Next Box?!

I believe it would be safe to assume that anybody who regularly reads this site (or just about any other) knows full and well that the Xbox 360 kicked the PlayStation 3 around the playground last year. Naturally, it just makes sense. Sony's dynasty was untouchable last generation, so Microsoft decided that a year-long head start against the competition would level the playing field and force Sony to release their new console—possibly before it was ready. The PS2's one year jump on the opposition did a lot to secure that six year lead. Xbox and GameCube didn't have a chance. The PS2 secured the early adopting chunks of the core gamer market and the lion's share of the third party developers in the first year, and then captured the casual market after a price drop the next year while the other two guys were launching their new machines at full price.

Microsoft had reasons to kill the original Xbox when they did. After Halo 2 and the largest media hype storm of any video game in history, the Xbox had more or less peaked. There was nothing left to say or do that could meet that level of commercial insanity. Also, the machine was poorly built from a production standpoint. The Xbox was made mostly from off-the-shelf PC parts rather than a strict proprietary design. This made cost-cutting difficult and kept Microsoft from cutting a profit from hardware sales. Microsoft wanted a chance to do it right, and with the Xbox 360 (as of fall 2007) they finally turned a small profit. The Xbox was Microsoft's time to learn on the job, so obviously they wanted a chance to start over and play the game right once they knew what they were doing. Gamers appeared willing to let them off the hook that time, so life moved on without much being said about the early death and wasted potential of the first Xbox. Now that Microsoft knows what they are doing and are making money with the 360, you would assume the 360 has a nice long shelf life ahead of it, right? Don't blindly assume that Microsoft intends to follow the old unwritten rule of a 5-6 year hardware lifecycle now that they are industry streetwise.

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