lol @ people looking serious over specs with next gen consoles. if one thing we should know by now they mean nothing. look at ps3's cell processor or whatever it was called or ps2 specs compared to dreamcast specs. I could go on forever.
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lol @ people looking serious over specs with next gen consoles. if one thing we should know by now they mean nothing. look at ps3's cell processor or whatever it was called or ps2 specs compared to dreamcast specs. I could go on forever.
"Lol" indeed @ the blind devotion to an expensive trinket that is using old tech and doesn't even have anything new gameplay wise to show for it. Only Microsoft is a megalomaniacal megacorp? That would require the historical memory of a goldfish. As I have pointed out recently, Sony takes credit for putting Sega out of the hardware business. Sony bought Psygnosis and turned them into a sequel factory only to eventually rename them and shut them down. Sony paid Core to make nothing but Tomb Raider sequels exclusive to the PS1 (and PC), causing the real talent behind Core to leave the company. Sony shut down Lik Sang so they could sell region exclusive games in Europe. Sony sued Bleem! out of existence even though all of the court rulings fell in Bleem!'s favor. Sony paid off Warner just to shut down HD-DVD. The list actually does go on and on.
When I think about what is wrong with corporations I think of Sony first, then Intel, then Apple and Microsoft and EA and Activision. What pisses me off the most is that Sega is acting just like them today, buying studios and then shuttering them as soon as their most recent game fails to sell millions.
You make it sound like Sega has only recently behaving this way and were somehow better than Nintendo/Sony/Microsoft etc before now, which is untrue. If you look back at when Sega was signing up publishers for the Megadrive/Genesis they were intent on copying Nintendo's restrictive licencing terms eg Sega maintaining absolute control of cartridge manufacturing for 3rd party games and limiting the number of titles that 3rd parties could release and also imposing similarly exhorbitant licensing fees per cartridge sold. Both Atari/Tengen and Electronic Arts were able to reverse engineer the Genesis cartridges and manufacture their own without infringing on any of Sega's patents. Atari Games/Tengen started selling Genesis games without signed Sega's agreement and Sega turned round and sued the crap out of Atari Games/Tengen.Quote:
Originally Posted by sheath
EA also announced that they were going to start releasing games for the Genesis but were able to use their reverse engineered cartridge designs to their advantage by persuading Sega to issue EA a more fair and less restrictive agreement. Sega proved right there that they were willing to be every bit as unfair and monopolistic as Nintendo, what would of happened if no other challengers had come to compete with Sega and Nintendo? The answer is - more of the same restrictive monopolistic crap that they were pulling throughout their respective 4th gen console's lifespan. The development of the 3DO system was in direct response to the unfair controls and outrageous licensing fees that Nintendo and SEGA were implementing and charging at the time.
I am not going to say that Sega was ever the ideal benevolent corporation either. There is a huge difference between what I just pointed out Sony has done, that has hurt the industry in numerous ways, or what Nintendo has done, and what you just described Sega doing. That difference is simple, charging a licensing fee and controlling what can be made for your product is_not the same as forcing software developers to only make said software for your product.
So no, what Sega did with its licensing fees and third parties was not exactly the same or as bad as what Nintendo implemented. I am also not aware of Sega, console days, buying up star developers just to keep them from making their hot product for the competition. Sega usually internally developed an answer or five to said hot product. At any rate, this particular conversation was about how certain Sony fans see MS as the only anti-competitive megacorp in the industry right now.
Specs are this generation's Bit Wars. What was before bits? Horsepower? I wonder what will be next.Quote:
Originally Posted by bultje112
Whether it's the latest or not tech, it gives game designers set parameters for the next 5-10 years and as consumers we get some price stability for our purchase. I know that every 6 months, I won't have to upgrade my tower with the latest whatever to be able to play the latest game. Now that's a bit of an exaggeration but you get what I'm saying.
However you wish to minimilize or explain away how Sega is more saintly than Nintendo/SonyMicrosoft etc, it still represents them attempting to unfairly control what a 3rd party publisher can and cannot release/sell. The retaining absolute control of cartridge manufacturing in particular was extremely damaging to the industry - effectively making 3rd parties "guess" how many copying of Game X, Y or Z they were going to sell, if they underestimated the number then they had to go back to Nintendo/Sega and order more, which would normally take months, by which time said game was likely off the HOT sellers list.Quote:
Originally Posted by sheath
On the other hand if they overestimated the number of copies ordered and the game wasn't as popular than they had forcasted, they were then left with tons of unsold inventory that they were then forced to discount in order to sell them. My main point was that you were claiming that today's Sega is somehow worse in a "monopolistic megacorp" sense than they used to be and I was pointing out that this is really a naive viewpoint to have, Sega has utilized unfair and restrictive practices in the past and do so now and will continue to do so in the future. In years gone past having absolute control over how many games/what sort of games/manufacturing of games were the restrictive policies of the day, nowadays it is buying up star talent/games thus blocking the sale of said star product from competing machines, then exploiting the advantage to the fullest extent before then sell off or close down/dispose of said star talent once exhausted - rinse and repeat X number of times over the period of a console generation.
Regarding your other point, I'm not disputing what you said about Sony being an "evil monopolistic mega corp" or whatever you wish to call them. IMO all of the big 3 Sony/Microsoft/Nintendo all can be labelled as such. The video games business is a large and cutthroat industry, just like the movies/music industries among a lot of others I could mention. Shitty, underhanded tactics are par for the course, hence my utter :roll: @ people who tried to defend said corporations. However saying that Sega isn't the same and defending them just because they were less successful at being a monopolistic corporation is equally silly as well imo, they tried using some of the same restrictive policies of the day and were beaten buy larger, better financed organizations who were even more ruthless. Sure it sucks but if people don't like it, find another hobby - simple..
sheath speaks the truth.Quote:
Originally Posted by sheath
This savage capitalism, that has the need to crush by any means necessary the competition, is one of the most damaging this we have in our society.I don't care what company is pulling this shit. It' wrong , imoral and it has to stop.
I'm done playing this game. I've stopped on the Dreamcast and i'm more than satisfied with my decision.
The PS4 will launch here ay the cost of 3.000,00 BRL( the PS3 launched at 7.000,00 )
The WiiU at 1.900,00.
The minimum wage here is 678,00 BRL.
Everytime i hear or read people moaning about this here ,i just laugh.It's pathethic.
I do understand the comfort food logic that people want to live in a bubble that has guaranteed returns on content. It's what drives the bitter console wars and the bickering between children. It's what makes exclusives valuable to these restrictive electronics juggernauts.Quote:
Originally Posted by synbiosfan
I don't understand the continuing myth that PC upgrades are even necessary. The latest and greatest games targeting max settings will still look and perform better than consoles on PCs from 3 years ago, on lower settings. Upgrading to cutting edge shit all the time is completely retarded, and dismisses the fact that PC hardware has the same performance lifespan for games.
The big problem with consoles VS pc right now is price. They're high cost and restrictive consoles, while PC gaming is getting cheaper and cheaper. The overlap is already there. Gaming is an online service industry now, and people are buying in to overpriced, restrictive gateways to these games, despite PC having become exceptionally cheaper year over year for two decades that they are now competing.
Nintendo, Sony, Microsoft. They need to be cheaper, or better than PC at innovating. We've seen waggle fad. We now see Kinect & trackpads. PC has a lot of interface options too, better pricing options on games, and better community content.
It's just a mind bender how console gamers turn into PC haters, feeling threatened by a someone pointing all of this out to them. I am saying all of this shit as a gamer, currently playing Ni No Kuni on a PS3.
Patience is the only factor that drives my adoption of these restrictive platforms now. Price drops and cheap deals on their exclusives, which should be all available on all platforms anyway. The software libraries that run this shit is standard and compatible. It's just rich assholes paying big money to make sure consumers can't buy what they want where they want. Selling hardware nobody really needs at a loss by dominating the consumer rather than selling them on their brand of gateway being functionally awesome . It's fucking crazy.
You forgot to say that I'll probably be buying a new computer anyways.
It's generally been an issue when the consoles first arrive... The price of a 360 or ps3 was roughly the price you would pay for a high end video card (or less, in some cards cases). Putting together a gaming PC back then capable of playing games comparable to those consoles, or better, was going to cost you ~double the price, and not easily allow you to hook that into your TV and be playable.
That's changed a fair bit now... and putting together a system that can offer spec parity with the PS4 and Xbone could, with an eye towards deals and prices, be had for roughly the same costs, if not cheaper... or of course run 2-3x more than either depending.
But the Consoles still have the advantage of convenience and being relatively fool proof. Not everyone is going to be able to build their own gaming system, nor are all who are capable of it willing to do so.
There is also the issue of configuring the software on the PC... not all console games go to PC, and many there do have a pretty wide array of options. Have you tweaked them to get the most out of it? Have you screwed up something somewhere that's tanking your PC performance in some way? Or just generally made things look uglier than they should? Is the game you're playing just optimized for a driver update you don't have yet, or maybe a different video card?
Things like that are more or less a complete non issue. The consoles are what they are, the specs don't change, what they have available (baring add on's like the old RAM carts and such) are not going to change from day one till the day they stop being supported.
So it give a lot of time to build the tools and skills to make some really awesome looking stuff... even if the hardware itself is dated shortly after (if not before) the consoles release.
I certainly don't hate PC gaming, but I don't do much on it... because I prefer the ease of getting it set up and jsut working (baring hardware failures).
I can go back to my Genesis and play the games there. I can go back to my Saturn, xbox, etc, and play the games there.
A PC is a tool, it's there for lots of reasons, one of which is games... but if I want to go and play an old PC game... well, how old? Do I need to build a dedicated system for it? If so, how available are working parts? Does it work on the new windows os? Does it flip out on a 64bit CPU?
In 20 years time I have no real assurance that I could pop in, say, Morrowwind, in a brand new computer of that age and actually have it play without some crazy amount of effort, if it's even possible at all.
The generational leap in consoles is a marketing gimmick. New games come out all the time that run on PCs equivalent to toasters. New games that come out which push the limits of what has been done can and will only be done on high end PCs.
Locking yourself to target a low tier PC while designing your game is completely doable, and can reach more customers who can't afford fancy video card setups. But to lock yourself to optimizing your game for a game console? Why are you limiting your market from those people with high end cards more than capable?
The only motivation is the high install base, revenue returns. Money hatting from the gate keeper console maker who is just there to whip the average consumer and sell them something that's restrictive. Consoles make up a huge part of gaming, and they're churning up billions of dollars to hold it all back for everybody. These services and gaming social networks like SEN/PSN or Xbox Live should run on every platform.
The point always comes back to:
Consoles - It's users just want to be spoon fed idiot proof accessibility standards for higher cost, regardless of those limitations.
PCs - Complicated. Scary. Messy.
To that I say, Consoles ARE restricted PCs, and PCs ARE as idiot proof as the modern console experience. Why are we all comfortable with wasting money on this garbage hardware paradigm?
Actually I think the opposite. The 360 brought nothing new to me. All games like fps (Halos, Star Wars, Unreal), racers (Moto GP, Rallisport, Colin Mc Rae), 3D stuff is already available in full scale on the original Xbox. Not the mention the core point: Microsoft was not cheaping with the original Xbox. They were losing money on it. With the 360 they started another period of RRoD, non-working D-pad, cheap chinese product... All I have to say: I bought one in 2006, sold it after a year of collecting dust and have never heard of it again and I feel good.Quote:
Originally Posted by Saturn Fan
Quote:
Originally Posted by Tom M.
I always hated MS for how badly they made the 360, software wise online/dlc/live/etc they offered a lot to the gamer,
but hardware wise.. I just never trusted the 360, and that's the only reason I never got one.
I didn't go for the PS3 because it was superior, I got it because the 360 was well known as a console that would easily die.
If it hadn't been for that I would have owned both, but I expect the stuff I pay good money for to not fall apart so easily.
Guess a part of me is glad that the Xbone gave me some good reasons not to want it, having only one console makes game choice much easier.