Xbox One: No Always-Online Requirement, But Needs To Phone Home

An anonymous reader writes "The Xbox One was revealed earlier, and Kotaku was able to get some answers about the always-online rumors that plagued the console before its announcement. Microsoft VP Phil Harrison said Xbox One doesn't need a constant connection in order to play games, and you won't be dropped from single-player games if your connection cuts out. However, it does require check-ins with Microsoft servers. This echoes the Xbox One FAQ, which cryptically says, "No, it does not have to be always connected, but Xbox One does require a connection to the Internet." The number Harrison gave was once every 24 hours, but Microsoft's PR department was quick to say that was just one potential scenario, not a certainty. Microsoft also provided half-answers about how used games and game sharing would work. Players will be able to take a game to a friend's house and play it (using their profile, at least). Players will also have some mechanism to trade and sell used games, but it's not yet clear exactly how it would work. If one player uses a disc to install a game on their Xbox One, then gives the disc to a friend, the friend will be able to install it, but needs to pay full price to play it. That scenario, however, assumes both players want to own the game — the second one would essentially be a unique copy. Microsoft said they have a plan for trading used games, which would involve deactivating the game on the original owner's console, but they aren't willing to elaborate yet." Several publications have hands-on reports with the new hardware: Engadget, Ars Technica, Gizmodo.

Comments

That's a whole...

[Anonymous Coward]

...load of crap !

Re:That's a whole...

[Shikaku]

There was news that the new console will be able to sell your used games on the Xbox One.

I think the reason is Microsoft just wants to kill the secondhand market and gamestop and take money for themselves. I bet it's gonna be revealed and clarified that you can sell your license to the game on their marketplace and you earn a certain percentage (if they were nice it would be high like at least 70% but who knows) and you can only put that money back into the Xbox marketplace for a new game or whatever.

To stay on topic, I bet this is why it requires always online, license checking. If you sell your game but never go back online then you can have your cake and eat it too.

Re:That's a whole...

[TWiTfan]

Well, looks like developers finally found a way to drive GameStop and its ilk out of business. First they made it impossible to sell used PC games, now they've finally come for the used console games too.

Re:That's a whole...

[JosKarith]

In a time of global recession M$ decided to release their new platform burdened to the hilt with DRM? Wow - that's not so much shooting yourself in the foot as sticking a live grenade into your boot. Sales of this are gonna tank and they're going to be forced into a Win8 style climbdown.
Also, what happens if the authentication servers go down? My old house the internet connection would drop to virtually useless for days at a time due to Virgin's shoddy infrastructure and the 360 was the only thing left to use. If it has to dial home every day then that's pretty damn useless.

Re:That's a whole...

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, looks like developers finally found a way to drive GameStop and its ilk out of business. First they made it impossible to sell used PC games, now they've finally come for the used console games too.

Perhaps eventually, but I don't see Gamestop and "its ilk" going away anytime soon...not while the store is still stuffed to the walls with every console game that existed before this new model came about.

Hell, I still play Atari games. And the popularity of very simplistic 99-cent games on cell phones and tablets clearly define a market for cheap, simple entertainment. Not to mention the millions backing projects like the Ouya console.

The XBox One model will almost certainly alienate users and create a niche of hardcore gamers whom no matter what will pay, not unlike that same group exists today who pay XBox Live fees for what every other gaming console offers for free. However, we seem to be hung up on the fact that Microsoft or any other company really gives a shit that they're doing that. Perhaps they're not. That's the sad reality in the sheer numbers of customers today. The arrogance of companies defines their knowledge that they'll always have enough customers, no matter how bad we may think they pissed users off.

A gaming company knows gamers. Inside and out. They know the spending habits, and the addictive nature behind it that keeps driving them to spend hundreds. What we fail to realize as consumers is they really don't give a shit who they piss off, because the revenue is almost guaranteed. Kind of like Facebook charging upwards of $100 to send a single email to the Inbox.

I suppose 30 years ago no one ever thought there would be a market to put water in a bottle either...who the hell would ever PAY for water, right?

Re:That's a whole...

[Anonymous Coward]

If you buy the game on day one for 60 Euros, do you really think you'll get 70% off it three months later when you can pick it up 10?

It's not about making money by killing gamestop, it's about vendor lock-in.

That's the whole Microsoft business model. That's how they keep corporate clients, that's how they've built Windows 8 and the the whole Office suite. Etc etc etc.

The reason they're not releasing any details, is because they're testing the water, looking to see how people react.

Re:That's a whole...

[Anonymous Coward]

There's a recession in Europe, not in Asia or the US.

Re:That's a whole...

[Rotag_FU]

I would love to see a reference to this claim, because I think it is too good to be even close to true.

Basically this would not kill the secondhand market, instead it would streamline it. Yes this would probably kill (or at least maim) Gamestop, but that would be because this would eat their lunch.

Using the marketplace to sell used games, for a presumably lower price than new or then what is the point, would be great. Currently you have to either deal with a practically not worth it system via Gamestop (used games sold for $5 off the cost of a new game and the seller getting a pittance) or deal with a potentially shady character off of craigslist and deal with the hassle of setting up a meeting time and place (or wait for something in the mail from ebay, etc.) with no real recourse if the disc doesn't work.

This solution would have no downside. You can buy the game for less than the cost of new (or again whats the point) for a digitally identical product (no worrying about does it actually work) and do it instantly from your living room. For the seller, as long as they get a reasonable percentage of the sales price then they are already ahead of where they would be with Gamestop. It is possible that the seller would not get as much of a return as they would by selling via Craigslist or via eBay, but they would also have less overhead (no mailing, meeting, etc.). Plus I think more people would actually enter into the used game sales market (both buyers and sellers) if this system were in place because it reduces the transactional friction.

All of these things would be great for the consumers and for MSFT, but the one group that would see this as a travesty are the publishers. There is absolutely no way they would support a system that actually made second hand sales easier. For this reason alone I cannot believe there is any way that this rumor is true. Although I would never have been so happy to be proven wrong.

Re:That's a whole...

[Megane]

And what about the secondhand market ten years later, after the Xbox Too is released? Will they decide at some point to drop whatever authorization server is needed to play the game disc you have? Will it even become impossible at some point to register new-old-stock shrink-wrapped games? Will there come a time when you can't even take it down out of the attic, dust it off, and play the games you bought 20 years earlier? What, you think still having an Xbox account will help? Just try to see what you can do online with the original Xbox now, and imagine what it would be like if DRM activation was a requirement.

So the hell with the regular secondhand market, what about the retro secondhand market? After all, old consoles and their enormous library of games (even if you don't consider emulation) have to be a major competitor to newer game systems. Oh sure, they won't have this year's NFL roster for the people who do nothing but play the annual sports games, but those games are worth zilch two years later anyhow. It's the games people grew up on and want to play again and again that can hurt the market for new games, so let's nip that in the bud while we (MS, Sony, etc.) still can.

So just throw away that N64 already. If we think you deserve to get some Goldeneye nostalgia, we'll see about letting you rent it for a few years on our newest hardware.

Re:That's a whole...

[Anonymous Coward]

Depends who you talk to, and when you talk to them. For instance, most times your boss might go "Recession? What recession?" if you ask them about it. But when it comes time for performance and compensation reviews, "We cannot offer you as much because we're in a recession".

Re:That's a whole...

[Penguinisto]

Basically this would not kill the secondhand market, instead it would streamline it.

Actually, it appears that it will "streamline" it right into Microsoft-owned territory, never to leave. Also, it would be less of a market and more like a company store, with all the attendant evils.

Re:That's a whole...

[EvilSS]

" Sales of this are gonna tank"

Yea, I'll take that bet.

Re:That's a whole...

[tbannist]

You can buy the game for less than the cost of new (or again whats the point) for a digitally identical product (no worrying about does it actually work) and do it instantly from your living room.

If they did that, the publishers would revolt. Think about it, Microsoft would be selling digital copies of the game for less than retail and probably not obliged to give any of the money back to the publisher. Of course, I suppose they could split the money three ways, but if you're getting less than a third of the retail price of the game in exchange for trading it, is it still worth it? An allternative way I see this working is if Microsoft allows you to "return" digitally downloaded games for a small refund in Microsoft dollars (M$) which can only be spent on other Xbox digital purchases. The carrot is the ability to get money for returned games, the stick is you can only spend the money on the Xbox. Lock-in achieved.

Re:That's a whole...

[Rotag_FU]

I agree that the publishers would revolt, which is why I'm questioning the source of the rumor since I'm highly skeptical about the concept.

If they did a three way split, it wouldn't need to be equal parts. I could see a method of the seller and the publisher equally sharing a large part and then MSFT getting a small percentage (e.g., 45% seller, 45% publisher, 10% MSFT). Although your point still stands about whether this would be seen as worth it for the seller. If it was truly equitable, the seller would get the lion's share and the publisher and MSFT both get a smaller percentage but I don't think the publishers would buy into that.

In the alternative that you propose, who would be funding this small refund? If it is too small then it just isn't worth it to the consumer to file for the return. If it is too large (for undefined quantities of too large and too small), then how does it benefit MSFT to bankroll it if they are not able to resell the returned license?

Re:That's a whole...

[CohibaVancouver]

Well, looks like developers finally found a way to drive GameStop and its ilk out of business

If you watch GameStop's ads, you'll see that they're already shifting their business model - A lot of their ads are about trading in iPads and Nexus tablets, not games.

Re:That's a whole...

[tattood]

Also, what happens if the authentication servers go down? .

That is probably why they are building a 300,000 server farm to run it.

Re:That's a whole...

[lgw]

When has the average consumer ever cared about DRM? People have gotten upset about an "always on" requirement, but DRM without that has proven marketable.

I suspect there will be a lot of variation between individual games in what the requirements are - just like Steam.

Re:That's a whole...

[lgw]

GoG is by far the best and easiest way to get old PC games, because they work out the emulation and such for you. There are still people who sell boxed copies of old games for more than GoG prices, but that's mostly the collectors aspect, I suspect.

Given a good online service to buy old console games cheap - like GoG (and to a limited extent Steam) provides on the PC - why would a second-hand store be needed?

Re:That's a whole...

[lgw]

If sellers get more money from this than they would from Gamestop, and buys pay less than they would from Gamestop, people are going to be happy with the result. These are console games - "locking them in" to a given console is the basic premise.

Re:That's a whole...

[Anonymous Coward]

You need to realize that we on /. are not the target audience. A buddy of mine hasn't stopped talking about how amazing the One sounds, and how he'll be getting one as *soon* as it's available. I fear he is far from the only one...

Re:That's a whole...

[Scarletdown]

They are just bound and determined to make sure this console is stillborn at release.

Re:That's a whole...

[Anonymous Coward]

The correct response is, "That's funny, both of the job offers I received were for more, how are they not part of the same recession?"

It's not a given that your employer will give you periodic raises. Most employers have a policy to do so in order to stay ahead of inflation and limit attrition. As an employee, if you're not taking an active role in determining your value to other employers and holding your employer accountable, you shouldn't expect your employer to just give you more money.

Re:That's a whole...

[mcmonkey]

Also, what happens if the authentication servers go down? .

That is probably why they are building a 300,000 server farm to run it.

It's one server farm, that's still a SPOF.

So to rephrase the question, what happens when the authentication servers are unavailable?

Re:That's a whole...

[mcmonkey]

To stay on topic, I bet this is why it requires always online, license checking. If you sell your game but never go back online then you can have your cake and eat it too.

But if you can only transfer a game through their online market, and they only pay out in credit at their online store, then if you sell your game but never go back online you'll never get paid.

You won't have your cake, and you didn't get to eat it, too.

Re:That's a whole...

[Keen Anthony]

Thank you! I had no idea about GoG. Looked it up and I've just found Tex Murphy: Under a Killing Moon. I can't imagine how a game from 1994 will run on a 2013 system, especially a Mac, but the site claims it will.

Re: That's a whole...

[sldghmr]

I think you make a good point. I'm no longer a gamer but my 16 year olds are. After upgrading to the latest XBox kinect last year and spending a little over $500 plus games plus bigger hard drives etc... I expect I will not be motivated to 'upgrade' again until this one burns out or just quits working. Now that said it is the third XBox we've had, the original, then the orignal 360, and now this 360 slim + kinect.... each upgrade happened when the previous finally quit working. Anyhow, good point :)

Can i please have two?

[Anonymous Coward]

More restrictions on the used game market, unknown "online requirements", what more would one want?

Re:Can i please have two?

[TWiTfan]

I tell you what I don't want: an Xbox One.

Re:Can i please have two?

[Anonymous Coward]

That was clear to anyone who opposes locked down consoles that are infested by DRM long before this news hit us (just like with the PS4 and pretty much any other console).

Re:Can i please have two?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yep. Thankfully I've built up a significant library of games for older systems. Enough to last the rest of my life. They can keep their crippled horseshit.

Re:Can i please have two?

[Mike Frett]

Unfortunately, million and millions of brainwashed masses will buy one; maybe even two. Nobody cares about privacy and the like anymore. I collected about a dozen or so links to real facts about Skype and the backdoors for Law Enforcement etc, and posted on many topics, nobody cares man. In fact they will attack you textually. They could announce right now that in order to use the Xbox One, you need an Always-on camera and a full time connection to a monitoring dept.; it would sell like hotcakes.

I've come to the conclusion that there is no hope for Humans and they completely ruin it for people who DO care about their privacy and other matters. So just let them have their fun and in the end it will bite them in the ass.

Re:Can i please have two?

[Vanderhoth]

(just like with the PS4 and pretty much any other major console).

FTFY, I'm pretty sure you didn't intend to lump the indi consoles like Ouya and game stick in with the big guys. I hate to make a "This is the year of" prediction, but I think some of the casual consoles will pick up a bit of steam with the crap Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo are putting out.

Of course PC still reigns supreme in any case, especially with gaming becoming more common on Linux boxes.

Re:Can i please have two?

[TWiTfan]

I think I may go back to PC gaming this generation. Those games are loaded with DRM too, but at least the games are cheap and developers are upfront about restrictions. I just really hate to go back to chasing that upgrade dragon.

Re:Can i please have two?

[schlachter]

It's not that no one cares. It's that we keep being offered all these new shiny toys and services for free or for cheap, things that make us happy, and all we have to do to get them is share a bit of info. A bit of info never hurt anyone, right? right???

Re:Can i please have two?

[chihowa]

I just really hate to go back to chasing that upgrade dragon.

As someone who just got back into PC gaming about five years ago, I can say that that doesn't seem to be as much of an issue any more. My rig was pretty awesome when I first put it together (though not that expensive), and I can still play any new games with all of the settings maxed out. If that trend continues for another couple of years, it's easily in the realm of console lifetimes.

Re:Can i please have two?

[BitZtream]

No, he didn't. No one outside of a few fanboys actually considers them consoles worth mentioning.

Re:Can i please have two?

[Comen]

Agreed, I read the article about required internet connection and people post things at the bottom saying that's if you can read the article then you can surely connect your XBOX every 24 hours, and let the nerd tears flow! These people have obviously never lost a internet connection before, I have had my cable connection down for over a week once, and the cable company could not figure it out for that long, I also go on vacation to a beach house that has no Internet and also other remote places, and I bring my console to keep me sane. These people either do not think of these issue because they are to young and spoiled, or are just trolling. I also worry about the constantly connected camera, and even thou you can throw something over the lens, the mic would always be on, even if Microsoft did not abuse this, it does not mean some hacker wont. I will not let a camera sit in my living room constantly on, connected to the internet, period!

This mentality is not just about the Xbox, I was just arguing the other day that I was upset that allot of the new Android tablets had no SD card slot, and also everyone responded that you can use the cloud to stream all your audio and video! so why would you need more local storage, WTF? I even have a unlimited 4G wifi puck that I carry around and I can not stream video in all places I might want to watch it, and imagine if everyone wanted to stream HD video via the cell phone network all the time. I was also just arguing with Amazon.com the other day because I accidently 1-clicked a digital video and bought it, even thou I have 1-click turned off in my settings, the guy at Amazon told me that 1-click was always on for digital purchases, because its digital, and is bought right away (like that makes any sense) and then when I explained that I was just trying to get to a screen that explained if I could download a copy of the video, he asked my why I would ever need a local copy, when you can just stream it!
This cloud mentality is scary, if you ever lose your internet (cable) connection you will have nothing to do at all I guess, no games, no movies, nothing.

Re:Can i please have two?

[Endo13]

I just really hate to go back to chasing that upgrade dragon.

Well then you're in luck, because keeping a gaming PC capable of playing the latest games is less painful than it has ever been. Mid-grade CPUs and motherboards from 3-5 years ago are still perfectly capable of running any new game. Ram and HDDs are dirt cheap. The only thing you'll be sinking much money into is most likely a graphics card, and even that isn't too bad if you shop carefully. Usually the best value is a current-gen mid-grade card that you can pick up for $150-200, and you won't need to upgrade it more than about every 2-3 years. And this situation is only going to keep getting better.

Re:Can i please have two?

[drinkypoo]

I hate to make a "This is the year of" prediction, but I think some of the casual consoles will pick up a bit of steam with the crap Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo are putting out.

Now look, I'm buying an Ouya and a lot of people like Steam but they both require online activation and many features will continue to require always-on. And Steam loves to revert to online mode, or has in my experience. I only launch it now and then to see if any new Linux stuff has appeared (Osmos showed up, whee, that's been on Linux for ages but not on Steam) and to try to finish downloading TF2, which should be an easy overnight download but not with Steam! Why, I have no ideer. I usually forget to resume the download. It has restarted itself completely once. Total shit software, complete amateur hour like a cheap cellphone game that downloads one or more gigabytes of data before you can play and doesn't resume the downloads. In fact, the initial Steam update during Steam install downloads without resume, too. Someone should call Valve and tell them it's not 1991 any more.

Re:Can i please have two?

[Anonymous Coward]

You know, even though I haven't been a gamer for ten years, and Microsoft's software generally just annoys the hell out of me, I liked the idea of it a lot. I've wanted a voice controlled TV for years.

But the more I hear about this the more I'm sure it's a "don't want." The "needs internet" is bad enough, but a CNET article convinced me that if anyone gave me one of these as a gift I'd be pissed off. I do not want my TV set to have a fucking camera!! WTF is wrong with the idiots at Microsoft and Samsung, the other retarded company that's trying to sell this garbage?

The Xbox1 is misnamed. Thay should have called it the Orwell.

Re:Can i please have two?

[Anonymous Coward]

"Unfortunately, million and millions of brainwashed masses will buy one; maybe even two."

I worked with a diabetic 300 lb man who rarely ate anything healthy (I shit you not, this man used to eat an entire fried chicken and like 12 AirHead candies for lunch). He lives to sit at the house and play his... everything (he's got every console). He's a programmer and feels that justifies him in "the best" society of the world. He claims that people like you are crazy, and everything to you is a setup (aka conspiracy theory). He doesn't understand why anyone would care if the folks that make these consoles and games want to protect their investment by any means necessary. He says, "Just follow the law, and you don't have to worry".

I don't know if "brainwashed" is the right word, as it assumes a brain is present. To me, he's a zombie.

Re:Can i please have two?

[Rotag_FU]

Those games are loaded with DRM too, but at least the games are cheap and developers are upfront about restrictions.

You mean upfront about the hidden rootkits they put on your PC to protect their IP while creating stability issues for your system? I've had to actively search forums and customer reviews to find out about such hidden DRM, it wasn't like the publisher put a big label on the box announcing what they were doing. At best, it might be in the fine print.

Re:Can i please have two?

[kamapuaa]

Why should that bother people about Skype? The phone and e-mail work the same way. In practical terms, it's a total non-factor. We don't live in a place where our standard everyday communication is recorded in such a system, and later used against us. And philosophically, most people are willing to accept the idea of wiretaps. You probably come off as a weirdo survivalist if you keep posting about that stuff to your friends.

Re:Can i please have two?

[Volguus Zildrohar]

I have never seen this - my downloads resume just fine (and I know they do, because my connection sucks). Maybe the linux client is still having teething problems?

I have noticed that the downloads page is bloody useless, often giving the wrong information. A few times it has even appeared as if it restarted the download from scratch, only to complete the "whole thing" a minute later.

Re:Can i please have two?

[0123456]

I think I may go back to PC gaming this generation. Those games are loaded with DRM too, but at least the games are cheap and developers are upfront about restrictions.

I mostly buy games DRM-free on GOG.com these days. A lot of new indie games go there, and there are plenty of older games still worth playing.

I just really hate to go back to chasing that upgrade dragon.

Fortunately most games are crippled for the console market, so a cheap old PC is capable of running them at medium to high settings. That may change for a year or two when the new consoles come out, but this one appears to be significantly less powerful than a high-end PC.

Re:Can i please have two?

[spire3661]

Philosophically i dont give a shit what most people are willing to accept. Full national wiretaps is absolutely 100% ILLEGAL.

Re:Can i please have two?

[Stormalong]

I just really hate to go back to chasing that upgrade dragon.

Its not as bad as it used to be. A decent gaming rig lasts a LOT longer these days. I used to be on something like a 6-8 month upgrade cycle. My current video card (Radeon 6950) is just over 2 years old, and still handles everything fine, I could probably easily get another year out of it and maybe more. A $300 card amortized over ~3 years is pretty cheap.

Re:Can i please have two?

[Vanderhoth]

These people either do not think of these issue because they are to young and spoiled, or are just trolling

I'd also like to point out this could be MS shrills trying to make a major issue seem less relevant by making it look like "the cool kids" don't care about it.

Remember back when Windows 8 was in Developer and Consumer preview. Every article on every tech blog was flooded with "I've used Windows 8 since XXXX and it's totally awesome!!!111!", Which we all knew then and know now was a load of crap. I have no doubts that SOME people like Windows 8, but with the number of comments parroting the exact same response appears more than four times by different people in the same form or comment section you know something isn't right. Now we see people on /. posting that they're looking to buy accounts with low IDs. Obviously so when they start posting about Windows 8.1 or Windows 9 or whatever other product, they'll seem more creditable, as the Higher more recent IDs belonging to accounts that have no other posts except "I've used xxxxx and it's totally awesome!!!11!!" are a dead give away when someone is shrilling.

Public perception is a huge part of the battle companies like MS are fighting to sell their products. Social manipulation is one of the weapons they use to make people with relevant concerns feel like outliers that don't have a leg to stand on so they might as well conform. They do everything they can to shut down critics. I wish I could find the manual I read a while back that described some of the techniques like posting garbage content in comment sections to push relevant critical material as far down the page as possible so it's unseen. If I find it I'll come back and link to it.

Re:Can i please have two?

[Anonymous Coward]

www.gog.com :-)

Re:Can i please have two?

[lgw]

Steam is darn good about clearly describing the DRM included with each game. Do people even buy games in boxes any more?

Re:Can i please have two?

[Wookact]

If it is restarting a download, either manually or automatically, it restarts the download counter as it checks the files already downloaded and compares them to the source. If the file is available and matches, then it goes on to the next one.. This is as designed. It means you don't actually have to re-download the files you already have.

The only time I have ever had an issue with a game was when some developer had a multi gigabyte file that needed to be updated. Patches required downloading almost the entire package again.

Re:Can i please have two?

[elistan]

I stopped using a PC as a gaming rig in 2007 when my PC couldn't do recent games very well and I got an Xbox 360 Elite. At $450 for nearly six years worth of use (not one RROD, somehow) your argument works that PC gaming is better regarding upgrades than it used to be, but not good enough to make me want to go back to PCs. A Live Gold subscription is still cheaper than a graphics card every two years. On the other hand, reading about how games on PCs tend to have better graphics than their console counterparts these days has been tempting me... but depending on the specifics of the XBox One when it comes out (eg, price, DRM restrictions, etc.) I might once again have a console for half a dozen years worth of gaming with no hardware upgrades required.

I just hope the new console is really good at AA. The pixilation on my 360 bugs me.

Re:Can i please have two?

[cluedweasel]

"Do people even buy games in boxes any more?"

Yes. Those of us who are unfortunate to live in local cable company monopolies. Our data cap is 150Gb per month with a $1.50 per 1Gb overage charge. Where possible, I buy games on disc. Between Netflix, Hulu, steam, X-box content, etc. it's way too easy to blow through 150Gb.

Re:Can i please have two?

[Anonymous Coward]

Tell me about it. It's ridiculous when game developers incorporate any kind of internet requirement for single player games, especially on a console which is supposed to already be locked down and copy protected.

Oh well. As long as game developers don't treat their customers (or potential customer) with respect, I'll just be sticking to my PC and gog.com for my gaming.

Re:Can i please have two?

[zeroryoko1974]

PC is the king of DRM games. Origin, Steam, EA Sim City.

Re:Can i please have two?

[martinQblank]

And people look at ME funny when they discover I have hundreds, if not thousands, of actual dead-tree books in my house. I'll somehow survive a week w/o the internet.

Re:Can i please have two?

[Vanderhoth]

Ah, I don't know if anyone's told you, but you don't have to buy games from them. There are plenty of awesome indi games and you can write your own if you choose, not impossible to do on consoles, but very difficult and expensive. On the consoles the DRM is at the device level, for PC gaming the DRM is at the game level. If you don't want DRM on your PC don't buy games with DRM, you don't want DRM on your console, then don't buy a console/no games for you.

Re:Can i please have two?

[J-1000]

2-3 years? These days you can buy a mid-low end graphics card and keep it for 5 years. You can thank the consoles for this, since publishers are keeping their hardware requirements low enough to run on the Playstation and XBox.

That said, we get new consoles this year. So that means this may be the year to upgrade your graphics card too, if you want to be proactive about it. Or be like me and hold on to the old card until you encounter a game you really like that runs poorly.

Re:Can i please have two?

[LBt1st]

The upgrade dragon isn't as bad as it used to be. A lot of gaming tech has plateaued in the past few years.
Buy/build any decent PC these days and you're good to go for some years.

Re:Can i please have two?

[complete loony]

But this trend is mostly *because* of the current console lifetimes. Most games are written to be ported to or from the main consoles.

Do you think that trend will change when PS4's and XBOX One's are becoming common?

Re:Can i please have two?

[chihowa]

I may need another video card if games start being written for the new consoles. On the other hand, consoles are aimed at contemporary TV sets and 1280p/60Hz is is pretty anemic even compared to last decade's PC gaming.

Re:Can i please have two?

[tirefire]

Chasing the upgrade dragon is a luxury, not a curse. Console games often do not render at 1080p and they often have a target framerate around 30 fps, which I find atrocious. Most PC gamers, myself included, prefer 60+ fps.

I've saved a lot of money by buying mid-range PC hardware and playing games that are one or two years old. Of course, this would not work so well with multiplayer games...

I think if you buy a mid-range PC a year or two after this next generation of consoles is released, you'll be set for a good 4-5 years at least.

Re:Can i please have two?

[cyclomedia]

You go on holiday to remote places, and take a games console? Next time take a book instead. Disconnect!

Re:Can i please have two?

[x_t0ken_407]

Exactly. I built a not-all-that-expensive system back in 2009 that I'm still easily playing games with on high graphics settings. I'm just now getting that upgrade itch, but it's not entirely necessary even at this point. Though, I'm that type that I don't absolutely need the highest possible settings to enjoy the game.

Re:Can i please have two?

[Anonymous Coward]

No one gives a shit about the Ouya. It's a piece of shit. Stop talking about it. No one is going to buy it. No one is going to make any games for it (that aren't already also available on phones, tablets, PCs, Steam, and PSN/XBLA). You wasted your money on Kickstarter by giving it to them. Accept this and move on with your life.

Re: Can i please have two?

[Anonymous Coward]

I would love if nobody made games exclusive to Ouya, because platform-exclusive titles are awful for consumers and gaming as a whole.

Re: Can i please have two?

[Anonymous Coward]

I think people pirate games more because of this kind of DRM strangling the consumer.

A camera in every living room

[blarkon]

Xbox One includes and requires Kinect. This means that each Xbox One has an internet connected camera. In every living room, dorm room and bed room where someone places an Xbox One http://windowsitpro.com/blog/csi-effect-not-everyone-wants-kinect-camera-their-living-room

Re:A camera in every living room

[Anonymous Coward]

So unplug the freaking thing

Re:A camera in every living room

[Nidi62]

Xbox One includes and requires Kinect. This means that each Xbox One has an internet connected camera. In every living room, dorm room and bed room where someone places an Xbox One http://windowsitpro.com/blog/csi-effect-not-everyone-wants-kinect-camera-their-living-room

Good thing they make a highly sophisticated camera disabling device. The bigger concern is, if the console is voice activated to turn on, is the audio recorder always on?

Re:A camera in every living room

[SJHillman]

I imagine this will cause masking tape sales to jump to the levels of hat-grade tin foil.

Re:A camera in every living room

[Shikaku]

It requires it to be connected at all times.

Re:A camera in every living room

[Anonymous Coward]

"This means that each Xbox One has an internet connected camera. In every living room, dorm room and bed room where someone places an Xbox One http://windowsitpro.com/blog/csi-effect-not-everyone-wants-kinect-camera-their-living-room"... .. or probably two internet-connected cameras, since laptops already come with these things.

Re:A camera in every living room

[andy.ruddock]

What does?

Turn it off, put it back in the box and return it to the retailer - tell them you'd like your money back because you're too stupid to own a computer.

Re:A camera in every living room

[TWiTfan]

Presumably, you can turn it off from the console. But you, of course, have to take MS's word that it's really off.

Re:A camera in every living room

[blueg3]

Presumably, you can turn it off from the console. But you, of course, have to take MS's word that it's really off.

Unless you, you know, unplug it.

Re:A camera in every living room

[Xest]

Is there a citation for this? I'd be intrigued to see the justification as to why Kinect is necessary for the system to function.

Re:A camera in every living room

[TWiTfan]

And miss out on all those great ads splashed on top of your cable signal? No way! ;-)

Re:A camera in every living room

[darkstar949]

That's assuming that the camera wouldn't error out for some reason if it can't detect anything other than the electrical tape. From the sounds of the presentation they gave, the microphone would have to be on when the Xbox One is plugged in for the voice activated âoeinstant onâ to work correctly so I'm assuming that it's always listening.

The bigger question would be if it can record anything or if there is a backdoor to access it.

Re:A camera in every living room

[Anonymous Coward]

So not only does it require a kinect, it requires at least a roll of Scotch Tape.

Did they put that on the requirements on the box?

Re:A camera in every living room

[Chris Mattern]

This means that each Xbox One has an internet connected camera.

No worries. That's what they make duct tape for.

Re:A camera in every living room

[FluffyBob]

No-one wants to see your bloody boring one of a billion living room, or your one of a billion pasty body on your one of billions couch or the same old crap you do there that everybody else does. If you are worried about privacy you can live a perfectly enriching technological life by taking some simple measures and really small sacrifices. If you really need a Modern Blast'um 25 from Evil Faceless Developer Corp then maybe you you don't need the precious privacy that playing it violates. Maybe just go outside.

Re:A camera in every living room

[NatasRevol]

Always on, always listening.

Re:A camera in every living room

[Jiro]

If they want to use automated tools to find all people in the city with Star Wars posters on the wall since a recent serial killer is known to be a Star Wars fan, they certainly do want to see your boring living room. Alternatively, if they want to get you for some other reason, they can watch your living room as part of a fishing expedition.

It's certainly true that there are so many boring living rooms that they can't watch them all, but the danger is not so much that they can watch you constantly, as it is that they can watch you whenever they choose.

Re:A camera in every living room

[Anonymous Coward]

You could also just turn it around. Point it at the screen or the table it's on. I don't know, is it that difficult figuring out a way not to point the thing at yourself? You don't use a gun do you?

Re:A camera in every living room

[Anonymous Coward]

hard to do that once computers and other drm dodging devices are illegal

Re:A camera in every living room

[spire3661]

Laptops arent locked down platforms with no way to see under the hood.

Re:A camera in every living room

[spire3661]

What about the always-on microphones?

Re:A camera in every living room

[EvilSS]

My what signal?

Re:A camera in every living room

[Anonymous Coward]

I haven't found any source that has MS saying specifically that the Kinect has to be plugged in. There is a lot of misreading that says it. Here's a sample:

http://www.polygon.com/2013/5/21/4352732/xbox-one-requires-kinect

The headline from Polygon.com is "Xbox One requires plugged-in Kinect to function." However, if you go to the Xbox.com FAQ page the question is "Why require Kinect with every Xbox One?" The question seems to be regarding making people buy a peripheral they may not want. With the 360 you don't have to have it. Neither the question nor the answer says anywhere that Kinect is required to be plugged in only that the system comes with it and there will not be an option to buy one without.

This doesn't say that the Xbox One won't require it to be plugged in, but the headline does not accurately reflect what's in the FAQ.

Here is IGN with something closer to the always plugged in statement:

http://www.ign.com/articles/2013/05/21/xbox-one-will-not-function-without-kinect-attached

The quote is "Kinect does require to be connected to Xbox One in all cases, yes." The IGN statement is then "Xbox One will not function without Kinect attached." However, again, we see an error in logic. Breaking down the statement we have X is required to be attached to Y to function. It is a logical fallacy called "affirming the consequent." That is, IGN is saying that the Kinect needs to be connected to the Xbox One to function therefore the Xbox One must be connected to the Kinect for it to function. It is not necessarily true that if X requires Y to function that Y requires X to function. IGN's headline reads the quote in reverse which may or may not be true.

The IGN headline is the one you see most. Anytime you see "Harvey Eagle says Kinect is required" or something like that they are referring to this. Eagle has never said that the Xbox One requires the Kinect only that the Kinect requires the Xbox One. That does not mean Y won't require X, only that that statement has not yet been made.

Re:A camera in every living room

[CohibaVancouver]

Laptops arent locked down platforms with no way to see under the hood.

A Macbook Air comes pretty close.

Re:A camera in every living room

[Anonymous Coward]

Here's the closest answer to the question, yet.

http://www.penny-arcade.com/report/article/the-kinect-is-mandatory-and-cant-be-turned-off-welcome-your-new-motion-sens

The Kinect Program Manager, Scott Evans, basically says MS isn't saying whether or not you can unplug it. “We’ve today announced that we’re selling them together. I’m not sure if we’re sharing details about what happens when you unplug them." “I think it’s a policy decision, we’re not going to discuss it . . . I don’t know what the policy is going to be yet, so I’m not commenting.”

Take from that what you will, but it does prove that MS has not made a statement on whether it has to be plugged in. This could mean a lot of things. He could be saying yes. He could be saying you might not be able to unplug them and I don't know because I don't make that decision. He could also be saying no. He could also be saying we'll talk about that tomorrow (the reveal is a two-day event) so I can't say today. It's really a non-statement statement.

What we do know is that MS *could* make you keep them plugged in now, in the future, or for certain things. Right now the answer is "maybe."

Re:A camera in every living room

[Anonymous Coward]

Always sitting on the store shelf. Always wondering why it's never bought.

Seriously, I'm not touching one of these things.

Re:A camera in every living room

[spire3661]

Im typing this on a Mac mini, so you'll pardon my LOL. By hood i meant the software hood. Sealed laptops like an Air dont bother me.

Re:A camera in every living room

[lgw]

Are you sure your brand of duct tape is IR-opaque? A tiny tinfoil hat for your console is the only way to be sure!

Re:A camera in every living room

[Bob the Super Hamste]

Pack them with cotton balls. That is what I do to those overly loud speakers in kids toys. If you pack enough in there they won't make or pickup any noise.

Re:A camera in every living room

[Anonymous Coward]

Nobody - exept the ones that are happy to take some fair amount of money to let the "naughty" things they recorded dissapear before your wife, relatives or boss got a chance to see it. If you don' t pay... well... they sadly have to post the material worldwide on youtube to "compensate" for their lossess. It's your choice mate...

Re:A camera in every living room

[TWiTfan]

I'm turning off your Kinect sensor, HAL.

I'm afraid I can't let you do that, Dave....wait....What are you doing Dave?

I'm returning you to the store, HAL.

Re:A camera in every living room

[geminidomino]

Put it behind the TV where you can't see the printout of goatse you've tacked to the wall in front of it?

Re:A camera in every living room

[Anonymous Coward]

My god! Next they will trick us into carrying internet connected devices with a camera around in our pockets!

Re:A camera in every living room

[Anonymous Coward]

Are you seriously trying to play up a problem that can literally be solved with a post-it note?

Re:A camera in every living room

[Anonymous Coward]

It used to be the case that there were so many boring email and phone conversations going on that the government couldn't possibly monitor them all. Now they do just that with automated systems combing through all of your communication, all the time. A camera in your living room is just another data source. Facial recognition systems already exist, and hey it makes it easier for the Xbox to recognize players and remember their preferences so it's a great feature, right? (and lets the govt as well as advertisers know who you socialize with so it's a win-win!)

Re:A camera in every living room

[Anonymous Coward]

I imagine this will cause masking tape sales to jump to the levels of hat-grade tin foil.

Not need to purchase masking tape. You can combine duct tape and tinfoil to accomplish the same end goal. Or better yet, making a tinfoil fat that covers the Kinect sensor! Stylish AND functional! Think of the fun the kids would have in making the hat!

Re:A camera in every living room

[Anonymous Coward]

they also say saved games will be stored in there cloud, for something that will NOT be "always-on" that seems suspect, they didn't give any (the good old M$ propaganda machine at work) details of how that would work, or why they would do that, other then "will if something happens to your hardware it will be there for you"

Re:A camera in every living room

[Dextrously]

How is that solving the problem? You're treating the symptom at that point. It seems to me this whole product is a problem.

* The uncertainty of what it is actually capable of, who can access it's features, etc.
* Lack of transparency from Microsoft on their exact intentions with such features.
* Microsofts stance on actively working against the freedoms of their customers, such as with the First Sale Doctrine in the USA.

In general, this product gives off an extremely hostile vibe. I don't want that kind of thing in my home. If you are fine with that, more power to you, I won't try to convince you otherwise, but you need to understand that other people have concerns that are perfectly as valid as your own.

Re:A camera in every living room

[kaatochacha]

It also makes me wonder if, perhaps, the kinect might be included as part of the base unit somehow, and you are incapable of disconnecting it. They might not want to mention that, as it would give away design spec.

Re:A camera in every living room

[oursland]

Can't do that. What if you forget to plug it back in every 24 hours so it can phone home?

Re:A camera in every living room

[Anonymous Coward]

Or for the really paranoid type that for some reason still wants an xbox...unplug the power.

Re:A camera in every living room

[Anonymous Coward]

This means that each Xbox One has an internet connected camera.

Yeah, just like the millions of smartphones around the world (which also have GPS). This is hardly a revelation of any significance.

Re:A camera in every living room

[Anonymous Coward]

Or better yet: don't buy one at all.

Re:A camera in every living room

[Anonymous Coward]

You do have a smartphone... don't you? That will tick all boxes that the XBox can and more.
Way more interesting than the walls of a living room.

Re:A camera in every living room

[Anonymous Coward]

You are aware that police have a system in their cruisers where their computers analyze license plates and are constantly searching for tags that are entered in a database, right? This is just conjecture, but I imagine they're working on the same technology for facial recognition (if it doesn't exist already). People won't be watching you, computers will, and they _will_ be able to watch everyone.

Re:A camera in every living room

[blueg3]

Then it will phone home when it's next plugged in. If that's even what it actually does (considering there are no authoritative, straight answers yet). Because you'd have to be an abject moron to make it so that it breaks if it's unplugged for 24 hours. They might manage to hire someone that dumb in engineering, but they'll be stopped to prevent the class-action lawsuits and/or mass customer support problems whenever there's a natural disaster or university moving day.

This will not END WELL.

[Anonymous Coward]

This will not END WELL.

Regards,
Yaboi

Re:This will not END WELL.

[kcmastrpc]

Yes, it will. People will still buy millions of these. The minor segment of population who actually cares about DRM/privacy will buy one too because everyone else has one.

Re:This will not END WELL.

[Anonymous Coward]

If what you say is true, you are wrong. That is the very definition of not ending well.

Explanation

[puddingebola]

The games do not require an always-on internet connection, provided that the user first supplies a blood sample and a retinal scan and wears a special microchip implanted in his/her skin. The special microchip must always be within contact of a wifi connection, and not doing so voids the warranty on your XBox. You are free to sell used games to your friends, but after doing so, you are required to provide their name and address to Microsoft so that they can hunt them down and kill them and destroy the existing copy of the game.

Re:Explanation

[Anonymous Coward]

Humm... I think I will stick with the Wii U, then.

Re:Explanation

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, somebody has to.

Re:Explanation

[Anonymous Coward]

Always on doesn't necessarily mean what you guys are interpreting. It means to most of us that you will not be able to play a game without a connection to the internet even if the connection isn't needed for the full duration of the game play. Microsoft's scheme means you will need to connect to the internet upon every launch of the game and that you can't actually play it till you do this.

Microsoft is obfuscating the meaning by the way they are phrasing the denial.

Re:Explanation

[Anonymous Coward]

Following political debates do, however. The constant connection is necessary for Microsoft to be able to measure your physiological responses to the talking points and predict the voting behaviour with over 90 percent certainty. Also, the next step in evaluating the effectiveness of in-game and tv commercials contain similar biometric techniques. On the brink of buying the thing? The could assisted system determines that you need a two minutes sales talk for the buy to be completed. Yes, in the middle of FPS match of your life, possibly for your life if you're a dirty used-game-buyer.

Why?

[Murdoch5]

How about making a straight forward good old console. Why do we need to have all consoles internet active and DRM locked, what ever happened to the rocking systems like the NES ans SNSES?

Re:Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

you can make more money by being evil and doing stuff like this?

Re:Why?

[quantumphaze]

The NES and SNES aren't so innocent since they still had the form of DRM known as region locking. The PAL/NTSC limitation is complete bullshit when the digital game ROM has no analog video signalling components.

At least my old games still work on those old consoles. The future is pretty bleak as to the longevity of current games with activation servers going offline after they become an expense. Cracking teams are our only hope of preserving our gaming history.

Re:Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

C(r)apitalism.

Re:Why?

[Murdoch5]

Fair enough, your right! Region locking was a pain in the ass but you never had to worry about your internet being down or buying a used game. Everything just worked, you might of had to blow in the cartage a few times but that was part of the magic of the system.

Re:Why?

[TWiTfan]

What, you mean you don't want your console to put an annoying kludgy overlay on top of your cable box?!?!?!? Don't you want your living room filled with the magic of MS ads?!?!?!?

You people are so ungrateful. Here MS is kind enough to allow you to pay $50 a year for the privilege of paying Netflix $8 a month to watch movies, and THIS is how you repay them?! Ingrates!

Re:Why?

[SirGarlon]

More accurately, it is easy to see how to make money being evil and doing stuff like this. When was the last time you saw customers actually reject an evil product? We, the consumers, make evil the low-risk option.

Re:Why?

[havana9]

The PAL/NTSC limitation is complete bullshit when the digital game ROM has no analog video signalling components.

I'm not sure about NES, but PAL and NTSC Commodore 64 have different clock speeds and the vertcal blank is at different frequencies, so on some games the timing is wrong or some video tricks aren't working.

Re:Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

(S)NES? Really? Consoles released in 85/90?

You are talking about consoles that existed before the internet as we know it. Before high speed internet access. Before DVDs (1995)/Blurays. Before XP (2001). Before GPS (1995). Before cell phones.

With Torrents and inexpensive burners (DVD/BluRay) ALONE, can you really blame a company for trying to protect their investments? There is a difference between acceptable DRM (Steam) and unacceptable DRM (Sims always on, Sony Rootkits, Starforce drivers that break computers). Where does X1 stand on the scale? We have yet to see, but you are blind if you think that any company will put THIS much investment without some sort of protection. (Or do you really think that someone should be able to simply rip/copy/burn games with no barriers?)

What happened to "Simple" systems like (S)NES? The same thing that happened to the phone booth, dial up, palm and the horse and buggy. The world has moved on and continues to do so.

Re:Why?

[JDG1980]

How about making a straight forward good old console. Why do we need to have all consoles internet active and DRM locked, what ever happened to the rocking systems like the NES ans SNSES?

If you ever saw that stupid blinking red light when trying to boot a game, you encountered a DRM-related problem on your NES.

Whenever the NES boots, its internal CIC (authentication) chip tries to do a handshake with the matching CIC chip in the cartridge. If it fails, then it goes into an endless reboot cycle (that blinking red light. This process is very sensitive to dirt or other contaminants on the connectors. Making matters worse, instead of using a standard card edge connector, they used a weird ZIF-like connector which was very unreliable. This was for marketing reasons, because they didn't want it to look like a game console (these had a bad reputation after the 1983 video game crash).

This DRM was aimed at unlicensed publishers, but it often affected end users as collateral damage. Nintendo wanted a cut of third-party game sales, and was also concerned that a flood of crappy third-party titles had helped precipitate the 1983 crash.

The game data itself was, fortunately, not encrypted in any way – they figured that the cartridge form factor would be enough to deter casual copying, and for the most part they were right.

The original Japanese Famicom didn't have any of this crap, and neither did the top-loading NES that was released in the early 1990s.

Re:Why?

[darkstar949]

The problem is that when I pull out my old PSOne I can put the disk in and sit down and play a game without any issues where as with the newer consoles if you have online activation the life cycle of that game is tired to the activation servers which might be turned off a year after the game came out. Since a lot of people that grew up with the NES, SNES, and similar systems are now having children of their own, they can sit down with their kids and introduce them to a game that they enjoyed as a child. Will the children that grew up with the Xbox One be able to do the same thing? For that matter, a year or two after you played a game would you even still be able to play it if you wanted to?

Re:Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

Consider 1990 vs Today, 20 years later. Intel 80486 was released in 89. Palm was born and died - original palm released in 96. Compare (S)NES vs PS1, PS2, XBox, XBox360... hell compare it against the DS. Google, Facebook, twitter, etc weren't even a twinkle in their parents eyes. IE6 was released in 2001.

The "Good Ole Days" aren't coming back for a good reason. They are obsolete and the memories shine because of all the misery you've forgotten about those years.

Anyone who sold a game system like the (S)NES today would be relegated to niche status. Without all the bells and whistles, people will stick to Facebook and iPhone/Android games.

Re:Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

The problem is that people have different expectations. There is a demand for a connected experience. Facebook, twitter, playing games with friends, Netflix...

I personally think any device like the (S)NES would be relegated to niche status as most people would stick with Farmville and Words with Friends so they can interact with each other.

Once you add the need to stay connected, you have to control copying (Otherwise people could just burn DVDs or Torrent the game and apply a patch to unlock DLC content). You have to enforce updates (so everyone is on the same page with patches and content updates). You have to protect the console, otherwise why would a company like EA spend bazillions creating the best games for a platform that doesn't stop hacking or copying?

I think the consoles should work 50 years from now as well... but you can't compare consoles from before the internet to consoles coming out now and expect no differences.

Re:Why?

[Hatta]

There is a demand for a connected experience.

There is also a demand for an isolated experience. Any console that doesn't provide it will not get my money.

Re:Why?

[Iceykitsune]

Ground pin 5 on the 10-nes to 'jailbreak" your NES

Re:Why?

[darkstar949]

Once you add the need to stay connected, you have to control copying (Otherwise people could just burn DVDs or Torrent the game and apply a patch to unlock DLC content). You have to enforce updates (so everyone is on the same page with patches and content updates). You have to protect the console, otherwise why would a company like EA spend bazillions creating the best games for a platform that doesn't stop hacking or copying?

For games that are inherently multilayer that's all well and good but they already solved for that problem years ago with the install keys. Each game gets a unique key and you keep a database of the ones that have been issued already. If an unknown key shows up you ban it and if the same key connects from two different IP addresses you ban it as well. Diablo II and Starcraft used that system for years without much problem.

Also, the number of people that are running around and pirating the AAA games likely isn't enough to for amount of hassle that your customers are going through to just play a game. If I spend $60 for a game I should be able to just sit down, install it, and start playing with a minimal of fuss. If it's a single player game I should be able to pull out a laptop on an airplane and play the game. If the game is muli-player I either know what I'm getting into ahead of time when I buy the game or I just don't buy it.

Re:Why?

[quantumphaze]

Interesting point. With the NES however, I'm sure it's all down to the CIC chip that Nintendo used to act as gatekeeper (like Apple's app store) to prevent the problems that led to the video game market crash back in the 80s (didn't prevent shitty games though).

Which brings up another point I should have touched on in my earlier post. You can't make a console game without the blessing of Nintendo, Microsoft or Sony, then or now. This usually does keep most of the terrible indie games off the market but does nothing to shitty big budget ones and it completely locks out those rare great ideas like Minecraft from ever starting off on a console.

Re:Why?

[gl4ss]

the words with friends market isn't the high end games console market. there is demand for some multiplayer, which needs online of course. there is no demand for getting chat popups while playing next elder scrolls(non-online) game though.

ea and others would publish games because they need to. they're a games publisher. EA has no trouble publishing hundreds of android titles yet copying them is easy.

what's going to be problematic is that they envision using this thing for ten years or more - say, what are the chances the server stuff in the cloud is going to be running for a game company that already went bankrupt between the time they published the game and the time someone buys it say, 6 years later - on a physical media from a games store. the store gets the blame.

but all that wouldn't matter shit if they "got" gaming, yesterdays announcement was done in such fashion that they don't really give a shit about gaming(all the studio showcases could have been the exact same bullshit reel - all used same empty hype words, same bullshit, same kind of rendered scenes which showed no gameplay at all). as a gamer there's exactly nothing to look forward to. "the new xbox let's us tessellate surfaces as you get closer to the object" uhh well no shit didn't the exact same studio use the same fucking line about the old xbox already. if a fucking dog is the most important thing you have to say about your game when demoed with new hardware release maybe there's nothing you got to say about the hardware really..

the presentation was very done and rehearsed, with sleek presenters, it was like from a movie, because it was so generic - it could have been almost any tv widget they were presenting, so too bad they had nothing to present. nobody cares how many transistors your cpu has.

Re:Why?

[davidbrit2]

Yeah, but in the case of the NES, you can disable it by clipping a single chip pin on the board, and for the SNES, just Dremel off a little bit of plastic in the cartridge slot. And typically, these games would be timed to the video refresh rate, so switching between NTSC or PAL will usually cause the game to run at the wrong speed.

Re:Why?

[Murdoch5]

haha

Re:Why?

[spire3661]

No one is saying that connected experiences are bad. What we are saying is that shouldnt be the ONLY option. You can only lock it down so far before things start slipping through your fingers.

Re:Why?

[cbhacking]

... except that you can, have been able to for years, and tons of people *have* made Xbox 360 games and published them online. They're even distributed on Xbox Live, under the completely sneaky and unexpected name of Xbox Live Indie Games. http://xbox.create.msdn.com/en-US

There are catches, of course: the online publication requires a $100/year account, and the games can only be developed using XNA (which is a quite nice framework but produces CIL assemblies, not native code). The tradeoffs are at least a modicum of curation of the store content and an architecture independence that should (don't know if this has been announced) allow running XBLIG, unmodified, on the Xbox One even though it runs on a different architecture than the 360.

Re:Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

With Torrents and inexpensive burners (DVD/BluRay) ALONE, can you really blame a company for trying to protect their investments?

Bullshit. The PSX would not play burned discs. So unless something's changed since then, you are flat out wrong that the only thing you need is a torrent and a way to burn a disc.

Re:Why?

[Khyber]

"If you ever saw that stupid blinking red light when trying to boot a game, you encountered a DRM-related problem on your NES."

Nope. Even after authentication the game can still fail and it will continue to do the same thing.

Re:Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

Fair enough, your right!

Where did all you aliterates come from? Read a few books, dammit, it's YOU'RE. Contraction for You Are. I'm seeing WAY too much of this aliteracy (that is not a misspelling, if you weren't a bibliophobe you'd know what it meant).

What grade did you drop out of, dumbass? Third? Fucking pathetic. At least you didn't say "worry about you're internet being down", I see that way too often as well.

Aliteracy like that is fine in a Fox news forum, or a sports forum, or a Highlights for Children forum, but this is tech and science and I, for one, am getting sick of how full slashdot is getting of uneducated morons. If you can't write at better than an eighth grade level, STFU and lurk.

Re:Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

You and two other guys. Oh noes, cried the console makers!

Re:Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

an annoying kludgy overlay on top of your cable box

We already have that, it's called the cable box menu system and programming guide. It's terrible on 100% of set top boxes.

Re:Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

yep, invalids will line up for this POS

Re:Why?

[LocalH]

Then you still have the game speed issues, since the games are tied to the vertical blank in 99% of situations. Then fast forward to today, and you have Nintendo just getting over forcing European gamers to play the old games at 50Hz on the VC, since that's "what they were used to".

Re:Why?

[LocalH]

But the red light won't blink because the 10NES chip isn't constantly resetting the system. If the light is blinking, it was a problem with the DRM. If there was no problem with the DRM, you could still have other issues (graphic corruption, game won't boot) but in no such situation will the 10NES connect to the chip on the cart and then reset the system (well, unless the chips go out of lockstep or something like that, but then again that's usually a problem with the 10NES).

Re:Why?

[Patman64]

what ever happened to the rocking systems like the NES ans SNSES?

They all got merged into a box of awesome.

With this thing coming out who needs to drop $500-$600 on a new Xbox?

Re:Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

To be fair, their system is probably 1000 times better than most people's cable box interfaces.

Re:Why?

[ildon]

The Retron is garbage. Bad sound, video issues, etc.

Re:Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

Never heard of Skyrim?

Re:Why?

[jwhitener]

There is a demand for a connected experience.

There is also a demand for an isolated experience. Any console that doesn't provide it will not get my money.

Well, not even isolated. Just not having to continually contact the person (corporation) who sold you the device.

When our family and extended family goes on vacation, like renting a beach house or cabin, we often bring the wii, xbox, etc.. to play at night. It is more fun and collaborative than just watching a movie. If one of the entertainment boxes requires an internet connection, it isn't coming on the trip.

And that demographic (parents with money and kids who travel) is a pretty large one.

Re:Why?

[trdrstv]

The problem is that when I pull out my old PSOne I can put the disk in and sit down and play a game without any issues where as with the newer consoles if you have online activation the life cycle of that game is tired to the activation servers which might be turned off a year after the game came out. Since a lot of people that grew up with the NES, SNES, and similar systems are now having children of their own, they can sit down with their kids and introduce them to a game that they enjoyed as a child. Will the children that grew up with the Xbox One be able to do the same thing? For that matter, a year or two after you played a game would you even still be able to play it if you wanted to?

Nope, and this is the "poison pill" that will keep me from buying one. I routinely play retro games and at some point in the future MS will turn off those authentication servers which means I'd have an entire generation of games being unplayable. I can understand online multiplayer servers being shut down, but most of those games have a single player campaign, not to mention the single player gamer or those with offline multiplayer I'd like to go back to. If they don't change their mind on this single "feature" it's enough for me to skip it entirely, regardless of what games they have on it.

Anon plays a game on the new Xbox

[Anonymous Coward]

http://i.imgur.com/inXnRfO.png

In other news

[quantumphaze]

Sony's stock jumps 9% during Xbox One announcement.

Re:In other news

[TWiTfan]

Yeah, but does Sony have a Halo TV series? I think not!

Re:In other news

[Lumpy]

You say that like it is a good thing. The HALO tv series is a joke. Like BattleStar Galactica 1980 level of joke.

Re:In other news

[Anonymous Coward]

You're probably right, but how do you know that? The stuff I saw about it was so devoid of content, meaning, or substance so as to be a complete waste of time. Is there a trailer or something out?

Re:In other news

[Megane]

Please don't joke about Galactica '80. I was there, man! I was only a kid then and it scarred my mind, man! It was worse than Buck Rogers second season!

Re:In other news

[Anonymous Coward]

You say that like it is a good thing. The HALO tv series is a joke. Like BattleStar Galactica 1980 level of joke.

Foward Unto Dawn was at least as high quality as the much loved Hunger Games movie. With that said, neither is considered "good" by my standards, but even that level of production seems to entertain.

Really, watch both for just 20 minutes, no difference in acting quality, special effects, story, or anything else that makes a movie.

Re:In other news

[TWiTfan]

I still have nightmares about the episode where the Galactica kids played little league.

Re:In other news

[Scarletdown]

Please don't joke about Galactica '80. I was there, man! I was only a kid then and it scarred my mind, man! It was worse than Buck Rogers second season!

At least Buck Rogers in the second season had Hawk, and what was The Most Awesome Figtrer Ship Ever.

It would have been even better if they had not immediately killed off Koori.

And it would have been awesome incarnate if they had simply done the bloody obvious as the basis for the second seasons of both Buck Rogers and Battlestar Galactica.

Re:In other news

[Keen Anthony]

Might I interest you in Logan's Run, the TV Series? It comes complete with enough "pow pow" effects to make you want to "renew" right away with a shotgun.

Re:In other news

[TWiTfan]

Only if it features a robot.

Steam for comparison

[tepples]

Steam has been reported to work offline for weeks at a time. If the Xbox One really can't stay in offline mode for more than 24 hours, it just makes the Steam Box that much more likely to succeed.

Re:Steam for comparison

[The MAZZTer]

Steam still needs to be online to activate new purchases, even if you buy them in a brick and mortar store AFAIK.

Of course there's nothing saying Valve can't change this if they want to make Steambox more attractive to the internet-less.

Re:Steam for comparison

[Custard Horse]

Steam has been reported to work offline for weeks at a time. If the Xbox One really can't stay in offline mode for more than 24 hours, it just makes the Steam Box that much more likely to succeed.

...The XBox One also makes the XBox 360 look like open source.

I'm pleased that I won't have to replace my 360 any time soon - there are too many uncertainties to jump in feet first into a new platform with new games and no backwards compatibility.

Re:Steam for comparison

[SirGarlon]

Of course there's nothing saying Valve can't change this if they want to make Steambox more attractive to the internet-less.

Nothing, that is, except their business model.

Re:Steam for comparison

[drinkypoo]

Steam still needs to be online to activate new purchases, even if you buy them in a brick and mortar store AFAIK.

Of course there's nothing saying Valve can't change this if they want to make Steambox more attractive to the internet-less.

Valve can not change this without eliminating what DRM they have. As such, they will not change this. Look for all consoles of the future to go this direction.

Re:Steam for comparison

[drinkypoo]

I'm pleased that I won't have to replace my 360 any time soon - there are too many uncertainties to jump in feet first into a new platform with new games and no backwards compatibility.

That's what I thought about my Wii. But since the latest system update and Netflix update, I'm getting those hard lockups where the Wii makes a horrible air horn noise. (Thanks, Nintendo!) It's almost as if they snuck a classic Wii-killing function into the latest update. I opened up the Wii using a guide and made sure there was no dust in it, and there really wasn't. I hope the fan is just dying or something...

I've had to repair my 360 as well, the optical drive went tits up so I replaced it, doing the logic board swap so that I didn't have to mess with key extraction. Just a small handful of solder points and I'm off and running. That is, after getting into the @#%@!!# case. Even the Wii was easier. The classic Xbox is like opening a Mac II by comparison.

Re:Steam for comparison

[Hatta]

My Atari 2600 has worked offline for 30 years.

Re:Steam for comparison

[gman003]

Steam still needs to be online to activate new purchases, even if you buy them in a brick and mortar store AFAIK.

Yes, but I'd wager money that the Xb1 does the same.

Re:Steam for comparison

[Luthair]

Ironically though Microsoft's apparently draconian complicated half-revealed scheme for controlling the second-hand game market still offers more freedom than Steam.

Re:Steam for comparison

[tepples]

Steam still needs to be online to activate new purchases

If you happen not to have wired broadband in your home, I guess you can do that by occasionally tethering to a smartphone.

Re:Steam for comparison

[Anonymous Coward]

From my experience you have to tell it to go off-line first. I had a couple Internet outages for 3 days during some storms and couldn't play any game because I didn't plan ahead. I would try to launch the game and would get an error message saying that it couldn't connect to Valve's servers. Joy. This was for playing Portal 2 single player.

Re:Steam for comparison

[Nemyst]

Valve actually want to spin off the platform so that people can build their own stores and sell whatever they want there. Basically, stop relying on Valve for serving and curating the games, unless you want to. Steam would become a store-agnostic system, with the store deciding the cut they want to provide. Obviously one can expect that Valve's store would still be prominently displayed and advertised, but you could also find indie stores, publisher stores, whatever.

Re:Steam for comparison

[Agent0013]

The WiiU also has lockups when using Netflix. I think their app has some room for improvement. But I did find the Wii to be a better Netflix experience. The touchpad is more clunky for scrolling through the show to a spot you are looking for than the wiimotes are. And it's battery dies much quicker, so you have to keep charging it.

Re:Steam for comparison

[Anonymous Coward]

i have to login to steam every month when set for offline mode

Re:Steam for comparison

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm pretty sure you can still use a Wiimote with the Wii U Netflix app. I haven't tried that yet though.

Re:Steam for comparison

[gcobb]

If you happen not to have wired broadband in your home, I guess you can do that by occasionally tethering to a smartphone.

Oh, I love to listen to you metro types... I live in a rural area. I do have wired broadband but I certainly don't have mobile data coverage. The farms the other side of the village don't even get the wired broadband.

"If you don't have broadband just use a smartphone" ROTFL

No Sale

[MitchDev]

So if you have to install games to your Xbox ZERO or "deactivate" them to sell them, why bother with a console at all, just get a PC...

Re: No Sale

[Namarrgon]

I guess you realise Steam, Origin etc are the same, only with no option to sell at all?

Re:No Sale

[mean revision]

Yes, the principle reason that I play console games is they are easy to rent or buy used.

All of the other features might be nice to have, but I don't see many people buying an XBox to get them since there are perfectly good media streamers for a fraction of the price. It's games first and foremost.

Re:No Sale

[Neil Boekend]

It's a relatively good solution. Way above "You can't sell it. Only one activation. You can't even buy it, legally it's a lease, so you don't own it" that seems to be the norm.

Re: No Sale

[drinkypoo]

I guess you realise Steam, Origin etc are the same, only with no option to sell at all?

While you are legally correct, Steam games are tied to Steam accounts and thus if you make a separate account for each game (in violation of the AUP) then you can sell the account (also in violation of the AUP).

It's time to put our support behind indie gaming. Kickstarter is making this possible. Let's actually do it.

Re: No Sale

[LordNimon]

There's little incentive to do this because Steam games are often much cheaper than Xbox games, and there are more of them. I frequently buy new games, but I justify the $60 cost knowing that I can sell it for about half that when I'm done with the game. If I only pay $20 for a game, I'm not worried about selling it.

If Microsoft wants to adopt the Steam model, they also have to adopt the Steam prices. This means that games need to sell for at most $50, and then they need to quickly go on sale.

Re: No Sale

[Anonymous Coward]

The biggest difference being I can wait a month and a game on steam will go on sale or drop a significant amount.
With a console game, I'm lucky if the price drops $5 in a month.

Re: No Sale

[JustAnotherIdiot]

...except you can't sell kickstarter/indie games either :P

Re:No Sale

[tlhIngan]

So if you have to install games to your Xbox ZERO or "deactivate" them to sell them, why bother with a console at all, just get a PC...

Uh, last I checked, deactivating a game happens today - when you sell your disc you can't play the game anymore. Seems reasonable to me. Unless you really want to pirate the game, in which case it means you sell the disc and don't give up the license. Not that Steam lets you do that, anyhow (given that almost no one now does used PC game sales).

As for the disc - it's a bridge between a full download (it's Blu-ray, so games can be up to 50GB) and using discs (which are slow, break, get scratched up, noisy, wear out, etc) which provide a very quick and efficient way of moving a large amount of data easily. The potential I see is where USB drives get really cheap and you can simply transfer a game to one via a kiosk.

This method has some interesting implications.

1) A game can't really go 'out of print' anymore - if the game is no longer available for sale (electronic or retail), but someone has the disc, you can always buy a copy by using the disc (assuming you can't download it, but if it's not for sale anymore...). This has very interesting implications because it means every game will be available. For those who want to find some hard-to-find game they made few copies of,, well, as long as you can get a hold of the disc, you can play it and pass the disc to someone else. Low print runs are no longer any excuse. (I have several games where you can't buy them anymore and they command $$$ now)

2) DRM on the disc is actually unnecessary. So one could, theoretically, download the game and burn it onto a BD and use that. Again, implications on rare and hard to find games.

3) Rare and hard to find games no longer command outrageous prices if rare discs aren't required to play the game - except for collectors.

4) You still have used game sales, but you also cut out the middleman (e.g., EBGames) - if you can transfer the license to someone else, it means Microsoft suddenly is a broker of the deal. You sell the game, Microsoft handles the monetary transfer (the hardest part), transfers the license, and the cut Microsoft takes pays for it all AND a little goes to the publisher. An alternative way would be to generate a code for the game license, then pass it onto a third party who can verify it, claim the license and sell it - i.e., online used game sales, no shipping required, even.

Hate to say it, but Microsoft really may be onto something here - allowing used game sales for disc/"digital" downloaded games,

Re: No Sale

[spire3661]

In certain regions, its not a violation of the AUP. Further, that particular aspect of their AUP has not been tested in court.

Re: No Sale

[MitchDev]

Yep, pricing is king and you need to make wise choices

Re: No Sale

[MitchDev]

Console games are on Discs, no need to for extra "DRM" like requiring a hard drive install and tying it to an account. And, as another user has mentioned, Steam has amazing sales with more realistic prices than consoles.

Re: No Sale

[cbhacking]

Annoyingly, Indies these days are showing a trend toward only publishing on Steam. If I can't buy the game straight from the developer, or through a quality (DRM-free, among other characteristics) retailer like Good Old Games, I won't support it (it's OK if they *also* want to publish on Steam so long as the other copies don't languish unmaintained). Unfortunately, sometimes they don't bother announcing "oh by the way, this will only be available on Steam" until after the Kickstarter (or other such thing) period ends....

Re:No Sale

[MitchDev]

1) With digital distribution, old "rare" games can't go out of print either. Now whether they will run on newer hardware/OSs on the other hand...

2) DRM on the disc is easier, as no network connection is needed to play the game you paid for

3) There are ways around this...much more difficult and of shadowy legality

4) Why include ANY middleman? Why do you need M$'s, or anyone's elses "Permission" to sell your used games? No "middleman" is needed. And since it's a "resale", why would M$ give anything to the Publisher? Why should the publisher get a cut shen they already got their money? Why need "codes" or "verification" at all?

Re:No Sale

[Anonymous Coward]

So you can play console games, duh. The best console games don't have PC ports.

Re: No Sale

[zlives]

citation please.

Games are not played in the living room

[ObsessiveMathsFreak]

If Microsoft want to make a home media device for use in people's main living rooms, that's fine. It's actually quite a good idea. But such a device cannot be principally viewed as a games console.

I don't know about the rest of you, but aside from the occasional multiplayer split screen session, I play console games on a dedicated screen, either in a bedroom or computer room. I cannot play a game in a main living room, on a screen which in in demand by others for watching TV, films, or even browsing the internet. It's nice that this device can do so much, but flipping "channels" to whatever everyone else wants to watch is not conducive to the 4-6 hour gaming sessions I would like to have.

Maybe they're going for the complete casual gaming market here, people who will flick over to Angry Birds or whatever. But even the most passé of run-of-the-mill gamers is going to spend an hour or so playing shooters online, and are not going to be inclined to flip over to daytime TV, or browse the web in the middle of their frag session. I just cannot see this working en masse.

Some may call it anti-social, but to me playing video games is closer to reading a book than watching TV; it's principally an individual experience, and the living room is not the place to have it unless you are specifically playing co-op. I don't think Microsoft are serious about the Xbox One as a gaming console. It appears to be principally oriented around completely orthogonal capabilities.

Re:Games are not played in the living room

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't know about the rest of you, but aside from the occasional multiplayer split screen session, I play console games on a dedicated screen, either in a bedroom or computer room. I cannot play a game in a main living room, on a screen which in in demand by others for watching TV, films, or even browsing the internet. It's nice that this device can do so much, but flipping "channels" to whatever everyone else wants to watch is not conducive to the 4-6 hour gaming sessions I would like to have.

They are probably assuming one of two major scenarios: that you will put it in a bedroom or computer room, or, that the principal buyers will be bachelors living alone who have no problems like contention for a living room.

Re:Games are not played in the living room

[Anonymous Coward]

...I cannot play a game in a main living room, on a screen which in in demand by others for watching TV, films, or even browsing the internet. It's nice that this device can do so much, but flipping "channels" to whatever everyone else wants to watch is not conducive to the 4-6 hour gaming sessions I would like to have.

Maybe they're going for the complete casual gaming market here...

Yes, or perhaps they're finding that not catering to the gaming addicts would still benefit them, as it would target the other 90% of their customers who can manage to play games on the main HDTV in the living room without pissing everyone else off for hours on end.

Just a thought...

Re:Games are not played in the living room

[bondsbw]

AC's got a point. If you don't like it, don't buy it. The most hard-core gaming is, and will always be, on your own rig using the very latest and most expensive components.

But don't be surprised, or get into a hissy-fit rant on the Internet, just because there exist multitudes of people who are casual gamers and would rather not drop a couple grand and spend days or weeks configuring a system that only gets them better graphics and frame rates. Some people simply don't care about such things.

Re:Games are not played in the living room

[0xdeadbeef]

TL/DR: "Microsoft is dumb because most people play console games on their little private TV in order not to interrupt the people using WebTV in the living room."

Re:Games are not played in the living room

[Anonymous Coward]

Did you forget to consider the entire 30 year history of video game consoles - entertainment which has primarily (if not solely) been centred around the living room!?

Since when did only casual gamers play video games in the living room? /. sometimes stuns in the myopic worldview nerds can hold (i.e. "The way I want to play games is the way the rest of the market wants to play games").

Re:Games are not played in the living room

[Uninvited Guest]

Indeed, the Xbox One seems to be still based on taking turns, not sharing. If it's your turn to control the Xbox One in the living room, life is good, and world is your oyster. If it's someone else's turn to control the Xbox One, life is kind of boring and crappy.

Re:Games are not played in the living room

[gl4ss]

well there was SHIT ALL NO playing at all at the announcement stream.
it's a box for watching live american cable tv. rest of the world doesn't care and neither do gamers.

playstation announcement might not have had the console on display, but at least it was somewhat about the games.

MS could just as well have skipped displaying the specs(8 gigabytes! ... and a cpu with x number of transistors) since they were so light on them.

Re:Games are not played in the living room

[MrMickS]

It looks like we are different then. I use the main TV in my living, and the associated sound system, for my current game system. I play a variety of games and play for anything from a quick 30 minute frag to your 4-6 hour sessions. Its just a different input channel to the TV. If I wanted to squirrel myself away I'd probably use a PC/laptop rather than a console.

This convergence of technologies was always going to happen. It has been the aim of Microsoft, and Sony, since their original consoles. They want to be the conduit through which entertainment is delivered.

I don't mind the phone home requirement. My console is always connected at the moment. It gives me updates and alerts me to friends coming online. A lot of the games I play have an online element, this is just going to add to it.

With the plethora of inputs to my TV at present this looks like it would reduce them and make the whole thing more manageable for the rest of my family. If it works as advertised it will fly off the shelves at the right price.

Re:Games are not played in the living room

[P-niiice]

And a significant number of people will have it in a den or man-room.

Re:Games are not played in the living room

[theurge14]

Does the new Xbox One not play games?

Then what's your problem with it? So the new TV features aren't for you, so what? I too play my Xbox 360 on a smaller TV in a bedroom but I do understand that many people have it in their living rooms as an entertainment hub. That doesn't prevent me from playing games the way I want.

Re:Games are not played in the living room

[Anonymous Coward]

But don't be surprised, or get into a hissy-fit rant on the Internet

That's what the internet is for, other than porn that is

What's it *really* cost?

[Tridus]

What's the real price going to be? You know, the one after you factor in whatever they're charging for Xbox Live this time around, in order to do what every other system on the planet lets you do for free. If they expect me to pay them for multiplayer gaming this time around, they're living in a fantasy land.

This unveiling was so vague and missing information that it's truly impressive. It's like Microsoft knows their answers are going to piss people off, so they're just avoiding giving details at all.

TBH the entire presentation was highly unimpressive. The people listening were core gamers, and Microsoft totally ignored them in favor of "hey look at Kinect moving the TV window around and bringing up a browser!"

Re:What's it *really* cost?

[Anonymous Coward]

What's the real price going to be? You know, the one after you factor in whatever they're charging for Xbox Live this time around, in order to do what every other system on the planet lets you do for free. If they expect me to pay them for multiplayer gaming this time around, they're living in a fantasy land.

I guess that silly pointless XBox live thing will just sit in beta with its 17 users then. Clearly there's no point in a company charging for that. Obviously no one will ever pay it.

Speaking of fantasy land, perhaps you should join us back here in the land of reality and established revenue streams before you start making your demands.

Re:What's it *really* cost?

[drinkypoo]

If they expect me to pay them for multiplayer gaming this time around, they're living in a fantasy land.

I feel the same way, but many people don't. And since games using Live will be able to use Azure to run servers, at least you're finally getting something for your money. In theory.

This unveiling was so vague and missing information that it's truly impressive. It's like Microsoft knows their answers are going to piss people off, so they're just avoiding giving details at all.

Which is why after the announcement, Sony stock is up and Microsoft stock is down slightly.

Re:What's it *really* cost?

[Xest]

"Which is why after the announcement, Sony stock is up and Microsoft stock is down slightly."

That doesn't make much sense given that Sony's announcement was even more vague again (they didn't even have a physical console to show).

Besides, someone else pointed out already Sony's stock is up because they've suggested they might spin off their entertainment unit.

Re:What's it *really* cost?

[drinkypoo]

Besides, someone else pointed out already Sony's stock is up because they've suggested they might spin off their entertainment unit.

I don't know if I buy that. Why would that be a good thing? That unit is profitable (unlike MS' entertainment division, when considered overall) and also synergistic. Blu-ray, for example, got a big boost from the PS3, and vice versa. It's possible neither one would be here today otherwise.

Re:What's it *really* cost?

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm not sure MS avoided the details to not piss people off instead of not revealing details so they can get people to watch again today. They are having the second half of the release today. I'm guessing they teased a lot of stuff yesterday, collected data from what hit and what missed, then tailored there details today to fit that reaction. It's cheesey, I know, but MS is selling you a product not actually trying to inform you of things (just like Fox News/MSNBC).

Re:What's it *really* cost?

[Xest]

It depends in part how it's done, it could be that they retain some shares in the spin-off (and presumably they would) but fundamentally say they spin it off and retain over 50% of shares so that they maintain control it means they can command a higher share price for the remaining 49% or whatever than they can for Sony shares alone.

Effectively this means that they'll get a big windfall which they can use to try and turn around their main units that are currently struggling (i.e. they could massively invest in smartphones and we know how much success there has been pulling in Samsung) whilst retaining a majority control of what happens at the spun-off entertainment business.

Also, in the near term that division will likely be loss making due to the production and marketing costs of the PS4, so it would act to lessen the blow on the main company. They probably feel it looks better if Sony makes a $1bn loss and The Playstation Company or whatever makes a $1bn loss that they can attribute to the cost of being spun off and temporary than if Sony in general makes a $2bn loss.

Alternatively it's even possible that they feel the main electronics business has more scope for profitability in general even without their entertainment division and that it simply needs a lot of income to turn things round and so they sell it off altogether and don't even retain a share in it. They may feel with a few billion $ in pocket to invest internally they can turn themselves into a Samsung, which is massively profitable even without an entertainment division but that's a bigger gamble.

There's lots of ways that selling off the entertainment division could be beneficial to them.

Re:What's it *really* cost?

[Tridus]

They got people to start paying for Xbox Live back in what, 2005? 2006? Back then there wasn't a lot of competition and they had a strong offering.

On a new system, asking people to pay Microsoft a toll so they can then pay Netflix to use Netflix is almost as a big of a joke as asking people to pay to play multiplayer games. Sure some people will keep going along with it, but I expect it'll be a much tougher sell this time around given the competition has caught up (and in the case of indie games, blown way past).

Soooo....

[DeathToBill]

How long before HTC starts the trademark infringement action?

Re:Soooo....

[Anonymous Coward]

As long as it takes the HTC executives to lose their brains.

Re:Soooo....

[Colonel Korn]

How long before HTC starts the trademark infringement action?

Right after Keanu Reaves.

Insight

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe before we rush to adopt a camera in every living room we should stop to consider the consequences of blithely giving this technology such a central position in our lives.

Re:Insight

[andy.ruddock]

That's sharp!

Re:Insight

[TWiTfan]

What really should worry people is the possibility of someone figuring out how to hack it. Or some MS employee realizing that he now has a limitless supply of free dorm room pron.

Re:Insight

[Anonymous Coward]

You're thinking too small, man. If CISPA goes through, the government can then legally compel MS to secretly hand over surveillance in the interest of "National Security". Just so happens they have a camera and mic in living room / bedrooms, bought and paid for by the consumer. Must be online regularly if you want to use it even for single player games.

I've never made a tinfoil hat before, but I do believe I'm adding a large roll of aluminum to the shopping list.

Re:Insight

[Anonymous Coward]

That's a great Insight, you must be really wise, thanks for addressing my biggest anxieties.

Re:Insight

[Anonymous Coward]

figuring out how to hack it ... limitless supply of free dorm room pron

That's exactly what I want! This might be the best thing ever!

Re:Insight

[RomanH]

You must be wise

Re:Insight

[JosKarith]

(M$ admin) : Remote activation of suspect's Xbox camera in 5...4...3...
(FBI agent) : Why the hell didn't we think of this years ago? Scr3w warrantless wiretapping statues...

Re:Insight

[TWiTfan]

I just hope the hot girl in the apartment next door is an Xbox fan.

Re:Insight

[sesshomaru]

Sounds like someone doesn't like their Telescreen....

Re:Insight

[Vanderhoth]

You're like the kid at the magic show that goes around pointing out how the magician did all his tricks. Thanks for ruining the show.

Re:Insight

[wertigon]

Hey, every guy (and gal) needs a hobby! :D

Re:Insight

[Anonymous Coward]

relevant xkcd:

http://xkcd.com/1215/

Re:Insight

[AmiMoJo]

I'm more worried about every random government agency that will demand access perfectly legally.

Re:Insight

[Anonymous Coward]

You've addressed my biggest concern with that comment.

Re:Insight

[spire3661]

Its only perfectly legal is you ignore the 4th.

Re:Insight

[bluegutang]

Or some MS employee realizing that he now has a limitless supply of free dorm room pron.

Not to mention that many XBox users are underage...

Re:Insight

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe before we rush to adopt we should stop to consider the consequences of blithely giving this technology such a central position in our lives.

http://xkcd.com/1215/

Re:Insight

[Anonymous Coward]

Nice xkcd!
I guess it shows the title text is true =P

Re:Insight

[Anonymous Coward]

Whooosh!

Re:Insight

[Anonymous Coward]

really, you could have atleast given xkcd credit for your quib.

Re:Insight

[Anonymous Coward]

Wait, I thought the 4th amendment didn't apply if a third party was involved. Isn't that why the government can intercept any internet communications / read everyone's e-mail?

Re:Insight

[spire3661]

Thats a bullshit workaround, not a faithful interpretation of the 4th.

Re:Insight

[Anonymous Coward]

The way I see it, there are two ways of looking at the other AC's post.

1) He's being serious.
2) He's making a joke.

In neither instance would I say that pointing out the source is the equivalent of explaining a magic trick.

Re:Insight

[Anonymous Coward]

At least it has only one camera and isn't mobile. The cell phones have two and go everywhere the user goes.

Re:Insight

[archshade]

you should cite your sources: oblig

Re:Insight

[Anonymous Coward]

Indeed

http://xkcdsw.com/520

Re:Insight

[Anonymous Coward]

I just hope the hot girl in the apartment next door is an Xbox fan.

Give her one for her Birthday!

Re:Insight

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah and then she drops trou and a big ol' weiner flops out.

Re:Insight

[Anonymous Coward]

This makes me wonder what you guys do in your living room to be concerned about the slim possibility YOUR Xbox camera may be hacked.

Re:Insight

[Anonymous Coward]

Thats a bullshit workaround, not a faithful interpretation of the 4th.

It is, unfortunately, the current one the courts and government have been adhering to.

If a commercial entity gathers the information, and the government requests it, the courts have upheld that practice.

Then again, they've mostly interpreted the 4th so narrowly as to be a pathetic joke, since your laptop and cellphone aren't considered your 'papers' because, well, they're not paper and you can have a "border stop" nowhere near a border.

Welcome to the Brave New World, where as long as it's industry spying on you on behalf of the government (and corporate profits), it's all good.

Re:Insight

[JD-1027]

Judging by some of the replies to your comment, it is working as promised...
http://xkcd.com/1215/

Re:Insight

[Anonymous Coward]

Someone visited xkcd today.

Re:Insight

[Scarletdown]

This makes me wonder what you guys do in your living room to be concerned about the slim possibility YOUR Xbox camera may be hacked.

I believe the correct answer to that is, " No matter what they are doing in their own private space, it is none of your fucking business."

Re:Insight

[Anonymous Coward]

If I knew I had mode points I would actually log in for the first time in three years just for your comment.
 
Bravo!

Re:Insight

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe before we rush to adopt a camera in every living room we should stop to consider the consequences of blithely giving this technology such a central position in our lives.

http://xkcd.com/1215/

Re:Insight

[grendal_fly]

Great use of the new XKCD line for all new tech!

Re:Insight

[Anonymous Coward]

I like to be watched... Please look at me ;)

Re:Insight

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah because most people don't already carry a constantly-connected GPS, microphone, front camera and rear camera just about everywhere they go, and laptops with webcams and microphones, tablets with cameras, glasses with cameras and microphones. If you're the sort of paranoid delusional spastic that avoids all such devices for that reason then you're not going to be buying an xbox now are you?

Why does it "need" to phone home?

[Anonymous Coward]

It's no good saying "It doesn't have to be always connected to the internet", but why the hell does it *need* to phone home AT ALL?

It's like saying for the OEM mass market Windows9 OS that it has to log in to a Windows AD controller on another machine. If they've made it that it must get its configuration on boot-up for a user to log in from an AD controller, then the fact is that it DOES need to connect to one.

What's missing is WHY they made it have to do that and could not make it so that the OS *could* join an AD domain, but didn't *have* to.

I can see from their point why: they sell another OS license and an AD license (in this fictitious case). And they can make up what benefit you get (you can have a roaming account that is the same for your laptop, MS Phone, Desktop, tablet and XBox), but that doesn't explain why these "features" are *must have*.

Re:Why does it "need" to phone home?

[Anonymous Coward]

steam has to call home.

Re:Why does it "need" to phone home?

[Anonymous Coward]

Neither of these "have" to call home, but they've been programmed that way because every large entity these days, be it government or corporations, are a bunch of paranoid control freaks who jump at any chance to reduce your liberties while lining their own pockets.

Vote no to this crap with your wallet, and let your voice be heard. These animals won't ever understand until it hits their bottom line.

Re:Why does it "need" to phone home?

[Killjoy_NL]

It's an anti-piracy measure, simple as that (and probably sending home some gathered stats)

It also allows for "offloading" of processing

[TWiTfan]

Anyone remember that EA bullshit about SimCity needed to "offload" some of it's processing (which was proven false by a hacker later)? Well, one of the things they mentioned specifically at the announcement yesterday was that the Xbox One would feature this capability (they bragged as if it was a good thing). And with them highlighting EA as a partner, you can bet you'll see plenty of One games that require always-online connections, to connect to EA servers for "processing."

Re:It also allows for "offloading" of processing

[Anonymous Coward]

Now that you mention EA, their recent move to drop online pass is starting to make a lot more sense, consoles will do it for them.

Re:It also allows for "offloading" of processing

[gl4ss]

Now that you mention EA, their recent move to drop online pass is starting to make a lot more sense, consoles will do it for them.

yeah... they're just switching from online pass to "play pass".

Re:It also allows for "offloading" of processing

[Anonymous Coward]

You appear to have an misunderstanding about what the word proof actually means. A hacker *claimed* that EA did not need to offload any processing based on his own analysis, he did not provide any actual *proof* that this was true.

Not to disagree with you on the overall claim that EA was lying, just that the particular claim you mention has not actually been proven (although it does appear to be reasonably likely).

Re:It also allows for "offloading" of processing

[Anonymous Coward]

My understanding is that they hacked SimCity to run completely offline and without a network connection, thus showing that no server was processing anything at all.

Re:It also allows for "offloading" of processing

[Anonymous Coward]

The question is, did they release the hack (the proof), or just claim to have accomplished this (not really proof)?

Re:It also allows for "offloading" of processing

[Anonymous Coward]

This is Social-DRM. The age of idiots and their DRM is over. The next stage is to implement any kind of feature that can be sold as a 'social' implement requiring a 'social' medium, which of course, means 'always-on'.

Social-DRM is the next lock-down, squeeze the consumer till it hurts plan of action.

Why not just own it?

[Gothmolly]

Why can't you just buy it, and own it, and use it how you like? Or... not buy the damn thing. It's supposed to be entertainment, not work, not some sort of interactive customer experience with Microsoft.

Re:Why not just own it?

[Solandri]

Because the long-term goal (dream) of every software company is not to sell software, but to sell subscriptions. They're just getting you used to what it'll be like to have a monthly/annual subscription to a game. Then like the proverbial frog in slowly boiling water, you won't be bothered by the change when they drop sales and offer games only by subscription. After all, it doesn't have any disadvantages over when you used to buy games, right?

False...

[mystikkman]

Sony's stock jumps 9% during Xbox One announcement.

From
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-05-21/sony-jumps-on-report-company-weighs-entertainment-spinoff.html

Sony Corp. (6758) rose as much as 9.2 percent in the U.S after Japan’s Nikkei newspaper reported the company is “leaning toward” spinning off its entertainment division.

Re:False...

[AmiMoJo]

I wonder what this includes. Sony Music and Sony Pictures? Their TV channels in south and east Asia?

I'm playing the game, not playing Steam

[Anonymous Coward]

So why the hell should I have to be online at all at any time for Steam, since that's not what I'm buying to play, I'm buying a game to play.

It's a second agreement I must agree with to a third party not producing the thing I wanted to buy that if I disagree with ensures I cannot play the thing I wanted to play and paid money for.

If the game is multiplayer and I must connect to the internet to do so, then there's a reason for internet connection. If the game has multiplayer modes and single player, connecting to the internet for the multiplayer is reasoned, but needing to to play the single player mode is not.

But if I disagree with Steam's terms, or if the terms change on either and I disagree with the change, why am I denied the thing I wanted to do, ESPECIALLY if it's something I wasn't buying in the first place that is stopping me (i.e. Steam)?

This is why Steam is a non-starter and will ALWAYS be a non-starter for many people.

It's why GoG.com will make sales and why Valve gives huge breaks on people agreeing to exclusivity on Steam: so that GoG can't get the triple-A titles, ensuring that they're not widely known and are starved of recognition. Same reason Microsoft wanted exclusive deals that banned Netscape installed on any PCs.

Nothing to make me want to "upgrade" from 360

[sorensenbill]

I've been following this closely and so far there's nothing that makes me want to get this over a 360. Between the vague answers on the new DRM scheme and the vaguer answers on used games I'm just not sold yet. If they keep the current DRM from 360 which I find to be mostly transparent and the current used game model I'll consider buying one. The live NFL games with on screen fantasy sound like it could be fun. However I haven't seen confirmation that it works without a cable subscription yet or if it's an extra charge on top of the Gold membership.

Re:Nothing to make me want to "upgrade" from 360

[CimmerianX]

Oh, I can almost guarantee it will be an 'extra' charge. They know that sports fans who play fantasy football are fanatics and will pay just like meth users to get their new and improved 'fix'. Just like how cable/dish have about 40% of the channels dedicated to ESPN and sports pay per view, MS knows the Sports fan will pay.

DRM wins

[witherstaff]

I think Microsoft is starting a trend that Sony and Nintendo will continue as the market is ready for this. As consumers we've been programmed to accept that you can't trade anything digital. Buying anything on itunes, google play, or steam is a one time purchase, can't trade or even give away. Kindle lets you loan books - if the publisher allows - for a single short period. Get a book loaned to you but something comes up and can't read it in that window? Oh well out of luck!

Re:DRM wins

[93 Escort Wagon]

Kindle lets you loan books - if the publisher allows - for a single short period. Get a book loaned to you but something comes up and can't read it in that window? Oh well out of luck!

I think the author has control over that, but I may be mistaken.

This is one that bit me just a few weeks ago. I'd purchased a recent Jonathan Kellerman Kindle book, but wasn't in the mood to read it yet - so I was going to lend it to my wife. Guess what? It wasn't allowed.

This is why, even though it's inconvenient, I strip the DRM from every Kindle book I buy. Because of that, I was able to "lend" the book to my wife without having to go without my own (physical) Kindle for the duration. Yeah, I know - I'm a hardened criminal and should be in the slammer. But I have access to my purchased ebooks and will be able to use them as common sense dictates, with or without Amazon's blessing.

If Amazon ever makes removing DRM impossible, I won't be buying from them.

Re:DRM wins

[Anonymous Coward]

just like politics, all we have to do is defund the scum. but will we ever?

Re: DRM wins

[Rhurazz12]

Shhhhh! Don't blurt that out too loud! Amazon might hear you and you'll ruin their plans of narcissism and taking over the world with DRM!

Re:DRM wins

[gcobb]

If Amazon ever makes removing DRM impossible, I won't be buying from them.

Some of us don't buy DRM-encumbered books at all, for that reason. Of course it is easy to remove... it is in their interests that it is easy to remove so that even the people who don't like DRM will still buy from them! Well, sorry, but I choose not to do business with anyone who won't sell me their goods on terms I find agreeable. I won't support them while they are screwing other people even if I know how to stop them screwing me.

I pay fair prices for DRM-free books which I can own.

Re:DRM wins

[Anonymous Coward]

It appears that the Technology and the Social use of Money vs "Points" are becoming fragmented, and everyone is trying to create a currency that locks in a consumer to a financial eco-system.

As the political structures fail to properly account for economic activity, the only resort is this kind of fragmentation.

If you want to get an head start on where the real money is, open up a virtual currency exchange.

Similar to a Directv receiver

[sunking2]

I haven't read up on it but I would guess it is for the same reasoning. For Directv it was because if you weren't hooked up you couldn't use the PPV and some other pay as you go options. Being specific about why just ads confusion when dealing with millions of people, so they blanket it and say you need to be connected either by phone in the old days, or internet at all times whether you care about these things or not. Not ever doing PPV I've not cared and have technically broken their rules by not being connected to them for 15 years and it still does everything I want. My guess for the XBox is they want to be able to keep current on what their offerings from a TV aspect are. You may get annoying messages, but I doubt it'll be come unusuable as a whole if you don't connect. That would be a nightmare for them.

Re:Similar to a Directv receiver

[Anonymous Coward]

Er, Directv does not require your box be connected to the internet. You can still order PPV via your computer and set recordings via the computer as well (both signals are sent via satellite not internet). Not doing something not required by the rules is not "technically" breaking the rules.

They just had to ruin it

[MikeRT]

All they had to do was make the installation process work just like it does on the 360 where you have to put the DVD in on start up to prove you own a copy or have physical possession of one. They could have improved on that for convenience simply by making a feature to tie it to your profile and require the Internet for that. That way, the worst that could happen is two gamers share the same disk.

Re:They just had to ruin it

[davidbrit2]

The problem there is that it allows the end user to resell a game without allowing MS to skim their God-given tithe off the top (or prevent it outright).

Re:They just had to ruin it

[Anonymous Coward]

Then you'd have to put a disc in to play a game. We moved away from this on the PC years ago, and it's about time consoles catch up. I shouldn't need to keep a bunch of plastic discs with my console and swap them to change games.

Get over it

[TheSkepticalOptimist]

I am kind of tired of this. I mean, the whining about something that you know is not an issue for 99% of people out there.

First, one of the prized features of the Xbox platform is the Xbox Live services. You know, those services that match you up in games with friends and offers social and multimedia feature. YOU KNOW, the service that requires an internet connection.

Second, pick up ANY smartphone or tablet and realize these devices are constantly online. You may not need to be online to play, but the online services are there in the background making sure your Tweets and Facebook followers are aware of what you are up to and you are kept informed of the world.

I know that in that RARE circumstance where there might be an internet outage or you take your Xbox One to the cottage and want to play some games on a rainy day might be a bummer if the game won't let you on because it can't phone home, but I doubt that will be an issue for most people out there.

So, its about people being naive and rebelling against a feature that, guess what, you have been supporting for the lat 8 years anyways everytime you turn on the Xbox360 and its signs you into the Live cloud.

Re:Get over it

[Anonymous Coward]

There are issues involving travel to remote areas, such as American suburbs in the Midwest. Internet access there is limited in speed and availability. Disclaimer: A friend of mine lives in northern Arkansas, we both loved Halo and talked about it a lot, but never could play together. I later found out that his lack of connectivity isn't particularly unusual for the area.

Re:Get over it

[Anonymous Coward]

People are mad that they can't share games and have Kinect always listening/watching. People are also annoyed when the inevitable day comes that the servers go down and you can't play your offline, single player game because of it...or just your unreliable internet provider fails you and you can't play your offline, single player game because of it.

But whatever, people will voice their opinion with their wallets.

Re:Get over it

[darkstar949]

First, one of the prized features of the Xbox platform is the Xbox Live services. You know, those services that match you up in games with friends and offers social and multimedia feature. YOU KNOW, the service that requires an internet connection.

This might be a fair point if we had a better idea of how many Xbox 360 owners never connect to the internet or are connected but only have the Silver accounts. There are a lot of people out there that only play single player games which means that most of the features that a Gold subscription account offers are completely useless.

Second, pick up ANY smartphone or tablet and realize these devices are constantly online. You may not need to be online to play, but the online services are there in the background making sure your Tweets and Facebook followers are aware of what you are up to and you are kept informed of the world.

True in the case of the smart phone but not so much in the case of the tablet even though the use case might be much smaller for those tablets that aren't online. However, not everyone has Twitter or Facebook running in the background all of the time or even wants people to know what they are doing. A lot of people don't care what their friends "Angry Birds" score is nor do they want to go out there and tell people about theirs. Also, there is a big jump from a smart phone or tablet that is online to a camera and microphone in your living room that is always online. There are major security implications that bear consideration. You can't put an attractive target like that in someones living room without hackers and other such folks wanting to crack it.

I know that in that RARE circumstance where there might be an internet outage or you take your Xbox One to the cottage and want to play some games on a rainy day might be a bummer if the game won't let you on because it can't phone home, but I doubt that will be an issue for most people out there.

Rare for some people, not so rare for others. But what's the point in buying an entertainment device if it can't entertain you when you actually want to be entertained. This is the whole reason that DVRs and time shifting shows became popular - the consumer of the entertainment wants to dictate when, where, and how they are entertained. The device itself should not be the one driving that decision.

Re:Get over it

[gstoddart]

First, one of the prized features of the Xbox platform is the Xbox Live services.

To many people, to many it isn't something we use.

Second, pick up ANY smartphone or tablet and realize these devices are constantly online.

Neither my tablet nor my smart phone have data plans. They get wifi turned on and used as needed. So your assertion that ANY of these devices is always connected is bullshit and anecdotal. I don't use Twitter, and I sure as hell wouldn't let Facebook onto my phone.

So, its about people being naive and rebelling against a feature that, guess what, you have been supporting for the lat 8 years anyways everytime you turn on the Xbox360 and its signs you into the Live cloud.

My current Xbox 360 doesn't connect to the network now, and a replacement one definitely won't be connecting to the internet.

There's not a single on-line feature about the Xbox I have any interest in. I don't play on-line games, and I never have. My XBox doesn't even know any information about my wifi and has no network cable running to it.

You may use these features, and you may actually believe that 99% of all people use them as well, but of the people I know who own Xboxes, about 80% of them don't use the networking feature, and aren't connected to XBox Live. So, for me and my friends, this is a major enough change that most of us probably aren't interested.

I'm more likely to buy a spare XBox 360 than this. What you consider rare and improbable is what I consider the normal use case for it. I'm sure Microsoft won't have their feelings hurt if I don't buy this, because I'm just one guy.

But that doesn't change the fact that I won't be buying this. Because contrary to what you believe, not everyone currently does connect to XBox Live or use the network features.

Re:Get over it

[Hatta]

First, one of the prized features of the Xbox platform is the Xbox Live services.

One of the prized features of the Xbox platform is playing games. Anything that gets in the way of this feature is a bad thing.

a feature that, guess what, you have been supporting for the lat 8 years anyways everytime you turn on the Xbox360 and its signs you into the Live cloud.

Has never happened, will never happen.

Re:Get over it

[Anonymous Coward]

You may use these features, and you may actually believe that 99% of all people use them as well, but of the people I know who own Xboxes, about 80% of them don't use the networking feature, and aren't connected to XBox Live.

While both of you may be right, if we look at the actual deviance of 16% compounded by the fact that 66% of that known 80% are actually real, that is not figmentary, and therefore only account for a, relatively speaking, small 23% of the total. Technically then, we only have a limited based of 55%, in real-world terms of course, that do not have such a feature nor need one. However, last year a poll was conducted showing that only 17% of the 82% of people that I personally know could even work the networking features without a diminishment in network performance ranging from 13% to a whopping 92%! To be fair to you, though, you did say "about 80%" which changes some of the numbers which results in an overall expected deviance here of 6%.

In the end, both of you are full of 100% shit with their numbers, but thanks for sharing anyway.

Re:Get over it

[gl4ss]

people wouldn't care if they had showed some "OMGWTFBBQ" gameplay on the announcement.

instead they got 30 minutes of a guy watching tv and skype on tv. like, wtf, my tv has that built in.

Re:Get over it

[sesshomaru]

There's no point in even comparing a smartphone to an Xbox. Conflating smartphones (still primarily used as phones, therefore always connected to network) with tablets (often WiFi only and connected only when an available network is within range) actually hurts your argument. (Xboxes are stationary so they don't have the same connectivity problems of Wifi tablets.)

No one I know uses Xbox Live, and of the 4 360 owners I know (myself and 3 others) I'm the only one who has it connected to the Internet. Two of the others are typical gamers who like shooting things, the other is a lady who bought it so she could use Kinect for... whatever it is one uses Kinect for. I think it's yoga or dancing or something... but I don't really know.

Now, the main reason those others never connected is because they don't have WiFi for their Xboxes and they don't have a hub near it due to the layout of their homes. Which brings us to our next difficulty and a fatal flaw in the current Microsoft strategy.

Microsoft, like many before them, has contempt for video games. They want a system that's an "everything box" and "used by the whole family." "Women are the new core, " is not just a pickup line for Microsoft executives, it signals a major change in how they are positioning the Xbox in the home.

Currently, my Xbox is hooked up in my office to a computer monitor with HDMI inputs. Why isn't it hooked to the big screen TV in the living room, one might ask? Because if it were, my wife would literally have killed me by now. Then she'd have all that blood to clean up off the carpet, not to mention disposing of the body. I love my wife, so I don't want to put her through that.

So, our set up now assures her that she will never have to miss a single episode of Law & Order: SVU, and I will never have to watch a single episode of Law & Order: SVU. Marital Bliss!

But it means I don't need to use the TV functions of the Xbox. If I want to watch Netflix, or Amazon, or HBOGo, I just switch the monitor over to my computer, although when I'm watching TV I prefer to do it with my wife (unless it's SVU or something about those non-Star Trek Cardassians.)

Now, if I do what Microsoft wants, and hook the Xbox One (which I'm not planning to ever get, but I said that about 360, so you never know) up in the living room, I will no longer be able to use it to play video games.

In which case, aren't I better off with a Web connected Blu Ray player, or a Roku Player?

Re:Get over it

[P-niiice]

I think the whining is natural, and what a lot of people want to see some games! Come E3 and i think the mood will be much better.

Re:Get over it

[Anonymous Coward]

The girlfriend and I celebrated the release of GTAIV by playing it in one of those cabins you can rent in state parks. All the Boy Scouts were mad jealous.

Well, fuck that ...

[gstoddart]

So the system is built to work even if your Internet connection goes down, but you still have to be connected at least once a day to use it, according to Harrison. We're not sure exactly what would happen if you don't connect once per day - and that timeframe could change - but this doesn't sound good for anyone who was hoping to use Xbox One without an Internet connection.

No, not happening. The last update I took on my current Xbox changed the screen the awful thing it is now, and introduced ads -- both in games and in the home screen. That's why my current Xbox isn't connected to the network and never will be again.

I will connect it to the network when and if I choose, but if it requires the ability to call home once/day, it's simply not happening.

Microsoft may have visions of this being my entertainment center of the future, but it won't be. And if it is going to require this ability to connect to the internet at will (and from the sounds of it when I even have it turned off due to this low power napping), then this is a non-starter for me.

Microsoft needs to clarify some of this, because the chances of me replacing my current Xbox 360 with something which demands it be able to access the internet when it chooses is pretty much zero.

I don't care about the TV integration, I don't care about the skype integration, I don't care about the web integration, I don't care about enhanced sports watching ... I care about one thing, single player games with no internet requirement. This isn't it.

Now I'm more likely to buy another XBox360 as a spare so I can keep playing the games I have now, but I won't be buying this.

Re:Well, fuck that ...

[drinkypoo]

Microsoft may have visions of this being my entertainment center of the future, but it won't be. And if it is going to require this ability to connect to the internet at will (and from the sounds of it when I even have it turned off due to this low power napping), then this is a non-starter for me.

I agree with you, but who the hell are you, statistically? And who the hell am I? We're just two people out of the masses of asses.

I don't care about the TV integration, I don't care about the skype integration, I don't care about the web integration, I don't care about enhanced sports watching ... I care about one thing, single player games with no internet requirement. This isn't it.

But that's the thing, most people are happy to suck down sports games with new rosters year by year, most people do want to watch TV. And Microsoft has seen how integration on cellphones drives use, and wants to bring the same concept to the console; I think it has a fair chance of being a good idea.

Now I'm more likely to buy another XBox360 as a spare so I can keep playing the games I have now, but I won't be buying this.

If you're serious about this, you need to take some steps now, like backing up and so on. Also, you should buy replacement optical drives for both your primary and backup console. That's what's most likely to go on a used machine which has demonstrated resistance to the RROD through simple longevity.

Re:Well, fuck that ...

[gstoddart]

I agree with you, but who the hell are you, statistically? And who the hell am I? We're just two people out of the masses of asses.

Statistically, you're right -- Microsoft has no reason whatsoever to care that I won't buy this, because I'm clearly not their target market. I'm a blip on the radar, and I'm well aware of that fact.

But that's the thing, most people are happy to suck down sports games with new rosters year by year, most people do want to watch TV. And Microsoft has seen how integration on cellphones drives use, and wants to bring the same concept to the console; I think it has a fair chance of being a good idea.

I agree it's a marketing force, but as someone who isn't obsessed with mobile phones and integrating them with every aspect of my life, I can tell you not everyone feels the same way. This is kind of like when marketing starts slapping "2.0" (and now "3.0" ) on everything and decides that everybody wants that thing in everything and we end up with the social media toilet or underpants which tweet you just before they start riding up. Some people want that, but not everyone, and foisting it on everyone just pisses people off.

For all of us who are casual gamers, who play exclusively single player games, and don't use any of these online features (and that's anywhere from a tiny fraction of user to a significant chunk, and I'm not sure anyone knows) ... what Microsoft is selling is something we don't want. But they better be awful certain before they decide people like me are an audience whose business they don't want -- though, from the sounds of it, it's a fait accompli.

But they're certainly free to decide that a segment of the gamer market is something they'll just ignore.

If you're serious about this, you need to take some steps now, like backing up and so on. Also, you should buy replacement optical drives for both your primary and backup console. That's what's most likely to go on a used machine which has demonstrated resistance to the RROD through simple longevity.

Well, I was thinking of just buying a new in-the-box retail unit and putting it on a shelf until this one dies. The actual save games, well, if I had to start over in Tiger Woods or my wife's dancing games for the Kinect, such is life. I don't have countless hours invested in save games (well, Skyrim) that I can't live without. I sure as hell haven't invested real money for in-game crap (something else I hate about modern games), so it's not like I'm out any additional investment.

If in the grand scheme of things I eventually find myself without a video game console ... well, it won't be the first time. But I definitely won't be finding myself with a game console which requires the ability to phone home when it pleases. Because there is no benefit to me in that scenario.

Re:Well, fuck that ...

[Anonymous Coward]

So the system is built to work even if your Internet connection goes down, but you still have to be connected at least once a day to use it, according to Harrison. We're not sure exactly what would happen if you don't connect once per day - and that timeframe could change - but this doesn't sound good for anyone who was hoping to use Xbox One without an Internet connection.

No, not happening. The last update I took on my current Xbox changed the screen the awful thing it is now, and introduced ads -- both in games and in the home screen. That's why my current Xbox isn't connected to the network and never will be again.

I will connect it to the network when and if I choose, but if it requires the ability to call home once/day, it's simply not happening.

Microsoft may have visions of this being my entertainment center of the future, but it won't be. And if it is going to require this ability to connect to the internet at will (and from the sounds of it when I even have it turned off due to this low power napping), then this is a non-starter for me.

Microsoft needs to clarify some of this, because the chances of me replacing my current Xbox 360 with something which demands it be able to access the internet when it chooses is pretty much zero.

I don't care about the TV integration, I don't care about the skype integration, I don't care about the web integration, I don't care about enhanced sports watching ... I care about one thing, single player games with no internet requirement. This isn't it.

Yeah, guys, me too. Just wanted to make sure everyone knows that this device does more than I want and I won't buy it. Just needed to make that clear. And if they do expect me to buy it they need to remove features that others want. I don't need them so nobody else should either.

Now I'm more likely to buy another XBox360 as a spare so I can keep playing the games I have now, but I won't be buying this.

That'll show em, sport!

Can you post this a couple more times so we're all on the same page with you? Don't want to miss anyone.

Re:Well, fuck that ...

[gstoddart]

Microsoft is free to put whatever features they want in their products. And I'm free to not buy them.

On my current XBox, I'm free to ignore the on-line features. It sounds like in the next version, I won't be. In which case I will just ignore the entire platform.

You can buy anything you want to and use it how you like, and I won't give a shit either. But I'm not providing Microsoft with a channel for ads and marketing data.

Re:Well, fuck that ...

[Anonymous Coward]

Save your saved games to USB stick...move them to new console. DONE!

Re:Well, fuck that ...

[Anonymous Coward]

wow they spam you with ads in game???

It's so disrespectful, I don't know why people tolerate it.

I haven't used consoles for gaming in many years, and It sounds like I didn't miss much.

It's almost like microsoft is trying to see how far they can erode people's standards.

Pay to play online, forced advertising. Maybe next is pay to play used games, and mandatory social network integration???

I honestly don't understand what the xbox offers that is so special, that people are willing to subject themselves to this.

Microsoft

[MemoryDragon]

"Where should I screw our customers today?"

Re:Microsoft

[Anonymous Coward]

Customer wallet is always a wonderfully leathery experience. Credit cards should be avoided, however.

Middleman

[EmperorOfCanada]

My guess is that Microsoft is Angry that other companies are making money off the Internet and that they plan on putting a stop to that. This box will probably do its damnedest to charge people to access Netflix, Hulu, and the like. I am also willing to bet that MS is looking at the catastrophic failure of the Wii U with relief as it won't be a competitor instead of the correct way which is in sheer terror that it foretells their own fate if they don't get this perfectly right.

I am not looking forward to the new XBOX that much. My timeline for buying one will be around 2015 and getting a used one. There is a long list of games for my existing XBOX to keep me amused for quite some time. I am looking forward to whatever Valve comes up with and every now and then amuse myself with something on one of my mobile devices.

And there lies the rub. MS probably thinks they are going to do battle with the PS4. I bet their charts don't really show how shattered the whole market is. Does MS realize that one of their competitors is Netflix? The gaming market is part of a larger market called entertainment. People have an entertainment budget and will spend it on different things of which console gaming is just one possible thing. This is something the movie and TV industries have learned the hard way when console gaming vastly reduced people's appetite/budget for network television and movies.

So as MS realizes that people want to do other things with their money and Televisions I suspect that MS will pathetically try to position their console in between people and what they want in order to collect some rent. I love when companies pull this sort of stunt because I always enjoy the show when fantasy crashes into and is steamrolled by reality.

Re:Middleman

[MrMickS]

And there lies the rub. MS probably thinks they are going to do battle with the PS4. I bet their charts don't really show how shattered the whole market is. Does MS realize that one of their competitors is Netflix? The gaming market is part of a larger market called entertainment. People have an entertainment budget and will spend it on different things of which console gaming is just one possible thing. This is something the movie and TV industries have learned the hard way when console gaming vastly reduced people's appetite/budget for network television and movies.

Erm ... I reckon Microsoft have a pretty good idea about Netflix usage, probably from the statistics they gather from people's use of their XBox 360. They'll have information about other TV related services. That's the whole point of the TV aspects of this device and the name the XBox One. Its built to be the one device that you use to access all content on your TV.

With the combination of a gaming system, a way to interact with broadcast TV, and a Windows 8 like OS for other content they should have all options covered. It provide a good deal for the entertainment companies too. If they can provide a way of delivering content to Windows 8, then they'll be able to deliver to the XBox One. Oh, and PCs, and tablets, and phones. Microsoft are well aware of the challenge facing this next console which is why they've gone with the approach they have and haven't stuck with a simple game playing console.

Re:Middleman

[UnknowingFool]

But their data only comes from their console. What about the millions that access Netflix with another device. I don't have an Xbox but I can get Netflix on my Blu-ray player, my computer, my tablet, my roommate's TV (mine is not Internet capable), my smart phone, etc. Even if I had an Xbox, I might not connect using it all the time.

Everything is an iPhone!

[Bacon Bits]

I seriously think the people running Microsoft have completely lost their mind. Every one of their core consumer software products -- other than MS Office -- has turned into a lame iOS clone. Exactly why do they they people buy a smartphone, a laptop, a desktop, a tablet or a gaming console? Do they seriously think people want the same capabilities everywhere? I understand the idea, and in theory is quite elegant. But it's just not reality. It's like a cafeteria that serves up salisbury steak, corn, fruit medley, and chocolate pudding with RC Cola to drink every day for all three meals. Allergic to corn? Too bad. Vegetarian? Too bad. Want diet soda? Too bad. Want breakfast? Too bad. This is what our product does, and it does it exactly this way, and you have no choice and no options. It does everything our marketing team says you want, so if you want something else you must be doing something wrong. Honestly that would work just fine for most people I know that didn't grow up playing on computers and with video games. It seems unbelievably dense to try that now as first gen computer kids are in their 40s.

I think the final nail for the XBox One is the BS for playing used games, since this also means that you can't borrow games from your friends (unless, get this, *you* sign in on your friend's console and play under *your* profile). Couple that with the fact that it seriously damages the secondary market -- who doesn't know someone who recycles games they're done with into credit for the next game -- and there's very little incentive to choose the XBox One over the PS4.

Get a Wii U

[postermmxvicom]

Get a Wii U, then you can play on the main TV and allow others to watch TV without interrupting your session.

Game sharing

[Anonymous Coward]

That means that if i have 2 xbox in separate location i cannot bring my games anymore . :(

i wont pay two time for the full games

Re:Game sharing

[MrMickS]

RTFA

Another piece of clarification around playing games at a friend’s house – should you choose to play your game at your friend’s house, there is no fee to play that game while you are signed in to your profile.

Hackers will crack this to hell and back

[Lumpy]

Microsoft is completely stupid by doing that. If I cant loan a friend the game, then I'll support all hackers from cracking their system and pirating the hell out of the games.

Microsoft deserves to lose big time for this, as well as all game devs that support such a platform.

Re:Hackers will crack this to hell and back

[Anonymous Coward]

Bullshit. The "hackers" didn't crack the 360. I still can't install XBMC on it. And they only marginally cracked the PS3.

Re:Hackers will crack this to hell and back

[iampiti]

Or you and your hacker friends, could, you know, just vote with your wallet and not buy this Xbox console.
You don't have a deity-given right to get a second-hand-games-friendly game console from Microsoft. Fortunately, there are alternatives, and buying them instead of the Xbox can harm Microsoft without any hacking.

Re:Hackers will crack this to hell and back

[Anonymous Coward]

Xbox 360 owner who never paid for a single game (new or used) here. I've played everything that caught my eye on this console without any trouble and with no money invested in hardware for playing the backups.

Leave XBMC for a real machine (not a console).

Re:Hackers will crack this to hell and back

[Anonymous Coward]

They cracked it enough to play copied games very early. It was only the "legal" things that you can do with a cracked system that they stopped.

Re:Hackers will crack this to hell and back

[Lumpy]

"Bullshit. The "hackers" didn't crack the 360."

Then you know absolutely nothing. the Xbox 360 has been hacked for a VERY long time. Try getting some education on the subject first before you act like you even know what an Xbox 360 is.

Re:Hackers will crack this to hell and back

[Lumpy]

"You don't have a deity-given right to get a second-hand-games"

Yes I do . it's called the right of first sale. and it was upheld by the US supreme court.

Dropped the ball again?

[garyoa1]

So we get a $500 voice activated remote for the tv. Cool.

Don't really want one.

On the other hand, for those gamers that detest the controller and only game on the PC... why on earth not install a keyboard option? Or are a few million more customers not worth it? I would think that even if the keyboard was proprietary they'd increase sales by a huge margin.

The most annoying thing on the planet is typing on a console/smart phone/tablet keyboard.

Re:Dropped the ball again?

[Agent0013]

Yeah, and the talk of switching away from the show or movie by reaching up and grabbing at the TV! I hope it is accurate enough to not switch away from a big football game when you throw your hands up into the air during an exciting play. And you have to be careful of what you say, or it might do something else also.You get your friends over to watch a really cool movie, but you have to inform them to all sit very still and don't say anything at all or the Xbox might change the channel on you. Nice!

Buying a videogame...

[Anonymous Coward]

Nowadays, buying a video game is a lot like buying real state, so many rules and regulations, do's and dont's.

Fuck that shit!!

10 to 20 yr cycle

[schlachter]

I read an interview from a MSFT exec yesterday where he said the XBOX One will carry XBOX through the next 10 to 20 yrs. Really? A 20 yr gaming cycle? 20 yrs ago I was playing my Super Nintendo. 10 yrs seems like a stretch for me but doable. I feel like the XBOX 360 is still in pretty strong shape 8 yrs in.

Re:10 to 20 yr cycle

[UnknowingFool]

I think that both Sony and MS need longer cycles as the last gen cost them a lot in terms of R&D and launch costs. Sony and MS could have launched a new console years ago but no one in the industry is challenging them with a newer upgraded console. Even Nintendo's Wii wasn't a huge cost as it didn't use the newest hardware.

X86 cpu? can it run any windows software?

[Joe_Dragon]

X86 cpu? can it run any windows software? Linux? Will it have an full file system with explorer?

IE with flash and other plug in's?

Re:X86 cpu? can it run any windows software?

[gl4ss]

X86 cpu? can it run any windows software? Linux? Will it have an full file system with explorer?

IE with flash and other plug in's?

no. no no.

you might get some metro apps. that's what the "snap" view was about.

Re:X86 cpu? can it run any windows software?

[killfixx]

Locked UEFI.

So, no.

Your best bet would be an official app from VMware or the like to allow for another OS to be installed as a VM...

Even then, that VM will have limited HW access...

Re:X86 cpu? can it run any windows software?

[cbhacking]

Well, Windows RT has IE with Flash (and that's not even x86, but is very locked down by default). IE is already present in Box 360s, and was mentioned several times for the Xbox One, so that will definitely be present (Flash is unknown). Arbitrary third-party plugins are almost guaranteed to be not present, though.

There is an NT kernel in there, as well as a whatever-they-call-the-Xbox-kernel for the gaming portions; you'll be able to switch back and forth between a gaming mode and a "runs stuff that runs on NT" mode very quickly... but I suspect that the "stuff that runs on NT" part is going to be extremely limited. Music, videos, web browsing, and probably not much more.

Linux is right out until the root of the system is cracked, I suspect. Too bad; it's a powerful x86 box.

"not willing to elaborate"...

[DriveDog]

Two strikes, at least—having to "check in" and not having a clear way to fairly trade used games. So why would anyone give them a dime? People don't buy cars that don't let you drive them where you want.

Re:"not willing to elaborate"...

[Anonymous Coward]

I noticed that also...a whole lot of evasions, half-truths and plain old bullshit.

Seems to be SOP for any major corporation lately.

So basically: No, except yes

[Anonymous Coward]

This basically means an XBox One won't work without an internet connection, since you wouldn't be able to play it in a place without one. In addition, it allows Microsoft to restrict the trade of used games at their whim. This puts the Xbox One in the "do not buy" pile along with the PS4 for me, as the practical implications of their DRM are largely the same.

Looks like Nintendo's the only console manufacturer getting my business this generation. Considering how horribly bass-ackwards Nintendo's online policies have always been, it's hard to believe this is the first generation in which that's a net benefit to us...

Re:So basically: No, except yes

[Anonymous Coward]

What the hell are you smoking? The PS4 doesn't require an internet connection.

So that the game can verify that you bought it

[tepples]

So why the hell should I have to be online at all at any time for Steam, since that's not what I'm buying to play, I'm buying a game to play.

It's so that the game you bought to play can verify that you did in fact buy it to play.

It's a second agreement I must agree with to a third party not producing the thing I wanted to buy that if I disagree with ensures I cannot play the thing I wanted to play and paid money for.

How is that any different from the government being a third party in every sale of goods?

If the game has multiplayer modes and single player, connecting to the internet for the multiplayer is reasoned, but needing to to play the single player mode is not.

Why would a 2-player game with two controllers like Street Fighter IV need an Internet connection while a 1-player game doesn't?

Still not good enough...

[Anonymous Coward]

It doesnt sound like I'll be spending any money on one of those.
Until they get cracked or something, at any rate...

Used games, borrowed games, etc

[DrEldarion]

In an interview with Kotaku, Phil Harrison, a MS VP, stated the following:

"The bits that are on that disc, you can give it to your friend and they can install it on an Xbox One," he said. "They would then have to purchase the right to play that game through Xbox Live."

"They would be paying the same price we paid, or less?" we asked.

"Letâ(TM)s assume itâ(TM)s a new game, so the answer is yes, it will be the same price," Harrison said."

Yes, that's right, you can't sell your used games because they'll end up costing the person you sell it to full price anyway. Want to lend a game to a friend? Sorry, full price. Want to bring it over to their house to play? Sorry, full price.

Disgusting.

Re:Used games, borrowed games, etc

[Anonymous Coward]

As I read it, you just log on with your Live account and install for you, already paid. Like Steam, it is tied to the account.

Re:Used games, borrowed games, etc

[CodingHero]

It also reads as if two different profiles on the same physical console can't both play a game without paying for it twice. So now if my wife and I want to play a game together each using our own profile or, god forbid, want to have our own separate single-player campaigns, we are stuck paying twice?

Re:Used games, borrowed games, etc

[magamiako1]

This isn't any different than the way Steam works right now...

Re:Used games, borrowed games, etc

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, that's right, you can't sell your used games because they'll end up costing the person you sell it to full price anyway. Want to lend a game to a friend? Sorry, full price. Want to bring it over to their house to play? Sorry, full price.

Disgusting.

That's just speculation. Microsoft has not mentioned how much it will cost to install elsewhere. Please stop spreading lies and FUD, it makes you look like a Sony zealot or 12 year old child. The reality is none of us know the finer details until E3.

Re:Used games, borrowed games, etc

[DrEldarion]

I'm sorry, spreading lies and FUD? This is a direct quote from a Microsoft VP. Read it again, he's explicitly saying that if you try to give your friend your game disc, they'll have to pay for it again at full price.

Re:Used games, borrowed games, etc

[BobSutan]

You beat me to it. This is exactly like Steam in that games will now be tied to the account. Many don't realize this has been the case for quite some time, such as with downloaded content (eg Minecraft). You buy the disk, install the game to your account, activate it, then you're good to go. I don't see a problem with this and have accepted this as reality years ago when Steam pioneered this model. The only difference is that with consoles people are accustomed to having a physical copy. Meh, PC gamers used to be the same way but we adjusted. In a few years once people's perceptions have adapted to the new model they'll be extolling it's virtues, SO LONG AS THE GAMES FOLLOW THEM FROM PLATFORM TO PLATFORM. Those games tied to your account better still be playable 20 years from now, you hear me Microsoft?

Re:Used games, borrowed games, etc

[CodingHero]

This isn't any different than the way Steam works right now...

I never said I agree with how Steam does it. In some ways, this is different from Steam (which is currently a primarily PC-based service) in a cultural way.

For the sake of argument let's only focus on activities done within the bounds of the law. In the console world part of the common culture is sharing, trading, and re-selling games. Not everyone does it but it's commonplace. (Sure, it happens with PC games (maybe not so much reselling) but my impression is that it's never been nearly as common as with consoles.) Moreover, console gaming has always been a place where two or more people can sit in front of the same machine to play together, something that PC games rarely do. Does this new model mean that when my friends come over to play Rock Band or Mario Kart they all have to ante up to the game publishers first?

It's more as if the console manufacturers and publishers are trying to change console gaming culture in the name of profit. This is certainly great for their bottom line in theory, but much of the console community is understandably upset.

Re:Used games, borrowed games, etc

[Anonymous Coward]

Your just flat out wrong by this. MS has already corrected this thought process.... Each game has an authorization code you can give to a friend or sell / trade online. Which is actually a much easier and efficient way to give / trade / sell used games. They dont even need your disk anymore.

Re:Used games, borrowed games, etc

[Anonymous Coward]

This has already been corrected and isnt the case. read up some more! multiple consoles same house are ok.

Re:Used games, borrowed games, etc

[Anonymous Coward]

This is wrong. you can sell your authorization code. without the user paying full price for the game.

Re:Used games, borrowed games, etc

[ildon]

They specifically said that the licensing system would work similarly to the current XBLA system. If accurate, what this means is that when you install a game for the first time on a console, it is tied both to that console and that profile. So any profile on that first install console can play it, even a profile that did not purchase it, but only on that piece of hardware, and the purchasing profile can play it on any machine. If it's a same-screen multiplayer game, when I'm playing it at my friend's house using my profile, he can even earn achievements and save game progress on his profile as long as he's player 2/3/4 and I'm player 1. But when I take my profile home or sign out of my profile, he no longer has access to that game. If he comes over to my house and brings his profile and plays it on my console, he has full access to the game as if he were its owner.

Basically, disc games are just being moved to the existing XBLA game licensing model that already exists.

This Scenario

[Anonymous Coward]

Does this smell like a BOYCOTT or what? What a bunch of crap.

Gamestop already rip off customers

[nhat11]

I sell a game to them for $10 while they sell it back for $40. Makes sense they're in business but its not even a 50% cut for the customer. If MS gives the user at least 70% or higher, that'll be good.

Re:Gamestop already rip off customers

[genghisjahn]

Sell the game yourself, there are a number of ways to do it. If you don't like going through the process of collecting payment, packaging the game and shipping it yourself, well, that's what you are paying GameStop for, not having to deal with the aggravation.

Reat the TOS.

[Anonymous Coward]

According to that, you are NOT allowed multiple accounts and if you're found, they can disable ALL identified accounts for breech of TOS.

Damn!

[Anonymous Coward]

The next thing you know... is that not only does this thing actually indeed require a constant internet connection, but the damned thing also needs to be plugged into a power outlet to supply it electricity too!

Not as much as you would think

[Anonymous Coward]

There are some killer DRM free games coming out for PC these days. Not from the big shops necessarily but from a lot of little guys.

Even on the DRM games, (and I can't believe I'm saying this) the prices are cheap enough to justify not being able to resell it.

It's that there's no other option.

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, there's the option of "not buying one", but then if you say that, you're as outlandish and alien (and moreover plain old DEAD WRONG!) for not buying it.

"You'll miss out on the cool new games!!!"
"You're on your own!"
"Can I get you some tinfoil for your hat?"
"You anticapitalist hippy econazi lunatic!!!"
And just plain old "You're just trolling"

Like freedom of speech, the freedom to "vote with your wallet" is only acceptable if you're not inconveniencing them or making choices they wouldn't agree with.

It may be a bit early...

[Anonymous Coward]

But I wonder when the "One Red Ring to rule them all..." meme will fire up?

My whole family can't be in the same room then

[Anonymous Coward]

Presumably this will be used for DRM on movies, not letting more than 4 people watch at a time or whatever it is?

Zune? Anyone?

[BravoZuluM]

How quickly people forget the past. Buy music for your Zune? Microsoft changes their business model and your device becomes a brick. Why on earth would I want to buy a device that ties me permanently to a company. The xBox 360 is good enough for me and when it no longer is, I'll find another solution. Hopefully by that time, a embedded Linux monster is developed.

For those not in the know...

[DarthVain]

http://www.xkcd.com/1215/ :)

re: GameStop, etc.

[King_TJ]

That's definitely the buzz going around the net.... That between Sony and Microsoft both moving to digital game downloads and no physical optical media to buy anymore, it will be the end of the used game shops.

Of course, I can see something else happening too.... There's a pretty massive collection of existing, used titles out there, just like there are plenty of used music CDs in circulation (even if no more were produced starting today).

It may turn out that the interest in "vintage" consoles and games increases, and rather like antique shops, the used game shops stick around indefinitely. (I could see a pretty good market developing for refurbishing and repairing older consoles too. Maybe each GameStop would have a tech. working full-time in the back room so you could drop off that PS3 or XBox 360 for service work, ready to pick back up the next afternoon?)

Already, the web sites like ArsTechnica who got previews of the new PS4 commented that the graphics were really only incrementally better than what we see now. We've reached a point where most game titles look "good enough" with today's hardware. It's tough to really amaze people to the point the audio/visual portion motivates them to spend hundreds and start over collecting new game titles. (I think to pull that off, you'd need a console that made all the games truly look just like live video/movie footage. Get it to where the stuff we're used to seeing as opening or cut scenes is actually the entire game. Until then? Nah, Microsoft has to sell the new console based on gimmicks like voice commands.)

Insightful

[DarthVain]

Possibly one of the more insightful posts I have seen in awhile, but I guess some find it interesting.

This is totally what is going through their collective minds, bet on it. I wonder what companies like EB Games think of things like this. May be some monopoly court cases in the future for Microsoft yet again perhaps.

Anyway I will take the obvious step further and say not only will this be a market place transaction (whereby EVERY transaction Microsoft makes a substantial cut, which would further reduce the number of transactions increasing new game sales), but in addition these will not be monetary but rather "Microsoft Points". Which of course you can ONLY spend on more online Microsoft stuff. I believe that is what you call WIN-WIN. It will also likely increase the liquidity (to borrow an investment phrase) of "Points" making them more useful. More developers will see opportunistic and produce more for availability, and every single transaction MS will be making a percentage.

If they can get away with it, it is genius really (evil genius perhaps). Then again, if they offer up (at least initially to soften the blow) significant incentives to users they will accept it. Then when it becomes entrenched, it is just how things are done now, and you milk it for profits.

Eh... people pick their battles too

[King_TJ]

Not saying I totally disagree with you, but there's SO much going on by way of invading privacy and data-mining people's info, it's impossible to keep up with all of it. People become numb to it after so long. We're at the point now where people only get concerned when they see a very serious and obvious threat. (EG. Word comes out that everyone you know who uses a credit card to buy groceries from a certain store winds up with mysterious charges on their card a month or two later.)

The fact that Skype probably leaks your conversations to law enforcement officials on demand? Disturbing -- yet ultimately kind of a thing when you consider Skype is free to use (at least for a pure Skype to Skype call) and totally optional to use in the first place. I mean, my workplace isn't going to stop taking advantage of it as a free solution to video teleconferencing two meeting rooms in different cities together over it. (Not unless we start holding meetings about illegal operations or something,anyway!) It provides real cost savings and solves a real problem for us, and there's no immediate reason that we'd be worried that law enforcement would WANT to listen in to what we're saying on those calls.

XBox 1? Probably more of the same. People aren't going to have a big issue with it needing "always on" Internet connections if that's what they're already paying for at home anyway with their broadband. You worried the XBox might reveal something it's not supposed to? Unplug it during that time. Whatever....

Re: GameStop, etc.

[gorzek]

Most of GameStop's profits come from used game sales. They make next to no profit on new games--that money goes almost wholly to the publisher. Reselling used games, especially recent ones, permits much higher profits. A new game is $60. While GameStop doesn't publish their trade-in prices, from what I can tell they pay $20 or less for all used games, and most games are going to pull in $10 or less. So, that $60 game you sold back to GameStop for (generously) $20, they will resell for $55. That's a quick and easy $35 profit for them.

If they are left only selling used games for the PS3/360 on back, you're talking much less profit per game. On top of that, demand for those games is going to diminish as the new generation takes off (assuming it does.) This is just not a viable business model that will promote growth of the bottom line.

This is not really in defense of GameStop, as making console games work more like PC games was pretty much inevitable, I'm just saying a retail gaming store like GameStop wouldn't be able to survive by changing into a "vintage" shop. That aims it at a totally different--much smaller--clientele. From a budget standpoint, it makes very little sense. No doubt GS is scrambling to figure out what to do once the used game gravy train stops.

Big XBOX Brother

[Anonymous Coward]

Connection, camera, mic always on, and communications centralised to ease eave dropping...

Listen to what wasnt said.

[Anonymous Coward]

They were extremely vague on the actual gaming hardware for a reason - if they had something that was the same power or more as their competitor (the PS4) they would have made sure everyone knew about it.

Their aim isnt a gaming console, its an all-in-one entertainment center that also happens to play games. Cable integration, NFL/Sports partnerships, exclusive TV shows, etc, are all aimed at capturing average joe.

From a business point of view it may be very successful.

Always Listening

[GPTurismo]

I am more concerned about their concept of Kinect 2 will be always listening. Wonder what privacy concerns we're now going to have to have with this. Might make the PSN getting hacked look like Christmas.

The game knows I have the game and the decrypt key

[Anonymous Coward]

What else does it need to do? Ask the retailler if I have the receipt?

Re: GameStop, etc.

[silentbrad]

Most of GameStop's profits come from used game sales. They make next to no profit on new games--that money goes almost wholly to the publisher.

That's what I thought, too. Then I read this today:

Interestingly, [GameStop president Tony] Bartel revealed that 70 per cent of GameStop's $1 billion market sales comes from the sale of new games rather than pre-owned ones.

Sounds like the XBox 360 becomes the "UPGRADE"

[Vitriol Angst]

True story; we just went into a used computer place to look at what we could pick up in a slightly used machine. The salesman said; "And if this were new, you'd have to have Windows 8." I mentioned that Microsoft did have an update -- but we agreed; "It still forced Metro on people."

So the XBox One is going to raise the price of used XBox 360s? I for one, welcome the new evil overlord!

XBox One sounds like Windows 8...

[Vitriol Angst]

True story; we just went into a used computer place to look at what we could pick up in a slightly used machine. The salesman said; "And if this were new, you'd have to have Windows 8." I mentioned that Microsoft did have an update -- but we agreed; "It still forced Metro on people."

The UPGRADE for many would be a box that doesn't suddenly stop working. Of course, I currently have Xbox Gold and the networking on the XBox SUCKS. It spends as much time "searching for server" as it does playing a multiplayer. Now they want to add another layer of complexity without guaranteeing the QOS on their current platform. Bravo. *slow clap*

So the XBox One is going to raise the price of used XBox 360s? I for one, welcome the new evil overlord!

Sooo...

[Kartu]

Sounds like you won't be able to just put a disk in, and play, without Allmighty Microsoft's Xbox Server's blessing.
I hope Sony doesn't follow the suit...

Re: GameStop, etc.

[gorzek]

That's revenue, not profit. Last I heard, it was about a 50/50 split in terms of revenue but I guess it favors new games by 20% now. You have to dig into their numbers a bit to find the net revenue, which is dramatically higher for used games (for obvious reasons.)

vote with your wallet

[Anonymous Coward]

I have not purchased a game console since the PS2 and N64 days. And I do not plan to purchase any new ones for the foreseeable future due to the current BS in the gaming industry. I sure hope there's another game console crash they bring great consoles back like the NES, PS1, SNES.

Reasons not to buy thew new game consoles:
1) internet always on requirement
2) needs to dial home
3) you don't own the game, it is only a license
4) you cannot sell the game without having to go through a bunch of hoops. Often times because it's a license and not ownership. Easier to go through a divorce
5) call me paranoid, but the cameras are always watching you
6) ads and more ads, even MOAR ads
7) more sophisticated games require more control which are much better on PC platforms.
8) web browsing is a bitch and a downright chore!

Reason to buy a new game console:
1) ........geee, I'm drawing a blank

I welcome this news....

[who_stole_my_kidneys]

This means they people who are way more apt then me will try even harder to hack the Xbox One and turn it into something every one actually wants.

Wrong Approach.

[Anonymous Coward]

The hackers should form a global union and all promise to NEVER buy one and NEVER hack one.

And tell everyone to just skip it completely. Don't buy it, don't play it, nothing.

Let the stupid thing die on the store shelves.

Anything to stop blockbuster from.

[ralphaostrander]

Renting them and gamestop from selling used. PC for me and not MS even if that means no or few games. If everyone followed the game makers would have to follow.

Jeni Cam

[Anonymous Coward]

Everywhere, for free....

WTF?

[Anonymous Coward]

The HALO tv series is a joke. Like BattleStar Galactica 1980 level of joke.

Oh no you didn't. It's on now!

My nephew is not happy with it

[Anonymous Coward]

I can turn on my old CBS Colecovision and show it to my nephew, and I can make him play with my old gameboy and even my dreamcast.
But no luck with this new Xbox: I guess 15 years from now they are moving to something else and this xbox will be just a brick.
They better hope that someone hack the system fast.

Oh and thank you for screwing up the videgame console in order to sell me you multimedia trojan horse, like Windows 8 and its tablet interface.
You want to sell me games as a service? Fine: I got a PC for that, no need for an other x86 box in the house.

Awesome move

[Anonymous Coward]

I've had Internet since the 90s, and can't really imagine not having it. However, there are still people out there without Internet access. For instance, two of my younger brother in laws are gamers, but they don't have Internet at home. They get by using their phones for Facebook and browsing. As more people use tablets and smart phones, there may be less of a reason to have Internet at home. So basically people like this won't be able to use the Xbox One. These are most likely younger people that would make up the typical gamer market.

I'm older and can't imagine not having Internet at home. However, I remember getting a 360 5 or 6 years ago and Xbox Live being down and then spotty for a good month. It was bad enough they gave everyone a free game as an apology. I'm not going to buy a console that may or may not work depending on if my Internet or their service is unavailable. There are plenty of old games I haven't played that I can go back and play. I never played Earthbound and plan on starting it soon. My kids are young enough that they don't remember the consoles older than this generation. This means they have a huge catalog of games to choose to play from.

I was talking to someone yesterday and they asked what does the Xbox One mean to us for games. I said they will probably look marginally better. They are too focused on doing everything but making a gaming console. I'm going to stick with my Wii U for this generation.

Re: GameStop, etc.

[mcmonkey]

Most of GameStop's profits come from used game sales. They make next to no profit on new games--that money goes almost wholly to the publisher. Reselling used games, especially recent ones, permits much higher profits. A new game is $60. While GameStop doesn't publish their trade-in prices, from what I can tell they pay $20 or less for all used games, and most games are going to pull in $10 or less. So, that $60 game you sold back to GameStop for (generously) $20, they will resell for $55. That's a quick and easy $35 profit for them.

Who buys a used game when a new game is less than 10% more? I often buy used (games, books, cars, houses), but I expect a discount for picking up someone else's cast off--more in the range of 30 to 40%, at least.

Yes, it's a receipt

[tepples]

The game knows I have the game and the decrypt key

But it doesn't know that you obtained the game and the decrypt key legitimately.

What else does it need to do? Ask the retailler if I have the receipt?

Yes. For example, the Ouya platform implements a similar policy to Steam and Google Play Licensing, and it actually refers to this data as a "receipt".

PSX + Dreamcast = Failure

[Anonymous Coward]

M$ has made a fabulous miscalculation with the XBOX ONE !

No need to re-iterate the details as the title says it all.

Dear Me. What a Slow Rowling Failure over the next 6 months (holiday season !).

The 'Games Division' is M$ bread and butter, err, was !

No more after this failure de jour for Fuhrer Balmer.

And M$ stock is on a rocket to ... Where ? ... down in a few days just when the bubbly hits the Balmer brain.

Have they even looked at EA's recent debacle?

[vision33r]

The recent Simcity requiring online DRM check backfired when their system could not keep up with the load caused major outages and non-MMORPG gamers are not used outages.

Jailbreak

[Anonymous Coward]

I think it will be jailbreaked in two weeks of release, the break will be patched over, then a new one will show up, repeat ad nauseum.

Re: GameStop, etc.

[King_TJ]

I don't really think the used games are generally only getting discounted by 10%? I've bought a number of used games at GameStop over the years, and typically, I pick them up for no more than $15-35 each. They're also typically titles I'm specifically seeking (because, for example, one of our kids is asking for it), and they're not even readily available on the new market anymore. (Might still be in production, but most retail stores don't bother to stock it on their shelves anymore due to waning interest.)

well there goes all the joy out the window.

[Anonymous Coward]

Well.... there went all my enthusiasm out of the window. I will wait for the dust to settle before i throw any money at this thing. I can already picture this thing being worst than any of E.A. stunts.

Re:Zune? Anyone?

[Anonymous Coward]

my ouya has shipped

yes

[sonnhanippon]

good dch v sn: http://www.sonnhanippon.com/

disc check for used games, fee=no-cd

[Anonymous Coward]

seems the most obvious solution is to require the disc be inserted for used games.

brandnew copies will register with console and human and run without needing the disc

You guys wont believe this but I got a Microsoft p

[Anonymous Coward]

You guys wont believe this but I got a Microsoft points card code and it redeemed just fine! Awesomeness!!!! Got it at freemspointsforever com