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Sony In Deal For Networked Arcade Games
Ggggeo writes: "I saw this story at Yahoo! about Sony in a deal with Sega and Namco about networked arcade games. Not just local networked games, but wide area networked games you can play in one arcade against other players in other arcades far, far, away. The article also mentions DoCoMo (in regard to bringing iPhone content to your TV through a PlayStation.) Basically it will be a pumped-up version of the home PlayStation with lots of additions and enhancements (cameras, monitors, and high speed networks among others)."
After reading "Snow Crash" by Neal Stephenson, I've just been waiting for a widely used real-time, virtual arena where individuals can actually interact in ways other than murdering one another with railguns. I could really see something like this coming out of a networked arcade. It's got big, expensive, custom hardware, cashing pouring in, and just the kind of people who would throw their money at really cool, but presently uneconomical eye candy. Arcades are a great place for murdering others, but I think all this hardware has potential for even more. If you think about it, we can't really even talk to each other in these games without disabling movement (since you need hands to steer).
I'd love to see an environment that actually is a world... a place where people can actually talk with each other by talking, or even smiling, and frowning, and gesturing, instead of typing. Arcades are just the place to get into this type of technology. Think about it. The nice thing about having public terminals is that lots of people are using the same gear and they're all paying to use it at different times. Because of this, the hardware can be way more expensive and therefore way cooler. What I'm wondering is whether anyone realizes the potential for an actual world, with actual people, rather than just musclebound, guntoting automatons. Imagine stepping into a booth, putting on a headset, and opening your eyes to an artifical, yet somehow real digital world, where you can actually meet people on the other side of the world, rather than just passing back and forth colorless messages in a terminal window...
Arcades in LAN / WAN. What a marvellous idea.. Except not..
Most people owning a computer nowadays have more processing power than the common arcade machines - the only advantage the Arcade still has is the fancy stuff, like a steering wheel and huge monitors, surround sound etc. The only reason I'd want to pay up 10 Norwegian Kroner (a little more than a dollar) to play in a WAN would be to see the face of the person I have beaten, right after I have beaten him..
It's all psychology. In short: I don't think it's very satisfying to win a game of Ferrari racing, and leave the Arcade machine thinking "Oh boy, did I cream that BllDg guy somewhere in Kansas City".
Point: It's completely irrelevant that the technology exists.. If I want to play long-distance-network, I might as well use the internet - in which case I can play for a week for the same prize it costs me to play two games in the arcade.
Give me the internet any day.
-- Haje Jan Kamps -- www.kamps.org -- Freelance journalist / Photographer
I frequent some "adult arcades" now and then like ESPNZone and Dave & Buster's and you are right. It isn't so much the game itself but the controllers and the huge screens you can use to play.
It is pretty fun to strap on a pair of fake skis or jump into an F-1 car and race your buddy who is right next to you. May be even cooler to race someone else from around the world and see their reactions as they play on a live video feed!!
Not in the slightest!
Granted you are correct and home systems can rival the arcade for game content and selection, but the one place that home systems fall way short is on interaction with other human beings. Going to the arcade gives you a chance to compete against other people who love the game just as much as you do. There is probably someone at the arcade that is better than you at any game at any given time. You can't get that level of competition at home.
Not only are pretty much limited to the people that you know when playing at home, and let me tell you playing the same fighting game time and again against the same person with no penalty when you loose get real boring real quick, but the arcade offers a little extra excitement because you know when you loose your money is gone. At home you paid for it, you own it, and the only thing that you loose playing is time.
Now with all this in mind I must say that I think that the idea of playing a networked game in an arcade seems like a brain dead idea. Obviously someone said to them selves, "Well it works with home games, let's take it back to the arcade!" What they are failing to realize is that eliminates more than half of the reason to even go spend money at the arcade - THE PEOPLE!
How will teenagers play arcade video games in the future? Giggling away with friends or alone in a networked world, battling anonymous foes in foreign cities, miles away, communicating only through blinking screens?
This is a trifle bleak and shortsighted. PC gamers with bandwidth to spare are already using Voice over IP products such as Roger Wilco to make WAN gaming more personal. I can envisage video conferencing technology making the arcade equivalent really very sociable.
There's a Namco arcade racing game (I forget the name) wherein a picture of taken of your face before the race begins, and that picture hovers above your car, so that in 2-8 player games you can see which of your friends you've just overtaken (or been overtaken by). It's a very simple idea, which adds to the pleasure of the game immensely. Imagine little ideas like this in a WAN context.
The real problem with WAN gaming, both in arcades and in the home, is this: who wants to play against arbitary strangers? You either want to play against people who are already your friends (I've never seen a lobby system that makes this easy), or in some sort of cup or leage that matches you against people whos skill level is similar to yours. This is a problem I haven't seen dealt with yet (although I don't frequent die-hard Quake communities, where things might be more organised -- but those communities demand your life and soul...).
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That was soooo months ago... catch up with the geek culture, sheesh...
Hello!
I'm working on networked arcade-style games myself.
An interesting point is that those games can only work with a minimal lag. When you're playing around the world, you get close to the physical limits. Imagine two gamers on opposite points of the earth. A signal would travel 21k kilometers. Double that - you want a response. That alone gives you a minimum lag of 42k/330k = ~0.13 seconds. Speed of light.
Of course the real problem for me are modem dialups. They usually give you a lag of 0.5 s.
Just a side note, but 'docomo', when pronounced, sounds just like 'dokomo', which in japanese means 'anywhere'. Don't know why they used Co instead of Ko, but then I don't know what DoCoMo stands for, explicitly, either.
Moo
Actually, there's a substantial amount of kids nowadays that have never really hung out in a real arcade... many municipal governments in the US have fought long and hard to make arcades... aka juvenile delinquent hangouts, as they saw them... a non-existent part of the landscape. Hence, there is no local arcade anymore, no place to really hang out and play all kinds of games.
Before you argue with me, an arcade is NOT:
1. a movie theater
2. an indoor amusement park that's rather large and is not easily accessible by foot for most people (some lucky kids have these nearby, but it's like the movie theaters now... you gotta drive a distance to get to one)
3. a deli or small shop with less than 3 arcade machines
4. anyplace that charges admission
5. a local-area tourist attraction or highway rest stop
Not to say you can't get your game on in those places, but in general, those are NOT hangouts for the purposes of playing arcade games. Specifically, a lot of those places are faraway for most kids, not easily accessible, expensive, and generally unsuitable for hanging out with the guys (or girls). You could hangout there, for whatever reason, but it's not like an arcade. It's not the same atmosphere.
I really wish that didn't happen, but there were too many pedophiles, drug dealers, thugs packin heat and knives, and all other kinds of seedy elements gathering there after a while to ruin it for everyone. I mean, it's not that it got bad at most arcades... but it was excuse enough for the cops to harrass the places. And since they got to be too much trouble to run, people stopped running them. I can personally think of 4 or 5 arcades in walking distance from my house that went belly-up when I was growing up. Hell, I had an amusement park in my town that got knocked down a few years before I was born (to make condos, no less) for the exact same reasons.
Video game consoles just replaced arcades... it's not that they made them extinct. They were already becoming extinct.
For proof, there's a lot of coin-op companies getting out of the business (or already out). Williams, the grand-pinball company, is one of them. It's sad, really.
Yes, those were the good ol' days. Now I can't stand more than 30 seconds on modern games without knowing 300 secret moves.
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Never hit your grandmother with a shovel, for it leaves a bad impression on her mind...
1. The arcade controls I like. Better than what I would use at home. Besides I love the point and shoot games.
2. I don't own every system. There are games in there that I don't have are can't have because I don't own the system.
3. I get to show off infront of my friends. 'Nuff said
4. Multiplayer games work so much better because everyone has their own screen and no fighting over the better conroller
Is this enough reasons?
__________________
Just a guy with an opinion
Anything that gets Sega doing its great software, instead of its ridiculous hardware is a good idea. Hopefully they won`t be working with MS, so it`ll be MS vs sony/sega/namco/etc.
Well considering Sega already worked with MS to provide a copy of WinCE for the dreamcast, this hardly seems a solid viewpoint.
As to the Dreamcast being "ridiculous" hardware, what the hell was "ridiculous" about stuffing half of an arcade machine in a $200 games console, so you could port all your top-end arcade games straight to the home for minimal cost? No developer ever stated the Dreamcast was difficult to develop for. The problem was Sega had no idea about marketing it, so no-one got to know how good it was. And we know what happens when the inferior tech gets all the marketing dollars: the inferior tech wins.
If it's "ridiculous" hardware you are after, then take a look at the innards of the Sega Saturn, or more to the point the PS2 with it's crazed innards.
Is this to compete against cyber-cafe's? They were the first to start using broadband and computers to get business...
I know there is a cyber cafe next to the university I went to. It got its business by charging by the 1/2 hour to play quake on their network (which was hooked to the internet). We all know competing against people is more fun, especially if its a lot of people (64 player quake2 games, for example).
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Good quote, too many chars. Seriously, the slashdot 120 char limit sucks!
Okay...Joe's coffee shop has a PC with a mouse and a copy of UT. Now, if sony wanted to do it, they'd have a 50 inch screen, a platform to stand on, and a "real" gun thing to aim and shoot with.
Play Star Wars:Pod Racer on a PC. Then go to Dave & Busters and play it there - as AMC Theaters say - "There is a difference".
OK, I'll bite.
Dude, I can only assume that you're just starting out as a troll. Now, you've got the inflammatory part right, but you have to be more subtle on your blatant factual inaccuracies. For example:
until the president of Japan...
Now, no one's going to take you seriously if you insist on sounding like an angry 4th grader who's dad beat up on him too much. Japan is a parliamentary democracy (sound it out, it's not as hard as it looks). What this means is, there's been an Emperor in Japan since around the 7th century. He's rather symbolic nowadays but, still there.
Have a nice day!
--Just Another Pimp A$$ Troll-Killer
El riesgo vive siempre!
Unless, that is, you want a game that ISN'T an FPS or RTS, because it seems that's all that PC game manufacturers make anymore.
Face it, consoles are your best bet for games. Especially now when you can buy a $300 console and get graphics that rival (if not surpass) a $1500 computer.
As always, though, it's all about the games. RPGs are strictly console territory. 99.9999% of the RPGs for the PC *SUCK HARDCORE*. Everyone was ranting and raving about Baldurs Gate 2, saying it's the best RPG ever, and, my god... Talk about a BORING game.
Oh, and if you want something that isn't the same old recycled dribble... something ORIGINAL, consoles are the best as well. Take Chu-Chu Rocket, Samba De Amigo, Seaman, etc.
Fighting games are better on a console than a PC. There's *no* argument on this one.
Stick to your PC if you want to play the same games over and over again. Consoles are for the true gamers.
-- Dr. Eldarion --
That would be great. Four people could play Gauntlet without crowding.
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"Outlook not so good." That magic 8-ball knows everything! I'll ask about Exchange Server next.
Probably along the lines of the "Waterworld" game from The Simpsons:
-move one step-
"Game Over. Please deposit forty quarters"
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"Outlook not so good." That magic 8-ball knows everything! I'll ask about Exchange Server next.
Imagine some of the cooler arcade games networked?
like the better 4 player hack and slasher games... if you could play with others or against them!
This might be what is needed to re-vitalize the arcade. although I see $2.00- $5.00 per play games coming out of this (The price per play has gotten a bit insane hasen't it?) as the operators and manufacturers squeeze the player a bit harder.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
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Not being a teenager I'm not really sure about the answer to this question, but what does the arcade really have to offer any more?
Home console systems now have pretty much all the power we need to run arcade-quality games, and every year sees a huge leap in performace with the release of new systems. The only thing I can see that traditional arcades offer is games with novelty controllers, like those huge ones that have fake motorcycles. And those cost so much that they're hardly economical...
So where does this leave the traditional arcade? It seems to be to be a doomed business...
Jon Erikson, IT guru
Right now, I'm able to go to a local arcade and play Unreal Tournament and a few other "arcade" games on a T1 connection to the internet for a certain amount of time per dollar (not that I'd spend that money)... What's the difference between that and what Sony plans (except for the obvious in using the PlayStation.. a lesser machine anyhow)?
*shrug* Nothing to see here, move along, move along...
Even still, perhaps what's hard to replace is the social aspects of the arcade environment itself. I'll still play the odd arcade game or two if I'm in a bar with friends and it's lots of fun. So if Sony can combine the power of online games with the social aspects of the arcade I think they may have a powerful combination.
Tux Racer experts. The Linux Pimp
--It's Pimptastic!--
What about our favorite bar game -- Golden Tee 2k? That has an access card you can apply for and you swipe it through and you play tournament games (FOR MONEY) right from your local watering hole (or whereever). This has been around for at least several years that I know of. I guess it isn't like playing a 4 player race car game hooked up against 50 other players, but it is the same general idea.
:)
I happen to prefer drunk golf than drunk driving
Yeah, but it's the RIGHT girls you DO end up meeting 8^)
Sorry Sony, but I already have a gaming station with a propietary operating system that is networked, with cameras, removeable storage and a scanner. It's called Windows 98 PC.
What's the value added for my going to Playstation? Are the games that much better to justify buying all new peripherals and learning an all new operating system, with all it's new quirks?
Nope, can't see it, stick with console games for the Joe Sixpacks out there who can barely boot a PC, let alone do something as complex as editing their registry.
And thats before we get onto the racist and sexist overtones that most japanese video games (and anime) seem to exhibit. What parent would allow their kids to play NAMCOs 'F-zero kamakazi' for example with its relentless portrayal of racially 'superior' Japanese bombing US ships at perl harbor ?
:(
Can someone please mod this down to flamebait before the war breaks out again? This has to be one of the most idiotic statements I've ever read in this forum.
There is a whole wide world outside your door. Different people hold different values and they have every right to do so. The Japanese bombing Pearl harbour was not Hitler murdering an entire race. It was a tragedy. I do not see what it has do with "racially superior" Japanese video games.
Jeez: you wound me up so much I replied to your drivel.
It appears to display the high scores based on location. Since at least one of the pubs is in a town without broadband or cable, and with ISDN being too expensive, it must transfer scores via modem at the end of the day.
Can anyone add any more?
I no longer work there, but while I was at Midway Games, I briefly worked on a project(called WaveNet) like this.
We took the arcade game Mortal Kombat 3, added a tiny board to an expansion connector with a 386 with a TCP/IP stack and ethernet port to it, and connected it to a Bay router hooked to a 56k leased line... We had a small NOC at Midway where all the 56k lines terminated, and some servers that acted as the hosts for the games.
At its peak, we had about 15 games in the Chicago area hooked up. It worked pretty well, we had to make a few modifications to the game... Mortal Kombat is a very very very twitch-reaction speed game. The delays introduced from networking it were, while unavoidable, kinda high. But, most people couldn't tell the difference after we were done.
(My only involvment with this was gameplay related changes to MK3 after the project was nearly completed)
After Mortal Kombat 3, the same thing was done with San Francisco Rush in a bunch of arcades in the California area. Same idea, but with a driving game, delays aren't nearly as noticable.
(I had no involvement in this project)
Now the project is called MTN. (Midway Tournament Network). They're taking several Midway games and networking them across the world... (You may be able to find details about it on Midway's website)
I'm not trying to downplay what these guys are doing, but i don't think many people here recognize that this is already in place, to some extent.
You know...you may have something there...
Square has been BIG into Sony for the past few years (basically ever since they dumped Nintendo) -- they've already announced the intention for FFXI -- MMORPG done right. Square makes great games (FFXIII excluded) so there's a chance they could actually pull it off.
Now...Sony has basically won the console market (Nintendo's been slipping due to a lack of good games, Sega dropped out, even though their console is just as good as a PS2) - so now it's time to make a bid for power -- imagine the temptation of a MMORPG-done-right that's accessible (for $$, of course) at the local mall arcade...
Wife decided to go to Bath & Body Works again? Go down to the arcade and play your character for a little while - sure, it'll cost a couple bucks, but you won't have to put up with the boredom =)
That's just an example, of course, but I think it's a possibility of what Sony's going for here.
Good call.