There was big news yesterday about the Wii, of course. $250 on November 19!
I was as happy to hear these final details as anyone. But my first reaction was: $250?? Wow! That’s more than I thought it would be. The Wii is, for the most part, an overclocked Gamecube with a new controller. There are tweaks here and there, but it wasn’t exactly a major hardware revision. So why the expensive price, when currently Gamecubes are going for $99?
The obvious answer is that the first N million units at launch are going to fly out the door at almost any price, so why leave money on the table? But at $250, it seems to no longer be an impulse buy – now the question for the consumer is, should I buy a Wii or an Xbox360?
To add insult to injury, today Reggie Fils-Aime stands up and says “We’re not going to lose any money on the hardware!” Why would you tell people that? Isn’t that just code for “We’re gouging you?”