14 DAY TRIAL // The new console war has been going on for quite a few months, ever since November of last year, when both the PlayStation 4 and the Xbox One were released in North America and other territories from Europe or other parts of the world.
Before the two consoles were announced last year, quite a lot of industry pundits and experts expected that Microsoft's new Xbox, then nicknamed Xbox 720, would beat the PlayStation 4, just like the Xbox 360 did with the PS3.
Reports from inside sources, however, began to highlight a difference in terms of power between the two consoles, in favor of the PS4.
After the PS4's reveal in February and the Xbox One's debut in May, things became official: Sony's device was more powerful than Microsoft's.
After the press conferences of the two companies at Gamescom 2014, the second part of the puzzle appeared, as Sony priced the PS4 at 399 USD/EUR, while Microsoft revealed a 499 USD/EUR tag for the Xbox One.
Right now, Microsoft is losing in terms of sales in favor of Sony, with the last official figures saying that it sold 3.2 million Xbox One units at the end of December 2013, while the PS4 got past the 6 million milestone at the beginning of March.
This difference is due to a few major issues, so let's talk a little bit about them.
Price
Price is always a factor when comparing two products. The PS4 is 399 USD/EUR, while the Xbox One is 499 USD/EUR. Yes, the Xbox One does come with the Kinect sensor bundled in, which most probably forced Microsoft to charge 100 USD/EUR more than its rival.
Unfortunately, for most consumers, the Kinect just looks like a useless peripheral that doesn't work most of the times when it comes to voice detection for example. Using the sensor to navigate the interface is also clunky and so far, many Xbox One owners I know just keep it unplugged. Others, however, can't live without it, but they're still in the minority.
Video game performance
The PS4 is more powerful than the Xbox One, or at least easier to make games run better on it. This has resulted in performance differences for multi-platform games in terms of resolution or framerate. This also means that Xbox One exclusives, like Titanfall or Dead Rising 3, for example, run at a drastically lower resolution than PS4 ones, like Killzone: Shadow Fall or Infamous: Second Son.
The confusing ESRAM on the Xbox One has already been blamed by some developers, like Respawn, so Microsoft really needs to step up its support for video game makers and help them come to grips with its hardware.
Online services
Both the PS4 and Xbox One require premium subscriptions to access online functions. The PS Plus is 10 USD/EUR cheaper than Xbox Live Gold and overall Plus is a much better deal in many different aspects. It comes with free games, big discounts, and other advantages, while PS4 owners without such a subscription can still access online applications like Netflix. Meanwhile, Xbox Live Gold still doesn't have Games with Gold on Xbox One, and it is needed even to access things like Internet Explorer, let alone Netflix, Hulu, etc.
Microsoft needs to take all sorts of measures in order to ensure that its Xbox One is at least a decent rival to the PS4. What's worse, it needs to implement changes as soon as possible, until Sony's lead grows.