Re:John Carmack Leaves Meta
by johnwheeler on Friday December 16, 2022 @07:39PM
(#34022758)
I have a quest pro, and it’s pretty awesome. Zuckerberg made the argument that Microsoft spent about 10 billion on development of the first Xbox, and that turned out to be a good bet.
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What is the ROI of the xbox series over time?
To the best of my knowledge it's negative so far but it's very hard to tell since MS only reports revenues but not the expenses. I'm guessing Xbox's main purpose right now is to serve the purpose of keeping MS relevant to home users and preserving brand awareness, but in terms of direct profitability Xbox is likely an overall loser.
So $10b (conjectured by OP I am responding to) dug a defensive moat, didn't bring in > $10b income
The $10B was the development of the very first XBox and no, MS never made 10B in income on that console, on the contrary MS lost 4 billion dollars on the first Xbox [1].
The total revenue for the entire Xbox division as a whole is currently about 16 billion dollars per year and does grow year over year by about 5-6% [2]. But it's worth noting that MS sells the Xbox at a loss and tries to recoup expenses through accessories and licensing. With that said MS stopped giving enough detailed information about Xbox's costs in order to deduce its profitability, but all the articles I find say that it continues to be an overall loser for MS.
[1] https://www.engadget.com/2005-09-26-forbes-xbox-lost-microso...
[2] https://www.videogameschronicle.com/news/xbox-closes-its-fis...
Its difficult to tell as it may be advantageous for the Xbox division to lose money in one set of accounts and tax area while profits could be recognized in a different tax area.
I bought an Xbox something as a Blu-ray player. So far I haven’t attached any other money to it but I do play a free racing game so there’s that.
But in the case of the Xbox they knew there'd be an appetite for a gaming console, because gaming consoles had been selling like hot cakes for over 15 years.
VR is a very differently-sized market.
Re:John Carmack Leaves Meta
by johnwheeler on Friday December 16, 2022 @08:31PM
(#34023247)
What are you talking about. They sold 100M quest 2s. People like it. Have you tried it? Most naysayers haven’t even tried it.
Do you have a source for that number? Most of the figures I've seen have it around 15M units globally as of this summer.
Indeed, it's an amazing gaming platform. I love Thrill of the Fight and Pro Era!