Microsoft Considers Making New Xbox Much Less Appealing
from the what-are-they-thinking? dept
One of the cardinal rules of developing a computing (or gaming) platform is nurturing a community of developers who will make lots of software (or games) for that platform. Microsoft is no stranger to this concept; in fact it's one of the secrets to their success. So what's going on with the forthcoming Xbox 360? An exec says that Microsoft hasn't decided whether to make it compatible with its predecessor. He cites "technical issues," specifically a new CPU and graphics processor. You'd think they would have either known better or sorted this issue out already. Incompatibility would render tons of games obsolete, and possibly worse, could alienate developers who will have to decide whether to develop exclusively for the new console (a much more expensive proposition than the previous version) or for both (even more expensive). And we all know what happens when you scare off developers. On the other hand, Sony made the very successful PS2 backward compatible and says it will do likewise with the PS3. If Microsoft doesn't spend whatever it costs to ensure compatibility, they could be facing much bigger costs (or losses) down the road when trying keep up with the competition.
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backwards compatibility
Personally I think it's a mistake (and not just because I have a library of old Xbox games I don't want to discard). But, right or wrong, we won't know the full impact for several months after launch, when the PS3 comes into play and the market makes its decision.
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Re: backwards compatibility
It isn’t about saving $3.00 a unit on the production of the consol… it is about an upgrade path…
It is the same reason a new iPod won’t work on any Mac OS other than X…. Jobs wants to sell more copies of OS X… so he cripples the Mac version of the iPod, to encourage people to upgrade to OS X.
Bill wants you to buy a new copy of all of the games you already own… the way he does that, is to make sure all your old games are useless.
The question isn’t “Are we going to save $3.00 a consol, at the cost of X number of customers” the question is “How much can we screw our customers before they become Sony’s customers?”
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Re: backwards compatibility
If you already own them, don't you have something to play them on?
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HA!
If the PS3 IS backward compatible and the new xbox ISN'T, my games are worthless anyway.
I can tell you my dollars will be going to the system with the largest library available.
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Re: HA!
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Re: HA!
For those of us who don't already have an Xbox, backward compatibility is important.
ANd who in their right mind buys more than 1 Xbox for the same household anyways?
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