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Someone needs to put Santa Claus on the naughty list - the fat, red clown has a nasty habit of giving you a gift, but then giving a much better one to the neighbor you always hated. And it looks like Microsoft India seems bent on following in jolly ol’ Sant Nick’s fur boots as far as the Xbox 360’s pricing is concerned.
Announcing a Christmas-slash-New Year price cut for the holidays, Microsoft has said that the Xbox 360 Core console will retail for INR 14,990 along with Forza Motorsport 2 and Viva Piñata, whereas the Pro console will retail for INR 23,990 along with Forza Motorsport2, Viva Piñata, PGR3 and Yuvraj Singh International Cricket 2007 - a net savings of almost 10,000 bucks on the Core version and over 12,000 big ones on the Pro version. Obviously, now, I’ve got to swallow a whole bottle of antacids and get a squeaky de-stressing toy while people who bought the console a week or so back will probably be out buying guns to shoot themselves dead on Christmas.
One wonders whether the offer, valid until the end of the year or until stocks last, is some sort of stock clearing scheme before the newer Arcade and Pro stocks come in. Bah, who cares! You’re not going to get these babies cheaper, so if you were still mulling your purchase over, stop thinking and get your ass to the nearest game store and satisfy that burning itch with an Xbox 360 and Mass Effect.
Mumbai got lucky this time around as well, considering we are seeing so many events going on here, with Sony and Microsoft both vying for our attention. As we had mentioned earlier, the Mumbai Microsoft / EA Game On event was on at The Squeeze and me and my GamingIndians friends were there to take in all they could throw at us.
Sadly though, the whole event was a relatively low-key affair, with maybe just 20 to 25 people in attendence - more television channels and online / print publications than a gathering of gaming fans. Good thing the place was small, making it look crowded enough! Guess Microsoft India E&D Country Manager saw this coming and chose not to attend, even though other Microsoft execs including Sanjoy John and Xbox India’s Product Manager Vivek Kulkarni hobnobbed with the attendees.
I like Neelesh Mukherjee. He regularly submits stuff for GameGuru.in, which can be a bit controversial for me to digest, but this is video games we’re talking about. I can’t, however, stand GameGuru at times. Sure, they’ll occasionally have some Indian gaming-related news that we’d be too lazy to report ourselves, and the interviews don’t hurt either. But other than that, Neelesh pretty much drives the place when it comes to actual content. And by that, I don’t mean taking a press release, quoting about a paragraphs’ worth of text and then slap some half-assed comment that’s supposed to make the thing sound relevant. Because there aren’t a million other sites that could do that for you, right GG?
Looks like the guys in Mumbai are luckier than the bastards at Delhi! Not only are they getting another Game On! event for their very own, but they can also be the first to get their hands on Mass Effect!
Announcing the details for the event at the official Xbox forums, Microsoft India has said that Mass Effect and PGR 4 will be available for purchase at the event, scheduled to be held on the 22nd at Squeeze, Khar, Mumbai. What’s worse (for those that live outside Mumbai, that is) is that all those that pick up Mass Effect will also get a Halo 3 Limited Edition poster autographed by Joseph Tung, producer at Bungie. Apparently, there’s only 500 of these in print so it’s a really sweet deal for those that would be buying Mass Effect anyway, like yours truly. Pity I live in Bangalore, the forgotten realm of Indian gaming!
Let’s see if we can have our Mumbai friends pick this one up for us and hopefully, part with said Limited Edition poster so that I can have it up right next to my gigantic Homer Simpson one!
via [360indians]
Maybe it’s just my total lack of enthusiasm for social gatherings when it means I have to travel long distances, or how stupidly single I am right now (Oh!) – but I’m not a fan of discos, clubbing, or late night drinking at the local pub. That’s more or less because of the company you bring along or the people you’ll involuntarily run into sometimes, which in itself depends a lot on how much liquor everyone’s been downing until it comes out like an exquisite river of dead puke. That’s why I’m glad Microsoft India was able to handle their recent Game On Event in New Delhi so darned well. Taking place in The Pyramid, a lot of the attention was focused on what people like me come 40 miles for - some cold, hard time with BioWare’s dandiest offering on consoles since Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic. And luckily, the free liquor surely soothed some of that pain for the disagreeable on-lookers present, minus the aforementioned puking sessions. Bonus!
Reggie and myself just got back a few hours ago from Microsoft’s Gamers Night, which is arguably the biggest gaming-related event ever held in Delhi, and I must say that we’re both poop-zhausted. Between trying to talk with companies, to actually squeezing some game time with big-boys like Mass Effect and Army of Two – having an open bar with infinite Coke refills is a caffeine blessing in disguise. But the sad truth, there’s not much to talk about. At least, not until this coming Monday, when the media embargo is lifted for all of Microsoft’s and EA’s juicy offerings. Until then, you’ll just have to keep pounding on the F5! In other news, I think I may have contracted some skin disease. These PR folks can be quite the wild bunch, you know! Certainly not as terribly inconvenient as getting an error message from Gears of Wa- OOPS, will you look at the time! I can’t ride that pumpkin back home!
Expect more news at the stroke of midnight on Sunday, count on it.
We have official confirmation! In a press release that was sent to us just now, Microsoft India says that the Xbox Originals service will indeed be available in the country on December 4, along with expectations that Xbox LIVE will cross the 10-million user mark by June 2008.
Each Xbox Original will retail for 1200 Microsoft Points (or approximately INR 590 a pop) and will range from 2GB to 7GB in size, which should take us about, oh, 2 days to download on our crappy 256k lines. (Sorry, Microsoft, that 4 - 8 hour download timeframe is for the lucky people in the rest of the world who have access to great 2Mbps lines!) And yes, we too will get the chance to download Carcassonne (or Hexic 2, we’re not sure) within a 48 hour period as we had previously reported. Also.. wait, what?! That’s not what we reported! We thought it was a 24 hour period, unless my Math is that phenomenally bad. But the press release claims we should be able to download “a free Xbox LIVE Arcade game*, within a 48 hour period starting 15 November 1:30 PM.” Oh well, this one’s better anyway.