I think the biggest problem with most of these services is that the technology just isn't there yet in the US, primarily the bandwidth. My personal favorite of the video download services is Xbox Live. For $6 I can watch a HD full length movie on my TV in my living room. The copy protection is restrictive, but it's usable. The biggest problem is the download time. It takes about 10 hrs to download the 6 GB file over my cable modem. At this rate, it's no longer an impulse buy. I have to think out ahead of time when I will want to watch the movie and plan accordingly. This puts it at about the same convenience level as Netflix, erasing any benefit it would have had.
For an in depth explanation I would point you to "The Undercover Economist" by Tim Harford. In short though, the answer is simply "that's what people are willing to pay".
I find it very ironic that the most apt rebuttal, I can think of, to the arguments you present would simply be to refer you to the very episode of Southpark that you reference with the way your formatted your post.
Product placement does have its place in some cases. The problem though, is that a product is usually placed at the exclusion of other products. Instead of getting a generic soda, you get a world where Pepsi is the only thing people drink, or Fords are the only cars anyone drives, or every billboard is for the exact same product. To me, these things detract from the experience just as much as the situation where all products are generic. I think there's a balance to be struck there. For instance, have a variety of different drinks in the game/movie but make only one of those brands a placed product.
This is essentially what the whole intelligent design movement is about, trying to provide a scientific basis for the biblical story of creation. The problem is that with such a strong and specific agenda behind it, it's inherently bad science.
True, the brunt of the blame for DRM rests on the shoulders of the copyright holders. However, the technology companies aren't blameless here. In some ways, the myriad of DRM schemes out there today hurt consumers just as much as simply having the DRM there in the first place. DRM would cause a lot less headaches if companies like Microsoft and Apple would settle on some standards.
In a perfect world, DRM wouldn't exist at all. But now that it's here, it's probably not going to go away for a long time. The onus is on the technology companies to make it a workable solution with as few headaches as possible for the consumer.
While I certainly don't approve of the way the current administration treats scientific research, the article seems to imply that it is bad for all science. No doubt the administration has hindered progress in areas that clash with its politics, such as climate change. However, there are plenty of areas not so politically turbulent that operate without interference. There are probably even some areas of scientific research that have benefited from the Bush administration, petroleum geology for instance. The Bush administration isn't necessarily bad for science, it's just bad for certain, politically sensitive, areas of science. I'm not taking issue with the report (like I said before, I don't approve of the way the administration has handled this), just the way that it has been presented.
I imagine a lot of the same questions were asked when we first started the space program. "Why even go into space?" I mean, it's just a vast nothingness right? There are plenty of place on earth that remain to be explored, like deep oceans and the rain forests."
50 years later we have massive improvements in telecommunications, accurate weather forecasting, GPS, major breakthroughs in solar power, and a whole host of other new technologies that we discovered along the way. As with most science, you don't really know the full implications of something until after you've discovered it. Uncertainty doesn't always mean that a risk isn't worth taking.
The standard TV setup, with hundreds of numbered channels is a horrible way to organize your programming, and one of the main reasons why nobody can make a simple, easy to use remote for TV viewing. As our video content moves increasingly to the internet we'll hopefully see this fade away and be replaced by systems that organize programming more efficiently by genres instead of just randomly assigned numbers.
A high profile game's budget these days is probably somewhere around $15 million. Mark Rein's quote of $10 million for Gears of War is misleading because that figure does not take into account the cost of the Unreal 3 engine. At the highest end you have a game like Killzone 2, which is currently budgeted at $21 million.
From the article I read, it seems that a move into the portable device market stems more from the failure of Microsoft's hardware partners to produce something that can compete with the iPod rather than a desire to take on Nintendo and Sony at another level.
I think this makes more sense since Microsoft probably views Apple as more of a threat to their overall corporate strategy than Sony or Nintendo. They probably would view gaming functionality as something that would differentiate such a device from the iPod rather than the primary function of the device.
PoP is more of a puzzle game, whereas Ninja Gaiden is more pure action oriented. The combat isn't nearly as satisfying, but the platforming elements and level design are extremely well done in the PoP games. The PoP games are also quite a bit slower paced than Ninja Gaiden (then again what game isn't?).
The combat is fairly satisfying, if not a bit repetative, and the you'll get an actual storyline in PoP as opposed to whatever the crap that was in Ninja Gaiden. If you're wantin to play a PoP game, Sands of Time is a much better game than Warrior Within IMO.
I think you've got it backwards. They've been ripping off the musicians since the early days, then they ripped off the customers, now they're going back to the musicians one more time just in case they didn't strip them of everything had the first time around.
I would hardly consider the Xbox 360 launch lineup disasterous. Sure there's no Halo or Mario 64, but there have been plenty of successful consoles with mediocre and even poor launch lineups. The PS2, easily the most successful console ever, had probably the worst launch lineup of any console ever (anybody remember Fantavision?).
Why is this getting so much press? CNN isn't exactly a bastion of gaming news. There's a similar article from the New York Post getting circulated today. I'll stick to Gamespot and Joystiq when I want to hear an opinion about the video game industry.
The question here is what happens with the Powerbooks if Apple introduces the Intel iBook first. Surely they're not going to have an iBook line that's more powerful than their current Powerbook offerings.
I count 4 non-sequels in the launch lineup: Gun, Kameo, Condemned, and King Kong, although I would probably lump the movie tie-in with sequels. You're generally not going to see a lot of original titles with a system launch. At this point it's all about economics and moving units. Only once the system has an installed base will you see developers taking real risks with their IPs.
You obviously haven't looked at the release list. Off the top of my head you have Kameo, Call of Duty 2, Condemned, King Kong, Quake 4, Gun, and Perfect Dark Zero as non-sport or racing titles that will be available on launch day. Of those, Kameo and COD2 have already recieved solid reviews and Condemned and King Kong have been getting stellar previews for months.
That's not true at all. Apple's last earnings report showed a 47% increase over last year in Macintosh sales. While that's not quite as impressive as the nearly 200% increase they showed in iPod sales, it's still incredibly good, especially when you compare that to the computer manufacturer growth rates and take into account the coming transition to Intel.
You obviously haven't tried gaming on a Mac lately. Sure there are a few developers (mainly Blizzard) that support the Mac platform for larger franchises, but for the most part Macs lag far behind PC's when it comes to gaming.
Guild Wars, Half Life 2, Battlefield 2, Doom 3, Rome: Total War, Pirates, San Andreas... Those are just a few of the major titles released recently that are not available for Mac gamers.
Furthermore, in the unlikely event that a big game does make it to the Mac, it is usually 6 to 12 months after the PC release.
Slashdot Mirror
I think the biggest problem with most of these services is that the technology just isn't there yet in the US, primarily the bandwidth. My personal favorite of the video download services is Xbox Live. For $6 I can watch a HD full length movie on my TV in my living room. The copy protection is restrictive, but it's usable. The biggest problem is the download time. It takes about 10 hrs to download the 6 GB file over my cable modem. At this rate, it's no longer an impulse buy. I have to think out ahead of time when I will want to watch the movie and plan accordingly. This puts it at about the same convenience level as Netflix, erasing any benefit it would have had.
For an in depth explanation I would point you to "The Undercover Economist" by Tim Harford. In short though, the answer is simply "that's what people are willing to pay".
I find it very ironic that the most apt rebuttal, I can think of, to the arguments you present would simply be to refer you to the very episode of Southpark that you reference with the way your formatted your post.
Product placement does have its place in some cases. The problem though, is that a product is usually placed at the exclusion of other products. Instead of getting a generic soda, you get a world where Pepsi is the only thing people drink, or Fords are the only cars anyone drives, or every billboard is for the exact same product. To me, these things detract from the experience just as much as the situation where all products are generic. I think there's a balance to be struck there. For instance, have a variety of different drinks in the game/movie but make only one of those brands a placed product.
This is essentially what the whole intelligent design movement is about, trying to provide a scientific basis for the biblical story of creation. The problem is that with such a strong and specific agenda behind it, it's inherently bad science.
True, the brunt of the blame for DRM rests on the shoulders of the copyright holders. However, the technology companies aren't blameless here. In some ways, the myriad of DRM schemes out there today hurt consumers just as much as simply having the DRM there in the first place. DRM would cause a lot less headaches if companies like Microsoft and Apple would settle on some standards.
In a perfect world, DRM wouldn't exist at all. But now that it's here, it's probably not going to go away for a long time. The onus is on the technology companies to make it a workable solution with as few headaches as possible for the consumer.
While I certainly don't approve of the way the current administration treats scientific research, the article seems to imply that it is bad for all science. No doubt the administration has hindered progress in areas that clash with its politics, such as climate change. However, there are plenty of areas not so politically turbulent that operate without interference. There are probably even some areas of scientific research that have benefited from the Bush administration, petroleum geology for instance. The Bush administration isn't necessarily bad for science, it's just bad for certain, politically sensitive, areas of science. I'm not taking issue with the report (like I said before, I don't approve of the way the administration has handled this), just the way that it has been presented.
Or... we could try to make them more efficient and cheaper! It's not like it's and either/or problem.
I imagine a lot of the same questions were asked when we first started the space program. "Why even go into space?" I mean, it's just a vast nothingness right? There are plenty of place on earth that remain to be explored, like deep oceans and the rain forests."
50 years later we have massive improvements in telecommunications, accurate weather forecasting, GPS, major breakthroughs in solar power, and a whole host of other new technologies that we discovered along the way. As with most science, you don't really know the full implications of something until after you've discovered it. Uncertainty doesn't always mean that a risk isn't worth taking.
The standard TV setup, with hundreds of numbered channels is a horrible way to organize your programming, and one of the main reasons why nobody can make a simple, easy to use remote for TV viewing. As our video content moves increasingly to the internet we'll hopefully see this fade away and be replaced by systems that organize programming more efficiently by genres instead of just randomly assigned numbers.
A high profile game's budget these days is probably somewhere around $15 million. Mark Rein's quote of $10 million for Gears of War is misleading because that figure does not take into account the cost of the Unreal 3 engine. At the highest end you have a game like Killzone 2, which is currently budgeted at $21 million.
From the article I read, it seems that a move into the portable device market stems more from the failure of Microsoft's hardware partners to produce something that can compete with the iPod rather than a desire to take on Nintendo and Sony at another level. I think this makes more sense since Microsoft probably views Apple as more of a threat to their overall corporate strategy than Sony or Nintendo. They probably would view gaming functionality as something that would differentiate such a device from the iPod rather than the primary function of the device.
PoP is more of a puzzle game, whereas Ninja Gaiden is more pure action oriented. The combat isn't nearly as satisfying, but the platforming elements and level design are extremely well done in the PoP games. The PoP games are also quite a bit slower paced than Ninja Gaiden (then again what game isn't?). The combat is fairly satisfying, if not a bit repetative, and the you'll get an actual storyline in PoP as opposed to whatever the crap that was in Ninja Gaiden. If you're wantin to play a PoP game, Sands of Time is a much better game than Warrior Within IMO.
I think you've got it backwards. They've been ripping off the musicians since the early days, then they ripped off the customers, now they're going back to the musicians one more time just in case they didn't strip them of everything had the first time around.
I would hardly consider the Xbox 360 launch lineup disasterous. Sure there's no Halo or Mario 64, but there have been plenty of successful consoles with mediocre and even poor launch lineups. The PS2, easily the most successful console ever, had probably the worst launch lineup of any console ever (anybody remember Fantavision?).
Why is this getting so much press? CNN isn't exactly a bastion of gaming news. There's a similar article from the New York Post getting circulated today. I'll stick to Gamespot and Joystiq when I want to hear an opinion about the video game industry.
The question here is what happens with the Powerbooks if Apple introduces the Intel iBook first. Surely they're not going to have an iBook line that's more powerful than their current Powerbook offerings.
Gamespot Kameo: 8.7
I count 4 non-sequels in the launch lineup: Gun, Kameo, Condemned, and King Kong, although I would probably lump the movie tie-in with sequels. You're generally not going to see a lot of original titles with a system launch. At this point it's all about economics and moving units. Only once the system has an installed base will you see developers taking real risks with their IPs.
You obviously haven't looked at the release list. Off the top of my head you have Kameo, Call of Duty 2, Condemned, King Kong, Quake 4, Gun, and Perfect Dark Zero as non-sport or racing titles that will be available on launch day. Of those, Kameo and COD2 have already recieved solid reviews and Condemned and King Kong have been getting stellar previews for months.
Not if you're buying them from Sony BMG.
That's not true at all. Apple's last earnings report showed a 47% increase over last year in Macintosh sales. While that's not quite as impressive as the nearly 200% increase they showed in iPod sales, it's still incredibly good, especially when you compare that to the computer manufacturer growth rates and take into account the coming transition to Intel.
You obviously haven't tried gaming on a Mac lately. Sure there are a few developers (mainly Blizzard) that support the Mac platform for larger franchises, but for the most part Macs lag far behind PC's when it comes to gaming. Guild Wars, Half Life 2, Battlefield 2, Doom 3, Rome: Total War, Pirates, San Andreas... Those are just a few of the major titles released recently that are not available for Mac gamers. Furthermore, in the unlikely event that a big game does make it to the Mac, it is usually 6 to 12 months after the PC release.
That's because KOTOR2, while a good game, is buggy as hell. It has absolutely nothing to do with the Xbox hardware.