Rumor: Titanfall Limited Edition & $399 Disc-Free Xbox Ones Coming Soon

[Alex Co]

Rumor: Titanfall Limited Edition & $399 Disc-Free Xbox Ones Coming Soon

Microsoft is allegedly set to spring a white Xbox One, a disc-free $399 version, another one housing 1TB and a Limited Editon Titanfall console within the year.

While we normally abstain from posting anything that pops up on any forum, NeoGAF user "ntkrnl" has been "verified" by a NeoGAF mod, which means he presented something that made his claims legitimate. The user claims Microsoft is set to release a white version of the Xbox One at retail to coincide with Sunset Overdrive's release this October. If true, this really shouldn't be surprising since the vanilla-colored unit has been made available to Microsoft employees [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/129882-Video-Microsofts-Alex-Noon-Unboxes-Exclusive-White-Xbox-One] last year. However, what is surprising is that Microsoft's allegedly set to release a disc-less version of the Xbox One at a price point of $399 later this year.

If that wasn't enough, ntkrnl also posted an image of a Limited Edition Titanfall Xbox One console that's set to be announced at a later date. Finally, the forum poster reveals that there's yet another Limited Edition Xbox One set for release this coming November that will include a 1TB hard-drive.

To add further credibility to the rumors, The Verge claims it has "verified" [http://www.theverge.com/2014/1/29/5359540/xbox-one-dashboard-update-white-console-release-date] that Microsoft is indeed planning to release a white Xbox One later this year, and can also confirm that Microsoft is presently testing versions of an Xbox One without a Blu-ray disc drive.

When reached for a comment, a Microsoft spokesperson told us, "We do not comment on speculation or rumors."

Are you willing to buy a disc-less Xbox One at a cheaper price? If ever that happens, even a 1TB hard-drive might not be enough to hold your content given the size of games these days.

Source: The Verge [http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=760013]

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[J Tyran]

Its interesting and a console without a BD drive might even interest me enough to get one, not the Xbox One though because as the last paragraph in the article points out 1TB simply isn't enough and you cannot swap out the HDD yourself. At least officially, I have seen tear downs of the Xbone and I am confident enough in my ability of taking computers apart and putting them back together to be able to change the drive myself but it invalidates the warranty and after the 360 I am not confident of Microsofts ability to launch a new console without crippling problems in the early versions just yet.

I suppose using an external drive[footnote]When Microsoft eventually get around to enabling them.[/footnote] is not all that bad as the Xbone does have USB 3.0 ports but having mutant outgrowths sprouting from your console just isn't the same as fitting an internal drive.

A PS4 and its user changeable HDDs is another matter though, if Sony offered one it would almost certainly be the version I got. I only own the one piece of physical media for my PlayStation 3 and that was because I imported it because there wasn't a version on the PS Store, every other game I own and have played for it was digital.

 

[RicoADF]

Well that confirms that Microsoft learned absolutely nothing with the online fiasco, nor that they understand that a console that dumps discs is utterly useless. Oh well atleast this gives players a choice so hats off to them there I guess. Too bad they didn't drop another part of the console instead, the part with a camera that alot of people don't want or like to make the savings, ah well that'd be too intelligent.

 

[Steven Bogos]

Well that confirms that Microsoft learned absolutely nothing with the online fiasco, nor that they understand that a console that dumps discs is utterly useless. Oh well atleast this gives players a choice so hats off to them there I guess. Too bad they didn't drop another part of the console instead, the part with a camera that alot of people don't want or like to make the savings, ah well that'd be too intelligent.

Speak for yourself - I don't think a disk-less Xbox is utterly useless. I haven't had a disc drive on my PC for years, because, well, physical media is pretty much on the way out. I buy all my games through steam, or other online stores. I even purchase most of my 3DS and Wii U games via Nintendo's online store.

Chopping $100 off the cost of a device by removing a feature that I honestly never see myself using makes the Xbox a lot more attractive to me, and i'm sure many others.

 

[RicoADF]

Speak for yourself - I don't think a disk-less Xbox is utterly useless. I haven't had a disc drive on my PC for years, because, well, physical media is pretty much on the way out. I buy all my games through steam, or other online stores. I even purchase most of my 3DS and Wii U games via Nintendo's online store.

Chopping $100 off the cost of a device by removing a feature that I honestly never see myself using makes the Xbox a lot more attractive to me, and i'm sure many others.

PC and console are 2 different things. I use steam alot on my PC but rarely buy digital on my console for the simple reason that I can always redownload my games on PC (and in the unlikely event that steam goes down the games can be patched to fix them), on a console once the system is abandoned by it's owners (and Microsoft dropped the origional xbox the moment the 360 came out) the your games will be gone for good as soon as you replace the hard drive (unless you can do a backup, I know Playstation can but wasn't certain with xbox considering all the restrictions Microsoft puts on their consoles). Meanwhile all my disc games on my PS1/2/3 etc are still 100% operating and I can play at any time. Also physical have a value, I can resell them if I ever want to, digital has no value at all once you buy it your stuck with it forever with no value to the owner. That's why on PC I won't pay more than $20 for a game on steam, since they have no value I pay accordingly.

 

[Irridium]

That diskless console better fucking have a bigger hard drive then. 500 gigs for next-gen games is not enough. I have 4 games for my PS4, and they currently take up HALF the goddamn 500gb hard drive that comes with it.

 

[fix-the-spade]

Disc free?

What the hell is wrong with Microsoft, it should be Kinect free and $399, not fecking disc free. I can already see the return form.

Reason you are returning this item: I can't put my game in it!

I don't see disc drive free home console going down any better than the PSP GO did, probably worse in fact since download sizes are so much bigger and being download only puts it right in the path of Steam and PCs. Madness, pure Microsoft branded madness. Hell if it doesn't accept discs are Gamestop even going to stock it?

 

[Kenjitsuka]

When I read "discless" I figured you meant the HDD.
Which would obviously be impossible.

Cutting out the BD-drive would be very dumb, because people do buy those things (as well as DVDs) and would PROBABLY like to play them in their so called all in one media box monster thing.

 

[N3squ1ck]

Cutting out the Drive takes the last advantage the consoles have over (most of) pc gaming: used games.
If they take that out, you can only buy your games from Microsoft and Microsoft alone, who will then completely control the prizes. On PC, you at least can choose out of a plethora of different stores (Steam, GMG, GOG, Humblestore, Origin), a choice you don't have on a console.

A console without a bluray drive seems like a terrible idea to me, it hands the last bit control of the console one got over to the manufacturer.

Also a media-center-thingy without a DVD/BluRay drive, but with a camera that always watches you? Nah, thanks

 

[Adam Jensen_v1legacy]

Holy shit. You know what this is, right? They are still trying to get people to accept an always online console. The rumor was true. They haven't changed their policy. They just delayed its implementation. I would suggest that everyone who's purchased an Xbone sell it right now and get a PS4 or PC. Get out while you can. "Disc free" is such an obvious attempt to put a positive spin on something bad. It's like saying "Come to North Korea. It's election free!"

 

[coil]

Seeing as I don't do business with PawnStop, a discless XB1 sounds fine to me. And while the HDD size is concern-worthy, it's no different for the original XB1 and PS4, both of which install the game to your HDD already.

What this article doesn't mention is the potential complication - on the ISP side - of downloading 20-50GB of game content on a semi-regular basis. On the other hand, I already do it with Netflix and the other streaming video services.

As for obsolescence: the XB1 version of "my discs all still work" is that eight years from now when the XB1 is on its way out, you'll pay $50 for a 5TB external HDD and download all of your XB1 games onto it. Maybe buy another for redundancy. It'll sure take up a lot less space than a shelf full of clamshells.

 

[J Tyran]

Speak for yourself - I don't think a disk-less Xbox is utterly useless. I haven't had a disc drive on my PC for years, because, well, physical media is pretty much on the way out. I buy all my games through steam, or other online stores. I even purchase most of my 3DS and Wii U games via Nintendo's online store.

Chopping $100 off the cost of a device by removing a feature that I honestly never see myself using makes the Xbox a lot more attractive to me, and i'm sure many others.

PC and console are 2 different things. I use steam alot on my PC but rarely buy digital on my console for the simple reason that I can always redownload my games on PC (and in the unlikely event that steam goes down the games can be patched to fix them), on a console once the system is abandoned by it's owners (and Microsoft dropped the origional xbox the moment the 360 came out) the your games will be gone for good as soon as you replace the hard drive (unless you can do a backup, I know Playstation can but wasn't certain with xbox considering all the restrictions Microsoft puts on their consoles). Meanwhile all my disc games on my PS1/2/3 etc are still 100% operating and I can play at any time. Also physical have a value, I can resell them if I ever want to, digital has no value at all once you buy it your stuck with it forever with no value to the owner. That's why on PC I won't pay more than $20 for a game on steam, since they have no value I pay accordingly.

Games from Xbox Live are primarily tied to the account just like Steam or the PSN store, you can download any games you buy as many times as you want on as many consoles as you want. There is also a licence initially granted to the machine you download the game as the "primary console". You can download and play an accounts games on any 360/Xbone but only when you are logged in, the primary console licence is transferable and it allows you to play a game you got from XBL offline and also any other account logged into the primary console to play the game as well. The restriction is you can only play offline on the console with the primary licence, there are no limits on how many times you can transfer a licence but there is limit on how frequently you can use the automated transfer process. You cannot use the system to transfer it to a new console every day for example, if you genuinely had a reason to change it other than manipulating the system for one reason or another there should be no reason customer support wouldn't help though. This is pretty reasonable really, it allows unlimited offline play on a console you own and lets you play them at a friends or wherever.

So you can re-download the games and you do not lose them if you replace either the HDD or the console, the primary licence authorises offline play as well. XBL carries no more risk of losing your games than with either Steam or PSN, the only one that ties your downloads to a specific console or storage device where Nintendo but I thought they fixed (or fixing?) that.

Having no resale value remains but thats an issue for all digitally distributed games, how important this is to people varies wildly although anecdotally it seems to concern pure console gamers more often than PC gamers. I guess thats because they got used to games having zero resale value for ten years or more now.

Maybe buy another for redundancy. It'll sure take up a lot less space than a shelf full of clamshells.

And this, seriously f**k boxes. I would need nearly three meters worth of shelving to store all my games (PC & Console) if I bought retail, Books,[footnote]although I only buy e-books for the same reason now, any future BD box sets will be digital after each current series is finished as well.[/footnote] DVD and BD box sets clutter up the place enough without having to find space for all that as well. This is down to preference of course, some people do like having shelves with a "collection" on display.

 

[zalithar]

Maybe Microsoft should start by seeing if they can remove features that market test poorly; maybe a certain terrible peripheral? One that's a homophone for connect. You know instead of something that people like.

 

[smithy_2045]

I'm very interested in this discless Xbox One. 95% chance I'll be buying one of them as my nextgen console.

 

[Dr.Awkward]

So uh, if you take the Titanfall skin and put it on a disc-less version, would it be fair to call that version the Reverse Adobe Edition?

I just had to comment on that...

 

[RicoADF]

Games from Xbox Live are primarily tied to the account just like Steam or the PSN store, you can download any games you buy as many times as you want on as many consoles as you want. There is also a licence initially granted to the machine you download the game as the "primary console". You can download and play an accounts games on any 360/Xbone but only when you are logged in, the primary console licence is transferable and it allows you to play a game you got from XBL offline and also any other account logged into the primary console to play the game as well. The restriction is you can only play offline on the console with the primary licence, there are no limits on how many times you can transfer a licence but there is limit on how frequently you can use the automated transfer process. You cannot use the system to transfer it to a new console every day for example, if you genuinely had a reason to change it other than manipulating the system for one reason or another there should be no reason customer support wouldn't help though. This is pretty reasonable really, it allows unlimited offline play on a console you own and lets you play them at a friends or wherever.

So you can re-download the games and you do not lose them if you replace either the HDD or the console, the primary licence authorises offline play as well. XBL carries no more risk of losing your games than with either Steam or PSN, the only one that ties your downloads to a specific console or storage device where Nintendo but I thought they fixed (or fixing?) that.

Having no resale value remains but thats an issue for all digitally distributed games, how important this is to people varies wildly although anecdotally it seems to concern pure console gamers more often than PC gamers. I guess thats because they got used to games having zero resale value for ten years or more now.

Maybe buy another for redundancy. It'll sure take up a lot less space than a shelf full of clamshells.

And this, seriously f**k boxes. I would need nearly three meters worth of shelving to store all my games (PC & Console) if I bought retail, Books,[footnote]although I only buy e-books for the same reason now, any future BD box sets will be digital after each current series is finished as well.[/footnote] DVD and BD box sets clutter up the place enough without having to find space for all that as well. This is down to preference of course, some people do like having shelves with a "collection" on display.

While the console is supported yes, but once they drop the XBO for the nextbox (Xbox Two?) then the live servers for the XBO will go down and you wont be able to redownload them. For now yes you can, but I'm talking 10+ years from now. It may not matter to you but to me being able to play the game whenever I want where ever I want without relying on servers that will go down someday is an important thing. I still play my PS1 games, and my PS2 games, but in 20 years time would I be able to play my digitally bought XBO games? I highly doubt it.

 

[pilf]

I don't see disc drive free home console going down any better than the PSP GO did, probably worse in fact since download sizes are so much bigger and being download only puts it right in the path of Steam and PCs. Madness, pure Microsoft branded madness. Hell if it doesn't accept discs are Gamestop even going to stock it?

Damn, you beat to the PSP GO. Seriously did we learn nothing from that? I know Sony would prefer we all just forget the GO ever existed but this (as you've already said), is more like them wanting to make another PC platform. Microsoft, you already make PC's what is the point of this sillyness.

 

[Mik Sunrider]

For people like me who only buy a few games a year, who doesn't rush out and do the 'MUST HAVE' on every single game that comes down the pike; this isn't a bad deal. I don't buy games at Gamestop or Wal Mart, I buy the on-line and download them. I have a computer I watch dvd's on, so a $100 off, yeah I would bite. If it was a PS4, that is ... still haven't seen a game exclusive to Xbox that made me want it nor do I really like the idea of my household appliances watching me while I sleep. Creepy

 

[Keith K]

Does that make it an Xbox Zeropointeightsevenfive?

And what is that disc slot shaped slot on the front?