first of all I want to say that the tone the Microsoft guy used in his tweets was a bit rough ...
although, I think, he has a point:
you know, when my internet is down (which happens like ... never), I cannot watch TV since I have IPTV.
when my internet is down, I cannot play Guild Wars 2 which I play almost daily.
when my internet is down, I cannot work from home anymore when I'm sick or have to stay at home for some other reason.
when my internet is down, I cannot receive mails, browse the internet (thank you Captain Obvious) or Skype with somebody
heck I can't even phone with my landline when my internet is down since my landline is VOIP
what I'm trying to say is: there are some many things that won't work at my home when my internet connection dies ... so if a console would be "always on" it would not bother me a bit since "everything" at my place needs the internet to work ... it would just be "one more thing that's online". And I think that's basically what Orth was saying: a lot of people are already "always online".
besides that: when the power goes out, I cannot play games either (besides my handheld games, of course) ... and while I cannot remember my internet being down even for some minutes, I can remember some power outages during storms or even just because some drunk driver ran into a distribution box on the street ... in my case (and I know I'm not necessarily a common case), power outages are way more common than internet outages. So for me, the "online requirement" is just "another requirement" some devices have ... like my kettle needs power to heat my water or like my cellphone needs a simcard to function etc. Every device has some kind of requirement (the most common denominator is power) and some of them require the internet to work ... no big deal IMO.
That being said: Internet is getting more important by the day and is largely considered as a basic need! I know that in a lot of countries like Germany, the regions that aren't well connected are effectively dying because everyone is moving away to cities with good internet connections. The huge majority of people can not work or do schoolwork etc. without access to the internet.
Therefore, always on has one advantage IMO: if always online on consoles and many, many other things becomes a norm, it is one of many factors (others are streaming services like Netflix etc.) that will FORCE providers to invest more into their infrastructure and thus making our connections better and more reliable, because their customers suddenly need better connections and not only connections that are good enough for some basic internet browsing.
In the UK, Netflix makes up for over 30% of all the internet traffic. It's the reason why Content Providers and Internet Providers are slowly starting to work together. YouTube and co will be paying the providers for the traffic they generate (it's already a reality in France, where YouTube pays money to ORANGE) and that money will be used to enhance the networks. If more content providers emerge (and an always online console - if it is a huge success and sells tens of millions of units - can become one of those driving forces), the internet connections will get better. Because these content providers generate the need for better connections ... like the iPhone generated the need for better mobile internet connections. Without the success of smartphones, which generated the need for high speed internet on mobile networks, we would not have 4G yet.
It makes sense actually. Services like YouTube, Netflix and co. generate huge costs for the internet providers and while the internet providers benefits are shrinking because of these costs, Netflix and co. make huge amounts of money. Therefore, the providers ask these content providers to pay them for the traffic and these providers then use this money to work on their networks and get more customers to subscrive to their internet services. These new customers also start consuming the content of the content providers, therefore the traffic grows, the money the content providers pay to the internet providers grows, the internet availability grows ... tl;dr: a popular always online console could help get the internet to places where it is not really available yet.
Besides that it is a well-known fact that many, many more devices are getting online by the day. Washing machines, dryers, heaters, air conditioners and so on are already available with online functions for remote access / control. And as soon as IPv6 is the norm, we will have enough IP adresses for every sand corn on this planet and then the boom will really start. Coffeemakers, fridges etc. etc. will go online as will the shutters of your windows, your cars, your watches etc. etc. I don't think that this process can be stopped.
Just to get back to TV: here in Europe, they shut down almost every analogue way to watch TV. You have to switch to digital. Normally, you have three options: IPTV, satellite and digital cable. IPTV needs the internet. Internet down, no telly. Satellite needs satellite reception. Bad, stormy weather outside, no reception, no telly. Digital cable often needs a smartcard in the receiver to decode the stream. If the card breaks or you forget to renew it etc, no telly.
No matter what method you choose, you are always dependent on something besides the "normal" requirement of electrical power. TV is mostly an entertainment medium (it's also an information medium, I know...) So it doesn't surprise me that other entertainment media - like videogames - are going down that route. People will always want some entertainment and if some day the only way to play vidya is via the internet, then people will use the always on console because they won't live without their entertainment fix.
"Knowledge is knowing that a tomato is a fruit, but Wisdom is knowing not to put it in a fruit salad."
As much as I'd like to believe that Microsoft is digging its own grave, I'm actually pretty worried that it will succeed. Microsoft loves exclusivity contracts, and developers love DRM. The next XBox will have DRM built in at seemingly no charge to the publisher, making the Xbox the ideal platform for AAA titles. Hell, publishers can even avoid most negative PR caused by DRM and an anti used games stance by publishing on the 720 alone. Exclusivity and the popularity of a console within social circles greatly drive sales. Sony seems to have little chance if they can't attract enough big budget titles, third party developers, and provide a quality online service.
Premature doom and gloom? Sure. But things don't look so great from my perspective. The prospect of a post-720 GFWL gives me chills as a primarily PC gamer. Cracks and mods mean little since at that point they'd only be a reactionary stopgap to a changed status quo.
I dunno. Look at the immense shitstorms caused just by games that have always-online DRM; Ubisoft dropped the idea entirely, and the stuff with Diablo 3 and Simcity have soured a lot of people on something they shouldn't even have been able to notice, much less had interfering with their games. Now imagine that applied to a system that not only won't play any of your old game, but you have to buy new copies all the time to play anything and the always-online hassle applies to every game.
That always-online notion would lock out a huge portion of the market.
Diablo 3 sold like 12+ million copies. Simcity sold a fair amount too.
I bought Diablo 3, so this is true. It is also true that Blizzard pissed me off badly enough with their horrid, horrid execution, that I shall exert my will, and never buy another Blizzard game ever again. The same applies to E.A. Further, the degree of my ire is such that I shall also go out of my way to influence other people to never purchase their products in the future.
How many more players than me, do you suppose have a similar mindset, after getting burned, thusly?
I'm in the same boat. Stopped playing Diablo after two weeks because I was tired of putting up with the servers shitting the bed.
I played both D3 and Simcity. D3 had bad server problems for 2-3 days, it was still playable. Simcity was a fucking disaster, city deleting/corrupting/rewinding cesspool. D3 stumbled, SimCity fell on its face, cracked it skull, and its brains spilled out onto the pavement.
That said, I reaaaaaaaallllly think people's anger at always online is because the companies that have done it have dropped the ball so fucking bad. Every MMO is always on and its hardly a problem. Why? Because 99% of those MMOs are subscription or microtransaction based, and the service being down causes them to lose money every second. In games not supported by subs/IAP, the ideal is for you to never play the game. When the service is down, they don't give a shit, they got your money, sucks to be you. D3 is slightly different because of the RM auction house, but if the RM AH was that lucrative the game would be F2P instead, in order to entice more people to use it.
As sick as I am of the BS arguments against always on, I'm equally sick of the developers reasons for it. There is no "service" that can be be added by always on that can't be removed in an offline scenario as a choice. The reason its not there is because you don't want to add it because it has an impact on time or your bottom line. There is no other reason. These are for profit companies, business decisions they make are intended to generate the biggest profit in the short/medium/long term.
The ideal for the consumer is every option available for free with no DRM, the ideal for the game company is you to pay them in advance for a game, then never download it, then to never log into their servers, never use their customer support, and continue buying future products, and provide an ongoing source of revenue without generating the need for any employee, work, or time from them. Consumers want games for free with no strings attached, companies want your money for nothing with no strings attached. Their viewpoints are completely opposed. Both parties compromise to get what they want, you agree to give them some money, they agree to give you a game.
The thing with always on is that there is no compromise, it provides no benefit to the consumer that couldn't be provided by making online connectivity optional. My view is that if you are going to demand always online connectivity, you need to compensate for it - Game has to be exceptionally awesome, cheap, and/or stable. Every always on game that didn't need to be has failed to compensate. I'm going to AVOID always on unless someone can make something that is so good I'll put up with it, but based on D3/SimCity the bar went much, much higher.
Sicho, I'm with you. Pretty much everything I'm going to be wanting to do at home is going to involve internet. Luckily for me for quite awhile now about the only time my internet goes down is in the middle of the night for random maintenance, which is pretty rare, or if the electricity goes out which is even more rare. So an always on console? In practice for me it would make very little difference assuming the company had their shit together on their end
But, and this is a but so large it may in fact have warped space and time to be the original inspiration for the great ballad by Sir Mix-a-Lot:
We aren't the point.
It's the people for whom an always on stable connection is a problem. And those people do exist. Unless there's a good reason for the console to require an always on connection, and quite frankly I don't believe there will be, I'm not really ok with screwing those people over just because.
And you're right, more and more things are going online. I'd argue that isn't universally a good thing though.
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CambiataCommander ShepardThe likes of which even GAWD has never seenRegistered Userregular
when my internet is down (which happens like ... never),
I think this is the point at which I think the divide is so sharp.
If you live in an area that has excellent internet, then you maybe will never understand why other people would be upset by this.
If you currently live or have lived in areas where the internet provider just couldn't get their shit together, then you feel concerned.
Yeah, when my internet goes down I can't watch Netflix or browse the internet, which is a pain, but if I'm bored and don't have a book to read, I just go to my ton o' steam games and play something, no big deal.
Forcing me to go online for things that simply don't require it? Why? You want me to feel even more annoyed that I can't get fiber to the home where I live? Trust me friend, I'm already plenty annoyed about that!
AthenorBattle Hardened OptimistThe Skies of HiigaraRegistered Userregular
On Saturday, my internet went down for 8 hours, and was only fixed after a modem restart on my end the next morning.
I played Lego city undercover most of that time.
Outages will happen. Even business clients that pay a LOT more for their internet have outages occasionally. We are all watching to sew what happens when it does.
CambiataCommander ShepardThe likes of which even GAWD has never seenRegistered Userregular
A few years back, the fiber optics offering from my company used to just automatically go down every wednesday at 1am for maintenence. Every. Single. Week. As I was working the phones then, I'd always get late night gamers calling in asking why in the world we would do that and why it had to be every week. My company has since changed the policy, I think, but imagining that internet never goes down because you happen to be using it only during the times when it's up is foolish.
Ov3rchargeR.I.P. Mass EffectYou were dead to me for yearsRegistered Userregular
I live in a pretty connected area (Redmond, WA) and the Internet connection still isn't perfect. Sometimes Comcast will cut out for the better part of a day, first world problems for sure, multiply that by ten for more rural areas, and an always online console is rendered unviable.
I know there are people that aren't as well connected ... but the point I was trying to make (and I suppose it's the same point Orth tried to make) is that when you have really shitty internet, you have other problems in life than some gaming console. Because honestly, living without a real good internet connection makes life today very hard. Some jobs need you to have internet access at home and quite frankly, I cannot imagine being a schoolkid nowadays and having no or bad internet at home ... If I'd be living in a "non-internet" area, I would really try to get away from there ASAP.
Sure, there are people that cannot afford good internet or afford moving away etc ... but I doubt that these people can afford a 300+$ console, so they are not the target audience anyway.
Videogames are a luxury and the target audience are people that can afford luxuries. And I think nowadays, most people that can afford 60 bucks a month or a week for a new game etc. can also afford good internet (or moving to an area where the internet is good). And I think, in a nutshell, that was Orths main idea ... the target audience for videogames are people with money and most people with money normally have access to the internet.
The problem IMO is: because we have a lot of problems with the economy worldwide, a huge part of that target audience is falling into the "cannot afford it anymore" category ... but they had videogames before and they want to be able to have videogames now and in the future, even though they don't have much money anymore. And I think it's these people that are pissed off the most about the fact, that always online may lock them out of videogaming.
"Knowledge is knowing that a tomato is a fruit, but Wisdom is knowing not to put it in a fruit salad."
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CambiataCommander ShepardThe likes of which even GAWD has never seenRegistered Userregular
But I don't need constant on internet for most thing. If my internet is down periodically for 5-10 minutes at a time, I can still continue to read the cached page of this forum that I was reading, or the internet article I was reading, or even the Youtube video I already had loaded. Brief periodic outages during the day are fine for most things. And my company doesn't allow me to work from home so I haven't run in to that issue.
But should I get one of those periodic outages while trying to play Mass Effect 3? WHOOPS, I guess I don't need that DLC content after all! It's fairly bullshit.
CambiataCommander ShepardThe likes of which even GAWD has never seenRegistered Userregular
Heck even Netflix movies load up to a certain point so that if your internet temporarily goes down while watching, your movie continues to play for at least a little while.
I know there are people that aren't as well connected ... but the point I was trying to make (and I suppose it's the same point Orth tried to make) is that when you have really shitty internet, you have other problems in life than some gaming console. Because honestly, living without a real good internet connection makes life today very hard. Some jobs need you to have internet access at home and quite frankly, I cannot imagine being a schoolkid nowadays and having no or bad internet at home ... If I'd be living in a "non-internet" area, I would really try to get away from there ASAP.
Sure, there are people that cannot afford good internet or afford moving away etc ... but I doubt that these people can afford a 300+$ console, so they are not the target audience anyway.
Videogames are a luxury and the target audience are people that can afford luxuries. And I think nowadays, most people that can afford 60 bucks a month or a week for a new game etc. can also afford good internet (or moving to an area where the internet is good). And I think, in a nutshell, that was Orths main idea ... the target audience for videogames are people with money and most people with money normally have access to the internet.
The problem IMO is: because we have a lot of problems with the economy worldwide, a huge part of that target audience is falling into the "cannot afford it anymore" category ... but they had videogames before and they want to be able to have videogames now and in the future, even though they don't have much money anymore. And I think it's these people that are pissed off the most about the fact, that always online may lock them out of videogaming.
Uhm, I have money, I exist in such a state that my family owns horses which trust me are mother fucking expensive.
I still have terrible internet. It is certainly reliable and I can game online but it is PHYSICALLY IMPOSSIBLE for me to have better internet than fucking terrible.
Suggesting always on is a bad idea because 'lol the internet costs money' is dumb. There are some exceptionally well off people who wouldn't be able to play on X-Box Live this generation just because XBL does not support the country they live in. That's nothing to do with wealth, at all.
The ideal for the consumer is every option available for free with no DRM, the ideal for the game company is you to pay them in advance for a game, then never download it, then to never log into their servers, never use their customer support, and continue buying future products, and provide an ongoing source of revenue without generating the need for any employee, work, or time from them. Consumers want games for free with no strings attached, companies want your money for nothing with no strings attached. Their viewpoints are completely opposed. Both parties compromise to get what they want, you agree to give them some money, they agree to give you a game.
I must say, this is one of the best things I read in a while!
I think the problem is that both parties are less ready to compromise nowadays than before and the trend is continuing that way. Both parties are drifting apart.
The customers have less money, so they want to pay less. But at the same time, they demand more and more from the companies for their money.
The companies have to pay more and more to get their products finished, but at the same time, they make less money than before and therefore want more "control" and steadier revenue streams.
If both parties would understand each other better, a lot of problems would be solved.
A lot of companies don't seem to understand the wishes of their customers anymore.
But at the same time, many customers are unable to see that some measures the companies take are a necessity nowadays to stay profitable.
Finding the middle way, the way that is acceptable for both sides, is getting harder and harder. And in my opinion, that's the big challenge the videogame industry is facing right now. As I said before: Both parties are drifting apart and bringing them back together is going to be very, very difficult.
"Knowledge is knowing that a tomato is a fruit, but Wisdom is knowing not to put it in a fruit salad."
I know there are people that aren't as well connected ... but the point I was trying to make (and I suppose it's the same point Orth tried to make) is that when you have really shitty internet, you have other problems in life than some gaming console. Because honestly, living without a real good internet connection makes life today very hard. Some jobs need you to have internet access at home and quite frankly, I cannot imagine being a schoolkid nowadays and having no or bad internet at home ... If I'd be living in a "non-internet" area, I would really try to get away from there ASAP.
Sure, there are people that cannot afford good internet or afford moving away etc ... but I doubt that these people can afford a 300+$ console, so they are not the target audience anyway.
Videogames are a luxury and the target audience are people that can afford luxuries. And I think nowadays, most people that can afford 60 bucks a month or a week for a new game etc. can also afford good internet (or moving to an area where the internet is good). And I think, in a nutshell, that was Orths main idea ... the target audience for videogames are people with money and most people with money normally have access to the internet.
The problem IMO is: because we have a lot of problems with the economy worldwide, a huge part of that target audience is falling into the "cannot afford it anymore" category ... but they had videogames before and they want to be able to have videogames now and in the future, even though they don't have much money anymore. And I think it's these people that are pissed off the most about the fact, that always online may lock them out of videogaming.
I think a large part of the disconnect here is that you live in Europe. The internet situations in the US and Europe aren't very comparable at all.
Population density, it is a thing.
*edit*
Basically you seem to be approaching this as a money thing. Cost isn't the issue. Availability is.
HappylilElf on
+1
AxenMy avatar is Excalibur.Yes, the sword.Registered Userregular
Alright, just to put this in to context for most people; when it comes to the internet the United States is effectively a Third World Nation. Our internet infrastructure is ultra-bad. Not just that, but the quality can vary greatly from State to State, County to County, hell even block to block.
It isn't about being able to afford it (though yeah, that is a factor) it is really just the infrastructure. Where I used to live we had one, and only one, ISP. They were THE ONLY GAME IN TOWN for over 200+ miles. They provided cable internet and it was fast and it was very affordable, but it was also down quite often and we had literally no alternatives except for Dish, but fuck that noise.
A Capellan's favorite sheath for any blade is your back.
I still have terrible internet. It is certainly reliable and I can game online but it is PHYSICALLY IMPOSSIBLE for me to have better internet than fucking terrible.
Suggesting always on is a bad idea because 'lol the internet costs money' is dumb. There are some exceptionally well off people who wouldn't be able to play on X-Box Live this generation just because XBL does not support the country they live in. That's nothing to do with wealth, at all.
is it physically impossible for you to move to a better connected area or is it just way to inconvenient and not worth the hassle for you?
oh and by the way: I live in one of the richest countries in the world and we weren't supported by XBL for years ... so I get what you saying. Still, it was possible to play on XBL, I just had to make a german account since I could not choose my own country on the list. But I was never locked out of LIVE even though I wa sonline with an IP adress of an unsupported country. Some content was not available for me (DLC and some XBLA games) but I could use XBL so they were not really strict on the "your country is not supported" thing.
"Knowledge is knowing that a tomato is a fruit, but Wisdom is knowing not to put it in a fruit salad."
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Ninja Snarl PMy helmet is my burden.Ninja Snarl: Gone, but not forgotten.Registered Userregular
I know there are people that aren't as well connected ... but the point I was trying to make (and I suppose it's the same point Orth tried to make) is that when you have really shitty internet, you have other problems in life than some gaming console. Because honestly, living without a real good internet connection makes life today very hard. Some jobs need you to have internet access at home and quite frankly, I cannot imagine being a schoolkid nowadays and having no or bad internet at home ... If I'd be living in a "non-internet" area, I would really try to get away from there ASAP.
Sure, there are people that cannot afford good internet or afford moving away etc ... but I doubt that these people can afford a 300+$ console, so they are not the target audience anyway.
Videogames are a luxury and the target audience are people that can afford luxuries. And I think nowadays, most people that can afford 60 bucks a month or a week for a new game etc. can also afford good internet (or moving to an area where the internet is good). And I think, in a nutshell, that was Orths main idea ... the target audience for videogames are people with money and most people with money normally have access to the internet.
The problem IMO is: because we have a lot of problems with the economy worldwide, a huge part of that target audience is falling into the "cannot afford it anymore" category ... but they had videogames before and they want to be able to have videogames now and in the future, even though they don't have much money anymore. And I think it's these people that are pissed off the most about the fact, that always online may lock them out of videogaming.
I'd bring up the infinitely-repeated point that some places just have shit for internet connectivity, but amazingly, that still seems to fall on deaf ears regardless of how absolutely true it is.
Not to mention that it's incredibly ridiculous to say that people who can't afford good enough internet for always-online connectivity automatically are too poor or have lives too substandard to have the right to enjoy something like games. Books cost money. Movies cost money. Are low-income parents just supposed to deny themselves and their children any and all entertainment luxuries because they don't make a lot of money? I suppose it really is up to us to say who should get to live in abject, grinding, joyless misery, though, simply because some of us are lucky enough to have a decent income right now.
I don't make a whole lot of money, but you can absolutely bet your ass that if I had a kid and getting them a game system would make them pretty happy, I could find the money for it. It's not like buying a new car. Locking people out of something like that for the sake of always-online connectivity to make the publisher leeches happy is just plain moronic.
Ninja Snarl P on
+2
CambiataCommander ShepardThe likes of which even GAWD has never seenRegistered Userregular
It should go without saying, but LOL POORS is the worst possible argument you could make here and is the best way to show you're completely ignorant on what people are actually talking about.
Literally my only option for internet is AT&T Uverse (VDSL). I have done extensive research, called lots of people, yes the website says I can get Comcast here, no it is not correct. The providers divvied up our area among themselves and AT&T got my street. Everyone else on the street has 2WIRE SSIDs as well.
My DSL link errors collected over the last 41 days say I've had 271 link retrains. This means my router is going to flash red for a bit and then green for a bit and then a little later I can use the internet again. 4881 cumulative seconds with errors. That's an average of 6 times a day, my internet drops for 2 minutes. That's just the average though, some evenings I just can't play online games, and some evenings I can.
Today I've only had one and it happened 50 minutes ago. Maybe tonight I can play Monster Hunter!
In those 41 days I've also had 44 DSL training errors, 14 loss of framing failures, 19 loss of signal failures, and 14 loss of margin failures. Not sure what those are, but I sure as hell know what that link retrain is.
It means I'm not buying an "always on" system.
And the creation of one doesn't mean AT&T is going to suddenly go "oh shit we'd better fix these problems immediately." It's already important enough that they would've done it by now if they cared.
EDIT: It just happened as I hit Post Reply. I guess maybe I won't try Monster Hunter tonight then...
is it physically impossible for you to move to a better connected area or is it just way to inconvenient and not worth the hassle for you?
Yes, because uprooting your life and moving to a new place is a trivial thing everyone is capable of doing just so they can get better Internets to play their video games or whatever else they do.
C'mon dude. C'mon. This is a bad argument and you know it.
I still have terrible internet. It is certainly reliable and I can game online but it is PHYSICALLY IMPOSSIBLE for me to have better internet than fucking terrible.
Suggesting always on is a bad idea because 'lol the internet costs money' is dumb. There are some exceptionally well off people who wouldn't be able to play on X-Box Live this generation just because XBL does not support the country they live in. That's nothing to do with wealth, at all.
is it physically impossible for you to move to a better connected area or is it just way to inconvenient and not worth the hassle for you?
Are you ... Are you for real?
Seriously, the amount of Silly Gooseyness coming from your keyboard just boggles my fucking mind.
I still have terrible internet. It is certainly reliable and I can game online but it is PHYSICALLY IMPOSSIBLE for me to have better internet than fucking terrible.
Suggesting always on is a bad idea because 'lol the internet costs money' is dumb. There are some exceptionally well off people who wouldn't be able to play on X-Box Live this generation just because XBL does not support the country they live in. That's nothing to do with wealth, at all.
is it physically impossible for you to move to a better connected area or is it just way to inconvenient and not worth the hassle for you?
oh and by the way: I live in one of the richest countries in the world and we weren't supported by XBL for years ... so I get what you saying. Still, it was possible to play on XBL, I just had to make a german account since I could not choose my own country on the list. But I was never locked out of LIVE even though I wa sonline with an IP adress of an unsupported country. Some content was not available for me (DLC and some XBLA games) but I could use XBL so they were not really strict on the "your country is not supported" thing.
Well yeah, in theory I could move to the city at some point and probably will do when I'm not in Uni.
But surely you must see if the quality of your entertainment is dictated by where you want to live it's a bit screwed up right? I can get the money argument. Like I said, Horses are stupid fucking expensive, it's just the thing with bad internet connections and always on is that always on basically forces them in your face for no good reason.
Like I said before, I accept that my phone works less of the time where I live because LOL Malvern hills and my phone needs signal to function. As it stands for a large number of gamers (I'm not one of them honestly) they don't need internet for their gaming and tying it to that is just pointless and shows disrespect to what they want.
I know there are people that aren't as well connected ... but the point I was trying to make (and I suppose it's the same point Orth tried to make) is that when you have really shitty internet, you have other problems in life than some gaming console. Because honestly, living without a real good internet connection makes life today very hard. Some jobs need you to have internet access at home and quite frankly, I cannot imagine being a schoolkid nowadays and having no or bad internet at home ... If I'd be living in a "non-internet" area, I would really try to get away from there ASAP.
I don't live in a non-internet area. I don't have "other problems in life." My internet is perfectly fine and serviceable most of the day. I can use it for most things just fine with the occasional 2 minute interruption. I can deal.
When I want to kick back and play a game for 4 hours straight though, that's when it falls apart.
And I'm not going to freaking move! What the hell, man?
I'd bring up the infinitely-repeated point that some places just have shit for internet connectivity, but amazingly, that still seems to fall on deaf ears regardless of how absolutely true it is.
no believe me, I get that. But I'm with Orth on one thing: just move away from there. (if possible with your job etc.)
I lived 26 years in a village (around 1500 inhabitants) where the internet connection was shit. Now I moved to an even smaller village (not even 500 people lol) and I have a fiber connection and 3G (in the other village, EDGE is the maximum when it comes to mobile internet).
It's only 10 kilometres from the other village so it did not really influence my commuting or shopping behaviours etc.
And while it's not the only reason, the internet was a major reason why I moved in the first place.
Granted, I live in a very well connected country, mostly because our government undertakes HUGE efforts to eliminate any "digital divide" in the population. They want to eliminate the possiblitly of having the problems the germans are facing (as I said in the other post, many regions in Germany are slowly becoming less and less populated because of the non-existant internet availability), so I'm very lucky in that regard. Still, there are places in the USA that are well connected and I don't think it is impossible to a large part of the population to move into a better connected area.
What baffles me a bit is the following: we here in Europe are very reluctant when it comes to moving. We don't like to move. But it was my understanding that in the USA, moving often is a very common thing. And therefore I'm surprised that the "move to a better connected area" option seems to be a non-option for many people.
"Knowledge is knowing that a tomato is a fruit, but Wisdom is knowing not to put it in a fruit salad."
I'd bring up the infinitely-repeated point that some places just have shit for internet connectivity, but amazingly, that still seems to fall on deaf ears regardless of how absolutely true it is.
no believe me, I get that. But I'm with Orth on one thing: just move away from there. (if possible with your job etc.)
The ideal for the consumer is every option available for free with no DRM, the ideal for the game company is you to pay them in advance for a game, then never download it, then to never log into their servers, never use their customer support, and continue buying future products, and provide an ongoing source of revenue without generating the need for any employee, work, or time from them. Consumers want games for free with no strings attached, companies want your money for nothing with no strings attached. Their viewpoints are completely opposed. Both parties compromise to get what they want, you agree to give them some money, they agree to give you a game.
I must say, this is one of the best things I read in a while!
I think the problem is that both parties are less ready to compromise nowadays than before and the trend is continuing that way. Both parties are drifting apart.
The customers have less money, so they want to pay less. But at the same time, they demand more and more from the companies for their money.
The companies have to pay more and more to get their products finished, but at the same time, they make less money than before and therefore want more "control" and steadier revenue streams.
If both parties would understand each other better, a lot of problems would be solved.
A lot of companies don't seem to understand the wishes of their customers anymore.
But at the same time, many customers are unable to see that some measures the companies take are a necessity nowadays to stay profitable.
Finding the middle way, the way that is acceptable for both sides, is getting harder and harder. And in my opinion, that's the big challenge the videogame industry is facing right now. As I said before: Both parties are drifting apart and bringing them back together is going to be very, very difficult.
Are you really implying that someone who can't afford to move their lives to a different state/country for a more stable internet connection are "too poor" to buy a $300 or $500 console?
Moving to get a better internet connection for the purposes of playing video games is not an option for most people.
Or more perhaps accurately it is absolutely not a reasonable solution nor is it an expectation a company wanting to sell a video game product should ever have. Like, ever.
To use the horse situation, yeah, if you want to own horses there are going to be fairly unavoidable location issues you'll have to account for That should not be the case for a video game console
Moving to get a better internet connection for the purposes of playing video games is not an option for most people.
Or more perhaps accurately it is absolutely not a reasonable solution nor is it an expectation a company wanting to sell a video game product should ever have. Like, ever.
To use the horse situation, yeah, if you want to own horses there are going to be fairly unavoidable location issues you'll have to account for That should not be the case for a video game console
Whatdoyamean?
I mean, there are stables in central Birmingham.
Though this is because the British are crazy. Not because it's a sensible place to maintain stables.
I'd bring up the infinitely-repeated point that some places just have shit for internet connectivity, but amazingly, that still seems to fall on deaf ears regardless of how absolutely true it is.
no believe me, I get that. But I'm with Orth on one thing: just move away from there. (if possible with your job etc.)
I lived 26 years in a village (around 1500 inhabitants) where the internet connection was shit. Now I moved to an even smaller village (not even 500 people lol) and I have a fiber connection and 3G (in the other village, EDGE is the maximum when it comes to mobile internet).
It's only 10 kilometres from the other village so it did not really influence my commuting or shopping behaviours etc.
And while it's not the only reason, the internet was a major reason why I moved in the first place.
Granted, I live in a very well connected country, mostly because our government undertakes HUGE efforts to eliminate any "digital divide" in the population. They want to eliminate the possiblitly of having the problems the germans are facing (as I said in the other post, many regions in Germany are slowly becoming less and less populated because of the non-existant internet availability), so I'm very lucky in that regard. Still, there are places in the USA that are well connected and I don't think it is impossible to a large part of the population to move into a better connected area.
What baffles me a bit is the following: we here in Europe are very reluctant when it comes to moving. We don't like to move. But it was my understanding that in the USA, moving often is a very common thing. And therefore I'm surprised that the "move to a better connected area" option seems to be a non-option for many people.
This might be where the disconnect is then. The "picking up your life and moving is a something you avoid if possible" thing is also a thing here in the States as well.
+2
CambiataCommander ShepardThe likes of which even GAWD has never seenRegistered Userregular
Look guys, if you can't afford to buy your own ISP and have them set up fiber to your door, then OBVIOUSLY you can't afford video games. That's just common sense.
AthenorBattle Hardened OptimistThe Skies of HiigaraRegistered Userregular
Moving just to get better internet is an argument on the scale of getting a second job to afford a PS3. Sure you can do it, and sure it is a priority for some. But to tell people it is the only way is like saying "fuck you, got mine."
Don't go down that road. Its bad enough corps are even considering it. And this is coming from a guy who needs internet as part of his job duties.
I'd bring up the infinitely-repeated point that some places just have shit for internet connectivity, but amazingly, that still seems to fall on deaf ears regardless of how absolutely true it is.
no believe me, I get that. But I'm with Orth on one thing: just move away from there. (if possible with your job etc.)
I lived 26 years in a village (around 1500 inhabitants) where the internet connection was shit. Now I moved to an even smaller village (not even 500 people lol) and I have a fiber connection and 3G (in the other village, EDGE is the maximum when it comes to mobile internet).
It's only 10 kilometres from the other village so it did not really influence my commuting or shopping behaviours etc.
And while it's not the only reason, the internet was a major reason why I moved in the first place.
Granted, I live in a very well connected country, mostly because our government undertakes HUGE efforts to eliminate any "digital divide" in the population. They want to eliminate the possiblitly of having the problems the germans are facing (as I said in the other post, many regions in Germany are slowly becoming less and less populated because of the non-existant internet availability), so I'm very lucky in that regard. Still, there are places in the USA that are well connected and I don't think it is impossible to a large part of the population to move into a better connected area.
What baffles me a bit is the following: we here in Europe are very reluctant when it comes to moving. We don't like to move. But it was my understanding that in the USA, moving often is a very common thing. And therefore I'm surprised that the "move to a better connected area" option seems to be a non-option for many people.
This might be where the disconnect is then. The "picking up your life and moving is a something you avoid if possible" thing is also a thing here in the States as well.
It's certainly not something you'd have to do just so you can play games that could also be played offline.
Sure. Everyone could just move away from their job and social environment.
Or always online could be a thing companies don't do or at least wait with until every place is perfectly connected.
PreciousBodilyFluids on
+1
CuvisTheConquerorThey always say "yee haw" but they never ask "haw yee?" Registered Userregular
I'd bring up the infinitely-repeated point that some places just have shit for internet connectivity, but amazingly, that still seems to fall on deaf ears regardless of how absolutely true it is.
no believe me, I get that. But I'm with Orth on one thing: just move away from there. (if possible with your job etc.)
I lived 26 years in a village (around 1500 inhabitants) where the internet connection was shit. Now I moved to an even smaller village (not even 500 people lol) and I have a fiber connection and 3G (in the other village, EDGE is the maximum when it comes to mobile internet).
It's only 10 kilometres from the other village so it did not really influence my commuting or shopping behaviours etc.
And while it's not the only reason, the internet was a major reason why I moved in the first place.
Granted, I live in a very well connected country, mostly because our government undertakes HUGE efforts to eliminate any "digital divide" in the population. They want to eliminate the possiblitly of having the problems the germans are facing (as I said in the other post, many regions in Germany are slowly becoming less and less populated because of the non-existant internet availability), so I'm very lucky in that regard. Still, there are places in the USA that are well connected and I don't think it is impossible to a large part of the population to move into a better connected area.
What baffles me a bit is the following: we here in Europe are very reluctant when it comes to moving. We don't like to move. But it was my understanding that in the USA, moving often is a very common thing. And therefore I'm surprised that the "move to a better connected area" option seems to be a non-option for many people.
It really depends. Some people can and will move to follow work, or for a lower cost of living, etc. Some people have roots down, and they can't or don't want to move. Moving any further than "across town" solely for better internet, however, is not something any sane person even thinks of doing.
It makes sense actually. Services like YouTube, Netflix and co. generate huge costs for the internet providers and while the internet providers benefits are shrinking because of these costs, Netflix and co. make huge amounts of money. Therefore, the providers ask these content providers to pay them for the traffic and these providers then use this money to work on their networks and get more customers to subscrive to their internet services. These new customers also start consuming the content of the content providers, therefore the traffic grows, the money the content providers pay to the internet providers grows, the internet availability grows ... tl;dr: a popular always online console could help get the internet to places where it is not really available yet.
Lol.
Maybe it works like that where you live; but in the US all the ISPs have local monopolies,* so they have no incentive to improve their infrastructure. Their customers have nowhere else to go and they know it, so they just keep raising their prices while lowering the quality of their service.
*For a given tier of service, anyway. For example, in my area, there's one cable ISP, one DSL provider, and one dial-up provider. And the DSL provider services other buildings on my block, but not mine; so there's that. My cable internet keeps getting more expensive for no reason (actually, gouging us here to make up for the reasonable prices their international parent company has to charge in Europe), but my only other option is dial up.
To use the horse situation, yeah, if you want to own horses there are going to be fairly unavoidable location issues you'll have to account for That should not be the case for a video game console
why?
If you are not a professional horse breeder than the odds are high that you own horses for your PLEASURE ... and I think most people also play videogames for their PLEASURE. Why can one pleasure be allowed to have location issues and another one not?
If I would be totally into skateboarding, I would like to live in a place that has a skatepark, no?
I think the main thing here is: it never was this way. It is a radical change. Videogames never needed always on. Suddenly pushing this requirement on people is causing a lot of problems and it is not what people are used to. I don't argue against that.
However I can also understand a lot of the reasons why this move is being enforced. There are still a lot of people here that don't see why moving from analog TV to digital was a necessity. But it was.
I don't think that going always on with videogames is a necessity ... yet. But one day or another, it will be inevitable, mostly for economical reasons.
As I said in another post above: companies want more "control" and more steady revenue streams to stay profitable. Always On provides that. And the day will come where it will be: always on or no gaming at all. And then, the people will play the always on games because they will always have the need to be entertained. they won't pass on videogames, no matter what. And even if they do: the kids of today are growing up with the internet as a totally normal thing. Later generations will not even know an "offline" world. They won't see any problem with always on.
You can blame many things for that: Greed. Bad economy. Pirates. Abuse of the Second Hand Market by Gamestop and co. The simple fact that it is technologically possible to do. The fact that the internet availability will get better and better every year. The fact that one day in the future, the things we argue about here (shitty internet, no availability etc.) will be a thing of the past. All this factors contribute their little role in going down that route.
And as I said before: it won't be stopped. "Everything" will be online one day. And if we are out of luck, it will be like "1984".
Sicho on
"Knowledge is knowing that a tomato is a fruit, but Wisdom is knowing not to put it in a fruit salad."
Heh, actually I have a friend who lives on a family farm and cannot get a stable high speed internet connection.
Or, well, rather they could but they'd have to pay the company to run it to their farm and last time my friend inquired about it was in the five figure range. Like basically "New tricked out work truck for the farm or stable high speed internet connection". That's not even touching what the company wanted for the month-month cost.
Needless to say he makes due with a shitty satellite connection which basically means he can't game.
0
CuvisTheConquerorThey always say "yee haw" but they never ask "haw yee?" Registered Userregular
If you are not a professional horse breeder than the odds are high that you own horses for your PLEASURE ... and I think most people also play videogames for their PLEASURE. Why can one pleasure be allowed to have location issues and another one not?
Because one's location issues are due to the logistics of the thing, and the other's is solely because somebody decided they aren't getting enough of your wallet.
To use the horse situation, yeah, if you want to own horses there are going to be fairly unavoidable location issues you'll have to account for That should not be the case for a video game console
why?
If you are not a professional horse breeder than the odds are high that you own horses for your PLEASURE ... and I think most people also play videogames for their PLEASURE. Why can one pleasure be allowed to have location issues and another one not?
Because horses are HORSES. They didn't suddenly evolve the need for space and sustenance, taking everybody by surprise, so everybody now needs to move or shoot their horse.
Spaffy on
ALRIGHT FINE I GOT AN AVATAR
Steam: adamjnet
+5
David_TA fashion yes-man is no good to me.Copenhagen, DenmarkRegistered Userregular
Because you're saying that just because a company wants something we should view it as acceptable.
You're also saying 'yes these things are still issues but fuck those guys this is the future'. The future is not now, the issues still exist today.
If those issues did not exist you're right, it would mostly just be a 'wah companies want to watch us' thing and honestly. I probably would not care a damn. However they still exist and thus I think it's fucking dumb.
Suggesting that someone should move because of video games is like suggesting someone should move because of not having this or that restaurant near them. It's not a good argument, and really isn't really going to sway anyone who doesn't want an always online system.
I do think there are arguments to be made that a company maybe fine with writing off a section of consumers without stable internet, and that may be where Microsoft is heading if these rumors are true. However, that doesn't in anyway negate the arguments that always online doesn't fundimentally add any value to consumers. There are cases where it makes sense, however to lock a console complete to it doesn't seem like a smart plan. It's like if the 360 would have only been able to useHdmi cables. Except in this case instead of just having to buy a new TV, you'd have to completely change where you live or go without.
Posts
although, I think, he has a point:
you know, when my internet is down (which happens like ... never), I cannot watch TV since I have IPTV.
when my internet is down, I cannot play Guild Wars 2 which I play almost daily.
when my internet is down, I cannot work from home anymore when I'm sick or have to stay at home for some other reason.
when my internet is down, I cannot receive mails, browse the internet (thank you Captain Obvious) or Skype with somebody
heck I can't even phone with my landline when my internet is down since my landline is VOIP
what I'm trying to say is: there are some many things that won't work at my home when my internet connection dies ... so if a console would be "always on" it would not bother me a bit since "everything" at my place needs the internet to work ... it would just be "one more thing that's online". And I think that's basically what Orth was saying: a lot of people are already "always online".
besides that: when the power goes out, I cannot play games either (besides my handheld games, of course) ... and while I cannot remember my internet being down even for some minutes, I can remember some power outages during storms or even just because some drunk driver ran into a distribution box on the street ... in my case (and I know I'm not necessarily a common case), power outages are way more common than internet outages. So for me, the "online requirement" is just "another requirement" some devices have ... like my kettle needs power to heat my water or like my cellphone needs a simcard to function etc. Every device has some kind of requirement (the most common denominator is power) and some of them require the internet to work ... no big deal IMO.
That being said: Internet is getting more important by the day and is largely considered as a basic need! I know that in a lot of countries like Germany, the regions that aren't well connected are effectively dying because everyone is moving away to cities with good internet connections. The huge majority of people can not work or do schoolwork etc. without access to the internet.
Therefore, always on has one advantage IMO: if always online on consoles and many, many other things becomes a norm, it is one of many factors (others are streaming services like Netflix etc.) that will FORCE providers to invest more into their infrastructure and thus making our connections better and more reliable, because their customers suddenly need better connections and not only connections that are good enough for some basic internet browsing.
In the UK, Netflix makes up for over 30% of all the internet traffic. It's the reason why Content Providers and Internet Providers are slowly starting to work together. YouTube and co will be paying the providers for the traffic they generate (it's already a reality in France, where YouTube pays money to ORANGE) and that money will be used to enhance the networks. If more content providers emerge (and an always online console - if it is a huge success and sells tens of millions of units - can become one of those driving forces), the internet connections will get better. Because these content providers generate the need for better connections ... like the iPhone generated the need for better mobile internet connections. Without the success of smartphones, which generated the need for high speed internet on mobile networks, we would not have 4G yet.
It makes sense actually. Services like YouTube, Netflix and co. generate huge costs for the internet providers and while the internet providers benefits are shrinking because of these costs, Netflix and co. make huge amounts of money. Therefore, the providers ask these content providers to pay them for the traffic and these providers then use this money to work on their networks and get more customers to subscrive to their internet services. These new customers also start consuming the content of the content providers, therefore the traffic grows, the money the content providers pay to the internet providers grows, the internet availability grows ... tl;dr: a popular always online console could help get the internet to places where it is not really available yet.
Besides that it is a well-known fact that many, many more devices are getting online by the day. Washing machines, dryers, heaters, air conditioners and so on are already available with online functions for remote access / control. And as soon as IPv6 is the norm, we will have enough IP adresses for every sand corn on this planet and then the boom will really start. Coffeemakers, fridges etc. etc. will go online as will the shutters of your windows, your cars, your watches etc. etc. I don't think that this process can be stopped.
Just to get back to TV: here in Europe, they shut down almost every analogue way to watch TV. You have to switch to digital. Normally, you have three options: IPTV, satellite and digital cable. IPTV needs the internet. Internet down, no telly. Satellite needs satellite reception. Bad, stormy weather outside, no reception, no telly. Digital cable often needs a smartcard in the receiver to decode the stream. If the card breaks or you forget to renew it etc, no telly.
No matter what method you choose, you are always dependent on something besides the "normal" requirement of electrical power. TV is mostly an entertainment medium (it's also an information medium, I know...) So it doesn't surprise me that other entertainment media - like videogames - are going down that route. People will always want some entertainment and if some day the only way to play vidya is via the internet, then people will use the always on console because they won't live without their entertainment fix.
I played both D3 and Simcity. D3 had bad server problems for 2-3 days, it was still playable. Simcity was a fucking disaster, city deleting/corrupting/rewinding cesspool. D3 stumbled, SimCity fell on its face, cracked it skull, and its brains spilled out onto the pavement.
That said, I reaaaaaaaallllly think people's anger at always online is because the companies that have done it have dropped the ball so fucking bad. Every MMO is always on and its hardly a problem. Why? Because 99% of those MMOs are subscription or microtransaction based, and the service being down causes them to lose money every second. In games not supported by subs/IAP, the ideal is for you to never play the game. When the service is down, they don't give a shit, they got your money, sucks to be you. D3 is slightly different because of the RM auction house, but if the RM AH was that lucrative the game would be F2P instead, in order to entice more people to use it.
As sick as I am of the BS arguments against always on, I'm equally sick of the developers reasons for it. There is no "service" that can be be added by always on that can't be removed in an offline scenario as a choice. The reason its not there is because you don't want to add it because it has an impact on time or your bottom line. There is no other reason. These are for profit companies, business decisions they make are intended to generate the biggest profit in the short/medium/long term.
The ideal for the consumer is every option available for free with no DRM, the ideal for the game company is you to pay them in advance for a game, then never download it, then to never log into their servers, never use their customer support, and continue buying future products, and provide an ongoing source of revenue without generating the need for any employee, work, or time from them. Consumers want games for free with no strings attached, companies want your money for nothing with no strings attached. Their viewpoints are completely opposed. Both parties compromise to get what they want, you agree to give them some money, they agree to give you a game.
The thing with always on is that there is no compromise, it provides no benefit to the consumer that couldn't be provided by making online connectivity optional. My view is that if you are going to demand always online connectivity, you need to compensate for it - Game has to be exceptionally awesome, cheap, and/or stable. Every always on game that didn't need to be has failed to compensate. I'm going to AVOID always on unless someone can make something that is so good I'll put up with it, but based on D3/SimCity the bar went much, much higher.
But, and this is a but so large it may in fact have warped space and time to be the original inspiration for the great ballad by Sir Mix-a-Lot:
We aren't the point.
It's the people for whom an always on stable connection is a problem. And those people do exist. Unless there's a good reason for the console to require an always on connection, and quite frankly I don't believe there will be, I'm not really ok with screwing those people over just because.
And you're right, more and more things are going online. I'd argue that isn't universally a good thing though.
I think this is the point at which I think the divide is so sharp.
If you live in an area that has excellent internet, then you maybe will never understand why other people would be upset by this.
If you currently live or have lived in areas where the internet provider just couldn't get their shit together, then you feel concerned.
Yeah, when my internet goes down I can't watch Netflix or browse the internet, which is a pain, but if I'm bored and don't have a book to read, I just go to my ton o' steam games and play something, no big deal.
Forcing me to go online for things that simply don't require it? Why? You want me to feel even more annoyed that I can't get fiber to the home where I live? Trust me friend, I'm already plenty annoyed about that!
I played Lego city undercover most of that time.
Outages will happen. Even business clients that pay a LOT more for their internet have outages occasionally. We are all watching to sew what happens when it does.
I know there are people that aren't as well connected ... but the point I was trying to make (and I suppose it's the same point Orth tried to make) is that when you have really shitty internet, you have other problems in life than some gaming console. Because honestly, living without a real good internet connection makes life today very hard. Some jobs need you to have internet access at home and quite frankly, I cannot imagine being a schoolkid nowadays and having no or bad internet at home ... If I'd be living in a "non-internet" area, I would really try to get away from there ASAP.
Sure, there are people that cannot afford good internet or afford moving away etc ... but I doubt that these people can afford a 300+$ console, so they are not the target audience anyway.
Videogames are a luxury and the target audience are people that can afford luxuries. And I think nowadays, most people that can afford 60 bucks a month or a week for a new game etc. can also afford good internet (or moving to an area where the internet is good). And I think, in a nutshell, that was Orths main idea ... the target audience for videogames are people with money and most people with money normally have access to the internet.
The problem IMO is: because we have a lot of problems with the economy worldwide, a huge part of that target audience is falling into the "cannot afford it anymore" category ... but they had videogames before and they want to be able to have videogames now and in the future, even though they don't have much money anymore. And I think it's these people that are pissed off the most about the fact, that always online may lock them out of videogaming.
But should I get one of those periodic outages while trying to play Mass Effect 3? WHOOPS, I guess I don't need that DLC content after all! It's fairly bullshit.
Uhm, I have money, I exist in such a state that my family owns horses which trust me are mother fucking expensive.
I still have terrible internet. It is certainly reliable and I can game online but it is PHYSICALLY IMPOSSIBLE for me to have better internet than fucking terrible.
Suggesting always on is a bad idea because 'lol the internet costs money' is dumb. There are some exceptionally well off people who wouldn't be able to play on X-Box Live this generation just because XBL does not support the country they live in. That's nothing to do with wealth, at all.
I must say, this is one of the best things I read in a while!
I think the problem is that both parties are less ready to compromise nowadays than before and the trend is continuing that way. Both parties are drifting apart.
The customers have less money, so they want to pay less. But at the same time, they demand more and more from the companies for their money.
The companies have to pay more and more to get their products finished, but at the same time, they make less money than before and therefore want more "control" and steadier revenue streams.
If both parties would understand each other better, a lot of problems would be solved.
A lot of companies don't seem to understand the wishes of their customers anymore.
But at the same time, many customers are unable to see that some measures the companies take are a necessity nowadays to stay profitable.
Finding the middle way, the way that is acceptable for both sides, is getting harder and harder. And in my opinion, that's the big challenge the videogame industry is facing right now. As I said before: Both parties are drifting apart and bringing them back together is going to be very, very difficult.
I think a large part of the disconnect here is that you live in Europe. The internet situations in the US and Europe aren't very comparable at all.
Population density, it is a thing.
*edit*
Basically you seem to be approaching this as a money thing. Cost isn't the issue. Availability is.
It isn't about being able to afford it (though yeah, that is a factor) it is really just the infrastructure. Where I used to live we had one, and only one, ISP. They were THE ONLY GAME IN TOWN for over 200+ miles. They provided cable internet and it was fast and it was very affordable, but it was also down quite often and we had literally no alternatives except for Dish, but fuck that noise.
is it physically impossible for you to move to a better connected area or is it just way to inconvenient and not worth the hassle for you?
oh and by the way: I live in one of the richest countries in the world and we weren't supported by XBL for years ... so I get what you saying. Still, it was possible to play on XBL, I just had to make a german account since I could not choose my own country on the list. But I was never locked out of LIVE even though I wa sonline with an IP adress of an unsupported country. Some content was not available for me (DLC and some XBLA games) but I could use XBL so they were not really strict on the "your country is not supported" thing.
I'd bring up the infinitely-repeated point that some places just have shit for internet connectivity, but amazingly, that still seems to fall on deaf ears regardless of how absolutely true it is.
Not to mention that it's incredibly ridiculous to say that people who can't afford good enough internet for always-online connectivity automatically are too poor or have lives too substandard to have the right to enjoy something like games. Books cost money. Movies cost money. Are low-income parents just supposed to deny themselves and their children any and all entertainment luxuries because they don't make a lot of money? I suppose it really is up to us to say who should get to live in abject, grinding, joyless misery, though, simply because some of us are lucky enough to have a decent income right now.
I don't make a whole lot of money, but you can absolutely bet your ass that if I had a kid and getting them a game system would make them pretty happy, I could find the money for it. It's not like buying a new car. Locking people out of something like that for the sake of always-online connectivity to make the publisher leeches happy is just plain moronic.
Literally my only option for internet is AT&T Uverse (VDSL). I have done extensive research, called lots of people, yes the website says I can get Comcast here, no it is not correct. The providers divvied up our area among themselves and AT&T got my street. Everyone else on the street has 2WIRE SSIDs as well.
My DSL link errors collected over the last 41 days say I've had 271 link retrains. This means my router is going to flash red for a bit and then green for a bit and then a little later I can use the internet again. 4881 cumulative seconds with errors. That's an average of 6 times a day, my internet drops for 2 minutes. That's just the average though, some evenings I just can't play online games, and some evenings I can.
Today I've only had one and it happened 50 minutes ago. Maybe tonight I can play Monster Hunter!
In those 41 days I've also had 44 DSL training errors, 14 loss of framing failures, 19 loss of signal failures, and 14 loss of margin failures. Not sure what those are, but I sure as hell know what that link retrain is.
It means I'm not buying an "always on" system.
And the creation of one doesn't mean AT&T is going to suddenly go "oh shit we'd better fix these problems immediately." It's already important enough that they would've done it by now if they cared.
EDIT: It just happened as I hit Post Reply. I guess maybe I won't try Monster Hunter tonight then...
Yes, because uprooting your life and moving to a new place is a trivial thing everyone is capable of doing just so they can get better Internets to play their video games or whatever else they do.
C'mon dude. C'mon. This is a bad argument and you know it.
Are you ... Are you for real?
Seriously, the amount of Silly Gooseyness coming from your keyboard just boggles my fucking mind.
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
Well yeah, in theory I could move to the city at some point and probably will do when I'm not in Uni.
But surely you must see if the quality of your entertainment is dictated by where you want to live it's a bit screwed up right? I can get the money argument. Like I said, Horses are stupid fucking expensive, it's just the thing with bad internet connections and always on is that always on basically forces them in your face for no good reason.
Like I said before, I accept that my phone works less of the time where I live because LOL Malvern hills and my phone needs signal to function. As it stands for a large number of gamers (I'm not one of them honestly) they don't need internet for their gaming and tying it to that is just pointless and shows disrespect to what they want.
I don't live in a non-internet area. I don't have "other problems in life." My internet is perfectly fine and serviceable most of the day. I can use it for most things just fine with the occasional 2 minute interruption. I can deal.
When I want to kick back and play a game for 4 hours straight though, that's when it falls apart.
And I'm not going to freaking move! What the hell, man?
no believe me, I get that. But I'm with Orth on one thing: just move away from there. (if possible with your job etc.)
I lived 26 years in a village (around 1500 inhabitants) where the internet connection was shit. Now I moved to an even smaller village (not even 500 people lol) and I have a fiber connection and 3G (in the other village, EDGE is the maximum when it comes to mobile internet).
It's only 10 kilometres from the other village so it did not really influence my commuting or shopping behaviours etc.
And while it's not the only reason, the internet was a major reason why I moved in the first place.
Granted, I live in a very well connected country, mostly because our government undertakes HUGE efforts to eliminate any "digital divide" in the population. They want to eliminate the possiblitly of having the problems the germans are facing (as I said in the other post, many regions in Germany are slowly becoming less and less populated because of the non-existant internet availability), so I'm very lucky in that regard. Still, there are places in the USA that are well connected and I don't think it is impossible to a large part of the population to move into a better connected area.
What baffles me a bit is the following: we here in Europe are very reluctant when it comes to moving. We don't like to move. But it was my understanding that in the USA, moving often is a very common thing. And therefore I'm surprised that the "move to a better connected area" option seems to be a non-option for many people.
Fuck. You.
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
Are you really implying that someone who can't afford to move their lives to a different state/country for a more stable internet connection are "too poor" to buy a $300 or $500 console?
What's wrong with you?
Or more perhaps accurately it is absolutely not a reasonable solution nor is it an expectation a company wanting to sell a video game product should ever have. Like, ever.
To use the horse situation, yeah, if you want to own horses there are going to be fairly unavoidable location issues you'll have to account for That should not be the case for a video game console
Whatdoyamean?
I mean, there are stables in central Birmingham.
Though this is because the British are crazy. Not because it's a sensible place to maintain stables.
This might be where the disconnect is then. The "picking up your life and moving is a something you avoid if possible" thing is also a thing here in the States as well.
Don't go down that road. Its bad enough corps are even considering it. And this is coming from a guy who needs internet as part of his job duties.
It's certainly not something you'd have to do just so you can play games that could also be played offline.
Sure. Everyone could just move away from their job and social environment.
Or always online could be a thing companies don't do or at least wait with until every place is perfectly connected.
It really depends. Some people can and will move to follow work, or for a lower cost of living, etc. Some people have roots down, and they can't or don't want to move. Moving any further than "across town" solely for better internet, however, is not something any sane person even thinks of doing.
Lol.
Maybe it works like that where you live; but in the US all the ISPs have local monopolies,* so they have no incentive to improve their infrastructure. Their customers have nowhere else to go and they know it, so they just keep raising their prices while lowering the quality of their service.
*For a given tier of service, anyway. For example, in my area, there's one cable ISP, one DSL provider, and one dial-up provider. And the DSL provider services other buildings on my block, but not mine; so there's that. My cable internet keeps getting more expensive for no reason (actually, gouging us here to make up for the reasonable prices their international parent company has to charge in Europe), but my only other option is dial up.
why?
If you are not a professional horse breeder than the odds are high that you own horses for your PLEASURE ... and I think most people also play videogames for their PLEASURE. Why can one pleasure be allowed to have location issues and another one not?
If I would be totally into skateboarding, I would like to live in a place that has a skatepark, no?
I think the main thing here is: it never was this way. It is a radical change. Videogames never needed always on. Suddenly pushing this requirement on people is causing a lot of problems and it is not what people are used to. I don't argue against that.
However I can also understand a lot of the reasons why this move is being enforced. There are still a lot of people here that don't see why moving from analog TV to digital was a necessity. But it was.
I don't think that going always on with videogames is a necessity ... yet. But one day or another, it will be inevitable, mostly for economical reasons.
As I said in another post above: companies want more "control" and more steady revenue streams to stay profitable. Always On provides that. And the day will come where it will be: always on or no gaming at all. And then, the people will play the always on games because they will always have the need to be entertained. they won't pass on videogames, no matter what. And even if they do: the kids of today are growing up with the internet as a totally normal thing. Later generations will not even know an "offline" world. They won't see any problem with always on.
You can blame many things for that: Greed. Bad economy. Pirates. Abuse of the Second Hand Market by Gamestop and co. The simple fact that it is technologically possible to do. The fact that the internet availability will get better and better every year. The fact that one day in the future, the things we argue about here (shitty internet, no availability etc.) will be a thing of the past. All this factors contribute their little role in going down that route.
And as I said before: it won't be stopped. "Everything" will be online one day. And if we are out of luck, it will be like "1984".
Or, well, rather they could but they'd have to pay the company to run it to their farm and last time my friend inquired about it was in the five figure range. Like basically "New tricked out work truck for the farm or stable high speed internet connection". That's not even touching what the company wanted for the month-month cost.
Needless to say he makes due with a shitty satellite connection which basically means he can't game.
Because one's location issues are due to the logistics of the thing, and the other's is solely because somebody decided they aren't getting enough of your wallet.
Because horses are HORSES. They didn't suddenly evolve the need for space and sustenance, taking everybody by surprise, so everybody now needs to move or shoot their horse.
Steam: adamjnet
...
I'll be right back.
You're also saying 'yes these things are still issues but fuck those guys this is the future'. The future is not now, the issues still exist today.
If those issues did not exist you're right, it would mostly just be a 'wah companies want to watch us' thing and honestly. I probably would not care a damn. However they still exist and thus I think it's fucking dumb.
I do think there are arguments to be made that a company maybe fine with writing off a section of consumers without stable internet, and that may be where Microsoft is heading if these rumors are true. However, that doesn't in anyway negate the arguments that always online doesn't fundimentally add any value to consumers. There are cases where it makes sense, however to lock a console complete to it doesn't seem like a smart plan. It's like if the 360 would have only been able to useHdmi cables. Except in this case instead of just having to buy a new TV, you'd have to completely change where you live or go without.