual Boy.

 

[Jabbawocky]

well here in the UK the xbox one has already broken pre order records at Blockbusters so that may be some indication

In fairness Blockbuster havn't been trading in hardware all that long. It wouldn't be hard for them to break records within their own brand.

 

[rasputin0009]

Microsoft knows how to market. It will sell well. They can approach it like it's the greatest innovation ever to television for the regular joe who doesn't game, and they can also sell it as the best Halo and CoD box to the average gamer. They are risking that hardcore install base with the DRM fiasco, but I think we're weak people for new, shiny games so a majority of us will buy it anyways (SimCity, Diablo 3 still sold very well).

The only thing that will slow sales is if hackers can bring down servers for more than 2 weeks (Oh, they will try), and it pissing off the average joe, who will tell everybody else in their book club that it's a waste of money.

Or the PS4 could sell so well that it chokes Microsoft's share of the market. Which would suck in the long run because that means less competition.

EDIT: Added a 3 to the end of Diablo for clarification between the two games. Because not smart people still might think that the original is relevant in that sentence.

 

[the_retro_gamer]

I will say yes for it selling well. But those sales will quickly die down due to word of mouth because people will get to see the red tape that microsoft decided to put on their console. But time will tell if this system will succeed or tank.

 

[fix-the-spade]

Please don't rant on the Xbox One here; we're all very aware how crappy the 24-hour online thingy and used games situation is. Rather, purely on a business level, do you think Microsoft will find themselves regretting the current situation once the console is released?

I think it will sell great initially, but they're going to have a huge problem with returns.

Most people aren't tech savvy, they'll buy it (or their kids will demand it) and assume it works like every other games console. Fast forward fourty eight hours and they're back at Gamestop or wherever demanding their money back because they don't have broadband, or they won't let it on their connection, or they don't have wireless, or XBL is down or any one of another dozen reasons has left them with an unusable console.

Many won't bother with the manual, they'll just declare it broken and go back for a refund, which is going to burn.

Captcha: ready, set, go.... lol

 

[Something Amyss]

That could partially be due to the fact that there aren't substitutes for those games. If you want to play Dragon Age, well you've got to suck it up and buy Dragon Age. If you want to game on a console, lucky for you there are two of them (three if you are considering a Wii U).

That doesn't change the total hypocrisy of calling for a boycott, demanding we not buy, then buying in silence.

Of course, you might have people in the situation where all their friends have Xbones, and to play with them you need to get one. In that case, there are no substitutes.

Nor does that.

In both instances, don't say you're not going to buy one and then buy one. I get it. Boycotting can be hard if you're the average gamer: selfish and self-entitled. But don't add to that by then becoming a liar and a hypocrite, too. None of these games are essential.

In fact, you know what? That's why game publishers are such authoritarian bitches about their products. They know that they are a luxury item and that we can stop at any time. They know that even the spoiled, "first world problems" crew can dry up if mommy and daddy won't buy them new games or if their minimum wage job at McDonalds dries up. So they panic. Cable companies used to be the same way: utilities tended to give you a larger grace period, but the cable company? If you were half a second later they'd breathe down your neck because "luxury good." They were so scared of losing you they'd lose thei minds.

If we treated games like a luxury good (which it is), game companies would have absolutely no power over us. But we don't, so they do. Power we give them. Power we enforce when we undermine our own boycotts. And even if it was "different," we'll still see people buy the Xbone for the next Halo or whatever else Microsoft snags as an exclusive, so it being software is meaningless.

Look, maybe I'm no different. My only active refusal to buy from a company ended prematurely when THQ went out of business. And even still, odds are I won't buy anything from Volition until the same conditions are met, but I don't know how far my mettle will ever be tested. But I have no plans to buy the XBone, and my latest investments i my PC kind of bear that out. I might still buy 360 games for Multiplayer, but I have no interest in a console where I have to pay a 400 dollar (estimate) entry fee to be treated worse than the free Steam Service, or GoG, or what have you.

This isn't so much a systemic boycott as it is disinterest, but I'd be willing to bet I won't have an Xbone in a year. Or two. Probably even five. And since I don't really care about their exclusives, it's no big deal for me to just skip it. I might skip consoles this gen entirely, depending on the PS4. But at the same time, don't be deluded into thinking they're much different; they've been deliberately vague about updates and how they work and they've said DRM is up to the publishers (in response to "always on" questions). People are giving them the benefit of the doubt despite having nearly as bad press relations as Microsoft.

I'd wait and see before I determined there were really two choices here (three if you count the Wii).

 

[rasputin0009]

And I know there are a number of God Gamers out there who will buy it just so they can gain an upper hand over the Gaming Master Race and have every console instead of only a PC

What the f...? God Gamers? The console wars got weird since the last time I checked in...

 

[Fox12]

Word of mouth will hurt the console. Hardcore gamers are a minority, butt they're a vocal minority. Out of my main friends of around six guys I hangout with, I'm probably the only hardcore gamer, and I told them how terrible this console is. Word of mouth is the best advertising for anything, but it can also ruin a product. Even my dude-bro friends are less than excited about it.

The system will be very successful at launch, but the sales will then taper off as consumers lose interest. The frat boy demographic won't swarm to a machine that requires a daily internet connection if their college barely gets internet, will they? Theses people barely buy games as it is, and even the ones they do play are often used. All they want is COD, FIFA, MADDEN, or maybe HALO, and never all of them at once. The game sales, as a whole, will taper off and die.

As a whole

 

[Fox12]

the system will sell modestly, but it won't be a major success like the 360.

 

[Something Amyss]

This goes both ways, there were plenty of games that's direction the average hardcore gamer was pretty cynical about, that indeed ended up selling below expectations, like Resident Evil 6, Dead Space 3, Syndicate, or Warfighter.

That's not "going both ways." RE6 sold roughly 5 million as was deemed a failure. Dead Space 3 was set to sales expectations of over five million just to consider continuing the franchise. You might as well include Tomb Raider in this list. Or any other SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEENIX title that was "disappointing."

Yes, you can argue that they sold worse than their predecessors (in a couple cases), but the sales predictions were unrealistic and the outcomes are still in sync with that. But I think you're on about something different entirely here, so...

Even if someone on an online forum crying "boycott" would be an ineffective way of predicting failure, it would hardly be a countereffective way, so that you can use it as an inndicator predicting success.

This is like saying "Last time my magic 8 Ball said that the Republicans would win the election and they still lost, and this time it says the same that they will win, therefore I think that they will lose again."

It's more like saying "Gamers have demonstrated they will buy anyway, and even Entitled's claims demonstrate games that sold pretty damn well like Resident Evil 6, so I have a foundation for a speculative opinion that it will sell well."

But hey, don't let actual statements get in the way of imagined ones.

I'm not trying to be a scientific predictor here. Speaking of....

No, it's not even really like that. A magic 8 Ball is entirely random, while whether or not hardcore gamers like a game is indeed the indicator of a corporation failing to appeal to a certain audience. Maybe it's sometimes a weak indicator, as hardcore gamers can be circumvented, but it's still a bad sign, and it needs proof of WHY another audience would like the Xbox One.

Can you actually demonstrate it's the hardcore base that's shunning these games? I'm betting you can't, because that would be an impressive feat. Not quite the saga of Hercules, but it would be impressive nonetheless.

To recap, you're offering a counterclaim to a claim I'm not making while making a claim on the nature of the sales in question that appears to be based in assumption. And somehow, you're questioning my logic (the logic you're disputing not being my own)?

Huh. That's...odd.

I've said it before and I'll say it again: a lot of what gamers are calling "victories" are not gamers standing up and fighting so much as the games industry over-extending themselves. It's their game to lose, and they're losing it. They're predicting twenty million sales or whatever on a sequel to a game that only made two or three (and I use "only" in comparison) and then gamers cheer when the game still sells twice as many units as before because "we sure showed them buy only buying the new game two to one over the last one! WOOHOO!"

To borrow from Jim Sterling, game companies need to understand that having a higher number at the end of a title is not a guarantee of higher sales. But I think also, gamers need to be reminded of the same, as a lot of the "failures" expressed here are predicated on the projections that come from a corporate need for rapid growth to please shareholders. THQ, Ubisoft and CDProjekt all value(d) their bases as comparable or greater to the install base of the Call of Duty franchise, a franchise that sets records pretty much every year. EA wants Call of Duty sales, and sets projections in that ballpark. And that's the problem.

I would like those numbers on hardcore gamers, though. Until I have some sort of real numbers, though, I'll tend to look at the rather lukewarm response the casual market had towards a lot of these games and just go "hmmmm...."

correlation doesn't indicate causation, but correlation is enough to investigate further or hypothesise.

You are right about one thing, though. Even if the Xbone sells well, it won't be because of my opinion on the matter. My opinion exists regardless of any future data gathered on sales. It's speculation, as this thread asked for.

 

[Something Amyss]

-snip-

"Excuse me?"

"What does God need with a console?"

 

[Darquenaut]

I think it will sell well enough out the gate and have a few good months. However, there will be some kind of manufacturing error like the PS2 had and the 360 did and all the naysayers will say the console is DOA.

A few months in, probably six-eight months in, there will be an announcement that they didn't meet their primary goal, and all the naysayers will call it a failure and doomed to fall. A few others will claim this will signify the end of Microsoft as a whole.

One year in, Microsoft will quietly change the formatting of the Xbone to be close to what the Naysayers have been complaining about. Naysayers will continue to state it is not good enough online, while quietly playing their Xbox One's they bought during the first few months.

So, par for the course, I figure.