Business Approach Comparison Sony PS4 and Microsoft Xbox

[Johnny Awesome]

IMO the bottom line was that MS was still working out the game sharing details when they pulled the plug.

Why? Because they couldn't figure out a message-able DRM/Sharing system that would be acceptable to both consumers and publishers.

Their solution: Pick consumers over publishers - "Too bad about the used games EA, but while Sony was raping Xbox One's stillborn corpse, you guys were off hiding under a rock instead of defending policies designed to protect your revenue."

EA wasn't willing to force the issue this time by pulling Madden/FIFA from PS4, which is what it would have taken to get Sony to budge.

MS did what they had to do. They might introduce sharing for digital content, but not until long after the dust has settled.

Realistically, I'm accepting the fact that the sharing was too good to be true and was going to be nerfed somehow, but I'm sad for the loss of disc-less gaming and instant switching between blockbuster games. It's a shame to need the disc. A real shame. I know that I could just go digital, but I'd break my bandwidth cap by a huge margin doing this and wouldn't end up with a physical copy I could sell once if I wanted to. I'm going to miss that feature...

 

[dobwal]

- how is sharing a game better than used games? For used games there is at least the potential that one buys the DLC. But then, MS never stated if you can share DLC in your library or not.

(Disclaimer: This doesn't apply if the shared feature was a demo platform.)

Do you think sharing would of revolved around someone saying, "Isn't this great, I get to buy 10 games and you nine other guys don't have to pay a thing".

Have you heard of commune and coop?

Ever heard of a community or a group structure build around the concept of one person taking care of nine other people at no cost? I have, a single mother or father with nine kids. LOL. There may be other examples but they probably revolves around social welfare, which gaming isn't. If so, we would of saw Sally Struthers on TV trying to convince people how 60 cents a day can help little jimmy play his xbox.

Sharing titles in this fashion means access to a cooperative library that basically increases your purchasing power. You are effectively paying $6 dollars for a game. But purchasing power isn't naturally inversely related to consumption. If you paid $600 for 10 games, why won't you pay $600 for 100 games?

Yes, people will accommodate those that they share intimate social links. A father freely sharing with his children. Or siblings and close friends freely sharing a library. Other than that sharing usually comes with a cost and is normally enforced in the form of equitable contribution.

There is nothing to say the userbase as a whole would of increased overall consumption of new titles motivated by the sharing feature. But if you eliminated piracy and limited the used sales market while offering sharing, you could encourage more people to spend in a way that the platform provider and pubs actually benefit. This is where Microsoft failed. Its should of laid out its DRM plan along side its sharing plan at the same time. And basically described how it was replacing the used market with its sharing feature. MS could of marketed the used game market as old and passe and that their DD sharing model would benefit everyone MS, pubs, devs and gamers. Sharing is a natural substitute for used games, because thats what the used market is used for, a tool to increase consumption with limited funds, which is what the sharing feature provided.

Everyone has a threshold of how much they are willing or can spend on gaming. In effect, if a platform provider and pubs can get everyone to spend up to their threshold, its doesn't matter if they give everyone access to only one title or the whole library. Sharing may have been an additional tool to motivate gamers to max out their spending on their consoles.

 

[Billy Idol]

Do you think sharing would of revolved around someone saying, "Isn't this great, I get to buy 10 games and you nine other guys don't have to pay a thing".

Have you heard of commune and coop?

Ever heard of a community or a group structure build around the concept of one person taking care of nine other people at no cost? I have, a single mother or father with nine kids. LOL. There may be other examples but they probably revolves around social welfare, which gaming isn't. If so, we would of saw Sally Struthers on TV trying to convince people how 60 cents a day can help little jimmy play his xbox.

Sharing titles in this fashion means access to a cooperative library that basically increases your purchasing power. You are effectively paying $6 dollars for a game. But purchasing power isn't naturally inversely related to consumption. If you paid $600 for 10 games, why won't you pay $600 for 100 games?

Yes, people will accommodate those that they share intimate social links. A father freely sharing with his children. Or siblings and close friends freely sharing a library. Other than that sharing will usually comes with a cost and would be probably enforced in the form of equitable contribution.

There is nothing to say the userbase as a whole would of increased overall consumption of new titles motivated by the sharing feature. But if you eliminated piracy and limited the used sales market while offering sharing, you could encourage more people to spend in a way that the platform provider and pubs actually benefit. This is where Microsoft failed. Its should of laid out its DRM plan along side its sharing plan at the same time. And basically described how it was replacing the used market with its sharing feature. MS could of marketed the used game market as old and passe and that their DD sharing model would benefit everyone MS, pubs, devs and gamers. Sharing is a natural substitute for used games, because thats what the used market is used for, a tool to increase consumption with limited funds, which is what the sharing feature provided.

Everyone has a threshold of how much they are willing or can spend on gaming. In effect, if a platform provider and pubs can get everyone to spend up to their threshold, its doesn't matter if they give everyone access to only one title or the whole library. Sharing may have been an additional tool to motivate gamers to max out their spending on games.

You did not read my posts. You did not think about the potential situation from different perspectives.

1.) I was talking about SP games. You are right, games with coop might be different. But I choose SP as these are likely to suffer most from such a strategy.

2.) How do you come to the conclusion that in a sharing group only one person will buy games? Think again about how sharing works, e.g. how it would work with your gaming buddy.

3.) You should also consider your 10 games example in the other direction: not 100 games for 600$, but the 10 games for 60$.

 

[joker454]

But if you are right, which I honestly doubt, they should immediately fire their PR team.

We'll never know now so I guess it's all moot anyways. Probably for the best because I'm tired of typing. But like I mentioned in another thread, the good news to Microsoft backtracking is it freed up $500 for me to buy a really good pc video card.

 

[dobwal]

You did not read my posts. You did not think about the potential situation from different perspectives.

1.) I was talking about SP games. You are right, games with coop might be different. But I choose SP as these are likely to suffer most from such a strategy.

2.) How do you come to the conclusion that in a sharing group only one person will buy games? Think again about how sharing works, e.g. how it would work with your gaming buddy.

3.) You should also consider your 10 games example in the other direction: not 100 games for 600$, but the 10 games for 60$.

Why would single player games suffer? Only the purchaser of the title and 1 other member can access a game at the same time. Any popular title especially amongst the group of 10 would require 5 copies. Do you not think people have a problem when certain people don't contribute in a group structure, outside of close friends and family, who happen to be the most likely to use you to avoid spending on titles even under the current structure?

There is potential of abuse in any model. The current allows you to buy a console and never contribute to MS other than buy their console at relatively its BOM. I can think of no other market that even allows that to happen.

If everyone is equally sharing then who cares. Humans have a problem with overconsumption. Give people more buying power and they tend to buy more not less or equally. The attachment rate of console don't usually hover around 10 titles because thats all gamers need to fullfill their gaming desires. The attachment rate is affected by the cost of the titles themselves. What do you expect the attachment rate to stay the same regardless of the price?

A shared library can be better than a used market because it can unify the used and new market and allowing manufacturers and pubs to partake in every sale while offering cheaper access to titles for gamers.

 

[AlphaWolf]

We'll never know now so I guess it's all moot anyways. Probably for the best because I'm tired of typing. But like I mentioned in another thread, the good news to Microsoft backtracking is it freed up $500 for me to buy a really good pc video card.

I'm actually gonna throw my console money in a nice haswell tablet/ultrabook, but my desktop PC is already well beyond next gen consoles.

 

[RancidLunchmeat]

IMO the bottom line was that MS was still working out the game sharing details when they pulled the plug.

Why? Because they couldn't figure out a message-able DRM/Sharing system that would be acceptable to both consumers and publishers.

I think the bottom line is that MS didn't have a clear vision. Or rather, they had a clear vision and then continued to alter that vision as the release got closer and closer.

They were trying to do something revolutionary and extremely forward-thinking. They got cold feet and included the physical disc. That caused DRM issues so they had to create unpopular policies. Then they decided to backtrack on the DRM policies, but doing so removes basic functionality that was the heart of what they were trying to accomplish.

I'm with Joker, only I'm spending that money on a PS3 this afternoon. There's no way I'm touching this cluster#@*! of a console anywhere within a year of its launch date.

I doubt MS has any clear idea of what they are doing at this very minute.

 

[Cyan]

IMO the bottom line was that MS was still working out the game sharing details when they pulled the plug.

Why? Because they couldn't figure out a message-able DRM/Sharing system that would be acceptable to both consumers and publishers.

Their solution: Pick consumers over publishers - "Too bad about the used games EA, but while Sony was raping Xbox One's stillborn corpse, you guys were off hiding under a rock instead of defending policies designed to protect your revenue."

EA wasn't willing to force the issue this time by pulling Madden/FIFA from PS4, which is what it would have taken to get Sony to budge.

MS did what they had to do. They might introduce sharing for digital content, but not until long after the dust has settled.

Realistically, I'm accepting the fact that the sharing was too good to be true and was going to be nerfed somehow, but I'm sad for the loss of disc-less gaming and instant switching between blockbuster games. It's a shame to need the disc. A real shame. I know that I could just go digital, but I'd break my bandwidth cap by a huge margin doing this and wouldn't end up with a physical copy I could sell once if I wanted to. I'm going to miss that feature...

Perhaps they had no choice. There was already a massive amount of discontent amongst media and consumers. Too much anti-Xbox One to deal with, and very little response from Microsoft PR and marketing focusing on the actual positive facts of those policies.

I picked up this thread from where I left it and I'd rather prefer not having read on anything.

It brings back bad memories and I must admit that deep down within my heart I am 1000% with joker454 on this, so I rather prefer to avoid reading his posts for a while in regards to this particular matter.

There are quite a few things going on in my life right now and the last thing I need is thinking about the "what it could be" and *what it actually is* and the system *wars*. It happened, it can't be changed now.

Some things still needed a fix -like the regional lock by country-, and perhaps a more elegant solution to some measures like the 24 hour check would be welcome, but other than that it was a dream.

There is hope though. I bet they are going to bring an opt in function in the future -1 or 2 years at the most-.

 

[NavNucST3]

I think the bottom line is that MS didn't have a clear vision. Or rather, they had a clear vision and then continued to alter that vision as the release got closer and closer.

They were trying to do something revolutionary and extremely forward-thinking. They got cold feet and included the physical disc. That caused DRM issues so they had to create unpopular policies. Then they decided to backtrack on the DRM policies, but doing so removes basic functionality that was the heart of what they were trying to accomplish.

I'm with Joker, only I'm spending that money on a PS3 this afternoon. There's no way I'm touching this cluster#@*! of a console anywhere within a year of its launch date.

I doubt MS has any clear idea of what they are doing at this very minute.

There is ALWAYS a sure sign that there is no vision or that there is a problem (clearly no one as MSFT has read "Start With Why: ...") because the tell-tale phrase:

"until the customer gets the XBOX One in their hands or home (or whatever Mattrick or whomever made that comment said) they don't know..." BAM your product has a problem if the customer has to own it FIRST before they know WHY they want it.

 

[Xalion]

You are taking the word "family" in family share too far to try to make a point. You dont have to establish a relationship beyond having someone on your friend list more than the previous 30 days to enable that feature. Its not even a mentally provocative description.

Actually, I don't. You see - I have a unique problem. I have 4 brothers and sisters, all of whom play video games. My wife has 11 brothers and sisters, 6 of which play video games regularly. I have around 23 nieces and nephews - and I would say 10 of them have their own consoles. I video chat with some regularity with both my parents and my inlaws - both of whom have consoles solely for that purpose. The majority of my friends are involved with video games in some form or another. Of those, I would say I have a dozen or so that I play with regularly on each platform.

So when you talk about 10 people - I will already have to leave some people out just to get my actual family on my list. So I get to start worrying about who to offend right from the start. If you include my actual friends, I would be faced with a pretty tough choice right from the start.

And you think that I will have room to put a random people on my list for 30 days so I can trade them a game? Then there is the big question that no one has ever answered - can you change the people on your list? If you do, does the person you remove lose the rights to the game you traded or gave them? Is there a way to "sell" games without going through a third party retailer or having them on your friends list?

Right now, this isn't a problem - everyone knows I have a first come, first serve policy for games I don't play anymore. They understand that that includes the neighbor kids. I don't have to worry about adding friends to my friends list. I don't have to worry about selling games through game stop. When I want to give a game to someone in my family or one of my friends, I just give them the disk.

Maybe if I only had a couple of friends and a small family I would have room to try and game the system to adding random strangers to my list for 30 days to get around the system. Personally though I prefer to not deal with something like this in the first place.

*Edit* I should note that I understand this is probably not a very common problem - but perhaps my situation might help people understand one case why this type of DRM isn't popular with people.

 

[zupallinere]

"until the customer gets the XBOX One in their hands or home (or whatever Mattrick or whomever made that comment said) they don't know..." BAM your product has a problem if the customer has to own it FIRST before they know WHY they want it.

Agreed but I hear that consumers don't know what they want so I guess MS chose one set of buzz phrases vs another :smile:

 

[zupallinere]

In no particular order

Humans have a problem with overconsumption

Humans also have a bigger problem with being risk averse and obsessing over what they are losing in any transaction. Why wouldn't shouldn't they freak out a bit when every other thing under the sun including every other console game could be bought and sold at the consumers convenience.?

The current allows you to buy a console and never contribute to MS other than buy their console at relatively its BOM. I can think of no other market that even allows that to happen.

keurig machines where 3rd part reusable cups are used off the top of my head.

Do you not think people have a problem when certain people don't contribute in a group structure, outside of close friends and family, who happen to be the most likely to use you to avoid spending on titles even under the current structure?

If 2 players share one game for the life of the game starting day one this will effectively halve sales during the most critical time of a game's release. Now of course it won't be a 50 percent drop in sales but there will be a loss in sales due to this arrangement.

So all the people ( or some obviously large portion ) who buy used games now will be the "freeloaders" ( because ... ?? ) that will somehow be so bad as to piss off the other people who they enter the 1/2 off bargain with. These pissed off folks will start buying new games and not entering into any more 1/2 off bargains in such quantities as to offset, by some non-trivial amount, the remaining 1/2 price bargaineers ? I think the bad apples will be ejected fairly quickly and a new set of 1/2 off bargain transactions will take their place but that's me.

A shared library can be better than a used market because it can unify the used and new market and allowing manufacturers and pubs to partake in every sale while offering cheaper access to titles for gamers.

I hope something that allows for more money for devs.

 

[blakjedi]

Actually, I don't. You see - I have a unique problem. I have 4 brothers and sisters, all of whom play video games. My wife has 11 brothers and sisters, 6 of which play video games regularly. I have around 23 nieces and nephews - and I would say 10 of them have their own consoles. I video chat with some regularity with both my parents and my inlaws - both of whom have consoles solely for that purpose. The majority of my friends are involved with video games in some form or another. Of those, I would say I have a dozen or so that I play with regularly on each platform.

So when you talk about 10 people - I will already have to leave some people out just to get my actual family on my list. So I get to start worrying about who to offend right from the start. If you include my actual friends, I would be faced with a pretty tough choice right from the start.

And you think that I will have room to put a random people on my list for 30 days so I can trade them a game? Then there is the big question that no one has ever answered - can you change the people on your list? If you do, does the person you remove lose the rights to the game you traded or gave them? Is there a way to "sell" games without going through a third party retailer or having them on your friends list?

Right now, this isn't a problem - everyone knows I have a first come, first serve policy for games I don't play anymore. They understand that that includes the neighbor kids. I don't have to worry about adding friends to my friends list. I don't have to worry about selling games through game stop. When I want to give a game to someone in my family or one of my friends, I just give them the disk.

Maybe if I only had a couple of friends and a small family I would have room to try and game the system to adding random strangers to my list for 30 days to get around the system. Personally though I prefer to not deal with something like this in the first place.

*Edit* I should note that I understand this is probably not a very common problem - but perhaps my situation might help people understand one case why this type of DRM isn't popular with people.

Well all you can control is the ten you would have shared with. Remember its not as if it was locked to just accounts. If you have three nephews in a household, they just have to log on with the account you shared with. All three could still play if no one else could play it.

No matter whether physical or digital sharing has limitations. Its not a problem anymore though. Share that one disc anyway you like.

 

[blakjedi]

There is ALWAYS a sure sign that there is no vision or that there is a problem (clearly no one as MSFT has read "Start With Why: ...") because the tell-tale phrase:

"until the customer gets the XBOX One in their hands or home (or whatever Mattrick or whomever made that comment said) they don't know..." BAM your product has a problem if the customer has to own it FIRST before they know WHY they want it.

Maybe. There is a reason why best buy has tvs displayed. There is a reason why there are kiosks at game stores. Its the reason why you test drive cars, and do house walk throughs before buying or renting. Its why you interview before you take a job. Its the reason why there are dressing rooms at department stores.

You really don't know what you like until you either try it or see someone else use it.

 

[RancidLunchmeat]

There is ALWAYS a sure sign that there is no vision or that there is a problem (clearly no one as MSFT has read "Start With Why: ...")

Well, if they can't be bothered to read out there in Redmond they should at least watch Sinek's TedTalk cliff notes on the subject!

 

[Rangers]

Maybe. There is a reason why best buy has tvs displayed. There is a reason why there are kiosks at game stores. Its the reason why you test drive cars, and do house walk throughs before buying or renting. Its why you interview before you take a job. Its the reason why there are dressing rooms at department stores.

You really don't know what you like until you either try it or see someone else use it.

Reminds me what Miyamato said about Wii U the other day...basically it was "once people try Wii u they get it" but there is not currently software to entice people to try it or "get it" without trying it, like Wii Fit did for Wii.

I dont agree with him in thinking Wii u is salvageable, but it fits this discussion.

 

[RancidLunchmeat]

*Edit* I should note that I understand this is probably not a very common problem - but perhaps my situation might help people understand one case why this type of DRM isn't popular with people.

No, what you should realize is how absurd it would be for MS to attempt to tailor their policies to suit your extreme situation. And the solution to your "problem" would be very simple: Somewhere, your clan would need to purchase two copies of the game. Problem solved.

And you would have had far greater rights, far greater sharing abilities than if your clan had just purchased two physical copies of the disc.

But as Jedi said, it's all moot now. You've complained, the policies have been rescinded, and now your only option is to purchase the physical disc and mail it or hand deliver it to each of your clan members if they want to play. And if you want to play your own game, you have to count on them to mail it or hand deliver it back to you.

I don't come from as large of a family as you do, but I can't trust them to return a DVD when I ask. Pretty much, if I loan it to them, I have to be prepared for the fact that I'm either never going to get it back or I certainly can't expect it to be returned when I ask for it.

 

[AzBat]

This sounds more plausible. However don't all 360 games have demos?

No. There are 3 kinds of digital games on the 360:

Xbox Live Arcade Games - These are smaller games(4gb I think is the limit now). When you download you can choose Full or Trial. Full game is the full game & you have to pay to unlock that. Trial is identical to the Full except it is free & has a special trial mode. Usually it's a full level or two, special trial level or timed. It's up to the developer. Most of the time you can play these as much as you want. Once you pay, it unlocks the full version. There is no new download as you already have the full version. Pricing is usually $10-20, but there are some $5 games still.

Xbox Live Indie Games - These work almost identical to XBLA except the trial mode is hard-coded to no more than 4 minutes. Developers can shorten if they want. Again it's totally up to the developer what they provide in the trial. There are restrictions on file size & it affects which price tier they get to sell the game at. 150MB or less can be priced 80MSP($1) or higher. 150MB to 500MB are required to be priced 240MSP($3) or 400MSP($5).

Games on Demand - These are identical to the disc versions. There is no trial. You pay in $, not MSP. They can't be downloaded or played until you pay. They are not released until at least a couple of months after the disc ships. They are usually the same price as the disc versions. These don't require a disc to play.

Hopefully Xbox One requires a demo for every digital game. Considering that there will not be a XBLA, XBLIG or GoD, I expect there to be some kind of trial. Hopefully it's not timed based.

Tommy McClain

P.S. Developers can make available free 360 demos that are totally separate from the 3 tiers above, but they are not required. You will not find a demo for every game. The demo doesn't allow them to upsell the digital version. Hopefully that will change on Xbox One.

 

[RancidLunchmeat]

Maybe. There is a reason why best buy has tvs displayed. There is a reason why there are kiosks at game stores. Its the reason why you test drive cars, and do house walk throughs before buying or renting. Its why you interview before you take a job. Its the reason why there are dressing rooms at department stores.

You really don't know what you like until you either try it or see someone else use it.

Sorry, Jedi, but I can't roll with you on this one because what we are talking about are features that will only work after purchase. These are on-line, sharing features that can't be demonstrated in kiosks at gaming stores.

The features of the One are... ehhhhm, sorry. were if not revolutionary, certainly evolutionary. But they can't be displayed at Best Buy like the Wiimote was. They require internet access (how many kiosks have that?), they require you to not only log into your personalized account, but also set up that account and connect to other's accounts in order to see the benefit.

They weren't something that could be demonstrated, so there is some truth in the fact that people wouldn't actually see the benefits until they actually used them. The problem is, if that is the case, then MS actually needed to actually explain the benefits. They shouldn't have hidden the downsides, but they should have said "This is what our vision is - these are the things you can do" then they demonstrate those features, then they say something about the trade-off that is necessary in order to achieve those great features.

I used to believe for the past month or couple of months that MS's Xbox marketing team needed to be fired over this mess. But now I believe that while a large part of this is the failure of the marketing team, I think the majority of the blame lies with the actual development/engineering/design team that clearly kept changing their vision for the product. Or the executive in charge that was calling the shots. Whoever it was that was responsible for these repeated changes in vision and scope are the ones that need to be terminated.

 

[Cyan]

I think the bottom line is that MS didn't have a clear vision. Or rather, they had a clear vision and then continued to alter that vision as the release got closer and closer.

They were trying to do something revolutionary and extremely forward-thinking. They got cold feet and included the physical disc. That caused DRM issues so they had to create unpopular policies. Then they decided to backtrack on the DRM policies, but doing so removes basic functionality that was the heart of what they were trying to accomplish.

I'm with Joker, only I'm spending that money on a PS3 this afternoon. There's no way I'm touching this cluster#@*! of a console anywhere within a year of its launch date.

I doubt MS has any clear idea of what they are doing at this very minute.

Well, I don't blame them at all. They knew what they wanted. They said 3-4 days ago; "We aren't going to change our vision, our idea".

But I have a feeling it was their investors who turned them down and asked them to change their policies after seeing the pre-order numbers.

It's not that they are confused, it's just that there is not option but to back down because their investors asked them to do so.

Their vision was crystal clear, they were focused and they had a clear mind, imho. They just didn't publicize it very well.

Add to this that some hatred helped 'cos the Xbox 360 the most successful console of the last generation, not only in terms of increased sales but also the quality of the platform overall.