Xbox 360 Gets Indie Self Publishing Too

[Lightknight]

Anyway, I don't understand negative reactions here. It sounds like MS is responding to consumer demands. Isn't that a good thing? I also don't see all this as being a huge problem. The majority of people who buy the consoles aren't reading up on every minor detail before the thing is even released yet. If MS really does have the ability to actually produce more consoles than Sony, that might make up the difference from these marketing mistakes.

It "MAY" be a good thing. Sony's announcement of this was that it's free and does NOT require a dev kit. This announcement already states that the initial XBO won't be capable of this and it'll require a working relationship with Microsoft in addition to a dev kit box. It makes no statement as to the cost of it or what would be involved with patching the game after release. This could basically be no different than before besides just removing a requirement to have a publisher back the developer.

If it were going to be free like Sony's then you'd think they'd say it too. Is it a good thing that they've removed one of many hurdles facing indie developers? Yeah, it's a step in the right direction. But they need to take some more steps before it makes a meaningful difference. You've got to understand, Microsoft's goal this time was to maximize developers/publishers as customers. To make them want to use the XBO by getting rid of the second hand market and to encourage them to start using Microsoft's cloud processing capabilities. This makes them extremely adverse to giving indies a free foothold into the market whereas Sony's goal is to keep our business as gamers.

As for the ability to produce more consoles than Sony, what does it matter if they aren't selling them? Sony is selling at more than 5:1 and they haven't sold out yet. Even Microsoft's day one edition had fewer consoles in it than Sony's launch day did. So where's the benefit in their production ability? I'm also not entirely sure how the ability to produce the product at one rate or another impacts the quality/desireability of said product.

 

[Jman1236]

Drop the price and the kinect microsoft, then will talk.

 

[shirkbot]

Then companies have no reason to care about your complaining. What do you think you're going to accomplish with it? Hurting their feelings?

I've not bought a lot of games because of DRM. And you know what? Once the hype train goes by, you don't really feel that left out in the end.

You do realize that was essentially my point, right? They don't have to care because the occupy such a large market share that someone is always going to be buying something from them, whether they know it or not. That's the problem: They're just too big. Not to mention that in punishing the publisher I have to punish the developer and the stores from which I would have bought the game as well. It's a giant, tangled mess.

 

[Lightknight]

Snip

Well, that being said, I can imagine that other companies might step in and take over the gap left by MS, that is how the Free Market is supposed to work.
That or MS sells the X-box to someone else and let them make future consoles.
Still, as an admitted Playstation Fan (From PS1 to Now), I'm enjoying this a lot more then I really should

It's just entertaining to see one of the Big 3 pull some of the most retarded moves in Gaming History before screaming "WAIT! NO! WE DIDN'T MEAN IT! COME BACK!"

The cost of entry into the market is too high by far. There aren't very many companies capable of creating these kinds of machines at this price and in mass. I know Sony and Microsoft are relatively new to the market but they stepped in when the console market started crossing over into the pc market in enough ways to lend to their skills. Look at Nintendo, if anyone should have been able to, it'd have been them but they've been failing since the gamecube at being competitive on the processing front and have suffered for it despite finding new and creative ways to attract customers (Imagine if the Wii had also been as powerful as the other consoles and able to play all those huge AAA gamesl, it would have slaughtered). This is because Sony is an actual hardware company with deep inroads there and deep pockets and Microsoft has strong ties into the hardware market as well by virtue of their history and damn deep pockets. The computer market as a whole is too fragmented for it to be united and optimized in the way that consoles are so new entrants in the market will be more niche (ouya) than AAA competitors. I mean, maybe we'll see a steam box implemented in some way and that'd be great.

But the opportunities for market entry aren't really there right now except for something like I mentioned. Maybe Apple, maybe some other hardware company I'm not thinking of. But it'd have to be VERY big.

 

[Lightknight]

Drop the price and the kinect microsoft, then will talk.

Even then you'll have a significantly weaker machine that is intentionally weak to encourage developers to use their cloud processing capabilities. An always on that is actually legitimately being processes on the server so we can't catch them lying like we caught EA doing with SimCity 5. If you're ok with systems that force Always Online gaming onto every game put out towards the end of the console generation then by all means, let price point and kinect 2 be the only talking point with a far larger elephant prancing in the room.

 

[BloodSquirrel]

You do realize that was essentially my point, right? They don't have to care because the occupy such a large market share that someone is always going to be buying something from them, whether they know it or not. That's the problem: They're just too big. Not to mention that in punishing the publisher I have to punish the developer and the stores from which I would have bought the game as well. It's a giant, tangled mess.

I'm not sure how you think market share works. If people refused to buy games with DRM, publishers who put DRM in everything wouldn't have any market share. And it doesn't matter if a publisher has 90% of the market- if a single game bombs horribly when it was their new pilot for always-online DRM, they've still lost money on it and will back off.

The fact that too many gamers bought anyway is why we're getting these increasingly restrictive DRM schemes.

 

[shirkbot]

I'm not sure how you think market share works. If people refused to buy games with DRM, publishers who put DRM in everything wouldn't have any market share. And it doesn't matter if a publisher has 90% of the market- if a single game bombs horribly when it was their new pilot for always-online DRM, they've still lost money on it and will back off.

The fact that too many gamers bought anyway is why we're getting these increasingly restrictive DRM schemes.

It's a two way street: People have to not buy, and companies need to understand WHY. NEITHER is happening, and that's really the problem. Sometimes people don't buy or they bomb the ratings on Amazon/Metacritic or what have you, but the companies don't care because 1) They don't care about anyone opposing DRM. They want DRM and by god they're going to keep putting it in until 0 people buy the game. 2) Everyone is still buying their other games anyway. Even if they post a huge loss one title, they're more likely to just never make that game again than to reverse policies that might have contributed to its poor sales. Both sides of the debate basically refuse to understand the other.

 

[Mumorpuger]

Does the phrase "too little, too late" apply to this situation? It's like telling the captain of the Titanic that they hit an iceberg after it's already snapped in half.

I'd disagree, to a point. At this stage I'd say it'd be more like warning him about the iceberg before they launched.

 

[TomWiley]

I'm not sure how you think market share works. If people refused to buy games with DRM, publishers who put DRM in everything wouldn't have any market share. And it doesn't matter if a publisher has 90% of the market- if a single game bombs horribly when it was their new pilot for always-online DRM, they've still lost money on it and will back off.

The fact that too many gamers bought anyway is why we're getting these increasingly restrictive DRM schemes.

It's a two way street: People have to not buy, and companies need to understand WHY. NEITHER is happening, and that's really the problem.

I see where you're coming from but I really disagree with that statement. The best way to use your consumer powers and improve the industry is by punishing unethical business practice and rewarding good practices.

That's why I think that it's good that Xbox One preorders have started to pick up. It shows Microsoft that listening to consumer feedback can actually pay off.

Cynically turning down the Xbox One because of the policies that it used to feature will only show Microsoft that changing policies after consumer complaints isn't worth the investment.