Hard-core gamers will save the X-Box

As most gamers can and will tell you today, Square is over rated and their weak FMV excuses for games don't bid well with us at all. They had a good run for awhile but lost their edge a long time ago and have been literally rehashing the same damn FF game plots over and over again. Capcom is the biggest leading Dev in Japan and they are behind the Xbox as I'm sure you can see by the high sales of the high priced Steel Battalion game for Xbox. This is just the begining and MS will continue to gain mind share within Japan. We all knew it was going to be an up hill battle, but you didn't expect Japan to just roll over within the first year did you? BTW: Square had to sell those shares to Sony because their movie that they spent so much money on (Spirits within) flopped big time as we all knew it would and if they didn't get some money quick, they were gonna go down the toilet as a whole. Sony knew that if they didn't invest into Square, MS was prepared to buy Square up all together. Square would have sold too because they were hurting for cash big time. My whole point of this e-mail was just to say that the Xbox is not going anywhere despite how things are going in Japan right now. MS will continue to invest in the Xbox and the tides will turn in it's favor. I just feel sorry for Nintendo. Not only have they lost their edge, but they obviously lost their minds as well letting Rare go. No 3rd party Devs will make up for that loss no matter what Nintendo says. I can see the Fisher Price Cube lasting five years. Hell... even the crappy N64 lasted a full console life span, but I don't see a Nintendo console in the future.

Subject: RE: X-Box fails to ignite in Japan

Just want to pass along a relevant bit of info, in case you're not aware. Xbox may not have sold many units in Japan, but chances are that most of the Japanese who bought one are hardcore gamers. You know, the type that absolutely must have every single console ever made, and every single good game ever released on those consoles (b/c even slow selling consoles can get a few good games). So when a game that appeals to those hardcore gamers comes out, like Tekki (Steel Battalion) or Sega GT 2002, it makes it into the best selling lists for a weeks:

Top Ten

Tekki = #5
Sega GT = #6

Not bad for a console with only 274,000 units in the market. While PS2 has grossly outsold Xbox in Japan, Xbox is not doomed solely because of that fact. Tekki has illuminated a niche that Xbox's horsepower has made possible - games targeted specifically to hardcore gamers, that may sell fewer units but with a higher cost (and perhaps profit margin) for each unit. If Japanese developers pick up on that and turn it into a trend, then Xbox will have carved out a decent niche for itself. Winning the hearts of hardcore Japanese gamers would be solid foot in the door for Microsoft, preparing the way for an Xbox2 with more name recognition and respect among the general Japanese gaming public.

Regards,
Byron Gibson
North Carolina, USA

See also:
X-Box fails to ignite in Japan