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[mr_toa]

Just because mobile gaming makes more money doesn't mean that traditional gaming is dead. They don't have the same audience. As long as traditional gaming is profitable it will continue to exist.

While you're certainly right on the money that traditional gaming is far from dead, some data exists to suggest that traditional gaming and mobile gaming to some extend competes for the same audience, and more importantly for the same paying audience.

For reference EEDAR defines "heavy payers" as an individual spending more than $10 a month on mobile games

 

[spisho]

Azure.

One word answers say very little. Azure is not a game service. Gaikai on the other hand is. MS' IaaS business means very little when it comes to a specific application or set of technologies that operate on top of the cloud.

 

[Godslay]

One word answers say very little. Azure is not a game service. Gaikai on the other hand is. MS' IaaS business means very little when it comes to a specific application or set of technologies that operate on top of the cloud.

See the edit. Going to bed now, have fun.

 

[spisho]

See the edit. Going to bed now, have fun.

Respawn are saying cloud infrastructure is useful because it enables you to run various services over a network and that the services scale to match demand. This isn't unique or new, and it certainly doesn't mean MS are ahead of Sony/Gaikai when it comes to cloud gaming, which is a specific application of the cloud that requires its own R&D.

 

[Godslay]

Respawn are saying cloud infrastructure is useful because it enables you to run various services over a network and that the services scale to match demand. This isn't unique or new, and it certainly doesn't mean MS are ahead of Sony/Gaikai when it comes to cloud gaming, which is a specific application of the cloud that requires its own R&D.

You made the argument regarding the dedicated servers and infrastructure, saying MS hasn't been clear on it, and Respawn says that MS is offering dedicated servers as well as access to Azure on the whole. Furthermore, neither the current PSN infrastructure nor the Gaikai network are on the same scale as Azure and the MS datacenters atm. You are also saying that PS+ promises better infrastructure, yet discredit the fact that MS is actually delivering on that promise.

Cloud gaming is still a ways off, especially if broadband penetration is as bad as GAF tells us it is. Long term they might be strategically ahead, but people still want discs in the drive, and most of them don't want to have to stream their games when they can pop it in the drive or run it off the HDD.

Gaikai as it stands is a cloud gaming service, Azure is basically a web platform. Given the details we know now, Azure will have an immediate impact, and the other is yet to be determined. I'll wait to see what Gaikai encompasses before fully judging it, but Azure is looking very promising for the platform.

Now I'm really going to bed dammit!

 

[starmud]

either way i think this is the last dedicated gaming box from MS. the original plan for one showed where they want to take gaming for themselves. there will be little reason left for them to release such a product in 5+ years time.

 

[sun-drop]

got an insight into how the NZ market is placed at the mo, mate of mine finally got around to pre ordering a ps4 here in wellington ... he didn't have much luck. JBHIfi have sold through the first shipment, and the waiting list for the 2nd is at 20. he eventually got one pre-ordered at dicksmith - there first shipment is sold out too , but he's pretty high on the 2nd shipment list :/

mean while no such issues with xbone, 1st shipment orders avail everywhere ..


so errr either ps4 demand is seriously outstripping xbones, or there are way more MS consoles avail at launch ...i'm guessing the former.

 

[jcm]

Name a better OS than XP or 7.

Why would you lump them together? XP is half-baked shit. 7 is solid.

 

[velociraptor]

If Microsoft Goes The Game Industry Goes Also. How many threads will be made though? -__-

I don't think so.

The game industry will only go if the games stop selling. It really is as simple as that.

Besides, I think there has been sufficient hype for the next-generation consoles to do moderately well. I don't expect the Xbox One to shift as many units as the 360, but I think the PS4 stands a pretty good chance of selling numbers similar to the PS3, primarily thanks to it's affordable price point.

 

[EloquentM]

I could see this happening but I doubt x1 will do much worse than the 360.

 

[spisho]

You made the argument regarding the dedicated servers and infrastructure, saying MS hasn't been clear on it, and Respawn says that MS is offering dedicated servers as well as access to Azure on the whole.

I said it's not clear these are going to be offered free for every title. Windows Azure has been out for over three years and yet most 360 titles are p2p.

Furthermore, neither the current PSN infrastructure nor the Gaikai network are on the same scale as Azure and the MS datacenters atm. You are also saying that PS+ promises better infrastructure, yet discredit the fact that MS is actually delivering on that promise.

PSN, Gaikai, and XBL are categorically different from something like Azure. It's possible to offer better online gaming infrastructure in terms of services provided to developers and customers without owning a cloud compute platform. If I get better quality online services from Sony, what does it matter to me as an external party whose cloud it runs on?

 

[ArkkAngel007]

We know a lot about Gaikai from before the Sony purchase, and the tech is already part of the PS4's remote play. Other Gaikai features such as download while you play are going to work day one.

We haven't seen any of it though with the Playstation 4, that's all I'm saying. We don't know how well all of this is going to work out. It will be better than the remote play provided on the PS3, but that's not much of a stepping stone.

For all we know, the framerate will be absolutely horrid when downloading while playing, and the streaming service could be a disaster with all the traffic once the more ambitious features come online.

Not trying to bust up the party, as I have high hopes for the service. But right now it's just a sales pitch for the console until we see the product in action where the validity can't be questioned [easily].

 

[SnakeEyes]

got an insight into how the NZ market is placed at the mo, mate of mine finally got around to pre ordering a ps4 here in wellington ... he didn't have much luck. JBHIfi have sold through the first shipment, and the waiting list for the 2nd is at 20. he eventually got one pre-ordered at dicksmith - there first shipment is sold out too , but he's pretty high on the 2nd shipment list :/

mean while no such issues with xbone, 1st shipment orders avail everywhere ..


so errr either ps4 demand is seriously outstripping xbones, or there are way more MS consoles avail at launch ...i'm guessing the former.

Aha, a fellow NZer. I also believe that MightyApe is all out of their first shipment of PS4s, as are Noel Leeming.

 

[GrotesqueBeauty]

That would be fine by me. I hate the take-over-your-living-room entertainment hub and advert heavy philosophy Microsoft has been working towards. The horrible "features" they pushed for Xbox One before backlash forced them to retreat are a progression of plans they've been chomping at the bit to implement from the outset. Outside of pushing better online infrastructure the Xbox brand offers nothing I particularly care about that couldn't just as easily land on other platforms in its absence. Easily the most disposable of the big three imo. Nintendo and Sony's studios mean far more to me as a gamer than anything Microsoft has ever directly put on the table. I wouldn't say I'm rooting for their failure or anything, but I feel pretty ambivalent about the Xbox brand in general.

 

[RobotRocker]

SNES wasn't really dominant: it "won", but Genesis was kinda always right behind it.

It took America and Japan handily compared to the Genesis but the Genesis/Mega Drive took Europe easily due to the more aggressive pricing compared to Nintendo's £60-85 pricing on SNES carts (And really poor PAL conversions and support on top of that). But there was a lot of competition, especially with the Commodore Amiga nipping on the consoles heels as a fairly stacked gaming machine and much more niche products like the NeoGeo available on the market that got a following. Also at the turn of that generation you had Panasonic, 3DO and Atari trying to get a piece of the pie by trying to beat Nintendo and Sega to the punch with their own consoles and 3DO and Atari in particular trying to get the US market. Sony took it by having the combination of dev support and correct pricing while Nintendo's arrogance in launching the N64 hurt them a lot. Especially in Europe where they had an utterly appalling launch that saw only 100 units being shipped to some countries.

Even though the road is filled with dead bodies, the large amount of competition was beneficial to the market since it established that manufacturers had to be hungry and try provide the best product or else they might get pushed out of the industry. The N64 hit Nintendo hard and even coming back with the Gamecube wasn't enough which made them think out of the box and come up with the Wii. The PS3 launch showed Sony's weaknesses in thinking they could make an extremely expensive machine with half-arsed features and the public would buy it on brand recognition alone while Microsoft had a fully fleshed out online service already in full swing which certainly influenced the direction of the PS3 and the PS4 for the better. Now it's Microsoft's turn to play catch up on the PS4, which should lead to a much more interesting race and a better one for consumers.

 

[twobear]

Why does anyone at all assume that another competitor would join the market if MS pulled out? The history of the console market is the history of failed hardware manufacturers. You really think that someone would look at a market where there were three competitors, one of which had invested billions, had clearly had a better product for a long time, and still couldn't make enough money to stay in the market, and think, 'yeah, I want a piece of that pie!'.

Amazon seem to be building a console, but good luck with that, I'm pretty sure it'll be the same set-top-box+gaming model that the Xbone is trying.

 

[netBuff]

You made the argument regarding the dedicated servers and infrastructure, saying MS hasn't been clear on it, and Respawn says that MS is offering dedicated servers as well as access to Azure on the whole.

But at a cost to developers, and not for free - which makes this proposition not much better than all the other cloud computing services that are available and Sony can utilize. In general, Azure is not that great a service compared to what's available elsewhere: Lowered cost due to Microsoft owning the service may be the only argument in favour of it.

I said it's not clear these are going to be offered free for every title. Windows Azure has been out for over three years and yet most 360 titles are p2p.

Respawn has already stated that they are paying for Azure access.

 

[Breakfast at Noon]

would make me happy to see Halo on my prefered console then

 

[Shion]

Why does anyone at all assume that another competitor would join the market if MS pulled out? The history of the console market is the history of failed hardware manufacturers. You really think that someone would look at a market where there were three competitors, one of which had invested billions, had clearly had a better product for a long time, and still couldn't make enough money to stay in the market, and think, 'yeah, I want a piece of that pie!'.

Amazon seem to be building a console, but good luck with that, I'm pretty sure it'll be the same set-top-box+gaming model that the Xbone is trying.

Yeah.

The cost of entry for a, competitive, product in the traditional console business is simply too high and the financial benefit from such an investment just isn't there. People need to consider the opportunity cost here.

It's the reason why the only company that entered this business, in the past 15+ years, was...Microsoft. And that's only because they wanted to use consoles as a Trojan horse.

 

[EvB]

Why would you lump them together? XP is half-baked shit. 7 is solid.

Wow , I have heard anybody diss XP since about 2002, win win98 SE was all the rage with gamers.

 

[MisterSamMan]

Unlike Sony, Microsoft's money maker isn't Xbox. So I don't really doubt this.

 

[SparkTR]

Unlike Sony, Microsoft's money maker isn't Xbox. So I don't really doubt this.

That's the exact reason why this could happen. If things aren't working out for Microsoft the first thing they'll cut is their entertainment division to focus on their 'money makers'.

 

[jhmtehgamr20xx]

I hope it is their last. It was fantastic for gamers when there was just 1 dominant console (NES, SNES, PS2 eras).

Microsoft needs to sell off the Xbox division and get back to making Windows great.

This system hardly dominated its gen at all. In fact Genesis killed it in Europe and was beating it in U.S from 91-late '94.

The info's all over the internet, I shouldn't even have to throw this in. Just hate seeing revisionist history, even if it's accidental.

 

[jhmtehgamr20xx]

Why would you lump them together? XP is half-baked shit. 7 is solid.

XP is solid if you have a computer worth a shit and at least 2GB ram to run it.

I mean, if I had an HP and was running Win 7, I could say Win 7 was shit too but we all know who the real culprit is...

 

[Vorg]

If Microsoft Goes The Game Industry Goes Also. How many threads will be made though? -__-

Hahahaha. Wut.

 

[Becky]

I think the PS4 stands a pretty good chance of selling numbers similar to the PS3, primarily thanks to it's affordable price point.

Not sure about that. PS3 had the advantage of being the best and cheapest blu-ray player and had free online play.

I don't think either system has a chance of reaching their predecessor.

 

[Thorgal]

Why does anyone at all assume that another competitor would join the market if MS pulled out? The history of the console market is the history of failed hardware manufacturers. You really think that someone would look at a market where there were three competitors, one of which had invested billions, had clearly had a better product for a long time, and still couldn't make enough money to stay in the market, and think, 'yeah, I want a piece of that pie!'.

Amazon seem to be building a console, but good luck with that, I'm pretty sure it'll be the same set-top-box+gaming model that the Xbone is trying.

While you certainly have a point i agree with .isn't the bolded true of any industry in the world ?

Every industry is paved with the bodies of those company's who fell by the wayside slain by their competitors or by bad management. and got replaced by new one even in industry's where a million or 10 is considered pocket change.

the point i am trying to make is: there will always be the young upstart who wants to make it big no matter what industry he jumps into and who knows what he will accomplish ?.


what makes the gaming industry any different ?

 

[Game Guru]

Yeah.

The cost of entry for a, competitive, product in the traditional console business is simply too high and the financial benefit from such an investment just isn't there. People need to consider the opportunity cost here.

It's the reason why the only company that entered this business, in the past 15+ years, was...Microsoft. And that's only because they wanted to use consoles as a Trojan horse.

Which is why the next entrants are not going for the traditional console business as defined by Sony and Microsoft. You've had the nontraditional Wii and these microconsoles that the Ouya seems to have started. You've got people asking for Apple or Google for a console when it isn't going to be a console in the traditional sense. Hell, there are even new Atari 2600, Sega Genesis, and Neo Geo systems which play a good chunk of older games from those systems. Quite frankly, it is easy enough now to make a system of sufficient graphical power at a low enough price point and make money off it than it has been for the past... 15 years.

 

[Melchiah]

This man speaks truth. Imagine if Microsoft had never gotten into the console business what online console gaming would be like today. Even though they have shit the bed with The One, they have done a lot right in the past. No one stays top dog or the fan favorite forever.

If that means we'd still have +15-hour SP campaigns, instead of rushed out 4-8 hour ones, with a tacked on MP portion, I'd say we had it better before the online multiplayer trend grew into what it's now.

 

[EGM1966]

Why does anyone at all assume that another competitor would join the market if MS pulled out? The history of the console market is the history of failed hardware manufacturers. You really think that someone would look at a market where there were three competitors, one of which had invested billions, had clearly had a better product for a long time, and still couldn't make enough money to stay in the market, and think, 'yeah, I want a piece of that pie!'.

Amazon seem to be building a console, but good luck with that, I'm pretty sure it'll be the same set-top-box+gaming model that the Xbone is trying.

You know thinking about it Amazon would arguably be in a better position to target set top box + gaming than MS is at the moment - particularly given their continuing growth and domination in most major markets. They have all the right media elements plus games plus they sure aren't interested in trying to balance physical retail in a store with digital.

 

[TheTwelve]

I would bet up to $200 with anybody on the side of this being Microsoft's last videogame console. Seriously.

Looking at every factor from price to hardware to competition to worldwide sales...I cannot figure out how the X1 will do well this gen.

 

[CadetMahoney]

If Microsoft Goes The Game Industry Goes Also.

Umm they ended up in 3rd place this gen. Have little to no user base in the East, far smaller user base outside North America and UK and will get destroyed in sales judging from forum opinions and pre-order numbers. Sony just fumbled a bit from arrogance but they have their ship in order now.

 

[Syphon Filter]

Umm they ended up in 3rd place this gen. Have little to no user base in the East, far smaller user base outside North America and UK and will get destroyed in sales judging from forum opinions and pre-order numbers. Sony just fumbled a bit from arrogance but they have their ship in order now.

If they can expand in Europe i think it makes sense to continue. If they are 3rd now it was recently and way too late for sony. "the damage" was done already years ago in this generation.

 

[Shion]

Which is why the next entrants are not going for the traditional console business as defined by Sony and Microsoft. You've had the nontraditional Wii and these microconsoles that the Ouya seems to have started. You've got people asking for Apple or Google for a console when it isn't going to be a console in the traditional sense. Hell, there are even new Atari 2600, Sega Genesis, and Neo Geo systems which play a good chunk of older games from those systems. Quite frankly, it is easy enough now to make a system of sufficient graphical power at a low enough price point and make money off it than it has been for the past... 15 years.

Oh yeah, I know.

It's just that some people expect to see a new entrant in the traditional console business.

And, frankly, I don't think that's going to happen.

 

[McHuj]

With the purchase of Nokia's Devices and Services and patents I doubt MS will be getting out of consumer devices any time soon. I doubt they would bring in a CEO focused just on enterprise now

 

[TechnicPuppet]

With the purchase of Nokia's Devices and Services and patents I doubt MS will be getting out of consumer devices any time soon. I doubt they would bring in a CEO focused just on enterprise now

Most of this discussion was about them pulling out of the consumer market, they have thrown themselves into it more than ever now.

 

[Klocker]

Balmer being a baller.