To be honest, im starting to wonder what exactly the next generation will offer consumers at all. With industry attitudes being what they are im skeptical a new generation will mean anything to the average gamer these days.
The Wii U kind of looks interesting, but its tablet looks like a pointless gimmick, the PS4 motion controls will probably add what they did this generation, something between bugger all and frustrating hardware problems.
I hope im wrong on this, but i see the next generation being as stagnant as this one is now.
@vortexcortex: Your argument implies that "better" mechanics/AI/whatever inherently make for better games. They give the opportunity, but many, many games have proven that they're not needed to make a game truly interesting or enjoyable. In fact, quite the opposite.
Yes, specs matter. Increasing technical capabilities while easing development effort is desirable. But gaming history has shown that increasing overall specs does not automatically lead to "better" games. Usually, it leads to more impressive graphics and... that's about it.
Streaming the game over the internet to play? No, I hate always online play, it takes away any ownership rights to the game I may have had while making me totally dependent on the provider LETTING me keep playing the game I already paid for, as well as making me dependent on my connection being stable/fast enough to be able to handle the game, which even in an ideal world won't be as good as when the data's only 6 feet away and directly from the TV/controller. And I will fight it to the last.
Streaming the game *while you download it to your machine*, on the other hand, I wouldn't mind as much. Steam is pretty popular and you pretty much download everything to your computer to play anyway, with the added option of playing offline if you choose (usually) in case the connection is down or you just don't want to be online. This would sidestep the latency issues (if it's bad, wait for the download to finish and try again), while allowing for the benefits of instant gratification with game purchases (as well as possible price reductions when physical media is cut out).
But even here, I'm still worried, because I know that since it's their exclusive platform, they'll make it so I'll be criminalized and cut off from further downloads if I try to take the game apart and examine it directly. Do I want to hack the game to add new functionality and challenges 2 years after the game came out? I hope they gave me modder tools, or else I'll probably be in violation of copyright and will be banned from downloading new games forever, making my $500 machine useless! And what about protecting against scams? How will we be able to tell if companies are ripping us off, such as when Capcom put DLC on the same disc as Capcom vs Street Fighter, but outwardly claimed it wasn't possible to put that content into the game directly so DLC would be available at a later date? Or when we recently put the lie to the "Sim City needs to be online so servers can crunch the numbers" myth by discovering that removing ONE line of code was enough to let us play the full game offline with no additional performance issues?
Until we get the same rights and abilities with streaming games as we have with disks, I'll continue going to the old brick-and-mortar and picking up a physical copy as opposed to downloading my game "library".
The way of the Paladin:
To Seek,
To Learn,
To Do.
-QFG2
If the speed of light is faster then the speed of sound, is that why people always appear bright until they speak? o_O
@vortexcortex "Well, of course console specs matter little to marketing drone and holiday sales, but I thought we were talking about the impact to ACTUAL GAMEPLAY, not to some marketing numbers severely swayed by the vendor-lock-in revenue model... If James is talking the later, then yeah, who gives a crap about specs, the masses will play with Stone's lit by LEDs if you market it right. If we're not talking the effect specs have to gameplay, just sales: Then screw this topic, it's retarded." So talking about the determinants of sales figures, those things that determine if any given console maker will be able to justify staying in the hardware industry and making a new console at all, is "retarded." So it does not matter if there are any companies with both the resources and economic incentive to make new consoles ever again. Even if every console maker became software only companies like Sega did, or just went out of business, we could still play games on PCs, tablet computers and smartphones. Heck like you said "the masses" will play games on LED lit stones, so why does anyone make or buy consoles at all?
@darkmage0707077: Game streaming is an incredible idea. It has limitations and significant obstacles to overcome, obviously; but the core concept is good... if you don't bring the idea of "ownership" into the equation.
I like to physically own things I buy, but in cases like (the late) OnLive and Gaikai, you're not buying a product, you're buying a service. It would be like having a VIP pass to an exclusive club (or whatever). You have the experience while you're there, but you don't "own" anything. And when your pass expires, you end with what you started: nothing. What did you pay for? The experience.
You pay for a subscription to a service which enables you to play a (hopefully) massive library of games whenever you want without actually having to buy the game. And even better, you don't have to own a machine capable of running that game. You don't own any of the games, but then, that's not what you're paying for. You're renting them, basically.
"...and the gameplay recorder, and the background downloading system, and the social media aspect, and the required Move system. 8 gigs of RAM really isn't that much when you consider that PC's running eight gigs of RAM don't usually run half that much stuff while people game on them."
You can't compare a computer running 8 gigs to a console. The needs are radically different. Hell, a PC needs 1 gig just to run WIndows 7. When games and services are built to a single tech spec, it's amazing how much they can squeeze out of it.
2:00 end of story. only reason i have an xbox and not a playstation is i will always be following the Halo universe. i do want to try some of the exclusives of playstation at some point, but that will probably only happen if i ever get through my backlog or i buy a console for extremely cheap second-hand.
But the Wii U's gamepad already lets you use the controller like a lightgun, or a driving wheel, or whatever. I'm glad Sony has feature parity from the get go, but let's not pretend like devs don't already have the tools to do what was mentioned, but have simply chosen not to yet implement those features. Nintendoland already showcases that and more though.
I'll be interested to see the pluses and minuses on how each system implements this feature.
+1
CuvisTheConquerorThey always say "yee haw" but they never ask "haw yee?" Registered Userregular
edited March 2013
You mentioned how the Move Bar is the first combination of motion controls with a traditional controller, but that's not technically correct, is it? The PS3's Sixaxis has rudimentary motion controls in it, after all. And I didn't see a lot of games rushing to take advantage of that, especially once Lair bombed. While it's true that the Move Bar will probably be a vast improvement on that, I don't know that it'd really enable a lot of new applications Sixaxis didn't. In fact, Lair specifically did the "flying like a jetfighter" thing you mentioned.
I would love to weigh in on the whole "console war" concept here. I can see a direct analogy to US politics. We have essentially 2 major companies (I don't count nintendo, they seem to be almost off to one side doing their own thing, many people have a 360 AND a Wii or ps3 AND a Wii, and don't really seem to be a player in the console hatred that exists)
So, 2 companies (political parties) duke it out, and our society is becoming more and more polarized. There is almost an actual hatred between people who prefer either console (or political party), not to mention the whole console vs pc rivalry.
If either side actually succeeds in a decisive way over the other we ALL lose. Competition in this area is very nearly the only thing that protects the interests of the gamers. Imagine how much worse EA would treat people if there wasn't another developer making games... Scary... We would also lose out on consoles forcing developers to look at new ways to make games (like when the Wii introduced motion control).
We as gamers all benefit from having multiple companies, and there isn't anything wrong with wanting both of them to succeed. And thank God for Nintendo. I don't say that as a person who actually likes much of what they've done since the snes, but can you imagine our children growing up without Mario? Isn't it bad enough that we lost Sega? I don't believe in the whole "too big to fail" mentality, where companies can hold us hostage because of the consequences of their failure, and then they can do whatever they want regardless of the consequences, but I Love that I'll get to share games with my kids where my nostalgia gets rubbed just the right way and its new enough to hold their interest.
Hope that wasn't too neurotic...
I would love to weigh in on the whole "console war" concept here. I can see a direct analogy to US politics. We have essentially 2 major companies (I don't count nintendo, they seem to be almost off to one side doing their own thing, many people have a 360 AND a Wii or ps3 AND a Wii, and don't really seem to be a player in the console hatred that exists)
So, 2 companies (political parties) duke it out, and our society is becoming more and more polarized. There is almost an actual hatred between people who prefer either console (or political party), not to mention the whole console vs pc rivalry.
If either side actually succeeds in a decisive way over the other we ALL lose. Competition in this area is very nearly the only thing that protects the interests of the gamers. Imagine how much worse EA would treat people if there wasn't another developer making games... Scary... We would also lose out on consoles forcing developers to look at new ways to make games (like when the Wii introduced motion control).
We as gamers all benefit from having multiple companies, and there isn't anything wrong with wanting both of them to succeed. And thank God for Nintendo. I don't say that as a person who actually likes much of what they've done since the snes, but can you imagine our children growing up without Mario? Isn't it bad enough that we lost Sega? I don't believe in the whole "too big to fail" mentality, where companies can hold us hostage because of the consequences of their failure, and then they can do whatever they want regardless of the consequences, but I Love that I'll get to share games with my kids where my nostalgia gets rubbed just the right way and its new enough to hold their interest.
Hope that wasn't too neurotic...
You mentioned how the Move Bar is the first combination of motion controls with a traditional controller, but that's not technically correct, is it? The PS3's Sixaxis has rudimentary motion controls in it, after all. And I didn't see a lot of games rushing to take advantage of that, especially once Lair bombed. While it's true that the Move Bar will probably be a vast improvement on that, I don't know that it'd really enable a lot of new applications Sixaxis didn't. In fact, Lair specifically did the "flying like a jetfighter" thing you mentioned.
I have to disagree, since the Wii Remote combines aspects of the earliest controllers (NES, SNES) with motion controls (which hadn't yet existed in a major console release) and modern controllers (compatibility with GC controllers, analog Nunchuk stick). Which IS Technically Correct. Sixaxis was a johnny-come-latley.
I could go off on (and actually am currently going off on) how the N pioneered shoulder buttons, analog sticks, etc. and everything else about how controllers are designed. Playstation perfected the feel and response, the 360 is what we mostly use with our PC's and console, but Nintendo innovated all of it.
@metroidkillah
You are correct, sir. Software drives hardware, and all platforms are most certainly going in the direction of hosted electronic media, regardless of whether it's a movie, game, TV, book, magazine, newspaper whatever. The means of delivery will be radically different soon (2-5 years), and it will be the content (and probably OS) will that will determine which provider(s) you want more than the hardware. That being said, hardware and OS will still mean a lot for content delivery (how many AAA games, apps, and programs STILL can't be easily played on Apple or LINUX machines by non-tech savvy people?) I think operating systems will be much more important than hardware platforms for gaming. We're seeing it now with who chooses what phone to buy based on the apps available.
I also love physical copies, and I think this option will be available for a long time... until it's not (will just be available with pre-orders, and then with box-set pre-orders, gold-box, and box-set nostalga re-issues). It's a collector thing, and I don't think it will ever die. Also, it's a hacker thing, to preserve pure IP on a physical media. For example: If Castle Crashers ever ever was available to me, for money, in a disk-inna-clamshell WITH A PAPER MANUAL... I would be suddenly be slightly poorer and I would need a change of pants.
It's just that the medium is changing as the band gets broader: we keep getting closer to Blue-Ray-quality delivery streams. Soon physical copies will only be important for just-now delivery, since a game or movie can be downloaded ahead of time (it's still cheaper to Fed-Ex massive amounts of data on physical media [look it up, it's cool as shit!]) but downloading a game, movie, or etc while you're at work is fast enough and latency is becoming a non-issue for multiplayer. Processing really is becoming the problem of providers and not the users, low-end bandwith and processing is handled better by machines on the user-side, and high-end is better by the provider-side.
And I just realized I went off on a huge rant, forgetting that breathing in occasionally is important. Sorry! Done for tonight!
"Crushed" by the Wii? That's the kind of verb you use when a system sells double or triple its competitors. The Wii sold 30% higher than its competitors...so far. At the moment, the Wii has one foot in the grave at half its competitor's price, and those competitors are still kicking its butt right now. The 360 and PS3 will likely end up in the low to mid 80 million unit range before they reach the point the Wii is currently occupying.
30% is a very large number for the end of a development cycle, and indeed crushed into pieces the PS3 and 360 console sales in the beginning of this generation, forcing both Sony and Microsoft to develop new tech (Move and Kinect), which was met with much more "meh..." than Nintendo (though Kinect gained a lot of traction with it's accessibility with hackers and artists, vs. the PS3's Linux/crackers debacle). The Wii is at the end of it's development cycle, as demonstrated by the release of Wii U, which has again forced the "bigger" console developers to launch a response.
Nintendo shows the others what they need to do, and then the others do it right (360, PS3, all the controllers), do it wrong (Vita, vs. GameBoy), or occasionally Nintendo looses its mind (VirtuaBoy, allowing so much bloatware for the Wii [the 360 Indy stuff on XBLA does this right, almost as good but more accessible than Valve])
I WOULD say that to me, the only thing that matters are who has the highest amount of good console-exclusive games...But I won't, since I buy them ALL once they're out of production.
From out of the west...came a console.
Xbox Durango Doug.
5:33 I love it when shows I watch reference other shows I watch.
Have you ever seen the shit quality of the average game video using footage from a non PC game? If they can capture decent quality footage from their consoles instead of holding a shaky camcorder up to the TV, that would be fantastic.
@z64dan, there is a always some delay, though. Just by rendering at 30 FPS, you get an average latency of 17 ms. And rendering pipelines can introduce delays of as much as 4 frames between the moment you press a button and the moment you see the result. At 30 FPS, this is a sluggish 130 ms.
Things change when you try to implement augmented reality. Any delay over 20 ms between the moment you move your head and the moment you get visual feedback will feel unresponsive and headache-inducing. It is currently on the verge of possibility to get latencies this small even without placing the internet between the motion sensor and the display. So, cloud gaming will be a complete non-starter for augmented reality, no matter how good our connections become.
@Don Reba: The problem is that the bigger the lag, the worse it gets, and the more sensitive to lag the game is, the worse it gets.
Tight controls are vital, and loosening controls in any way can lead to a massively worse experience. Games are designed with a certain level of lag in mind.
You can and people DO do frame-perfect timing, and many games require near-perfect timing, small alterations to which can completely destroy the experience. Screwing that up can mess up the game. Badly.
@Volrag: The tablet controller has a lot of potential. The DS did a lot with having two screens, one of them touch, and the Wii U is basically the world's largest DS. There are a lot of games which having two screens or having a touch screen for can be very useful, and assymetric gameplay is one of the very awesome things you can do with it.
@metroidkillah: Its actually a terrible idea. Streaming gaming is just a non-starter because, quite simply, it isn't going to save money. You have to set up an enormous server bank with a huge amount of power in the computers in it to run the games. You have to have fat pipes going out from there to the end user. You have to have extremely low latency. And worst of all, you need tons of these facilities to ensure that low latency, as well as to provide adequete service.
Its a huge amount of money invested by the company in terms of hardware costs, connection costs, property costs, ect. and to what end? So that people don't have boxes in their living rooms, boxes that you could sell them and profit on?
Its just not a good way of doing things. Distribution beats centralization.
Also remember that your servers have to be able to deal with peak load, and because of their locations will thus very often only be running at near capacity at certain times of day.
@Titanium_Dragon didn't say it was a practical idea, just a "cool" one. You very accurately pointed out the obstacles needed to be overcome, ones which will probably never be- but that doesn't mean it's not a good idea. Who knows, maybe in the future...?
Your characterization of the industry suit is spot on. My time with EA was basically that over and over.
The act of selling a feature as a designer is absurd. There are a few basic rules to keep in mind; execs and marketers don't care until you employ a buzzword. Remember to say "Social" or "Cloud" at least once. That makes their eyes light up. They have no clue what it really entails, but if you can fit your feature into a trendy box, it's that much more likely to get the green light, and if you can really focus your presentation around it, you might even be 'cut proofed' by becoming some suit's pet project.
As per the usual, I agree. If Minecraft can get people addicted to low-rez textures in an infinitely generated world, and Angry Birds can be the #1 app on practically every mobile device, rendering individual hairs and particles in future titles smells of style-over-substance (though Angry Birds isn't exactly substantial either, I guess), and shows that the market needs inventive, thoughtful games, rather than something that renders like a cut-scene in real-time.
Also: Would love to see more "Games You May Not Have Tried" segments. Those always feel informative, and I think Kentucky Route Zero would be a great entry into that one.
Don't you think that having a streaming service defeats the purpose of having a console because you can stream games to anything, like iPad, a your mother's PC or something like OUYA or Game Stick? Which means they will probably make it exclusive to Sony products which would make them a bunch of a--holes, if they weren't already.
On April 13 an MMO called "Defiance" is going to launch. Two days later a television show of 12-13 episodes also called "Defiance" and set in the same universe will air on Showcase and Syfy. Both are going to be set in the same universe and its been both hoped and hinted that if either or both of these tied-in products survive events from one could affect the other.
As per the usual, I agree. If Minecraft can get people addicted to low-rez textures in an infinitely generated world, and Angry Birds can be the #1 app on practically every mobile device, rendering individual hairs and particles in future titles smells of style-over-substance (though Angry Birds isn't exactly substantial either, I guess), and shows that the market needs inventive, thoughtful games, rather than something that renders like a cut-scene in real-time.
Also: Would love to see more "Games You May Not Have Tried" segments. Those always feel informative, and I think Kentucky Route Zero would be a great entry into that one.
Its not the size of the sword but how you use it.
Consider GTAIV and GTAIII:SA. Both had big ass swords but the first used it haphazardly until the dlc and the other used it well until you had a few missions between cities.....well....that first mission outside Los Santos after Brutus made his move.
Streaming (especially in the US) requires a LOT of infrastructure that doesn't exist at a low price. More over the larger the screen the more data has to be transmitted BOTH ways. As the spectacular implosion of OnLive and the SimCity fiasco shows the support system for this cloud gaming is not there and given the way things are going there is little incentive for it to move forward.
Specs have nothing to do with console success, that's not why people want to know about them. People want to know about them because they want to know their capabilities. You narcissistic assholes completely missed the point.
It's all games. Why didn't the 64 sell? The only decent exclusives it had were Rogue Squadron, Zelda and Golden Eye. Same for PS2's success. Xbox 1 had fuck all. I can't even remember any games that stood out on it apart from Halo, which I think is massively overrated. It was just sports games and mediocre FPS. Several entire genres were missing. If you have the games people want the console will sell.
Also, what does this video have to do with anything? The only ones who care what console sells the most are console companies. How is this video supposed to be of interest to us?
As per the usual, I agree. If Minecraft can get people addicted to low-rez textures in an infinitely generated world, and Angry Birds can be the #1 app on practically every mobile device, rendering individual hairs and particles in future titles smells of style-over-substance (though Angry Birds isn't exactly substantial either, I guess), and shows that the market needs inventive, thoughtful games, rather than something that renders like a cut-scene in real-time.
Also: Would love to see more "Games You May Not Have Tried" segments. Those always feel informative, and I think Kentucky Route Zero would be a great entry into that one.
Angry Birds is neither inventive or thoughtful. Like the vast majority of Rovio/Zynga games, they shameless stole it and changed nothing but the graphics. It had already been around for about half a year as a flash game before Angry Birds came out, but the slingshots were catapults and the birds were rocks.
On April 13 an MMO called "Defiance" is going to launch. Two days later a television show of 12-13 episodes also called "Defiance" and set in the same universe will air on Showcase and Syfy. Both are going to be set in the same universe and its been both hoped and hinted that if either or both of these tied-in products survive events from one could affect the other.
What's your guys' take on this?
It's a lie until proven otherwise. You must not have been a gamer long if you're not extremely skeptical of something like this.
@Pixelmancer:
I created this account specifically so I could respond to you, because your comment was SO stupid, I just had to say something.
Mainly, how do justify blasting a system for a lack of games when you clearly didn't actually PLAY the system? The Xbox was just sports and mediocre FPS games huh?
Breakdown, Crimson Skies, Otogi 1 and 2, Gunvalkyrie, Phantom Crash, Phantom Dust, Fable, Knights of the Old Republic 1 and 2, Jade Empire, Panzer Dragoon Orta, Jet Set Radio Future, Battle Engine Aquila, Ninja Gaiden, Far Cry: Instincts... and that's just exclusive stuff that I can REMEMBER.
Aside from the killer library of games (which you were ignorant of, but still claimed doesn't exist), you're also blowing off Halo? It's okay if you don't like the series, that's fine. You're entitled to your opinion, but you HAVE to acknowledge that it completely changed the way FPS games were designed on consoles.
Not to mention the hardware. Xbox Live had a MASSIVE impact on the industry, and the internal hard-drive? Like that was nothing?
And your comment on the N64 is just incredible. You personally not enjoying a certain game does not mean it's a bad game. Saying those are the ONLY 3 quality exclusives is, again, ignorant. Super Mario 64 revolutionized 3D movement in gaming, alongside the control stick. Goldeneye, before Halo, was the first REAL successful implementation of FPS controls on a console. Star Fox came with the rumble pak, another innovation we're still benefiting from today. And you're gonna tell me that games like Super Smash, Banjo, Jet Force, Perfect Dark, Ogre Battle, and so many others weren't quality titles? Seriously?
There are more factors at work than what you're talking about. The PS1 and PS2 both got ahead because of their additional media features. It's not a big deal NOW, but being able to play CDs, and then DVDs, was a big deal. Marketing and public image have a lot to do with how a system sells, as is evidenced by the Wii. Which isn't to say that the Wii has no amazing games, because it REALLY does.
And that's my point. Sales have absolutely nothing to do with the quality of games on a system. Each system I've mentioned has innovated and changed the industry in some way, and they all have a strong library of quality titles. Just because you're unaware of them, doesn't mean they aren't there.
Angry Birds is neither inventive or thoughtful. Like the vast majority of Rovio/Zynga games, they shameless stole it and changed nothing but the graphics. It had already been around for about half a year as a flash game before Angry Birds came out, but the slingshots were catapults and the birds were rocks.
Agreed. In all fairness, that's still going to a good bit of trouble for the one dollar Rovio has successfully pried from my hand to date.
Zoku Gojira on
"Because things are the way they are, things will not stay the way they are." - Bertolt Brecht
@Pixelmancer and @Dante2k4
I think it's easy to wave aside the library of a console if you and your friends never owned it. It's dumb to assume, but at the same time, simply not owning a certain console means missing a huge amount of games, often good ones too. You won't hear about as many games because you won't be looking for them.
I had friends when I was a kid who had an Xbox (I had a PS2) and they would always say "Yeah but there're no good games for PS2!" And it baffled me, because I've loved so many PS2 games. But sometimes you just don't know about them until you've had good reason to really dig around in their library.
Point is, it's easy to miss titles on consoles you don't have, and I think that's what leads to people assuming that it doesn't have anything good. I've played several great games on the Vita, but a lot of people don't even know what games the system has...
Posts
The Wii U kind of looks interesting, but its tablet looks like a pointless gimmick, the PS4 motion controls will probably add what they did this generation, something between bugger all and frustrating hardware problems.
I hope im wrong on this, but i see the next generation being as stagnant as this one is now.
Yes, specs matter. Increasing technical capabilities while easing development effort is desirable. But gaming history has shown that increasing overall specs does not automatically lead to "better" games. Usually, it leads to more impressive graphics and... that's about it.
Streaming the game *while you download it to your machine*, on the other hand, I wouldn't mind as much. Steam is pretty popular and you pretty much download everything to your computer to play anyway, with the added option of playing offline if you choose (usually) in case the connection is down or you just don't want to be online. This would sidestep the latency issues (if it's bad, wait for the download to finish and try again), while allowing for the benefits of instant gratification with game purchases (as well as possible price reductions when physical media is cut out).
But even here, I'm still worried, because I know that since it's their exclusive platform, they'll make it so I'll be criminalized and cut off from further downloads if I try to take the game apart and examine it directly. Do I want to hack the game to add new functionality and challenges 2 years after the game came out? I hope they gave me modder tools, or else I'll probably be in violation of copyright and will be banned from downloading new games forever, making my $500 machine useless! And what about protecting against scams? How will we be able to tell if companies are ripping us off, such as when Capcom put DLC on the same disc as Capcom vs Street Fighter, but outwardly claimed it wasn't possible to put that content into the game directly so DLC would be available at a later date? Or when we recently put the lie to the "Sim City needs to be online so servers can crunch the numbers" myth by discovering that removing ONE line of code was enough to let us play the full game offline with no additional performance issues?
Until we get the same rights and abilities with streaming games as we have with disks, I'll continue going to the old brick-and-mortar and picking up a physical copy as opposed to downloading my game "library".
To Seek,
To Learn,
To Do.
-QFG2
If the speed of light is faster then the speed of sound, is that why people always appear bright until they speak? o_O
I like to physically own things I buy, but in cases like (the late) OnLive and Gaikai, you're not buying a product, you're buying a service. It would be like having a VIP pass to an exclusive club (or whatever). You have the experience while you're there, but you don't "own" anything. And when your pass expires, you end with what you started: nothing. What did you pay for? The experience.
You pay for a subscription to a service which enables you to play a (hopefully) massive library of games whenever you want without actually having to buy the game. And even better, you don't have to own a machine capable of running that game. You don't own any of the games, but then, that's not what you're paying for. You're renting them, basically.
"...and the gameplay recorder, and the background downloading system, and the social media aspect, and the required Move system. 8 gigs of RAM really isn't that much when you consider that PC's running eight gigs of RAM don't usually run half that much stuff while people game on them."
You can't compare a computer running 8 gigs to a console. The needs are radically different. Hell, a PC needs 1 gig just to run WIndows 7. When games and services are built to a single tech spec, it's amazing how much they can squeeze out of it.
I'll be interested to see the pluses and minuses on how each system implements this feature.
So, 2 companies (political parties) duke it out, and our society is becoming more and more polarized. There is almost an actual hatred between people who prefer either console (or political party), not to mention the whole console vs pc rivalry.
If either side actually succeeds in a decisive way over the other we ALL lose. Competition in this area is very nearly the only thing that protects the interests of the gamers. Imagine how much worse EA would treat people if there wasn't another developer making games... Scary... We would also lose out on consoles forcing developers to look at new ways to make games (like when the Wii introduced motion control).
We as gamers all benefit from having multiple companies, and there isn't anything wrong with wanting both of them to succeed. And thank God for Nintendo. I don't say that as a person who actually likes much of what they've done since the snes, but can you imagine our children growing up without Mario? Isn't it bad enough that we lost Sega? I don't believe in the whole "too big to fail" mentality, where companies can hold us hostage because of the consequences of their failure, and then they can do whatever they want regardless of the consequences, but I Love that I'll get to share games with my kids where my nostalgia gets rubbed just the right way and its new enough to hold their interest.
Hope that wasn't too neurotic...
So, 2 companies (political parties) duke it out, and our society is becoming more and more polarized. There is almost an actual hatred between people who prefer either console (or political party), not to mention the whole console vs pc rivalry.
If either side actually succeeds in a decisive way over the other we ALL lose. Competition in this area is very nearly the only thing that protects the interests of the gamers. Imagine how much worse EA would treat people if there wasn't another developer making games... Scary... We would also lose out on consoles forcing developers to look at new ways to make games (like when the Wii introduced motion control).
We as gamers all benefit from having multiple companies, and there isn't anything wrong with wanting both of them to succeed. And thank God for Nintendo. I don't say that as a person who actually likes much of what they've done since the snes, but can you imagine our children growing up without Mario? Isn't it bad enough that we lost Sega? I don't believe in the whole "too big to fail" mentality, where companies can hold us hostage because of the consequences of their failure, and then they can do whatever they want regardless of the consequences, but I Love that I'll get to share games with my kids where my nostalgia gets rubbed just the right way and its new enough to hold their interest.
Hope that wasn't too neurotic...
I have to disagree, since the Wii Remote combines aspects of the earliest controllers (NES, SNES) with motion controls (which hadn't yet existed in a major console release) and modern controllers (compatibility with GC controllers, analog Nunchuk stick). Which IS Technically Correct. Sixaxis was a johnny-come-latley.
I could go off on (and actually am currently going off on) how the N pioneered shoulder buttons, analog sticks, etc. and everything else about how controllers are designed. Playstation perfected the feel and response, the 360 is what we mostly use with our PC's and console, but Nintendo innovated all of it.
You are correct, sir. Software drives hardware, and all platforms are most certainly going in the direction of hosted electronic media, regardless of whether it's a movie, game, TV, book, magazine, newspaper whatever. The means of delivery will be radically different soon (2-5 years), and it will be the content (and probably OS) will that will determine which provider(s) you want more than the hardware. That being said, hardware and OS will still mean a lot for content delivery (how many AAA games, apps, and programs STILL can't be easily played on Apple or LINUX machines by non-tech savvy people?) I think operating systems will be much more important than hardware platforms for gaming. We're seeing it now with who chooses what phone to buy based on the apps available.
I also love physical copies, and I think this option will be available for a long time... until it's not (will just be available with pre-orders, and then with box-set pre-orders, gold-box, and box-set nostalga re-issues). It's a collector thing, and I don't think it will ever die. Also, it's a hacker thing, to preserve pure IP on a physical media. For example: If Castle Crashers ever ever was available to me, for money, in a disk-inna-clamshell WITH A PAPER MANUAL... I would be suddenly be slightly poorer and I would need a change of pants.
It's just that the medium is changing as the band gets broader: we keep getting closer to Blue-Ray-quality delivery streams. Soon physical copies will only be important for just-now delivery, since a game or movie can be downloaded ahead of time (it's still cheaper to Fed-Ex massive amounts of data on physical media [look it up, it's cool as shit!]) but downloading a game, movie, or etc while you're at work is fast enough and latency is becoming a non-issue for multiplayer. Processing really is becoming the problem of providers and not the users, low-end bandwith and processing is handled better by machines on the user-side, and high-end is better by the provider-side.
And I just realized I went off on a huge rant, forgetting that breathing in occasionally is important. Sorry! Done for tonight!
30% is a very large number for the end of a development cycle, and indeed crushed into pieces the PS3 and 360 console sales in the beginning of this generation, forcing both Sony and Microsoft to develop new tech (Move and Kinect), which was met with much more "meh..." than Nintendo (though Kinect gained a lot of traction with it's accessibility with hackers and artists, vs. the PS3's Linux/crackers debacle). The Wii is at the end of it's development cycle, as demonstrated by the release of Wii U, which has again forced the "bigger" console developers to launch a response.
Nintendo shows the others what they need to do, and then the others do it right (360, PS3, all the controllers), do it wrong (Vita, vs. GameBoy), or occasionally Nintendo looses its mind (VirtuaBoy, allowing so much bloatware for the Wii [the 360 Indy stuff on XBLA does this right, almost as good but more accessible than Valve])
From out of the west...came a console.
Xbox Durango Doug.
5:33 I love it when shows I watch reference other shows I watch.
Have you ever seen the shit quality of the average game video using footage from a non PC game? If they can capture decent quality footage from their consoles instead of holding a shaky camcorder up to the TV, that would be fantastic.
@Don Reba: The problem is that the bigger the lag, the worse it gets, and the more sensitive to lag the game is, the worse it gets.
Tight controls are vital, and loosening controls in any way can lead to a massively worse experience. Games are designed with a certain level of lag in mind.
You can and people DO do frame-perfect timing, and many games require near-perfect timing, small alterations to which can completely destroy the experience. Screwing that up can mess up the game. Badly.
@Volrag: The tablet controller has a lot of potential. The DS did a lot with having two screens, one of them touch, and the Wii U is basically the world's largest DS. There are a lot of games which having two screens or having a touch screen for can be very useful, and assymetric gameplay is one of the very awesome things you can do with it.
@metroidkillah: Its actually a terrible idea. Streaming gaming is just a non-starter because, quite simply, it isn't going to save money. You have to set up an enormous server bank with a huge amount of power in the computers in it to run the games. You have to have fat pipes going out from there to the end user. You have to have extremely low latency. And worst of all, you need tons of these facilities to ensure that low latency, as well as to provide adequete service.
Its a huge amount of money invested by the company in terms of hardware costs, connection costs, property costs, ect. and to what end? So that people don't have boxes in their living rooms, boxes that you could sell them and profit on?
Its just not a good way of doing things. Distribution beats centralization.
Also remember that your servers have to be able to deal with peak load, and because of their locations will thus very often only be running at near capacity at certain times of day.
The act of selling a feature as a designer is absurd. There are a few basic rules to keep in mind; execs and marketers don't care until you employ a buzzword. Remember to say "Social" or "Cloud" at least once. That makes their eyes light up. They have no clue what it really entails, but if you can fit your feature into a trendy box, it's that much more likely to get the green light, and if you can really focus your presentation around it, you might even be 'cut proofed' by becoming some suit's pet project.
I'll rewrite this later when I have time.
Also: Would love to see more "Games You May Not Have Tried" segments. Those always feel informative, and I think Kentucky Route Zero would be a great entry into that one.
On April 13 an MMO called "Defiance" is going to launch. Two days later a television show of 12-13 episodes also called "Defiance" and set in the same universe will air on Showcase and Syfy. Both are going to be set in the same universe and its been both hoped and hinted that if either or both of these tied-in products survive events from one could affect the other.
What's your guys' take on this?
Its not the size of the sword but how you use it.
Consider GTAIV and GTAIII:SA. Both had big ass swords but the first used it haphazardly until the dlc and the other used it well until you had a few missions between cities.....well....that first mission outside Los Santos after Brutus made his move.
I created this account specifically so I could respond to you, because your comment was SO stupid, I just had to say something.
Mainly, how do justify blasting a system for a lack of games when you clearly didn't actually PLAY the system? The Xbox was just sports and mediocre FPS games huh?
Breakdown, Crimson Skies, Otogi 1 and 2, Gunvalkyrie, Phantom Crash, Phantom Dust, Fable, Knights of the Old Republic 1 and 2, Jade Empire, Panzer Dragoon Orta, Jet Set Radio Future, Battle Engine Aquila, Ninja Gaiden, Far Cry: Instincts... and that's just exclusive stuff that I can REMEMBER.
Aside from the killer library of games (which you were ignorant of, but still claimed doesn't exist), you're also blowing off Halo? It's okay if you don't like the series, that's fine. You're entitled to your opinion, but you HAVE to acknowledge that it completely changed the way FPS games were designed on consoles.
Not to mention the hardware. Xbox Live had a MASSIVE impact on the industry, and the internal hard-drive? Like that was nothing?
And your comment on the N64 is just incredible. You personally not enjoying a certain game does not mean it's a bad game. Saying those are the ONLY 3 quality exclusives is, again, ignorant. Super Mario 64 revolutionized 3D movement in gaming, alongside the control stick. Goldeneye, before Halo, was the first REAL successful implementation of FPS controls on a console. Star Fox came with the rumble pak, another innovation we're still benefiting from today. And you're gonna tell me that games like Super Smash, Banjo, Jet Force, Perfect Dark, Ogre Battle, and so many others weren't quality titles? Seriously?
There are more factors at work than what you're talking about. The PS1 and PS2 both got ahead because of their additional media features. It's not a big deal NOW, but being able to play CDs, and then DVDs, was a big deal. Marketing and public image have a lot to do with how a system sells, as is evidenced by the Wii. Which isn't to say that the Wii has no amazing games, because it REALLY does.
And that's my point. Sales have absolutely nothing to do with the quality of games on a system. Each system I've mentioned has innovated and changed the industry in some way, and they all have a strong library of quality titles. Just because you're unaware of them, doesn't mean they aren't there.
Agreed. In all fairness, that's still going to a good bit of trouble for the one dollar Rovio has successfully pried from my hand to date.
I think it's easy to wave aside the library of a console if you and your friends never owned it. It's dumb to assume, but at the same time, simply not owning a certain console means missing a huge amount of games, often good ones too. You won't hear about as many games because you won't be looking for them.
I had friends when I was a kid who had an Xbox (I had a PS2) and they would always say "Yeah but there're no good games for PS2!" And it baffled me, because I've loved so many PS2 games. But sometimes you just don't know about them until you've had good reason to really dig around in their library.
Point is, it's easy to miss titles on consoles you don't have, and I think that's what leads to people assuming that it doesn't have anything good. I've played several great games on the Vita, but a lot of people don't even know what games the system has...