Investigating Infinium Labs

the web writes "By now, the whole world has heard of Infinium Labs and their infamous Phantom Game Console, but what do we really know about what could be the next big gaming console or the people bringing it to market? At this point, we know little beyond what they've been willing to share. We haven't seen the console outside of a few 3D renderings, we haven't seen the facility where they claim beta units are being built, and we haven't seen the Infinium Labs base of operations." Our own Roblimo has found some reality to the Phantom console.

Comments

I'm a skeptic.

[grub]

from the link: "Infinium Labs is an industry-leading global entertainment and interactive game company."

How on earth can you be an industry leader when you haven't shown anything yet? Hell, I could claim "GrubCorp(tm) is an industry-leading global purveyor of anti-cancer drugs and massage oils." without having gotten off my lazy ass to do anything.

Don't be suprised to hear that they're planning to get more investors in the near future..

Re:I'm a skeptic.

[citizen6350]

As am I. If they actually are going to put out a product, they're going about it the wrong way. Their trumped up press has died away. Meanwhile, they arent feeding the gamers any reasons to keep interest other than saying, "trust me guys, it's really cool." They're starting to sound like that guy who sends you links to stupid websites, and while you're waiting for it to load hes saying "its the best thing ever" and after you've seen it you realize you just wasted 40 minutes of your life on an idiot. 40 minutes you'll never get back. My message to Infinium Labs: Dont be that guy. Everyone hates that guy.

You're right

[LorneReams]

This whole thing feels like a pump and dump from the very beginning.

Yay, another *yawn* MS gaming device

[deadmonk]

OK, so it's an Xbox made by a different company - although it sounds like they're doing the impossible and writing even more draconian licensing terms than even MS..

So what?

[stratjakt]

What, you dorks seriously thought it was all a big hoax or scam?

So these guys think they can package PCs as consoles, and sell a subscription based service.

Good luck to them. They'll fail.

PC games and console games are practically a world apart. As a rule, console games don't play well on a PC, PC games dont play well on a console.

Not only do they have PS2/NGC and Xbox to compete with, they're doing so with an inferior product, and one that customers have shown repeatedly they DONT WANT.

People want to go to the store, buy the game, and own it. They don't want to "liscense" it. They dont want their libraries limited by how much space this thing's hard drive has.

This is DIVX for the game industry. It'll be stillborn.

What would be a killer plan, though, would be to revamp the "Sega channel" idea, but do it like this: sell an adaptor for xbox or ps2/ngc with hdd addon, broadcast playable demos on the channel 24/7. No monthly subscriptions - that will kill the idea, people HATE monthly fees. People would rather pay 500 bucks upfront than 10 bucks a month for a year. Think of the channel as a form of advertising. Have publishers pay to have their latest demo broadcast. Hell, you could piggyback the demos on G4 or TechTV or something, come up with a standard so that you could broadcast for different consoles and PCs...

Ah well, no point in getting all worked up about it. It'll be a long, long time before execs "get it". They're so horny over the idea of a constant, predictable revenue stream that subscriptions offer, they cant see straight. Xbox live is tanking, as will Phantom, as will the uber-mega-next-gen-only-5$-a-month-for blah blah scheme.

I'm impressed ...

[s20451]

The best way to read the NewsForge article is that Tim Roberts trolled Roblimo. I'm impressed ... trolls, take note.

Read the HardOCP article first, then the NewsForge article. When Roblimo said, "He's renting high-end office space in Sarasota, Florida," soda nearly went shooting out of my nose. (I won't spoil it for you, read the articles.)