Microsoft announced that it hopes to add 5 more years to the lifespan of its most recent console. Now the X-Box 360 has been released since its days back around 2005, and it has recently reported its first ever, profitable quarter. Microsoft believes that the Kinect and future services and features will contribute to this proposed lifespan. In this blogger's opinion, this could be a good thing and a not so good thing. I'll start with the not so good. If Microsoft is planning to expand its console's life by five years, there is a possibility that within those five years its competitors might drop a new console and eat up everyone's attention. I believe that could be a possibility because of the demand for new technology and technology's ever so rapid pace of evolving. But I could be mistaken on this because the X-Box 360 could be like the Dreamcast from SEGA. The Sega Dreamcast was still being played even after its bigger rivals (Nintendo and Sony) decided to bring in the Gamecube and the Playstation 2. These two managed to bring a vacuum that would suck up some of the fans of the genre that Dreamcast held tightly on (like fighting games and RPGs), but still the Dreamcast held strong and kept getting attention and even had games still being developed for it until 2007. Could the X-Box 360 hold on and repeat what Sega did with its Dreamcast? Well to quote a wiseman "I can't predict the future".

Now the good news side of the view is that Microsoft can take advantage of being a more "bang for your buck" when it comes to its X-Box 360. Now in these economic times of doubt and panic, even gamers are suffering. Gamers will suffer more if they get news of a new console that's coming. They will feel the ones they own are totally obsolete. And when a new console comes out, it always goes at a hefty price. I'd like to quote from Sony's Ken Kutaragi from E3 2006:

"The Playstation 3 will retail for 599 US Dollars."

That's probably going to be around-average price for new consoles. It's new technology what can you do? It could also trickle down. New system means new games with new technology. Now replace the word "new" in that last sentence with "higher priced". Games now cost an average of sixty dollars. Wouldn't the next new console technology the competitors show be higher as well?

Well, Microsoft is thinking smart and financially savvy. If it can expand the 360's lifespan, it will hold onto more people who can't plop down what seems like a small mortgage on a new console. Why spend so much on a new console that you can't predict the future of its success on when Microsoft sticks to its guns and says "hey, we won't break your wallet and we'll keep you just as entertained as the others can". This to me is a very good thing.

xbox360balllogolarge