Alternative distribution to optical disks : SSD, cards, and download*

[Rangers]

In the future, the retailers would be out of the loop as broadband speeds increase. But, currently, the majority of Americans don't have the broadband speeds to download a 50GB game. They could work an odd job to get the gas money, drive to the store, d/l to SSD, drive home, make a sandwich, and eat, way before the game would be finished d/l over the broadband connection.

In the model I was thinking of, retailers would have a server kiosk with enough storage to hold lots of games and the only speed issue would be disk transfer rates.

If there's a one time upfront cost of an SSD cart that you would recoup later from lower priced games (which may or may not be possible due to the cheapness of disc media and expense of transportation), I see that it's possible people would adopt. Lots of people don't mind buying expensive memory sticks for their PSPs for movies and homebrew.

They've talked about a model like this in distributing movies for a long time (where you would get your movie burned to disc on the spot), but yet it's never come to pass.

Problem I see with it, when you buy a DVD you want your nice pretty case and box art too. So you're going to have to print the art, and keep a supply of blank cases on hand..so you're not gaining any physical inventory at the store level...I dont know, there's just problems with it.

Immediate problem I see with "DL from a kiosk" for games is, are you going to have a separate flash cart for every game? If not, then you cant own multiple games ready for instant play at once. For example, lets say I want to go buy five new games..I either need a really big flash cart (expense..and now what if I want to buy twenty games? Or I'm rich and I want to buy fifty?) or I need five separate flash carts. (Although, most consoles have HDD now, so maybe you could just use that instead).

I think DL at home is more likely going forward. Someone threw out 50GB games a minute a go, but there's like one of those (MGS4). Other than Blu Ray, most are 4-6 GB.

There's competing forces on game (and movie for that matter!) size right now..the trend toward download (XBLA, even a few full games from PSN) will tend to put a premium (and pressure that direction) on small file sizes. Even as Blu Ray says "Hey devs, fill all these GB's up, please!". It's similar to the movie market, where netflix download wants to give you a tidy file size at a lower quality, while Blu Ray wants to spare no expense. In audio, we know small file sizes (MP3) easily won out..

 

[DeadlyNinja]

Just image going to a store for a mid-night launch with 100s of other people while waiting for your game to be downloaded and burned from a kiosk. Doesn't that sound like so much fun?

Actually, how fast is the fastest download rate today? I have a measly 768k connection, but I'm more than happy with it since I don't download big things. Even if it takes 1 minute to download 50 gigs, I think it'll still take more time than going to the counter and grabbing the game. It won't benefit the stores themselves.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Oh come now..I'm sure Blu Ray's aren't that cheap from all we hear compared to DVD (I'm thinking, $2?)..but it's not crippling them versus DVD..

The minimum cost of a DVD will go down to cents eventually. The minimum cost of flash storage will always be higher (I presume, unless there's some shocking new chip manufacturing system devised), like HDDs. The bottom price will remain higher than discs, with the minimum storage increasing.

A console company gets about $10 per disc printed in license fees. A flash storage costing $3 is going to eat up a good 30% of their profits. And in a market where game sales are the entire profit source with lossy hardware, where the consoles accrue billions of dollars deficit before turning profitable, that percentage is considerable.

That said, there's an existing parallel in DS. It's a cheap enough medium. But also, it's the 'only' medium. Custom discs in a portable aren't such a hot idea... I don't really know how the economics would pan out, but it's not a trivial thing as you seem to think. There would be massive losses for a console where the console company ate into profits to subsidize flash storage. The only sensible choice from their POV is to pass the extra costs onto the retail, who either soak it up or, more likely, pass it onto the consumer. If the increase were only $5 though, and £3 (not a fiver, which it would be!) it may not impact sales terribly.

 

[V3]

In the model I was thinking of, retailers would have a server kiosk with enough storage to hold lots of games and the only speed issue would be disk transfer rates.

If there's a one time upfront cost of an SSD cart that you would recoup later from lower priced games (which may or may not be possible due to the cheapness of disc media and expense of transportation), I see that it's possible people would adopt. Lots of people don't mind buying expensive memory sticks for their PSPs for movies and homebrew.

This was done in Japan with the Famicom system. I don't think it was successful though. AFAIK Nintendo never bother to try it again.

 

[obonicus]

The minimum cost of a DVD will go down to cents eventually. The minimum cost of flash storage will always be higher (I presume, unless there's some shocking new chip manufacturing system devised), like HDDs. The bottom price will remain higher than discs, with the minimum storage increasing.

Not to mention that by sharing media, optical discs often become commoditized. Sony probably can't get UMDs as cheaply as it can DVDs, or even Blu-Ray.

 

[DeadlyNinja]

This was done in Japan with the Famicom system. I don't think it was successful though. AFAIK Nintendo never bother to try it again.

It was for the SNES. They call the device the Nintendo Power (yes, same as the US magazine). They did this at the very end of the SNES's lifespan, and one of their most successful downloads was eventually released on cart in 2000. Granted, it was successful, but they obviously felt they could earn more by releasing the game on cart. I own the game -- Fire Emblem Thracia 776.

I wonder though, if Nintendo did this earlier in the system's lifespan, would we see a difference. I mean, this device was still selling games when the N64 was almost dead.

 

[Jedi2016]

The minimum cost of a DVD will go down to cents eventually. The minimum cost of flash storage will always be higher (I presume, unless there's some shocking new chip manufacturing system devised)

That's just it.. it already is.

That's why this will never happen. Especially in this day and age of large file sizes.. Blu-ray discs and the like. To compete, they'd need to make it around 50GB. And the price of those will never come anywhere near as cheap as optical media.

Even if you consider that Blu-ray discs are more expensive than DVDs, it's still marginal. DVDs cost a few cents to make. Blu-ray discs cost many times more than that.. maybe a quarter. Whoopty-doo. Can they make a 50GB flash drive that costs less than a dollar? By the time they do, Blu-ray discs will cost about two cents a pop.

This is all just estimates... does anyone have any numbers to throw around? Per-disc production costs for CD, DVD, and Blu-ray? (Obviously, I'm not talking about store-bought burnable media.. I'm talking about production media used by those duplication facilities that spit out a million discs a day).

 

[Shifty Geezer]

That's just it.. it already is.

Sorry, typo. That was supposed to be BRD.

 

[one]

It was for the SNES. They call the device the Nintendo Power (yes, same as the US magazine). They did this at the very end of the SNES's lifespan, and one of their most successful downloads was eventually released on cart in 2000. Granted, it was successful, but they obviously felt they could earn more by releasing the game on cart. I own the game -- Fire Emblem Thracia 776.

I wonder though, if Nintendo did this earlier in the system's lifespan, would we see a difference. I mean, this device was still selling games when the N64 was almost dead.

I think V3 meant Famicom Disk System in 1986 which I mentioned too in another thread. Also they did Satellaview, distribution via a satellite modem, in 1995 for SNES in Japan, then proceeded to Nintendo Power which used download kiosks at convenience stores in Japan in 1997.

 

[V3]

It was for the SNES. They call the device the Nintendo Power (yes, same as the US magazine). They did this at the very end of the SNES's lifespan, and one of their most successful downloads was eventually released on cart in 2000. Granted, it was successful, but they obviously felt they could earn more by releasing the game on cart. I own the game -- Fire Emblem Thracia 776.

I wonder though, if Nintendo did this earlier in the system's lifespan, would we see a difference. I mean, this device was still selling games when the N64 was almost dead.

Did you download the game from kiosk ? How was your experience with it ?

 

[V3]

I think V3 meant Famicom Disk System in 1986 which I mentioned too in another thread. Also they did Satellaview, distribution via a satellite modem, in 1995 for SNES in Japan, then proceeded to Nintendo Power which used download kiosks at convenience stores in Japan in 1997.

Yeah, that's what I meant. I remember hating the system though.

Nintendo did really try with their distribution system. I think it was to solve their inventory problem.

I think there is a chance that Nintendo will move to optical disc for their next gen handheld. They probably used the Gamecube mini DVD, who knows maybe even Gamecube hardware inside. I think not being able to produce enough DS carts is a problem for them this gen. Optical disc would solve it.

 

[DeadlyNinja]

Did you download the game from kiosk ? How was your experience with it ?

Actually, I owned the cart version that was released later, not the Nintendo Power thing.

I think V3 meant Famicom Disk System in 1986 which I mentioned too in another thread. Also they did Satellaview, distribution via a satellite modem, in 1995 for SNES in Japan, then proceeded to Nintendo Power which used download kiosks at convenience stores in Japan in 1997.

No, what I meant was that they did most of these things too late into the console's lifespan. The Famicom Disk System isn't downloadable as I recall. It did support some of the greatest games though.

 

[one]

The Famicom Disk System isn't downloadable as I recall.

FDS games were sold on diskettes but they were also available through the Disk Writer kiosks Nintendo set up at game shops in Japan. The price was very reasonable, you could overwrite a disk with a new game for only 500 yen (a disk with a game loaded could be purchased for 2000-4000 yen, which was still cheaper than ROM games).
http://www.nintendo.co.jp/nom/0408/what/

On the other hand, Satellaview is a service in which users directly download games onto their flash carts via a satellite modem in home.
The Nintendo Power service is essentially the same as Famicom Disk System, but it's with a flash cart, without a special hardware, and on a larger distribution scheme by convenience stores.

 

[Rangers]

I really think this could provide a technical advantage for whoever would chose to use this.

How does the typical write speed of a SSD compare to the 5400RPM HDD in consoles? Advantage?

The problem is you're always limited by the disc speed in a normal system though. And apparantly "cache while you're playing the first level" systems dont work because PS3 typically has mandatory install before you play. Perhaps it's to technically demanding to stream and play at same time.

It would also make the system much quieter.

I think 16GB would probably be enough for next gen in most cases. Perhaps you could have 32 GB available for large games. Looking at PC games, few take this large an install, yet the Pc has much more power than available on consoles. I think Crysis installs around 12Gb, but the rip is 6GB.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

The problem is you're always limited by the disc speed in a normal system though. And apparantly "cache while you're playing the first level" systems dont work

It works okay for other games and other systems.

 

[DeadlyNinja]

FDS games were sold on diskettes but they were also available through the Disk Writer kiosks Nintendo set up at game shops in Japan. The price was very reasonable, you could overwrite a disk with a new game for only 500 yen (a disk with a game loaded could be purchased for 2000-4000 yen, which was still cheaper than ROM games).
http://www.nintendo.co.jp/nom/0408/what/

On the other hand, Satellaview is a service in which users directly download games onto their flash carts via a satellite modem in home.
The Nintendo Power service is essentially the same as Famicom Disk System, but it's with a flash cart, without a special hardware, and on a larger distribution scheme by convenience stores.

I honestly didn't know the Famicom Disk System actually allowed you to write the games on a disk. I was under the impression that it was a disk that you buy instead of a cart.

The Satellite system was a joke though. I think it was mainly hindered by the speed of modems back then. I can't image how fast a game would download from a satellite modem. I do know the games were more like unfinished demos. some of them don't even have music. Most games contains about 1 level and that's it. The BS Zelda is the only full game I know of. The Fire Emblem games were split into 4 parts and each map didn't even have a true goal.

The Satellite thing deserves to fail! I'm not sure why the Disk system failed though. I certainly did not come out at the end of the system's lifespan. The Satellite thing was released around the time when the N64 came out. And the game sucks.

 

[Johnny_Physics]

I'm not sure why the Disk system failed though.

It didn't fail so I don't know what you're talking about.

 

[AzBat]

Could a satellite system work now? Remember was there was some talk about the Xbox 360 getting a DirecTV blade. Now that might have turned into the Video Marketplace. However, the game console as a satellite receiver to receive games doesn't sound like a completely terrible idea. It does gets rid of the problem of requiring broadband to get the games. Using it for multiplayer gaming would suck though. Anybody have any idea of the speed of downloading data through satellite? The only real big problem with this is placing the dish on the house etc. Unless of course they use the same type of system used for XM and Sirius Radio, but then what would they have to sacrifice?

Tommy McClain

 

[DeadlyNinja]

It didn't fail so I don't know what you're talking about.

Is it a success? I really don't know the extent of success the FDS was. Back then, we had no internet to find out about such things.

 

[Cheezdoodles]

The minimum cost of a BRD will go down to cents eventually. The minimum cost of flash storage will always be higher (I presume, unless there's some shocking new chip manufacturing system devised), like HDDs. The bottom price will remain higher than discs, with the minimum storage increasing..

I assume you talk about BRD. Minimum cost a misleading word to use here, because the only significant costs with BRD right now are fixed costs, this as for any other product in the world goes down as production numbers raises. Material costs for bluray are the same as dvd more or less..

According to reports from Samsung, they expect flash memory to reach price parity with HDD's by 2010, and keep going lower after that.

I dont think flash storage will have the same costs like HDD's at all. Look at how the prices for Flash memory sticks have gone, upon launch you could get 32mb for £50 and now you can buy a 2GB mem stick for £10. Prices are gonna keep going down as production methods get better (the biggest cost reduction will be being able to store the information denser , requiring less materials for the same amount of storage.)