As nice as all the shiny new hardware is, and I am happy that the specs are as nice as they are, it doesn't change the fact that a lot of us are disappointed with the results. It's not because they're similar to a high end machine today it's because they weren't futuristic enough. Where's the solid state drive? Where's the display port capable of running 2560, or even 4k with a full 3d at 120hz, even if displays can't handle it today the graphics cards can and we do expect to be gaming with this for the foreseeable future. Why don't we have the newest standard of wifi which is faster and stronger capable of greater ranges? Why not include the 10gb/s ethernet capability given that cat 6 cable isn't exactly hard to come by and internet speeds are in fact increasing?
For those of you not in the know, HDMI so far is incapable of handling 2560 properly let alone at 120hz meanwhile the displayport which is royalty free is capable of handling it with ease.
Simply put new console hardware takes time, usually 4 years from concept through production which means that in this particular case the designs are already feeling their age given how much has changed in just the last year or two. That's not to say the changes should have been simply ignored though as they had a respectable amount of time to include some very basic components and I for one consider it negligent on their behalf to not consider how the console will behave and be received when it came out knowing what the industry would be like to some extent. Clearly this generation was not designed with longevity in mind, I'd wager to say they'll start designing replacements within a year and this generation of consoles will likely have a very short 5 year life span. I really hope I don't end up eating my words on that last one because they really haven't impressed me and considering another 7 year lifecycle on these consoles just sounds painful.
It sounds like they're trying to do something innovative which I will give them credit for by going for personalization, streaming, vita capabilities with tie in, and all the other goodies they're so proud of, but at the same time I doubt it'll be enough to really set it apart in the long run in a manner that will demand market share. That's what it comes down to in reality is you want a console so awesome even pc gamers look at it and go "I want one" to the extent that people are more than happy to wait 3 days in line for it with their camping gear and have the large number of great exclusives that nobody considers jumping ship, when you have more than 20% of the market dedicated exclusively to your brand you can accomplish a lot and I just don't see that happening with sony. Instead I see this being a shameful split again with even distribution across the board and a lot of people grabbing both consoles at some point, just not really compelling the move into next gen. I'll be happy to sit with my ps3 for a couple extra years and play catch up down the road. Maybe I'll get lucky and by the time I consider picking it up the next will be announced and I'll just grab a few games in the hope they're backwards compatible on the new machines and do it that way.
Speaking of which I'm happy to hear they plan on using their streaming service to solve backward compatibility as that is a big item for me. While it may be true that I don't go back and play really old games that often the fact that I can when I do want to is important as I like to keep my classics, in particular my gaming gems. I was particularly upset by my restriction from playing mgs3, ico, shadow of the colossus, etc more so when I could still play any given ps1 game including those ancient gamesharks without a single problem. I'm interested to see how xbox handles this same problem as honestly Halo is probably the only original xbox title I still have other than maybe morrowind which I have both on the pc, an arcade version and the anniversary edition of halo and yet I do have quite the substantial 360 collection which I would be more than a little cheesed at if I found out I couldn't play any of it on the next xbox or if I found out all my xbla purchases were suddenly worthless.
In the end no amount of griping will really change any of these shortcomings and so as disappointed as I may be with this gen I at least have hope for the future, the future in which sony finally changes their annoying little controller to something more worthy of being in my big hands for hours at a time, honestly why couldn't they just offer me the nice option of changing the shell to an xbox one instead of making me have to void the warranty by doing it myself, because if I ever grab one that's the first thing I'm doing.
Edit:
turns out ps4 will supposedly support 4k, maybe with a new hdmi 2.0 standard?, still I have my reservations on if it's a proper 4k or the bare minimum and to what extend it'll actually be used.
May 24, 2013
May 20, 2013
On the Horizon
Over a century ago a man said "everything that can be invented has" and well.... we all know how wrong he was. I took a moment to consider though just how wrong he was and decided I should elaborate on everything I can think of that has been invented more or less since my grandmothers time. Be prepared, it's quite a list and is in no particular order and is most likely very incomplete and redundant.
the move from party line telephones to individual numbers, rotary phones, touch tone, voip, records, color pictures, personal film reels, vhs, dvd, blu ray, 8 track, cassette, cd, mp3 players, computers from vacuum tube to integrated circuit, the internet and everything to do with it, wifi, bullet trains, TV's both black and white as well as color and subsequent improvements like LCD's, refrigerators, microwaves, toasters, surround sound, possibly popcorn at the very least microwavable popcorn, VIDEO GAMES!!!, stop lights, probably the assembly line and minimum wage, again I'm not so sure how old my grandma really was I want to say born in 1927 but I'm not looking everything up for exact dates, the astronomical advances in medicine not including what I'll count as stand alones like x-rays and MRI's, satellites, possibly pyrex and plastic, hydroponic plant growing, possibly pesticides? at least modern effective ones, jet engines, genetics, the FDA, pasteurization, modern physics, the federal reserve and FIAT currency, solar energy panels, most modern weapons and military use chemicals, and so much more.
Just consider how big a difference the integrated circuit has made, going even from DOS to the various stages of windows, mac, linux, and everything the net has provided in that time from streaming, search engines like google, information repositories like wikipedia, email, twitter, facebook, any other social media, this blog, when it comes down to it look at everything around you and consider how much of it relies on something quite literally invented within the last century. We've come a long way in tech alone and we're going to go a lot further.
As it is right now developing research in FPGA chips even promise to replace CPU's or add new sections to motherboards prompting complete redesign in which we might see processing power explode in ways we can't even properly conceive right now. Just one FPGA chip running at only 25mhz when put to the specialized task it's programmed for can absolutely destroy a CPU at the world record of +8ghz. The beauty of FPGA's is that they can be reprogrammed fairly quickly and in theory could have a series of profiles based on each program you intend to use doing for computational processing what SSD's did for hard drives, redefine what speed is.
Where HDD's use to be rated by rpm's and avg seek time you now have SSD's completely obliterating them in terms of read/write and with no rpm's and no noise and ever increasing capacity, the real test now is IOPS and MTBF, which respectively is operations a second and meantime between failure.
The future of tech is changing so fast that to try and comprehend where we'll be in another century is nearly incomprehensible, and yet I almost bet we still won't have flying cars. The real task will be to keep up with the programming needs to utilize this new found power and speed and provide it to the masses. Hopefully someone will use it to design a new power source for the world that's clean, effective, reusable, renewable, and can be used to completely replace oil in every area and is so cost effective and easy to adopt that by the time the car companies have the first cars out it'll already be everywhere and not using it would be insane. I also can't wait for my personal robot butler with fully functional VI (virtual intelligence).
the move from party line telephones to individual numbers, rotary phones, touch tone, voip, records, color pictures, personal film reels, vhs, dvd, blu ray, 8 track, cassette, cd, mp3 players, computers from vacuum tube to integrated circuit, the internet and everything to do with it, wifi, bullet trains, TV's both black and white as well as color and subsequent improvements like LCD's, refrigerators, microwaves, toasters, surround sound, possibly popcorn at the very least microwavable popcorn, VIDEO GAMES!!!, stop lights, probably the assembly line and minimum wage, again I'm not so sure how old my grandma really was I want to say born in 1927 but I'm not looking everything up for exact dates, the astronomical advances in medicine not including what I'll count as stand alones like x-rays and MRI's, satellites, possibly pyrex and plastic, hydroponic plant growing, possibly pesticides? at least modern effective ones, jet engines, genetics, the FDA, pasteurization, modern physics, the federal reserve and FIAT currency, solar energy panels, most modern weapons and military use chemicals, and so much more.
Just consider how big a difference the integrated circuit has made, going even from DOS to the various stages of windows, mac, linux, and everything the net has provided in that time from streaming, search engines like google, information repositories like wikipedia, email, twitter, facebook, any other social media, this blog, when it comes down to it look at everything around you and consider how much of it relies on something quite literally invented within the last century. We've come a long way in tech alone and we're going to go a lot further.
As it is right now developing research in FPGA chips even promise to replace CPU's or add new sections to motherboards prompting complete redesign in which we might see processing power explode in ways we can't even properly conceive right now. Just one FPGA chip running at only 25mhz when put to the specialized task it's programmed for can absolutely destroy a CPU at the world record of +8ghz. The beauty of FPGA's is that they can be reprogrammed fairly quickly and in theory could have a series of profiles based on each program you intend to use doing for computational processing what SSD's did for hard drives, redefine what speed is.
Where HDD's use to be rated by rpm's and avg seek time you now have SSD's completely obliterating them in terms of read/write and with no rpm's and no noise and ever increasing capacity, the real test now is IOPS and MTBF, which respectively is operations a second and meantime between failure.
The future of tech is changing so fast that to try and comprehend where we'll be in another century is nearly incomprehensible, and yet I almost bet we still won't have flying cars. The real task will be to keep up with the programming needs to utilize this new found power and speed and provide it to the masses. Hopefully someone will use it to design a new power source for the world that's clean, effective, reusable, renewable, and can be used to completely replace oil in every area and is so cost effective and easy to adopt that by the time the car companies have the first cars out it'll already be everywhere and not using it would be insane. I also can't wait for my personal robot butler with fully functional VI (virtual intelligence).
May 15, 2013
Resting
In previous weeks I have been unusually busy and thus my posts were later in the day rather than my standard 5am however as you may have noticed this week I completely missed, that is because unlike previous weeks I actually couldn't make it this week. I had a slight accident while helping someone move and couldn't quite get to a computer to write an update.
For those of you calling it an excuse I should remind you it's a reason as it is logical and it actually prevented me from being able to blog where as an excuse tend to either be illogical or unsatisfactory in that you chose not to do something though you could for a given pretext.
In that time my computer was on loan to a friend and being the wonderful system that it is apparently every cat video he decided to like among other things got a post to my twitter.
On the game front I actually didn't get much work done as I was primarily busy with infrastructure scouting locations for an official office now that I have some funding, placing a few ads, arranging to get equipment and software, a multitude of other things. I really don't remember setting up a business being this hard the last time I made one, so the question is if it's harder because of what it is or am I just stressing trying to make things go smoother and better than before.
I also happened to make a couple starcraft 2 arcade games, one is a revision on the bunker wars game type and the other is a massive hybrid on bunker wars, tug of war, king of the hill, and turret defense. The later of which is actually not yet completed however is substantially far along.
The important principal to know about the revisions is that rather than having to build a different unit each time and upgrade them separately I just merged spawn count into an additional upgrade.
I'm also seriously considering a revision on an old game I used to love making mods of called zergling blood though I see there's quite a repository already perhaps I can distinguish myself enough to make it interesting.
As to words of advice this weak, take it easy sometimes and don't take on more than you can handle, burning yourself out won't help anyone and you tend to work better when you're well rested so take some regular breaks or some time off as you need it, there will always be more work for you when you get back, it's not going anywhere.
For those of you calling it an excuse I should remind you it's a reason as it is logical and it actually prevented me from being able to blog where as an excuse tend to either be illogical or unsatisfactory in that you chose not to do something though you could for a given pretext.
In that time my computer was on loan to a friend and being the wonderful system that it is apparently every cat video he decided to like among other things got a post to my twitter.
On the game front I actually didn't get much work done as I was primarily busy with infrastructure scouting locations for an official office now that I have some funding, placing a few ads, arranging to get equipment and software, a multitude of other things. I really don't remember setting up a business being this hard the last time I made one, so the question is if it's harder because of what it is or am I just stressing trying to make things go smoother and better than before.
I also happened to make a couple starcraft 2 arcade games, one is a revision on the bunker wars game type and the other is a massive hybrid on bunker wars, tug of war, king of the hill, and turret defense. The later of which is actually not yet completed however is substantially far along.
The important principal to know about the revisions is that rather than having to build a different unit each time and upgrade them separately I just merged spawn count into an additional upgrade.
I'm also seriously considering a revision on an old game I used to love making mods of called zergling blood though I see there's quite a repository already perhaps I can distinguish myself enough to make it interesting.
As to words of advice this weak, take it easy sometimes and don't take on more than you can handle, burning yourself out won't help anyone and you tend to work better when you're well rested so take some regular breaks or some time off as you need it, there will always be more work for you when you get back, it's not going anywhere.
May 06, 2013
Understanding Game Laws
This isn't a fine tuned explanation of gaming laws and obviously I'm no expert however I will try to get a broad strokes idea out there that's kind of important for game devs, granted it's targeted for the devs that are working with multiplayer and running servers so probably not so indie but all the same it's important.
Basically Health Information Protection Act (HIPA) has been interpreted by the law to include almost all digital data. The basic concept of this is that just because you own the server doesn't mean you own the data on it. All you really need to know about HIPA itself is that it mandates doctors to keep your records private, it's one of many such laws that guarantee your medical privacy. This might not seem like such a big deal at first however if you stop to consider many recent shutdowns of various servers for games and the upsets that they tend to cause you can then understand some of the very interesting court cases coming up lately. Namely a couple different cases by players of these smaller MMO's out there that insist that the items in their inventory constitute digital property and shutting down the server is tantamount to destruction of that property or by restricting access is theft.
My basic suggestion on avoiding that whole thing is a little thing I'm sure you've heard of called a "terms of service" (TOS). You wonder why they exist and you probably always scroll right to the end of them or blindly click accept and move on with your day. This is the very reason those things tend to exist, because by establishing that all the content of the game including the players characters and contents of those characters are your property and that they're being charged a "rental" fee for access to this content, you pre-emptively avoid this entire scenario. One of the most important things I can stress is investing in a good lawyer preferably one who specializes in video game law or entertainment law to draw up a really good TOS for each game, it will save you all kinds of headache.
Assuming you're also an indie dev like myself and can't quite afford such a lawyer then I can suggest looking at the TOS of existing games and software similar to your own and maybe looking up various "free" legal documents online and try to draw one up yourself. You don't have to force people into wasting time on it if you don't want to, rather you can just put a small message or warning somewhere in an intro for example saying that by playing this game they comply to the TOS and then have a link to the TOS in your main game menu or accompanying documents somewhere. Some games just do a small TOS that has broad strokes statements saying they're not responsible for anything and that you can't sue them for any reason related to the game or it's content and you only see it for a second or so on startup. They're strangely effective even though time has proven that unless you're specific then someone will find some creative way around a broad stroke statement like that.
Thankfully there isn't an overwhelming amount of gaming specific laws out there however it's always a solid investment to look at them and related entertainment laws that might effect you, some of them are regional however most are country wide. Laws however are not the only thing to look for, related cases are also important as interpretations of laws by other "judges" constitute 90% or more of what we consider to be "the law" and judges stick together generally upholding existing rulings and using them as direct deferment for similar cases. For example if the content of some game came up regarding the legality of displaying illegal content and behavior or that displaying this game in public during the display of that illegal content and one judge rules that it's covered under existing law establishing it's protected, or prohibited, or any other ruling then if a similar case comes up where the premise is that showing someone doing illegal drugs then it's likely they would defer to the previous ruling and the case would be resolved quickly.
The bottom line is if you're going to get into gaming from a business standpoint it's important to know your laws and disregarding them will always lead to headache down the road.
Basically Health Information Protection Act (HIPA) has been interpreted by the law to include almost all digital data. The basic concept of this is that just because you own the server doesn't mean you own the data on it. All you really need to know about HIPA itself is that it mandates doctors to keep your records private, it's one of many such laws that guarantee your medical privacy. This might not seem like such a big deal at first however if you stop to consider many recent shutdowns of various servers for games and the upsets that they tend to cause you can then understand some of the very interesting court cases coming up lately. Namely a couple different cases by players of these smaller MMO's out there that insist that the items in their inventory constitute digital property and shutting down the server is tantamount to destruction of that property or by restricting access is theft.
My basic suggestion on avoiding that whole thing is a little thing I'm sure you've heard of called a "terms of service" (TOS). You wonder why they exist and you probably always scroll right to the end of them or blindly click accept and move on with your day. This is the very reason those things tend to exist, because by establishing that all the content of the game including the players characters and contents of those characters are your property and that they're being charged a "rental" fee for access to this content, you pre-emptively avoid this entire scenario. One of the most important things I can stress is investing in a good lawyer preferably one who specializes in video game law or entertainment law to draw up a really good TOS for each game, it will save you all kinds of headache.
Assuming you're also an indie dev like myself and can't quite afford such a lawyer then I can suggest looking at the TOS of existing games and software similar to your own and maybe looking up various "free" legal documents online and try to draw one up yourself. You don't have to force people into wasting time on it if you don't want to, rather you can just put a small message or warning somewhere in an intro for example saying that by playing this game they comply to the TOS and then have a link to the TOS in your main game menu or accompanying documents somewhere. Some games just do a small TOS that has broad strokes statements saying they're not responsible for anything and that you can't sue them for any reason related to the game or it's content and you only see it for a second or so on startup. They're strangely effective even though time has proven that unless you're specific then someone will find some creative way around a broad stroke statement like that.
Thankfully there isn't an overwhelming amount of gaming specific laws out there however it's always a solid investment to look at them and related entertainment laws that might effect you, some of them are regional however most are country wide. Laws however are not the only thing to look for, related cases are also important as interpretations of laws by other "judges" constitute 90% or more of what we consider to be "the law" and judges stick together generally upholding existing rulings and using them as direct deferment for similar cases. For example if the content of some game came up regarding the legality of displaying illegal content and behavior or that displaying this game in public during the display of that illegal content and one judge rules that it's covered under existing law establishing it's protected, or prohibited, or any other ruling then if a similar case comes up where the premise is that showing someone doing illegal drugs then it's likely they would defer to the previous ruling and the case would be resolved quickly.
The bottom line is if you're going to get into gaming from a business standpoint it's important to know your laws and disregarding them will always lead to headache down the road.
April 29, 2013
Respect The Classics
There's a lot of value in some of the older titles. It's not always just about the newest game on the block. It's easy to get overwhelmed with endless new titles to the point you hardly ever finish a game any more and it's true both as a player and an indie developer. Take some time this week to go back and play a game from a few years ago, maybe something you've been meaning to get around to. Then go back further and play a real classic, it doesn't have to be some grand award winner everyone remembers.
I recently broke out an old copy of my original final fantasy tactics on the PSX and was surprised at what an amazingly good game it still is. It really made me sit back and look at my archive to wonder what other gaming gems might deserve another play through. If your collection is pretty sparse feel free to borrow a friends or if you don't have any try to find a store around you other than gamestop that might still sell the classics and try to pick up a SNES and Zelda for it, or an n64 and Zelda, really most zelda titles hold up pretty well I've found. If you simply can't find anything in it's original form cheat and play it with an emulator or even modern day replicas like tetris on facebook.
Emulators can give old games new life in very creative ways as well, imagine playing super mario bros with link from zelda or with samus from metroid, there are emulators out there that do exactly this. There are also rom mods that completely change the game one in particular practically turns super mario bros into I Want To Be The Guy.
Note while you play the kinds of struggles developers had making these games and how things have really changed. For example cartridge games never had loading screens because of the overall small file sizes and fast transfer rates provided by working with rom chips, something which went away with the invent of compact discs. Note how even though the music is simplistic it sticks with you so well. More accurately you probably remember the music because it's simplistic but it also came out of necessity as full orchestral pieces weren't possible on older hardware.
Back in the day the lack of graphical power necessitated powerful and innovative gameplay. That's not to say creativity has been lost merely shifted around to adapt. Consider how you would make a game today under the same restrictions and see where it takes you.
I recently broke out an old copy of my original final fantasy tactics on the PSX and was surprised at what an amazingly good game it still is. It really made me sit back and look at my archive to wonder what other gaming gems might deserve another play through. If your collection is pretty sparse feel free to borrow a friends or if you don't have any try to find a store around you other than gamestop that might still sell the classics and try to pick up a SNES and Zelda for it, or an n64 and Zelda, really most zelda titles hold up pretty well I've found. If you simply can't find anything in it's original form cheat and play it with an emulator or even modern day replicas like tetris on facebook.
Emulators can give old games new life in very creative ways as well, imagine playing super mario bros with link from zelda or with samus from metroid, there are emulators out there that do exactly this. There are also rom mods that completely change the game one in particular practically turns super mario bros into I Want To Be The Guy.
Note while you play the kinds of struggles developers had making these games and how things have really changed. For example cartridge games never had loading screens because of the overall small file sizes and fast transfer rates provided by working with rom chips, something which went away with the invent of compact discs. Note how even though the music is simplistic it sticks with you so well. More accurately you probably remember the music because it's simplistic but it also came out of necessity as full orchestral pieces weren't possible on older hardware.
Back in the day the lack of graphical power necessitated powerful and innovative gameplay. That's not to say creativity has been lost merely shifted around to adapt. Consider how you would make a game today under the same restrictions and see where it takes you.
April 23, 2013
My take on the "always on" situation
I was thinking about it and I decided to elaborate on the subject of "always on" which has been a big topic on the net recently.
I can't quite call it a debate as it's fairly one sided. I say this because in the end the consumer is always right and the consumers don't want to be force fed any more nonsense liked 3d, motion controls, full multimedia system replacements, or always-on consoles and games. Granted there is a time and place for most of these things. I would wager to say gamers would appreciate 3d if it were done right but they might not want it for all games, the same I would say to be true of motion controls especially for some party games but who in their right mind would want these motion controls for complex intricate systems, especially without 3d and more so without accurate response or feedback. I can't remember ever seeing a tech demo in which motion controls actually worked like they were supposed to and even when they do work with games it's never anything terribly complex. Even worse are the games that tack it on after the fact and force you to use it. Moving on as a gamer, and again only speaking for myself, I don't want my xbox or playstation ever being in control of my other multimedia services. I don't need or want it to replace my cable providers box, that of course would be if I still had cable tv... which I don't. I have my pc for all my multimedia and my consoles are certainly not about to replace my pc. I could easily be in the minority on this one though, perhaps something like steam's big picture mode when adapted to include various tv apps could be a nice addition and so I would caution that if done properly it would be an acceptable option to include so long as I have control over it. However I find it ridiculous to design or develop a gaming console around music, tv, and social media, just down right ludicrous. In that scenario I could also then see always-on to some extent but even then it just seems horribly intrusive and unnecessary. Outside of that though I don't see any other scenario that could justify always-on other than what everyone is saying it's for so far which is DRM which in all honesty infuriates me to no end.
It may be that I'm too harsh or not seeing the other side of this however if you'll continue reading I think you'll find it worth the time. I've read time and again how developers somehow think piracy = lost sales. In the case of a game like world of goo this almost seems true. The number of pirated copies was shameful and the game hadn't sold nearly as well as it would have projecting the numbers. That may have changed since the last time I read about it but at the time it was one of those things I had to seriously read because I couldn't fathom it. I've seen other cases though where piracy helped increase sales. From my experience I tend not to buy a game without having at least some kind of trial or demo of it first. Which sadly all signs point to making a demo for a game being a very bad thing, I haven't read a study in which a demo for a game didn't decrease it's sales / pre-orders etc let alone increase them. This is also part of how the misconception came to play. On my end though I'll admit to having absolutely pirated world of goo, though not until after reading the article about it's so called "losses". After having played it a little I turned right around and bought it. Had it not been for a pirated version of it I absolutely would've never bought it. More often than not if I have no other way of finding out about a game I resort to finding some other way of playing it, usually renting through a service like gamefly for example. I read reviews and find which games I still want to play after reading those reviews and then I look up vids of people playing or first impressions those sorts of things. Sometimes that's enough to convince me to buy it though often it ends up leaving me so I want to play but I'm leery about spending the money on it knowing it could turn out horribly in spite of what I've seen thus far. In the end I tend to only end up buying great games I know for a fact I'll enjoy because I've already played them a little.
One of the big points on games for me though is that I can play them when and usually where I want within reason. I don't mind connecting once in a while for validation or something however an always-on scenario means if I'm ever without internet even for a short while it can ruin my entire experience. It might not even be that scenario it could just be that the game company is the ones having the problem. I end up being frustrated that the product I bought and paid for is somehow unavailable to me for some reason and ends up essentially being an inferior product to a pirated version. What happens then in ten years or so when the company decides to shut down those particular validation servers or re-purpose them for something else. The idea that eventually I just won't be allowed access to what I consider to be my property is preposterous. For those of you that want to argue timeframe, you're missing the bigger picture. It doesn't matter if it's 20 years, 50 years, or even a century from now. Maybe I want to pass down my game collection to my grand kids that end up wanting to play it. Right now I can break out my old nintendo and put in super mario bros and guess what, it works fine, no hassle of any kind other than maybe a little cleaning and classic jiggling to get it to load right. This will likely still be true in another 20 years just as it's also true of my old atari and pac man which actually works better than my nintendo come to think of it. Granted most games today will not endure in the same manner as even if we still have these games that far down the road it's unlikely we'll want to play them for a multitude of reasons. The point being though that at least it's an option.
It just may come to pass that if always-on becomes a standard then the new standard for me will be to find pirated copies of products I buy just so I can avoid dealing with such restrictions. As to the rumors of the next xbox being an always-on system I would say that it is probably the case simply because microsoft has not yet openly denied it to my knowledge. You would think given the backlash concerning it if it wasn't even an issue they'd have just come out by now and said that the console isn't even always-on required. Playstation on the other hand knows better. After the massive downtime they had they know that if they made the ps4 an always on system they'd be declaring bankruptcy by the end of the year if not the month. Simply put if xbox is going to be always-on required to play any games then we'd all better abandon ship because if an attack like what happened to Sony happened to the xbox you wouldn't be able to play any game at all not just being cut off from multiplayer and in that scenario I don't doubt there'd be a few offices burned to the ground.
I could probably write several additional articles on the subject, rather than doing so I'll just summarize that I don't see any scenario where always-on should be a requirement and I see a very limited few situations where it's even beneficial at all, it's a significant dentriment and should seriously be completely avoided at this point in time. That's just if you're in a country with a decent network backbone like America, Europe, Japan, etc. If you're in a country where the backbone is weak or you live in an area away from the broadband then you should be running away from always-on like your life depended on it. Granted my real concern is not with your connection rather the companies connection as Sim City clearly proved. Which I will add that EA must've been drinking the worlds largest keg of retard juice to do some of the nonsense they pulled with that game, and if you haven't gotten it yet don't bother just pick up sim city 4 it's a better game anyway. If you really want to punish EA feel free to grab anno 2077 or cities xl 2013, to my knowledge anno also uses a resource system which the new Sim City seems to have copied....
On one last side note I will say that while I don't like to speculate on consoles until I start seeing some games for them beyond launch titles I will say that I'm probably going to be sitting this round of consoles out and rather just picking up a new graphics card and some games, it'll cost about the same and I'll be better off for it. If I do pick up a console based on what I know right now it'll probably be a ps4 but even so right now it's far from selling me on it.
I can't quite call it a debate as it's fairly one sided. I say this because in the end the consumer is always right and the consumers don't want to be force fed any more nonsense liked 3d, motion controls, full multimedia system replacements, or always-on consoles and games. Granted there is a time and place for most of these things. I would wager to say gamers would appreciate 3d if it were done right but they might not want it for all games, the same I would say to be true of motion controls especially for some party games but who in their right mind would want these motion controls for complex intricate systems, especially without 3d and more so without accurate response or feedback. I can't remember ever seeing a tech demo in which motion controls actually worked like they were supposed to and even when they do work with games it's never anything terribly complex. Even worse are the games that tack it on after the fact and force you to use it. Moving on as a gamer, and again only speaking for myself, I don't want my xbox or playstation ever being in control of my other multimedia services. I don't need or want it to replace my cable providers box, that of course would be if I still had cable tv... which I don't. I have my pc for all my multimedia and my consoles are certainly not about to replace my pc. I could easily be in the minority on this one though, perhaps something like steam's big picture mode when adapted to include various tv apps could be a nice addition and so I would caution that if done properly it would be an acceptable option to include so long as I have control over it. However I find it ridiculous to design or develop a gaming console around music, tv, and social media, just down right ludicrous. In that scenario I could also then see always-on to some extent but even then it just seems horribly intrusive and unnecessary. Outside of that though I don't see any other scenario that could justify always-on other than what everyone is saying it's for so far which is DRM which in all honesty infuriates me to no end.
It may be that I'm too harsh or not seeing the other side of this however if you'll continue reading I think you'll find it worth the time. I've read time and again how developers somehow think piracy = lost sales. In the case of a game like world of goo this almost seems true. The number of pirated copies was shameful and the game hadn't sold nearly as well as it would have projecting the numbers. That may have changed since the last time I read about it but at the time it was one of those things I had to seriously read because I couldn't fathom it. I've seen other cases though where piracy helped increase sales. From my experience I tend not to buy a game without having at least some kind of trial or demo of it first. Which sadly all signs point to making a demo for a game being a very bad thing, I haven't read a study in which a demo for a game didn't decrease it's sales / pre-orders etc let alone increase them. This is also part of how the misconception came to play. On my end though I'll admit to having absolutely pirated world of goo, though not until after reading the article about it's so called "losses". After having played it a little I turned right around and bought it. Had it not been for a pirated version of it I absolutely would've never bought it. More often than not if I have no other way of finding out about a game I resort to finding some other way of playing it, usually renting through a service like gamefly for example. I read reviews and find which games I still want to play after reading those reviews and then I look up vids of people playing or first impressions those sorts of things. Sometimes that's enough to convince me to buy it though often it ends up leaving me so I want to play but I'm leery about spending the money on it knowing it could turn out horribly in spite of what I've seen thus far. In the end I tend to only end up buying great games I know for a fact I'll enjoy because I've already played them a little.
One of the big points on games for me though is that I can play them when and usually where I want within reason. I don't mind connecting once in a while for validation or something however an always-on scenario means if I'm ever without internet even for a short while it can ruin my entire experience. It might not even be that scenario it could just be that the game company is the ones having the problem. I end up being frustrated that the product I bought and paid for is somehow unavailable to me for some reason and ends up essentially being an inferior product to a pirated version. What happens then in ten years or so when the company decides to shut down those particular validation servers or re-purpose them for something else. The idea that eventually I just won't be allowed access to what I consider to be my property is preposterous. For those of you that want to argue timeframe, you're missing the bigger picture. It doesn't matter if it's 20 years, 50 years, or even a century from now. Maybe I want to pass down my game collection to my grand kids that end up wanting to play it. Right now I can break out my old nintendo and put in super mario bros and guess what, it works fine, no hassle of any kind other than maybe a little cleaning and classic jiggling to get it to load right. This will likely still be true in another 20 years just as it's also true of my old atari and pac man which actually works better than my nintendo come to think of it. Granted most games today will not endure in the same manner as even if we still have these games that far down the road it's unlikely we'll want to play them for a multitude of reasons. The point being though that at least it's an option.
It just may come to pass that if always-on becomes a standard then the new standard for me will be to find pirated copies of products I buy just so I can avoid dealing with such restrictions. As to the rumors of the next xbox being an always-on system I would say that it is probably the case simply because microsoft has not yet openly denied it to my knowledge. You would think given the backlash concerning it if it wasn't even an issue they'd have just come out by now and said that the console isn't even always-on required. Playstation on the other hand knows better. After the massive downtime they had they know that if they made the ps4 an always on system they'd be declaring bankruptcy by the end of the year if not the month. Simply put if xbox is going to be always-on required to play any games then we'd all better abandon ship because if an attack like what happened to Sony happened to the xbox you wouldn't be able to play any game at all not just being cut off from multiplayer and in that scenario I don't doubt there'd be a few offices burned to the ground.
I could probably write several additional articles on the subject, rather than doing so I'll just summarize that I don't see any scenario where always-on should be a requirement and I see a very limited few situations where it's even beneficial at all, it's a significant dentriment and should seriously be completely avoided at this point in time. That's just if you're in a country with a decent network backbone like America, Europe, Japan, etc. If you're in a country where the backbone is weak or you live in an area away from the broadband then you should be running away from always-on like your life depended on it. Granted my real concern is not with your connection rather the companies connection as Sim City clearly proved. Which I will add that EA must've been drinking the worlds largest keg of retard juice to do some of the nonsense they pulled with that game, and if you haven't gotten it yet don't bother just pick up sim city 4 it's a better game anyway. If you really want to punish EA feel free to grab anno 2077 or cities xl 2013, to my knowledge anno also uses a resource system which the new Sim City seems to have copied....
On one last side note I will say that while I don't like to speculate on consoles until I start seeing some games for them beyond launch titles I will say that I'm probably going to be sitting this round of consoles out and rather just picking up a new graphics card and some games, it'll cost about the same and I'll be better off for it. If I do pick up a console based on what I know right now it'll probably be a ps4 but even so right now it's far from selling me on it.
April 19, 2013
Special Friday post
Thursday was a great day and Friday has only just begun. Sadly I think I'll be staying inside Friday because it's a nightmare already.
Thursday I attended an award ceremony, and a masquerade where we were served swedish meatballs and baklava as well as a goodie bag. My day went on to include a wet T-shirt contest and a few other good times.
Then Friday hit at the stroke of midnight like a freight train crushing my cloud 9 reality. It started innocent enough with a little turnabout where after the wet t-shirt contest was done it became "male review" which equates to male strippers so I decide I might want to move down the road, one of my friends that was with me had an emergency so I could then see the warning signs. I started wrapping things up as quickly as I could to get home before it got worse. Right when I was less than a mile from home I get a flat tire and a severe rain storm with hurricane winds. Low and behold I find myself somehow missing my jack from my trunk and knowing exactly where it is I have to run all the way home get it, go back to the car and change the tire in the storm. For those of you thinking "ah just leave it" I would like to remind you that this is Flint, if I didn't do it now I wouldn't have the chance to do it later. Here I am now drying off and informing you that Friday is not a day worth leaving the comfort of your bed for, go back to sleep and save yourself from the day because if it keeps on at the rate it's on I wager to say that by the end of the day we'll be on the verge of armageddon / ragnarok / w/e you want to call the apocalypse.
Thursday I attended an award ceremony, and a masquerade where we were served swedish meatballs and baklava as well as a goodie bag. My day went on to include a wet T-shirt contest and a few other good times.
Then Friday hit at the stroke of midnight like a freight train crushing my cloud 9 reality. It started innocent enough with a little turnabout where after the wet t-shirt contest was done it became "male review" which equates to male strippers so I decide I might want to move down the road, one of my friends that was with me had an emergency so I could then see the warning signs. I started wrapping things up as quickly as I could to get home before it got worse. Right when I was less than a mile from home I get a flat tire and a severe rain storm with hurricane winds. Low and behold I find myself somehow missing my jack from my trunk and knowing exactly where it is I have to run all the way home get it, go back to the car and change the tire in the storm. For those of you thinking "ah just leave it" I would like to remind you that this is Flint, if I didn't do it now I wouldn't have the chance to do it later. Here I am now drying off and informing you that Friday is not a day worth leaving the comfort of your bed for, go back to sleep and save yourself from the day because if it keeps on at the rate it's on I wager to say that by the end of the day we'll be on the verge of armageddon / ragnarok / w/e you want to call the apocalypse.
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