If the history of the Internet is any guide, soon any company that is running "free" servers for PS2 online games is going to have the game be 75% advertisements and 25% content.
I really don't know which model will work. The advantage Microsoft gives is that the individual game companies don't have to pony up the cash to run their own servers. The game company probably won't get a dime from the online usage of their game (unless they decide to charge an additional fee for their games), but they won't have server expense. It gives game makers the additional option of making an online experience. The advantage Sony gives is that the game companies will get 100% of any online fees charged. This means Square gets all the money for PlayOnline charges from people playing Final Fantasy XI. However, this means that Square also has to pay for all the servers and maintanence. EA is the same way.
In the end, I don't think one will end up being cheaper than the other. I imagine most companies making PS2 games will charge for online content because the servers will be costly to run. Pay $10 for all your games or pay $3 for one, $3 for another one and $4 for another one. It's all the same.
What do "XBox Live Network", "Nintendo Drops GameCube Price to $150" and "Console Pricing Economics" have in common? They're all ways to allow more posts saying "M$ and their suX-box suck!"
Though in this case when Microsoft brought the Xbox out, they matched it to the Playstation 2's pricing. Sony basically matched Microsoft's $199 pricing (yes, Sony announced it a little over a day before Microsoft did, but it had already been leaked that Microsoft was going to make the announcement today-May 20-of a price of $199).
The companies really don't need a margin at the end of the day. I hope the competition drives the prices into the ground. We all know how evil Microsoft is here in the US. What a lot of people don't realize is that Sony is basically just as evil in Japan. Both have a lot of money and can survive price drops.
If price drops continue, I'll be the winner by being able to afford both of these systems plus the Gamecube and whatever good games each system has to offer.
"I never got around to disconnecting from Earthlink or from AOL, which I've been on for years, clinging to the hope that with more than 25 million subscribers, something would eventually happen there that would be interesting enough to write about."
This seems familiar somehow. I feel that I've been clinging on to Katz articles for years, feeling that something would eventually happen and Katz would write something interesting.
"But so far, Sony is far and away doing the best job with online gaming, and with their partnership with AOL, and the Linux system on the PS2"
Excuse me, but what do AOL and the Linux system have to do with online gaming? Nothing! the PS2 Linux is just for people wanting to play around with Linux. Also, I believe it's been noted that if you have Linux loaded on the hard drive, then you can't use the hard drive for normal game usage. Hardly great for online gaming.
Also, you forgot to mention that there is a monthly fee to play Final Fantasy XI. If every game is going to have a fee to be played online, I'd rather just pay one flat fee and be able to play all my games online.
I think the company that by far and away is doing the best online gaming is Sega. They have their experience from the Dreamcast to bring with them. They've already had their Sega Sports titles and Phantasy Star Online going online. They should be able to fairly quickly deliver a decent number of online games.
E3 should give us some indications of what companies want to do online, but we really won't have a good feel of what's going to happen until late summer or fall.
It's really nice to see all sorts of nice specs in a preview, but it doesn't really tell us much of anything about actual performance - especially gaming performance. People trust nVidia previews because nVidia has had a good run of high performing gaming video cards. Matrox can add a flux capacitor to their cards and still have a worthless gaming card. Specs and previews mean nothing. Final hardware and drivers are everything.
The Xbox has been out for all of 5 months in the US and all of 2 in Japan. It's a little early to be saying which "winner" is emerging. The real battle will begin with this year's E3 with a rumored price drop on the PS2, ramp up in late sumer/early fall when both systems are slated to roll out their online gaming plans and be in full swing by the all-important Christmas season.
Sales in spring for videogames/systems are not the all-important ones. Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo all know that.
Everquest becomes a huge seller on the PS2, making the PS2 internet adapter the first successful console add-on. Developers start churning out games and sit back to check their sales... to find that they're only selling games to 1% of users with internet adapters. Cause of problem? 99% of users bought the adapter for Everquest, and they don't play any other games.
Is distributed computing more likely to:
a) Find intelligent life on other planets?
b) Find a cure for cancer?
c) Translate "All your base are belong to us" to Sanskrit?
Nice idea, but I'm not sure how well it'd really work.
It should be noted that sometimes it's the licensor that does the editing. FUNimation is the company responsible for much of the Dragonball Z censoring. Nelvana is the company responsible for hacking up Cardcaptor Sakura into Cardcaptors.
Yes, Cartoon Network does some of their own censoring, but sometimes they don't get the original, unedited material to begin with.
Yes, the Japanese controllers are smaller. One of the big complaints about the Xbox controller is the size of the controller.
Now I could see if Microsoft wanted to stop third parties not paying licensing fees from making controllers, but I can't see why Microsoft itself would want to make it's own controllers (albeit MS-Japan) not work.
If they do work, Microsoft just gets more money from people who don't like the standard US controllers but prefer not to buy 3rd party ones.
Slashdot Mirror
If the history of the Internet is any guide, soon any company that is running "free" servers for PS2 online games is going to have the game be 75% advertisements and 25% content.
I really don't know which model will work. The advantage Microsoft gives is that the individual game companies don't have to pony up the cash to run their own servers. The game company probably won't get a dime from the online usage of their game (unless they decide to charge an additional fee for their games), but they won't have server expense. It gives game makers the additional option of making an online experience. The advantage Sony gives is that the game companies will get 100% of any online fees charged. This means Square gets all the money for PlayOnline charges from people playing Final Fantasy XI. However, this means that Square also has to pay for all the servers and maintanence. EA is the same way.
In the end, I don't think one will end up being cheaper than the other. I imagine most companies making PS2 games will charge for online content because the servers will be costly to run. Pay $10 for all your games or pay $3 for one, $3 for another one and $4 for another one. It's all the same.
Just wait until Taco finds out that the anonymous web site is actually the Slashdot advertisement program.
What do "XBox Live Network", "Nintendo Drops GameCube Price to $150" and "Console Pricing Economics" have in common? They're all ways to allow more posts saying "M$ and their suX-box suck!"
Though in this case when Microsoft brought the Xbox out, they matched it to the Playstation 2's pricing. Sony basically matched Microsoft's $199 pricing (yes, Sony announced it a little over a day before Microsoft did, but it had already been leaked that Microsoft was going to make the announcement today-May 20-of a price of $199).
The companies really don't need a margin at the end of the day. I hope the competition drives the prices into the ground. We all know how evil Microsoft is here in the US. What a lot of people don't realize is that Sony is basically just as evil in Japan. Both have a lot of money and can survive price drops.
If price drops continue, I'll be the winner by being able to afford both of these systems plus the Gamecube and whatever good games each system has to offer.
"I never got around to disconnecting from Earthlink or from AOL, which I've been on for years, clinging to the hope that with more than 25 million subscribers, something would eventually happen there that would be interesting enough to write about."
This seems familiar somehow. I feel that I've been clinging on to Katz articles for years, feeling that something would eventually happen and Katz would write something interesting.
"But so far, Sony is far and away doing the best job with online gaming, and with their partnership with AOL, and the Linux system on the PS2"
Excuse me, but what do AOL and the Linux system have to do with online gaming? Nothing! the PS2 Linux is just for people wanting to play around with Linux. Also, I believe it's been noted that if you have Linux loaded on the hard drive, then you can't use the hard drive for normal game usage. Hardly great for online gaming.
Also, you forgot to mention that there is a monthly fee to play Final Fantasy XI. If every game is going to have a fee to be played online, I'd rather just pay one flat fee and be able to play all my games online.
I think the company that by far and away is doing the best online gaming is Sega. They have their experience from the Dreamcast to bring with them. They've already had their Sega Sports titles and Phantasy Star Online going online. They should be able to fairly quickly deliver a decent number of online games.
E3 should give us some indications of what companies want to do online, but we really won't have a good feel of what's going to happen until late summer or fall.
It's really nice to see all sorts of nice specs in a preview, but it doesn't really tell us much of anything about actual performance - especially gaming performance. People trust nVidia previews because nVidia has had a good run of high performing gaming video cards. Matrox can add a flux capacitor to their cards and still have a worthless gaming card. Specs and previews mean nothing. Final hardware and drivers are everything.
What the heck is this supposed to mean? You sit on your ass and drink ale? I can do that without paying $15 a month.
And that's why they released a smaller controller in Japan? You might have missed previous mention of this.
If you compare the same game on the PS2 and the Xbox, you can often tell that it looks better on the Xbox due to the Xbox's power.
The Xbox has been out for all of 5 months in the US and all of 2 in Japan. It's a little early to be saying which "winner" is emerging. The real battle will begin with this year's E3 with a rumored price drop on the PS2, ramp up in late sumer/early fall when both systems are slated to roll out their online gaming plans and be in full swing by the all-important Christmas season.
Sales in spring for videogames/systems are not the all-important ones. Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo all know that.
Everquest becomes a huge seller on the PS2, making the PS2 internet adapter the first successful console add-on. Developers start churning out games and sit back to check their sales... to find that they're only selling games to 1% of users with internet adapters. Cause of problem? 99% of users bought the adapter for Everquest, and they don't play any other games.
Is distributed computing more likely to:
a) Find intelligent life on other planets?
b) Find a cure for cancer?
c) Translate "All your base are belong to us" to Sanskrit?
Nice idea, but I'm not sure how well it'd really work.
It should be noted that sometimes it's the licensor that does the editing. FUNimation is the company responsible for much of the Dragonball Z censoring. Nelvana is the company responsible for hacking up Cardcaptor Sakura into Cardcaptors.
Yes, Cartoon Network does some of their own censoring, but sometimes they don't get the original, unedited material to begin with.
Yes, the Japanese controllers are smaller. One of the big complaints about the Xbox controller is the size of the controller.
Now I could see if Microsoft wanted to stop third parties not paying licensing fees from making controllers, but I can't see why Microsoft itself would want to make it's own controllers (albeit MS-Japan) not work.
If they do work, Microsoft just gets more money from people who don't like the standard US controllers but prefer not to buy 3rd party ones.