Poll: Xbox One or PS4

[Sbeezy]

Originally Posted by Luis_GT

iTunes removed the DRM from its music...

My ipod photo isn't DRM filled either... it is closed software... but what can you do to a ipod other than playing music with it...

Pokemon!

Sent from my SPH-L710 using Tapatalk 2

[cfusionpm]

http://gizmodo.com/the-xbox-one-just...ault-514411905

At least someone shares my view. :P

The Xbox One Just Got Way Worse, And It's Our Fault
Microsoft just announced that its much-maligned DRM policies won't look at all like they originally had originally been described. They're going to more relaxed, sort of like the PS3's. Good news, you say? No. Bad news. The Xbox One just got worse.

But what? Isn't all DRM bad and anti-consumer? No. Often it is, sure. If applied in the ways that gaming culture has been anxious about for the past few weeks, it would be disastrous. But that's not what was really at stake. This was:

These changes will impact some of the scenarios we previously announced for Xbox One. The sharing of games will work as it does today, you will simply share the disc. Downloaded titles cannot be shared or resold. Also, similar to today, playing disc based games will require that the disc be in the tray.
That SUCKS.

The Vision

Here was the simple vision of the Xbox One, selling and reselling games:

-Every game you bought, physical or digital, would be tied to your account. This would eliminate current-gen problems like buying a disc, and then being unable to store it or download it from the cloud.
-Because every single game, physical or digital, would be tied to an account, publishers could create a hub to sell and resell the games digitally. Let's refer to these as "licenses" from here, even though it's a loaded term.
-Because reselling games would now work through a hub, publishers could make money on resold games.
-Here is how this makes sense for YOU: New games could then be cheaper. Why? Publishers KNOW that they will not make money on resold games, so they charge more to you, the first buyer. You are paying for others' rights to use your game in the future. If the old system had gone into place, you would likely have seen game prices drop. Or, at the very least, it could have staved off price increases.
-You also would have started getting a better return on your "used" games—because a license does not have to be resold at a diminished rate.
-How do you know that this would have been the case? Because that's exactly what happens on Steam. But wait!, you shout. Steam is CHEAP cheap, and it has crazy sales. We love Steam! Micro$oft is nothing like that. Well, no, it isn't now, but Steam was once $team, too. It was not always popular, and its licensing model was once heavily maligned. Given time, though, it's now the only way almost every PC gamer wants to play games.
-Sharing games would have worked either by activating your Live account on someone else's Xbox One, or by including them in your 10-person share plan, which would not have been limited to "family.". Details on that had been scarse, but even the strictest limitations (one other person playing any of the shared games from your account) would have been a HUGE improvement over the none that we have now. We don't get that now.
-The 24-hour check-in would have been necessary for the X1's store, which it is not for Steam, because the physical product (game discs) would still be available. This check-in, literally bytes of data exchanged, would confirm that the games installed were not gaming the system in a convoluted install-here-and-then-go-offline-and-I'll-go-home-and-check-in-and-go-offline-too-and-we'll-both-use-the-game methods.
-You would also, as it happens, have been able to share your digitally purchased games. That's a REALLY BIG DEAL. We won't be able to do that now, though. We still have to use the disc for games we buy physically. -This is the loss of some of the most future-facing features of the system, things that changed and challenged the traditional limitations of console gaming. We are literally standing in stasis, refusing to move forward, at the behest of those who are loudest and not ready for the future.

The DRM Boogey Man Is So Last Decade

More than anything, the outcry over the Xbox One was a reaction to buzzwords that are easy to distance ourselves from. "Censorship," "retcon," "person who disagrees with Joss Whedon." DRM is right there with any of those for Microsoft's core gaming audience.

The real fear behind DRM on games is the idea that at some point in the future, you'll be told that you are no longer allowed to use the content you'e paid for. It's that you're "allowed" to use anything at all, instead of outright "owning" it. And in the past, shitty DRM has absolutely worked like that. Walmart MP3s and the like have taken their servers offline, stranding file formats and leaving them to die, forgotten.

That is not how DRM, by and large, works today. There is very little risk of any particular format dying off. The dangers, as such, lie in a dropoff of support, or at worst, confiscation. That for whatever reason, Microsoft would tell us to screw ourselves and stop supporting Xbox One games, or kick you, specifically, out.

Fair enough. But compare that to the benefits of DRM. It helps build an ecosystem that is easy and convenient and, most of all, affordable enough to draw customers. That's what Apple did with iTunes and music, and it's what Amazon did with books. The content was just too easy to get and too cheap to bother with pirating it. We could have had that with the Xbox One and games.

Here's a video game example of effective DRM in practice: World of Warcraft, more or less the most popular game of the past decade. WoW, a Massively Multiplayer RPG by Blizzard, is played entirely online—always online, even. Your account is not your property, Blizzard can ban it, or remove items from it at its pleasure. Everything is within its right.

And yet, all Blizzard does is run customer support to users who have been hacked (oh, so many are hacked) or who accidentally deleted something or any number of other problems for their accounts. They were even years ahead of the two-factor authentication push, basically giving away authenticators at a loss, with in-game bonuses, just to keep customers from being hacked. Because Blizzard knows that its whole job is keeping its customers coming back for more. And it works. And no one complains.

Our Capacity

Today's news proves, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that the internet has a voice. You're heard, and you can affect change in the things that you care about deeply. It's oddly fitting that the news comes as fan-saved Futurama gets ready to go off the air again. But today also proves how widely that nerd-influence can swing an entire generation of hardware, based solely on the whims of internet jokes based on information that isn't even accurate, and tinfoil fears about worst-case scenarios.

Cheaper games. Easier sharing. The end of discs. The Xbox One would have been just fine despite the chorus of haters, would have been a better system for ignoring them. Microsoft losing its nerve on this isn't just disappointing for the features we lose. It's unfortunate because it shows just how heavy an anchor we can be.

[Luis_GT]

Originally Posted by cfusionpm

When did it do that? I never used iTunes personally, other than to organize the mp3 collection on my first gen 4GB nano that I use in my car. All I remember is I can't even plug this thing into another computer without wiping the memory clean.

Regardless, that still misses the main point. DRM exists and its the future of digital based media. Pirated copies and used sales do nothing to help an industry survive and only help in driving up costs and prices.

A couple of years ago, also... set the ipod to manually manage... I plug my ipod to multiple PC's just to borrow some songs from friends or to grab some songs I have in my laptop and not on my desktop... granted you can't pass from ipod to PC unless you use some special program.

Originally Posted by Sbeezy

Pokemon!

Sent from my SPH-L710 using Tapatalk 2

How do you play pokemon with a clickwheel....

[PelzerC]

IMO I think the Xbox One is worth the $100 extra. Yes they have basically identical hardware but the Xbox One features are a lot better. With the PS4 you are getting a gaming console with a 3D bluray player. With the Xbox One you get a gaming system, a 3D bluray player, and a cable box with a built in DVR. If you subscribe to a cable provider and rent a DVR cable box from them it's easily $25 a month just to rent it!

[n2oinferno]

Originally Posted by PelzerC

IMO I think the Xbox One is worth the $100 extra. Yes they have basically identical hardware but the Xbox One features are a lot better. With the PS4 you are getting a gaming console with a 3D bluray player. With the Xbox One you get a gaming system, a 3D bluray player, and a cable box with a built in DVR. If you subscribe to a cable provider and rent a DVR cable box from them it's easily $25 a month just to rent it!

No you don't. The Xbox One has a HDMI input that intercepts the video from the cable box you already own and drops the signal into their frame and supplies you with a Xbox-based TV guide. And no DVR built in.

What you want is an HTPC.

[Luis_GT]

Originally Posted by PelzerC

IMO I think the Xbox One is worth the $100 extra. Yes they have basically identical hardware but the Xbox One features are a lot better. With the PS4 you are getting a gaming console with a 3D bluray player. With the Xbox One you get a gaming system, a 3D bluray player, and a cable box with a built in DVR. If you subscribe to a cable provider and rent a DVR cable box from them it's easily $25 a month just to rent it!

http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2013/05/xbox-one-tv/

"To be fair, the Xbox TV integration looks pretty stellar. Voice control that actually recognizes your voice (you can change the channel by saying the network), original content is coming (woohoo Halo), on screen fantasy football integration, and you can have video chats while watching TV. Okay, that last one sounds pretty lame. But even though the One is basically going all Google TV on us, it looks slicker and is building upon the entertainment platform that’s given the Xbox 360 a second life as a media device in many homes.

But the company should have gone further. The console features game DVR, but no actual TV DVR. Using a pass through lets the Xbox work with your existing cable or satellite box, but you’re still stuck with a cable or satellite box. It could be that Microsoft wasn’t willing to navigate the wild and wooly world of subscription TV."

[PelzerC]

Oh ok my bad, I was under the impression it was going to be done through the cloud. Thanks for clearing that up. Still think it's worth it to have all your entertainment on one device.

Originally Posted by Luis_GT

http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2013/05/xbox-one-tv/

"To be fair, the Xbox TV integration looks pretty stellar. Voice control that actually recognizes your voice (you can change the channel by saying the network), original content is coming (woohoo Halo), on screen fantasy football integration, and you can have video chats while watching TV. Okay, that last one sounds pretty lame. But even though the One is basically going all Google TV on us, it looks slicker and is building upon the entertainment platform that’s given the Xbox 360 a second life as a media device in many homes.

But the company should have gone further. The console features game DVR, but no actual TV DVR. Using a pass through lets the Xbox work with your existing cable or satellite box, but you’re still stuck with a cable or satellite box. It could be that Microsoft wasn’t willing to navigate the wild and wooly world of subscription TV."

[BlueSTaR]

Also, with Microsoft caving, this article is relevant.

http://gizmodo.com/the-xbox-one-just...ault-514411905

Everything has pros and cons.

[Whitigir]

Originally Posted by BlueSTaR

Also, with Microsoft caving, this article is relevant.

http://gizmodo.com/the-xbox-one-just...ault-514411905

Everything has pros and cons.

Damn... Disheartened...so the hackers will still find a way to aim bot players then.....

I had high hope for the banable Xbox account with every game purchased bound to it, if that player is a hacker. This is the ultimAte punishement. But it is now gone.....argh. Can I please for once play a hack/bot free online game ?

[Mango22]

This reminds me of a scenario I like to call the "neglected wife syndrome". So this wife finally tells the husband she is leaving him because he doesn't care what her needs are anymore. The husband says he knows what's best for her, but the wife says she found someone else who understands her and appreciates her. Seeing that his wife is serious, the husband falls to his knees and realizes he needs her to stay or his world will fall apart. The wife kicks off his grip and walks out the front door, never to be seen again by this man.

Hey Microsoft, we aren't your bitch anymore.

[BlueSTaR]

Originally Posted by Mango22

This reminds me of a scenario I like to call the "neglected wife syndrome". So this wife finally tells the husband she is leaving him because he doesn't care what her needs are anymore. The husband says he knows what's best for her, but the wife says she found someone else who understands her and appreciates her. Seeing that his wife is serious, the husband falls to his knees and realizes he needs her to stay or his world will fall apart. The wife kicks off his grip and walks out the front door, never to be seen again by this man.

Hey Microsoft, we aren't your bitch anymore.

So you're saying, you should be fucking someone on the side?

Good analogy

[SUB-FT86]

I'm glad MS cave in to consumer demand because at the end of the day it's about the consumer shelling out the ''MONEY".

Now I would like it if they made the Kinect 2.0 optional instead with a price of $399.99 without it or $499.99 with.

[n2oinferno]

Originally Posted by BlueSTaR

So you're saying, you should be fucking someone on the side?

Good analogy

Well, I do also own a WiiU.

Originally Posted by Whitigir

Damn... Disheartened...so the hackers will still find a way to aim bot players then.....

I had high hope for the banable Xbox account with every game purchased bound to it, if that player is a hacker. This is the ultimAte punishement. But it is now gone.....argh. Can I please for once play a hack/bot free online game ?

Here's something I don't think most people get. Cheaters aren't going to change. Even under the threat of a ban it's not going to stop all of them. Steam has a similar policy, yet there are still cheaters. I'm not really going to call them hackers, because they're not hacking. Most have no knowledge of the framework of the additional software they're running, they just know it lets them win and they stick to it. Script kiddies I guess, most of them, really.

[slicktop]

Even if they removed the Kinect requirement in addition, I would not buy the Xbox One solely because of how disrespectful they have been to the general public.

Playstation 4, regardless of the fine print DRM publisher red tape, did it the best way they could. They got my vote and my business.