Xbox 720 Reveal

[alanschu]

I know you're being tongue in cheek Bruce, but as a through and through PC Gamer, all of the "platform wars" have always irritated me.  I have zero beef if someone prefers to play on the console, and for some games (sports games, but also stuff like Arkham City) I usually prefer to play on the console just because it's a different environment and I get to leverage my beefy television.  The set up is also better for "gaming with an audience" than my computer is.

 

 

In any case, as a gamer in general, I want people to want to play games, regardless of what platforms those games may be for.

Edited May 22, 2013 by alanschu

[Morgoth]

So now we need Sony storming out of the gates and finally announce that they have the exact same DRM & Used games policy.

 

THE INTERNET would explode.

[BruceVC]

I know you're being tongue in cheek Bruce, but as a through and through PC Gamer, all of the "platform wars" have always irritated me.  I have zero beef if someone prefers to play on the console, and for some games (sports games, but also stuff like Arkham City) I usually prefer to play on the console just because it's a different environment and I get to leverage my beefy television.  The set up is also better for "gaming with an audience" than my computer is.

 

 

In any case, as a gamer in general, I want people to want to play games, regardless of what platforms those games may be for.

 

Yeah I'm just having some fun

 

I only play PC games but end of the day your choice of gaming platform is up the individual.

[Keyrock]

I know you're being tongue in cheek Bruce, but as a through and through PC Gamer, all of the "platform wars" have always irritated me.  I have zero beef if someone prefers to play on the console, and for some games (sports games, but also stuff like Arkham City) I usually prefer to play on the console just because it's a different environment and I get to leverage my beefy television.  The set up is also better for "gaming with an audience" than my computer is.

 

 

In any case, as a gamer in general, I want people to want to play games, regardless of what platforms those games may be for.

Was it always like this or did "platform wars" start with teh internetz?  I remember playing games with my buddies on my NES, then going to their house and playing on their Master System and we had fun.  I don't remember pulling out our console peens to compare who's was bigger. 

[Amentep]

I know you're being tongue in cheek Bruce, but as a through and through PC Gamer, all of the "platform wars" have always irritated me.  I have zero beef if someone prefers to play on the console, and for some games (sports games, but also stuff like Arkham City) I usually prefer to play on the console just because it's a different environment and I get to leverage my beefy television.  The set up is also better for "gaming with an audience" than my computer is.

 

 

In any case, as a gamer in general, I want people to want to play games, regardless of what platforms those games may be for.

 

I think the biggest problem with the PC vs Console is that the strengths of the PC don't seem to be leveraged very well (which probably helps perpetuate some of the anti-Console feelings of the PC player).  The PC can have a lot more robust input via the keyboard which can leave a lot of room to do complex things a controller can't.

 

I don't think that makes consoles bad - not every game has to be the same - but it does seem that PCs strengths aren't really being played with.

 

 

 

 

Was it always like this or did "platform wars" start with teh internetz?  I remember playing games with my buddies on my NES, then going to their house and playing on their Master System and we had fun.  I don't remember pulling out our console peens to compare who's was bigger. 

 

 

I certainly don't remember anyone I knew caring whether you were playing on an Amiga, an Amstrad, a C64, bbc micro.  Didn't know people cared about such things until I got online - and it was never kids, it was always adults arguing their SNES was better than you Genesis, their PC was better than your mac, their AMD graphics card was better than your Intel graphics cards, etc.

Edited May 22, 2013 by Amentep

[Malcador]

In any case, as a gamer in general, I want people to want to play games, regardless of what platforms those games may be for.

So, what now, I can't call these console people untermensch ? Bah!

[AwesomeOcelot]

I don't quite follow, why does anyone care about what someone else is using as a gaming system?

The larger install base (because of user friendliness and cheaper initial costs, although I believe PC gaming is cheaper in the long run), lack of piracy (and ridiculous exaggerated perceived level of piracy on PC), and move to multi-platform releases (because of higher production costs) destroyed FPS gaming, and damaged PC gaming across most genres including RPG and even RTS.

Edited May 22, 2013 by AwesomeOcelot

[Cultist]

 

 

 

I don't quite follow, why does anyone care about what someone else is using as a gaming system?

Schadenfreude.

 

That is totally uncalled for and utterly insulting! We are not like that.

We are just arseholes.

 

 

Funny 

 

I'm proud to be a part of Internet majority.

[alanschu]

Was it always like this or did "platform wars" start with teh internetz?  I remember playing games with my buddies on my NES, then going to their house and playing on their Master System and we had fun.  I don't remember pulling out our console peens to compare who's was bigger. 

 

 

I didn't notice it with NES vs. Master System (I think Master System was pretty inconsequential in my neck of the woods.  I only know one person that had one).  There was definitely a degree of SNES vs. Genesis in my area, however.  And I lived out in the boonies to boot.

[Rostere]

There's a lot of confusion going on regarding why MS did things the way they did. Even Jimquisition doesn't seem to understand just what the purpose of new XBox is.

 

Online DRM but especially the transition to subscription-based services is here to stay.

 

W8 also might get some of the new stuff. Remember how people say MS is not earning a lot from the XBox? Well, it's great for introducing people to their products. If you fell at home with your XBox, you will like W8 and WP as well. As much as possible is going to be made cross-platform.

 

The argument that your smart TV can already do much of the "new stuff" (although much of it was actually in the XBox 360) is a bit misleading. Sure it might be able to (but of course not all people have smart TVs). The streamlining of merging all media to online services is definitely the future. And in that sense, it was retarded to put those features into a "smart TV" because your console or media PC will be able to do those things as well, and better (I don't get why Jim says that his "smart TV" can do the stuff better - how can he put any confidence into that statement at this stage?). The only reason smart TVs exist at all in the first place is because computers and consoles were far too slow to get the same functionality.

 

I have no idea whether or not people will have XBoxes or PS4s or W8 gaming and media PCs or whatever plugged into their "big screen" in the future, but I can say for certain that it will have the same functionality. There are a lot of gamers who are very nostalgic and want their console to work essentially just like the NES, but in truth those were the same who years ago lamented the addition of Blu- ray and DVD capabilities to consoles of the past, and how this jacked up their price. Let's face it - in the future, you will have one entertainment computer in your home which does all of the stuff.

[babaganoosh13]

 

Was it always like this or did "platform wars" start with teh internetz?  I remember playing games with my buddies on my NES, then going to their house and playing on their Master System and we had fun.  I don't remember pulling out our console peens to compare who's was bigger. 

 

 

I didn't notice it with NES vs. Master System (I think Master System was pretty inconsequential in my neck of the woods.  I only know one person that had one).  There was definitely a degree of SNES vs. Genesis in my area, however.  And I lived out in the boonies to boot.

 

There was a little bit of it around here with sports titles, which is kind of where it started. The Genesis had the faster processor, and it took until about the 96 EA Sports games to get rid of most of the slowdown on all the SNES sports games. It was really Mortal Kombat, and the censorship stances taken by the two companies at the time that really caused it to explode. Mario vs. Sonic just kind of got swept up in that IMHO.

[AwesomeOcelot]

The only reason smart TVs exist at all in the first place is because computers and consoles were far too slow to get the same functionality.

What are you talking about? That's not even remotely true.

[Labadal]

So now we need Sony storming out of the gates and finally announce that they have the exact same DRM & Used games policy.

 

THE INTERNET would explode.

 

They probably will do something similar. But they could get some goodwill if they don't do it.

[entrerix]

 Let's face it - in the future, you will have one entertainment computer in your home which does all of the stuff.

 

"all the stuff" except play ps2 games.  or playstation 3 games. or  xbox 360 games. gamecube games. nes games etc etc etc

 

no backwards compatibility means that gamers will always have to have 3-6 boxes plugged in at a time

[Labadal]

 

 Let's face it - in the future, you will have one entertainment computer in your home which does all of the stuff.

 

"all the stuff" except play ps2 games.  or playstation 3 games. or  xbox 360 games. gamecube games. nes games etc etc etc

 

no backwards compatibility means that gamers will always have to have 3-6 boxes plugged in at a time

 

 

I play PS2 and Gamecube games on my PC, woohoo!

[Gfted1]

Isnt Sony offering BC through their cloud?

[Labadal]

Isnt Sony offering BC through their cloud?

 

I don't think we know yet. It's just rumors at this point. Someone at the company said yes, someone else said no. They can't even agree on it internally.

[entrerix]

Isnt Sony offering BC through their cloud?

 

are they?  i hadn't heard that.  sounds like wishful thinking, but maybe i missed that bit of news

 

seems more likely that they will just sell new versions of popular ps2-3 games that will be playable on ps4.  got to get that double dip

[Morgoth]

Nice and thorough hardware analysis: http://www.anandtech.com/show/6972/xbox-one-hardware-compared-to-playstation-4/2

[Morgoth]

Isnt Sony offering BC through their cloud?

 

I think that was their goal but I don't think it's gonna work well.

[alanschu]

Given that the entire idea that consoles could have backwards compatibility is a relatively new invention, I think gamers frankly have unreasonable expectations over demanding it, and in part Sony is responsible for giving gamers that expectation.

 

I remember thinking it was awesome with the PS2, until I realized that ultimately, I mostly played PS2 games on my PS2, and only a handful of times even touched my PSX games.

 

I also am curious how much demand their truly is for backwards compatibility.  I enjoy retro gaming and tickling my nostalgia as much as the next person (I recently played through some Punch Out and a ton of Tetris when a coworker brought in their NES), but ultimately it's hard to say if I would have really cared if I wouldn't have loaded up those games and played it recently.

 

 

The only reason we have legacy backwards compatibility with the PC is because some other person spent his time granting us an emulator that mimics the machine.  Again, a situation where gamers are spoiled, and ultimately have created a false expectation that things *should* be inherently backwards compatible.  I don't even have a 5.25" floppy drive (and haven't for years), and I'm not really going to bother configuring one so I can load up my original copy of Test Drive.  Fortunately, some people out there did some work and have convinced me that this is an innate feature of PCs, and hence it should always exist and should exist even in other hardware that is decidedly more closed!

[Majek]

[Malcador]

Not too sure people are wanting backwards compatibility with games from the early 90s or late 80s, heh. Keeping it with the immediately previous generation would probably be enough, I guess.

[LadyCrimson]

Given that the entire idea that consoles could have backwards compatibility is a relatively new invention, I think gamers frankly have unreasonable expectations over demanding it, and in part Sony is responsible for giving gamers that expectation.

I tend to think the same, although I do understand wanting to be able to at least play more recent games ( a few years old say) with an upgraded piece of gaming hardware, even if those older games didn't benefit from the higher res settings/graphical improvements. That desire is a big reason I stick with PC's, where you can still upgrade/patch/tweak old games to run for years and many O/S changes (or have multiple O/S installs or PCs if you want) etc.

 

But when you're buying an enclosed unit that isn't upgradable/you have little to no control over its make-up, I think the expectation that it should have almost endless backwards compatibility starts to become a little unreasonable. That said, I also wouldn't disagree that Microsoft isn't really thinking about what gamers want, at this point. Actually, I have no idea what they're thinking, but that's because I still believe one is better off just connecting a PC to your big screen TV instead.

[Drowsy Emperor]

I always want BC because it gives me a reason to skip on buying an entire console just to play the half a dozen games I really want to play.

 

If they don't promise me that I won't promise them I won't reach for the emulator.

Edited May 22, 2013 by Drowsy Emperor