Mod: Thread remodelled for anyone who wants to express their view, but bare in mind this is NOT a discussion thread! It's an expression thread. There are to be no replies; only posts. A record of your personal opinion to share and to maintain for posterity.
___
The following is just my personal impression from the games and announcements so far. I am not trying to convince or force this to anyone else. This is just me. And I am using the forum only as a means to express how I feel.
Perhaps someone might find some of my thoughts interesting and as another way of seeing things, perhaps someone might just find it a good way to kill time. Others may see things differently and disagree but this is just me.
Regardless below is how I experienced gaming in the past, how I am experiencing it now and my impression about Sony's and MS's Next Gen offerings and where they are heading my experience
My first contact with games
My first gaming experiences were at arcades or luna parks at very young age. I was probably 3-4 years old when I had my first experience with Yu Suzuki's Outrun. And surprisingly I was good for my age. I couldnt forget it because one time I managed to impress people enough as a toddler that they gathered around the cabinet. It's those little things that are BIG for kids. Yep. I have some memories that go that far in the past
My first experience with a video game console was a couple years later in the mid or late 80s though. My father brought this strange black device. I had no idea what it was. I remember looking at the images on the box and it felt like something special. And it was. I was hooked. The games were astounding for my little mind.
This was my first gaming console and a huge revelation for me. It didnt last very long though as after some time we moved and it was packed and hidden so I would study. Bummer
My second console was a japanese Nintento in 1991 which I got only to play in a summer in a country abroad where my father was working.
They didnt let me bring it with me because my parents were afraid I wouldnt study. The games that drove me crazy on that machine were Contra, Super Mario and TMNT 3. I played some co-op Contra with my dad at some arcades and because he also liked it he bought the console when he saw it. It was an amazing feel to have an actual awesome arcade game at your home comfort. Coins not required. I loved Super Mario so much that I managed to find by myself secrets that jumped me to stage 8-1 by going half through a few stages only. But TMNT3 was just freakin awesome. The visuals, gameplay and music were outstanding. It probably had the best soundtrack than any game I have played on the console. It was a masterpiece. I must have finished it 20 times. Then that console also got packed and hidden and when I found it, God I wasnt allowed to play almost at all.
And of course my parents wouldnt buy me a new console later either so I would study. People were getting their Super Nintendos and Mega Drives, their Game Gears and Game Boys, their IBM family computers? I had a 386 computer that only came home because my father needed it for work. But there were some very good games to play on it too like all those shareware games that came from Apogee etc.
This has left me with a hunger for games that was never satisfied. And I was left behind in gaming. I heard no news about what was coming next. And then I saw for the first time 3D games from a Computer and Games show called Cybernet. And my jaw dropped on the floor. 3D looked sophisticated and a huge jump from the 2D games I was used to. I wanted a Playstation.
A new generation of games
In 1996 my dad bought me a Playstation (which unfortunately I was allowed to play only during the summer. Bummer) because I got good grades. I knew no one who had a Saturn or Playstation at the time. It felt special. I never felt so excited about gaming in my life.First games were Toshinden, Wipeout and Adidas Power Soccer. And Demo1
But my favorite was Wipeout. A true work of art. Experiencing those games for the first time on my TV felt ecstatic. A new generation of awesome sophisticated looking games. The Playstation was like a wonder box. There were no words to describe how I felt about it. I played for hours every game and every demo I had on my disposal. Demo1 was simply the best compilation of tech demos and game demos that Sony could ever create for a console launch. It was filled with content and amazing presentation. I look at it today and it doesnt fail to impress me at how well crafted it was. Sony was serious about the PS. The visual and sound quality were acting like a drug. I was so hooked. Despite that I didnt have my Playstation most of the year, I bought many magazines and got many demos. Due to the popularity of the console it became a massive exclusive magnet of amazing games. Every year I knew for a given that I d have new awesome games to play during the summer. Only on Playstation. Oh and my father had it chipped because games were expensive. So I bought many games that otherwise couldnt afford. But still I was always selective with what I bought. Only the good games
Interesting notes:
a. When my father took me to the shop to buy a PS, the employee told him he had other consoles too. Goldstar/Panasonic. Otherwise the 3DO. My father was going to buy me one of those instead of the console I wanted but fortunately he didnt only because their powersupply was incompatible with our house voltage. Phew that was close.
b. 1996 was the first time I saw VF3 in a magazine that looked freakin amazing. It was also the time the N64 was released. It made me feel slightly uneasy reading about a Saturn VF3 released. My Toshinden next to VF3 looked like a chihuahua barking at a T-Rex. Super Mario 64 also looked amazing and the N64 launch sales slaughtered both the Saturn and PS launch sales combined. What if I bought the wrong console at the wake of better offerings? Fortunately I actually bought the best console I could buy as things showed later
The evolution of 3D
A few years later I begun reading about Saturn add ons which eventually became the new Sega console, the Dreamcast. Me and a friend were trying to download videos of its games through our 56k connections that took ages but it was worth it. Good times
The DC was a brilliant console but I was looking for the next PS2 expecting it was going to be better
In 1999 Sony showed for the first time PS2 tech demos. Finally, games that came close to old PS1 CGI. The excitement was over the roof.
The launch was huge. News about the PS2 frenzy were everywhere. Even crazy news like the one about Saddam buying thousands of PS2's to use for military purposes
E3 was here. The MGS2 trailer was the game that showed what the next gen was about. Physics, interactivity, AI, facial expressions, everything was too good to be true. And the whole package was like an amalgamation of everything that Sony has promised to deliver with the PS2.
Whats also great about the trailer?
All real time, gameplay footage of what the PS2 allowed to do that wasnt possible before both in terms of visuals and in gameplay! You hear that 2013 CGI, cutscenes, target renders and "seen it all" gameplay demonstrations????
I actually downloaded the whole traler with a 56k modem at the time
I got the PS2 in Xmas 2001. People were lining like crazy outside the store. This time I got the console with my own money and I was an adult. I could play as much and whenever I wanted. XBOX and GC didnt matter. PS2 was such a success that the important games an franchises were guaranteed to arrive on the PS2. It was a repetition of the 32 bit era. Nothing could beat the feeling of owning a console with a ton of exclusive games. This time around all my games were bought original not pirated as I considered them a work of art to be kept and stored into a collection (something that I will no longer be able to do in the future). Again I was targeting only the best games.
Games promised to take us to a whole new level of immersion and consoles that did more than just games
Fast forward to the E3 2005 the PS3 looked again like a console that would beat competition in both content, features and games. My expectations were higher this time as I have matured. 360 looked like a childs play after those E3 demos (which unfortunately were just smoke and mirrors). They showed exactly what I was expecting. And having announced Linux, BR, Cell, Internet, Sixaxis on top of those amazing visuals? Sold. It was going to be another repetition of Sony's past successes. Nope. Launch didnt go well, console very expensive, performance not so different fromthe 360, console was at high risk
I finally bought the 60GB GC console in late 2007 before it was extinct and the 360 in late 2008. They were both awesome but it didnt feel the same as when owning one console that got the biggest and best library. Well, games were better but they still felt like PS2 games. Ironically Shadow of the Colossus felt more next gen than the next gen games I was playing on next gen consoles. Why? Because Shadow of the Colossus had a convincing world. It felt real. The characters' animation was more sophisticated than most next gen games. The presentation was top notch and it incorporated effects that were sometimes even absent from next gen games: Motion blur and a technique that mimicked HDR.
There were only two games this generation that met the expectations that I initially had. Uncharted 2 and GoW3.
When gaming on consoles did not feel the same
I begun feeling also something wrong as the consoles matured. But why? They came with the technological conveniences I liked. I couldnt understand why and what it was. Now I can play online games, I can download special content and demos, there are new features and services that werent available before. So what was it? It didnt make sense.
Then I begun realizing what was wrong. It was the same things that I begun to realize when I was studying economics which I am not going to analyze here but I will make a small effort to isolate how in a much tinier scale it is expressed in the microcosm of my gaming experience.
My gaming experience as a consumer worked under a pretty straightforward and simple concept.
This is how things worked for me in the past:
I buy a product, I buy the games, I buy the peripherals and thats it. By the time I pay and the product reaches my home I am an independent consumer. I do whatever I want and everything is as is as when I first purchased a console and game. The company that produces a product communicates what it has to communicate and I reach the company's information only when and where I want to reach it.
This is how things are for me now:
My product does so much more and I like it that it does so much more. But it has become a clusterfuck of services and features that bombard me together every time they got the chance to, even though I just wanted to experience one of them at a time. And that single thing I want to experience is subject to changes, alterations, terms and conditions, updates and sometimes it even comes in an incomplete or buggy state from the get go waiting for an update to fix it. I begun getting crashes, failed HDD that needed replacements, Lights of Death, apps that didnt work perfect etc. It was no longer a simple, consistent, steady and personal experience anymore. In the past I didnt have to put a tick on user agreement terms and conditions to access my content. Its a huge text that only a lawyer can fully understand and have the patience to read (When I die I ll probably discover that in one of the terms and conditions i ticked, I agreed to sell my soul to satan). I want to entertain myself God damn it. Enough bureaucracy and agreements I get at my work already. Keep that crap away from my home's comfort.
Paradoxically although I have these frustrations, it doesnt make sense to go back to a product that just does one thing like it was in the past. Its like mobile phones. I cant go back into not using a mobile phone because my life will feel more difficult. But paradoxically before their invention and their mass incorporation in our daily lives, I never felt that my life was difficult without it and never felt the need to tell myself "oh my God if only I could own a walky talkie to call anyone from everywhere". It wasnt a necessity back then. Now it feels like it is when in reality I am mentally dependent on a convenience that brought other inconveniences, like....bringing my God damn work at my home. Whenever I am and at any time I am available for work obligations. My company can reach me. Its crazy how "conveniences" get such a powerful attention that they feel like necessities. I also got a smartphone for the first time last year. Not because I needed it. Because I wanted to see how it was like. After that experience, its difficult to go back into a phone that does less. Even though I dont really need it. This phenomenon worries me.
Am I a sponge of consumerism?
And this is how my console experience feels like now. There are those tiny tiny steps where companies infiltrate my independence as a consumer through my demand for conveniences as they see it as an opportunity to improve their business. Its profitable. And what they want to do is to be able to talk to me constantly even when I am at my home. They throw at me information that might interest me. Before I didnt have to deal with so much information and I looked for it when I decided to look for it. They show me products and services, intertwined subjects and and this and that and before I know it, I spend more energy, more hours and more money on stuff I would have spent less if at all in the past. All that energy (especially mental), time and money were spent more productively years ago. What I find scary is that people dont realize this. They say "they are giving me what I want and thats a good thing" when what happens is that companies see what we want they try to subtly shove it in our face until we are lured to make a buying decision. Its the same with social media like Facebook. We never cared before about the concept.Now we spent too many hours and energy on them and we are bombarded with information overload. I am starting to see mothers spending hours on facebook apps instead with their children or going outside for a walk with them. Scary shit!
My identity conflict and how corporations see me
Corporations want to find a way to get information from us and communicate with as at all times. This is a powerful marketing tool. It improves their business. It makes sense for them. It was hugely apparent in the last Marketing Forum I have been into. We had executives from big name businesses such as Financial Times and Google. We were going to have a spokesperson from Microsoft too but he didnt manage to come. Their constant concern was how to take information from consumers, how to analyze the raw data to get meaningful information, use that information to bombard the consumer with the appropriate content and find the best means to be able to contact the consumer up to a level that the consumer increases sales. Social media and always online technology were the answer and the future. I saw the future that our consoles were taking before they were revealed. And I didnt know how to take this. From a professional level, it makes sense. It's good. Its brilliant. Its the best thing since sliced bread. I work at a business and I am a part of this brilliant thing
As a self aware consumer? This was worrying.
I prefered the consumer POV because a business is concerned about its isolated interest. When I lay my foot outside the business doors I become a normal personl like everyone else and like everybody else I am a target unit who is subject to marketing "attacks" and luring by countless of businesses
My consoles as means of the above today
For a quick reminder read This is how things worked for me in the past.
The reveal of the XBone and PS4 both hide this under their cover. With XBone doing it more explicitly and intensely to the point where they want control of the console and games I purchase even AFTER I reach the comfort of my home. I no longer buy just a console. I buy a console that acts as a means of infiltration to my personal space. This is not what I want. I want to use a feature and look into their information when I feel strongly enough about it that I take my ass off the couch and look for it. If I feel that strongly about it, I am more likely to also make a quality decision that serves ME foremost and not the corporation. The easier its on my face,the easier I am going to make a decision that does not serve me. Today for example I have many digitally purchased games on my console's HDD that I dont play. To the contrary my disk based games actually got more use. Yeah yeah I know, we have to promote innovation, and evolution and blah blah I have heard it a dozen times. I like them and want them too. But this doesnt mean I will become the type of consumer that blindly accepts anything that is accompanied by "innovation and evolution". My message to this is " Change the means and intentions for innovation and evolution" and I will wholeheartedly open the gates of my consumerist heaven for them.
Why this years E3 turned me off
And to tell the truth I was never so turned off by a next gen revelation as this one. None of the companies tried to showcase a real change in how games will play. I saw old experiences in a better cover. Their emphasis to sell their products was towards a) improvements and features that are only available through more dependency on the corporate side such as cloud computing and DRM checks. And b)integrations with TV/social media. Not so much was shown about how games will improve from the opportunities opened by the more powerful hardware itself and its new peripherals. There was not a single game that has had an impact in me as the MGS2 trailer in 2000 above.
I would like to note that I stopped watching TV for years because I have realized that they are mostly bombarding my brain with crap information that I dear to admit I sometimes may even have enjoyed or often get carried away and develop in me negative emotions (because they are experts at doing so) . My brain's grey matter is too valuable to waste like that.
I mean, I check XBOXone's terms and conditions and I see bureaucracy and limitations just so they they can offer innovation, evolution and move forward. Thats a paradox.
Bureaucracy and gaming were two words belonging into different dimensions years ago. Now they are together.
I know that we are going to see some "revolutionary" games in the future on these consoles than what we saw at the conferences. But the biggest subject at this year's E3 was the DRM and online (un)social media features. Both companies under-delivered with their presentations regarding their gaming announcement and demonstrations. Sony would have had the worst conference after Nintendo if they didnt say two things:
a) "we support used ganes"
b) "$399"
___
The following is just my personal impression from the games and announcements so far. I am not trying to convince or force this to anyone else. This is just me. And I am using the forum only as a means to express how I feel.
Perhaps someone might find some of my thoughts interesting and as another way of seeing things, perhaps someone might just find it a good way to kill time. Others may see things differently and disagree but this is just me.
Regardless below is how I experienced gaming in the past, how I am experiencing it now and my impression about Sony's and MS's Next Gen offerings and where they are heading my experience
My first contact with games
My first gaming experiences were at arcades or luna parks at very young age. I was probably 3-4 years old when I had my first experience with Yu Suzuki's Outrun. And surprisingly I was good for my age. I couldnt forget it because one time I managed to impress people enough as a toddler that they gathered around the cabinet. It's those little things that are BIG for kids. Yep. I have some memories that go that far in the past
My first experience with a video game console was a couple years later in the mid or late 80s though. My father brought this strange black device. I had no idea what it was. I remember looking at the images on the box and it felt like something special. And it was. I was hooked. The games were astounding for my little mind.
This was my first gaming console and a huge revelation for me. It didnt last very long though as after some time we moved and it was packed and hidden so I would study. Bummer
My second console was a japanese Nintento in 1991 which I got only to play in a summer in a country abroad where my father was working.
They didnt let me bring it with me because my parents were afraid I wouldnt study. The games that drove me crazy on that machine were Contra, Super Mario and TMNT 3. I played some co-op Contra with my dad at some arcades and because he also liked it he bought the console when he saw it. It was an amazing feel to have an actual awesome arcade game at your home comfort. Coins not required. I loved Super Mario so much that I managed to find by myself secrets that jumped me to stage 8-1 by going half through a few stages only. But TMNT3 was just freakin awesome. The visuals, gameplay and music were outstanding. It probably had the best soundtrack than any game I have played on the console. It was a masterpiece. I must have finished it 20 times. Then that console also got packed and hidden and when I found it, God I wasnt allowed to play almost at all.
And of course my parents wouldnt buy me a new console later either so I would study. People were getting their Super Nintendos and Mega Drives, their Game Gears and Game Boys, their IBM family computers? I had a 386 computer that only came home because my father needed it for work. But there were some very good games to play on it too like all those shareware games that came from Apogee etc.
This has left me with a hunger for games that was never satisfied. And I was left behind in gaming. I heard no news about what was coming next. And then I saw for the first time 3D games from a Computer and Games show called Cybernet. And my jaw dropped on the floor. 3D looked sophisticated and a huge jump from the 2D games I was used to. I wanted a Playstation.
A new generation of games
In 1996 my dad bought me a Playstation (which unfortunately I was allowed to play only during the summer. Bummer) because I got good grades. I knew no one who had a Saturn or Playstation at the time. It felt special. I never felt so excited about gaming in my life.First games were Toshinden, Wipeout and Adidas Power Soccer. And Demo1
But my favorite was Wipeout. A true work of art. Experiencing those games for the first time on my TV felt ecstatic. A new generation of awesome sophisticated looking games. The Playstation was like a wonder box. There were no words to describe how I felt about it. I played for hours every game and every demo I had on my disposal. Demo1 was simply the best compilation of tech demos and game demos that Sony could ever create for a console launch. It was filled with content and amazing presentation. I look at it today and it doesnt fail to impress me at how well crafted it was. Sony was serious about the PS. The visual and sound quality were acting like a drug. I was so hooked. Despite that I didnt have my Playstation most of the year, I bought many magazines and got many demos. Due to the popularity of the console it became a massive exclusive magnet of amazing games. Every year I knew for a given that I d have new awesome games to play during the summer. Only on Playstation. Oh and my father had it chipped because games were expensive. So I bought many games that otherwise couldnt afford. But still I was always selective with what I bought. Only the good games
Interesting notes:
a. When my father took me to the shop to buy a PS, the employee told him he had other consoles too. Goldstar/Panasonic. Otherwise the 3DO. My father was going to buy me one of those instead of the console I wanted but fortunately he didnt only because their powersupply was incompatible with our house voltage. Phew that was close.
b. 1996 was the first time I saw VF3 in a magazine that looked freakin amazing. It was also the time the N64 was released. It made me feel slightly uneasy reading about a Saturn VF3 released. My Toshinden next to VF3 looked like a chihuahua barking at a T-Rex. Super Mario 64 also looked amazing and the N64 launch sales slaughtered both the Saturn and PS launch sales combined. What if I bought the wrong console at the wake of better offerings? Fortunately I actually bought the best console I could buy as things showed later
The evolution of 3D
A few years later I begun reading about Saturn add ons which eventually became the new Sega console, the Dreamcast. Me and a friend were trying to download videos of its games through our 56k connections that took ages but it was worth it. Good times
The DC was a brilliant console but I was looking for the next PS2 expecting it was going to be better
In 1999 Sony showed for the first time PS2 tech demos. Finally, games that came close to old PS1 CGI. The excitement was over the roof.
The launch was huge. News about the PS2 frenzy were everywhere. Even crazy news like the one about Saddam buying thousands of PS2's to use for military purposes
E3 was here. The MGS2 trailer was the game that showed what the next gen was about. Physics, interactivity, AI, facial expressions, everything was too good to be true. And the whole package was like an amalgamation of everything that Sony has promised to deliver with the PS2.
Whats also great about the trailer?
All real time, gameplay footage of what the PS2 allowed to do that wasnt possible before both in terms of visuals and in gameplay! You hear that 2013 CGI, cutscenes, target renders and "seen it all" gameplay demonstrations????
I got the PS2 in Xmas 2001. People were lining like crazy outside the store. This time I got the console with my own money and I was an adult. I could play as much and whenever I wanted. XBOX and GC didnt matter. PS2 was such a success that the important games an franchises were guaranteed to arrive on the PS2. It was a repetition of the 32 bit era. Nothing could beat the feeling of owning a console with a ton of exclusive games. This time around all my games were bought original not pirated as I considered them a work of art to be kept and stored into a collection (something that I will no longer be able to do in the future). Again I was targeting only the best games.
Games promised to take us to a whole new level of immersion and consoles that did more than just games
Fast forward to the E3 2005 the PS3 looked again like a console that would beat competition in both content, features and games. My expectations were higher this time as I have matured. 360 looked like a childs play after those E3 demos (which unfortunately were just smoke and mirrors). They showed exactly what I was expecting. And having announced Linux, BR, Cell, Internet, Sixaxis on top of those amazing visuals? Sold. It was going to be another repetition of Sony's past successes. Nope. Launch didnt go well, console very expensive, performance not so different fromthe 360, console was at high risk
I finally bought the 60GB GC console in late 2007 before it was extinct and the 360 in late 2008. They were both awesome but it didnt feel the same as when owning one console that got the biggest and best library. Well, games were better but they still felt like PS2 games. Ironically Shadow of the Colossus felt more next gen than the next gen games I was playing on next gen consoles. Why? Because Shadow of the Colossus had a convincing world. It felt real. The characters' animation was more sophisticated than most next gen games. The presentation was top notch and it incorporated effects that were sometimes even absent from next gen games: Motion blur and a technique that mimicked HDR.
There were only two games this generation that met the expectations that I initially had. Uncharted 2 and GoW3.
When gaming on consoles did not feel the same
I begun feeling also something wrong as the consoles matured. But why? They came with the technological conveniences I liked. I couldnt understand why and what it was. Now I can play online games, I can download special content and demos, there are new features and services that werent available before. So what was it? It didnt make sense.
Then I begun realizing what was wrong. It was the same things that I begun to realize when I was studying economics which I am not going to analyze here but I will make a small effort to isolate how in a much tinier scale it is expressed in the microcosm of my gaming experience.
My gaming experience as a consumer worked under a pretty straightforward and simple concept.
This is how things worked for me in the past:
I buy a product, I buy the games, I buy the peripherals and thats it. By the time I pay and the product reaches my home I am an independent consumer. I do whatever I want and everything is as is as when I first purchased a console and game. The company that produces a product communicates what it has to communicate and I reach the company's information only when and where I want to reach it.
This is how things are for me now:
My product does so much more and I like it that it does so much more. But it has become a clusterfuck of services and features that bombard me together every time they got the chance to, even though I just wanted to experience one of them at a time. And that single thing I want to experience is subject to changes, alterations, terms and conditions, updates and sometimes it even comes in an incomplete or buggy state from the get go waiting for an update to fix it. I begun getting crashes, failed HDD that needed replacements, Lights of Death, apps that didnt work perfect etc. It was no longer a simple, consistent, steady and personal experience anymore. In the past I didnt have to put a tick on user agreement terms and conditions to access my content. Its a huge text that only a lawyer can fully understand and have the patience to read (When I die I ll probably discover that in one of the terms and conditions i ticked, I agreed to sell my soul to satan). I want to entertain myself God damn it. Enough bureaucracy and agreements I get at my work already. Keep that crap away from my home's comfort.
Paradoxically although I have these frustrations, it doesnt make sense to go back to a product that just does one thing like it was in the past. Its like mobile phones. I cant go back into not using a mobile phone because my life will feel more difficult. But paradoxically before their invention and their mass incorporation in our daily lives, I never felt that my life was difficult without it and never felt the need to tell myself "oh my God if only I could own a walky talkie to call anyone from everywhere". It wasnt a necessity back then. Now it feels like it is when in reality I am mentally dependent on a convenience that brought other inconveniences, like....bringing my God damn work at my home. Whenever I am and at any time I am available for work obligations. My company can reach me. Its crazy how "conveniences" get such a powerful attention that they feel like necessities. I also got a smartphone for the first time last year. Not because I needed it. Because I wanted to see how it was like. After that experience, its difficult to go back into a phone that does less. Even though I dont really need it. This phenomenon worries me.
Am I a sponge of consumerism?
And this is how my console experience feels like now. There are those tiny tiny steps where companies infiltrate my independence as a consumer through my demand for conveniences as they see it as an opportunity to improve their business. Its profitable. And what they want to do is to be able to talk to me constantly even when I am at my home. They throw at me information that might interest me. Before I didnt have to deal with so much information and I looked for it when I decided to look for it. They show me products and services, intertwined subjects and and this and that and before I know it, I spend more energy, more hours and more money on stuff I would have spent less if at all in the past. All that energy (especially mental), time and money were spent more productively years ago. What I find scary is that people dont realize this. They say "they are giving me what I want and thats a good thing" when what happens is that companies see what we want they try to subtly shove it in our face until we are lured to make a buying decision. Its the same with social media like Facebook. We never cared before about the concept.Now we spent too many hours and energy on them and we are bombarded with information overload. I am starting to see mothers spending hours on facebook apps instead with their children or going outside for a walk with them. Scary shit!
My identity conflict and how corporations see me
Corporations want to find a way to get information from us and communicate with as at all times. This is a powerful marketing tool. It improves their business. It makes sense for them. It was hugely apparent in the last Marketing Forum I have been into. We had executives from big name businesses such as Financial Times and Google. We were going to have a spokesperson from Microsoft too but he didnt manage to come. Their constant concern was how to take information from consumers, how to analyze the raw data to get meaningful information, use that information to bombard the consumer with the appropriate content and find the best means to be able to contact the consumer up to a level that the consumer increases sales. Social media and always online technology were the answer and the future. I saw the future that our consoles were taking before they were revealed. And I didnt know how to take this. From a professional level, it makes sense. It's good. Its brilliant. Its the best thing since sliced bread. I work at a business and I am a part of this brilliant thing
As a self aware consumer? This was worrying.
I prefered the consumer POV because a business is concerned about its isolated interest. When I lay my foot outside the business doors I become a normal personl like everyone else and like everybody else I am a target unit who is subject to marketing "attacks" and luring by countless of businesses
My consoles as means of the above today
For a quick reminder read This is how things worked for me in the past.
The reveal of the XBone and PS4 both hide this under their cover. With XBone doing it more explicitly and intensely to the point where they want control of the console and games I purchase even AFTER I reach the comfort of my home. I no longer buy just a console. I buy a console that acts as a means of infiltration to my personal space. This is not what I want. I want to use a feature and look into their information when I feel strongly enough about it that I take my ass off the couch and look for it. If I feel that strongly about it, I am more likely to also make a quality decision that serves ME foremost and not the corporation. The easier its on my face,the easier I am going to make a decision that does not serve me. Today for example I have many digitally purchased games on my console's HDD that I dont play. To the contrary my disk based games actually got more use. Yeah yeah I know, we have to promote innovation, and evolution and blah blah I have heard it a dozen times. I like them and want them too. But this doesnt mean I will become the type of consumer that blindly accepts anything that is accompanied by "innovation and evolution". My message to this is " Change the means and intentions for innovation and evolution" and I will wholeheartedly open the gates of my consumerist heaven for them.
Why this years E3 turned me off
And to tell the truth I was never so turned off by a next gen revelation as this one. None of the companies tried to showcase a real change in how games will play. I saw old experiences in a better cover. Their emphasis to sell their products was towards a) improvements and features that are only available through more dependency on the corporate side such as cloud computing and DRM checks. And b)integrations with TV/social media. Not so much was shown about how games will improve from the opportunities opened by the more powerful hardware itself and its new peripherals. There was not a single game that has had an impact in me as the MGS2 trailer in 2000 above.
I would like to note that I stopped watching TV for years because I have realized that they are mostly bombarding my brain with crap information that I dear to admit I sometimes may even have enjoyed or often get carried away and develop in me negative emotions (because they are experts at doing so) . My brain's grey matter is too valuable to waste like that.
I mean, I check XBOXone's terms and conditions and I see bureaucracy and limitations just so they they can offer innovation, evolution and move forward. Thats a paradox.
Bureaucracy and gaming were two words belonging into different dimensions years ago. Now they are together.
I know that we are going to see some "revolutionary" games in the future on these consoles than what we saw at the conferences. But the biggest subject at this year's E3 was the DRM and online (un)social media features. Both companies under-delivered with their presentations regarding their gaming announcement and demonstrations. Sony would have had the worst conference after Nintendo if they didnt say two things:
a) "we support used ganes"
b) "$399"
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