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Phantom Releases, Retracts Game List, Debut Rated
Thanks to GameSpot for its story noting that Infinium Labs has released, then quickly retracted a list of game for its Phantom PC-based 'console' shortly following its CES debut. The story notes: "The list featured over 500 titles from 60-plus companies", and the page's new notice, which replaces the old list (Google cache), "urged visitors to return to the site to see a list of games 'pending developer/publisher approval,' which indicates some of the companies on the list [which include Atari and Take Two] may have asked Infinium to remove it." 1UP has also debuted a preview of the Phantom, taken from impressions of a working unit at CES, in which the console is described as "promising and grounded in reality" (though a second editor is " not yet convinced.")
If Tycho and Gabe make fun of it, it must be true... I don't know what to think anymore... ARRRGH!
THIS THING CAN TURN ON A DIME, MACROSSZERO STYLE ALSO FUCK BETA, ~NYORON
I honestly don't know what to think... if it is a hoax, its one of the best attempts at a hoax I've seen in a while, if its real and this is how they plan on running things when (if?) it launches, they might as well just pack up and go home now instead of wasting time and money.
So far they have promised announcements, demos etc etc etc and they have failed to deliver on all of them, since the final product will be rated on the quality of the content and their management of it, they have to sort out their operating practices to have any hope of succeeding, and thats not even taking into account the competition they have...
... but I can't wait to bust a cap with some Reader Rabbit multiplaying action in the living room!!!!
Woozha!
That the considerable majority of the games listed are very old? Hasbro Interactive released Risk II in, what, 1989?
This says it best.
I hate to be one of those people who just posts a link to a relevant comic, but I'm REAL bored at work right now, and I've already read FARK...
GeekNights!
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I emailed blizzard, like I said, some time ago about the Phantom. Infinium has used screenshots of Starcraft: Ghost in a few of their previews, and strongly implied it would be available for their system, but it isn't on their list.
I'm even more hesitant to trust them after a few things like that.
I have an issue of game informer and electronic gaming monthly from 1992 which talks about the coming of the Phantom Console in a month or two.
Couple years from now, you'll get another article saying Phantom coming with newer hardware specs. This thing is the biggest april fools joke.
So, the writer says it's a good deal, because a PC plus video card that you have to routinely upgrade will cost you more than the 300-500 dollar phantom plus 10 dollar monthly obligatory subscription (on top of which you add even more charges for game lisences).
In short: You don't have to constantly replace and upgrade your PC anymore! You play your phantom forever!
Except, of course, that PC games scale up and up as the years go by, demanding newer and more powerful hardware... while the Phantom remains a single closed box you can't upgrade at all. The best you can do is buy a 'Phantom 2' or whatever they'll call it in 2008, just like you'd buy a PS3, X-Box Next, or Gamecube Part Deux.
How exactly does that make this a bargain when the only advantage -- a closed, upgradeless PC -- is its primary disadvantage for the types of games you're gonna play? All you're doing is buying a low-cost PC and then constantly paying monthlies for the honor of using it, then repeating the cycle every few years as usual.
If I'm wrong, please, tell me I'm wrong and why; I would like to see something like this succeed, I just don't see this particular example working...
From the phantom.net FAQ:
All content streams from a central server farm maintained by Infinium Labs.
Well, we all know how well corporate IT systems handle large loads. I can see it now...on Friday night you'll NEVER be able to download any games you want to play.
"You cannot find out which view is the right one by science in the ordinary sense." - C.S. Lewis on Intelligent Design
Marketing for this has been a little misdirected. After reading the article, it sounds like this is going to be a Pay-Per-View (Game?) on demand game console. Unlike every game console of the past, this is more like a cable box or a TIVO. First of all, thier market is going to be successful if they can make online games fly. Also, there is a real question of costs. $300-500 bucks for the hardware, $10/month for the service, $45/month for broadband, plus the cost of games? Good luck. If they give away the hardware and only charge a monthly fee (with a contract) then it might see more support, IMO. Also, what if it can't connect? Does it break? Can I download games and then take it to my cabin in the himalayas? What if the company goes bankrupt? Does it break then? My NES still works, as does my atari 2600. Honestly, this sounds worse than WebTV because with WebTV at least you got the internet.
Prediction: This gets most of its money through hotels and related outfits. Also will look much like the movie (with adult stuff) menus from said hotels.
-Sean
All of the titles in the list seem to be old DOS and Win95/98 titles.
It makes me suspicious that they got some of the game-names wrong (for example, they attribute Capcom with a "Mega Man X Legends", which does not even exist, although it's quite possibly a typo of 'Mega Man Legends', which was ported to PC around 1998), and even credited the wrong companies with games (an outfit called 'Div Games Studios' is listed as supplying Mega Man X, but that game is a part of Capcom's flagship Mega Man property). Oh yeah, and some of the companies that were listed no longer exist (some haven't for years, some went bankrupt not-so-long-ago), and others are listed several times - note that many of Take Two's various names are in that list, and Disney is listed as both 'Disney' and 'Disney Interactive'. The presence of editions of some software dated as far back as 2000 is also quite bizarre.
The whole list reads like they skimmed through a few lists of games-by-{whoever} on GameFAQs or someplace similar, and shoved it all into one document (and forgot to name it - it was called Untitled Document when it was first up).
(And isn't it odd that nobody has said they have dev-kits for the Phantom, considering when dev-kits arrive for existent new consoles, you tend to hear about it on gaming news sites?)
Incidentally, I've seen quite a few of the listed titles available for purchase on TryGames.com - isn't it curious that TryGames.com's try-and-buy-online service for PCs is so similar to the much-touted broadband-content-delivery-system that the modified-Win-XP (IIRC) based Phantom will supposedly have?
In closing, it just seems to me like it's more a case of "these big-name-big-developer games will run on our modified PC-like box", as opposed to "these developers are making games on our machine"...
This is quite likely similar to my long-held belief regarding the massmog Horizons.
It isn't necessarily a hoax per se, no-one is going to be pointing and laughing.
Rather it's more like a scam. An attempt to use the overly hungry and journalistically naive hardcore gaming media to push their non-existant product with big promises. Promise the moon, mock up some renders, build up the buzz, sell. Who cares if the product never materializes? the money sure did.
Quite frankly what would it take Infinium to make a 'playable' prototype unit? 1 slickly designed custom case, standard pc parts, a neat 3d demo and mockups of potential menus. Horizons similarly licensed a 3d engine and had some artists mock up a few of their promises to look good in still images.
The difference is, the David Allen feller behind Horizons simply promised the moon and stars, grew the marketability of the product, and got bought out. He never implied partnership with other corporations, let alone dozens of corporations.
Infinium may be crossing the bounds of shameless and jumping squarely into the illegal by trying to build their name through unlicensed implications and declarations about the involvement of established gaming developers and publishers.
So no, I don't expect them to put out a press release in 4 months saying 'April Fools!'. Rather, I expect for someone to eventually be suckered into investing into this idea, and after a year or so having to quietly put out a press release saying: yolk's on us folks, it doesn't exist and never did.
// "Can't clowns and pirates just -try- to get along?"
Those pics from Gamespot of the console case could be slightly fake. They don't look very well made (when was the last time you saw rivets on the outside of you connectors like those USB ports?) and while it does have some impressive video out options, that power plug is INSANE looking. I dunno if I should plug it into it's power cord or if I should plug in my 220v clothes dryer into it. Only time I've seen cables like that was when I was a lighting/sound guy for a concert group at my University.
Plus I'm thinking this thing will have a DOS/Windows wrapper so you can drop it PC games and have it work...that's why there's so many games on that list that are so old. Hmmm. I still won't buy the piece of shit, I just find it slightly interesting following this thing travel downward in a spiral likened to that of a toilet flushing...
Viva La Revolucion! Buy a Mac!
Can somebody please explain to me why there's a coaxial socket on the back labeled "cable modem"?
I don't get it - I thought cable internet provider's signals and boxes were proprietary, but had an ethernet port on the back that you connected to. Your computer never sees the raw cable connection and is still able to transmit & receive.. so why would this device need it?
Also: On the grounds that the more insane the better, that's a bitchin' power socket. It'll probably only run you about a trillion dollars for a replacement if you loose the cable or need to replace the power supply. Which at this point, I'm guessing is a full-size standard ATX power supply in a custom case about the size of a large cow.
If the phantom was shown at some form at CES, then I don't think it would be a hoax. What seems more likely is that Inifinium Labs had this idea of making some hardware that is pay to play, and ended up fooling someone (venture capitalist, big corporation) into giving them some money to work on this product.
I think where all the bad opinions about the phantom are coming from are just how disorganized the company has been with its execution of the product, which to me makes it seem like some of those startups that got a lot of money for some mediocre idea and did a poor execution of it (names removed in order to protect the innocent employess of those companies).
Is the phantom a hoax? doubt it. Are they gonna have a bad product? All signs are pointing that way, but because they probably got so much funding, they have to try to come out with something.
Every time infinium labs (which is not a real trademark by the way) shows something about the phantom everybody just nods their collective heads and says "ah! so its real!" so far not only they havent even announced when the console will be released, Everything that they have released about this product does not prove that they are developing the units at all. Im not saying they are vapor hardware for a fact but they havent released anything that proves otherwise They have shown: A "beta test" sign up form A video A webpage A games list A "working prototype" at the CES. (which is not much considering is a modified PC running PC games) Where are the definitive specs, designs, release shipping dates, sdk, known developers, marketting campaign, etc, etc? As far as I can see, they are selling an idea of some thing that could be done (and that actually has been done by other companies in the CES) in the hopes of attracting investors, but other than that is just marketting talk.
Go ahead MOD my day!
More opinions here
The more that Infinium reveals, the more obvious it becomes that they are nothing more than con-men looking to scam some money from investors with a promise of a super-duper game console.
A coax connector labeled "cable modem"? Do these guys even know how a cable modem works? Sure, techinically they could build a cable modem into the unit, but there's a lot of reasons why that would be really stupid.
Their business model makes no sense. If the Phantom actually contains the hardware they claim, they'll be selling it at such a huge loss that every person who buys one would have to subscribe to their service and play a lot of games for quite some time before Infinium even begins to make any money.
Has anyone out there seen "The Producers"? James has and he's banking on a proven business plan it looks like.
It has all these old PC games, but no Megaman 3 or Wizards and Warriors or GAUNTLET. No, thanks. I think I'll just stick to my NES.
Awesome analysis. I give a score of 12/10.
I can't wait to see this fly. When I worked at EB, we had problems with customers mixing up the power cable with the A/V cable. They thought the memory card fit into the controller slot. We had one guy who came in to buy a Dreamcast jump pack (generic tremor pack) because he couldn't jump high enough to get a certain part of the game. Did you see the back of the Phantom? Dear God, this'll be great. Obviously, they're going for a more mainstream audience than the PC niche crowd, since those people already have PCs AND broadband AND the patience to install hardware and software and patches. So the question is literally: who's dumb enough to buy this?
Oh yeah. We "people" may have enough consoles and a powerful PC, but whenver a new console comes out, we always buy it. I forgot.
What if the company goes bankrupt? Does it break then?
If the company goes bankrupt you dismantle the box and you got yourself a new hd, a geforce fx, an atlhon 3200 and a kick ass sound card for the price of the video card.
If they can make online games fly, as you said, I'll buy it.
I really suspect that the reason this all took place in a private suite was because the "console" wasn't powering the demonstration at all.
Inviting a couple of journalists who spell "through" "threw" to a private showing of your device doesn't exactly inspire confidence. Did the author even get a chance to play a game on this system, or was he just watching things happen and assuming it was real?
I am also *very* suspicious of the alleged content distribution model. At first, the big gimmick was supposed to be that it would have thousands of games because it could play older PC titles. Now they're saying that it somehow streams the game content to avoid installation time. I don't buy it. There are only a tiny handful of games that are coded to work like this (e.g. Soul Reaver, Metroid Prime), and I seriously doubt that many publishers are willing to dust off their old source code to make the modifications necessary to support it.
I would almost be willing to bet money that this "prototype" was at best a regular PC in a fancy case made to look like it was doing what they claimed it could, and at worst was a plastic box with a blue LED that wasn't powering the demonstration at all.
"...always new atoms but always doing the same dance, remembering what the dance was yesterday." -Richard Feynman
After all, the last few advertisements I've seen on the PA website...they were pimping the games long before the company bought advertising space. Interesting how that works out...
modified-Win-XP (IIRC)
Win XPe (Embedded).
Not to sound like I'm defending this bad idea of a console, but as far as dev kits: It's a PC. It doesn't require its own dev kit yet, since they apparently plan to take existing PC games and just adapt them slightly to work as downloads. Personally, I'm far more suspicious of their headquarters being an unused unit in a Florida strip mall. And the minor matter of the upper management's near-complete lack of succesful business outings.
Look at the power connector. There's like 20 pins! No power supply on earth would need this many! They're using standard PC components, so they need a t best a ground pin, a plus 12 volt, a plus and a minus 5 volt. Let's just say maybe they also need a minus 12 volt, okay? That is 5 pins. Any guesses what's on the other pins? How about Video and USB to another machine, perhaps?
If that's the case, then they have spent zero time working on the prototype, since I could build a PC of those specs to fit in that case in 3 days.
I think this thing is vapor, and that they don't even have a factory lined up to build these things. Any real company would be negotiating with manufacturers for bulk rate deals for motherboards or video chipsets, but I've seen no evidence that any arrangements or agreements have even been attempted by Infinium Labs.
Think about it, these guys are basically going to sell PC's, and sell contracts, they have NO hardware hurdles to overcome. None. Why, then, is the "development" cycle so long? Why would they need a console at all? Why not just sell the subscriptions to anyone with a PC and add some DRM?