Not to mention you can't play the (single-player) game while a friend does as well.
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MS eliminates its best new feature: 10 person, 60 min Family Sharing plan for Xbone
- Thread starter Horse Armour
- Start date
Not to mention you can't play the (single-player) game while a friend does as well.
Wickerbasket
Member
They could have done it for digital games, but they decided to throw all their toys out the basket because they couldn't get their way.
NullPointer
Member
Then design a system that doesn't fuck over 30% of your existing customer base while tethering 100% of your new customer base to internet checks.
Its more than possible.
I hope you're right. And in all honesty I think we can probably agree that using it as a carrot to incentivise people to switch to digital distribution would be more effective than having it in as standard.
soul creator
Member
Part of me feels like I should still buy digital, because the any fancy sharing features (whenever they are actually implemented) would really only work for games bought from Xbox Live.
So either buy a game on disc initially, and get the benefit of reselling them and not needing to be online...or buy it from Xbox Live initially, get the benefit of instant switching now, and (ideally) the fancy digital sharing stuff later.
Or resell the disc-based games I have, and re-buy them on Xbox Live whenever any fancy digital features are added, lol. Hell, I've done this before with games I always want easy instant access to, like Rock Band 3, and fighting games. Of course, this depends on pricing as well. Lot of things to think about now!
I guess it may turn out to be a net positive if they actually do make it an option in the hopefully near future
Alx
Member
Yeah, great plan... lend your disc to someone, and only get it back 2 months later. If ever.
Never forget...
Never once had any of the issues that the PS4 part of the picture brings up. Most of my friends I live close to. As do most other people. People may have friends online but most of the people we know/meet/spend time with are people in the same geographic vicinity. Where we work, play, school and live. This picture is stretching things.
That picture is/was a sad attempt at mocking the excellent PS4. Excellent, in fact, by the way the MS crumbled like a house of cheap cards by folding in on their plan in gaming.
What kind of company has so little confidence in their product/features that they remove them and copy their competitor? It's pretty spineless imo and they get not respect from me for it.
computers putin'
Member
Yeah, nothing was confirmed but Major Nelson basically confirmed only one person could play one game at a time(which is also the only reasonable way this could work); doesn't sound that great to me. Well whatever, that's all in the past now anyway, and no drm, games being bought and resold = a win for the majority, yessssssssss.
Moral Panic
Member
XB1 no longer does the things it was promised to do. Whether you liked it or not Xbone had benefits that no other console had, now all those are gone. You are just left with a weaker, more expensive PS4.
I think what basically happened was, the sharing was messy, thrown together, not thought out reaction to the outcry from the gaming public. They realized it wasn't going to work/publishers weren't got to sign on, so they had to get rid of the whole clusterfuck that was their DRM policy all together.
Alx
Member
It's probably not worth going through the whole infrastructure and negociations with publishers if it's only applied to a part of the audience. Managing one system is a lot of work, managing two is just wasting money.
Family-Plan GAF, you're looking at this the wrong way - customer backlash just succeeded in getting MS to backpedal on most of their DRM policies in record time, so there's no reason to think that you can't keep the pressure on and get them to rethink the total removal of the Family Plan. They've already backpedaled once in less than a month, plenty of months left to get them to backpedal again.
Never forget...
I live in Norway, got family and friends in NY, Hong Kong, London, Denmark, etc. The old sharing feature would be supreme. But apparently people are still in High School or live tops 1 hour away from each other.
Yes, I'm actually disappointed.
Kind of what I'm wondering. Maybe after all the backlash they realized it would be worse if they couldn't deliver the family share plan like they promised.
Not saying that is the case, but makes you wonder.
This may be true for school kids and students, but here in England at least I don't think that's valid for many adults.
All of my gaming friends are over 50km away with many in other countries (Scotland etc.).
Fleshfeast
Member
The most vocal people I was seeing on my Facebook feed were people that I know for a fact have never owned an Xbox or Xbox 360.
nillapuddin
Member
My Xbox live "group"
California, Georgia, Utah, Florida
You're totally right, lets just start an inter-continental Fed-ex account and share, thats way easier
The Faceless Master
Member
indeed. could have been a selling point for the digital version.
Alx
Member
You think you just have to whine to get what you want ? Things don't come for free. Family plans were a compromise, they couldn't probably be set up if they didn't promise to the publishers the control of the used market as a counterpart. You can't have it all, if you want to win something, you'll have to lose something else.
THIS. It is exactly what I was thinking. They need to not FORCE people into the digital age (like they tried to force people into Windows 8.) Slowy doing it by providing incentives is the way to go, and what I have been saying all along. Cheaper digital games/digital sharing/etc lock people into their software so they CAN'T resell it.
For each "Family" that took full advantage of the program that's $540 lost for the publishers/creators. I really want to know what restrictions were going to be applied that made the publishers okay with losing money. While the idea was great, sharing digitally... I just don't see how it could have been done.
But it needs some sort of DRM check to work. I guess they could do it for digital copies only.
K
kittens
Unconfirmed Member
I can't believe people are blaming this on the anti-DRM campaigns. Microsoft didn't have to axe family sharing along with DRM.
Mr.Wreckless
Banned
Most adults dont see their friends that often. We have our own lives and families and cant meet up with our friends to exchange games. Sharing physical games is amazing for people still in high school or college but for adults its a pain in the ass.
I for one live 500 miles away from the friends i grew up with. This feature would have been amazing for us as we all went our separate ways after college.
Caayn
Member
This is true for the people in my area. Well I can't blame Microsoft for back pedaling after the, mostly biased, outcry.
I don't care for the family plan and what not. I just want phyisical discs that allow me to play the game without having the disc in the console. Like the Xbox One was originally supposed to.
Moral Panic
Member
No way. The whole point was that it would be a fruit basket due to the loss of used games. it was "hey you don't need used games, just get your friend/brother/uncle/cousin to buy it and you can play it from the family plan!". But now we still have used games I highly doubt we'll see this feature. Theres no way pubs will take the loss on this + still have used games.
dragonelite
Member
You can still do it, but in limited form.
I know because it was told a many times in family sharing thread.
Playsation_
Banned
So MS failed again?
They just can't catch a break.
Well, as long as DRM is gone, that's a buy for me.
They just can't catch a break.
Well, as long as DRM is gone, that's a buy for me.
. A distraction that was never intended to be implemented how they talked about it. Is there anything stopping them from having a separate policy for digital games? It was all bullshit indeed.
that would be cool ... I am hopeful that you are correct
Good for you. My friends like 400 km away from me. Sharing physically is impossible.
NullPointer
Member
That's my take.
BurnOutBrighter
Banned
How was this a great feature? Now I can share with anyone just by giving them the disc.
Does PS4 got a Family-Plan? Because they are apparently the pro-consumer company.
Grizzlyjin
Supersonic, idiotic, disconnecting, not respecting, who would really ever wanna go and top that
No, it really wouldn't have been. How would that even work, who gets booted while two people are playing at the same time? Does the original owner control who gets what game, or do the 10 people in your "family" just have access to your library. or do you give them certain games.
The entire thing just unravels when you think of the logistics if everyone can't play the same game at the same time. And I highly doubt publishers would be okay with that. You really think they want 10 people playing the same copy of Halo 5? Just have two people do it cuts your sales in half.
Dark Rider
Member
It was there for one reason, that they could mention something positive about their console against all the negative stuff. I guess they see no reason for it now after they caved in regarding the rest of their policies.
King Beyond the wall
Member
Makes sense that Microsoft would backpedal on this: people could exploit the system to the extent that only 1 person would buy a game and then ten others could play it freely.
The whole system always came over as a quick response to criticism that they never completely thought through. There is no reason that MS could not have maintained this policy.
So there's literally nothing from a gaming perspective that puts the Xbone over the PS4 now (unless you like the exclusives more, but that's all opinion). Instead, it's a weaker, more expensive console with a camera I can't just toss in a closet.
Why did Microsoft go back on this again?
Why did Microsoft go back on this again?
Relaxed Muscle
Member
"Applies to me, so it must apply to you". Thanks but most of my friends aren't conveniently across the street where I can easily share games. Not the mention you can never play a game while it's shared. It's not a 'sad attempt', it was a hard fact about the old system and the inherit disadvantages associated with it. Now we're stuck with it for another generation when it's only a matter of time before the digital model becomes the ONLY model.
Wickerbasket
Member
Yeah it does, it's called physically passing the game.
No reason why Microsoft couldn't have kept the family plan for digital games.
Vicetrailia
Member
So what exactly are people clinging to with Family Sharing?
Do we know how it works? The restrictions, and etc? For example Sony allowed digital sharing (do they still now?), is it better than that?
Do we know how it works? The restrictions, and etc? For example Sony allowed digital sharing (do they still now?), is it better than that?
Zoe
Member
They never got around to the nitty gritty details.
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