Sony PS3 basic online service to surpass Xbox360 Silver

[overclocked]

I have no problem, none whatsoever, paying $1/week to play games online with an integrated system (like Live gold).

It's worth every penny to me and I don't even miss it.

If it's more important for some not to pay, well then congratulations on this news (if true).

I agree that it isnt much money over a whole year but a big plus in the book nontheless for many.
There can be cases where you have one title out of ten that you want to play online. So in many circumstances i think that this can be a positive trend only paying for what you want and different from game by game basis so to say.

Many guys that buys 2 games a year or so can spend that money on a third one instead and when games fall in price perhaps twice that. Thats how i look at it atleast.

 

[Johnny Awesome]

I want to address the issue of an online MMO game being detrimental to the console business model: It isn't as long as the hardware player gets a cut of the subscription revenue.

If MS can make $5/month from an MMO game that's $60 per year, which is equivalent to the royalities from 6+ games. That's a pretty huge equivalent attach rate even if gamers don't buy any more games. Over the lifespan of a console that's $300 in revenue for MS per console gamer locked into an MMO. If 50 million gamers did this it would generate $15 billion in royalites. That's insane!

What I'm trying to say is that as long as MS or Sony share in subscription revenues, each MMO player contributes more to their bottom line than any regular console gamer ever ordinarily could.

 

[Sis]

My guess is the UI won't be as refined as XBL.

I actually expect it will be a near identical clone of PSPs interface, which is kinda nice. (And actually quite similar to what I'm seeing out of Vista's Media Center.)

 

[Platon]

What I don't get is if the online play is for free, what will Sony offer so people use their service which they have to pay, I assume most of the gamers are looking for playing online. If they can do that for free is there any reason to by a subscription? And did one of the slides say that the service starts for free, which means that they might charge for later on?...

 

[NavNucST3]

$2 per game? how many EA games are out a yr?

For which platform? Either way, it is NOT a short list

 

[speng]

In all honesty--and as much as I'd love to see WoW or Guild Wars on a console, as a manufacturer this would be the absolute last thing I would want. People spend hundreds of hours and months upon months playing a single game. I hear too much anecdotal evidence of "I haven't even purchased another game since I bought WoW 9 months ago". And when your business model is about maximizing your attach rate, this seems wrong.

Then again, it's probably just short sigtedness on my part that leads me to this way of thinking...

Most of these games like Guild Wars offer expansion packs or downloadable content. They will pump these out every 3-6 months for $10-$25, keeping the revenue stream going.

Most people who buy console games, will buy the must haves for the type of games they have regardless. But if nothing comes out that interests them, they will still not buy a new game, at least downloadable content will keep them buying something.

Speng.

 

[Powderkeg]

I rather suspect MS execs are laughing at this.

Why? Because they know how much time and money has to be invested in an Xbox Live like service, and they are probably overjoyed at the prospect of Sony taking nearly a 100% loss on that investment. It's certainly going to hurt Sony's overall profits, that's for sure.

MS is more concerned about making the 360 profitable than they are offering free online play. As long as they've got 2+ million paying subscribers I doubt they see any reason at all to give up that income.

 

[Platon]

I rather suspect MS execs are laughing at this.

Why? Because they know how much time and money has to be invested in an Xbox Live like service, and they are probably overjoyed at the prospect of Sony taking nearly a 100% loss on that investment. It's certainly going to hurt Sony's overall profits, that's for sure.

MS is more concerned about making the 360 profitable than they are offering free online play. As long as they've got 2+ million paying subscribers I doubt they see any reason at all to give up that income.

I agree. If MS, that is more than willing to take a loss, as they have shown with the original xbox, is taking money for playing online, I really can't see Sony passing up on that and just lose money instead...

 

[c0_re]

I agree. If MS, that is more than willing to take a loss, as they have shown with the original xbox, is taking money for playing online, I really can't see Sony passing up on that and just lose money instead...

I mean does Sony have a couple billion just laying around to invest in a Live type Network and 2 years to put it together and make it work? It took Microsoft atleast that long and ptobably a 1000 developers working around the clock , and microshaft has about a 200x more experience in the software development work. I'm not saying it's not possible or even likely but I think it'll take some time to get where 360 is right now as far as online which IMO is still lacking.

 

[ban25]

Because Sony doesn't want yet another thing it has to subsidize with software sales?

To my knowledge, Xbox Live is the only current example of a peer-to-peer gaming service that requires a subscription fee. In other words, it's the exception.

 

[ban25]

If the "service" is literally just Gamespy and ICQ, that's good for me...

Costs to play online are probably optional. Ssomething like COn doesn't warrantee charging people to play online. GW doesn't charge either. Leave it open to the dev.

As for finding people to play with, if you can create freidns lists and closed games, I'm a happy bunny. The only interest I have in playing online is playing with 'real world' friends.

What perhaps concerns me is the development of said infrastructure is said to be created by SOE and GameSpy. Can they be trusted with doing a good, elegant job? The little of GmaeSpy I used in NWN was scarey and problematic, but I don't know how much is GameSpy and how much is the implementation by the game developers.

 

[-NakedZ-]

In the handheld forum there was a thread about EA charging you $2 to play a game without giving up your personal info...maybe something along those lines. Hope not though.

If PSNP is anything like XBL where you have one username for all network enable game for the system, how would this work without a big hitch?

.Z

 

[Sis]

To my knowledge, Xbox Live is the only current example of a peer-to-peer gaming service that requires a subscription fee. In other words, it's the exception.

Certainly these other services are not non-profit. They make their money somewhere and the "peer-to-peer" service is subsidized by the other sources of revenue. Regardless of what others feel the cost to run Xbox Live is, I'm sure we'd all agree that it's not "free" and therefore the cost of it must be accounted for somewhere.

 

[-NakedZ-]

I rather suspect MS execs are laughing at this.

Why? Because they know how much time and money has to be invested in an Xbox Live like service, and they are probably overjoyed at the prospect of Sony taking nearly a 100% loss on that investment. It's certainly going to hurt Sony's overall profits, that's for sure.

MS is more concerned about making the 360 profitable than they are offering free online play. As long as they've got 2+ million paying subscribers I doubt they see any reason at all to give up that income.

It's possible that Sony could/would offer free online play but for a limited amount of time (like 2/5 hours a week/month). I'm pretty sure most XBL Gold members plays online more than 2 or 5 hours a week or month.

.Z

 

[ban25]

Certainly these other services are not non-profit. They make their money somewhere and the "peer-to-peer" service is subsidized by the other sources of revenue. Regardless of what others feel the cost to run Xbox Live is, I'm sure we'd all agree that it's not "free" and therefore the cost of it must be accounted for somewhere.

Perhaps you're not clear on the technical details of a peer-to-peer network. It does have a cost associated with it, the cost of your internet access and that of the people you are playing with. The only thing Sony/Gamespy does is run a server with a list of active games -- so they send a few kilobytes of data to each player before they join a game.

This is how it has been done on PCs since the days of DOOM over IHHD, it's how Quake does it, Neverwinter Nights, and yes, for the most part, Xbox Live. The only difference with Live is that MS has somehow convinced people like you that you're getting more with it than you really are.

 

[scooby_dooby]

Perhaps you're not clear on the technical details of a peer-to-peer network. It does have a cost associated with it, the cost of your internet access and that of the people you are playing with. The only thing Sony/Gamespy does is run a server with a list of active games -- so they send a few kilobytes of data to each player before they join a game.

As well as the cost of creating the system, testing and quality assurance and more testing, maintaining & fixing the system, customer support(huge), developer support etc

 

[Sis]

Perhaps you're not clear on the technical details of a peer-to-peer network. It does have a cost associated with it, the cost of your internet access and that of the people you are playing with. The only thing Sony/Gamespy does is run a server with a list of active games -- so they send a few kilobytes of data to each player before they join a game.

This is how it has been done on PCs since the days of DOOM over IHHD, it's how Quake does it, Neverwinter Nights, and yes, for the most part, Xbox Live. The only difference with Live is that MS has somehow convinced people like you that you're getting more with it than you really are.

Since you didn't actually address my point, I need you to clarify your position, so feel free to correct me if I'm misquoting you: "Running Xbox Live costs zero money. And when Sony runs their service, it will also cost zero money."

Otherwise, you are just being obtuse, trying to pretend the cost is "a server". How many team members do you think work for Xbox Live? 30? 40? 150? Multiply whatever figure you come up with by 120,000 per year. That is the minimum cost--a headcount cost only. Of course, then there's support. Billing. Data center costs (the server you speak of).

Now, not all of these people work on the online gaming part--the peer to peer part--but they do work for Xbox Live. Microsoft choose to subsidize the overall cost of Xbox Live based not on console game sales, but on sales of the subscription to the people who want to play online.

Hence, the cost is accounted for somewhere.

 

[Inane_Dork]

To my knowledge, Xbox Live is the only current example of a peer-to-peer gaming service that requires a subscription fee. In other words, it's the exception.

XBL is more than a peer-to-peer gaming service, though. It allows a lot more stuff than that, and some of that stuff isn't restricted to paying customers.

 

[ban25]

If the costs were really as bad as you suggest, companies like Bioware would be out of business and you'd be paying a lot more than $60/year for your online gaming. Let's not overthink this, we're literally talking about a list of IP addresses here. Yes, there is a cost associated with that but it is paid for by the revenues of the game publisher (i.e. Bioware licenses Gamespy to provide a matchmaking service for gamers, and gamers buy a $40 game from Bioware along with two $20 expansions).

Microsoft provides free online matchmaking for the AOE series, the Dungeon Siege series, and more...how can they manage that when they need to charge $60/year on the console side of the business?

Isn't more likely that they don't really need 150 support people paid $120k/year just to support their online matchmaking software? Maybe they farm out their support to a company in India who pays its employees $5/hour. Maybe their server costs don't exceed more than a few hundred dollars a month per server and they are taking advantage of existing assetts for other parts of their multi-billion dollar a year business. Maybe when four million people pay $50 for a game, that's enough revenue to cover the support costs of running some matchmaking servers for this game.

Since you didn't actually address my point, I need you to clarify your position, so feel free to correct me if I'm misquoting you: "Running Xbox Live costs zero money. And when Sony runs their service, it will also cost zero money."

Otherwise, you are just being obtuse, trying to pretend the cost is "a server". How many team members do you think work for Xbox Live? 30? 40? 150? Multiply whatever figure you come up with by 120,000 per year. That is the minimum cost--a headcount cost only. Of course, then there's support. Billing. Data center costs (the server you speak of).

Now, not all of these people work on the online gaming part--the peer to peer part--but they do work for Xbox Live. Microsoft choose to subsidize the overall cost of Xbox Live based not on console game sales, but on sales of the subscription to the people who want to play online.

Hence, the cost is accounted for somewhere.

 

[Sis]

Ok. Deep cleansing, breath. Now then:

Yes, there is a cost associated with that but it is paid for by the revenues of the game publisher

And my original post:

Because Sony doesn't want yet another thing it has to subsidize with software sales?

Also, I didn't say 150 support resources, I said 150 team members for Xbox Live. Given a 2 million person install base across the world, I would be surprised if support is only 150 people strong. However, that's likely contracted out anyway, so it's harder to determine actual cost.