Console Exclusives: Are you for or against them & why?

[trainplane]

Third party exclusives are only good for the platform holders and rarely ever good for the consumer. It's not about evil or not evil. It is business as usual but we don't have to like it. You can't even argue they are optimizing for one system. For SFV, they could do everything they are doing now, supposedly "building from the ground up for PS4" and allocate a different team to port to Xbox One. It might be inferior to the PS4 version, and will be like the PC version, but having an Xbox version doesn't have to hurt or compromise the PS4 version. There are very few reasons to advocate big 3rd party exclusives unless you are a company person, and that stuff ends up backfiring in the future.

Having big formerly multiplatform games (multi-million sellers) go to one console or the other is just bad for the business overall. People would be up in arms if the next Red Dead Redemption or Fallout would only be on Xbox One or PS4 permanently, so consumers should not support this at all for either side.

With SFV, it would at least be a good will gesture if they could make the Madcatz sticks work on both PS4 an PC. The SFIV sticks only worked on PC and Xbox 360 officially. PS3 was not compatible with PC.

 

[Scott_Arm]

I totally understand not liking it, or choosing not to support 3rd party exclusives. As consumers, it can suck if you see a game you want to play and can't. I just don't agree with the idea that securing exclusives is something nefarious, unethical etc.

 

[trainplane]

I totally understand not liking it, or choosing not to support 3rd party exclusives. As consumers, it can suck if you see a game you want to play and can't. I just don't agree with the idea that securing exclusives is something nefarious, unethical etc.

Yeah I'm staying away from calling it evil, but it certainly isn't consumer friendly. The worst part about locking franchises in a future iteration is you are locking out fans who already bought into the game world/system on a different. Fans of Red Dead and Fallout would rightly be upset if MS had one and Sony had the other. As would pulling Minecraft from all PS platforms, which MS could do. The TR deal (if not timed) and SFV deal are just bad all around and short sighted for the long term good of the console industry.

 

[Billy Idol]

I totally understand not liking it, or choosing not to support 3rd party exclusives. As consumers, it can suck if you see a game you want to play and can't. I just don't agree with the idea that securing exclusives is something nefarious, unethical etc.

I really think it is to be honest, as it is (as you say) a pure business decision and against a large junk of gamers who can't afford both consoles.


But, when Sony and MS continue and overdo this...we might see a even larger drift to PC gaming as this gets more and more the only platform where you can play most of the available games.

 

[Deleted member 11852]

A developer might not have a need or interest in going exclusive until someone waves a lot of money under their nose.

If game developers / publishers are employing people who are naive, easily swayed and/or unable to objectively make a decision about what is best for a particular brand or the finances, in company positions where they get to make significant decisions about game exclusivity then that's the real problem here.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

The way you've written this basically reeks of some kind of bias against successful companies accepting financial support in business.

It's one representative argument from the extreme end of the choice-spectrum, written with colourful language to mirror the views of people who think that way. It's not my own personal opinion - I have zero emotions involved in gaming business shenanigans.

In the case of either of these two games being discussed, we have no idea what the discussions were...

Right, and I presented both possibilities with the example (all the examples) I presented. Are you another of those people who only reads half a post before replying to a bit they didn't like?

 

[Shifty Geezer]

I just don't agree with the idea that securing exclusives is something nefarious, unethical etc.

Yeah I'm staying away from calling it evil

I really think it is to be honest.

WRONG THREAD. Discussions of whether it's evil or not is an ethical discussion that doesn't belong in this forum. Take discussions on the morality of business practice to the RSPCA forum.

If game developers / publishers are employing people who are naive, easily swayed and/or unable to objectively make a decision about what is best for a particular brand or the finances, in company positions where they get to make significant decisions about game exclusivity then that's the real problem here.

Wrong decisions get made all the time. And negotiations can sway people, and there exist charismatic people better able to sway folk than not. I don't think an executive would have to be particularly weak willed or daft to be swayed. They could be a very average person looking at a lot of variables with a high degree of uncertainty and then have a very well presented, logical argument entice them into a course of action that they perhaps wouldn't have gone with themselves, but which they're comfortable with after the fact. Part of PR is keeping people's estimation of your company favourable to make them more inclined to go with your schemes. eg. A dev is struggling with some code on your console. Fly some code ninjas over for free, the dev is really grateful. Next game, show some interest and suggest they go platform exclusive, that dev is more likely to accept on the weight of previous 'friendship' than if the console company hadn't been supported.

As long as people are involved, human relationships will come into play in (some) people's decision making. And this could go both ways. What if a console company doesn't particularly want to invest in a game, but the game developer is charismatic and manages to sweet-talk the console company round? Then the console company ends up investing in a second-party title where they wouldn't have asked to themselves.

 

[Deleted member 13524]

Shifty, perhaps the thread title should be changed then?

The OP asks a question - Are you against them and why - but then there's only a subset of answers we're allowed to give?
Perhaps the thread itself belongs to RPSC..

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Replies can be given as to them limiting availability and excluding gamers and breaking trust with fans and whatnot. We just can't go into discussing whether such standard business practices are Evil or not. Like it or not, they exist. People are free to grumble about them, but an argument against them on moral grounds is an argument against free-market capitalism which clearly doesn't belong in this forum!

The console forum operates within the socio-political-economic Status Quo. Discussion of that Status Quo belongs in the RSPCA forum. Feel free to start a thread over there "Do you think common business practices like securing exclusive content are immoral?" (A discussion which naturally leads on to the light-hearted question "Is free-market capitalism evil?" and, by progression, "Isn't Socialism/Anarchy/... the One True Way")

 

[AlNom]

I like cake.

But the cake is a lie.

So help me Gabe-us

 

[Deleted member 11852]

I like cake.

But the cake is a lie.

So help me Gabe-us

Bless your little heart. You'll be wanting Half Left 3 next.

 

[Deleted member 11852]

Wrong decisions get made all the time.

Agreed. Some decisions can only be seen as bad with the benefit of hindsight, others because they were bad decisions period.

And negotiations can sway people, and there exist charismatic people better able to sway folk than not.

They can, though I don't manage anybody who would be swayed by persuasion, only newly introduced data that gives cause to re-example the preliminary position. Something I found when I joined Government, which surprised me given the obscene amount of poor decisions across Government, was a preference for evidence-based policy and decision making. Not everybody uses the doctrine but if more people did, charisma and persuasion wouldn't count for anything and decisions would be based on facts and evidence.

Even then there are basic guidelines you can put in place, like no decisions being made during meetings or negotiations. Give all major decisions a "cool down" period - for at least overnight. These are approach that have certainly served me well but which are still unusual in much of the private sector where when visiting you meet the "project administrator" who looks like a model from Vogue but can't answer basic questions about the project. It's obvious why they're there.

As long as people are involved, human relationships will come into play in (some) people's decision making.

And this is my point; these are the wrong people to be making significant decisions about valued IP or which will have a major impact on the company's finances. Not everybody is geared to be making these decisions (or knows how).

 

[MrFox]

I don't see "blame" and "praise" as politico-socio-economic terms, I hope nobody does. And when I say blame, I don't imply evil, I only imply responsibility for the move which gamers disagree and can act upon. Falsely attributing the blame will make those actions very counter-productive.

I think it's important to point out who is "to blame" for things gamers didn't like, who is "to praise" for the great things, and to understand which deals were the product of fair compromises that might have been misinterpreted (my point here is the co-productions or the Titanfall situation which is all about the details and cannot be simply categorized as exclusives). I want to figure out which cases helped us and which cases hurt us, both the gamers and the industry. The result of this kind of public discussions will shifts the companies' decision between what is most profitable, if they get the pulse of the gamers community correctly. If most gamers have the honest opinion that timed exclusives and last minute snatch of a third party exclusive is perfectly fair and they don't care, it will escalate and there will be more of that happening in the future. Third party studios, and platform holders, will go fishing much more often, which in turn will invariably end up being the consumer losing. I don't want it to escalate I want them to stop. The discussion doesn't seem to be split between for and against, it's those who care and feel impacted and those who don't care and accept the situation as something they can't do anything about it.

Just like the DRM fiasco, I'm I naive to want everybody to win?

 

[Sonic]

Bring on the exclusives. I don't see how 3rd party exclusives hurts gamers except for the individual gamers that don't hold the platform the exclusive is being released on. I know it sucks, but that's life and it doesn't need to be fair. If in the end there are more quality games that come from going exclusive then I'm all for it. If it allows them to tap the power of the specific machine they are targeting more than multi-platform then I'm all for it.

In a more lopsided market there will likely be more exclusives. MS wants to secure content on its platform that it thinks will sell consoles. Sony wants to secure content on its platform that it thinks will sell consoles. Nintendo would need to do the same thing if the company decided to compete. If PS4 ends up grabbing the lion's share of the market and allows profitability for the developer and publisher I don't really see a problem. The assets are already in place so porting over to another platform shouldn't be that difficult or expensive where a few more million in profits can be made. But in this scenario I imagine MS will be securing more 3rd party content and give me reasons to continue buying and playing games for my XB1.

I wish SEGA were still in the console business.

 

[MrFox]

I wish SEGA were still in the console business.

I wish Nintendo was still in the console business.

(too soon?)

 

[trainplane]

Why would having an Xbox version of SFV hurt the PS4 version technically? It could just be a port of the PC version and the PS4 can be developed as it has been.

And actually, exclusives can be looked at in 3 parts. I'm looking at it from the consumer's perspective. Not the inside baseball perspective.

1st party: This is one major aspect that differentiates the consoles and creates healthy competition.
3rd party new franchises: such as Mass Effect, Valkyria Chronicles, and Titanfall. I don't think they help the industry but are not too harmful because players who don't have that system can just ignore, almost like a 1st party.
3rd party existing franchises: This is where I think the industry is not helped at all, sequels bouncing from one console to another. It causes resentment to those who don't have the system and are really only interested in that one game. They'll either not buy the system for the game and resent it or will buy it and resent having to do so. It's not a sale in good faith which can eventually hurt the platform holder. It's why I think both the TR and SFV deal are not good for the industry.

 

[onQ]

Third party exclusives are only good for the platform holders and rarely ever good for the consumer. It's not about evil or not evil. It is business as usual but we don't have to like it. You can't even argue they are optimizing for one system. For SFV, they could do everything they are doing now, supposedly "building from the ground up for PS4" and allocate a different team to port to Xbox One. It might be inferior to the PS4 version, and will be like the PC version, but having an Xbox version doesn't have to hurt or compromise the PS4 version. There are very few reasons to advocate big 3rd party exclusives unless you are a company person, and that stuff ends up backfiring in the future.

Having big formerly multiplatform games (multi-million sellers) go to one console or the other is just bad for the business overall. People would be up in arms if the next Red Dead Redemption or Fallout would only be on Xbox One or PS4 permanently, so consumers should not support this at all for either side.

With SFV, it would at least be a good will gesture if they could make the Madcatz sticks work on both PS4 an PC. The SFIV sticks only worked on PC and Xbox 360 officially. PS3 was not compatible with PC.

Why would having an Xbox version of SFV hurt the PS4 version technically? It could just be a port of the PC version and the PS4 can be developed as it has been.

And actually, exclusives can be looked at in 3 parts. I'm looking at it from the consumer's perspective. Not the inside baseball perspective.

1st party: This is one major aspect that differentiates the consoles and creates healthy competition.
3rd party new franchises: such as Mass Effect, Valkyria Chronicles, and Titanfall. I don't think they help the industry but are not too harmful because players who don't have that system can just ignore, almost like a 1st party.
3rd party existing franchises: This is where I think the industry is not helped at all, sequels bouncing from one console to another. It causes resentment to those who don't have the system and are really only interested in that one game. They'll either not buy the system for the game and resent it or will buy it and resent having to do so. It's not a sale in good faith which can eventually hurt the platform holder. It's why I think both the TR and SFV deal are not good for the industry.

But if the SF5 deal really did allow them to bring their Fighting community together where everyone can play against each other no matter if they are console players or PC players then it was good for the industry. It's a step forward.

 

[shredenvain]

But if the SF5 deal really did allow them to bring their Fighting community together where everyone can play against each other no matter if they are console players or PC players then it was good for the industry. It's a step forward.

It can't be a negative for one console and a positive for another just because it might feature something new in the way of features because of the exclusivity.
I still think 3rd party exclusives are a pretty standard practice. Soul Caliber for the Dreamcast anyone? What about Bloodborne? Is that not a 3rd party exclusive? If the 1st party publisher is actually paying for and pitching in on development of a title being made by a 3rd party I don't have an issue with it. RoTR, SFv and even Bloodborne fall into this category. Now if the title in question has been completed for all platforms and then one of the Big 3 pay the dev to only release on their platform That is bad for the industry.

 

[trainplane]

But if the SF5 deal really did allow them to bring their Fighting community together where everyone can play against each other no matter if they are console players or PC players then it was good for the industry. It's a step forward.

I'm again not understanding how that changes with an Xbox One version. MS can decide the Xbox One version can't do cross-play and it'll be the inferior version but that doesn't change the PS4-PC relationship. If people decide that is an important feature, the sales will be their victory.

I can't see how having established franchised be split is any good for the industry. If MS secures the next MK and Marvel vs Capcom and Sony secures the next MK vs DC. That's good? What if we take it even further? MS has GTA VI and Sony has the next Red Dead. MS has the next Mass Effect and Sony the next Dragon Age. Throw in Nintendo if they make a Wii U successor and we could need to buy 3 consoles to play franchises we used to play with one.

 

[onQ]

I'm again not understanding how that changes with an Xbox One version. MS can decide the Xbox One version can't do cross-play and it'll be the inferior version but that doesn't change the PS4-PC relationship. If people decide that is an important feature, the sales will be their victory.

I can't see how having established franchised be split is any good for the industry. If MS secures the next MK and Marvel vs Capcom and Sony secures the next MK vs DC. That's good? What if we take it even further? MS has GTA VI and Sony has the next Red Dead. MS has the next Mass Effect and Sony the next Dragon Age. Throw in Nintendo if they make a Wii U successor and we could need to buy 3 consoles to play franchises we used to play with one.

It hurts the devs vision of one community though.

Say SF5 sell 3 million on PS4 , 1 million on Xbox One & 300K on PC, as time go by less people will be playing the game as other games come out so the online community will be small on the PC and hard to find matches will lead to less & less people playing online on the PC. But if the PC players can play against the console players the small PC install base wouldn't be as big of a problem.