Crackling Karraker fires back at Microsoft’s Xbox 360 Elite
When Sony announced the PlayStation Home service for the PlayStation 3, Microsoft was rather quick to bash it, saying that it’s not even game-centric. So after confirming the long-rumored Xbox 360 Elite, MS should expect the same from its rival company. This time, the guns were fired by David Karraker, Senior Director of Corporate Communications for Sony Computer Entertainment America (SCEA).
The official said that this move will not, in any way, increase MS’ market share. If anything, releasing a third SKU will diminish it as it will ultimately eliminate existing Core consumers. Karraker even said that Microsoft should focus on expanding its demographic outside its 10 million-strong user base. And then Karraker explained,
We’re focused on reaching out to the mass market beyond the hardcore gamer, through things like LittleBigPlanet, through Home, through the network. We view every single PlayStation consumer as an elite consumer. Meaning no one is going to get shortchanged at the end of the day, whether they bought one on day one or just yesterday.
It should be remembered that Microsoft remained quiet for so long about this upgraded version of the Xbox 360. At one point, some of its officials were even quoted saying that the HDMI feature is not necessary and that a 20GB space is enough to handle several downloadable content.
Karraker then discussed how the Core version of Xbox 360 is related to PlayStation 2 (PS2). According to him, introducing a new SKU will not allow MS to dip into the existing PS2 consumers. Lastly, he mentioned that when one really thinks about it, the PlayStation 3 (PS3) is just an upgraded version of the PS2. Karraker remarked,
It’s the value proposition. When you do the inflation figure for the US$ 299 PlayStation 2, and include the hard drive price in that, it’d be about the same price as a PlayStation 3. The onus is on us to educate the consumer on the value of a console that is going to last for 10 years.
When Sony announced the PlayStation Home service for the PlayStation 3, Microsoft was rather quick to bash it, saying that it’s not even game-centric. So after confirming the long-rumored Xbox 360 Elite, MS should expect the same from its rival company. This time, the guns were fired by David Karraker, Senior Director of Corporate Communications for Sony Computer Entertainment America (SCEA).
The official said that this move will not, in any way, increase MS’ market share. If anything, releasing a third SKU will diminish it as it will ultimately eliminate existing Core consumers. Karraker even said that Microsoft should focus on expanding its demographic outside its 10 million-strong user base. And then Karraker explained,
We’re focused on reaching out to the mass market beyond the hardcore gamer, through things like LittleBigPlanet, through Home, through the network. We view every single PlayStation consumer as an elite consumer. Meaning no one is going to get shortchanged at the end of the day, whether they bought one on day one or just yesterday.
It should be remembered that Microsoft remained quiet for so long about this upgraded version of the Xbox 360. At one point, some of its officials were even quoted saying that the HDMI feature is not necessary and that a 20GB space is enough to handle several downloadable content.
Karraker then discussed how the Core version of Xbox 360 is related to PlayStation 2 (PS2). According to him, introducing a new SKU will not allow MS to dip into the existing PS2 consumers. Lastly, he mentioned that when one really thinks about it, the PlayStation 3 (PS3) is just an upgraded version of the PS2. Karraker remarked,
It’s the value proposition. When you do the inflation figure for the US$ 299 PlayStation 2, and include the hard drive price in that, it’d be about the same price as a PlayStation 3. The onus is on us to educate the consumer on the value of a console that is going to last for 10 years.