Microsoft's Aaron Greenberg
On money, Kinect, and Milo & Kate.
Microsoft's just announced that Kinect will cost £129.99 / €149.99 and come bundled with launch title Kinect Adventures.
It's also revealed a new Xbox 360 4GB model, to be launched in the UK on 20th August, priced at £149.99 / €199.99.
The 4GB Xbox 360 plus Kinect and Kinect Adventures will be available as a bundle for £249.99 / €299.99 when Kinect launches in the UK this November.
Last night, Eurogamer chatted to Xbox product director Aaron Greenberg to pose some burning questions on Microsoft's hot-off-the-press announcements. Read on for the result.
Absolutely. We obviously don't make pricing decisions without doing our research. We've done a number of pricing studies on a global scale across a whole variety of audience segments. When we talked to consumers about the different types of experiences you get with Kinect, we found that that sensor with the full game at $149 does quite well.
We've even seen some of the retailers put up some speculative pre-orders for just the sensor as a standalone at $149. On Amazon.com, for example, it jumped to one of the top two things in the videogame category coming out of E3. Now we're saying it's not just $149, but you're also getting a full $50 retail game as part of that.
That said, there's a tremendous opportunity here to drive new console sales. There will be a whole new wave of consumers looking for all new ways to experience games and entertainment. To be able to do that with the console plus the sensor and the game at that value is pretty unprecedented.
It will effectively replace the Arcade console. We see it as a great value entry price point for consumers. We're upgrading the storage to a full 4GB, which is quite a bit of storage. At $199 we think that's a great price point. That 4GB is built-in flash memory, so it's not a hard drive. There is a hard drive bay built into all the new Xbox 360s.
At £199 you've got the 250GB SKU, which is selling exceptionally well. We've heard some good initial feedback from the first week of sales. I know in Europe it has been really strong. Here in the States, just the first couple of weeks for the month of June, NPD data put Xbox 360 console sales ahead of both the PS3 and the Wii.
Consumer demand seems to be really strong for the new console. To be able to add the remaining piece of the puzzle now for Kinect and how we're bringing it to market, and the price points, is the focus of the announcement.
No. It's got Wi-Fi built in. It's the same form factor. The difference is finish and storage. They both come with Wi-Fi. They both come with a controller. We're excited to have a new console this holiday at different price points for different types of consumers. And the same with the bundle and the Kinect sensor and Kinect Adventures.