For those interested in "mainstream press" takes on the video game industry, the New York Times has posted "Xbox 360 Out of Order? For Loyalists, No Worries".
It's a little light, a little late, a little inaccurate, and doesn't include any really relevant sources. Other than that, it's fine.
While there's a snippet with Frank O'Connor at Bungie Studios, it doesn't interview relevant Microsoft folks about the failure rate or new return policy. On the analyst side, there's no Michael Pachter or even Colin Sebastian. And while they talk to someone whose Xbox 360 has died 3 times, they don't talk to the guy whose Xbox has died 12 times, or reference arguably meaningful polls like the one by Kotaku.com.
And while the NY Times says, "Microsoft has said that it will fix any faulty Xbox 360 free of charge," it's actually just "Red Ring of Death" items that will get fixed. That's three red rings indicating a system failure, not four red rings (for you folks who can't plug in a video cable correctly). That misinformation may cause some disgruntlement.
The article doesn't even include the Halo 3 pre-order numbers. At over a million pre-orders, Microsoft's claiming the "Fastest-Selling Pre-Ordered Video Game in History" crown. And if you assume a standard / special edition / Legendary Edition split of 80% / 15% / 5% (for discussion sake), you're looking at $48M / $10.5M / $6.5M. Since Halo 2 day one sales shattered any movie's opening box office weekend numbers, and Halo 3 looks to shatter Halo 2 numbers, you'd think those kind of things would make it into a New York Times story.
I think the linking and layout of Halo 3 and broken 360s (arguably done to show the game is so big, the broken Xboxes and repairs don't matter to loyalists), sends a negative message, and probably not the kind of PR Bungie or Microsoft want for the game.
But hey, it's mainstream coverage of video games.
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