Has consumer pressure ruined gaming for the next decade? *spawn

[Nesh]

I dont know what to say about the thread's title. Its a rant without merit. Its exaggerated rant. If MS never came with the idea of an always online console from the start nobody would have been complaining "hey we need an always online console in order to have proper console gaming. Hey our expectations were not fulfilled. We wanted the cloud". Instead everyone would have been waiting advancements on AI, physics and visuals from the local hardware like always. These very forums are proof of that. People have been extensively discussing and predicting about the local hardware. People relied their expectations there (Not on the cloud) and expressed disappointment/satisfaction when certain hardware targets could not/could be reached. . Then MS comes with the tag line "cloud based, always online" and other hyperbole to compensate for the lower cumbers and a bunch of people act like thats what they were relying their expectations on before the announcement. The thread title sounds like our gaming was more awesome in the past and now because of consumer pressure we lost that something which ruined gaming. Ironically it was the other way round.

In addition the removal of DRM restrictions does not prevent developers from still using the cloud if they want to. The cloud is still there and MS is going to use it. Funnily even MS has not been clear about its uses, technical sites like Digital Foundry question the number of implementations, and a large portion of what is guaranteed to be featured through the cloud is what has been done on some other games that relied on always online connection

Just sit back and enjoy the show. We shall see how much console gaming has been ruined because of consumer pressure which I highly applaud. The consumer wants to protect his independence and quality of his experience whereas the business if sees more profitability in providing lesser consumer independence and lesser games they will provide the opposite of what the consumer wants. And thats what can ruin gaming

 

[Aeoniss]

I think you just contradicted yourself, but whatever.

I never asked for any of the things you mentioned that would supposedly be granted through a "fully online console", nor would I value them if I had them. You see, some of us actually prefer to not share everything we do every second of our lives with huge corporate entities, or ask them permission to play the games we have actually paid for, and so on.

If I want to boot up a game for Fully Online Console X in ten, fifteen (shit, 25+, like some of my NES collection) years' time, will it even work, or will I be told that the mandatory online servers were shut down an age and a half ago and I should go buy something newer?

...So no, fully online consoles can go fuck themselves. I don't want them and I never did.

Laughed.

This post sums up much of my feelings especially nice.

 

[warb]

There's reason to be annoyed if you were pleased with the fewer real world restrictions on DD games they were offering. The family sharing plan was dropped I imagine because it's no longer worth the potential cost in sales to MS. More open to abuse, piracy, and they get nothing from used game sales.

 

[hesido]

... universal acceptance it won't be supported, it'll be treated like an optional peripheral mostly only supported by 1st party...

Oh.. No.. You cannot compare internet connectivity to an add-on peripheral. If a game requires an internet connection, it's targeting a population that is equal to at least the size of Xbox Live subscribers. Not shabby. Also, like in my previous post, a mandated log-in check once a day doesn't mean universal guarantee that your cloud augmentations will work.

Also, do you really think non-exclusive games would support cloud to the fullest? Unless the game is an exclusive, you could forget about making use of the cloud like in your vivid dreams. Even if online check-in was mandated on Xbox One, what makes you think 3rd parties would use the cloud, given that their games also have to work on the PS4? That means they'd have to make their game work without the cloud anyway. This of course is based on the assumption that you need an always online console to make use of the cloud, which is a falsehood to begin with.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Sure, but if you came to me and said, I got the a game I want to make. Its great, I just need 100M USD, to make and market it.

I agree, but that same market pressure would apply to an always online, cloud connected console in a sea on non-online devices. How do you convince a publisher to front up the development costs for using the cloud on the always-connected device when those costs are only valid to a small section of the market? The economic sense would be to forgo the cloud and target offline devices as that results in a larger market.

Any game that could use the cloud on XB1 when it was always on can still target the cloud on XB1 with no worse economic consequences now it isn't always online. If Activision want to make COD cloud-empowered on XB1, it'll face the same issues regardless of MS's mandated policy - a subset of their users benefiting from the added costs of cloud development. The difference now is they can choose to provide offline game options and sell to a wider audience if they deem that the number of offline users is worth it (I doubt that myself. I don't believe real rejection of online games would be any significant in the long run).

Every dev is going to face the same economic choice - Should I move this game to the cloud at added cost and reduced userbase for greater quality and increased interest, or should I keep everything local, lower costs, and produce a more mundane game? That choices exists irrespective of MS's policy. We have several examples of publishers choosing to go with the greater impact of the cloud, such as the very well received Tom Clancy's Division, which surely was a platform agnostic choice based on observing the way technology is evolving.

 

[zupallinere]

We have several examples of publishers choosing to go with the greater impact of the cloud, such as the very well received Tom Clancy's Division, which surely was a platform agnostic choice based on observing the way technology is evolving.

This is all before Microsoft's Cloudy Future.

Did Respawn give up because of the change in Microsoft's online plan ?? I think not. Let's just wait for Microsoft's next PR broadside "The POWER of the Kinected Cloud" :smile:

 

[joker454]

You don't see this as venting ??

I see it as predicting the future. Sit back and watch when the complaints start rolling in. Maybe I missed it, but can anyone share with me what's new on these new consoles aside from prettier pixels? Aside from a few games which were made with online specific features that look cool, all the rest are the same old same old.

If MS never came with the idea of an always online console from the start nobody would have been complaining "hey we need an always online console in order to have proper console gaming. Hey our expectations were not fulfilled. We wanted the cloud". Instead everyone would have been waiting advancements on AI, physics and visuals from the local hardware like always.

Actually yeah, I expected cloud to be standard, it's 2013 after all. Aren't consoles supposed to be on the cutting edge?

Oh.. No.. You cannot compare internet connectivity to an add-on peripheral. If a game requires an internet connection, it's targeting a population that is equal to at least the size of Xbox Live subscribers. Not shabby. Also, like in my previous post, a mandated log-in check once a day doesn't mean universal guarantee that your cloud augmentations will work.

I think it is comparable actually. Look at the Xbox 360, most of the models sold had a hard drive, but regardless all games made were built to work at the speed of optical drive. Because there was no way to guarantee everyone had a hard drive means games were tailored to the speed and bandwidth of optical media. I think GTA5 may be the first major game (coming 8 years into this generation) that will put a "requires hdd" sticker on the box. Also I do think it would guarantee that cloud augmentations would work because I suspect all the first coming cloud augmentations would be uber latency tolerant ones to start with as people learn what to do with that extra compute, the type that can handle 24 hours of latency and low bandwidth connections. That's how I anticipated it would all start.

Also, do you really think non-exclusive games would support cloud to the fullest? Unless the game is an exclusive, you could forget about making use of the cloud like in your vivid dreams. Even if online check-in was mandated on Xbox One, what makes you think 3rd parties would use the cloud, given that their games also have to work on the PS4? That means they'd have to make their game work without the cloud anyway. This of course is based on the assumption that you need an always online console to make use of the cloud, which is a falsehood to begin with.

Yes they totally would because it's a way to continue future r&d at a discounted rate. You always make a baseline version because regardless of cloud you still have to make a game that works without online for the time being. So a non cloud version is guaranteed. But now they could count on someone else managing all the server crap and most of the costs involved because presumably Microsoft would be offering it at a heavily discounted rate to xb1 devs since it lets Microsoft effectively subside their cloud presence and have improved games, it's win-win for Microsoft either way. This lets companies use that compute to try new things this gen that would overwhelm the console, the same stuff which could then be moved back to the console next gen with their augmented cpu power, rinse and repeat.

So for example, in 2005 we were writing a sky simulation for an Xbox 360 sports game. Rather than go with typical looking skies as games have done for years we were going for a far more realistic look taking all kinds of details into account going as far as pollution in different cities that effect how sunset looks, real clouds, the works. Problem was it took too much cpu use so we abandoned that and went with a typical approximated sky. There was no choice back then, as cool as the research was there was no real world (ie paying) application for it. Now if Xbox 360 had mandatory cloud compute what we could have done is still made the typical looking sky since we have to do that anyways, but then make a complex version on cloud compute. That would be win for us since it keeps us on the correct edge of the r&d curve, and we would be one up on the competition. But even then the only way that would be acceptable to the higher ups is if cloud was standard. If not, then there is no way it would have been approved.

 

[zupallinere]

By the by

http://msntv.com/pc/

MSNTV is shutting down. This started in 189 ... 1997. This is what MS has been trying to do for over 15 years. The Xbox experience is just the latest in a string of attempts at being your ONE INPUT !!!

I see it as predicting the future. Sit back and watch when the complaints start rolling in. Maybe I missed it, but can anyone share with me what's new on these new consoles aside from prettier pixels? Aside from a few games which were made with online specific features that look cool, all the rest are the same old same old.

Ah you and Microsoft need to look up the definition of Hubris.

 

[BoardBonobo]

If you want to point a finger of blame then point it squarely at the party that deserves it. And that is MS. If they hadn't tried to force the issue, respond to questions with arrogance. If they had been able to tell their arse from their elbow when it came to communication, if they hadn't spat their dummy quite so publically and cut off their nose to spite their face with regards to how much of the service they removed. If they hadn't got bollox talking orators to try and blame their customers for their own f*ck up(s) then this golden future you seem to want might still be on the cards. As it has been left now it's up to developers to bring to reality. And it also means that every other player has an equal chance at the same vision if that is what people want this time around.

 

[Bagel seed]

I see it as predicting the future. Sit back and watch when the complaints start rolling in. Maybe I missed it, but can anyone share with me what's new on these new consoles aside from prettier pixels? Aside from a few games which were made with online specific features that look cool, all the rest are the same old same old.

Prettier pixels is 90% of why we have new console generations and how the masses are convinced to go out and buy into it. Also, we were stuck with 512mb ram (and 32-bit OS limitations) for 8 years. If this gen had a name it'd be called the 'Generation of Compromises'.

I'm fairly certain we'll see more than just prettier pixels. Believability in games still has a ways to go before it feels immersive. Things like animations, AI, and overall freedom of choice for the player have very much been limited. And if I'm not mistaken having more ram already massively opens up the room for improvement in those areas.

 

[AzBat]

To a certain extent I agree with joker454. Imagine that. But I think you'll see that with those that follow party lines. I didn't have a problem with the always online requirement before. So it was a little depressing to hear the backpeddling. Though I'm not angry about it. However, I definitely see it hampering developers & now they will probably play it safe without it. Though I can understand Shifty's response that technically it shouldn't matter, but I still think it will.

Tommy McClain

 

[joker454]

Though I can understand Shifty's response that technically it shouldn't matter, but I still think it will.

For people that don't think it would technically matter I'll throw this out there. Every platform has code custom written for it, so it's not always a lowest common denominator situation. So for example just because power pc was the lowest common denominator doesn't mean that games were all written in 100% power pc code, time will be taken to customize it to spu (guaranteed available) on ps3, or say vmx (guaranteed available) on 360. So when the case is made that ps4 not having guaranteed internet means no 3rd party would support cloud on a guaranteed internet xb1, that's not necessarily true.

However, that platform does need to have guaranteed support within the platform itself if it wants any hope to have a particular feature set get developer support. To make that point I'll ask people this, imagine for a minute that all ps3's were not guaranteed to have spu's available. So one of your customers playing your game on their ps3 may have spu's available, but then again they may not. Given that, do people think it would be easier or more difficult to get a developer to fund programmer man hours to support spu's? Imagine yourself in a meeting budgeting programmer man hours for a project, and the topic of using spu's come up. Would it technically not matter that not all your customers have spu's and that developer support of them on the ps3 platform would be unchanged?

 

[manux]

I don't get how ms or sony position would have killed online enabled games, invention or be it whatever. We will still have same amount of consoles and pc's connected to internet as before microsoft back peddled. For customers you might have to make the game only loadable via online or have huge "Online required" sticker to make it clear to purchasers what they are getting into(or do wow/mmo style monthly subscription with free first month)

We already have plenty of games that require online. Similarly we will continue to have games that require online. If anything not having solution that locks you into single vendor gives more possibilities than less(i.e. larger addressable market including macs and pc's).

Even a simple not much money startup could do always online über shitsnickles game if they had the right idea. Amazon would scale nicely with the amount of players. If the game becomes popular pay more and get more servers. It's not like the startup would need to do massive investment to servers...

It's not like the microsoft solution would have been free either(though that was mistakenly rumoured first)

Why should we expect for example blizzard didn't already figure out what works via server's and what doesn't? Is there really something out there that the mmo and whatnot companies didn't already try and figure out if things work or not.

It's a shame sony's agency never came out. That was kind of an interesting concept for "mmo" like experience that isn't really WOW.

 

[zupallinere]

Will we get Cloud AI as a service ? Part of a Platinum subscription

Back to the topic NO consumer pressure has not ruined gaming for the next decade.

 

[zupallinere]

To make that point I'll ask people this, imagine for a minute that all ps3's were not guaranteed to have spu's available.

Imagine if there was no GPU .... come on there has got to be a better analogy than that. Remember devs and publishers are already throwing MP elements into SP games already, all DLC, all F2P, all of this nonsense comes with the Internet. Seems to me lots of man hours are being spent on Cloud functionality already.

 

[joker454]

Imagine if there was no GPU .... come on there has got to be a better analogy than that.

You just made an excellent example that perfectly makes my point, thanks Imagine if there was no gpu guaranteed, so some customers had a gpu and some didn't, would developers support gpu just the same compared to if there was guaranteed to be a gpu? Hint: That question has already been answered very decisively, and the answer is no, they would by and large not support the gpu and instead go with software renderers (think back to the earlier days of gaming). If you had a gpu it largely went unused. The funny part here is that back then gamers were complaining about having to spend extra money on a gpu.

Now back to my question, it's a very simple question really. If spu's were not guaranteed to be available on ps3, would developer support be the same compared to if they were guaranteed?

 

[dagamer]

You just made an excellent example that perfectly makes my point, thanks Imagine if there was no gpu guaranteed, so some customers had a gpu and some didn't, would developers support gpu just the same compared to if there was guaranteed to be a gpu? Hint: That question has already been answered very decisively, and the answer is no, they would by and large not support the gpu and instead go with software renderers (think back to the earlier days of gaming). If you had a gpu it largely went unused. The funny part here is that back then gamers were complaining about having to spend extra money on a gpu.

Now back to my question, it's a very simple question really. If spu's were not guaranteed to be available on ps3, would developer support be the same compared to if they were guaranteed?

No, it's been proven time and time again if hardware/peripheral isn't available to everyone, it isn't comfortably used by all developers (without outside mandates anyway).

 

[manux]

Now back to my question, it's a very simple question really. If spu's were not guaranteed to be available on ps3, would developer support be the same compared to if they were guaranteed?

The better question to ask is that will there be less online connected consoles after microsoft 180? Another question to ask is that is there something online related mmo developers didn't already figure out? Is there something preventing the smallest startup not using amazon cloud or kickstarter and revolutionizing online enabled gaming? I think for such startup the market with ps4+xbox one + pc + mac is much larger than what the microsoft only market would have been(and microsoft would still have asked money for the server time, it wasn't to be free)

 

[zupallinere]

You just made an excellent example that perfectly makes my point, thanks Imagine if there was no gpu guaranteed, so some customers had a gpu and some didn't, would developers support gpu just the same compared to if there was guaranteed to be a gpu? Hint: That question has already been answered very decisively, and the answer is no, they would by and large not support the gpu and instead go with software renderers (think back to the earlier days of gaming). If you had a gpu it largely went unused. The funny part here is that back then gamers were complaining about having to spend extra money on a gpu.

Now back to my question, it's a very simple question really. If spu's were not guaranteed to be available on ps3, would developer support be the same compared to if they were guaranteed?

Well it wouldn't be a cell processor and if it doesn't have a GPU it's just a computer so why are you using it for games... The TOPIC is does the fact that MS doesn't get to say that you MUST be connected to the Internet once every 24 hours ruin gaming for a decade ... NO. Will developers continue to use dedicated servers for MP and throw in a bunch of other Cloud related things into games YES. No one has any idea how valuable Der Cloud is for SP games but I am sure we will find out, maybe slower than you like but ...

 

[zupallinere]

No, it's been proven time and time again if hardware/peripheral isn't available to everyone, it isn't comfortably used by all developers (without outside mandates anyway).

I guess the Internet is now the NEW Move Controller