[PARANOiA]

I doubt MS would do this, since this would effectively throw out the plan for "control of the living room". I also think an EA console would be bad for the industry as a whole.

[AzBat]

Originally Posted by PARANOiA

I doubt MS would do this, since this would effectively throw out the plan for "control of the living room". I also think an EA console would be bad for the industry as a whole.

Nobody thought MS would sell Bungie either. MS could keep a minority stake in the new venture with EA. Could possibly explain the recent development with the 3 B's. Anyway, just depends on how bad EA wants one platform to develop for. We already know the likelyhood of Nintendo, Microsoft and Sony converging on one platform is even more unlikely than EA goin at it alone.

Tommy McClain

[borowki]

Originally Posted by AzBat

I still think the possibility of EA goin at it alone is more probable. EA would be more likely to make their own platform or buy somebody else's. Then they'd go exclusive to their own platform(except maybe they would still develop for the PC and mobile devices). Wouldn't surprise me if Microsoft uses this as an excuse to get out of the hardware business. Maybe they spin-off the Xbox platform and sell it to EA?

Tommy McClain

It's tricky for a large publisher to own the platform. There's too much conflict of interest. Other publishers won't help out a competitor. That's at least one of the reasons why Microsoft was willing to let Bungie go.

The Xbox platform wouldn't be an attractive acquisition, as such a spin-off doesn't mean Microsoft is out of the gaming business. It will just put its full weight behind gaming on Windows. The march of the PC into the living-room--I wouldn't want to be one trying to halt it.

[standing ovation]

Originally Posted by AlphaWolf

sure we can start with the abacus as the center of home entertainment and work up from there.

You joke about it, but a recession isn't far-fetched. The convergence of "new" (i.e., unproven) technologies seems to be nudging the industry in this direction. So the market is being pushed to the point of diminishing returns, where producers can ill afford to make games and consumers can ill afford to buy them.

[AlphaWolf]

Originally Posted by standing ovation

You joke about it, but a recession isn't far-fetched. The convergence of "new" (i.e., unproven) technologies seems to be nudging the industry in this direction. So the market is being pushed to the point of diminishing returns, where producers can ill afford to make games and consumers can ill afford to buy them.

This is why game sales are up something like 30-40% year over year?

[liolio]

I think MS need a "landslide" victory to leave the market nextgen, they will need to tighten theirs hold on the market (if they come on top this gen).

I still think MS will try to convince Intel or AMD/ATI (but a far second I guess Gates will pimp itself to convince Intel ) if the market opportunity for a closed box are strong.

[wco81]

We're not going to see pipes in the US which will permit full DD.

Even then, you still need some kind of local storage to keep stuff you buy so large-capacity hard disks (say in the 300 GB range) isn't going to be cheap to put in consoles or any hardware which has to hit mass-market price points.

Someone will talk about future consoles without some kind of cheap-to-distribute, high-storage drive but the telecom infrastructure won't support it, unless the Wii effect regresses gaming back to simpler, less graphically rich genres.

If gaming goes back to simple arcade/parlor games, then we could do DD right now.

DD has become successful in music but we've traded lossy content for the convenience and instant gratification of DD.

It could happen with video too, if we dumb down our standards. So it may happen to gaming as well.

[borowki]

Originally Posted by wco81

We're not going to see pipes in the US which will permit full DD.

Even then, you still need some kind of local storage to keep stuff you buy so large-capacity hard disks (say in the 300 GB range) isn't going to be cheap to put in consoles or any hardware which has to hit mass-market price points.

If you can IPTV, you can do gaming. It's just a matter of compressing the audio-visual information and sending it down the same fiber link. One point I was trying to make. No equirpment to buy and no waiting for a game to download. The set-top box wouldn't need storage. I think it provides a viable business model.

[RobertR1]

Originally Posted by borowki

If you can IPTV, you can do gaming. It's just a matter of compressing the audio-visual information and sending it down the same fiber link. One point I was trying to make. No equirpment to buy and no waiting for a game to download. The set-top box wouldn't need storage. I think it provides a viable business model.

Streaming would be a crapshoot to be honest. You'd really limit your install base. Downloads to HDD are more than possible such as Valve's Steam model. The effects on retail relations is the biggest hurdle I see.

[wco81]

Yeah retailers aren't going to be enthusiastic about selling consoles if they can't sell the games, which is where the profits are.

Right now, the main IPTV provider is AT&T with their FTTN U-Verse service. We'll see what the adoption rate for that is. They're giving away free movie channels for the first year but otherwise the price isn't better.

The total bandwidth with FTTN isn't that great, with many predicting AT&T would eventually have to go FTTP like Verizon's FIOS to stay competitive. The bitrates for video are low and the bandwidth for data isn't going to permit easy downloads of even say DVD-9 amount of content, let alone more high-density formats.

US telecom infrastructure doesn't show the promise of doing away with packaged media altogether, apart from the distribution problems with hardware if software is taken away from retail channels.

[borowki]

Originally Posted by RobertR1

Streaming would be a crapshoot to be honest. You'd really limit your install base. Downloads to HDD are more than possible such as Valve's Steam model. The effects on retail relations is the biggest hurdle I see.

Of course it's possible. But at the end of the day, you're selling the same games to the same audience. Those who wait for a large download would have bought the game at retail.

Streaming offers the possibility of expanding the market--i.e. reaching those who would never buy a console. I can see it being tied into the regular IPTV offerings. For example, after watching a film, you're offer a chance to play the game based on that film.

[AlphaWolf]

Originally Posted by borowki

Of course it's possible. But at the end of the day, you're selling the same games to the same audience. Those who wait for a large download would have bought the game at retail.

Streaming offers the possibility of expanding the market--i.e. reaching those who would never buy a console. I can see it being tied into the regular IPTV offerings. For example, after watching a film, you're offer a chance to play the game based on that film.

As soon as you get credit cards in the hands of 10 year olds that will be a huge success.

[Arwin]

Originally Posted by AlphaWolf

As soon as you get credit cards in the hands of 10 year olds that will be a huge success.

Irrespective of whethetr I think any of the above a good idea or not, the PS3 has a day one allowance system for non-master account online purchases that I think is quite well thought out and easy to use ...

[AlphaWolf]

Originally Posted by Arwin

Irrespective of whethetr I think any of the above a good idea or not, the PS3 has a day one allowance system for non-master account online purchases that I think is quite well thought out and easy to use ...

For 10 year olds? Kids would buy lots of things, because they often have little concept of money. Their parents might not be so happy when they spend a bunch of money on something they will only play for 5 minutes.

That said the online content delivery is not the biggest problem with trying to make an open PC work replacing consoles and dvd players in the home.

[Shifty Geezer]

That's the purpose of an allowance though! They have a finite amount of money and its for them to make their own choices on what to spend it on. If they buy junk they only play for five minutes and then tire of, they hopefully learn that money needs to spent on wiser purchases in future.