Xbox 360 launch

The Xbox 360 launch marked the release of the first high-profile seventh generation video game console. It was Microsoft's second foray in console development succeeding their 2001 launch of the original Xbox.

Viral advertising and alternate reality games

The promotional campaign for the Xbox 360 began on March 30, 2005, with the opening of an alternate reality game called OurColony. Throughout March and April OurColony.net offered challenges to its community, rewarding solutions with cropped pictures of the console and game screenshots. On May 12, 2005, the ARG section of OurColony closed, visitors were instead greeted with a promotional video hosted by J. Allard. OurColony participants were allowed special access to insider info and previews before release to the general public.

OrigenXbox360.com was the next viral marketing campaign from Microsoft. Unveiled on September 27, 2005, the website, hosted by talking rabbits Boss and Didier, offers visitors an opportunity to enter in various contests. The initial contest was a raffle that required participants to answer three trivia questions regarding the Xbox 360 for a chance to attend a promotional pre-launch event. New contests include a Halo 2 tournament and a competition to design a "Gamertile" (an avatar icon). The design for the website employs flash animation of a Bonsai tree and bland elevator music to create a serene environment that is punctuated by visually intense psychedelic episodes involving the host rabbits.

October 2005 saw the launch of "Hex168" ( 168 is 360 in hexadecimal), another viral marketing campaign commissioned by Microsoft and executed by the Marden-Kane advertising agency.

Announcement

The official unveiling of the Xbox 360 occurred on May 12, 2005, on MTV in a program called MTV Presents Xbox: The Next Generation Revealed. The special was hosted by the actor Elijah Wood and featured a musical performance by the band The Killers as well as a preview of Perfect Dark Zero, and appearances by Tony Hawk, Ryan Cabrera, and the crew of West Coast Customs who pimped an original Xbox. The Xbox 360 was also featured on the cover of TIME Magazine's May 23, 2005, issue with an article written by Lev Grossman. The cover shows Microsoft CEO Bill Gates holding up one of the units. In the article he says "It's perfect... The day Sony launches (PlayStation 3), and they walk right into Halo 3."[3] Read more at wikiquote. Microsoft executive Robbie Bach later clarified this statement, saying "Philosophically the point Bill was trying to make is that we're not just going to ship and not have great stuff coming up."[4] Gates himself later clarified that "Halo 3 will ship when Bungie is ready."

Release dates and pricing

Microsoft first publicized the initial prices and configurations for the Xbox 360 on August 18, 2005, at the Games Convention in Leipzig, Germany.[7]

Titles

Eighteen launch titles were available for customers in the United States, Canada and Puerto Rico on November 22, 2005. The European countries had fifteen titles available for the launch date of December 2, 2005. Japanese customers, however, only had seven titles to choose from by the time the Xbox 360 was released on December 10, 2005. This discrepancy is partially accounted for by the time needed to localize the games.

In North America, the best-selling title was Call of Duty 2, which had an attach rate of 77%, followed by Madden NFL 06 and Need for Speed Most Wanted.[15] The most successful first-party title was Perfect Dark Zero.[16] In Japan, the most successful titles were Ridge Racer 6 (29,891 copies), Perfect Dark Zero (14,897 copies), and Need for Speed Most Wanted (6,842 copies).

Sales by region

North America

Prelaunch reports assumed that Microsoft would intentionally restrict supply[17] although there is nothing to support this and Microsoft has said they released all units into supply chains as quickly as possible.[18][19] Evidence indicates that Microsoft launched with all consoles available at the time, and was operating at maximum production capability (that is, they did not withhold produced consoles). They did not, however, build up a sufficient supply of consoles to satisfy the entire demand at launch. This allowed them to launch several months earlier than would otherwise be possible but also led to shortages.

Immediately after the launch, reports about the new machine's technical glitches started coming out. Some reported the Xbox 360 crashing with errors, some reported the hard drive does not respond in certain situations while others reported error messages during various games or unusually fast overheating.[20]

References

"Rumor Control: World of Warcraft 360 and Vice City Stories, gamespot.com, October 14, 2005^
"Hex 168 Contest Rules", hex168.com, October 18, 2005^
"Out Of The Xbox, TIME, May 23, 2005^

Japan

While other regions such as the United States or Europe enjoyed successful launches, sales in Japan have been very slow. In fact, only 103,990 units had been sold by the end of April 2, 2006.[37][38]

Some believe this is mainly due to the other popular and prospective video game handheld consoles like the Game Boy Advance, Nintendo DS, and PlayStation Portable, all of which have sold far more than the Xbox 360 and all of them are Japanese originated consoles, indicating a nationalistic preference to game consoles. Others have attributed this slow start to titles such as Dead or Alive 4 and Enchant Arm missing the launch date, while others point to the marketing strategy that focused on selling the Xbox 360 as a fashionable item when customers were looking for an affordable or a high performance gaming console. It should also be noted that ToHeart2 XRATED, a highly anticipated hentai PC port of the PlayStation 2 game of the same name, was released one day prior to the Xbox 360's Japanese launch;[39] this might also be a factor in the console's low launch sales.

For his part, Famitsu Xbox 360 editor-in-chief Munetatsu Matsui pointed to Dead or Alive 4's absence as the main factor behind the slow start. He even added information that over 60% of his readers had planned to buy the much anticipated Tecmo fighting game. The 2-day 62,135 sales figure of the Xbox 360 is a little past half of the 123,334 units of the original Xbox that Microsoft sold in the first 3 days in Japan in February 2002.[40]

Initial predictions were highly optimistic as the highest rating launch game reviewed by Famitsu, Namco's Ridge Racer 6, scored 35 out of 40 stars. Namco expects to sell 500,000 copies of Ridge Racer 6 in Japan. This number is roughly equal to the number of Xbox units sold in Japan by November 2005. Microsoft Japan executive Yoshihiro Maruyama stated that he expects sales of Xbox 360 in Japan to hit one million units sometime next year. Maruyama is widely credited for attracting support from Japanese game developers.

To entice people into buying the Xbox 360 some retailers are offering discounts on the system if they sign up for a 2-year broadband contract, similar to cell phone deals in the US.

On the day of the launch, Capcom unveiled their Xbox 360-exclusive science fiction game Lost Planet, which features South Korean actor Lee Byung-hun in the lead role.

Since the release of Blue Dragon, the console has gained popularity. On October 19, 2006, all 10,000 Blue Dragon preorders bundled with a limited edition Xbox 360 Core system were sold-out in Japan.

Viral advertising and alternate reality games

Announcement

Release dates and pricing

Titles

Sales by region

North America

See also

References

Europe

Japan

India

Latin America

Brazil

Hong Kong, Singapore, South Korea, and Taiwan

China

Australia and New Zealand

Philippines