So this past Tuesday the XBOX 360 came out and sold out. Kinda pissed me off at first. Now it wasn’t so bad that there wasn’t one to be found anywhere, that was expected, especially when I checked after 5pm on release day. Was I going to find one? Not fucking likely. See, what pissed me off more than anything was that just about every retailer decided to make a few bucks instead of offer just the system. It has been a common practice for years now that when a new console comes out, you get the console, a controller, and thats it. Accessories are just that, accessory. You buy extra what you need extra, controllers, memory cards, games, and so forth. The core system which was a base model sans hard-drive and included software capable of playing original Xbox titles was supposed to cost $299. The hard disk and additional software came at an extra $100 premium. The cheapest bundle I found was near $600, with some bundles exceeding $3500. FOR A FUCKING GAME SYSTEM. Now Microsoft’s plan here is the same as usual, take a loss on the system to get it out into the hands of consumers, and make the investment back on accessories and games. With the starting price of the PS3 rumored to exceed $800, someone’s going to have to save the video game industry from itself. The systems cost more than enough, the games are heading north of $60 per unit, and they expect us to buy one 3 years down the line. Might work for a $100 Sega Genesis, not for a $600-$800 console. Tack on the pride of human evolution that broke out into fisticuffs at retailers and consoles that are already crashing everywhere, I think I’ll wait a few months until they get the kinks worked out.
Hell, my Nintendo still works. Sega too. 🙂
