On the one hand, Harmonix has a new owner that's taken on $100 million in debt on their behalf.
On the other, third-party trackers have noted that Wii RBN sales have long blown serious chunks, at least compared to the 360 and PS3.
I think that would be different arguments. Not buying currently available DLC is showing apathy toward either the product, the content, or the method of delivery. The RBN sales on PS3 have, in general, kept pace with the same songs on the 360.
The idea that somebody could gather all the data, put it on a disc (or whatever format), and release it with the ability for people to use at will without paying for it, would more negatively impact sales of DLC on the PS3 rather than increase the number of people who even use DLC on the Wii.
To what degree, I can't rightly say. Not yet, anyway. But if you don't buy and play additional content now, then the increase in people who at least play is not going to be increased significantly just because access has been made easier.
So in the spirit of that, reality show producers have officially run out of ideas.
Waka waka waka! Pac-Man, is headed to reality TV. Merv Griffin Entertainment has teamed with leading game maker Namco Bandai Games America, which owns the Pac-Man brand, to develop an unscripted series based on the hugely popular video game. This marks the first major foray into TV for Pac-Man whose only previous TV presence was a short-lived animated series in the early 1980s. The project also coincides with the 30th anniversary of the best-selling game and 1980s pop culture icon.
The Pac-Man reality series is envisioned as a "big, crazy Wipeout-type event with a lot of energy," said Merv Griffin's president of TV Roy Bank. "The idea we have is to take what Pac-Man is and bring it to life, to bring what is essentially the world's biggest game of tag to television." Bank is executive producing the project, which is now being taken out to the broadcast networks, with David Russo, who brought the idea to him.
I miss the giant foam obstacle course game shows like Fun House or that one-off Storm the Castle, which was based on Takeshi's Castle (mocked as MXC on Spike).
I miss the giant foam obstacle course game shows like Fun House or that one-off Storm the Castle, which was based on Takeshi's Castle (mocked as MXC on Spike).
I miss the giant foam obstacle course game shows like Fun House or that one-off Storm the Castle, which was based on Takeshi's Castle (mocked as MXC on Spike).
Wipeout on ABC is kind of bad, but if you watch it long enough, it becomes "so bad it's good." It's no [vidurl=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lJmCem8qbTE]Ninja Warrior,[/vidurl] though, the only reason I'm sad we no longer get G4 in our house.
Despite not making December's NPD top 10 list, Gran Turismo 5 sold 560,500 units last month in the US and Canada. IndustryGamers got the number straight from the NPD Group -- a number which looks like an apparent dropoff from Sony's late November launch numbers, which heralded 5.5 million units shipped worldwide, 1.25 million of which were in North America alone.
And hey, let's not kid ourselves: a good amount of December's "sales" figures are also accounted for in November's "shipped" figures. All of them, in fact -- 1.14 million copies of Gran Turismo 5 have been sold in the US and Canada thus far, a representative from NPD told us this afternoon, leaving approximately 110K copies from the initial shipment still on store shelves.
So Sony apparently uses "shipped" numbers for game sales too.
Also: is it just me, or do any of you keep reading "Gran Torino" when you see "Gran Turismo?" I keep picturing Clint Eastwood saying "get off my lawn."
I don't know what MoH you played, but the one I played was utter garbage. CoD BLOPS has a way better campaign than it. As silly as it is, the fact that it's fun and fast paced trumps MoH lame attempt at dramatic effect. You talk about scripted sequences. MoH has just as many, but at least CoD BLOPS don't bug out half the time. The team AI in MoH is some of the worst I experienced this year in a FPS. It also doesn't look very good thanks in no small part in using UE3 tech really poorly.
Well, that was an unnecessary rant but hey if you can do it then I can to.
MoH certainly looked like crap but no, just no. Yes MoH had scripted sequences, what's your point? My problem wasn't that Black Ops had scripted sequences in the first place, it was that they were horrendously designed. Instead of making you play the game naturally, you basically just follow the marker around the entire game. Take the sequence where the helicopter goes down and you're in the water. If they had not placed the marker where it was, there really isn't any way you'd know that you have to go to that specific spot. Don't go to the market and try take out the enemies from the bank? Your gun doesn't fire and you die almost instantly.
And just because I said MoH had a far better campaign doesn't mean I thought it was great. It was mediocre and forgettable.
I guess what I am most interested in is the how the contracts are worded. If Sony can't make any efforts to prevent the theft of their middle man's products, what rights do the developers have.
I mean, they are the ones getting screwed here. Sony is fine as people will still be purchasing the consoles, but the developers will be losing money. Using Fyrewulff's example. Imagine people being able to print off discs containing 1000 DLC Rock Band songs. That's roughly $1800 of loss, per disc. Of which is entirely missing from Harmonix's pocket.
You have absolutely no idea how the industry works, do you? You seem to be under the impression that the third parties have all the power in this situation, they don't. Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo hold the power. The idea that they'd hold assurances that there'd be no piracy on their systems and then compensate third parties if it did happen is laughable. Everyone knows piracy is inevitable, including third parties.
Sony is fine? Uh, what? You realise Sony make games too, right? And that they earn royalties off of every game sold on their systems? You really think they're happy with just earning some money off hardware?
As for your example, if you can find proof that those downloaded songs would've been purchases otherwise then I'll agree with you. Otherwise, no money is missing from Harmonix's pocket because they never would've had it anyway.
The doom scenario is piracy skyrockets so high that publishers no longer make profits off their PS3 versions of games and they all abandon the system. The chances of this happening however are nil. After all the ridiculous hyperbole, I expect the piracy ratio on the PS3 to be pretty much the same as the 360. But it's so much easier to pirate games on PS3? So? If someone wants to pirate games on either system, they can quite easily.
The doom scenario is piracy skyrockets so high that publishers no longer make profits off their PS3 versions of games and they all abandon the system. The chances of this happening however are nil. After all the ridiculous hyperbole, I expect the piracy ratio on the PS3 to be pretty much the same as the 360. But it's so much easier to pirate games on PS3? So? If someone wants to pirate games on either system, they can quite easily.
Well, I don't think you can easily discount just how easy it has become for the PS3. The bar for the effort has been lowered considerably.
I don't think I'd agree that this spells doom, however.
It is much harder. I disagree with Unco on the basis that we have the Dreamcast and especially the PSP as examples of piracy making consoles less attractive.
Hell, even the DS in Japan. Piracy is partly to "blame" to the 3DS.
It is much harder. I disagree with Unco on the basis that we have the Dreamcast and especially the PSP as examples of piracy making consoles less attractive.
Hell, even the DS in Japan. Piracy is partly to "blame" to the 3DS.
However easy it was for piracy on the Dreamcast, as a factor in it's failure, it would have to be pretty low on the list. Piracy might have contributed, but there was simply too much else to choose from.
It is much harder. I disagree with Unco on the basis that we have the Dreamcast and especially the PSP as examples of piracy making consoles less attractive.
Hell, even the DS in Japan. Piracy is partly to "blame" to the 3DS.
However easy it was for piracy on the Dreamcast, as a factor in it's failure, it would have to be pretty low on the list. Piracy might have contributed, but there was simply too much else to choose from.
Yea, the Dreamcast died a horrible death mainly due to Sega's terrible mis-management, botching and consumer aftertaste of the Saturn, and too much superior competition.
That's a shame. I know someone who just got RB3 Wii for Christmas.
I really hope whatever Nintendo does next console-wise, they don't fuck up their online implementation nearly as bad as they did with Wii.
In terms of what? I'm not going to argue that nothing is wrong, but what is lacking here? It's not like they can't host the same number of tracks or can't charge as much or downloading is slow or error-prone or it's somehow more of a hassle to buy music. I guess you could say the low amount of space is a problem but that doesn't have anything to do with the online implementation.
Since they're stopping because it's not profitable, I'd say it's most likely due to "hardcore" music game fans buying all their music on the 360/PS3 versions, while families get the Wii one and are satisfied with the base game.
In terms of what? I'm not going to argue that nothing is wrong, but what is lacking here? It's not like they can't host the same number of tracks or can't charge as much or downloading is slow or error-prone or it's somehow more of a hassle to buy music. I guess you could say the low amount of space is a problem but that doesn't have anything to do with the online implementation.
Since they're stopping because it's not profitable, I'd say it's most likely due to "hardcore" music game fans buying all their music on the 360/PS3 versions, while families get the Wii one and are satisfied with the base game.
Nintendo's Wii Shopping Channel could definitely use some usability and UI tweaks, but I'm going to agree with Sporky on this one. The people buying the game on the Wii aren't the ones who care about a larger track list or downloading more songs.
In terms of what? I'm not going to argue that nothing is wrong, but what is lacking here? It's not like they can't host the same number of tracks or can't charge as much or downloading is slow or error-prone or it's somehow more of a hassle to buy music. I guess you could say the low amount of space is a problem but that doesn't have anything to do with the online implementation.
Since they're stopping because it's not profitable, I'd say it's most likely due to "hardcore" music game fans buying all their music on the 360/PS3 versions, while families get the Wii one and are satisfied with the base game.
Nintendo's Wii Shopping Channel could definitely use some usability and UI tweaks, but I'm going to agree with Sporky on this one. The people buying the game on the Wii aren't the ones who care about a larger track list or downloading more songs.
Which suggests more of a relation to the design of the console rather than the online portion.
My guess is that Warlock was just a bit confused on the whole issue.
It is much harder. I disagree with Unco on the basis that we have the Dreamcast and especially the PSP as examples of piracy making consoles less attractive.
Hell, even the DS in Japan. Piracy is partly to "blame" to the 3DS.
However easy it was for piracy on the Dreamcast, as a factor in it's failure, it would have to be pretty low on the list. Piracy might have contributed, but there was simply too much else to choose from.
Yea, the Dreamcast died a horrible death mainly due to Sega's terrible mis-management, botching and consumer aftertaste of the Saturn, and too much superior competition.
And the PSP died (outside of Japan) because game releases dried up to a point where most of the userbase pretty much abandoned it, leaving just the hardcore custom firmware users remaining. This isn't something that will happen with the PS3.
Piracy wasn't the reason why game releases dried up by the way. There are a number of reasons why that happened but it's mostly down to SCEA and SCEE's shitty support. They didn't understand the market or the platform itself and treated it like the red headed stepchild of the family.
Joystiq just posted an article about PS3, trophies, and the hacking thereof due to the jailbreaking thing.
edit: Though I guess people have been getting achievements for a while by cheating too.
Did they post how it doesn't even work properly? They can't sync the edited trophy lists with Sony's database so the only people they can show off their cheating e-peens to, is themselves. And even if they could upload it to the servers, it'd be a simple matter of looking at the timestamps, seeing that so-and-so somehow started and finished the game at the exact same time and banning them.
Don't forget Harmonix initially snubbed the Wii for Rock Band, only to frantically come out with RB1 just a few months before RB2 came out. Also, the Wii gained the ability to get DLC even later than that. Most of the dedicated Rock Band fans are on the 360/PS3 because of that.
So I read George Hotz's attorney's response to the TRO filing. It's pretty good, and it got me thinking to a few years back. The response mentions how Sony purports that it system does "everything" and yet they are actively moving to lock down what it can and cannot do.
Remember a few years back when the PS3 launched and Sony tried to have it classified not as a gaming console, but as a "computer"? If I recall correctly, this was to avoid some sort of tax thing. I wonder what would have happened if PS3s were deemed as "computers", since I'm not sure how they are covered in the DMCA.
Don't forget Harmonix initially snubbed the Wii for Rock Band, only to frantically come out with RB1 just a few months before RB2 came out. Also, the Wii gained the ability to get DLC even later than that. Most of the dedicated Rock Band fans are on the 360/PS3 because of that.
It's my belief that their initial lack of support for the Wii was a design choice. In the vein of going with the systems that can provide the 'fullest' experience they could give. Then the outcry forced them into a quickie deal.
Thus setting the stage for HMX constantly reacting to public outcry...and managing to fuck it up somehow.
They'd have ultimately been better off not making a Wii version at all.
Piracy wasn't the reason why game releases dried up by the way. There are a number of reasons why that happened but it's mostly down to SCEA and SCEE's shitty support. They didn't understand the market or the platform itself and treated it like the red headed stepchild of the family.
Well, that and the fact that software sales dried up to near-zilch. There's a number of factors behind that--too many PS2 clones, poor Sony support, an absolute flood of releases at first that diluted sales of each individual game too much, and of course rampant piracy. I don't have the statistics on hand, but I seem to recall surveys indicating the PSP was vastly more pirated than, well, any of the consoles, largely because people wanted to get around Sony's restrictions and get the multimedia powerhouse they were promised.
cloudeagle on
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Warlock82Never pet a burning dogRegistered Userregular
In terms of what? I'm not going to argue that nothing is wrong, but what is lacking here? It's not like they can't host the same number of tracks or can't charge as much or downloading is slow or error-prone or it's somehow more of a hassle to buy music. I guess you could say the low amount of space is a problem but that doesn't have anything to do with the online implementation.
Since they're stopping because it's not profitable, I'd say it's most likely due to "hardcore" music game fans buying all their music on the 360/PS3 versions, while families get the Wii one and are satisfied with the base game.
Nintendo's Wii Shopping Channel could definitely use some usability and UI tweaks, but I'm going to agree with Sporky on this one. The people buying the game on the Wii aren't the ones who care about a larger track list or downloading more songs.
Which suggests more of a relation to the design of the console rather than the online portion.
My guess is that Warlock was just a bit confused on the whole issue.
And your guess would be right. I was thinking they meant all DLC support, not just the indie stuff. Indie stuff is not a huge deal.
As far as Wii goes though, yeah, it's partially the shopping channel interface. It's also the 50mb limits on everything, the lack of a decent disk space solution (SD cards work but are not ideal, and the system still seems to need enough space to "fake copy" the game over when "playing from the SD card"), and other dumb implementation stuff.
In terms of Rock Band DLC specifically, the stuff that prevented them from getting that going right away and forced them to come up with a different approach to the whole thing. It really shouldn't have been as hard as Nintendo made it for them. And you could say that initial "we can't support DLC" period probably did lead to some lost sales, since (please correct me if I'm wrong), Wii still doesn't have all of the DLC tracks available. Ultimately Wii is by far the inferior version of the game, even ignoring unimportant graphical differences.
I don't know what MoH you played, but the one I played was utter garbage. CoD BLOPS has a way better campaign than it. As silly as it is, the fact that it's fun and fast paced trumps MoH lame attempt at dramatic effect. You talk about scripted sequences. MoH has just as many, but at least CoD BLOPS don't bug out half the time. The team AI in MoH is some of the worst I experienced this year in a FPS. It also doesn't look very good thanks in no small part in using UE3 tech really poorly.
Well, that was an unnecessary rant but hey if you can do it then I can to.
MoH certainly looked like crap but no, just no. Yes MoH had scripted sequences, what's your point? My problem wasn't that Black Ops had scripted sequences in the first place, it was that they were horrendously designed. Instead of making you play the game naturally, you basically just follow the marker around the entire game. Take the sequence where the helicopter goes down and you're in the water. If they had not placed the marker where it was, there really isn't any way you'd know that you have to go to that specific spot. Don't go to the market and try take out the enemies from the bank? Your gun doesn't fire and you die almost instantly.
And just because I said MoH had a far better campaign doesn't mean I thought it was great. It was mediocre and forgettable.
While I'll admit that all CoD games (not just Black Ops) suffer from going from one set piece to the next, at least it makes it clear. MoH (and BFBC2 did this too) do a bad job of telling you what to do. In MoH's case the lack of a HUD exacerbates the problem. Black Ops never kept you in one place longer than you needed to (except in Khe Sahn where it should have been more blatant about it) and the action felt great since the controls were tight. MW2 probably has a better overall campaign, but if you're going to tell me the story in MW2 isn't downright laughable then I'll go ahead and keep thinking Black Ops did something a bit interesting with its story.
In any case, I played enough of the big three (I can't believe I just gave MoH that honor) to know that MoH is not only firmly planted in mediocrity but none of its game modes hold a candle to either of the other two shooters from last year. Also, if you're going to deny the bugs don't break the gameplay then you must play some pretty awful games to stand for it.
And the PSP died (outside of Japan) because game releases dried up to a point where most of the userbase pretty much abandoned it, leaving just the hardcore custom firmware users remaining. This isn't something that will happen with the PS3.
Piracy wasn't the reason why game releases dried up by the way. There are a number of reasons why that happened but it's mostly down to SCEA and SCEE's shitty support. They didn't understand the market or the platform itself and treated it like the red headed stepchild of the family.
Shitty support from the producer/manufacturer doesn't stop third parties from releasing games on the system.
Look at Nintendo. Third parties constantly complain about them but haven't stopped supporting it.
Where as if Sony has crappy support AND your game is easy to pirate, then there's not much of an incentive to support it.
I'm not saying it's the major factor, but it definitely will be. If the cost of porting to the PS3 doesn't offset worries about piracy, then you may see the market dry up.
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Warlock82Never pet a burning dogRegistered Userregular
edited January 2011
Honestly I'd say the big reason PSP died was a combination of price (seriously Sony, I would buy one if you would fucking lower the price already!) and the DS taking most of the userbase. Lack of 3rd party stuff is also to blame, but probably in more of a self-fulfilling prophecy sort of way. 3rd parties skip it because it lacks a userbase, and it lacks a userbase because it lacks games.
This is actually probably something that gives Nintendo an edge, since regardless of sales Nintendo is at least going to support their hardware with a Mario game or something which will bring people in. And as I recall, the DS actually had a really, really shitty lineup to start out with as well (I seem to recall a serious lack of good titles for the first several months). It wasn't until it had sold like gangbusters that the 3rd parties really signed on en-mass.
1.) Wii Dec 2009: 3.81 million
2.) DS Dec 2009: 3.31 million
3.) DS Dec 2008: 3.04 million
4.) PS2 Dec 2002: 2.73 million
5.) DS Dec 2010: 2.5X million
6.) DS Dec 2007: 2.47 million
7.) Wii Dec 2010: 2.36 million
8.) GBA Dec 2003: 2.26 million
9.) Wii Dec 2008: 2.15 million
10.) GBA Dec 2002: 2.14 million
11.) GBA Dec 2004: 2.06 million
12.) Wii Nov 2008: 2.04 million
Remember a few years back when the PS3 launched and Sony tried to have it classified not as a gaming console, but as a "computer"? If I recall correctly, this was to avoid some sort of tax thing. I wonder what would have happened if PS3s were deemed as "computers", since I'm not sure how they are covered in the DMCA.
I am fairly sure it was just the PS2 they tried to do this with, to avoid taxes in Europe that apply to game systems but not computers.
Remember a few years back when the PS3 launched and Sony tried to have it classified not as a gaming console, but as a "computer"? If I recall correctly, this was to avoid some sort of tax thing. I wonder what would have happened if PS3s were deemed as "computers", since I'm not sure how they are covered in the DMCA.
I am fairly sure it was just the PS2 they tried to do this with, to avoid taxes in Europe that apply to game systems but not computers.
Or did they try it again?
I remember they made claims about how the PS3 was a computer. But I recall that was in relation to the price and 'working hard to afford it'. It felt more like marketing bullshit rather than some kind of legal claim. Though they could have tried that, too.
I can see people renting/buying a game, running a program on the PS3 that rips it and signs it, and then returning the game. Much easier than using a flash cart, no?
Not really, no. The mindset and skills involved in finding and running the program and then burning your own copy seems to be about the same, to me, and the cost and work involved seems much higher if you have to keep going to the store.
It sounds like the path of least resistance in this case is for pirates to just browse torrent lists and snork down whatever they want.
The biggest hurdle in pirating sony exclusive ps3 games is that they are absolutely ginormous
Actually that's going to be the biggest problem for pirates in the coming years for PC as well, as I assume the next generation of consoles will be blu-ray and in much of the country internet speeds aren't going up at all (problem for digital distribution as well)
Remember a few years back when the PS3 launched and Sony tried to have it classified not as a gaming console, but as a "computer"? If I recall correctly, this was to avoid some sort of tax thing. I wonder what would have happened if PS3s were deemed as "computers", since I'm not sure how they are covered in the DMCA.
I am fairly sure it was just the PS2 they tried to do this with, to avoid taxes in Europe that apply to game systems but not computers.
Or did they try it again?
I think they did, which is funny that they bring up the "only does everything" ad campaign in the response.
I think some of the fervor regarding Rainslick is that no one will fucking say anything about it. Give us a real reason and not the bullshit "It will all make sense in time" nonsense we have been getting/got at PAX.
I can see people renting/buying a game, running a program on the PS3 that rips it and signs it, and then returning the game. Much easier than using a flash cart, no?
Not really, no. The mindset and skills involved in finding and running the program and then burning your own copy seems to be about the same, to me, and the cost and work involved seems much higher if you have to keep going to the store.
It sounds like the path of least resistance in this case is for pirates to just browse torrent lists and snork down whatever they want.
The biggest hurdle in pirating sony exclusive ps3 games is that they are absolutely ginormous
Actually that's going to be the biggest problem for pirates in the coming years for PC as well, as I assume the next generation of consoles will be blu-ray and in much of the country internet speeds aren't going up at all (problem for digital distribution as well)
There are plenty of 360 ports that aren't much bigger than 360 games.
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I think that would be different arguments. Not buying currently available DLC is showing apathy toward either the product, the content, or the method of delivery. The RBN sales on PS3 have, in general, kept pace with the same songs on the 360.
The idea that somebody could gather all the data, put it on a disc (or whatever format), and release it with the ability for people to use at will without paying for it, would more negatively impact sales of DLC on the PS3 rather than increase the number of people who even use DLC on the Wii.
To what degree, I can't rightly say. Not yet, anyway. But if you don't buy and play additional content now, then the increase in people who at least play is not going to be increased significantly just because access has been made easier.
So in the spirit of that, reality show producers have officially run out of ideas.
http://www.deadline.com/2011/01/pac-man-reality-series-in-the-works/
I miss the giant foam obstacle course game shows like Fun House or that one-off Storm the Castle, which was based on Takeshi's Castle (mocked as MXC on Spike).
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Wipeout is pretty similar to that, no?
How does one bring Pac-Man "to life" exactly?
Wipeout on ABC is kind of bad, but if you watch it long enough, it becomes "so bad it's good." It's no [vidurl=
I really hope whatever Nintendo does next console-wise, they don't fuck up their online implementation nearly as bad as they did with Wii.
http://www.joystiq.com/2011/01/14/gran-turismo-5-moves-560-500-units-in-december-1-14-million-sol/
So Sony apparently uses "shipped" numbers for game sales too.
Also: is it just me, or do any of you keep reading "Gran Torino" when you see "Gran Turismo?" I keep picturing Clint Eastwood saying "get off my lawn."
MoH certainly looked like crap but no, just no. Yes MoH had scripted sequences, what's your point? My problem wasn't that Black Ops had scripted sequences in the first place, it was that they were horrendously designed. Instead of making you play the game naturally, you basically just follow the marker around the entire game. Take the sequence where the helicopter goes down and you're in the water. If they had not placed the marker where it was, there really isn't any way you'd know that you have to go to that specific spot. Don't go to the market and try take out the enemies from the bank? Your gun doesn't fire and you die almost instantly.
And just because I said MoH had a far better campaign doesn't mean I thought it was great. It was mediocre and forgettable.
You have absolutely no idea how the industry works, do you? You seem to be under the impression that the third parties have all the power in this situation, they don't. Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo hold the power. The idea that they'd hold assurances that there'd be no piracy on their systems and then compensate third parties if it did happen is laughable. Everyone knows piracy is inevitable, including third parties.
Sony is fine? Uh, what? You realise Sony make games too, right? And that they earn royalties off of every game sold on their systems? You really think they're happy with just earning some money off hardware?
As for your example, if you can find proof that those downloaded songs would've been purchases otherwise then I'll agree with you. Otherwise, no money is missing from Harmonix's pocket because they never would've had it anyway.
The doom scenario is piracy skyrockets so high that publishers no longer make profits off their PS3 versions of games and they all abandon the system. The chances of this happening however are nil. After all the ridiculous hyperbole, I expect the piracy ratio on the PS3 to be pretty much the same as the 360. But it's so much easier to pirate games on PS3? So? If someone wants to pirate games on either system, they can quite easily.
Well, I don't think you can easily discount just how easy it has become for the PS3. The bar for the effort has been lowered considerably.
I don't think I'd agree that this spells doom, however.
I don't think it will necessarily be a huge problem, but game companies will probably make it out as a huge problem.
edit: Though I guess people have been getting achievements for a while by cheating too.
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It is much harder. I disagree with Unco on the basis that we have the Dreamcast and especially the PSP as examples of piracy making consoles less attractive.
Hell, even the DS in Japan. Piracy is partly to "blame" to the 3DS.
However easy it was for piracy on the Dreamcast, as a factor in it's failure, it would have to be pretty low on the list. Piracy might have contributed, but there was simply too much else to choose from.
Yea, the Dreamcast died a horrible death mainly due to Sega's terrible mis-management, botching and consumer aftertaste of the Saturn, and too much superior competition.
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In terms of what? I'm not going to argue that nothing is wrong, but what is lacking here? It's not like they can't host the same number of tracks or can't charge as much or downloading is slow or error-prone or it's somehow more of a hassle to buy music. I guess you could say the low amount of space is a problem but that doesn't have anything to do with the online implementation.
Since they're stopping because it's not profitable, I'd say it's most likely due to "hardcore" music game fans buying all their music on the 360/PS3 versions, while families get the Wii one and are satisfied with the base game.
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=418760
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Nintendo's Wii Shopping Channel could definitely use some usability and UI tweaks, but I'm going to agree with Sporky on this one. The people buying the game on the Wii aren't the ones who care about a larger track list or downloading more songs.
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Which suggests more of a relation to the design of the console rather than the online portion.
My guess is that Warlock was just a bit confused on the whole issue.
And the PSP died (outside of Japan) because game releases dried up to a point where most of the userbase pretty much abandoned it, leaving just the hardcore custom firmware users remaining. This isn't something that will happen with the PS3.
Piracy wasn't the reason why game releases dried up by the way. There are a number of reasons why that happened but it's mostly down to SCEA and SCEE's shitty support. They didn't understand the market or the platform itself and treated it like the red headed stepchild of the family.
Did they post how it doesn't even work properly? They can't sync the edited trophy lists with Sony's database so the only people they can show off their cheating e-peens to, is themselves. And even if they could upload it to the servers, it'd be a simple matter of looking at the timestamps, seeing that so-and-so somehow started and finished the game at the exact same time and banning them.
Remember a few years back when the PS3 launched and Sony tried to have it classified not as a gaming console, but as a "computer"? If I recall correctly, this was to avoid some sort of tax thing. I wonder what would have happened if PS3s were deemed as "computers", since I'm not sure how they are covered in the DMCA.
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It's my belief that their initial lack of support for the Wii was a design choice. In the vein of going with the systems that can provide the 'fullest' experience they could give. Then the outcry forced them into a quickie deal.
Thus setting the stage for HMX constantly reacting to public outcry...and managing to fuck it up somehow.
They'd have ultimately been better off not making a Wii version at all.
Well, that and the fact that software sales dried up to near-zilch. There's a number of factors behind that--too many PS2 clones, poor Sony support, an absolute flood of releases at first that diluted sales of each individual game too much, and of course rampant piracy. I don't have the statistics on hand, but I seem to recall surveys indicating the PSP was vastly more pirated than, well, any of the consoles, largely because people wanted to get around Sony's restrictions and get the multimedia powerhouse they were promised.
And your guess would be right. I was thinking they meant all DLC support, not just the indie stuff. Indie stuff is not a huge deal.
As far as Wii goes though, yeah, it's partially the shopping channel interface. It's also the 50mb limits on everything, the lack of a decent disk space solution (SD cards work but are not ideal, and the system still seems to need enough space to "fake copy" the game over when "playing from the SD card"), and other dumb implementation stuff.
In terms of Rock Band DLC specifically, the stuff that prevented them from getting that going right away and forced them to come up with a different approach to the whole thing. It really shouldn't have been as hard as Nintendo made it for them. And you could say that initial "we can't support DLC" period probably did lead to some lost sales, since (please correct me if I'm wrong), Wii still doesn't have all of the DLC tracks available. Ultimately Wii is by far the inferior version of the game, even ignoring unimportant graphical differences.
While I'll admit that all CoD games (not just Black Ops) suffer from going from one set piece to the next, at least it makes it clear. MoH (and BFBC2 did this too) do a bad job of telling you what to do. In MoH's case the lack of a HUD exacerbates the problem. Black Ops never kept you in one place longer than you needed to (except in Khe Sahn where it should have been more blatant about it) and the action felt great since the controls were tight. MW2 probably has a better overall campaign, but if you're going to tell me the story in MW2 isn't downright laughable then I'll go ahead and keep thinking Black Ops did something a bit interesting with its story.
In any case, I played enough of the big three (I can't believe I just gave MoH that honor) to know that MoH is not only firmly planted in mediocrity but none of its game modes hold a candle to either of the other two shooters from last year. Also, if you're going to deny the bugs don't break the gameplay then you must play some pretty awful games to stand for it.
Shitty support from the producer/manufacturer doesn't stop third parties from releasing games on the system.
Look at Nintendo. Third parties constantly complain about them but haven't stopped supporting it.
Where as if Sony has crappy support AND your game is easy to pirate, then there's not much of an incentive to support it.
I'm not saying it's the major factor, but it definitely will be. If the cost of porting to the PS3 doesn't offset worries about piracy, then you may see the market dry up.
This is actually probably something that gives Nintendo an edge, since regardless of sales Nintendo is at least going to support their hardware with a Mario game or something which will bring people in. And as I recall, the DS actually had a really, really shitty lineup to start out with as well (I seem to recall a serious lack of good titles for the first several months). It wasn't until it had sold like gangbusters that the 3rd parties really signed on en-mass.
"Professor Layton and the Poorly-Handled Craigslist Posting"
Hahahaha
EDIT: Oh, I see what you're saying. Ne'ermind.
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
I am fairly sure it was just the PS2 they tried to do this with, to avoid taxes in Europe that apply to game systems but not computers.
Or did they try it again?
It probably had all of them prior to Wii.
And/or data collection only started becoming public for part of its life span?
Released October 2000. The first holiday would have been severely supply constrained. That would leave only 2001 not on the list.
I remember they made claims about how the PS3 was a computer. But I recall that was in relation to the price and 'working hard to afford it'. It felt more like marketing bullshit rather than some kind of legal claim. Though they could have tried that, too.
The biggest hurdle in pirating sony exclusive ps3 games is that they are absolutely ginormous
Actually that's going to be the biggest problem for pirates in the coming years for PC as well, as I assume the next generation of consoles will be blu-ray and in much of the country internet speeds aren't going up at all (problem for digital distribution as well)
I think they did, which is funny that they bring up the "only does everything" ad campaign in the response.
I think some of the fervor regarding Rainslick is that no one will fucking say anything about it. Give us a real reason and not the bullshit "It will all make sense in time" nonsense we have been getting/got at PAX.
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