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J. Allard Responds to Hard Drive Criticism
Edge Online is reporting on responses Xbox 360 platform chief J. Allard gave in response to questions regarding the hard drive on the Xbox 360. From the article: "I don't know who we've let down. There isn't a game on 360 that you can't play without a hard drive, so I think that's a good thing for consumers. We've made a commitment to broadening the audience, and while I think most of our energy here at X05 is about the hardcore, over time we're really setting the stage for making this a bigger category for everybody. So from the developer point of view you have the best tools and the commitment of the most well-resourced company in the world going worldwide with this product and saying that we want to grow the audience. So that seems like a win for developers - I'm not sure who's supposed to be disappointed."
Heh. He lies in that statement. Flat out.
/will/ require a harddrive to play.
Quote: "I don't know who we've let down. There isn't a game on 360 that you can't play without a hard drive, so I think that's a good thing for consumers."
I can name it right now: FFXI. It
Matthew Walker
http://www.tweeterdiet.com/ - My Diet Tracking Tool
Without a harddrive how am I supposed to install linux on it and turn it into a cheap media center that runs mame ?
Search your logs like the web: splunk!
I think he missed the real point of the criticism with his defense. I think the idea of different tiers of packaging and possible upgrades is a good idea. But I think many people believe that internal storage is no longer one of the "optional" features that can be removed to cut the cost of the machine.
...the game could be crippled without one. Imagine when all the new maps come out for Halo3 and you're the one that can't play with your friends on Live because you don't have the HD to download the map-pack.
They really need to give up the act about 'broadening our audience' for a while. Until this system costs less than I pay for my car each month, I don't think they'll be reaching for anybody but hardcore gamers.
Perfecting Discordia
www.stevenvansickle.com
There is no way Final Fantasy XI can play WITHOUT a hard drive. It's really simple, MMORPG will always have patches and update contents. So unless M$ is dropping FFXI, or J. Allard isn't aware that FFXI will be ported to Xbox360, his statement is simply not true.
The problem with making it optional is that developers will never make any cool features for the HDD unless it's ubiquitous. I think that's the main reason Sony just did away with the HDD when releasing the PSTwo. Why would developers make games that even made use of it at all, much less required it, if it just alienated the people that did not have one.
We may not see quite the same problem here, since at least it will exist as an option from the start, but no major developer is going to release a game that has any features supporting the HD without serious consideration of how it will effect the customers that don't have one.
I also agree with the first reply, FFXI will NEED the HDD, but maybe he's just using Microsoft speak (poster #2) and saying that there are no games on the system NOW that require the HDD because there's technically no system available and no games available. Wouldn't be the first time MS abused "language loopholes" to pacify the audience...
Sure, all games can run without the hard drive...
BUT, if ALL systems DID have the hard drive... that allows the game developers to utilize it to it's max potential.
Imagine if the Revolution's controller was optional. An add-on of sorts. That kind of cripples the system. But since ALL the systems will have this extra ability, it means the developers can utilize it. Only having a fraction owning a particular accessory could scare developers away from actually using it.
This, IMO, is why it's too bad that all the systems don't have the hard drive.
From the article:
"I'm not sure who's supposed to be disappointed." -- The unknowing customers you're screwing over by forcing developers to not take advantage of the hardrive for fear of screwing their customers over and the developers who can no longer use the HDD for caching, etc. etc. (listed later)
"Are there developers who are disappointed? Yeah, sure." -- Did he not just say he wasn't sure who was supposed to be disappointed?
"I was the biggest fan of the hard drive and its potential, but the problem is that we sold 22million Xbox consoles and 5million, maybe 10million just don't care about it." -- Maybe they didn't even know it was being used in games they were playing, used for caching, storing huge save games that would require an entire memory card, used for map updates, used for patches to the game itself, etc.
"We can either ask the gamer to pay for it, pay for it ourselves, or prove that there's enough value in it and have the gamer say 'I want to pay for it' - I think that's the right model." -- again just completely missing the point, it creates a situation where developers have to make a choice to support it or not, piss off the customers that don't have one or not, etc.
"A lot of people have said: 'This is really confusing - you have different configurations and blah, blah, blah', and I'm like: what consumer electronics business in the world has three manufacturers, three brands that each make one thing that doesn't change for seven years?" -- that should be pretty damn obvious, it's the consumer electronics business that YOU are in...
The problem is that there is an implication that you're saving 100 dollars by getting the cheaper model when in fact you will need to purchase a 40-dollar memory card to save games (something that is a fundamental requirement of modern gaming). Thus you will only save 60 dollars and get a much worse deal. A lot of people will be disappointed when they opt for the cheaper model and find out a few hours later that they still need to spend another 40 bucks before they can save their game.
As it is I see this as a major mistake on Microsoft's part. They are making it more difficult for developers to take full advantage of their console just so some customers can save 60 dollars and still feel like they got ripped off.
The people who lose are the people who want to play old xbox games on their xbox 360. My understanding is that you need the hard drive (and an xbox live connection) to play older xbox games. Or has this fact changed in the past two weeks?
Gonzo Granzeau
"Nothing the god of biomechanics wouldn't let you into heaven for.." -Roy Batty
Source
Last but not least, after we were told that there was no ability to fly aircrafts in the game due to the DVD drive's inability to stream the environment fast enough in full 720p resolution. We asked Jacques Hennequet (Producer for Saint's Row), "If the Xbox 360 Hard Drive was standard across both SKU's, would flying aircrafts in the game have been a reality?", Jacques simply answered "Yes". While he completely understands why MS made the decision to not include a hard drive in the Core System, I think he felt somewhat disappointed, as it could have opened up much more possibilities within the gameplay for Volition's first Xbox 360 title.
Not making it standard is making features be cut from games. End of story. Why is this a big deal when the others don't have a HDD? The Xbox had one standard, so it's taking a step backwards. THAT is why people are complaining - you're removing a feature that was being used unconsciously, and causing developers to cut features that otherwise would have been included.
Like they did with the original Xbox, when they fell on a large pile of NEGATIVE money?
On the bright side, has anyone noticed that since the hard drive is removable, when it does go out (and it will), all you need to do as Joe Blow average consumer is go buy a replacement drive for it? The hard drive and the dvd drive are the two most likely pieces to fail in the console. At least you won't be screwed when the hard drive craps out as in the original XBOX model. Notice that I'm talking about Joe Blow here - not you hot rod modders.
Reasons for a HD:
1) Downloadable content for games. Not just a little, as will fit on a memory card, but lots and lots of it. Especially important for any patches.
2) Downloadable media - game trailers and the like.
3) Backward compat. Because the original Xbox has a HD and did not abstract it away, all Xbox 1 games will require a HD to run at all.
4) Games CAN use it. They just won't require it. There are games that will release on or close to launch day that will make use of the HD to improve the game experience.
There is plenty of reason to get the HD, and it's more or less a necessity of you plan on playing over Live (a memory card will work, but the experience will be pretty piss-poor, I'd guess).
"You know your god is man-made when he hates all the same people you do."
There isn't a game on 360 that you can't play without a hard drive
I can't not misunderstand this sentence because it doesn't have not too many un-un-negatives...
And that's why people are disappointed. One of the great things about a console is that you can assume people will have the same hardware, so you don't have to scale down to the lowest common denominator. If it works on the development machine, it'll work on everyone's machine, otherwise theirs is officially broken.
And if a hard drive, broadband connection, high-end nVidia card, quad-core processor (do I have that right?), and all of these are things you can count on most people having, you'll use all of them. Meaning we'd see a lot of very cool games using all of them. As it is now, this is worse than the original xbox -- it's just a high-end PS2. The only reason I'll ever buy one is if I can't borrow someone's for long enough to play through the Halo 3 campaign.
It looks like PC gaming wins here, with things like Half-Life 2 -- you pretty much need an Internet connection, and probably broadband, in order to play the game and keep up with all the patches, meaning all that, plus some decent minimum requirements, can be assumed by any modders. Which is why we see such awesome mods. Natural Selection, anyone?
So, PC gaming wins... maybe that's what they wanted?
Don't thank God, thank a doctor!
SquareEnix certainly seems to believe that FFXI will be on the Xbox 360.
After all, there is always the remote possibility they may have someone "on the inside" feeding them information.
I seem to recall reading some M$ sales info on the XBoX a few years ago (I'm too lazt to find a link) that said if 10% of the user base gets a hardware add-on, that is consider a good margin for an add on. Unless your company also sells the addon then, it's not worth development cost to code for an addon. I thought these were the reasons they included a HD and Broadband in the XBoX, so they would be used by developers, and thus a reason XBoX was better than a PS2.
/. rss. If I can't do all that *and* have great games on 360, I'm happy where I'm at now.
I think they see XBoX as a failure, even though they said they expected a loss. They are now trying to not repeat themselves, but they don't know why XBoX failed. It failed because of the lack of games, not the platform. How sad is it when I mod my XBoX so I can BT any games I want and realize the 5 I bought are the only 5 I'm intereste in playing?
I love my XBoX, it runs mame, streams avi's, and mp3's, does karaoke, taps into my tivo, and lists the latest