RoQuEr

This is true, isn't it?

Then why don't any of them allow a 3rd party to make a cross platform system, that will play multiple consoles? Since they make all their money from liscencing rights to the games anyway, what risk are they taking?

Groucho

I don't know that any of them have really admitted this. Whenever this discussion is brought up, there are conflicting reports.

young

i think you can reverse engineer the consoles but it's probably not worth it.

i can think of a few reasons why they wouldn't let a 3rd party make the hardware:

quality control
brand recognition
piracy (mods)
price control

similar reasons why apple does business their way.

joshd2012

At this point in production, I don't think Sony is selling their console at a loss. Sony has bascially been setting the price for their console with out pressure from Microsoft or Nintendo. I think they have been making huge profits for a while. As for Microsoft and Nintendo, it is no longer clear. When the consoles first launched, it was easy to figure out the losses, but now, it is hard to tell when they have to lower the price to compete with Sony.

edstein

How many games does it take plus the console cost for these companies to break even? I figure the average person buys 2-3 games a year and rents the rest. I'm sure most of us here buy more like 10 games a year.

al_bundy

How would they make money with a cross platform system? With console lock in they sell dev kits and publish all the games taking their cut. If a third party made the consoles who would the developers go through to make a game?

darkside

For a major publisher like Nintendo it would be no big deal to just publish games, but most of Sony's money comes from licensing their platform to third parties. They couldn't survive without a console. Neither could MS for that matter. They publish few big sellers for the Xbox other than Halo.

Lee Harvey Oswald

The sell their systems at low prices (loss) to get people to buy their system. Then they make their money off the games sold. So they may lose money on their systems sold, but make their profits of the games and accessories.

gcribbs

actually lately I think Sony has also been making a bunch of money on their games.

Sony was down to a manufacturing cost of $177 last year in May. so now i expect they are down even lower to around $150 or so.

So they have been making money on their console for the last year. sure it is only $22 each but it was at least a profit. I am not sure about Nintendo although I would bet they are below $149 maybe even down to the $120 level.

MS is the only one that is above cost. Mainly due to the deals they signed with specific steps down in price at certain sales figures and years of operation which locked in component costs when they launched.

Jerri Blank's Boy

I remember reading that the Gamecube wasn't losing much money even at launch.

tanman

I remember hearing that as well. You have to admit that it is a very efficient sytem as far as cost of components. I am pretty sure that the XBox is still losing money just because of the incredible cost of the components, but hey that is good news for gamers, more bang for your buck. They have deep pockets they can take the hit.

OT: Now the real question is does anyone know how much a cell phone really costs?

Trigger

A few companies have tried this in the past and all have resulted in failure. There are many reasons actually why these companies don't do this. One is name recognition. Another is the simple fact that even if another company could do it a little cheaper, that company would then have to sell the systems at a loss because in addition to manufacturing costs and advertising costs, they have to pay Sony or Microsoft or whatever as well. The only type of situation that could work like this would be where the 3rd party console would be more expensive - like a luxury item. Like the Panasonic version of the Gamecube. There are other reasons, but anyway - these console makers all start off selling systems at a loss to build a large user base - then they make profits off the games. Eventually, the consoles usually become profitable themselves.

joltaddict

Youre confused about how liscencing works.

Companies pay to publish to a console.

Michael Corvin

I remember reading this a while back, my memory is fuzzy so if anyone else knows please add on...

Another thing MS pays for for each system is right to use Dolby Digital. Dolby makes money on each XB sold. That is why Nintendo went with a different audio format. Cheaper.

Josh H

Nintendo went with Dolby Pro Logic II. If MS has to pay to use Dolby Digital, I'm sure Nintendo has to pay to use Pro Logic II as well.

I don't see why either would have to pay Dolby though. Neither system decodes either format, you have to have a receiver to do that. I could see maybe game developers having to pay if they put the formats in their games, but not the consoles as all they do is read the discs and send the info to the receiver.

Kainan

Young said it best. This pretty much covers my opinion exactly.

As far as who is losing and who is making money, I think MS is the only one losing at this point. I know that Sony lost for a full year BEFORE the Xbox ever hit though so when you think about whether the Xbox will be losing in a year it is a tough call. There is no doubt that MS is the biggest money loser here because they set out to give the best console package out there. Sony went the middle of the road and Nintendo took the cheapie route. This is all my opinion of course but I think most would agree.

tanman

It's not cheapie, its efficient

Seriously though, since the GCN can handle any PS2 game and most XBox games (come on developers push that hardware!) I don't really care what components they have. As long as it is reliable. plus there is less to break down.

But yes they definately took the more "economical" route. Understandable since they don't have as deep pockets as the other two. I still think they put out a great product though.

Kainan

Don't get me wrong, I believe Nintendo put out a good system that is doing what it was designed to do. The GC is a games only machine and not a game/dvd/multimedia machine. One thing I will say however is that there have been SEVERAL games that have actually played worse on the GC than on the PS2 much less the Xbox version. I don't know why this is but it is the truth according to many reviews. I believe that the last SSX game was on of them ones that pointed out the GC version playing the worse due to frame rate drops.

Josh H

The reason is due to shoddy ports. Need for Speed 2 is another great example, as the PS2 version looked great, and the X-box and GC versions looked terrible and had horrendous slowdown.

Developers know that most of their sales are going to be on the PS2, so they focus most of their attention on that version. I mean the PS2 has like a 50 million world-wide installed base, compared to 9-10 million for the X-box and GC combined, so their reasoning is well founded.

They focus on the version that will sell the best, and then rush out ports for the other consoles to get some extra $ for the few gamers that don't own a PS2.

Plus, even when they take their time on the ports, the game engine was designed for the PS2 and won't take advantage of the X-box or GC's extra power much if at all (the "lowest common demoninator" effect).

Kainan

Josh, I don't mean to analyze your post here but you just pointed out what is probably the ONLY port in the entire Xbox library that the PS2 counterpart is known to be better than. This is misleading to say the least.

I propose a different way to look at things. The developers design the game for the weakest system which is the PS2 and then add what they have time for on the ports. It could be seen as more difficult IMO to port down due to high expectations. I will bet it took more time to port Splinter Cell down to the PS2, which still lost a ton of shadowing/lighting detail and special effects than it took to port Hitman 2 to the Xbox from the PS2. With the conversion to the Xbox you are dealing with a system that is easier to develop for with more power. Kick that puppy up to 480p (for HDTV people like me) and sharpen the textures a bit and you have it shipped out in no time. If you start low then you aren't forced to go under the skin of a game and start removing polygons to fit on an inferior system (my opinion). Anyway, to me NFS2 did nothing more than show the laziness of EA towards the Xbox and GC. Everyone knows that EA is in bed with Sony (not meant in a bad way as this is business) so it is kind of expected.

Josh H

I didn't mean it as a bash of the X-box.

Nor the developers. If I was them I wouldn't bother much with the GC or X-box versions either.

As is we either get half assed ports on the GC and X-box like NFS 2, or ports that just have slightly tweaked graphics that in no way take advantage of the extra power of either system.

Of course it took more time to port Splinter Cell to the PS2, companies are going to spend more time when porting something from the x-box/GC to PS2. As you said, it's probably tougher to get it to run on a less powerful system than it is to slightly tweak the graphics when porting it to a more powerful system. Also, the PS2 has a huge user base, so they want to get it right as they know they'll likely sell more copies of the PS2 port than the original on the GC or X-box. Ubi Soft really stuck it to MS with Splinter Cell IMO. They made them pay for a time exclusivity deal,and then put out very good ports on the competition. It's likely many just waited for the ports rather than buying an X-box to play the game a few months earlier with better graphics.

tanman

I won't be as nice as Josh and outrightly blame the developers. It is just an unwillingness to take the time and do a decent port. It has nothing to do with the hardware otherwise the XBox version would look better than the Cube and the Cube better than the PS2 consistently.

If they are going to be lazy about the programming then I will speak with my dollars and not buy. I think that is one of the detriments to the Nintendo systems. Nintendo owners generally buy few 3rd party games so dev spend less time on them which causes owners to buy even less 3rd party games. I mean come on, if the choice is between a half a$$ port of Shrek or great original exclusive game such as Pikmin, Zelda, RE0 etc etc. which will the people choose? Good ports do work though. I believe SpiderMan and LotR sold well across all three systems (taking into account user base of course). I developers take the time then people will buy.

Josh H

I think the thing with Nintendo owners not buying 3rd party ports is simply due to the fact that not many gamers own only a Nintendo system.

I mean I'm a die hard Nintendo fan, but I had a playstation last generation and then a Dreamcast to complement the N64, and a PS2 this generation to complement the PS2.

Nintendo has just done a shoddy job the last 2 generations of getting 3rd party support (they improved a little this time with RE, but that's not really my cup of tea), thus Nintendo fans like me just buy their consoles to play their games and some second party stuff, and buy another console to get the third party exlusive and superior verisions of most multi-platfrom 3rd party games.

Kainan

Well said Josh. Nintendo basically hung themselves with many developers during the N64 days by forcing the use of CARTS and forcing developers to buy 100,000 of them before they could make a game. They made many developers angry and this did nothing but help Sony make that huge leap in the console wars. Nintendo did it to themselves.

goLUCKY

Hit the nail on the head! Well said.