The potential to cost more than twice as much as the alternatives.
Probably because it's twice as powerful and offers features that the 360 especially, touts as "add-ons" (If you add up the add-ons the price becomes comparable).
The potential to find new and creative ways to abuse customers.
You blame the hardware company instead of the software company that used a feature badly, bravo on your ability to shift blame.
The potential to lock buyers into Yet Another Stupid Sony Format.
How so? It only locks developers into this format for PS3 games, which happens to offer the same major features as HD-DVD, oh and it gives twice the storage space. Whose fault is it that some idiots don't take advantage of it? 360 doesn't even have the HD-DVD built in, it's an "add-on".
I agree that the PS3 is not being developed correctly on the software front, thats impossible to argue against at this point. But as a piece of hardware it's a solid machine that doesn't have a habit of dying on you, like some other console I know.
I've been making your point for years among friends and family, and many of them still to this day do not get it. And to make things worse the media makes it out that the popular vote is the deciding factor. At the same time, I do not know if I can trust the general populace to select our leader anymore then the electoral college, though I think I give them a small edge. Democracy/Republic itself in my general opinion is a horribly inefficient and incredibly risky form of government. However, it's own problems (not to mention we still have a strong Judicial branch) tend to keep it in check.
Anyways, after working in what is, to some degree, a service industry I've learned a very important lesson: Give them what they need in the disguise of what they want. People will always want what they don't need, and giving them what they want all the time will quickly approach disaster. Or at least incredibly useless software.
Since you were civil and raise good points, I'll clarify what I did. You are correct about the loss, and I did redo the math when I replied to the first commenter who pointed it out and supplied some numbers. They are still slightly in favor of the 360 but Wii will probably catch up pretty soon. As for the profit, I calculated revenue we the consumer hand the companies. My reasoning being that since MS and Sony are giant corporations and Nintendo is really only a gaming company, MS and Sony can make up their losses elsewhere in their company, therefore the "war" comes down to the revenue we send them. At least thats my reasoning and it makes sense to me, take what you will from it.
#1 Valid point, I was and am biased against the PS3 (ironically its also the only one I own) I semi-assumed no one would buy the higher price version cause, well thats just dumb. Sooo there number is probably even lower then my estimation.
#2 I counted revenue and not profit because I think it would be unfair to Nintendo to do otherwise. You must remember that Sony and MS can sell at a loss because they are giant corporations that can make up the loss in other places, hence why I did not count them in the negatives. I based it off of the money we the consumer give to the companies. I think this is relevant, but it's up to the reader I guess. Either way it's a valid point that I should have clarified.
#3 Mostly valid point, while that doesn't negate my rough math, it could very well play into what I said about the Wii's game market being the big decider. At the moment I think it's gonna be iffy, if they pull out some heavy hitters aside from the ones we already know are coming, they may rocket past everyone. I don't know, but good point.
Wow, a well thought out reply that wasn't insulting, thanks. Btw I did redo the numbers with the loss calculated on the first reply, if you missed it. They skew more to the Wii, and if does not have the lead at the moment it probably will shortly.
I agree, and on several occasions have mentioned that the numbers are not exact because we do not have the information available to actually do a proper mathematical analysis. And yes I did not really think about the game being split, valid point, I overlooked it. But as we seem to agree that they do sell consoles at a loss, therefore they must make their money somewhere. That only leaves games, so while the exact amount is split, my half-assed math should at least give you an idea of the ratio since Sony/MS/Nintendo probably get a standard percentage.
And if you wanna be technical about it, selling a console at a loss implies no profit, which means that Microsoft and Sony are so far behind Nintendo it's not really that funny. I was basing calculations off of the money we the consumer handed them, so even at a loss we have handed MS more money then Nintendo. Besides, I am pretty sure they account for the fact they are losing money, they must be making it up somewhere else.
For those that still don't get why I didn't mark MS and Sony in the negative, I made the assumption that as a company they made up the difference elsewhere, therefore the console war itself comes down to the amount of money we turned over to them for their products, not what it cost them to produce it. Hell, MS could spend it's whole budget and give away consoles and they could "win the war". But thats not a very good overall business model.
Taken care of if you read the reply to the first commenter. And also, you will notice their are some assumptions because we have no hard numbers, sorry but thats the best I can do with whats available. As for R&D costs, thats one more thing we don't have any hard numbers for.
Supposedly it is now selling at a profit, but since a commenter kindly supplied me with updated numbers from when they originally came out I have redone the hardware math. It can be seen off the first comment above. However, there is also that repair cost for dead 360s, unfortunately we have no numbers for it at the moment, so use your imagination.
Actually I did account for it with PS3s, I just did not know the numbers, and recently I heard the 360s did not sell at a loss, however that may be a recent development. So, to alleviate concern using the links you provided the hardware numbers change too:
360: $2,042,500,000 (if all Pro) | $1,379,500,000 (if all Core)
Note: If it's true 360s no longer sell at a loss, this number is higher, as before true value is probably in between. This also does not include recent elite sales either, which may farther skew the numbers either up or down. Plus repair costs, which once more we do not have numbers for.
PS3: $714,655,000 (if all sold at $500, the cheapest offered)
Note: And Sony drops back, at more then a 50% loss per unit. Guess they are banking on that 80GB and games to pull them out of the hole. Which is still a possibility even at their current consoles out there. At least they aren't going bankrupt.
Wii: $2,250,000,000 Note: No change.
How interesting, the lost revenue due to subsidizing the hardware is:
360: $1,112,500,000
PS3: $1,135,345,000
This has no real bearing since 360 has sold practically 3:1 with PS3, I just find it amusing at his point.
New Conclusion: 360 is still winning, but not by a lot. It'll be neck and neck for a bit. I'll give Wii the likelihood of pulling ahead in the immediate future, don't know if they can keep it though in the long run, gonna probably come down to games.
I never claimed Wii owners only play shallow games, just that the majority of Wii owners are quite possibly casual or social gamers. Therefore how many games will they buy compared to the traditional gamer? Will it be enough to overcome the other two consoles. It is also quite possible that the "hardcore" across all three consoles are probably evenly matched since they are also probably the same people, since a dedicated gamer will pick up all 3 or at least one of the two heavy consoles and Nintendo's console since it's cheaper. Hardcore also probably have an allegiance to either PS3 or XBox which may even out, however they both are likely to pick up a Wii since once more its cheap and will expand their collection. For some number fun I just did this in response (and I was curious) to the replies to my posts: http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=296969&cid=20594067
I just did up the math as a separate reply off the main article, summary is 360 is winning by a small chunk or is head to head with the Wii. Hinges on how much the repairs and subsidizing has cost them. PS3 is naturally in dead last, though closer then I would have thought. Link if you don't feel like searching: http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=296969&cid=20594067
Using the proposed units sold from the article I arrived at these totals (base-line console, no bundles):
360: $3,155,000,000 (if all Pro) | $2,492,000,000 (if all Core) Note: True number is somewhere in between.
PS3: $1,850,000,000 (if all sold at $500, the cheapest offered) Note: Doing better then I expected in all honesty.
Wii: $2,250,000,000 Note: Shear units is their advantage and possibly their weakness.
Results: From a pure hardware stand-point it appears that the 360 is ahead by a few hundred million $$s, it's gonna be close if the Wii continues to sellout. But don't forget the repair costs of the 360's Red Ring of Death; unfortunately I could not find an accurate number for 360s repaired at this point so I'm guessing the margin is not that big or they are neck and neck if the worse case is assumed for 360s. Sony even in it's trailing, is only $400,000,000 (800,000 consoles) behind the Wii. Which is far closer then I would have thought. However, if it's true that Sony significantly subsidizes the PS3, then they are probably not as close, I could not find the numbers to determine the offset.
Now the real decider is gonna be games sold. The PS3 and Xbox similarly price their games, they have a comparable user base, so it's gonna be a more even head to head match with them, hardware sold may give enough numbers to gauge their results. Wii games on the other hand are $10 cheaper, which means to equal PS3/360 revenue on a game being sold they need to have 6 to every 5 PS3/360 sales. So to make it easy (and over-simplify) the game revenue lets assume there is a title for each console that every single person with a console buys, this results in:
360 game at $60: $534,000,000 Note: Obvious leader.
Wii game at $50: $450,000,000 Note: To Catch up to 360 they need 1,680,000 more consoles.
PS3 game at $60: $222,000,000 Note: And yea, no surprises here.
Conclusion: At the moment I believe the 360 is winning in terms of total revenue generated from hardware and software sales, though the Wii is closing in and might be able to surpass them from shear hardware sales in the future (impressive in its own right). I personally do not think the Wii will be able to compete with software sales. It will come down to the buying habits of the individual console owners. Will the casual Wii market buy enough games to beat out the hardcore 360/PS3 crowd that buys games almost weekly at slightly higher price? I don't know and I don't think it can be accurately guessed at this point, only time will tell.
What strikes me as odd is that not only is it out of stock, it has nothing worth playing at the moment aside from Metroid and Zelda. My conclusion is that people who would normally never buy a console are being pulled in by the cheap novelty, which was of course Nintendo's plan all along, and well executed I must say. My impression is that Nintendo found a way to stay in the console game, instead of bowing out to be a 3rd party a la Sega. (They still dominate handhelds, I don't think that'll change for awhile.)
However, as many have said before, selling hardware does not win a console war. Games are the deciding factor. (Not to mention that $$ wise since a Wii is cheaper, therefore you would want to base it off of profit more then units sold to determine who is "winning") What are the odds of the casual gamer picking up more then just the main party games? And even then, they won't buy too many of them since how many party games do they need? Will that shear abundance of "small-time" Wii owners out-pace the 360 and Sony die-hards who pick up a new title every 2-3 weeks? Thats not even getting into Live Arcade and the Wii equivalent. (Not even gonna include the PS3 one at this point)
I think it's still too early for a verdict without direct revenue quotes from M$, Nintendo, and Sony to determine a trend if any exists at the moment. (Pretty sure Sony is last on that list at the moment.)
Not really, if you can't play it you cannot give a review of the gameplay, that includes a negative review. Thats like complaining that doesn't work on my PC so it must suck. Or even better, complaining that a game sucks cause it won't run on your 10 year old machine. If the game failed to run properly or sucked under ideal (reasonable) conditions you would then have a valid point, however as this is not the case since the majority of users had none to few problems. You lack any substantial argument, which in turn tells me that you just want to bitch about something for the sake of being an ass.
Re:Why no mention?
on
BioShock Review
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
While the post above has a good point, I wonder if it's possible that maybe it was supposed to give you back an install. Which after it was determined it was not, they promised a utility that would do it for you if they could not fix it in a patch or if it was more then a specific user configuration bug.
And to help the above comment I add: While I hate to burst your bubble OP, if the people working at the company don't know what's going on, the odds are good you know even less of the big picture.
By the way, awesome job at ignoring context and using half quotes.
So what I see as the common trend among those who happen to disagree with me, is that the package and delivery is more important then the contents when estimating the value of a game because you lack either the patience or the technical expertise to get a game up and running. (I apologize to the few who it's not in any way, shape, or form your fault it didn't work) I'm a software engineer and a gamer, I've come to an understanding when software and hardware decide to disagree about functioning. I have had to jump through hoops many times before (luckily in reference to Bioshock I did not have too) to get things working, it's unfortunately the way most complicated systems behave sometimes. Hence why when someone complains about something that under ideal circumstances works perfectly fine, I tend to call it "a you problem".
It's almost like they planned to have a cohesive arching plot...oh wait they did.
Re:fun yes; groundbreaking no
on
BioShock Review
·
· Score: 1
I saw a commercial the other day and realized that at one point the player loads a life preserver with proximity minds and then uses telekinesis to throw it at a big daddy. Yea, I never thought of that one. (I think it requires the smart-grenade upgrade for the launcher) Point being that the game has many different options available, however unless you naturally are looking for neat tricks you will probably skip over most of what makes it unique.
Favorite Big Daddy tactic so far is a 5 trap-bolt array across a door or hallway. Works quite well, still needs one or two armor piercing bullets to the head to put them down though. Plus it's cool when they drop dead mid charge and fly into stuff.
Re:Why no mention?
on
BioShock Review
·
· Score: 4, Informative
The problem is you are horribly wrong. Two days after release due to complaints they increased it up to 5 installs and rearranged the rules somewhat. A proper uninstall should return an install slot to you, but if it doesn't there will be a utility coming soon that does the same thing if they can't fix it through the server.
However I don't know about the 5 installs per 5 machines part, last I heard it was 5 flat installs active at any time. He may be wrong on that, I do not know if it has changed.
As I have mentioned above it appears that the "buggy" aspect is not a general problem but a specific hardware setup issue. Meaning that the game itself plays fine on a large range of machines without extra patching. It was not shipped "broken" so that no one could play it. In the realm of PC gaming, with it's multitudes of hardware configurations such problems things are not unheard of, but rarely do they effect everyone or the majority. I, among many, have had no problems installing and playing the game. I have had one crash, and could not replicate it in 15+ hours of play. I would not by any means call it "buggy".
From the sound of it, it's not a general problem but a specific hardware/driver combo problem. I personally have had one crash so far (over 15+ hours played) and I'm pretty sure it was a freak accident since I couldn't replicate it. I got a friend who just managed to fix his sound thats been acting up on vista with some games, turned out it was the vsync aspect of his nvidia drivers. Imagine that.
Re:Why no mention?
on
BioShock Review
·
· Score: 5, Insightful
Probably because it has no bearing on the quality of the actual gameplay. If it's a factor in whether or not you enjoy the actual game, that's what I like to call "a you problem".
Slashdot Mirror
Probably because it's twice as powerful and offers features that the 360 especially, touts as "add-ons" (If you add up the add-ons the price becomes comparable).
The potential to find new and creative ways to abuse customers.
You blame the hardware company instead of the software company that used a feature badly, bravo on your ability to shift blame.
The potential to lock buyers into Yet Another Stupid Sony Format.
How so? It only locks developers into this format for PS3 games, which happens to offer the same major features as HD-DVD, oh and it gives twice the storage space. Whose fault is it that some idiots don't take advantage of it? 360 doesn't even have the HD-DVD built in, it's an "add-on".
I agree that the PS3 is not being developed correctly on the software front, thats impossible to argue against at this point. But as a piece of hardware it's a solid machine that doesn't have a habit of dying on you, like some other console I know.
I've been making your point for years among friends and family, and many of them still to this day do not get it. And to make things worse the media makes it out that the popular vote is the deciding factor. At the same time, I do not know if I can trust the general populace to select our leader anymore then the electoral college, though I think I give them a small edge. Democracy/Republic itself in my general opinion is a horribly inefficient and incredibly risky form of government. However, it's own problems (not to mention we still have a strong Judicial branch) tend to keep it in check.
Anyways, after working in what is, to some degree, a service industry I've learned a very important lesson: Give them what they need in the disguise of what they want. People will always want what they don't need, and giving them what they want all the time will quickly approach disaster. Or at least incredibly useless software.
Since you were civil and raise good points, I'll clarify what I did. You are correct about the loss, and I did redo the math when I replied to the first commenter who pointed it out and supplied some numbers. They are still slightly in favor of the 360 but Wii will probably catch up pretty soon. As for the profit, I calculated revenue we the consumer hand the companies. My reasoning being that since MS and Sony are giant corporations and Nintendo is really only a gaming company, MS and Sony can make up their losses elsewhere in their company, therefore the "war" comes down to the revenue we send them. At least thats my reasoning and it makes sense to me, take what you will from it.
#1 Valid point, I was and am biased against the PS3 (ironically its also the only one I own) I semi-assumed no one would buy the higher price version cause, well thats just dumb. Sooo there number is probably even lower then my estimation.
#2 I counted revenue and not profit because I think it would be unfair to Nintendo to do otherwise. You must remember that Sony and MS can sell at a loss because they are giant corporations that can make up the loss in other places, hence why I did not count them in the negatives. I based it off of the money we the consumer give to the companies. I think this is relevant, but it's up to the reader I guess. Either way it's a valid point that I should have clarified.
#3 Mostly valid point, while that doesn't negate my rough math, it could very well play into what I said about the Wii's game market being the big decider. At the moment I think it's gonna be iffy, if they pull out some heavy hitters aside from the ones we already know are coming, they may rocket past everyone. I don't know, but good point.
Wow, a well thought out reply that wasn't insulting, thanks. Btw I did redo the numbers with the loss calculated on the first reply, if you missed it. They skew more to the Wii, and if does not have the lead at the moment it probably will shortly.
I agree, and on several occasions have mentioned that the numbers are not exact because we do not have the information available to actually do a proper mathematical analysis. And yes I did not really think about the game being split, valid point, I overlooked it. But as we seem to agree that they do sell consoles at a loss, therefore they must make their money somewhere. That only leaves games, so while the exact amount is split, my half-assed math should at least give you an idea of the ratio since Sony/MS/Nintendo probably get a standard percentage.
And if you wanna be technical about it, selling a console at a loss implies no profit, which means that Microsoft and Sony are so far behind Nintendo it's not really that funny. I was basing calculations off of the money we the consumer handed them, so even at a loss we have handed MS more money then Nintendo. Besides, I am pretty sure they account for the fact they are losing money, they must be making it up somewhere else.
For those that still don't get why I didn't mark MS and Sony in the negative, I made the assumption that as a company they made up the difference elsewhere, therefore the console war itself comes down to the amount of money we turned over to them for their products, not what it cost them to produce it. Hell, MS could spend it's whole budget and give away consoles and they could "win the war". But thats not a very good overall business model.
Taken care of if you read the reply to the first commenter. And also, you will notice their are some assumptions because we have no hard numbers, sorry but thats the best I can do with whats available. As for R&D costs, thats one more thing we don't have any hard numbers for.
Supposedly it is now selling at a profit, but since a commenter kindly supplied me with updated numbers from when they originally came out I have redone the hardware math. It can be seen off the first comment above. However, there is also that repair cost for dead 360s, unfortunately we have no numbers for it at the moment, so use your imagination.
Actually I did account for it with PS3s, I just did not know the numbers, and recently I heard the 360s did not sell at a loss, however that may be a recent development. So, to alleviate concern using the links you provided the hardware numbers change too:
360: $2,042,500,000 (if all Pro) | $1,379,500,000 (if all Core)
Note: If it's true 360s no longer sell at a loss, this number is higher, as before true value is probably in between. This also does not include recent elite sales either, which may farther skew the numbers either up or down. Plus repair costs, which once more we do not have numbers for.
PS3: $714,655,000 (if all sold at $500, the cheapest offered)
Note: And Sony drops back, at more then a 50% loss per unit. Guess they are banking on that 80GB and games to pull them out of the hole. Which is still a possibility even at their current consoles out there. At least they aren't going bankrupt.
Wii: $2,250,000,000 Note: No change.
How interesting, the lost revenue due to subsidizing the hardware is:
360: $1,112,500,000
PS3: $1,135,345,000
This has no real bearing since 360 has sold practically 3:1 with PS3, I just find it amusing at his point.
New Conclusion: 360 is still winning, but not by a lot. It'll be neck and neck for a bit. I'll give Wii the likelihood of pulling ahead in the immediate future, don't know if they can keep it though in the long run, gonna probably come down to games.
I never claimed Wii owners only play shallow games, just that the majority of Wii owners are quite possibly casual or social gamers. Therefore how many games will they buy compared to the traditional gamer? Will it be enough to overcome the other two consoles. It is also quite possible that the "hardcore" across all three consoles are probably evenly matched since they are also probably the same people, since a dedicated gamer will pick up all 3 or at least one of the two heavy consoles and Nintendo's console since it's cheaper. Hardcore also probably have an allegiance to either PS3 or XBox which may even out, however they both are likely to pick up a Wii since once more its cheap and will expand their collection. For some number fun I just did this in response (and I was curious) to the replies to my posts: http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=296969&cid=20594067
I just did up the math as a separate reply off the main article, summary is 360 is winning by a small chunk or is head to head with the Wii. Hinges on how much the repairs and subsidizing has cost them. PS3 is naturally in dead last, though closer then I would have thought. Link if you don't feel like searching: http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=296969&cid=20594067
Using the proposed units sold from the article I arrived at these totals (base-line console, no bundles):
360: $3,155,000,000 (if all Pro) | $2,492,000,000 (if all Core) Note: True number is somewhere in between.
PS3: $1,850,000,000 (if all sold at $500, the cheapest offered) Note: Doing better then I expected in all honesty.
Wii: $2,250,000,000 Note: Shear units is their advantage and possibly their weakness.
Results: From a pure hardware stand-point it appears that the 360 is ahead by a few hundred million $$s, it's gonna be close if the Wii continues to sellout. But don't forget the repair costs of the 360's Red Ring of Death; unfortunately I could not find an accurate number for 360s repaired at this point so I'm guessing the margin is not that big or they are neck and neck if the worse case is assumed for 360s. Sony even in it's trailing, is only $400,000,000 (800,000 consoles) behind the Wii. Which is far closer then I would have thought. However, if it's true that Sony significantly subsidizes the PS3, then they are probably not as close, I could not find the numbers to determine the offset.
Now the real decider is gonna be games sold. The PS3 and Xbox similarly price their games, they have a comparable user base, so it's gonna be a more even head to head match with them, hardware sold may give enough numbers to gauge their results. Wii games on the other hand are $10 cheaper, which means to equal PS3/360 revenue on a game being sold they need to have 6 to every 5 PS3/360 sales. So to make it easy (and over-simplify) the game revenue lets assume there is a title for each console that every single person with a console buys, this results in:
360 game at $60: $534,000,000 Note: Obvious leader.
Wii game at $50: $450,000,000 Note: To Catch up to 360 they need 1,680,000 more consoles.
PS3 game at $60: $222,000,000 Note: And yea, no surprises here.
Conclusion: At the moment I believe the 360 is winning in terms of total revenue generated from hardware and software sales, though the Wii is closing in and might be able to surpass them from shear hardware sales in the future (impressive in its own right). I personally do not think the Wii will be able to compete with software sales. It will come down to the buying habits of the individual console owners. Will the casual Wii market buy enough games to beat out the hardcore 360/PS3 crowd that buys games almost weekly at slightly higher price? I don't know and I don't think it can be accurately guessed at this point, only time will tell.
What strikes me as odd is that not only is it out of stock, it has nothing worth playing at the moment aside from Metroid and Zelda. My conclusion is that people who would normally never buy a console are being pulled in by the cheap novelty, which was of course Nintendo's plan all along, and well executed I must say. My impression is that Nintendo found a way to stay in the console game, instead of bowing out to be a 3rd party a la Sega. (They still dominate handhelds, I don't think that'll change for awhile.)
However, as many have said before, selling hardware does not win a console war. Games are the deciding factor. (Not to mention that $$ wise since a Wii is cheaper, therefore you would want to base it off of profit more then units sold to determine who is "winning") What are the odds of the casual gamer picking up more then just the main party games? And even then, they won't buy too many of them since how many party games do they need? Will that shear abundance of "small-time" Wii owners out-pace the 360 and Sony die-hards who pick up a new title every 2-3 weeks? Thats not even getting into Live Arcade and the Wii equivalent. (Not even gonna include the PS3 one at this point)
I think it's still too early for a verdict without direct revenue quotes from M$, Nintendo, and Sony to determine a trend if any exists at the moment. (Pretty sure Sony is last on that list at the moment.)
Is anyone actually surprised here?
Not really, if you can't play it you cannot give a review of the gameplay, that includes a negative review. Thats like complaining that doesn't work on my PC so it must suck. Or even better, complaining that a game sucks cause it won't run on your 10 year old machine. If the game failed to run properly or sucked under ideal (reasonable) conditions you would then have a valid point, however as this is not the case since the majority of users had none to few problems. You lack any substantial argument, which in turn tells me that you just want to bitch about something for the sake of being an ass.
While the post above has a good point, I wonder if it's possible that maybe it was supposed to give you back an install. Which after it was determined it was not, they promised a utility that would do it for you if they could not fix it in a patch or if it was more then a specific user configuration bug.
And to help the above comment I add: While I hate to burst your bubble OP, if the people working at the company don't know what's going on, the odds are good you know even less of the big picture.
By the way, awesome job at ignoring context and using half quotes.
All other points aside, he bought and played the 360 version, so for him it was not a problem. Nice try though.
So what I see as the common trend among those who happen to disagree with me, is that the package and delivery is more important then the contents when estimating the value of a game because you lack either the patience or the technical expertise to get a game up and running. (I apologize to the few who it's not in any way, shape, or form your fault it didn't work) I'm a software engineer and a gamer, I've come to an understanding when software and hardware decide to disagree about functioning. I have had to jump through hoops many times before (luckily in reference to Bioshock I did not have too) to get things working, it's unfortunately the way most complicated systems behave sometimes. Hence why when someone complains about something that under ideal circumstances works perfectly fine, I tend to call it "a you problem".
Could you give some specific examples that the plot does not clear up?
That was last week, now we're talking about the actual gameplay, get with the program.
It's almost like they planned to have a cohesive arching plot...oh wait they did.
I saw a commercial the other day and realized that at one point the player loads a life preserver with proximity minds and then uses telekinesis to throw it at a big daddy. Yea, I never thought of that one. (I think it requires the smart-grenade upgrade for the launcher) Point being that the game has many different options available, however unless you naturally are looking for neat tricks you will probably skip over most of what makes it unique.
Favorite Big Daddy tactic so far is a 5 trap-bolt array across a door or hallway. Works quite well, still needs one or two armor piercing bullets to the head to put them down though. Plus it's cool when they drop dead mid charge and fly into stuff.
The problem is you are horribly wrong. Two days after release due to complaints they increased it up to 5 installs and rearranged the rules somewhat. A proper uninstall should return an install slot to you, but if it doesn't there will be a utility coming soon that does the same thing if they can't fix it through the server.
However I don't know about the 5 installs per 5 machines part, last I heard it was 5 flat installs active at any time. He may be wrong on that, I do not know if it has changed.
As I have mentioned above it appears that the "buggy" aspect is not a general problem but a specific hardware setup issue. Meaning that the game itself plays fine on a large range of machines without extra patching. It was not shipped "broken" so that no one could play it. In the realm of PC gaming, with it's multitudes of hardware configurations such problems things are not unheard of, but rarely do they effect everyone or the majority. I, among many, have had no problems installing and playing the game. I have had one crash, and could not replicate it in 15+ hours of play. I would not by any means call it "buggy".
From the sound of it, it's not a general problem but a specific hardware/driver combo problem. I personally have had one crash so far (over 15+ hours played) and I'm pretty sure it was a freak accident since I couldn't replicate it. I got a friend who just managed to fix his sound thats been acting up on vista with some games, turned out it was the vsync aspect of his nvidia drivers. Imagine that.
Probably because it has no bearing on the quality of the actual gameplay. If it's a factor in whether or not you enjoy the actual game, that's what I like to call "a you problem".