Or, perhaps, more tellingly, reasons why this won’t be happening anytime soon, regardless of the fight that Sony’s PSN starts to put up.Let’s face it, Sony’s offering, for free, is beginning to pick up a little bit of speed, the re-launch was a success and there is more Sony specific content headed to the PSN network. Home, if it ever decides to truly make an appearance has the potential to be a service that hundreds of thousands of PC users would be glad to shell out ten plus dollars a month to use. Sony, to its infinite credit, is not going to be charging for Home. Even Nintendo is starting to get her online ducks in a row, though I wish somebody would turn friend codes sideways before shoving them up Reggie’s …
While neither network has the functionality of Xbox Live, Sony’s attempt is at least building momentum; why then won’t Microsoft be forced to drop the subscription required to play games online? Well, the answer has to do with ignorance and hardcore gamers (which, like it or not, if you’re reading this you probably are).How many soccer moms paying for Jimmy’s Xbox Live subscription have any idea what the PSN will be able to do for free, or how many parents working the grind have the time to sit and research another system or realize that they might be able to get the same value for free somewhere else? These families already have the Xbox 360 established as the online platform for their household; and it only seems natural to pay Microsoft 50 dollars every thirteen months or so. I am guessing on the numbers here (don’t have hard data) but I would estimate that four million Xbox Live subscribers fall into this category. They like the service and they don’t really have the knowledge to question what it is they are paying for, or why they are paying for the service that might be free elsewhere.
The other point Microsoft has in her favor is the limited number of hardcore gamers out there.
When it comes to protesting something unfair our voice is able to be heard loud and clear (thank you Lono!), but we truly lack the numbers to make a difference on a service as large as Xbox Live. Maybe five percent of the gaming population realizes the differences between Xbox Live and the PSN network are shrinking. These are the persons that would be willing to drop Xbox Live for the PSN, and most likely these gamers are passionate enough about their hobby that they will be able to invest in a PS3. Still, not all of their friends list will be able to migrate over with them and I could see even the most ardent PS3 supporters (ala Rothbart) keeping Xbox Live to stay in contact with their 360 gaming brethren.
Still, regardless of what the industries hard core game players choose to do there are far too many soccer moms and dads that have Little Jimmy plugged in to Xbox Live to give Microsoft any incentive to change their billing policies.
Can you tell who has a subscription that is coming up?
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15 responses so far ↓
1 lost989 // May 7, 2008 at 1:29 pm
XBL for free……. is this fiction friday
i’ve never experienced XBL but i’ve never heard of any issues with it so if i had a 360 i’d be willing to pay for reliability
2 irish boy90 // May 7, 2008 at 1:44 pm
“i’ve never heard of any issues ”
I was here when there were articles about when XBL went down.
so yeah there have been issues.
3 thefriendlyghost // May 7, 2008 at 1:52 pm
only 1 major issue in December and one minor issue last month after the major update. PSN has had many many issue, GTA VI need a patch just to work on PSN. Not XBL on day 1 I was able to play online and without freezing issue.
So of course I ratter pay for RELIABILITY which i get from MS no matter what the problem.
4 akkarin128 // May 7, 2008 at 2:11 pm
While your opinion is…interesting, I’d love to see some sort of facts on this issue? 5%? Hardly. You really think that few people know what they’re putting their money into? I think you’ll find it’s not ignorance, it’s a lack of interest. Frankly they just don’t care. When you look at the price of XBL, it’s not any more than the difference between the price of the consoles anyway. As well as that they’re getting a more stable, (seemingly) more secure and better integrated system to use.
Seems fair tbh. This coming from a primarily PC gamer, by the way. Ideally I wouldn’t be paying for any sort of thing like this, but I can certainly see why people pay for XBL.
5 akkarin128 // May 7, 2008 at 2:13 pm
@irish boy
You’re seriously going to claim a couple days downtime as ‘issues’ ? I think at most it was down for a day each time? Really, people are not aware of what to expect if they want 100% uptime. Never, ever going to happen.
6 Lono // May 7, 2008 at 2:22 pm
While I was pissed at the time, we’re talking about three or perhaps four days total of issues. Let’s keep that in perspective… 3 or 4 days out of 365…
Dang, you people are harsh…
7 Anski // May 7, 2008 at 2:38 pm
@thefriendlyghost
GTA4 needed a patch on PS3 because R* messed something up. The PSN was -not- the issue there, it was working perfectly. The game was polling the GTA servers and locking up, it had nothing to do with the PSN other than it wouldn’t try to poll the servers if you weren’t logged into it.
8 Riki // May 7, 2008 at 4:15 pm
Econ 101: Supply and demand.
People are willing to pay for access to xbox live. The issue for consumers (demand) isn’t whether or not microsoft could afford to make it free or if the competition is getting closer. For consumers, the question is whether it is worth $50 a year to play xbox games online. Obviously millions of gamers think so.
If microsoft (supply) made live free, they would be out a crap load of money. It is worth it to them to lose a little bit of business in order to rake in the dough.
So, is a time coming (in the foreseeable future at least) when microsoft will decide that they are going to make more money with free online gaming rather than a $50 a year subscription service? Not in this generation. The price of a subscription is tiny compared to the price of trying to switch consoles. They have a large enough share of the market that they can milk live accounts for all they are worth, even if the networks were the deciding factor for a significant portion of gamers.
Now, if sony and/or nintendo get their networks up to microsoft’s level, then they might feel the heat going into the next generation. In that case, they may want to consider changing their strategy, finding other ways to empty our wallets, and at least dropping the price. Maybe.
9 CrouchingGekco // May 7, 2008 at 6:30 pm
Does the PS3 have voice chat in every game?
10 Leewow AUS // May 7, 2008 at 9:23 pm
Think about it because we pay for Xbox live thats giving the programmers more money. more money equals harder workers, if we didn’t pay MS that problem over Christmas wouldn’t have been fixed as fast as it did if they were hardly getting payed because they wouldn’t be working as hard because it was there vacation time
I reckon if people had to pay for PSN, PSHome probably would have been released very soon
11 Lurkero // May 7, 2008 at 9:29 pm
Okay, I’m sure it is greater than 5%. If you’re gonna throw out random percentages make them believable.
You also forgot to mention the install base of XBL before 360 was released, and it’s reliability. [although its unclear whether its because of the money, or because Sony is inexperienced with online services].
12 Meresin // May 8, 2008 at 1:31 am
Sony still has a long way to go. Sure, Home’s coming…Next year. In-game XMB? Who knows? To my knowledge, they haven’t said anything about it recently except to let us all know when it *isn’t* going to be in a firmware update.
Sad thing is, the vast majority of PS3 gamers would be happy with in-game XMB. Home sounds cool, but it’s not critical. Having a polished, integrated online experience is, and that’s what is lacking - 3D avatars we can do without for now.
13 RK1 FaMiCuS // May 8, 2008 at 10:41 am
@cheap people
Seriously people, it’s $4.17 a month. If you can’t afford it maybe you should b*tch at the internet companies who charge around $30 - $60 a month and make you share you internet connection speed (cable) with everyone in your neighborhood.
@the (it should be reliable because we pay for it) people
Really, you spent over $400 on machine that is known for RROD and disc drive failures. No I’m not Xbox 360 hater, I actually love my Xbox 360 and it is the only system I want to be gaming on.
14 NoneOfYourBusiness // May 8, 2008 at 11:46 am
I think XBL users should get XBL for free for having to undergo the horror and shame that is Undertow. No gamer deserves that.
I like how people are associating 360 with reliablilty. I sure XBL was and for some may currently be worth shelling out money, but last I checked you needed a 360 to use Live. And last I checked it was called the Red Ring of Death, not the Red Ring of Reliable Hardware.
15 Platinum_Seet // May 9, 2008 at 4:51 pm
I say keep it at $50 when little Jimmy’s parents can’t afford it anymore and make him play PS3 that’s one less kid in my ear while I’m driving 100mph running down bastards in GTAIV….
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