Microsoft Spending Half a Billion on Kinect Launch

eddhorse

http://ie.xbox360.ign.com/articles/112/1128566p1.html

The NY Post reports Microsoft is set to spend $500 million dollars in marketing Kinect, the Xbox 360 controller-free camera, this holiday.

"Kinect is the largest, most integrated marketing initiative in Xbox history, bigger than its launch," said Robert Matthews, general manager of global marketing communications for Xbox. "We are going to be spending millions to launch this globally."

The device will appear on soda cans, cereal boxes, television, magazines and the Internet.

"The campaign started 18 months ago when Don Mattrick and Steven Spielberg stood on stage at E3 to announce what would become Kinect," Matthews added. "The video we produced for that occasion went on to become one of the most watched viral videos of the year, according to Advertising Age."

Promotions for the device include Pepsi, Kellogg's cereal, Nickelodeon, YouTube, Disney and People magazine. Microsoft is also planning a launch event at Times Square in New York City.

Kinect is set to launch worldwide this November.

=========================================
Anyone got any opinions on this ? They will have to sell a shed load to cover that spend....

NotorietyH

I would've thought that money would've been better spent actually developing decent games for it. Launch line-up was released today and it's woeful. Something like 4 sports compilation games alone, 3 dance games, and a few fitness games.

Could still sell well so maybe spending the money on advertising it makes sense. I've no intention of picking it up though.

eddhorse

Maybe, Id be interested to see if many Xbox owners will get this straight away.
thats why i posted it in this forum to get both Playstation and Xbox opinions.

Although i found this :
http://www.mcvuk.com/news/40790/750000-gets-PlayStation-Moving
750,000 spent on Playstation Move :rolleyes:

Hard to know where all the money goes even if it is global !

Sabre0001

Not worth it...Shovelware games - and for that reason, I'm out!

quarryman

I have a feeling history will look back at kinnectas a huge flop.

johnny_ultimate

Well they already have an entire building rented on Grafton Street showcasing the thing. That must cost a bit, especially with at least five workers at any time.

Personally, I'm laying off Kinect until there's some interesting games (Child of Eden namely). Dance Central is the only impressive one in the Grafton Street show room, and tbh as much as I love Harmonix I have far less interest in a dancing game than I do in Rock Band 3. Technically, and as a party game, it looks pretty damn entertaining, but I'm not the target market for it, and as a result, Kinect yet.

eddhorse

http://ie.xbox360.ign.com/articles/110/1106913p1.html

...First up, the price. Kinect will have a suggested retail price of $149.99, as many online retailers have recently guessed. The news is that Kinect will be bundled with a free game, Kinect Adventures. All first-party Kinect games will have a suggested retail price of $49.99 and Microsoft expects that to be the standard, though it is leaving third-party pricing up to those publishers.



Kinect on its own comes with a game for $150.
At least one third-party game will follow that standard. Microsoft has announced that Dance Central, from Harmonix and MTV Games, will also retail for $49.99.

For those new to Xbox 360, Microsoft will have a special Kinect console bundle available at the November 4 launch of the sensor. For $299, the bundle will include an Xbox 360 console, the Kinect sensor and Kinect Adventures. The Xbox 360 will be the previously confirmed $199 redesigned Xbox 360, not the 250 GB model that has spurred sales in the past month....

That was posted in July, any new price lists?

http://ie.xbox360.ign.com/articles/112/1128547p1.html

17 Titles Prepped for Kinect Launch
Motion sensor appearing on Oprah tomorrow.

This November, Microsoft is preparing to launch one of its biggest entertainment devices ever, the Kinect for Xbox 360.

The company announced it's spending half a billion on marketing the motion camera for the Xbox 360, and plans to showcase it on Oprah tomorrow and The Ellen DeGeneres Show later this month.

"The Xbox 360 team created a multiyear, integrated campaign showcasing real people at the heart of the experience," said Mike Delman, corporate vice president of IEB global marketing, Microsoft.

"Kinect puts consumers at the center of their entertainment, and our marketing efforts follow that same charter."

17 games in total will be available in the month, 12 on the day it launches on November 4.

Kinect Adventures (included with every Kinect) - Nov. 4

Kinectimals - Nov. 4

Your Shape Fitness Evolved - Nov. 4

Dance Central - Nov. 4

The Biggest Loser Ultimate Workout - Nov. 4

Dance Masters - Nov. 4

Kinect Sports - Nov. 4

MotionSports - Nov. 4

Kinect Joy Ride - Nov. 4

Adrenalin Misfits - Nov. 4

Fighters Uncaged - Nov. 4

Sonic Free Riders - Nov. 4

EA Sports Active 2 - Nov. 16

Game Party In Motion - Nov. 18

Zumba Fitness - Nov. 18

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1 - Nov. 16

Deca Sports Freedom - Holiday 2010

Lots more than the Move though for launch...Good timing for xmas or not by MS?

jaykhunter

NotorietyH wrote: »

I would've thought that money would've been better spent actually developing decent games for it. Launch line-up was released today and it's woeful. Something like 4 sports compilation games alone, 3 dance games, and a few fitness games.

Could still sell well so maybe spending the money on advertising it makes sense. I've no intention of picking it up though.

Me and you, buddy - we're on the exact same wavelength! I was going to say the exact same things - specifically that that money'd be better spent on a decent launch game, best of luck, but i've no intention of buying it and i think it'll be a flop; same with Move. Maybe When the "2nd Generation" of motion control games come out in 2-3 years, it'll take off.

GTR63

Apparently its been getting a LOT of pre orders.Its meant to be as good sold out in the UK & nearly in the US.Like Sony with Move you'd wish they'd offer a game just one that is actually good.The launch line-up similar to Move's is just plain bad.That Dragon game may be good & Child of Eden could be a Class title but its all up in the air.

ProjectColossus

I could not be less interested in Kinect. This has disaster written all over it imo.

WolfForager

150euro? I can think of 150 better ways to spend it tbh.

eddhorse

Yeah €150 was sounding a tad steep.

Thats three games really !

I did see the exhibition type thing on grafton st, cheap rental around there. Probably in competition with the Playstation Hub nearby.

jaykhunter

That Dragon game may be good & Child of Eden could be a Class[/QUOTE]

What games are these? Any game footage?

chavezychavez

ProjectColossus wrote: »

I could not be less interested in Kinect. This has disaster written all over it imo.

Thoroughly agree, the novelty of it will barely make it to Christmas.
After spending half a billion on advertising, I have a feeling this is what the MS execs will be seeing in the boardroom come January

ronkmonster

It's stupid to release this in the middle of the 360s life. I'll never get one so games that rely on it, I won't get. And big games might add in some support for it, but they will still to support a regular controller so they can't utilise it properly.

Maybe when next Xbox comes out with it as standard it'll be used more.

jaykhunter

As Daniel Floyd said in his escapist video, MS and Sony are putting billions into their motion controllers. If (when :pac:) it flops, lots of game developers will lose their jobs and likely some great games will never be made

It's a small thing but Heavy Rain cancelling their planned DLC to work on Move support is the start of something I really, really don't want to see :mad:

listermint

ronkmonster wrote: »

It's stupid to release this in the middle of the 360s life.

I think were past that milestone.

WolfForager

Sony aren't pumping nearly as much money into the move as MS is kinect. Sony are treating the move as a way to enhance your gameplay, while MS are pushing the kinect as a new platform altogether.

johnny_ultimate

jaykhunter wrote: »

What games are these? Any game footage?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pKivlywog-o

The sequel to Rez. A killer app if ever there was one.

The dragon game I'm guessing is the one in development by the Panzer Dragoon creator? Suda 41 and a few others also have intriguing, 'proper' games lined up.

maximoose

quarryman wrote: »

I have a feeling history will look back at kinnectas a huge flop.

definately. they really need to invest more in the games lineup rather than marketing

ronkmonster

listermint wrote: »

I think were past that milestone.

That's even worse. Although there will be some overlap in 360 and next console.

They should have just brought next console forward and then every game could support it.

NotorietyH

johnny_ultimate wrote: »

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pKivlywog-o

The sequel to Rez. A killer app if ever there was one.

The dragon game I'm guessing is the one in development by the Panzer Dragoon creator? Suda 41 and a few others also have intriguing, 'proper' games lined up.

Yes but you can play it without Kinect, it's also coming to PS3 and will be Move compatible, so it's not really a killer app for Kinect. Most reports I've heard say that it actually plays better with a regular controller, that Kinect doesn't add anything to it.

rizzla

I guess the half billion is to get the casual audience.

I'm already buying it. Must be the only one.

ShiverinEskimo

I don't feel the users of boards are a fair representation of the target market for Kinect. Most of the people saying they believe it will flop or expressing their disinterest are probably not the type of people this will be aimed at.

The marketing budget reflects this IMO. Mass appeal means mass marketing so expect this to be driven at parents and kids and family-oriented media outlets like TV and possibly cinemas which cost a lot more than online, magazine and email marketing campaigns.

They are going after the casual gamer with this technology - I think it's fair to say that the majority of posters on an xbox forum on a message board site are not casual gamers.

iMuse

Would be interested but due to price and crap launch software ill wait it out. Xtravision and im sure other stores are pushing it , Few weeks ago i went to buy a hdmi cable for my ps3 and the guy in xtravision says to me would i like to pre order Kinect to which i replied that i didnt have a 360 :P

WolfForager

Looking at it in terms of the current economic climate...

The majority of people who own 360s are core gamers, with a few kids thrown in. How many families have a 360 set up in their sitting rooms? Very few i'd imagine. However there are a helluva lot of wii's in sitting rooms across the country. The target audience is the current wii audience.

Now let alone the 150 price tag for existing 360 owners, but it comes to 300 for the bundle for new customers. New customers who more than likely already own a wii. I can't see many families forking out 300+ euro for this and games when paying the electricity and heating bills is becoming a bit of a burden, especially when they look at they're wii they bought 3 years ago and have used twice in the last year.

o1s1n

Hang on hang on... Child of Eden is coming out Kinect?

Well there's my bad news of the day. For **** sake. I was really looking forward to playing that as I love Rez. Absolutely zero interest in buying a Kinect.

NotorietyH

o1s1n wrote: »

Hang on hang on... Child of Eden is coming out Kinect?

Well there's my bad news of the day. For **** sake. I was really looking forward to playing that as I love Rez. Absolutely zero interest in buying a Kinect.

It's not a Kinect-only game though. It's even coming to PSN. So you can play it with a regular (or Move) controller if you like. By some accounts it's preferable to play with a reg controller over Kinect.

o1s1n

Well that's a relief! Cheers

Retr0gamer

ShiverinEskimo wrote: »

I don't feel the users of boards are a fair representation of the target market for Kinect. Most of the people saying they believe it will flop or expressing their disinterest are probably not the type of people this will be aimed at.

The marketing budget reflects this IMO. Mass appeal means mass marketing so expect this to be driven at parents and kids and family-oriented media outlets like TV and possibly cinemas which cost a lot more than online, magazine and email marketing campaigns.

A mass appeal gadget shouldn't cost the price of an Xbox 360 and the price of Kinect on topof it. MS are never going to get the audience they want at that price point. The Wii succeeded because it was at a price sweet spot. The 360 is a hardcore gamers console and therefore it's not in the majority of casual gamers households. For people without a 360 the price is going to turn them right off. This really needed to be packaged with the system as a massive loss leader in time for christmas. I can see this flopping hard which is a shame. The launch line up is dire but the kinect games from japan look really interesting.

o1s1n

Retr0gamer wrote: »

This really needed to be packaged with the system .

Exactly.

It's such a rookie error. Console add ons always flop when you have to buy them separately.

Look at Sega. The Megadrive alone had the 32X, Mega CD, The Power base converter and the Master System Converter II. All of which were bought separately from the console and flopped.

Or how about even the n64 DD?

I reckon the Snes Sony CD add on would have flopped too.

Actually, has there been any console add on which hasn't flopped? (I'm drawing a blank!)

Retr0gamer

Guitar hero is the only one I can think of but it came out at a time when PS2 had completely saturated the market, was only 80 euro with the games as opposed to 150 with no game or whatever the kinect is and was a damn fine game that caught the casual crowd after the hardcore crowd picked up on it.

jaykhunter

o1s1n wrote: »

Actually, has there been any console add on which hasn't flopped? (I'm drawing a blank!)

Em, the light gun for the NES? I can't think of any others....RG's right about guitar peripherals; although i wouldn't count it since it's 3rd Party.

Actually, I've a question. Could you make Kinect console? I mean something that will run Kinect games for $200? Instead of making Kinect a 360-peripheral?

Retr0gamer

jaykhunter wrote: »

Em, the light gun for the NES? I can't think of any others

The zapper was bundled with the console since release with duckhunt and then again with duckhunt and mario on the same cartridge meaning a large amount of zappers were in NES owners hands. Even then there's not many zapper games for the NES. It's what MS should have done.

Retr0gamer

The thing about this is that half a billion is pocket money to MS. Sure this is the same MS games division that celebrated when on the year that Halo 2 launched their games division made their first and only profitable quarter for the entire Xbox life cycle and managed to lose only 2 billion dollars for the year

Zombrex

Without good games both Kinect and Move will die a death.

Microsoft should have put the technology into the next Xbox and released it with control built around this, the way the Wii fully committed to this type of control. As an add on I would be very surprised if it does well.

Retr0gamer

Wicknight wrote: »

Without good games both Kinect and Move will die a death.

Microsoft should have put the technology into the next Xbox and released it with control built around this, the way the Wii fully committed to this type of control. As an add on I would be very surprised if it does well.

Too true. However when it comes to games I think MS seems to have the more interesting line up. Move has absolutely nothing that interests me and anything else I'll be playing on a dual shock. I have a Wii and know that the controls are interesting but not exactly an improvement on a traditional controller. I also very much doubt that Sony have sold half a million move units and think it's very much a shipped figure. Sony are well knownto lie about shipped vs. sold figures.

The Kinect has some very interesting big budget, what look like, vanity projects coming out for it from japan that look a whole lot more interesting.

Hocker

Half a billion.. imagine what else you could do with that..

o1s1n

Sorry, when I said add ons I meant consoles, not perhiperals. There are many light guns and other things like that which have done very well. (I Guitar Hero!)

What I was talking about was expensive add on machines that connects to your existing console with the aim of prolonging that consoles life and/or branching it out into some other area. (Like the Kinect)

It never works. You're immediately whittling down the buyer base for the games.

To play a 360 game you have to do this - buy 360 -> buy game.

To play a Kinect game you have to do this - buy 360 -> buy Kinect -> buy game.

That one extra step really makes all the difference to how many games get produced and bought. It's why there are only 30 odd games for the Sega 32X, about five games for the N64 DD...okay the Mega CD has a much larger library than that, but it's still not massive.

Sega even went one further and made CD 32X games. Games that require both attachments to be stuck on a Megadrive. There are only 6 games for this.

Anyway, I'm rambling. In short, this idea, while interesting, has not worked in the past. Maybe Microsoft will be the first to make it happen. Who knows. I doubt it though. Especially seeing as we've had the Wii now for so long.

testicle

NotorietyH wrote: »

I would've thought that money would've been better spent actually developing decent games for it.

Microsoft doesn't develop any games anymore.

weiland79

Funny i had a conversation about the Move V's Kinect a couple of weeks ago.

The non gamers at the table had all heard of the Kinect but none of the Move which had already been on general release for two weeks.
I guess thats the difference between 750,000 and 500 million.

I've since read on the PSX newsletter that some Sony dude was quoted as saying that they will never allocate the kind of cash that MS do, for advertising.

If my calculations are right(its probably not) then they will have to sell approx 3,333,333.33 units just to recoup their 500m.

I was just watching some dude play Sonic with the Kinect and it looks like far too much like hard work for my liking.

WolfForager

Move has apparently sold 1.5million units in Europe and 300k in the US.

EDIT: Source http://www.joystiq.com/2010/10/15/playstation-move-launch-sales/

NotorietyH

testicle wrote: »

Microsoft doesn't develop any games anymore.

I suppose they have to spend their money on something then. That'll be news to Rare and 343 industries too :P

Retr0gamer

WolfForager wrote: »

Move has apparently sold 1.5million units in Europe and 500k in the US.

I'd love to know if tose figures are true. As I said Sony is notorious for passing off shipped figures as sold figures.

eddhorse

People do forget (as did I) that its not XBOX but Microsoft who have bundles of money, i would like to see proper sales figures as well !

Magill

I hope the move fails, id rather sony spend they're money developing real games instead of this fcuking jump around wii bullsh!t... if i wanted to jump and swing about like a fcuking monkey i'd go play a game of tenis. It really is the last thing i want to do when i come home from work or from training.

I really hate the wii and have no intention of getting either the move or this over priced piece of monkey crap !

So please sony... stop wasting your money on these kids toys ! Thats microsoft's job.

NotorietyH

Retr0gamer wrote: »

I'd love to know if tose figures are true. As I said Sony is notorious for passing off shipped figures as sold figures.

I know Sports Champions was fairly high in the UK charts for a few weeks, it was no. 1 the week it launched I think.

The advantage I think that the Move has over Kinect, is that Sony is making pretty much all its first party titles have Move support, but they're not Move only games. I know partly the reason I picked up the Move was to try it with Heavy Rain and MAG (which I haven't got around to yet), but knowing that Killzone, LBP2 and socom were coming down the line made it much more of a palatable impulse purchase for. Hell Resident Evil 5 is there too if I was to have a blast on that for a bit. Don't have the option with Kinect, so it's really flying under my impulse buy radar. Because I can't see myself using it for more than ten minutes. Whereas I've used my Move for 15 mintues. :P

vasch_ro

I have to say I can't wait for Kinect, I have had both the xbox and 360 since launch and consider to myself to be a pretty committed gamer in that I enjoy playing games, I just think Kinect is cool and will be a cool gadget to show people and should be a fun social gadget, I can't wait for it really surprised at the negative vibes here,.

WolfForager

vasch_ro wrote: »

really surprised at the negative vibes here,.

Take it you haven't been reading any other forums/blogs recently then?

vasch_ro

no just happened to glance at this one when i saw the title....

Otacon

vasch_ro wrote: »

no just happened to glance at this one when i saw the title....

Reviews and previews for Kinect are a mixed bag. A lot of people are praising its potential, with Child of Eden and Dance Central being trumpetted. However, many people are also saying the technology isn't accurate enough yet and the games are almost exclusively casual.

Personally, I won't be getting it. Its too expensive, there are no games that interest me and having tried it myself, I don't think the tech is that good.