Xbox 360 price drop revealed in Wal-mart brochure?

Sure, this one would be a breeze to Photoshop, but the fact that a Circuit City brochure so recently and successfully predicted a PS3 price drop gives us cause to hope. The teensy picture above purports to depict a new Wal-mart ad with that oft-rumored new $349 price point for the Xbox 360 Premium. The EXIF data checks out, so if it is a prank at least they took the time to do it right. No better way to figure out the legitimacy of this one than to wait it out -- and start betting on sales boost figures if Microsoft does indeed cut the price.

[Thanks, Brad]

[(Unverified) Posted Jul 28th 2007 11:01PM]

The ad is fake for several reasons.
1.)This isn't a Wal Mart magazine, it's from Circuit City
2.)Notice how everything has CENTS after the dollar value such as the Wii priced at 249.99. The Xbox 360 is just $349.
3. Why is the picture so tiny?

[(Unverified) Posted Jul 29th 2007 2:28PM]

1. Take a look at the Walmart ad in today's paper. You will see the same orange background with the same font.

2. Also in today's paper - see the PS2 add, you'll see that its listed at $129 (with the "$" and no ".99") you'll notice that all of the products that are .xx do not have "$"

I think this is legit.

[Garst Posted Jul 29th 2007 10:54PM]

Another thing about prices at Wal-mart, go into one and look at the televisions. None of them have any change, it's all $XXX.00. So it's possible they could have decided to just go the same way with the 360 as they did with the TVs.

[(Unverified) Posted Jul 29th 2007 1:17AM]

Well Im pretty sure its a price cut for the premium and not a mark up for the core sku. I think this because there is no real reason for Microsoft to increase the price at all. The reason why it most likely is a price cut for the premium system is because of the fact that Microsoft has changed the chipset to the much cheaper and more efficent Falcon chips.

As for a price cut for the Elite and Halo 3 SKUs, i doubt there will be a price cut for those. Mainly because those systems were intended for hardcore gamers and the whole idea of Microsoft's pricecut is to make the Premium at a more mass market price like the Wii (basically an attempt to get sales away from the Wii).

Not that I hate the PS3 or anything but there pricecut was actually a liquidation (no more production of 60gb), so I would rather the 360. In addition to that none of the PS3 games (currently or on the way) run at 60 fps, instead they run at 30 fps which isnt very high definition. This is mainly because of difficulty for developers whereas the 360 has a vast assortment of high def 60 frames per second games.

However I do think that within time the ps3 will be as good as it was supposed to be as long as Sony can get enough solid exclusive games (not exclusivity that lasts only a few months - like Resident Evil 5 and others which are going on the 360).
Until then if you have a ps3 get an Xbox 360 so you dont have to worry about games or high definition content. Because if you have both or just a 360 your alrite, but only having a ps3 is just gonna end with disappointment or just owning the same 5 good games(Resistence, Killzone, Heavenly Sword, etc.) for a long time until they get scratched, old, or dusty.

So there you have it either system is entertaining but if your only into gaming ur best off with a 360, blu-ray = a ps3(well actually you can get a blu ray player for cheaper than a ps3), loading operating systems = ps3, online play = 360, control w/out rumble= ps3.

[(Unverified) Posted Jul 29th 2007 1:28AM]

since when does the ps3 have more games than the 360. And GTA4 is not a ps3 exclusive its coming to the 360 with more exclusive downloadable content then the ps3, get your facts straight.

[(Unverified) Posted Jul 29th 2007 1:33AM]

Actually Metal Gear Solid 4 is only an exclusive to the PS3 for a few months after that a Konami is putting it on the 360 instead of Kojima, his succesors will take over the franchise and put it on the 360. If you don't believe me check out 1up.com or some other gaming site.

[(Unverified) Posted Jul 29th 2007 2:38AM]

Why is there an obvious smudge mark next to the 9 for the price of the xbox 360??? As I remember, all Walmart ads have cent marks BELOW 99¢. Usually like 88 or 84 or something near these amounts. FAKE oc

[roach Posted Jul 29th 2007 2:41AM]

More games run better on 360 than PS3 because of 360 head start with next gen. Companies are using 360 for developement tools, then ported into PS3, Wii,... Last gen developement was done mostly on PS2, so I would choose PS2 because better optimization. Unless, the game is only for 1 console release, it's better to get 360. I know, I work in the industry.

[Seahawk Posted Jul 29th 2007 4:20AM]

http://i7.photobucket.com/albums/y300/MechDX/imagejpeg0copyvf2.jpg


ToysRus ad

[(Unverified) Posted Jul 30th 2007 10:09AM]

Exactly, there is now a Wal-mart ad, a Circuit City ad and a TRU ad all showing the $349 price.

Its confirmed.

[(Unverified) Posted Jul 29th 2007 11:30AM]

The Xbox 360 has a 33% failure rate:

http://www.dailytech.com/Retailers+Estimate+Xbox+360+Failure+Rate+High+as+33+Percent/article7892.htm

http://www.google.com/search?client=safari&rls=en&q=xbox+failure+rate&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8

[Sy Posted Jul 29th 2007 2:17PM]

"the 5 min heavenly sword demo is for 1 gb...each level of killzone 2 is for 2-2.5 gb
yea u guys r right....blu-ray does suck.....we just need 9 gb....so that we can be HD versions of old games

40 mins of heavenly sword and 3-4 levels of killzone 2!!!!

blu-ray sucks...end of story
:)
"

Clearly, you are not very familiar with programming and the nuances of game demos.

[(Unverified) Posted Jul 29th 2007 2:35PM]

I'm surprised that Microsoft skipped the opportunity to market the XBox 360 for $360. "Now the 360 is actually 360!"

[(Unverified) Posted Jul 29th 2007 3:49PM]

Cmon man, you gotta learn the basics when stating something like that.

The "codec" aspect that Davey Jones mentioned is perfectly true. And I'll agree that the PS3 doesn't suck, but it does lack games and the enhancement of gamplay thru a decent online service such as XBL.

"ROCKSTAR is making an exclusive for the ps3 which they have officially stated is not possible without the cell and other ps3 features." --- Yeah I totaly agree thats possible, but keep in mind the amount of data and calculations you are dealing with.

Same thing with a computer, If you open up a pic in PhotoShop and save it with the highest settings, you can have a resulting picture of upwards of 50mb, which is very useless and inconvenient.

Sure if you have the best computer it will open relativley fast, wheras an midrange/older computer it can take 5 minutes or crash.

Lets remember that the PS3 has 2 teraflops of power and 360 has one, BUT the PS3 has 5x more data to precess from the blu-ray based games.

I have donwloaded and watched trailer for the new GTA coming for 360, it is amazing and it was based on actual gameplay. It is supposed to have a huge new map aswell.

So how do you justify your Blu-Ray arguement? Just stop trying to win blog battles and simply enjoy gaming, with whatever system makes you sleep at night..

[(Unverified) Posted Aug 1st 2007 10:51AM]

Why does everyone keep talking about August 8th? Toys R Us puts out a flier every two weeks as far as I can tell on Sundays. Speaking with a sales clerk the other day she confirmed their new add will be out this Sunday. That makes it August 5th. Also, Toys R Us just ran a special last week which gave a free $50 gift card for a purchase of a 360. Seems at least a little odd with the upcoming price drop. Were they just trying to see how well it would sell at that price??

[(Unverified) Posted Aug 9th 2007 10:09AM]

Did anyone else's Walmart not drop their prices today (the 8th), despite the price showing up on walmart.com?