Differences between xbl and psn(online only)

[Alkohallick]

I really appreciate everybody responding to my original question, thanks for all the info!!!

Now what I dont understand is why make this into a feature argument? I think everybody is at least somewhat aware of what features are available so why even bring them up?

I read here everyday and have come to respect this forum for its mature content(not adult nudie stuff) We all love our games and game systems but please leave all the back and forth bickering to yourselves.

If you feel the need to respond to the thread please re-read op and see if your reply fits the question. If this tread has run its course as far as the op then mods please close or create new thread as what has been posted dose not apply to the op.

 

[DuckThor Evil]

I'm in general fairly sceptical when it comes to these things. If it looks to be too good to be true it usually is. How do you make profit in finland selling these 12month coupons under the official price? Or is it just some guy getting small amount coupons for free for some reason and then dealing them around? I assume there cannot be too many of these floating around if they are for real(too many as in available for thousands of people)

I don't know how or where they get them and at what price, but I assure you that there is plenty of them to go around, basically enough for everyone. Those links going to huuto.net aren't anything special as there are dozen upon dozens seller of these items, for example many dedicated websites for these across Europe so it's not some one time super deal.

 

[Tap In]

As mentioned above, I prefer developers to spend their time and money on the real game. There are more than one ways to market their final game, especially when PSN doesn't train consumers to try-before-you-buy. At the end of the day, if they feel that a demo is effective to market their game, they can certainly do one.

For the price sensitive consumers, I have seen people pooling together to share PSN purchases. For them, the experimental game purchases will be a fraction of the retail price.

why do you care how a developer spends his resources. seriously? why is it any of your business? unless you are leading the team what does that have to do with whether MOST consumers would want to try before they buy?

I'm sure some do it but do you really think most , or even many people would actually take the effort or have the contacts to pool money to share a game that none of them are sure they want to buy?

I mean how many ways can you dance around a subject? Just say hell yea, a demo would be nice, too bad.

 

[RobertR1]

It's most certainly a time vs money thing. Most studios and teams working on XBLA / PSN games aren't huge, and neither are the sales. Why waste money creating a demo if studies show (and they do) that Demos, more often than not, negatively impact sales?

You have to pull people away from your team. Demo's are not a 1 man job. When you're talking smaller studios like That Game Company, then it makes it a bit difficult to go out of your way to create this demo, when you've already been working on your project for an extended period of time and need some money.

Not sure why you're referring to XBLA games since every single XBLA game does have a demo included.

 

[Asher]

I'm surprised no one mentioned TrueSkill as another Xbox Live feature that, AFAIK, has no parity on other platforms: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TrueSkill

 

[joker454]

In reference to all the other absolutely ridiculous and hair brained comments you've made in regards to "PS3 fans" (really? Are we 12 years old?)... Grow the hell up man.

When you can't even get someone to admit that every XBL game having a demo is a bonus/advantage to consumers, then sorry, it becomes patently obvious that we're dealing with bias. Demos are bad for consumers? Consumers don't care to have demos? Really? Give me a break. Yet here we are, yet again, many posts later trying to get people to acknowledge something that should be painfully obvious. Only on a forum would you get the situation where every game having a demo and hence being able to try before you buy every single available XBL product is somehow a bad or irrelevant thing. It's comical and ridiculous at the same time.

It's most certainly a time vs money thing. Most studios and teams working on XBLA / PSN games aren't huge, and neither are the sales. Why waste money creating a demo if studies show (and they do) that Demos, more often than not, negatively impact sales?

You have to pull people away from your team. Demo's are not a 1 man job. When you're talking smaller studios like That Game Company, then it makes it a bit difficult to go out of your way to create this demo, when you've already been working on your project for an extended period of time and need some money.

I'll say it again, there is no cost. I've never even seen "demo" listed on a cost breakdown sheet of a project, not once. That's because it costs nothing. I'm not talking about just where I've worked, but friends I've spoken with including the tech director at a major publisher who I recently had lunch with, people at PS3 only studios where costs are always high, etc. You do *not* have to pull people off the team. By the time the demo is being made, many of the engineers are already idling because the game is at QA. At a certain point late in the project, all engineers get banned from checking anything in, period, because they could break the build. They are only allowed to fix approved bugs, and that's it. So most are idling at that point. One of those idling engineers will get pulled to make the demo. So instead of surfing the web, said engineer will spend a few days making the demo.

So making a demo has absolutely zero hit on the team, and adds zero cost to the project. Nothing, zero, nada, nil. What does have an effect, something that is somehow impossible to get people to admit to of course, is Sony charging studios for bandwidth. If you are really and truly concerned about costs, then what you should be talking about is the cost hit on small studios of paying bandwidth, not the cost of making a demo which is non existent.

I'm surprised no one mentioned TrueSkill as another Xbox Live feature that, AFAIK, has no parity on other platforms: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TrueSkill

No point, it will just be spun as irrelevant/not needed/bad for consumers. If you can't even get people to see the advantage of the very common "try before you buy" concept, then it's hopeless to get them to admit anything is an advantage.

 

[ShadowRunner]

No point, it will just be spun as irrelevant/not needed/bad for consumers. If you can't even get people to see the advantage of the very common "try before you buy" concept, then it's hopeless to get them to admit anything is an advantage.

You are confused. The disagreement is whether or not the advantage is worth the price attached to it.

Having a demo for every game is a good thing for the consumer yes. Does it justify XBLs price? maybe, maybe not.

 

[joker454]

You are confused. The disagreement is whether or not the advantage is worth the price attached to it.

Having a demo for every game is a good thing for the consumer yes. Does it justify XBLs price? maybe, maybe not.

There is no price attached to demos, Live Silver accounts can download them just fine for free, and demos don't cost developers anything. It's free all around. So demos have nothing to do with justifying Live's price.

 

[Panajev2001a]

There is no price attached to demos, Live Silver accounts can download them just fine for free, and demos don't cost developers anything. It's free all around. So demos have nothing to do with justifying Live's price.

Gold users get them earlier, at least some of them IIRC.

 

[RobertR1]

So making a demo has absolutely zero hit on the team, and adds zero cost to the project. Nothing, zero, nada, nil. What does have an effect, something that is somehow impossible to get people to admit to of course, is Sony charging studios for bandwidth. If you are really and truly concerned about costs, then what you should be talking about is the cost hit on small studios of paying bandwidth, not the cost of making a demo which is non existent.

ah! I didn't think of this. For smaller teams, which is what PSN/XBLA teams often tend to be, such a cost is the real issue. It's one thing they have to pay for bandwidth for buyers but they could be left with a decent bill from all the people who'd be willing to try the game out. Sure you could get more buyers from this but it's still a gamble they'd have to take.

 

[RobertR1]

Gold users get them earlier, at least some of them IIRC.

Not for XBLA games, which is really the how this whole demo talk started.

 

[Acert93]

I'm surprised no one mentioned TrueSkill as another Xbox Live feature that, AFAIK, has no parity on other platforms: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TrueSkill

I can only speak for the games I play, but Halo 3 has the best skill-based match making I have seen in any game for competitive MP. There is a reason it has been in the Top 3 online games since it launched in 2007.

True, it takes 10-20 matches for Halo 3 to get you where you should be. And with the number of experienced players with new accounts (i.e. very good players with 0 rank) your start can be a little rough. But once you get settled in MatchMaking in Halo 3 conistantly pits you against players of similar skill and experience. As you get better you ascend the ladder but it is a steady progression that continues to increase the difficulty accordingly. Also very rewarding. It is also nice that this feature works for parties as it consistantly tries to match you with groups of similar skill (e.g. lets say we have a 4 player party of a 45, 32, 23, and 10 as isn't uncommon in the B3D groupings, the MatchMaking attempts to get groups of similar skill -- with a priority given to parties that most closely match).

If a game isn't going to do "team / objective bases" Multiplayer and is going for TDM or the like Match Making or the like is definately a vital feature for long-term rewarding play. It actually allows the non-Top10% to enjoy online competitive MP which is a major reason people play games like Halo 3 for a very long time.

 

[Panajev2001a]

Not for XBLA games, which is really the how this whole demo talk started.

True.

 

[makattack]

Demos with every game would be a nice feature for sure, and better for the consumer in general.

I dont think a demo is always a good idea from the developers point of view though, im not entirely sure that having demos for some games improves thier sales. In fact for me personally i cant remember the last demo that i played that encouraged me to buy a game that i wasnt planning on buying already, on the other hand plenty of times i have decided not to buy after playing a demo, wich i probably would have bought if i didnt.

I think the fact that many games dont have demos is quite telling. If it was a certainty that producing a demo would result in a significant increase in sales, that would more than offset the costs of producing one, then pretty much every game would have one.

As a consumer demos are great. As a publisher demos can be hit or miss and often do more damage than good.

This thread has turned into a "demo" vs "no demo" debate -- which seems odd, since we're all mostly consumers at the end and should want demos. I would never buy a bike, car, or even movie without seeing it first.

At any rate, I think the risk of demos to publishers diminish when you have the XBLA model:

* All games are downloaded/digitally distributed
* All games have demo mode
* All games can be switched onto full retail modes with one or two button presses
* All current progress (achievements/incentives) are used to advertise/encourage a full purchase.

I will admit that many of my XBLA game purchases were made after I got the first achievement and a box came up saying "buy this game to make your achievement permanent!"

 

[BadTB25]

Sometimes it gets really GAF-like in here.
With the brain power in these forums, it's a shame that some members have to resort to childish comments.

OT - I agree with joker for the most part, except when it comes to mid-cycle release demos. I seem to remember Bungie having to pool a lot of resources to get a demo ready in time for E3 for Halo 2. Other than that, demos are good for consumers in that it gives you an opportunity to try before you buy. It's not always representative of the final product, but it does give you a sense of how it will play.

If the game is a good one, why be afraid of putting out a demo. If it is good, it can really generate some hype for your product especially if your game is not a well known series from a proven publisher ala Halo, COD, Insomniac games, etc.

 

[ShadowRunner]

There is no price attached to demos, Live Silver accounts can download them just fine for free, and demos don't cost developers anything. It's free all around. So demos have nothing to do with justifying Live's price.

Fair point. So how do we justify XBLs price? Having the demos free on silver has a negative effect on the percieved value of the paid service.

 

[DuckThor Evil]

OT - I agree with joker for the most part, except when it comes to mid-cycle release demos. I seem to remember Bungie having to pool a lot of resources to get a demo ready in time for E3 for Halo 2.

That's entirely a different kind of demo and situation. Shining up your product for a trade show is not what Joker was talking about.

 

[joker454]

This thread has turned into a "demo" vs "no demo" debate -- which seems odd, since we're all mostly consumers at the end and should want demos.

Yeah it sucks that it came to that, but if we can't even come to an agreement on something as basic as "try before you buy" being a good thing, then going beyond that is pointless really, it will never result in any meaningful conversation other than spin. If you can't agree with someone that 1 + 1 = 2, would you then go on to discuss math with them? I'd probably just walk away

I will admit that many of my XBLA game purchases were made after I got the first achievement and a box came up saying "buy this game to make your achievement permanent!"

Yes! Incidentally, that is *very* much by design

except when it comes to mid-cycle release demos. I seem to remember Bungie having to pool a lot of resources to get a demo ready in time for E3 for Halo 2.

E3 is a totally different beast though, it is indeed hugely distracting to every project out there that needs to be on the show floor. But that doesn't really have anything to do with PSN/XBL, since that's more about getting something to show at E3 for the press. Those demos do require totally messing with engineers (which is why many studios were happy when E3 got canned), so they hobble together whatever they can on a mini pre-E3 crunch to demonstrate at the show. Worse yet, E3 demos often require new art content creation, some of which might get discarded or reworked later because it was rushed. Regular 'end of ship' demos are infinitely easier, no new content creation required except for a "buy me" splash screen on exit. Some studios will try to make some extra use of E3 though, and use it as a beta test of sorts for multi player demos. It's pretty good for that, you just have to keep someone nearby at all times to deal with issues.

Edit: Dr. Evil beat me to it

Fair point. So how do we justify XBLs price? Having the demos free on silver has a negative effect on the percieved value of the paid service.

Well we're at an impasse. Like I mentioned above to makattack, if we can't come to an agreement on the basics then we can't move forward from there with anything even remotely resembling unbiased discussion. If free demos don't register as an advantage to XBL, something that should universally be considered an advantage, then I'm sure every other XBL advantage will be shot down as worthless and/or not needed with some form of spin. I don't really expect that to change here, so it's probably time to just move on.

 

[2real4tv]

For me...one is free the other one isn't. XBL is more evovled but it matters to me little, an example play session would be: power on system-->start online game--->play online game---> end play session---> go handle grown up business

 

[Cheezdoodles]

Fair point. So how do we justify XBLs price?

Imo this is impossible, and why my XBL gold account is closed.

Even thought XBL might offer a more coherent experience than PSN, this has no relation to the fee you have to pay.

After all, this coherent experience and whatever extra features XBL might offer, are just one time costs for development. And they are not even particularly high costs, we are talking profit margins with many multiples!!!

The only reason how i could justify having XbL gold is if they offered huge amounts of dedicated servers for the most popular games. Thats the only thing that would justify the $5 a month.

Now your paying $5 a month for fixed costs that have already been paid for !