MS is not making its product more compelling, they are making the competitor's product LESS compelling by their policies.
MS regulating developers choices on other platforms *spawn
- Thread starter Gubbi
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MS is not making its product more compelling, they are making the competitor's product LESS compelling by their policies.
But isn't this really the pot calling the kettle black? Why should we discuss the tit for tat politics between these two console makers when they are both guilty and yet we gain nothing much from discussing these anecdotes of he said she said.
SedentaryJourney
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Is it the pot calling the kettle black? The above quote from Shifty seems to indicate MS is less developer friendly or takes a harder line concerning publishing on XBL than Sony does on PSN. Then again, given the success of XBL it's amazing that anyone would air Microsoft's dirty laundry seeing as how it would only damage one's relationship with Microsoft and won't influence purchasing behaviour towards PSN or Steam. I doubt the average gamer takes publishing fairness into consideration when buying a game on one of several competing platforms.
You ignore the above quotes so of course you would call it into question
THEY CHANGED THE GAME BECAUSE OF THE DVD LIMIT...
And then they did alot of PR bullshit ehmm damage control because it´s bad business to claim that the 360 is limited (same goes for any platform),
Who cares about those politics, the interesting part is that we have had arguments about storage for years, and it turns out there is a direct policy from Microsoft to make that problem "not exist". Which of course is the best confirmation there is that it is a problem
There is nothing anti-competitive or underhanded in the MS position. MS is not requiring developers to ship on XBox or lose something else, like say, PC version. MS is not stopping a game from shipping on a competing system at all.
What it has done is create a set of expectations. If you do not meet them, you cannot ship on XBox. You can ship anywhere else you want, there's nothing stopping you being a PS3 exclusive.
Let's say I require visitors to remove their shoes when visiting my house, or they can't come in. Those visitors have no right to complain that I'm being unfair because my neighbour lets them wear their shoes into the house. It's my house, my rules.
One of the expectations is that a game shipped on a BD should not exceed the content contained on a DVD. Am I reading you right?
Uhm, the analogy would be that you don´t let them in without shoes in your house, because you happen to know they had shoes on in your neighbours house.
Who cares about those politics, the interesting part is that we have had arguments about storage for years, and it turns out there is a direct policy from Microsoft to make that problem "not exist". Which of course is the best confirmation there is that it is a problem
But couldn't you argue that Sony prevented developers from taking advantage of more memory on the Xbox 360, etc. Both companies have these rules in place.
I don't think that's true. There's no evidence or suggestion Sony have a mandate saying "you can't publish on our platform if yout textures are of lower quality" or the like, and we see PS3 titles being inferior. This isn't really about performance, but content. Whether this move from MS is affecting how much content devs put on disc, I don't know, though I would like to find out! Would devs really use more of BRD's capacity if it weren't for wanting to maintain parity to be allowed to publish on 360? I find that hard to believe, but it's quite an important question in my mind as it's suggestive that one thing holding back technology is business practice.But couldn't you argue that Sony prevented developers from taking advantage of more memory on the Xbox 360, etc. Both companies have these rules in place.
You ignore the above quotes so of course you would call it into question
THEY CHANGED THE GAME BECAUSE OF THE DVD LIMIT...
And you're ignoring the fact that a) RAGE is far from a typical example of current gen game and b)there are multiple other examples were the developers decided that 1 DVD is not enough and went multiple disc route.
How often do you think a developer creates a 15gb-20gb game and then realizes that 360 has a dvd drive and changes need to be made? That is not a revelation, it's been know since 2005. I would imagine most (if not all) developers know about it and know how to plan for it beforehand. It's more of a inconvinience than a hard limit.
Another thing - if Microsoft demands that the games be 1:1 on both platforms then how are we going to explain those multiple multiplatform titles releasing at the same time but having exclusive content available only on PS3. Mafia 2, L.A. Noire, Dead Space 2, SSX, RDR. Sony always makes a big deal out of it during their E3 presser. Sure, it's never anything substantial, but it's happening. Platform exclusive content is a fact. Are all those DLC vouchers?
As far as I'm concerned, in console space MS and Sony are equal players. If MS is throwing their weight around, it's Sony responsibility to try to combat that and encourage developers to take advantage of additional storage capacity on PS3.
Except this particular move by MS would lock those games out of 50% of the HD market. Sony aren't going to be able to convince devs to lose half their revenue in favour of a spending more on assets for a PS3 exclusive!
I am using rage because it´s not a typical game in the sense that John Carmack doesn´t shut up and they actually opened up a bit about the challenges they faced with the small storage. And then they backtracked like crazy because the "world" or Microsoft did not want to hear it.
I bet you a dollar that there is plenty of examples of the exact same thing and rage isn´t that special. Was it Bizaarre that scrapped some tracks because there wasn´t space for the night races? And of course went on a full blown backtrack on the 'not enough space" comments
And you needed a harddrive if you wanted to enjoy all cars and tracks in Forza 3 because IT DID NOT FIT on one dvd.
And imho, the reason they aren´t discussing the issues is that it´s bad politics and Microsoft doesn´t like it.
Well again it comes back to the point I mentioned earlier - it makes you wonder how many publishers/devs are actually complaining about not being able to conviniently sink more money in their games, exclusive or not.
We have games like Fallout 3 or RDR that are "big" in many ways (and probably pretty expensive to develop) and they easily fit on 1 DVD. Fallout 3 actually takes up 5.5gb with some space left (the current limit on 360 dvd is 7.5gb as i recall). That being said I think we are reaching the point where 1 dvd won't be enough anymore for an increasing number of AAA titles and more and more games will take up to 15gb of pure "game content" - without going crazy with HQ prerendered videos. That should be enough for the remainder of the gen imo. But as I said, I don't see it as a creativity-ruining limitation, rather an inconvinience.
We have games like Fallout 3 or RDR that are "big" in many ways (and probably pretty expensive to develop) and they easily fit on 1 DVD. Fallout 3 actually takes up 5.5gb with some space left (the current limit on 360 dvd is 7.5gb as i recall). That being said I think we are reaching the point where 1 dvd won't be enough anymore for an increasing number of AAA titles and more and more games will take up to 15gb of pure "game content" - without going crazy with HQ prerendered videos. That should be enough for the remainder of the gen imo. But as I said, I don't see it as a creativity-ruining limitation, rather an inconvinience.
He said a few harsh things about blu ray in PS3 as well. More on the transfer speed side though. To me it seems both machines have their share of problems that need to be dealt with when developing for them. It's not just "dvd is small, blu ray is a breeze to work with". You probably know that already if you have watched his Quakecon keynote.
So they added a second dvd. As i said, an inconvinience more than a limit. They did not make an exception for PGR4 in 2007, but Forza 3 was already on two discs, same for Forza 4. And the same is true for a constantly increasing number of other games.
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Are PS3 exclusives using bluray discs in any significant way outside of multiple languages and better FMV quality and sound ?
I am using rage because it´s not a typical game in the sense that John Carmack doesn´t shut up and they actually opened up a bit about the challenges they faced with the small storage. And then they backtracked like crazy because the "world" or Microsoft did not want to hear it.
I bet you a dollar that there is plenty of examples of the exact same thing and rage isn´t that special. Was it Bizaarre that scrapped some tracks because there wasn´t space for the night races? And of course went on a full blown backtrack on the 'not enough space" comments
And you needed a harddrive if you wanted to enjoy all cars and tracks in Forza 3 because IT DID NOT FIT on one dvd.
And imho, the reason they aren´t discussing the issues is that it´s bad politics and Microsoft doesn´t like it.
So what are you suggesting? That MS should undermine their incredibly hard earned customer base by allowing their customers to get the shitty end of the stick?
MS don't seem to have a problem with multi disk games - they publish them, they let other people publish them. Any choices that making games work within DVD sized chunks forces on game design are simply a reality of the platform existing and people developing for it.
Why is none of this Sony's "fault"? They were beaten to the punch by a cheaper competitor with a better graphics chip (meaning better multiplatform games), and now developers have to factor that competitor's more popular machine into things. Why are Sony being presented as victims here?
Not significantly from what I've seen in most cases, hence that I don't really believe the Sony comments (games are held back by MS not allowing sub-BRD quality) and view them as political spin.
Maybe cut gameplay content, which is pretty big imo.
In terms of optical media capacity they already got the shitty end of the stick.
