It's Official

[Brad Company]

What really sucks is that Sony may do something similar. Hopefully all the bad press Microsoft is receiving will persuade Sony to do the right thing.

Sonys' public stance on the matter is that they are leaving that sort of thing to the publisher.
No publisher has so far announced anything, and probably won't unless most of them are in collusion.
I consider this highly unlikely, as even EA has scrapped the Online Pass strategy.

[Brad Company]

I'm back to dump on Xbone some more. Todays' topic, the "power of the cloud".
http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-in-theory-can-xbox-one-cloud-transform-gaming

[Jason]

I should thank Microsoft for making my next-gen buying decision MUCH easier. I saw a similar article that stated the Xbox One could quadruple its power by using the cloud and didn't even have to read it (but I did) to know it's a bunch of bullshit. It's amazing how they announced their system after Sony and it still has lower specs.

[Brad Company]

What's sad is we're the older- somewhat -more- affluent crowd the thing seems aimed at. I went from ambivilence to hostility after the reveal.
The furious backpedaling and obfuscation by MS since then hasn't helped, either.Of course, on the other hand, some "dudebro" types and gamer dads I run into playing online are stoked; some examples also to be found at DSP, where the controller looks "badass".
So, the thing may sell like hotcakes.

[Brad Company]

Some more stuff made clear by MS in the past couple of days.
Not all terrible news,but not much good at all;


    You do not own the games you buy. You license them.
    Discs are only used to install and then license games and do not imply ownership.
    People can play games installed on your console whether you're logged in or not.
    10 people can be authorised to play these games on a different Xbox One via the cloud, but not at the same time.
    Publishers decide whether you can trade in your games and may charge for this.
    Publishers decide whether you can give a game you own to someone for free,  this only works if they've been on your friends list for 30 days.
    Your account allows you to play the games you license on any console.
    Your Xbox One must connect to the internet every 24 hours to keep playing games.
    When playing on another Xbox One with your account, this is reduced to one hour.
    Live TV, Blu-ray and DVD movies are exempt from these internet requirements.
    Loaning and renting games will not be possible at launch, but Microsoft is "exploring the possibilities".
    Microsoft may change these policies or discontinue them at any point.

How this stuff got out of the spitball/idea phase is beyond me

[Ted]

That list is so ANTI-consumer that I can only shake my head.  I have a good feeling that indie PC gaming will become more popular than ever in the years after this launch.  And it's not even like it's a good thing for developers.  As a developer you want to get your game into as many hands as possible.  I think publishers are going to get a lot of blowback from this strategy and the bigger they are the worse it will be.

[Jason]

There's two things I like about the announcement:

   
• The physical disc does not need to be in the drive to play a game and I'd have access to all my games from anyone's console if I log in under my Xbox Live account.
• Shared games can be used by me and one other person at the same time. I'm hoping that means that we can actually play against each other using different consoles.

Everything else completely sucks. How are they going to decide who is in your "family group"? Will the accounts need to be linked to the same credit card? If not, what would stop me from sharing my games with friends?

Publishers have all the power in determining whether you can sell, trade or loan your games and none of them have made their intentions known yet. To be quite honest, I can't see them doing anything that favors the gamer and just keeping track of the different policies for different games/publishers will be annoying.

Sony has been vague in their responses to DRM, but I'd be shocked if the PS4 didn't have similar restrictions except for the required constant Internet connection.

[Brad Company]

My question again, is why sell physical discs at all? I already have to have a persistent broadband connection for the console to function, why sell the product at all at retail and involve middle-men?

What's going to be funny is when Dudebro and Gamers'Mom go to Redbox to pick up some titles for their new 'Bone. Or when they head to Gamestop to do a little tradin' to get the new Madden or CoD. The outrage and moral indignation will be priceless.

Of course,there is a lot of people who know and yet don't care about this stuff at all. You can head to DSP and see the reactions;paying for a license and then paying an extra fee to have the service to utilize the license is A-OK with some folks.

[Jason]

I think there are two reasons they're still selling physical discs:

   
• There are some people that like to physically own a game to have as part of their collection. I've downloaded my fair share of games but I still prefer physical copies (I feel the same way about movies too).
• The game publishers would not be happy if they lost the visibility and accessibility they have by having their games displayed and on sale in retail stores. They'd also lose the people buying games as gifts for other people.

I think the game publishers would love to eliminate the middle-man but they're afraid of being ahead of the curve and losing sales. On the other hand, by offering downloadable games the same day as the physical version, they're certainly setting the stage for an all-digital future and pushing the gaming public towards getting comfortable with the idea. I'd be shocked if any future consoles offer physical games after this generation.

Having said all that, my son and I were talking about our options of graphics cards and controllers for our computers. We may just invest in $150 graphics cards (Geforce GTX 650) and buy the Xbox controller for Windows. Will the standard, wired Xbox 360 controller work with a PC or do we have to buy the Xbox 360 Controller "For Windows"?

[Brad Company]

"There are some people that like to physically own a game to have as part of their collection. I've downloaded my fair share of games but I still prefer physical copies (I feel the same way about movies too)."

You won't own it anymore.

"The game publishers would not be happy if they lost the visibility and accessibility they have by having their games displayed and on sale in retail stores. They'd also lose the people buying games as gifts for other people."

Yes,but a XBL points/gift card would be the same thing.

Sony has been doing day one digital for a while,but I haven't seen any sales numbers for that.

Looks like you can use your controller;http://support.xbox.com/en-US/games/pc-games/xbox-controller-for-windows-info

[Ted]

Jason,  I can answer the controller question since I use controllers with my PC for some games.  You need a hardwired xbox 360 controller for you PC.  The kind that has the plug into the wireless controller to charge will not work even when plugged in.  The ones that work are the ones that are always wired.  The always wired ones will also work on the console.

Edit:  Just looked at Brad's link and I wasn't aware that was even possible to I guess you can?

[Ted]

http://www.polygon.com/2013/6/7/4406170/xbox-one-internet-trade-policy

[Jason]

Brad, good point about the XBL points and gift cards but I don't think stores will really push those since there's almost no markup on those items. Microsoft not only risk losing the consumer, but they may lose their retail store business too. It'll be very interesting to see how things shake out from all of this. Needless to say, any excitement I had for the next-gen is practically gone now.

Is Sony's day one digital sales for first party games only? I'd be curious to see those numbers too. As I said, I like owning a physical copy of a game but it is convenient knowing that you can just download a new release on the morning it's available.

Thanks for the link about the controllers. I was considering a wired controller but I can just buy the wireless receiver for less than $15 and use my current controllers.

Ted, what video card do you use for gaming on your PC? Would you recommend the Geforce GTX 650 for someone not looking for ridiculous frame rates?

[Brad Company]

First and Third party...NBA2K13 was up day one.

[Ted]

Jason, the PC I'm using was built about a year ago.  It has an i5-2500 3.3Ghz CPU in it and an Nvidia GTX 560 with 1GB.  I run pretty much every game on highest settings with no problems.


http://www.hwcompare.com/13473/geforce-gtx-560-vs-geforce-gtx-650/

I don't keep up on hardware like I used to.  I bet you know much more about that stuff than I do.  This PC I actually had a flight sim acquaintance build for me because I didn't have the time and didn't want to do the research.  I just told him I wanted something that would run FSX with all the sliders to the right and it does.