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Peter Moore Talks About His Experiences In the Gaming Industry
Over the past several days, the Guardian has posted a five-part interview with Peter Moore, head of EA Sports. Moore was also the president of Sega, and a vice-president at Microsoft, so his experience at the top levels of the gaming industry is extensive. He describes how he came to be employed by Sega, the development of the Dreamcast, and its subsequent flop when confronted with the Playstation 2. He also discusses his involvement with the development of the Xbox franchise, how the integrated hard drive "killed" the original model, and he gives his account of how the Red Ring of Death fiasco affected the company. The series ends with a look at EA Sports' plans for the future, and how they're trying to create a new business model beyond the micro-payments popularized by iTunes, which Moore calls "a rip-off."
Over the past several days, the Guardian has posted a five-part interview with Peter Moore, head of EA Sports. Moore was also the president of Sega, and a vice-president at Microsoft, so his experience at the top levels of the gaming industry is extensive. He describes how he came to be employed by Sega, the development of the Dreamcast, and its subsequent flop when confronted with the Playstation 2. He also discusses his involvement with the development of the Xbox franchise, how the integrated hard drive "killed" the original model, and he gives his account of how the Red Ring of Death fiasco affected the company. The series ends with a look at EA Sports' plans for the future, and how they're trying to create a new business model beyond the micro-payments popularized by iTunes, which Moore calls "a rip-off."
So in other words he has a lot of experience with companies that end up failing? Lets see... As the summary states the Dreamcast failed, when he worked with the Xbox he ended up when they started having the RRoD, and how he hates his current company (which can't make a decent game IMO) for charging micro-payments. Sure he has experience, but he doesn't seem to have any decent experience in succeeding.
Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
Texture mapping the dreamcast did well. The capabilities of the Dreamcast were very close to the PS2; even better in some ways. It died because of Sony marketing, plus the fact that the PS2 included a DVD... which I think was the biggest advantage of the PS2 over the Dreamcast.
Great little console.
success of companies rarely depend on one man. and modern games are not made by a single man alone either. publishers dont let that much of creative freedom to anyone.
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and it doesn't keep the same controller, but uses that huge bloated monstrosity that the Xbox controller was obviously based on.
Actually the Dreamcast controller is probably my favorite console controller to date. The Playstation Dual-Shock controler is my least favorite. They have zero ergonomic feel and the left analog stick is in an awkward position (because it was pretty much just tacked onto the original PSX controller). Don't get me wrong I've got a PS2 and I have played a ton of good games on it, but it was certainly in spite of the controller rather than in spite of it. In 99% of games where the option was there I just broke down and used the D-pad on PS2 games because the analog stick was so hard to reach.
The Xbox controller was good but the handles were much "fatter" than Dreamcast - made it harder to grip. The Gamecube controller has similar sized handles and felt almost as good as the Dreamcast controller to me, but I didn't like the button layout as much.
All in all though, IMHO, the major downfall of the Dreamcast was that it was just too easy to copy the games. After people figured it out you could just download ISO's off the net and burn them with any old CD burner and play on Dreamcast. As to game library, I had fun, though I always play a fairly limited selection of games on any system anyways. On the Dreamcast I played through Resident Evil: Code Veronica, Soul Caliber, Grandia II, and Skies of Arcadia and enjoyed all of them immensely. Grandia II I particularly liked. Now most of those were later available on the other systems too, but I still felt my Dreamcast was worth the price (and I was one who bought it at full price on released day - I'd just headed off to college and couldn't take my N64 because it technically belonged to my brother as well, so the Dreamcast was the first system I purchased for myself using my own money).
"People who think they know everything are very annoying to those of us who do."-Mark Twain
So paying 40% to 60% more just because of what country you live in isn't a rip off?
Nintendo always was around the same price point for their systems; they've been going the longest and know their marketplace well.
The Wii IS the next logical generation. The other two are a huge price jump to skip a generation ahead which was because they were marketing on penis envy to an older audience (who has that problem.)
As disposable income has gone down, we have 2 game systems that have gone up in price. When I was a kid, nintendo was a BIG purchase for my parents and the 80s econ wasn't as bad now-- plus having irresponsible debt wasn't as popular (for families.)
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