Sony Boss: Don't "Shove Something Down a Consumer's Throat"

[Strazdas]

I wasnt going to comment but damn, Ultrawinkie seems to be spewing hatred for whole PlayStation existence based solely on the fact that a single game developers cannot balance their game? are you freaking seriuos? PLanetside developer is dictating whole industry trends? And yeah, Xbox has no unbalanced games right? nto to mention you completely sway away non-console markets as irrelevant.
Speaking of which, there is a quote i often use when talking about developement, and that still stands true for every sucesful game:
"I'd rather have my players annoyed than bored".

I used it as an example, people asked about it and I explained what it was and what happened. The debate went on a tangent of explaining it and the role of publishers than actual debate on sony. The point I was originally trying to make is that just because sony didn't put DRM on a console doesn't mean the industry is suddenly saved, so any boasting on DRM doesn't hold any weight no mattr how many times they bring it up. A point that others have already said. People took that as an offense and are trying to "defend" Sony's "honor" even if the point was as obvious as hell.

It seems if you imply Sony doesn't own and direct the entire console market after E3, everyone loses their minds.

Fair enough as far as example goes. As i dont play planetside, i didnt knew about it. indeed you made the point that Sony inst angel saviuor, however then went into a ran of how "Evil" sony is and how "sheep" we are for liking it more than its competitor even though there is a clear advantage for us for liking it more than Microsoft. the consumer is also greedy and seeks maximum profit everywhere. supporting what Sony does right now is profitable for consumer, so it does that. Industry isnt suddenly saved, and noone claims that. They do however, and rightfully so, celebrate that the status quo was kept instead of going the direction that would bring less benefits to the consumer. Them not having DRM have weight and you seem to think that weight means they are saving a consumer, when in reality that weight is simply corporate advantage over Microsoft. and corporate advantage comes from providing a service consumers like more.
Sony does not own entire console market, however from the people who were going to buy a console this christmas, majority will be buying Playstation, because it benefits them as a consumer to do so.

 

[Strazdas]

I said Sony was no different from any other company out there. It wasn't a charity, its the same company it was during this generation, and it was doing the same things the others were. The same things gamers complained about.

Since they aren't the defender of gamers, they won't try and stop DRM if it seeps in from third parties. In fact, they can't or risk burning bridges with the fewer and fewer publishers that can stay in business. If they burn bridges, they run the risk of publishers not making any games for that system, a kiss of death for a console.

You say its evil, I say its realistic. They either play ball with the industry or their console dies like the many that came before it. As brutal as that sounds, that's the kind of mentality businesses use.

Although I can see why you think that, the guy I was talking with decided to delete his posts.

Except that it wasnt doing the same things gamers complained about Xbox is doing.

They will try and maybe even suceed in stopping at least some forms of DRM. why? because thats beneficial to them. Gamers dont like DRM, this is quite clear. So if they got a system that does not have DRM, they will choose that over the other all else equal. Therefore, stopping DRM will actually bring them costumers, which is profit for them.
And publishers wont dare to burn bridges. After the backlast Xbox had and their attempts to isolate Nintendo away there is no market left for them to sell us those yearly 60 dollar games. There is PC you say, yeah, and see how much publishers like it if they plan to "Start porting" after 3 years?

Their console wont die because they wont play ball with the industry. because not playing ball is exactly what got them superior sales at this very moment. it is profitable for them not to play ball, and as long as that remains so, they wont.

I saw FieryTrainwreck posts before they got deleted (it seems they did now, why i wonder), so that was not interacting my perception.

 

[Flames66]

How about we stop insulting our customers by calling them "consumers". Yea, that'd be great.

Again Sony is not really doing anything much... that means neither BAD nor GOOD. They are kinda waiting out what is going to happen and the are letting others like Microsoft make the big mistakes.

But are they defenders of gamers.. no far no! They only reason they are so "nice" right now is because they have looked at Microsoft.

Again the same people who wanted the Xbox One DRM in place [aka EA, Activision and I expect Bioware] also talked to Sony.

Just because Sony didn't give in doesn't means they are the heroes of gamers. Instead they just waited to see what the market was doing and how far they could push things.

This looks about right. I won't be buying any consoles as I'm perfectly happy with my PC, but if I did I wouldn't be getting either of the big AAA ones.

 

[Strazdas]

I said it was the same this generation, and there are traces of it almost doing what the xbox was doing but was dropped. It became obvious that blatant DRM doesn't really work in that fashion, but low profile DRM does.

Low profile DRM is known very well in this generation. In fact, gamers have been proven to buy things if its hyped enough. Its been proven before. If gamers really hated DRM, everything EA would have made wouldn't have made a profit. In fact, Diablo wouldn't have sold as much as it did. The general population doesn't really seem to care, they surely haven't before.

The general population see the market in this way: what do i gain if i sign up for DRM. the only DRM that worked, is the one thatgave its users a lot in return ( see: steam). Diablo is quite poor example really, since the game is a ghost town now. There arep robably more Diablo 2 palyers than diablo 3 by now. I doubt you can call that sucess.
And EA isnt the one with most DRM. its ubisoft and activision. though Sim City did bring EA close. i know its fashionable to hit on EA at every turn, but there are worse gaming publsihers out there.

Publishers can easily play hard ball and isolate your console, you can't afford that to happen. Sure some gamers would praise it, but at the end of the day its all game library numbers and exclusives.

One word: Nintendo
No, but, seriuosly, publishers will not be stupid enough to avoid the most popular console this generation if they want to stay profitable with their bloated budgets. it simply wont work if Sony keeps the ration of users as it has now and refuses to implement DRM publishers will have no choice but to play ball with sonys rules. dont underestimate the power of a huge userbase.

Its also a very poor general public now, so they can't afford to support a console that won't get support.

Im sorry, this is 2013, would you stop blaming the 2008 crysis for everything by now?

So publishers really could kill a platform if they really wanted to.

yes, but it would be as profitable to them as a person who jumps in front of a car. sure you may havei nconvienienced the driver that was an ass, but you suicided in the process.

Keep in mind the cost that goes into hardware like this and how Sony is having some financial issues with its divisions means Sony can't last long if the publishers banded together and wanted them gone. Its a big gamble for them to really stand up against DRM.

Xbox division was reporting a loss all the way till 2010 and it is still a net loss (meaning the whole project as a whole, even ignoring inflation, is a complete failure from investors perspective). and yet they stand.

The safest route would be to not have DRM on console, but allow third party DRM. Which they obviously would do.

they already said that they do not have any DRM support but pulishers can do as they pelase, exatly the same way they did with PS3 - as in we aint changing anything toward publishers.

like you siad yourself, the more people that you sell console games to, the more profit you get, thus it is in fact profitable to stand agaisnt DRM.
you significantly overeastinate the bargaining power of publishers.

 

[Strazdas]

You think that everyone is suddenly okay now? Analysts have said time and time again customers are still scared to put money down on big items. Just because the crisis isn't happening doesn't mean everyone magically turned confident and rich.

And the fact publishers could also die brings a new issue. Who will make the games? Consoles need support day one or risk being unprofitable. If publishers go, they end up taking the games they would have made with them until other companies could scrounge up to afford it. Consoles cannot afford to lose any games or hope that someone will replace it quickly. These are huge companies, it will take a long time for another to take its place. In fact, it may never be replaced because PC gaming has kneecapped consoles when it comes to developer attractiveness. WHo would really want to make expensive games for consoles when you can make cheap and profitable games on PC? Its a game of chicken to be sure, it only remains to be seen who breaks first.

First party publishing wouldn't really work, you wouldn't be able to turn out the required games to keep your console afloat. You spent money, made little money, and hope your console debts can be paid off. Doesn't work that way.

When publishers isolate a platform, they aren't there for money. They are there for blood and to destroy an entire platform. They would find many ways to make people jump. If activision said "no call of duty" on the playstation when call of duty started to get really popular, the playstation would have been severely hobbled.

lack of DRM takes a backseat to games. Its the reason Origin has any users at all. So yes publishers could starve them out.

Of course not. there was no time in human history when "Everyone was okay". Yes, they are scared to take huge loans they wont be able to pay. i call that a good thing. maybe we can root the "living on a loan" type of life a bit. but thats a different topic. The crysis is over, you can stop blaming it for everything.

Publishers are not even making games nor are they essential to making games. they are the middleman between game studio and the consumer. one that in ever digitalizing matrket become more and more obsolete, so they fight tooth and nail to deny us the ability to control our purchases and contact with developers. we saw them suceed in musci industry, we can see them suceeding in movie industry, but we dont have to let them suceed in gaming.
the developers themself have often stated they got no interest in DRM or console wars and would be much more open on releasing it on a DRM free console. and lets not ignore all the independant and upcoming developers. sore most of them dont make AAA games, but do i really need to point out at Star Citizen and Minecraft again?

Consoles can afford to loose some games if that means their other games will sell to a much larger (judging from preorders 3 times higher at least) audience. as you said, they are big companies, and they can cover some loses if that means lots more profit in the future. heck, Microsoft has been doing just that for the last 10 years. and Sony completely ate up the failure of PS3 sales and havent gone bancrupt. Micorosft and Sony have huge part of thier business in other things than gaming, and as such they can easily cover the console loses if they see a future cash cow. and having a huge audience is a cash cow.

And as you say yourself PC is mroe attractive to developers and more profitable, then why doesnt the big companies go there? answer is simple - audience. consoles have more of it. (although to be frank i wish to see the day when PC goes back to being on top, but thats subjectivity)

First party has kept nintedo afloat, so you cant really spin this argument.

Call of duty, as much as it riled up on the internet, isnt actually that huge. FOr example god of war 3 sold more copies than all COD games combined on PS3. PC sales, who are praised as a "Shooter platform" is in fact dominated by The Sims. And it cant even come clsoe to scraching the sale fogures of big nintendo franchises. it may be the largest FPS, but it isnt as internet makes it out to be. WOW has more players than COD sold copies. Sure there would be fanatics. i know a person who bought a PS3 only for Last of Us. but they arent that numerous. as you said yourself, the average gamer doesnt care that much.

Origin was a smart push becasue it came with extremely anticipated game, and some people valued the game mroe than their freedom. however you cant really call Origin a sucess with what userbase it has and even those are the people who are forced into it by the publishers and never really use the "origin services" other tha "shut up and allow me to play the game".

 

[Something Amyss]

They were planning the launch since 2008 and nobody thought it was a good idea to suggest revealing what the console looked like upon it's announcement? That's kind of worrying really.

If Microsoft hadn't screwed their announcement up people would still be mocking the PS4's original announcement to this day.

Not to mention the fact that it was only Microsoft's announcement that changed their plans for packaging with Move mandatory, a higher price point, and DRM. They already said that the DRM decision was at least partially made by Microsoft and the response.

Of course, they still get some points for not deciding to double down on such stupidity.

And they probably should still be mocked for their reveal, yeah. They were kind of ridiculous about it and were saved only by Microsoft being ridiculous-er.

Ridiculouser should totally be a word. It seems perfectly cromulent.

 

[Strazdas]

<long post?

Consoles have games outside of publishers. They are not the main reason. and once again you overvalue the bartering power of a publisher. They cannot do a denial of access for Sony because that would be a suicide for the publisher.

Sorry, i dont count "Barely working" PC ports as pc games. They are developing for consoles, and PC is just a port for a cash grab. Most PC ports come a year late.
I stated that there are games that have huge sucess and no publishers. you said game studios cant work without them. you were wrong. what platform it is is irrelevant.

Ditial isnt there on the consoles, because publishers are acting stupid again. the sony statement has been shown to be wrong. people want to buy digital. but they want to buy digital when buying digital has advantages (see: steam again), isntead of only disadvantages (current console online sale model). it has nothing to do with digital and everything to do with service provided.

Nintendo holds the title for having top 10 games in worldwide sale count to be all nintendo first party games. i call that extreme sucess.
well if we count mobiles then i guess its 8 out of 10.

PS4 cost less to develop, since Microsoft tried to cut corners with its processor, failed, and had to redo it again, hence less copies available for preorder (not manufactured fast enough) and we can expect high failure rate from this as well.
but that is beside the point. it costs 3 billion to develop. microsoft has reported a $4.24 billion revenue in 2012Q4 [http://www.joystiq.com/2012/01/20/microsofts-xbox-division-revenue-at-4-24-billion-in-q2-xbox-l/]. that is 4.24b revenue in 3 months. lets say this revenue is the same every year for simplicity (or course its not), and lets say console is being developer for 3 years (its longer in reality). so they spent 3 billion to develop a product, while 4.24*4(quarters)*3(years)=50,88 billions revenue was made. Which means that the profitability lowered by money spent into research is by 5,89%. A companys profit is normally considered too low if it is bellow 10%. Microsofts profit rate was a quite stable 20-30% rate [http://ycharts.com/companies/MSFT/profit_margin] and has fell in 2012 because they had to write off a $6.19Billion for aQuantive [http://techcrunch.com/2012/07/19/microsoft-posts-192m-q4-2012-loss-because-of-6-19b-aquantive-writedown-18-06b-revenue/].
So yeah, the developement costs can certainly be eaten up without going bancrupt. heck, sony did it with PS3.

Lets assume its a 50/50 division

but thats the thing. with what sony is doing, this wont be 50/50, this will be more like 25/75, and if that means you loose a few bestsellers, you still make up just by sheer amount of sales.

EA released 30 games in 2012.
Activision released 11 in 2012.
I had a bit o an issue with finding exact number for Ubisoft.

there were 651 games released for Playstation3 in 2012. Out of them 233 were big enough to receive enough critical attention to get a metascore. So really, how big is 11 games compared to 651? And did activision released 11 games for every plantform? because if we look at 2012 for PS3+Xbox+PC it goes to multiple thousands.

It is the publishers who will be chasing sony when the userbase is divided this way. if you got a product to sell it is stupid to ignore 75% of your market.

 

[Strazdas]

Microsoft makes most of its money from windows. Not from gaming. In fact, its gaming division has profit troubles even before the Xbox one. Sony does NOT have that same luxury. Its entertainment division is by far the most important.

As you said, Microsoft can eat the cost. Sony can't. It needs its entertainment division.

And again, you fail to fucking realise this main issue.

No publishers means almost no games. This isn't PC gaming so they can't do kickstarter and indies are all busy making PC games. So past the launch titles there won't be anything else. No one is coming to save the consoles, what you see is what you get. It doesn't matter if 75% of people have it, if there are no games people won't use it and it will be dead. Not to mention its debt won't be repaid.

You keep bringing profits and market share into an argument. Its like a city without water, it won't be a city for long when everyone leaves because there is no fucking water. Do I have to spell this out for you?

Just like a city, you can kill it by not letting it get water (games). A console with no games is just a paperweight, and unlike PC gaming no one is coming to save it. No one. They are all at kickstarter on steam, they wouldn't waste their time with high costs and a highly locked down market.

Good games doesn't always equal money. If that was the case both Sony and Microsoft would have left long ago and consolees would be owned entirely by nintendo. Instead Nintendo has issue moving Wii Us.

Okay, so you say digital makes publishers irrelevant then turn around and say digital on consoles isn't there? So publishers are still needed on Consoles? agreeing with me?

Why didn't you just concede earlier?

And platform does matter. Publishers matter on consoles because no actual way to self publish, PCs don't rely on retail so self publishing is okay.

You keep bringing PC into an argument over consoles as if it matters because its the only place you actually grab excuses from. We are talking about consoles and games, leave the PC at the door because its way of doing things is way ahead of consoles.

Otherwise, publishers and gamestop would already be gone and everyone would be downloading all their games directly from the internet. Consoles rely on retail, PC relies on digital. Consoles don't have digital by your own admission and the mentality of Sony itself. So therefore publishers still matter in consoles.

It doesn't matter if sony is "wrong." Digital isn't there to save the day so consoles have no other choice than use publishers. Sony says online still isn't viable, then it isn't coming for consoles. Simple as that.[/quote]

Yes, microsoft makes most of its money from windows. and SOny makes most of its money from hardware. since, you know, they make pretty much every hardware device out there by now.Sony can eat the price, they done it with PS3 before.

You heard about the Indie acess for PS4. that is a gateway for all non-publisher dev, essentially, same gateway that a PC would have to reach its fans. if sony wanted, it could easily provide similar support as PC does to develop on their platform.
Also you assume all publishers go away instantly. but its really only the big three pushing for DRM in the first place. and those are not majority of publishers market.
I think your whole failure to udnerstand my point cones from thuinknig that all publishers will run away from sony. they wont. i repeat: they wont.
there is absolutely no efficient method for EA to deny console of all games. it can deny it of its own games, and thats it.
No, good games dont mean money, sales mean money. i was pointing out that nintedo games got most sales. i could argue about them being the best ( i think they are far from it) but thats not the place.

digital makes publishersi rrelevant, hence publishers fight to nto allow consumer beneficial digital distribution. publishers are not needed, they however are fighting to stay there. there are plenty of stuff that is not needed but exists. just because it exists does not mean its needed. for example stupidity.

Consoles dont ahve to rely on retail. they chose to. whether being bought by publishers, or themselves supporting the model. they dont have to.
of course PC matters. its a healthy alternative. peopel palying consoles are not stuck with consoles. the whole argument is that consoles CAN do "way ahead" as PC does, but they dont. and thats why publishers still retain any power. Granted i often use PC exampels because those are the ones i know best, being mostly PC gamer. you do have to remember that games like Minecraft sold more on consoles than on PC, though admitedly they had to sign into MS publishing because console manufacturer had all the power.

gamestop is experiencing troubles if you follow the news. and it should be gone as soon as consoles start providing beneficial (isntead of restrictive) digital sales.

digital IS there to "save the day". you shoudl rather say "Sony is not using digital".

i find it funny how you use current gen situation to base next gen sales whne it is obviuos the tables have turned.

 

[Strazdas]

Sony can eat the losses. at what cost is a different question. but they dont have to eat the loses to begin with, so that discussion is going nowhere.
some analyst shouting that "electrinics are worth 0" isnt realyl sainyg much. its the kind of analyst that predicted Wii will be end of nintendo, well, you know the kind.
Sony is profitable all around, while Microsoft is seeing a decline now that they are attemting to force their win8, new office and other "Features" that people dont want.

Sony CAN offer similar service for their PS4. Will they is a different question (as in, would that be proftiable).

COnsole manufacturers can get consoles screwed, yes indeed, i dont deny that. costumers are already runing away (remember the threads of "im going to buy PC, help me choose one"?
Fair enough, i did had the old PC sales number for Minecraft. it did sell like crazy at launch.

Sony already told publishers what they can and cant do. Publishers wont like it, but they will play ball. Why? once again, sony has the majority of their costumers. and no publisher that has a brain on his shoulders will ignore that kind of market share.
No, im not suggesting that sony should have a crusade. im suggesting that sony should continue on providing a service that is geared towards its costumers, thus earning the lion market share, and turning the tables in such a way that it is publishers that have to paly ball and not theo ther way around. When you got a machine that is owned by 75% userbase, noone but the very stupid is going to ignore you. I guess you could compare this to windows vs Mac. most people program for windows only or for both as windows has way bigger market share.

Just because you are huge, does not mean there are no other huge players around. in a market as big as gaming being a huge company does not mean you can go monopoly on the market, and this was proven wnhe ubisoft was forced to take back its DRM decisions and when rockstar DRM failed spectaculary for GTA4 and they pretty much gave up on PC altogether.

Gamestop reported loses according to latest news. i dont think getting loses is good way to run a business, do you? Thing with being anticonsumer is that consumers run away from you, and once an alternative is found (in this case Sony), they will flock there en-mass, leaving you alone with your anticonsumer practices. and you will be forced to go there and play by their rules.

Yes, nintendo isnt selling now, but really, nintendo isnt even in the race anymore. WiiU can easily be labeled a currentgen (PS3, Xbox360) console for all intents and purposes, that launched very late. Nintnedo is a historical example of how it can stand on first party alone. What will come of it now we will have to wait and see.

 

[Strazdas]

I have destroyed every single argument you made for the last page, and you repeat the same rhetoric that customer base somehow means something. Gamers don't have patience or any sort of loyalty.

Now are you done making flimsy excuses and actually debate or are you going to waste my time with more false information?

And i guess we will end here before it gets ugly.