For all those who have written too extensively and/or quickly for me to properly quote. For eastmen and blakjedi. Alphawolf and Scott_Arm. Throw in Cranky for good measure. I suppose I am the "whiner", the "forum warrior" "the one who was never going to buy it and now compains about Kinect". I am one of those whom you have extensively complained about that was party to getting MS to change it policy back to the" 1970's." For the points being made that MS was making the Model T when consumers wanted a faster horse and better buggy whips. Ms wasn't making the model T to my eyes. It was making the Corvair, the Edsel, the Smart Car.
For any arguing that we do not own, should not own, and should not be able to resell our own physical property, then kindly tell me why Gamestop is allowed to operate? How about Redbox? Ebay? Garage sales? Craigslist? No, don't guess, I will just give you this one for free. Hint, it is not a lack of an enforcement measure. As has been shown it is not a lack of legal backing. Pray tell, what do you think happens when Joe Sixpack, Molly Sprinkles and their 2.4 "whining, entitled, neogaf" children suddenly find out they are not allowed to buy or sell their used paperbacks, their movies, their video games? Those same people that are a large part of driving the demand only to be dismissed as morons. Because the instant that kind of enforcement is even attempted you can bet your shiny red ass that the time it takes to have those precious IP laws changed is going to be measured in weeks if not days. The SOPA outrage would look miniscule in comparison.
The suggestion that those of us who opposed MS's policies are a bunch of clueless whiners who understand nothing of the gaming industry is laughable on its face. The "forum warriors", the ten of thousands out of the millions and millions of people classified as gamers. We who attend or scramble to watch live watch events like E3, who claw around for youtube segments from the GDC, who frequent forums like Beyond 3d looking for informed opinions about hardware and software, about intent and direction and possibility. We are now apparently the uninformed morons who killed some great march into the future. We, the informed and involved consumer, the "vocal but meaningless minority" are now apparently the enemy of progress. In one breath the complainers are a bunch of clueless journalists who only use Apple products and the next we are luddites tossing our shoes into the digital machinary that represent the future.
MS held a launch party centered on an interactive overlay for live television.
MS had the balls to phrase the new restrictions on lending or trading games as some great new feature.
MS announced they will be granting publishers the option to "allow" us to trade or resell our games at the publishers discretion. How do we all feel about Ubisoft, EA, Activision and Sega having that kind of control? Always subject to change without notice of course. I would say how "we" feel about that possibility has been amply demonstrated.
It was MS who took a games console, decided that gamers will not be their core demographic anymore, and tossed us to the side now that we had served our purpose as a living room trojan horse.
MS attached an expensive, always on camera system that adds substantially to the system cost without an equivalent benefit to games. A successor to a camera system known for its useless and annoying nature when applied to gaming. One for which the few uses which have been shown are limited to small children or dance games. Do they think we have forgotten those painful reveals of actors on stage making absolute fools of themselves attemtping to throw a football or control a floating raft to pick up coins? The gaming community had already become skeptical and jaded regarding Kinect only to find out it is now required and always on. Just in time for the NSA to get held up as the best example for the conspiracy theorists to keep their tinfoil hats. Only months after arstechnica runs an article on hackers breaking into peoples laptops to use the camera for their own twittering mischief. (I am considering the microphone elements separately because they do have uses, demonstrated uses that work well, and it is a very minor portion of the cost of Kinect 2.0).
It was MS who announced that game rentals will not be available at launch. They did not trot out the CEO of Redbox to say its is coming, that details were being worked out, that games would be available for rental at x price. They did not announce a digital rental system with attendant pricing structure. They did not announce a Netflix like alternative for games. In fact, they had to be asked by a jounralist about this possibilty and replied with "That is a possibility." They did not even have the forethought to have something in the works and be able to state "It is coming."
It was MS who tried to sneak a more detailed press release about their used game policy out just days before E3 in hopes that signal would be lost in the noise of E3.
It was MS who failed utterly to bring front and center the 10 friends and access to your digital library feature to the forefront. Before we even get to whether or not that was actually going to take place in practice, and with what restrictions that were also probably to be left "up to the publishers" and "subject to change without notice".
It was a creative director at MS who told us to "deal with it" when the leaks were coming fast and hard about MS requiring an online connection to function. A connection that later was detailed to be a check in system whereby failure to connect every 24 hours would result in your video games becoming unplayable.
It was MS who said "Let them eat cake!". Excuse me, "We have a product for that, it's called the 360".
MS decided to they needed 8gb of RAM to support a slew of non-gaming centric social features, the result of which proved to be a system with a significant reduction in potential gaming centric performance.
It was MS who then priced their system at 500$. A full 100$ above and beyond their competitor. A competitor that has measureably better hardware.
It was MS who failed to show how their system would expand your ability to play games across platforms. There was no demo of title being played on the Xbox and then being paused only to instantly resume on another as you were forced to change screens.
It is MS who keeps simple services such as Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon Instant behind their paywall in yet another slimy attempt to force us into paying for Gold.
It is MS who has talked up their "Cloud" services as some great panacea for their basic hardware failure. Yet another buzzword for which they have demonstrated somewhere between little and no practical benefit to gamers. When they show something that has not been done before, then I will take notice. Until then it is another bullshit marketing term trotted out to confuse the uninformed.
MS could have announced that digital versions would cost less since you cannot resell them. Perhaps even stating that retail disc AAA games would be $60 at launch while the digital versions would be $40. MS could have introduced the head of a major publisher who would state "No more independent bullshit DRM, no more Bullshit added online or needless online multiplayer content designed to be a DRM in sheeps clothing." But MS didn't do that.
And no, if MS would have removed the mandatory Kinect, focused more on the games centric hardware and dropped the DRM requirements it would not have been a PS3. Then the differences would have come down to the games, the price(s), or which controller you prefer. The idea that a gesture sensing camera, when it works, is somehow going to offer "innovative" new gaming experiences is false until proven otherwise. It is false based upon the history to date and the complete lack of a live demonstration showing it making a game experience better. It is false because MS has spent all its consumer goodwill built up over the past 12 years in spite of fiascos like the RROD.
No I will not be forgetting what MS tried to do. Even after their policy 180. If I buy an Xbox One it will be with a trace of shame and small hope that no one I know see me with it.
