Microsoft's Maruyama Talks About Xbox 360 Challenges in Japan--Page 2

GP: What is Microsoft doing on first-party games?

YM: We have a very strong lineup of titles under development by [Mistwalker's Hironobu] Sakaguchi, [Game Republic Inc.'s Yoshiki] Okamoto and [Q Entertainment Inc.'s Tetsuya] Mizuguchi and we are updating the Okamoto and Mizuguchi titles today.

GP: What is the image of Xbox 360 amongst Japanese gamers?

YM: I think many gamers, particularly in Japan, simply haven't cared much about Xbox. But the industry people have seen the superior performance of the Xbox console. Until the new console is launched by the end of this year no one can be sure if it's going to be a success so people have to take a big gamble anyway. Hopefully, among the consumer's mind it's not negative or positive. Many have heard of it but they haven't touched it and many haven't heard of it because we have very limited store front these days.

GP: What's the image among retailers?

YM: Retailers know our performance hasn't been reaching expectations, I have to admit, but fortunately they want to have the new console to drive end-of-year sales so we have been approached by many Japanese retailers. They have been very flexible. Even though our previous generation wasn't successful, if we are launching a new console with a strong lineup of titles they'll give a little more store front.

GP: How many titles will you have at launch?

YM: We need to ask you to wait until around the Tokyo Game Show [until that is announced]. Making a game available at the time of the launch is a very challenging task. And we don't want to have too many good titles for the launch because we might not be able to supply enough hardware. It's a very fine balance.

GP: How competitive do you think the battle will be?

YM: It's a fairly competitive business but at the same time I think in the video-game business there is no such thing as a captive market you can grab. My belief is that if you provide great content a market emerges. Simply, many people want to talk about this like other markets but I don't want to take that approach. If we have a great title, which makes people want to play, our business just emerges there without taking anyone's business. Eventually you have to be dominant, which basically means you have to attract more titles. What we are selling is not hardware, it's not software, it's entertainment. So I'm always telling people there is no such thing as a market in this industry. We have to open a market by creating great entertainment and if we create that the market follows.

GP: How important will first mover advantage be for you?

YM: First mover advantage doesn't guarantee success of the game console, which we have seen in history. [Sega's] Dreamcast came much earlier than PlayStation 2, but Dreamcast didn't offer a better entertainment experience to consumers.

GP: How about price. You haven't talked about price yet but will price be important?

YM: Pricing alone cannot drive sales of a console because in the last two generations Nintendo has been cheaper than Sony but they couldn't capture the market. But if you have a higher priced console you're going to have a tough challenge in certain segments of the market so our position has always been that we'd like to launch at a reasonable, historical console price.

GP: The design of the Xbox 360 is very different from the old Xbox. How much of the Japanese or Asian audience were you thinking of when you were designing it?

YM: Design is very subjective judgment. I have to admit that this generation Xbox was a little too aggressive for the Japanese market. We took care of that by including lots of focus-group studies from Japan and ID [industrial design] firms in Japan.

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