"I am not sure what Microsoft can do with its image. After all the things Sony have done to the Europeans it never seems to tarnished its reputation sufficiently to matter."
What things are you referring to about Sony? I can't think of any per se. Later next gen entry & high price are obviously horrible for sales and adoption, but I can't really see them as stains on their reputation. The competition has done great, but the product itself everybody seems to agree is a good product, reliable and with some unique features, MS on the other hand has got the huge stain of hardware failures which I think stopped a lot of people from buying in and I think continues to do. People want a console to play games, not to worry about crashing, noise, or have to take it in for repairs. Also buying a console should be an easy thing, a magical box that just works, not something that you have to worry about getting the one with the falcon chip/hdmi... something I suspect even harder in Europe where due to the slower adoption I'm guessing more of the older models are still in retail channels.
I think ms said so in the past too taht it's shifting focus to Europe, but while for Japan I can put my finger on what they're doing (specific games, pricing...) I can't really see what they're doing to convince people to go away from Sony, something particularly critical to do now as PS3 is starting to get up on it's feet. I'm so very curious how this will play out. Price would be a strong move from MS, but I wouldn't be surprised if Sony at least kept close if that happened.
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"I am not sure what Microsoft can do with its image. After all the things Sony have done to the Europeans it never seems to tarnished its reputation sufficiently to matter."
What things are you referring to about Sony? I can't think of any per se. Later next gen entry & high price are obviously horrible for sales and adoption, but I can't really see them as stains on their reputation. The competition has done great, but the product itself everybody seems to agree is a good product, reliable and with some unique features, MS on the other hand has got the huge stain of hardware failures which I think stopped a lot of people from buying in and I think continues to do. People want a console to play games, not to worry about crashing, noise, or have to take it in for repairs. Also buying a console should be an easy thing, a magical box that just works, not something that you have to worry about getting the one with the falcon chip/hdmi... something I suspect even harder in Europe where due to the slower adoption I'm guessing more of the older models are still in retail channels.
I think ms said so in the past too taht it's shifting focus to Europe, but while for Japan I can put my finger on what they're doing (specific games, pricing...) I can't really see what they're doing to convince people to go away from Sony, something particularly critical to do now as PS3 is starting to get up on it's feet. I'm so very curious how this will play out. Price would be a strong move from MS, but I wouldn't be surprised if Sony at least kept close if that happened.