Califer said,

I shouldn’t have even done the last generation. I have a Wii with two games, and a XBox360 with zero games that I only got to do XBLIG (Spoiler alert: I didn’t make enough to cover the cost of the 360 on sale).

PC on the other hand. I have more games there than I have time to play.

Xian said,

I really don’t prefer one console over the other, but this time I think Sony has the upper hand, at least out of the gate. Their unveiling was completely different than the Xbox One – they came out strong on the gaming front.

The one cool thing I saw recently about the new Xbox One was not even shown during their presentation – Illumiroom
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W9aKQqE1MKw

I think the name is going to cause some confusion among consumers too. One thing I had heard at the 360 launch was that they didn’t call it the Xbox 2 because they didn’t want to be perceived as being behind the PS3, 2 vs 3. Now it’s going to be PS4 vs XB1. Some consumers might even think that the 360 is the later model, after all it comes after 1.

Xenovore said,

@Xian: Agreed on the naming. What happened to the rumored “XBox 720”? It makes logical sense and looks/sounds much cooler. “XBox One”? Boring, unimaginative, ostentatious even.

Walter said,

I already have an Xbox 1, Microsoft, and it sounds a million times better than than the new One you’re promoting. (Though I would have appreciated that backwards compatibility with the Dreamcast that Sega was begging you for.)

alanm said,

Never owned a console. I’ve never seen the point of paying more for a worse gaming experience and a more limited selection of games. Over the long term, walled gardens will always fail.

TheBuzzSaw said,

This post is spot on. Microsoft needs to be confronted about its lies. It wants prospect customers to swallow the online requirement under the guise that we live in a world where “everything requires an Internet connection”. As you’ve so elegantly outlined, that is simply not the case. None of my devices give me attitude about a lack of Internet connectivity. Sure, I lose a feature or two, but the bulk of the product works fine.

Microsoft, enlighten me: what does the XBONE require Internet for? No, don’t give me your canned responses of “updates”, “bringing you the best service”, etc. What part of the XBONE *cannot* function without Internet?

Anima said,

Actually I read an article yesterday that Microsoft has patented the technology to bill a streamed film according to how many people are watching it. And I don’t mean how many TVs. They use the kinect camera for that, by identifying individual people in front of the TV.
While a patent doesn’t mean all that much, you can see the hopes of the executives shining trough.

Does that count as more creative stuff?

Anon said,

@Anima
Jep, read that too. It was sometime in 2012 so they (Microsoft) went in prepared. Naturally. Which is why Kinect2 comes with every console even though “core gamers” *will* opt for the gamepad >90% of the time.

Older folks remember that MS desperately tried to go into the TV business, with MSNBC being something of a second choice after they couldn’t establish their own big network.
I guess selling out the audience is the way to go nowadays – they are only following Google, Facebook etc., after all: You don’t need to provide the content, the user is! And then you sell it to the advertising industry or directly to your clients (Microsoft owns image libraries – why shouldn’t they build their own ad agency?).

And for the record: I strongly(!) believe the PS3 is already doing this to some effect and expect the PS4 to follow suit.
Why? There is way too much activity on the network connection and especially if I have just watched a movie…
The difference is that my PS3 doesn’t have a camera or a microphone connected to it – and neither will a potential PS4 in my living room (haven’t decided yet by a long shot).

I absolutely don’t see myself needing voice commands to switch the damn thing on etc.! I don’t see a more efficient way to operate a home entertainment system than with a good remote control. In fact I’m using a Harmony One (ha ha) right now with my PS3 and stuff.

A quadriplegic may see this differently but I doubt that a games console with a movement sensor will be his first choice anyway…

The truth is of course that voice control is nothing more than the “trojan horse sales argument” to market the console.
It’s just like back then when we Germans were forced to accept the Euro as our new currency. Their trojan horse argument was that there was no need for currency exchanges when doing holiday trips (we Germans travel a lot). This was of course true for European countries that use the Euro but the real consequence was that while the wages were converted accordingly many products got a hefty price increase.

The only party to really profit from the new currency were of course the big corporations that import a lot of stuff and generally handle money in other countries. For them the value of money did increase – for us poor citizens it was the other way round…

So, back to the Xbone: What we will see is some people relishing this gimicky function (showing off to family and friends) and most of them ignoring it – all the while the microphones and the cameras are still pointed at them. I wonder if it is even possible to operate the console without them?

About backward compatibility:

I don’t care either way as I only have an Xbox “1” and no 360.
However, I do think that Don Mattricks statement (“you are really backwards”) is incredibly arrogant and a piss poor choice of words. If I were a 360-owner I wouldn’t even consider the Xbone now!

If you don’t believe me (even though I’m an old fart and no highschooler with hot hormones): I won’t prolong my paid Flickr-account thanks to their new product and pricing strategy, which CEO Marissa Mayer defended with the same tactics: “There’s no such thing as Flickr Pro today because…there’s really no such thing as professional photographers anymore.”
So much for the funny antics of Yahoo!, mother company of Flickr…

I can understand a company like Adobe intentionally letting customers go with their new strategy (Creative Cloud only) but at least handle it professionally and not in a customer degrading manner!

Obviously the new American business manager breed tries to spearhead the field with aggressiveness and open arrogance now. Soft skills, good communication – the things the very same persons expect from their employees is apparently nothing they need to care about any longer.