14 DAY TRIAL // Eric Hirshberg, the executive leading Activision Publishing, says that at the moment the PlayStation 4 from Sony is winning the battle over value with the Xbox One from Microsoft, although there is still time for the situation to change.
He is quoted by VG247 as saying, "If you do a focus group of a gazillion people and you show them two prices for two competitive products, 100% always prefer the lower price."
The Xbox One will retail for 499 dollars or Euro while the PS4 is set to launch at the 399 dollars or Euro price point.
The executive adds, "Microsoft is going to have to win the hearts and minds and convince people that the higher price point is worth it, and that it provides really meaningful capabilities that will be meaningful to consumers. And it’s a long game, so I am sure that’s what they intend on trying to do."
Hirshberg believes that both devices are interesting in their own right and that the coming battle over features and value will be fun to watch for fans and for the development community.
The launch dates for both the Xbox One and the PlayStation 4 are set for some point during November, probably just a few days ahead of Thanksgiving, which marks the start of the Christmas shopping period.
Microsoft recently stunned gamers by announcing that it was dropping DRM from its console in order to respond to the wishes of the fans and make it easy to resell and lend games.
Many gamers expect both companies to continue to announce smaller features in order to gain a slightly larger fan base.
Activision is a platform agnostic company, which means that its titles launch on both the Xbox One and the PlayStation 4, although some smaller pieces of content might be timed exclusives.