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Next Generation Xbox and Playstation Consoles Will Have Optical Drives

Posted by timothy on from the may-the-circle-be-unbroken-and-shiny dept.

First time accepted submitter dintech writes "The Wall Street Journal reports that while Sony considered online-only content distribution for its next-generation Playstation, the manufacturer has decided that the new console will include an optical drive after all. Microsoft is also planning to include an optical disk drive in the successor to its Xbox 360 console as the software company had concerns about access to Internet bandwidth."

11 of 206 comments (clear)

  1. Internet Speeds Suck by 0racle · · Score: 4, Insightful

    And they suck hard in very large parts of the US. Digital Only distributions would make it so those parts of the US wouldn't consider buying the consoles.

    6 days to download TERA, I'm not doing that again.

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    1. Re:Internet Speeds Suck by gstoddart · · Score: 5, Insightful

      And they suck hard in very large parts of the US. Digital Only distributions would make it so those parts of the US wouldn't consider buying the consoles.

      And for a lot of people, the bandwidth is capped, with extra fees if you go over it.

      Assuming a modern video game puts a big dent in the disks now, I can only imagine that digital-only distribution would make the cost of the game more expensive overall.

      I wouldn't go to a digital download model. It's a video game console. I want to put in a disk an play games ... I don't want it connected to the internet all the time. But, it seems increasingly, video game companies are insisting on an always-on internet connection.

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    2. Re:Internet Speeds Suck by skids · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Considering how many patches these games end up needing, and add-on content, the happy medium (pun intended) between download only and optical ROM might be a flash stick 2x the size of the base game or so (with some r/o and write-once protections built in.) That would allow the game to store patches on the same medium as it is distributed, rather than filling up your console drive.

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    3. Re:Internet Speeds Suck by cpu6502 · · Score: 4, Insightful

      >>>a flash stick 2x the size of the base game

      If you're going to do that, you may as well just go back to cartridges. Let's see... the N64's biggest cartridge was Resident Evil 2 at 64 megabytes. The new PS4 will have 50,000 megabyte carts. ;-) Of course the reason cartridges were phased-out is because assembling hardware is more-costly to build than a flat disc of reflective foil. So you idea is a nonstarter.

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  2. Reminds me of the old quote... by sidthegeek · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Never underestimate the bandwidth of a station wagon full of tapes hurtling down the highway. â"Tanenbaum, Andrew S.

    1. Re:Reminds me of the old quote... by tepples · · Score: 5, Insightful

      If you try to download a 20 GB game over 5 GB/mo satellite Internet access, you'll have 4 month latency.

  3. Good. by cpu6502 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    (1) My 750k internet would take 7 days to download a 50 gigabyte Bluray-sized game. (2) Easier to just buy the disc from amazon and have it shipped to me. (3) Plus when I get bored with the game I can sell the disc and recoup my money. Example: I played Final Fantasy 12, thought it was kinda boring, and sold it for $55. Recovered my money.

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    1. Re:Good. by DragonWriter · · Score: 5, Insightful

      (1) My 750k internet would take 7 days to download a 50 gigabyte Bluray-sized game. (2) Easier to just buy the disc from amazon and have it shipped to me. (3) Plus when I get bored with the game I can sell the disc and recoup my money.

      That they will support physical media doesn't mean they will play used games.

  4. Content already owned by internerdj · · Score: 3, Insightful

    This generation sold as a "media hub" with the capability to play the video discs, play games, and serve apps because they were so expensive. It served a host of needs out of the box. If they drop discs then I can't play my existing media out of the box. I need to drop $500 for a new console and repurchase my media? That is going to cut into the sales figures at least a little.

  5. You expected different? by thetoadwarrior · · Score: 1, Insightful

    It amazes me how clueless gamers are when they think just because they have broadband in their little suburb that the whole world should go digital only.

    These systems sell globally and not everyone gets broadband (not even in the US) and a lot of people certainly don't have unlimited bandwidth or even want to let their system run for a day or more to download a game that will no doubt be expensive. Physical media won't be going away for quite some time.

  6. Re:Hoping for flash media by crazyjj · · Score: 1, Insightful

    By the time these consoles comes out 16GB of flash media will be pretty cheap.

    And 50 GB of blu-ray storage is even cheaper.

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