Minecraft, Rocket League, Fortnite, etc CrossPlay on every Platform but Sony because...

Not playing with your friends isn't a problem? It's no different to have a bunch of strangers over to your house for your birthday rather than your friends??

 

Well, yes no-one, least of all me, is saying or even implying that gamer's are entitled to play games with their friends. Just saying that it's horrible that gamer's can't play with their friends unless they all have the same platform, or at the very least don't have friends that own a competitor's platform.

Regards,
SB

 

Reply-Ban handed out to thread crapper. Enjoy!

 

This was largely likely because they didn't meet requirements, and Epic has been known to be cheeky, in particular Tim S.
As you can see, both PS4 and Xbox underwent heavy changes for their cross play.

Just because MS asked them to remove cross play doesn't imply they don't want it. The two are not correlated in this sense, I can only speculate that fortnite passed certification only for it to be found later that they were in breach of items namely how cross play was handled and interacted with Xbox Live.

 

lol, missed it!

 

It's obvious. With an unified pool of players the game has larger chances to survive.

 

Tim Sweeny on cross-platform play

https://www.rollingstone.com/glixel...form-play-creating-new-social-network-w518414

 

“It’s an amazing thing,” he said, “Sony and Microsoft honor purchases in Fortnite made on an iOS platform, or on their platform. In that way all of these platforms are working together.”

That's where the problem lies. To date, a person owns a game on a platform, and pays that platform holder for content. If same person can buy content through other portals, it reduces the income to the platform holder. Hypothetically, Console company A could see the sale of the game only, while Console company B sees the sale of the game and $100 worth of in-game purchases. Or neither company does and only Apple or Valve does. That could also see a price war on what was otherwise protected income. If Company A drops their commission to 25% instead of 30%, gamers are more like to buy from them, seeing Company B want to drop commission to 20%.

Having invested billions in creating walled gardens to be harvested, I can see the desire to protect the same gardens. I'm not sure how the economics can pan out successfully.

 

in this type of scenario, MS and Sony need to come to the table together to figure out how they can both walk away in agreement and provide this service for their customers.

whether they have been or not been I don't know. I suspect there have been talks. Unsure about the level of progress. When you're Sony, and your leading and the PS business is driving a lot of growth for the total company, you're not going to risk meeting revenue targets in best interests of the consumer.

For MS, success of this puts them closer to achieving their goal of your software anywhere on any device. Given the cost structure of MS' backbone in content delivery compared to Sony, this likely gives them an inherent advantage on pricing, which enables them to price more aggressively.

 

Sure, that's a problem with cross-buy/play anywhere type of solutions. But that isn't what this thread is about.

Cross-Play doesn't deny a platform holder income if the game is played on their platform. In such a case (not Fortnite in this instance, obviously as it appears to be Cross-Buy), you'd still have to pay the platform holder for the game and DLC.

The only sticking point that might come into play is when a game shares its account across multiple platforms. But even that can be mitigated to a great extent. FFXIV shares account data between PS and PC, but you have to buy the game on PS if you want to play it on PS even if you have it on PC.

F2P games, of course would be tricky as there is no actual purchase, just a bunch of micro transactions. This is where Fortnite falls.

However, for games which require you to pay for the game up front, there is no problem. You still have to buy it for your platform.

Regards,
SB

 

It's not, but I think the concern causing the lack of cross play is a desire to maintain those walled gardens. People are asking for cross-plat play. If you lower your wall to allow that, next thing they'll be asking is why they have to buy the same content multiple times.

Which is likely to become more and more common. My game ionAXXIA will have DLC. Clearly I want people who buy content on Steam to have access to the same content when they play on their iPhone or Android and vice versa. In theory I can register purchases on a server and unlock through that, but I don't know how Apple will feel about that, having in-game content that can be bought outside their store. It's an unknown and one you can be sure companies will drag their feet over if they feel their secure incomes are going to be threatened.

Pretty much every game is looking for post-sales DLC these days. Imagine all the GTA V DLC revenue a platform holder gets, and imagine they don't get that for GTA VI which everyone also plays on their mobile and buys content there.

 

DLC is easily restricted to the platform you purchase it on if the platform holder desires it. Again, using FFXIV as an example. Expansions for the game are basically just really large DLC packages.

• On PSN, you are required to buy them even if you already own it on PC.
• On PC it's more nuanced.
  • The Steam version requires you to buy the base game and expansions as well.
  • However, the stand alone FFXIV client (downloaded from Square-Enix or installed from physical media) only requires you to have a valid account and have paid for the content somewhere (PSN, Steam, physical copy from store or the Square-Enix website...it doesn't matter).

Of course, the platform holder can decide not to restrict it if it views it to be worth more to allow DLC purchased on another platform to work on their platform. IE - if they hope that the some of the people on another platform may get their platform and begin buying games on it.

IE - while you can attempt to lock players to your platform by locking DLC, you also prevent players that don't have your platform from migrating to your platform.

Currently microtransactions aren't limited like that. Again, using FFXIV, micro-transactions for the game are conducted on Square-Enix's website. Neither Sony nor Valve get a single cent from microtransactions in FFXIV.

That allows a F2P game like Fortnite to bypass the platform restrictions that Sony has for Game purchase and DLC purchase as micro-transactions are conducted in game. Although in the case of F2P games currency for microtransaction can sometimes be purchased on the platform (PSN, Steam, Xbox Live, iOS, etc.) as well as through the developer's own website. But they aren't required to do that on most platforms. PSN, Steam, and Xbox Live don't require cash currency for microtransactions to be purchased through their platform.

So, if we take a look at something like Fortnite, there's the opportunity for Sony to cash in on shared DLC or micro-transactions if someone starts playing it on a mobile device and gets hooked enough that they start to think about playing it on a dedicated device (console or PC). Since the DLC/MT is shared, there's no barrier to that player moving to PS4 as they won't have to rebuy their DLC/MT.

In that case, perhaps Sony never makes a single dime from that Fortnite player in Fortnite. But, they might make money from those players buying other games on PS4.

Regards,
SB

 

Agreed with this when limiting the discussion to one company.

However, if the general trend shifts to more games like Fortnite, then you're asking consumers to find different platforms that give them a bigger player base and flexibility. The game is F2P anyhow so Sony isn't making money from someone playing the game. They're making money off the DLC and someone being on the PS4 platform for an extended period and hopefully increasing their spend on the platform.

They would have to worry about a consumer looking at the PS ecosystem as "closed and limited" so they end up choosing other platforms that give them more options and the ability to seamlessly transfer between platforms.

If this F2P model becomes commonplace then you're likely looking at a longer term negative image of your platform. If it's just a blip, then it's fine to hold firm rather than pulling back later and the negative PR surrounding such an action.

 

That’s rectified by an agreement that all retail prices of in game purchase remain the same across platforms.

 

With an amendment that a platform holder can opt out of it.

For instance developers want to have a 75% off all content sale. Platform holder B doesn't want that deep of a sale on the title on their platform at that time.

Instead of vetoing the sale and thus preventing the sale across all other platforms, they can instead opt out of the sale and they can prevent their users from partaking of the sale while other platform holders can enjoy the sale.

Chances are they'd want in on a sale, however, they may want to keep the "brand value" of their platform high and only have deeply discounted sales coordinated with other titles in a special sales event to avoid a situation that Steam had a while back of almost no one buying a title unless it was 75-90% off.

You'll note over the past couple of years, 75-90% off titles on Steam have become relatively rare in Steam sales, whereas they were quite prevalent say 5 years ago. It's also why their "flash" sales disappeared during sales events. People weren't buying regular sale titles until the last day of the sale in hopes that there would be a flash sale of the title during the sales event.

So there are cases, where a platform holder may not want deeply discounted sales while another platform holder might welcome them.

Regards,
SB

 

https://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2018-04-12-do-gamers-really-care-about-cross-platform-play

Crossplay gamers don't care of it

 

You mean European gamers didnt care, the ones who are more likely to be Playstation owners. You'd have far different views if you asked in the US.

 

I think if they do the same things in US it will be a little different but it will not be a surprise if a majority of gamer don't care too... It is something really niche and ask by a part of core gamer and not mainstream gamer or casual gamer.

Mainstream gamer are sport gamer + COD, and GTA...

If it was not the case Xbox One would sold better than PS4 in US since the Sony refusal because Xbox division peoples are the nice(looser) guy. Sony ask too cross play last generation when they were behind Microsoft and MS refuse because they were winning...

 

Yeah, I think it's all a bit of a storm in a teacup really. I'd like to play a bit of Rainbow Six Siege with my Xbox owning friends, but since I can't, I'll just have to occupy my gaming time with Dragon's Dogma, Child of Light, Shadow of War, Final Fantasy XV, Skyrim VR, and Superhot.

I think I'll be okay.

If you're desperate to play with your friends, talk amongst yourselves and buy the same console. If needs be, spend about £200 and buy a second hand, secondary console for the occasional game.

A simple solution that doesn't require multi billion dollar corporations risking their multi billion dollar investments in a multi billion dollar industry.

Then again, that's not presently the way of Western cultures: people expect society to conform to them, and consider any attempt at its corollary nothing more than oppression. I suppose it's all part of the same pernicious, creeping sickness that turns noble adults into mewling infants, who throw a tantrum every time they're wrenched from the placating teet of eternal gratification.

 

You may have. That's unproven so far and assumes a very different mentality between XB buyers or NA citizens which would need some justifying.