Xbox Reveal

[Firewind]

Re: Xbox Reveal

Hey Mal! Good news!

[Nestama]

Re: Xbox Reveal

Oh goody. I'll get to keep my two FIFA 2012 achievements I got while my 360 was turned off... yay.

[Malacite]

Re: Xbox Reveal

lol

That's about the only thing I'm really happy about thus far. And I know you don't like achievements, but I get free Microsoft Points for racking them up - got 100 in April alone.

So

[Icemage]

Re: Xbox Reveal

lol

That's about the only thing I'm really happy about thus far. And I know you don't like achievements, but I get free Microsoft Points for racking them up - got 100 in April alone.

So

100MSP = $1.25

Meanwhile, Sony sent me $10 in April just for being a good customer, and then gave me a $40 rebate for spending money on their storefront on stuff I'd have bought anyway, on top of the discounts that I got for pretty much everything I bought. And none of that was dependent on me wolfing down games like a starving man at a buffet.

But seriously, no backward compatibility is mostly expected. I'm sure Microsoft took a good hard look at the money Sony and friends have been making on "HD editions" of older games and decided that making a BC option of some sort wasn't worth the difficulty when they could just fleece their customers by putting a dash of paint on old games.


Icemage

[Firewind]

Re: Xbox Reveal

lol

That's about the only thing I'm really happy about thus far. And I know you don't like achievements, but I get free Microsoft Points for racking them up - got 100 in April alone.

So

Nah Achievements don't bother me. I do actually like having progress trackers, especially if I put a game down for a while, and some achievements are really well thought out.

People who decide to ruin my online experience purely to get them however, do. CoD (yes the Challenges count), Rift and WoW were the worst for it because you would have Raid Wipes and PvP matches thrown down the toilet because someone wanted his achievement. I did also receive death threats from one guy on Steam for beating him in a Shogun Total War 2 game because he was one win away from some achievement or another. Some people really need to remember that there are others playing the game too.

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

Re: Xbox Reveal

Xbox One is just a walking disaster.

What's particularly amazing in the last couple of days is that MS plans to change nothing about their relationship with indies, meanwhile Nintendo and Sony have pretty much done everything to woo them in their general direction, like letting indies waiving their usual fees, set their own prices and sales and allowing them to self-publish. Pretty much what Steam and iOS and Android platforms do.

Then there were all the Kinects on current 360s that either shut off or cut the livestream and went to the home screen because of commands uttered during the conference the current version of Kinect supports. This will be awesome of they repeat this error again during their E3 conference. This is, of course, assuming they have games to show at it.

All in all, this is the best free advertising PS4 and Wii U could have hoped for. "Come play our games, we're not going to be massive draconian douchenozzles about this."

[Malacite]

Re: Xbox Reveal

All in all, this is the best free advertising PS4 and Wii U could have hoped for. "Come play our games, we're not going to be massive draconian douchenozzles about this."

You saw the link I posted earlier right? About how both their stocks have shot up in the wake of the XB1 announcement? Man, E3 is gonna be a doozy... Sony is going to have to really fuck up hard to be outdone by MS this year. I'm still waiting for the major retailers to rage against MS, though I suspect they're all waiting for E3 as well to see if MS will walkback some of their bullshit like the full-price fee on discs.

Even if you do have to pay full price for it, why should I even bother going to a retailer to buy the game myself (unless I want the box and everything) when I can just borrow a friend's copy of a game and pay for the code? It's not just used sales that are going to hurt, but possibly even the sales of new games - Retailers don't make much as it is off of new games so this is like a double-kick to the nuts.

[Icemage]

Re: Xbox Reveal

Then there were all the Kinects on current 360s that either shut off or cut the livestream and went to the home screen because of commands uttered during the conference the current version of Kinect supports. This will be awesome of they repeat this error again during their E3 conference. This is, of course, assuming they have games to show at it.

I'm going to pop some popcorn for the XBone launch for the first reports of griefers shouting "Xbox Off!" in a multiplayer match. Hilarity will ensue, because you have to have the Kinect plugged in or the console won't work.

Seriously, Microsoft's PR is making Nintendo look like geniuses in comparison right now.


Icemage

[Firewind]

Re: Xbox Reveal

The implications of compulsory Kinect and compulsory always on internet connection are also pretty frightening.

[Taskmage]

Re: Xbox Reveal

I have nothing of substance to add to this conversation, but in the vein of today's Penny Arcade comic, I just wanted to throw this in here:

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

Re: Xbox Reveal

Wii U sales drastically spike after Xbox One presentation - Destructoid

Possible coincidence the basic Wii U bundle got a sale on Amazon UK going through next week, offered up with a side of "Well, i was going to wait and see on Xbox One, but fuck it, Wii U will make a fine compliment to my PS4/PC." Not that i think the UK needed much persuasion in regards to what they were getting next.

Report: Microsoft and publishers get a cut of used sales - Destructoid

Interesting how people typically interested in getting out their pitchforks regarding Gamestop, but that this system MS proposes would leave Gamestop seeing less money and cuts out the mom'n'pop chains entirely shows people finally looking at the bigger picture. This is what I always try to remind people of when they just want to hammer Gamestop, there are legitimate small businesses that make their living on used product because most of these publishers just don't give them a reasonable cut of the new game sales. Used is the lifeblood of those smaller chains and independent stores.

And I still don't believe publishers deserve a second cut of the revenue anyway.

[Firewind]

Re: Xbox Reveal

I actually called the GAME Manager friend about this and yeah, confirming that the Wii U is getting more sales in the wake of the XBox One shitstorm. I think that Nintendo and Sony couldn't have asked for a better start to this generation. Now let's hope they don't squander it.

As for the Kinect thing. It is actually reality if you live in a city in the UK. There's not a single route from home to work where I'm NOT on a CCTV camera (and yes it has done nothing whatsoever to decrease crime) and that isn't even including the marked and unmarked Police monitoring vans that are everywhere during Rush Hour. I don't even have privacy in my bedroom if the curtains are open because of the security cameras at the school behind where I live.

What scares me is that this is a company that is renowned for selling on people's personal information for profit and people want this device in their own fucking homes.

[Taskmage]

Re: Xbox Reveal

And I still don't believe publishers deserve a second cut of the revenue anyway.

Publishers don't currently deserve a cut of used game sales because they have nothing to do with them. Maybe giving them a whiff of profit will incentivise them to earn their keep by doing things like supporting their products beyond the first week of sales. They might even, and this is certainly being fanciful, increase support for smaller, more focused game experiences, Portal-like games, that may have a greater potential for quick turnovers rather than milking each installation for every cent via DLCs.

- - - Updated - - -

On the Kinect thing, we've had this concept of the future since like the 60s that involved calling out to your house and just having it do things for you. I don't think people had put it together that that would mean something watching and listening to you 24/7.

Hacking and corporate intrusion are things, but I think most people are just creeped out by the idea. I mean, if it were Jarvis I'd be 10000% cool with that, but some awkward product from a company I don't entirely trust kinda makes me feel gross. So I think there's an uncanny valley element. People don't trust machines in a personal way yet, and it's going to be some other company's job to fix that. Probably Apple.

[cidbahamut]

Re: Xbox Reveal

I think my biggest beef with the xbox one's model is that it basically amounts to producing dead games. The entire console's library is going to be lost to history before it even hits the market. It's part of why I didn't really get into the last generation either, but the X1 just makes it that much worse. Once the servers go down, every single game on the console vanishes forever, and those servers will go down.

It's basically book burning.

[Taskmage]

Re: Xbox Reveal

The shitty thing about the cloud is it's made of vapor.