Well, I was looking at Farcry 3: Blood Dragon earlier today, considered a pre-order, but part of me stopped and went "Oh yeah, isn't that published by Ubisoft? Better wait and see."
Lo and behold. Ubisoft is pushing for that fucking Always Online bullshit again.
(I love you gut instinct, pity I don't listen to you more often.)
Looks like they didn't learn their lesson after all; but were just biding their time after the last time gamers threw that consumer-hating shit back in their face.
Welcome back to my shitlist, Ubisoft.
Time to start the burning.
That we get to play the game? That isn't much of a fucking "benefit" when we have that already, now is it?
All you're doing is offering the same products, but only with a digital gun held to their head.
You mean DLC? I can get that without needing an "always online" system already.
I find it hilarious that you tout "clear benefits" when you're being as vague as fucking possible about what those benefits are.
"Oh yes. Clear benefits. They are benefits, and they must exist. Clearly."
Benefits to whom, I wonder.
And way to conveniently ignore the fact that all of those "always online devices" are completely useless in their primary function without a signal of some sort, while consoles are NOT.
*Everything he says after this is worthless. He speaks in nothings, providing elaborate answers about rising development costs that don't actually answer the question*
With Always Online DRM, nearly every advantage you can think of is in the Publisher's hands.
-Absolute Legal Control (and complete potential for extortion)
-No secondary market at all
-Garden style market control
-Targeted marketing
\-More accurate demographic profiling and data mining potential (they nix a lot of false data and assumptions about their market when the game is monitored and routed through their system)
-Threat of loss aimed at the consumer ("agree to our terms, or lose your account and associated purchases") to ensure compliance and dependency, which if accepted, enhances the attachment and thus future sales.
-Maybe throw in some planned obsolescence there, but that's much further down the line. They have to pitch it first.
Really, "fighting piracy" is just gravy.
Doubly so, considering that Ubisoft has grown as large as they have in spite of the boogieman of software piracy.
What benefits are there to the customer?
I can think of absolutely nothing over the current model.
Every other ancillary service they could provide with such a system is already a standard in the existing systems, or one I can find elsewhere (for cheaper and at a generally superior quality).
The common pitch I see to customers for these systems always pulls from a grab bag of buzzwords like "Connected, Internet, Evolution, Enhanced, Experience..." but never once actually addresses what that means, but just assumes that it's better by default.
"It's online! It's multiplayer! It's social! Therefore it is better automatically! No, don't question it! Don't bring context into this!"
Lo and behold. Ubisoft is pushing for that fucking Always Online bullshit again.
(I love you gut instinct, pity I don't listen to you more often.)
Looks like they didn't learn their lesson after all; but were just biding their time after the last time gamers threw that consumer-hating shit back in their face.
Welcome back to my shitlist, Ubisoft.
Time to start the burning.
What "benefits"?Yannis Mallet said:The answer lies in the question ? as soon as players don't have to worry, then they will only take into account the benefits that those services bring.
That we get to play the game? That isn't much of a fucking "benefit" when we have that already, now is it?
All you're doing is offering the same products, but only with a digital gun held to their head.
Oh yes, "extra content".And I agree, these services need to provide clear benefits. It's important to be able to provide direct connections between us and our consumers, whether that's extra content or online services, a lot of successful games have that.
You mean DLC? I can get that without needing an "always online" system already.
I find it hilarious that you tout "clear benefits" when you're being as vague as fucking possible about what those benefits are.
"Oh yes. Clear benefits. They are benefits, and they must exist. Clearly."
Benefits to whom, I wonder.
Ah yes, "ready". In the same way a prisoner is "ready" to surrender any orifice necessary to his new cellmate to avoid a beating. (or worse)Well, that's a question you should put to Microsoft and Sony! I would say that a lot of people are already always online through other devices ? I would suspect that the audience is ready.
And way to conveniently ignore the fact that all of those "always online devices" are completely useless in their primary function without a signal of some sort, while consoles are NOT.
*Everything he says after this is worthless. He speaks in nothings, providing elaborate answers about rising development costs that don't actually answer the question*
My theory is that whichever company successfully pitches this to consumers and makes it stick, wins big.Snotnarok said:I don't get this, why are these companies, especially Ubisoft so set on removing ownership from players with games?
With Always Online DRM, nearly every advantage you can think of is in the Publisher's hands.
-Absolute Legal Control (and complete potential for extortion)
-No secondary market at all
-Garden style market control
-Targeted marketing
\-More accurate demographic profiling and data mining potential (they nix a lot of false data and assumptions about their market when the game is monitored and routed through their system)
-Threat of loss aimed at the consumer ("agree to our terms, or lose your account and associated purchases") to ensure compliance and dependency, which if accepted, enhances the attachment and thus future sales.
-Maybe throw in some planned obsolescence there, but that's much further down the line. They have to pitch it first.
Really, "fighting piracy" is just gravy.
Doubly so, considering that Ubisoft has grown as large as they have in spite of the boogieman of software piracy.
What benefits are there to the customer?
I can think of absolutely nothing over the current model.
Every other ancillary service they could provide with such a system is already a standard in the existing systems, or one I can find elsewhere (for cheaper and at a generally superior quality).
The common pitch I see to customers for these systems always pulls from a grab bag of buzzwords like "Connected, Internet, Evolution, Enhanced, Experience..." but never once actually addresses what that means, but just assumes that it's better by default.
"It's online! It's multiplayer! It's social! Therefore it is better automatically! No, don't question it! Don't bring context into this!"