X-BOX ONE

[SpikeNard]

Originally Posted by canprime

What happens if your disc gets scratched or damaged to the point where it can't play?

I already thought about that. It's on you, at least the trust is on yourself versus trusting a company with your property. People usually take good care of their stuff. And love the fact they actually own it with no restrictions, or worries.

[Beechy]

I have no worries or restrictions.

[ImNotThePro]

Originally Posted by canprime

What happens if your disc gets scratched or damaged to the point where it can't play?

If you're talking about Xbox 360 games, then you have to replace it. If you're talking about Xbox One games, well I don't think the discs will get to that point because they are now (finally) on Blu-ray discs. Blu-ray discs are MUCH more resilient to scratching and unless you toss your games out the window after you are done with them, damaged discs shouldn't be a problem.

[Autobot_Lancer]

Guys don't feed the trolls

[Matrix_Holder]

Originally Posted by Beechy

I have no worries or restrictions.

You cant lend your game to a buddy, can't trade it in and can't play it on a friends system for a game night with digital games, those are restrictions.

[Shepp]

A fact we have to remember is that online distribution platforms like Steam and Origin still use brick-and-mortar stores.

You buy a copy of Half-Life 2 or Mass Effect 3 from somewhere like BestBuy, and install them on your computer. The disc is basically just a quick unpatched installation.

You still have to install Steam or Origin in order to play them, and the code gets linked to your one account. You cannot install those games to another account, you can't sell it or give it away (unless you bought it as a gift in the first place), and you can't let a friend borrow it. They become just an obsolete version of the game once that installation code has been entered.

You CAN logout of one system, and login to another, download the games fresh, and play them on the other system (providing the online distributor still exists and your account isn't banned). You can have multiple accounts on the same system, but you can't play games from one account on a different account, despite the fact that the game's already installed.

You can't play the game or anything without the online distributor, even with a physical copy, as demonstrated by EA's Origin client running the newer SimCity game.

And yet.... They STILL have brick-and-mortar distributing. They can't avoid it. Most people don't buy stuff online. Most people don't have an account with these online distributors like Steam and Origin (though the numbers are growing).

The PC gaming community has had to deal with a number of the XB1's issues for years. To cope with the downsides, great online distributors like Steam have regular sales and giveaways. They want to make things easier for the consumer so that they have more consumers.

But then they didn't have to develop the hardware. Since Microsoft "loses out" on the R&D to make the XB1, the games for XB1 are priced more expensive than they really should be by taking a larger cut. In exchange, the game developers have an easier time by working with a specific set of console hardware and console OS software with specific console drivers that rarely change.

This is where Microsoft will lose out on their proprietary online distribution system for XB1. They can't afford to have the kind of sales like Steam does simply because they have to make back the money used to develop the system. So instead of a new release being priced at $49.99, Microsoft's gotta charge $69.99. And after 6 months, they can't or won't drop the price or have a crazy sale, because they still need to recover the hardware costs. Plus, they have to keep the price the same as the brick-and-mortar stores so they don't piss off the retailers like BestBuy or Wal-Mart or whatever.

This might be a big reason that retail stores have an absolute crappy selection of PC games. And the ones they do have are ridiculously overpriced and old.

I mean, seriously.... Matrix: Path of Neo for $39.95? wtf? Wasn't that out in like 2004 or something?
Anyways, PC games have gone so far into online distribution that they've scorned retailers, so selection is crappy or overpriced. In a way, this is good for online distribution since the added selection and lower cost compared to retail brings in more people. But they still need that "gateway" retail purchase.

Consoles can't afford that. They will sorely need the brick-and-mortar stores to sell their hardware consoles. If not, they're dead in the water. So consoles have to cater to the brick-and-mortar stores as distributors.

/insane ranting

[Beechy]

Originally Posted by Matrix_Holder

You cant lend your game to a buddy, can't trade it in and can't play it on a friends system for a game night with digital games, those are restrictions.

I just log in on their system and redownload it. They just can't play it when I'm not there. That's a restriction on them.

[SpikeNard]

Originally Posted by Shepp

You buy a copy of Half-Life 2 or Mass Effect 3 from somewhere like BestBuy, and install them on your computer. The disc is basically just a quick unpatched installation.

You still have to install Steam or Origin in order to play them, and the code gets linked to your one account. You cannot install those games to another account, you can't sell it or give it away (unless you bought it as a gift in the first place), and you can't let a friend borrow it. They become just an obsolete version of the game once that installation code has been entered.

You CAN logout of one system, and login to another, download the games fresh, and play them on the other system (providing the online distributor still exists and your account isn't banned). You can have multiple accounts on the same system, but you can't play games from one account on a different account, despite the fact that the game's already installed.

You can't play the game or anything without the online distributor, even with a physical copy, as demonstrated by EA's Origin client running the newer SimCity game.

Yes, brings back memories of installing half life 2. I played the game offline, altering the exe just to play it offline. It worked most of the time. But I remember there was a rare time, when I was playing the game, a dialogue box popped up saying, it said "Error: connecting to steam" Or the error message was something similar to that, I can't remember the exact wording. But it closed my game!

But it totally pissed me off. That's not where I want to see consoles going, it should just do an official disc check in the system. Perfect piracy control. If I were to buy a PC game, that was single player, and it forced me to login to an online account before I could play it. I would just literally hack the game. Because I wouldn't put up with that.

Originally Posted by Shepp

This is where Microsoft will lose out on their proprietary online distribution system for XB1. They can't afford to have the kind of sales like Steam does simply because they have to make back the money used to develop the system. So instead of a new release being priced at $49.99, Microsoft's gotta charge $69.99. And after 6 months, they can't or won't drop the price or have a crazy sale, because they still need to recover the hardware costs. Plus, they have to keep the price the same as the brick-and-mortar stores so they don't piss off the retailers like BestBuy or Wal-Mart or whatever.

This is very interesting, because before I read this. I found an interview where the exact question was asked if there was going to be sales on xbox one games since steam has lower prices. Larry hryb said "absolutely there is a infrastructure for it." And he was bragging about the xbox 360 sales. But his answer was "I can't say there is going to be sales on day 1, I mean the console is not even out yet." He liked dodging most of the other good questions, of course. As to say, xbox one is moving to the future, and it's a connective console, and Angry Joe's response to that was, but it limits it. Then Larry hryb says, "oh it doesn't because the experience of giving you a game on the other side, is that limiting it?" My reaction to that was, I'm like what? You are placing restrictions on people buying the physical disc so they can't play it as much as they want without having to do online checks or it permanently disables their games on the system, it has nothing to do with drm policies. You could still have drm as an option

When angry joe asked him, "I know it's really easy for you to disable the 24 hour check", and at that point Larry hryb takes the microphone and makes a very rude sarcastic answer, "do you? Are you on the development team?"

Yeah, like you need to be on a development team to know you can disable restrictions. It's ironic because they decided to remove the restrictions anyways. Along, with everything else(they supposedly planned that made xbox one have the advantage of the future)

I find it funny it. The damage is still done. They still had an idea to do this, they planned on it, they defended it, and according to them, people were still willing to buy it. And among others, people that wanted the xbox one without restrictions continually complained to them about it. Which I'm led to believe that apparently stopped it. Or I'm led to believe that xbox one sales weren't as great because of competition, maybe that was part of it also. Because I don't think they care about feedback(maybe a little), because they look at business first, and if business says otherwise, they would have done it. I don't know for sure. But I think it had to with what you said, about competing with steam for prices, and then competing with PS4.

Even though xbox 360 was on number 4 on amazon, for every one xbox 360 sold, there were 7 more ps4s.

I think they also did it because of the possibility, there just trying to get people to ease into it. So they can change it later with a simple update.

Because I read information from this article:

http://www.vg247.com/2013/06/20/xbox...-not-the-core/

"And remember, Microsoft can shift these policies as it likes. Mattrick’s note applies to the Xbox One at launch, not necessarily the Xbox One in a year or three or five. Mark my words, we’ll be circling back and having this conversation again soon: always-online is coming, and the shift from disc-based to digital-only software — as well as the question of whether we ought to be able to resell the latter in some form — is inevitable."

Which is a sick thing to do, but they can potentially do it. They can have some update along in the future that renders your xbox one with these restrictions (24 hour online checks or your console won't plays games permanently), or you can try to avoid updates. That is what I mean as to the damage is still done. I still don't agree with any article that states systems won't have disc based systems in the future. In Microsoft's mind they think always online is the future. I still don't know why, logically how that makes sense. You don't need an online connection to play a single player game. It's a restriction. And I can believe people don't want to use steam either for that very reason(when it comes to single player games). It doesn't mean people don't have online connection. It's even more of a restriction to disable a system to play games forever if you don't do a certain online check. Online is the future of them of restricting people (their future, for their personal gain). Not the future of someone owning a console just to play single player games.

[Matrix_Holder]

Originally Posted by Beechy

I just log in on their system and redownload it. They just can't play it when I'm not there. That's a restriction on them.

but you cannot borrow one of their games, that's a restriction on you. restriction FTW!

[Beechy]

I usually already own the same game.