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Microsoft's Open Invitation To Valve, Nintendo and Others To Join Xbox One and PC Crossplay (vg247.com)
Microsoft has said it's ready to have a "conversation" with any development team that wants to feature crossplay support on consoles and PC. From a report: Mike Ybarra, vice president of Xbox, told VG247 that it's happy to talk to the likes of Valve and Nintendo when it comes to getting multiplayer games working across multiple platforms, not just between Xbox One and Windows. "It's more about gamer choice, more about making an IP on our platform last longer. I don't care about where they play, I just want people to have fun playing games because that's just better for the industry," said Ybarra. "The demands of consumers and developers have changed," he continued. "People are like, 'we want all of our gamers in one multiplayer pool together, playing.' "We totally agree with that. If any developer wants to have that conversation... Valve is right down the street from us, Nintendo is too -- they're like a block from us. We're having these discussions as developers come up, and we're completely open to that."
I read that as
Microsoft's Open Invitation To Valve, Nintendo and Others To Join Xbox One and PC Cosplay
And wondered what the hell sorts of things are going on in MS these days.
I am Slashdot. Are you Slashdot as well?
At least in case of Valve/PC, any crossplay will quickly turn into massacre. For example, in FPS keyboard and mouse players of moderate skill would dominate competition-level console players. The same would hold in RTS or any other game where skill element revolves around player control.
This would be the embrace phase...
http://www.roughlydrafted.com/...
You know once they're at 75%+ marketshare, they'll change their tune...
-=Lothsahn=-
This won't work for many of the most popular types of games, including FPS. WASD + mouse input will always outperform dual joysticks.
Also, I'll be damned, as a PC player, that I want to hear chatter from 12 year old kids rattling on about my mother's vagina. Because of the price point of PC systems, there seems to just be far fewer twits like that.
Inviting everyone to come join them in a walled garden Microsoft itself controls. It's not like their online service wasn't available to paid subscribers only, the low-level protocols undocumented and proprietary.
Actually, I do.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Where do I sign up?
You are welcome on my lawn.
If I were Sony and Valve, I'd say "We'll consider it as soon as you release Halo for the PC and PlayStation." :)
MS is inviting all these people to do MS's work for free, and for MS's benefit. What an honor.
I'm looking forward to kick some console peasant ass with my keyboard and mouse while they struggle with their gamepads. Muwhahaahha. On a serious note, I'm happy about this, more players in games overall. The more we are in games the more fun we have...and less waiting for a match.
cartwheeling in from stage left and stage right, big smiles and pom poms, kicking their legs out like dancers, shaking their stuff screaming EMBRACE, EXTEND, EXTINGUISH!
My ism, it's full of beliefs.
Sounds like the embrace phase of "Embrace, Extend, Extinguish". Microsoft must think people have short memories.
Maybe they'll allow Steam on Xbox... (says with a straight face)
Exactly what I came here to post.
Do this if you want to see console FPS players get murdered by keyboard + mouse
Wait... do the FPS players get murdered, or just their characters?
"That's the way to do it" - Punch
It's a trap!
While I agree with MS that full cross-platform play should be a thing, lets be clear about MS's intentions. They're loosing badly to Sony on console sales, and well, Windows Store is a tiny spec compared to Steam. They weren't making any noise about this last generation when they were much closer (maybe even leading, I haven't kept up with the numbers) in market share.
Kinda like Internet Explorer was just fine as was when it had the market share, but once it started getting dumped by people MS realized that maybe web standards/interoperability were a "thing they should do".
They also know full well that this would be much harder for Sony to pull off than it is for them as Xbox & Win10 share quite a bit. Maybe Valve can ask MS to provide support for all this (and Direct X 12) for older version of Windows before they come on-board.
"Mike Ybarra, vice president of Xbox, told VG247 that it's happy to talk to the likes of Valve and Nintendo when it comes to getting multiplayer games working across multiple platforms, not just between Xbox One and Windows."
ELWOOD: What kind of music do you usually have here?
CLAIRE: Oh, we have both kinds -- country and western.
For those who are worried (or gloating) about control equality, keyboard and mouse control will soon be available for the Xbox.
MS was asked many times to do cross platform networking, FFXI (MS refused, Sony did it square skipped MS with FFXIV), Borderlands 2, Steam w/Portal 2 on 360 (MS refused, Sony did it on PS3)
MS gave this reasoning via Kotaku: "Here's a Microsoft spokesperson saying "no," while promoting how awesome the Xbox 360's online service is: "Xbox Live delivers the best entertainment experience unmatched by anyone else, with 35 million actively engaged members. We have a high level of expectation for our game developers to ensure that all Live experiences remain top notch. Because we can't guarantee this level of quality, or control the player experience on other consoles or gaming networks, we currently do not open our network to games that allow this cross-over capability.""
Now that they need players on Xbox Live and Windows Store and are having trouble making inroads in those areas, they're panhandling.
Twinstiq, game news
Make it so that windows store is not needed or get rid of the sand boxing so that game can do the same things that can be done with steam.
Main things are
workshop
SLI and Crossfire (windows store seems to have limited support for it)
disable VSync
non borderless fullscreen modes like ( Exclusive Fullscreen)
mod's
user maps
mouse / keyboard custom bind software
why need to take control of the folder as admin to mod? steam games are not forced to setup.
games are forced to supports cloud saves??
"I don't care about where they play, I just want people to have fun playing games because that's just better for the industry,"
sounds like it ought to mean
"We'll still support future Minecraft releases on Mac, Linux, and older Windows versions after all; sorry about the confusion at E3!"
but I'm guessing it actually means
"I'm lying. I'm lying right now. Isn't it fun that I can lie to your face, and you can't even call me on it or I'll just give someone else the "story"? Now type my lies for me, stenographer. Maybe tell your kids to take a few classes in economics rather than journalism, huh?"
There's no reason they can't put a macro editor and keyboard support into a console version.
Other than that console games are self-contained. This means each studio would have to design a macro editor for each game, with only the capability that the studio can imagine, and each publisher and Microsoft would have to sign off on each macro editor. On a less closed platform such as Windows Home or Pro, a third party can develop a macro editor and make it available to several games. To put it another way: It's like iOS before iOS 8 introduced support for third-party floating keyboard apps.
what's to stop logitech (or whoever) from making a keyboard / mouse that allows programmable functions?
Microsoft would deny Logitech use of the authentication chip required to get the Xbox One console to recognize a controller. Both Xbox One and Xbox 360 use a lockout chip to reject unauthorized controllers.
They refused with FFXI, FFXIV, Borderlands 2, Steam when Valve were trying to get Portal 2 cross platform multiplayer/voice etc. Sony accepted by the way.
Of course now lagging behind online with Xbox and Windows Store they are shamelessly doing a reversal...
Here's a classic quote from back in the day, the same kind of thing they're chiding others for saying currently, via Kotaku:
"Here's a Microsoft spokesperson saying "no," while promoting how awesome the Xbox 360's online service is: "Xbox Live delivers the best entertainment experience unmatched by anyone else, with 35 million actively engaged members. We have a high level of expectation for our game developers to ensure that all Live experiences remain top notch. Because we can't guarantee this level of quality, or control the player experience on other consoles or gaming networks, we currently do not open our network to games that allow this cross-over capability.""
Twinstiq, game news
All I can say is...Hypocrites!
"A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky dangerous animals and you know it." - K
So wait, in a story about Microsoft trying to tear down the walls between consoles and PC and encourage cross-play... you say game designers should be able to allow cross-play (or not) if they so choose. Then, you say Microsoft pushing to make that a reality doesn't help that?
I think, then, that you should never look at what Sony is doing. Your head might explode.
APK quotes people (including myself) without context and should not be trusted. Just thought you should know.
In your case, the macro functionality is built into the controller, not the game or the operating system. But I thought the Xbox 360 and Xbox One consoles used a cryptographic challenge and response to ensure that only controllers approved by Microsoft can be used with Xbox games, specifically to avoid macros in the controller. How does the X-Arcade Xbox One adapter work around this?
Hey that's not a bad idea! Here's a better one: how about you make crossplay of those windows 10 only games with older versions of YOUR operating system. Take your time, I'll wait. If anything Steam is the platform I think should be the one to connect all these platforms. Not some WinStore.
Sorry for posting this twice :( I thought there was a problem with the first and didn't see it come up when I refreshed. Apologies.
Twinstiq, game news
I think it's because the main consoles are crippled by design to only allow games to connect to the paid-for gaming network, interaction with which is controlled by the console manufacturer.
So as a game developer you can either work within their constraints or miss out entirely on sales to that platform. Cross-platform play isn't going to happen in either instance so you're not helping your customers at all by restricting your market, and there are strong financial incentives to avoid being the game that challenges the hegemony of the console companies.
That makes no sense... Cross platform means you can play on your Playstation WITH people on XBox, so you don't have to buy the platform you don't want.
This is *Microsoft* we're talking about.
You can bet that "Crossplay" will practically implemented as games released for other platform being also able to log-in onto microsoft's accounts (XBLive or whatever it's actually called).
Meaning that now even gamers owning only Nintendo Switch and PlayStation4 will need to sign into XBLive and pay monthly fee (or get their public data sold - I actually didn't bother to check what is Microsoft revenue model) if they want to be able to play these Crossplay games.
Meaning that Microsoft has extended their revenue stream from "only their XBox One owners" to "absolutely all on-line player of their multiplayer game, no matter what console they use".
I.e.: bring more people into their (paid) walled garden.
---
Otherwise it won't make any sense economically :
the whole point of gaming console is to lock players into walled gardens where they can be milked for their money.
If suddenly the gamer don't need anything from microsoft to enjoy online multiplayer, Microsoft would be actually losing arguments for their lock-in and thus losing revenue stream from potential gamer (who decide to play games on the non-Microsoft consoles using a 3rd party network)
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That of course won't prevent game developers from making game that attempt to organise multiplayer by going through external 3rd party server not owned by any console manufacturer (e.g.: all the ports of Quake that have ever popped-up on networked consoles) (except that some didn't have mass storage to download newer content onto, so some ports could only play using the default maps. e.d.: Quake 3 on DreamCast vs PC).
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
what's to stop logitech (or whoever) from making a keyboard / mouse that allows programmable functions?
Answer: Hardware cost.
Nearly* all modern keyboard with "programmable macros" are actually plain fucking stupid bland keyboard with a few extra hardware keys,
and it's the driver that came on the CD which was packed with it that installs a Windows-only software on the PC that handles the macros.
i.e.:
plug the exact same keyboard on Linux (or any console which supports USB keyboards),
and you won't get your recorded macros, you'll simply get a "extended key 145 pressed" signal on your OS.
Now nothing prevents you from using a keybinding system to do macros on *that* platform (there are certainly key macros software for GNU/Linux and Android).
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* : But I've actually have seen keyboard with HW macros.
The most complicated I've ever seens was a macro board from Saitek that was able to read barcodes printed on the back of the paper keyboard overlay and automatically upload new macro settings.
That one would work with any console accepting its PS/2 connector (e.g.: DreamCast) or a PS2-to-USB converter box (e.g.: a Wii with the updated firmware supporting USB keyboards)
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
Do you have your Union Card?
It happens on PC where gamepads and M/K are matched up, people of varying frame rates, ping times, abilities, matchmaking seems to work fine. This is not even a problem.
Twinstiq, game news
What does happen if you look at them in the eyes? They blink?
Maybe they'll allow Steam on Xbox... (says with a straight face)
Why would anyone with a closed environment with a storefront allow a competitor in? Would Valve let anyone open a competing store in Steam? Blizzard in Battle.net? EA in Origin? Sony in the PlayStation store? Nope.
What does happen if you look at them in the eyes? They blink?
As long as they aren't crossplaying Weeping Angels, then it may be safe?
Jumpstart the tartan drive.
I am a touch typist, and since the Duke Nukem 3D days of the 1990s, I have always programmed my left hand keys the same:
F - Forward
D - Backward
S - Crouch
A - Jump
G - Use
Y - HUD/Map/whatever
T - Use 2 (for whatever needed)
R - Reload (or other for non-gun and run)
E - Throw grenade or similar
W - Strafe right
Q - Strafe left
Tab - Run
Right hand is on the mouse, with the left button firing, right button alt-fire, and wheel for selecting weapons. I also map the number keys on the main keyboard for weapon switches as necessary.
Always worked like a charm for me and keeps my touch typing skills intact.
HBI's Law: Frequency of calling others Nazis is directly correlated with the likelihood of the accuser being Communist.
It is not as ridiculous as it sounds, and the recent success of Pokemon Go showed it. For games like Mario Kart, there is no reason not to make it available on Android. Yes, not on Xbox as the public is not the right one. There can be some games tied to the console controllers but Mario Kart and such ... totally playable on a phone, tablet, or android TV. They're wasting huge amounts of money not doing so.