Consoles and Exclusives: Is there a point to it anymore?

[Evonisia]

Exclusives aren't necessarily helpful for developers either, because they limit the share of the market they can sell their games to. So when a developer makes a game system-exclusive when they could sell it across a variety of platforms, they're taking a risk of some sort; With consoles, it's usually in exchange for some sort of concession from the console manufacturer like marketing support, localization, or even funding (Bayonetta 2 on the WiiU, or Halo on the Xbox series are examples).

In all fairness to Halo, I think I remember that Bungie stated that they couldn't get Halo to work on the PlayStation 2 anyway, but that was before the PlayStation 3 and all of Microsoft's shenanigans to promote the hell out of Halo 3.

 

[Atmos Duality]

In all fairness to Halo, I think I remember that Bungie stated that they couldn't get Halo to work on the PlayStation 2 anyway, but that was before the PlayStation 3 and all of Microsoft's shenanigans to promote the hell out of Halo 3.

I'd be stunned if Microsoft actually allowed them a serious attempt at a PS2 port, given that M$ owned Bungie outright during Halo's development and such a port would present a considerable conflict of interest for them. (plus, it was Halo that saved the Xbox in its infancy; I doubt they would have ever given up their ONLY real killer app at the time)

PC, I can understand since Halo for PC only really worked on Windows.
(somewhat badly, on launch. I had WEIRD freaking issues with it back in the day, like the Specular Lighting not working properly. An effect that basically keeps 90% of the game's textures and explosion effects from looking like total ass. Halo looks worse than Quake 2 without that effect, I shit you not.)

Granted, the PS2's Emotion Engine was still fairly enigmatic to developers around 2000-2002, I can't imagine trying to actually port something as weirdly optimized as Halo to it.

 

[Vegosiux]

Well, that's great. But everyone that loves God of War certainly would miss it. And they'd be mad at the people who didn't support God of War "Because it was Exclusive".

Yeah, those damn people who spent their own money on what they wanted to spend it on instead of on God of War.

Yes, but you said you wanted to tell Game Developers to stop making Exclusives, and you said we all had to come together and stop buying exclusives in order for that to happen. Many Exclusive series are beloved, and killing off all Exclusives because of their Exclusivity is pretty dumb.

The exclusives already existing aren't going to poof out of existance, but with enough interest and potential extra market, ports could be made, eliminating exclusivity as a concept, yet killing no actual games. As for future games, well, develop them as multiplatform from the get-go, and none of them will get the axe.

Doesn't matter; if it stops selling on One Console, the makers are going to assume it will not sell anywhere period. They aren't going to say "Oh, it didn't sell on the PS3, so maybe the next game in the series will be a Multiplatform that's on the PS3, XBox 360 and Wii as well". They're going to kill off the Series. Your wish to end the Exclusiveness of series will only lead to the mass death of those series.

As I said, doesn't matter whether it's exclusive or not. If a franchise doesn't sell, it's liable to get axed. Exclusive or not.

And I won't be arguing that Playstation Users are different from PC and XBox ones, because they're not. But your plan would not make those Playstation Exclusives Multiplatform games.

How about future ones?

Man, I am completely and utterly surprised by how many people that are anti-exclusive think that Companies will not screw us over. Microsoft's PR Debacle proves they would try to screw us over: They thought they had a loyal fanbase that would stick with them through thick and thin, but they didn't, and their competition was playing against their debacle, so they had to bow down. Without Sony and Nintendo's alternatives, they would have never bowed down. Companies are all about money, and making as much of it as possible.

Now I have to ask you something: Why?! Why do you trust any company to not screw us over? If their is only one company in charge of Consoles, regardless of tiering, regardless of using other companies to make it, then why would they not try to screw us over?!

Where did I say I do? But taking away one way of them screwing us over is better for as than not taking away any way of screwing us over. This is a complete strawman.

 

[Pink Gregory]

Well presumably current/next gen consoles are so similar in their architecture that we can't bring the practice of developing for a standardised hardware i.e. one console or another? Hence why we hear of inferior ports because the game was developed for a certain console 'from the ground up'. I'm thinking specifically of the slight inferiority of the PS2 port of Killer7 compared to the original Gamecube version. It's only some slight slowdown and some muddying of the textures, but it shows.

But again, I don't really know anything about the next gen (and don't really care), but I'm again assuming that they're similar enough for the above to not be a factor.

I 'unno, I don't personally mind first-party exclusives. I'm not particularly hurting that I won't get to play X or Y. Console-exclusive content in multiplats, that can fuck right off though.

 

[JamesK2]

Imho consoles are waste of money. Most of games come for PC too. Why would you buy a console if you can buy a better PC?

 

[GoaThief]

Seems like the right thread for this: http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2013/11/05/valve-shows-off-steam-hardware-promises-no-exclusives/

"If it can run in both places, we don?t like to create those artificial barriers to accessing content. We believe that, in maybe five years from now, folks will find it a quite antiquated notion that you should assume that when you change devices or platforms, that you lose all of your other games and friends. We?re hoping to unify, to get Steam to be as platform- and context-agnostic as possible. You shouldn?t have to shed that every generation, or even slightly shed it."

Exclusives are a stupid, consumer-hostile notion that should have died off a long time ago.

"Sorry kid! You can only watch Finding Nemo on SONY DVD players!"
"Hold up there Ma'am, Peaches are only available with Frigidaire!"
"Sorry buddy, ESSO gas is exclusive to Ramblers! You're stuck!"

The same Valve who made Half Life 2 an original Xbox console exclusive? The same Valve who had exclusive deals with Sony regarding Steamworks and even gave ALL PS3 Portal 2 purchasers a free PC copy whilst 360 fans languished in a solo Portal hell.

Yup, they totally don't do that exclusive thing. PR is PR, even if it comes from a company you like. They aren't above it by any stretch of the imagination.

 

[WeepingAngels]

Exclusives are how consoles distinguish themselves while still being similar enough to have multiplat games. I can't see the problem with this model.

 

[Lightknight]

Exclusives are only there to blackmail you into buying a console. There's no point to them other than that, oh and guess by extension make money for the producers.

This is the most concise, correct answer to the topic's question I've seen thus far.

"Blackmail" is hilariously overshooting the scope of things. That's like saying that a restaurant that has a secret recipe everyone loves is just "blackmailing" people into going to their restaurant for it. No, this is the definition of producing a good product.

Exclusives are most commonly developed and/or published BY the console manufacturer. Complaining that them only putting something they developed on their own consoles is silly.

This thing with Titanfall is a bit ridiculous though. It's a third party publisher (EA) who likely did NOT benefit from any exclusivity. But there are several explanations for why EA might do this (for example, when they signed the contract they may have still thought that the XBO was going to have that insane DRM that EA loves).

I think this generation will continue to see the severe decline of third party exclusives. We're already seeing it with the likes of Metal Gear Solid for example and we saw it last generation from Square Enix titles like the FF series. There's generally too much money to make across platforms for any console company to adequately compensate the publisher (the ones who decide who the game is made for) for exclusivity and the big boys all being x86 makes porting very simple.

Instead, we'll see more first party content. Sony really shone this generation in this area with a significant IP offering across the board, though they've been doing great with that since the ps1's entry which is the only reason they toppled the reigning king when they did. Microsoft took home the shooters (Halo, Gears of War) and sports games but didn't really bring new IPs to the table and multi-platform shooters like COD are now available with any Titanfall sequels not being console exclusive (according to the dev). Nintendo brought new peripherals in that changed everything while generally failing to create any new IPs that weren't just extensions of the peripheral and have failed to gain 3rd party support this generation.

So I think Sony has the advantage here with an already robust lineup of IPs and studios geared towards new IPs. I'm not sure why Microsoft isn't better at the software since their studios are technically the largest in the world. Nintendo's content is getting stale and even they have realized this. So we may see a significant move from them in the next few years on the IP front. Microsoft may take some time to get up to speed with this but we'll start to see more compelling reasons to buy systems shortly or those systems will die.

 

[Atmos Duality]

"Blackmail" is hilariously overshooting the scope of things. That's like saying that a restaurant that has a secret recipe everyone loves is just "blackmailing" people into going to their restaurant for it. No, this is the definition of producing a good product.

OK, blackmail might be too strong of dysphemism, but the point remains.

I will add that exclusivity doesn't always imply better quality of a given product, only its availability in the greater market at large. Everything else I've already covered conceptually, or don't have any further comments on.

 

[Lightknight]

"Blackmail" is hilariously overshooting the scope of things. That's like saying that a restaurant that has a secret recipe everyone loves is just "blackmailing" people into going to their restaurant for it. No, this is the definition of producing a good product.

OK, blackmail might be too strong of dysphemism, but the point remains.

I will add that exclusivity doesn't always imply better quality of a given product, only its availability in the greater market at large. Everything else I've already covered conceptually, or don't have any further comments on.

The point being that they produce quality products to give customers a reason to come to them? Is the remaining point a negative one? It's sounds to me like a basic business principle.

If the product isn't a quality product, then we don't care about it. We're talking about the hugely popular exclusives like the Last of Us, Uncharted, inFamous, Halo, Gears of War, Journey, Mario, etc. The things people actually want to play.

 

[Atmos Duality]

The point being that they produce quality products to give customers a reason to come to them? Is the remaining point a negative one?

If the product isn't a quality product, then we don't care about it. We're talking about the hugely popular exclusives like the Last of Us, Uncharted, inFamous, Halo, Gears of War, Journey, Mario, etc. The things people actually want to play.

I'm not talking about just good exclusives; I'm talking about ALL exclusives.
For example, several games in the Sonic the Hedgehog franchise are system exclusive, and are quite awful.

The existence of quality exclusive games is not sufficient proof to assume exclusivity implies quality.
So please, stop Moving the Goalposts.

 

[Mr.Mattress]

SNIP

1) A lot of those people would still want to pay for a God Of War sequel, Exclusive or Not. Just like there are still people waiting for a Psychonauts Sequel, even though it won't happen for a long, long, long time.

2) The Exclusives already in existence would go Poof if they stop selling. They are Not going to be making anymore games in that series, exclusive or Multiplatform, if they stop selling. Take Mass Effect for Example: Do you honestly think EA would support a Multiplatform Sequel if the original Mass Effect didn't sell? How about Epic Mickey: Would there be a Second Epic Mickey if the first one was a complete failure on the Wii? No! If these games didn't sell on their Exclusive Console, the Sequels would not be made.

And it's very nice and dandy that all the new games that would be would be Multiplatform, but it would be at the expense of Mario, Halo, God of War, Gears of War, Knack, Little Big Planet, Link, Kirby, Donkey Kong, Forza, Titanfall, Pokemon, Resistance, Uncharted, The Last of Us, Metroid, Star Fox, and countless more simply because the masses didn't buy them "Because they're Exclusives".

3) Yeah, and if God of War stopped Selling "Because it's Exclusive", then it wouldn't get any more Games!

4) The Future ones, yes. But a lot of people would be pissed off at the loss of the old ones. Also, it would be a strain on Sony and their First Party Companies to port those games to the XBone and WiiU, just as it would Strain Nintendo and Microsoft.

5) If you take away Exclusives (Which I don't even see as Screwing us over, but I won't argue that), then the Competition between the Consoles will cease to have a point, and whoever happens to win simply happens to win. However, the Company with the Console that wins will know they can take advantage of us in the same way Itunes and Steam do: They'll start sneaking in things in Contracts every time you update it (Like you can't sue them for a faulty product, or that they are allowed to spy on you everytime your on), they'll start pushing out their competition through sneaky manipulative ways (They'll make their machine and OS Superior while keeping it cheap, making the other competitors a waste of time and space, as well as the fact that Brand loyalty will be strong, especially in the United States), and they will deny you basic consumer rights (Like Microsoft tried to do).

Not only that, but if you Kill Exclusives, then All Games are gonna be exclusive because 70-90% of Gamers will own one type of Console, so why would the Game Makers bother making their games for the consoles with less then 10% each? It'd be like Nintendo in the Late 80's all over again! And don't tell me "Oh, that was the 80's! That won't happen again" because you and I both know that it could happen again, regardless of whether you think it would or wouldn't. The idea of Getting rid of exclusives is only a good thing in the short run, and then in the long run someone will basically monopolize the industry! So is getting rid of one way of them "Screwing you Over" worth the extra 80 ways they can? I certainly don't think so...

 

[Lightknight]

I'm not talking about just good exclusives; I'm talking about ALL exclusives.
For example, several games in the Sonic the Hedgehog franchise are system exclusive, and are quite awful.

Are you claiming that them being available for other systems would somehow make their game better?

The existence of quality exclusive games is not sufficient proof to assume exclusivity implies quality.
So please, stop Moving the Goalposts.

If the exclusives aren't good, we don't care. Do you disagree? We don't care about missing shitty exclusives. We care about the good ones that everyone raves about. The ones that are on a system we don't have that we wish we could play. Sonic's bastardization doesn't fit that criteria in most cases.

 

[Doom972]

Yes their is. IF they want my money then they had better give me a reason to buy their systems (aka the exclusives).

You'd have to pick one system to play your games on anyway, unless you found a way to interface directly with game discs using special powers. If exclusivity didn't exist, you would just have to pick a system based on its own merits, rather than what games it holds hostage.

 

[Mikeyfell]

Well, console exclusives are the only point... Right?

All the consoles are basically the same (And the PC isn't that far off)
So the only reason to get one console over the other is for the exclusives.


Or maybe it's all an illusion and people are really stupid.

I wonder if there were no exclusives what would happen.
The only real change would be that people wouldn't buy multiple consoles, but other than that I doubt anything would change.

I mean I don't actually like any of the Xbox exclusive games but I still prefer it to the PS3 because of the controller and User Interface.

But all my JRPG's are PS3 exclusives so I'm kind of in a pickle and the only easy way out is to buy both.

 

[Atmos Duality]

Are you claiming that them being available for other systems would somehow make their game better?

Absolutely not.
For the last time: EXCLUSIVITY IS NOT A FACTOR FOR QUALITY.

An exclusive game can be good. An exclusive game can be shit. Or anywhere between.
Conversely, a NON-Exclusive game be any of those things.

Therefore, the only thing that exclusivity actually changes is the share of the market that a game can be sold to.
That's LITERALLY why it's called exclusive.

So, if exclusivity doesn't ensure an increase in quality, why does the market need it?
Short answer: It doesn't.
Long Answer: I've covered this way back in my original post in this thread. Look it up if you care.

If the exclusives aren't good, we don't care. Do you disagree? We don't care about missing shitty exclusives. We care about the good ones that everyone raves about.

How do I put this...

If the games aren't good, we don't care. Do you disagree? We don't care about missing shitty games. We care about the good ones that everyone raves about.

There, now it's even more accurate.

The ones that are on a system we don't have that we wish we could play. Sonic's bastardization doesn't fit that criteria in most cases.

Most doesn't mean all.
Sonic's "bastardization", like on the Wii and Kinect exclusive games, fits my assertion perfectly.
That you can't assume exclusivity will lead to better quality.

Guys guys guys, I have one argument as to why Exclusives are a good thing. Now, we can argue that Exclusives really don't do much for gaming or gamers, and that there's no point to exclusives, but let's ignore those. The Argument is: Without Exclusives, there's no point to multiple consoles, thus only one console would exist, and thus we would have one console owning a monopoly. And when in the world has a Monopoly ever been a good thing?

So, Exclusives prevent Monopolies. Case closed.

Exclusivity means exactly that; it excludes part of the market that a product can be sold to.
It is, in fact, an anti-competitive practice with very limited utility to the market.
Which invalidates your claim of exclusives "preventing monopolies".

Finally, a console with a monopoly would logically have every game exclusive to it. Ironic, no?

Case overruled.

 

[Mr.Mattress]

You'd have to pick one system to play your games on anyway, unless you found a way to interface directly with game discs using special powers. If exclusivity didn't exist, you would just have to pick a system based on its own merits, rather than what games it holds hostage.

But I have to ask: What if there is only one real choice? What if that one choice is still the worst to pick from? Let's say that Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo all make Consoles, but that Microsoft is the one with the most Consoles out there (Let's say 80% of Consoles on the Market are Microsoft made), and let's say their next Console version of the Console is akin to their original idea for the XBone, but with the added bonus of signing a Contract that says "You can't sue us for a faulty product, and we can spy on you 24/7". Nintendo and Sony don't have these restrictions. However, the XBone is only 99$, has the best Operating System for a Console, has the most customers and brand loyalty, so anyone picking another console is "Uncool", and that it has the best Resolution and Technical Spec. Is there still a real choice in the matter? Do you want the best machine that treats it's customers like crap, or do you want a console that, while it can still play all the same games, is more expensive, harder to use, is branded as "Uncool" to have, makes all those games look worse, and the only reason you'd buy it because of policies they might have to end up getting?

There's no real choice if one Console ends up dominating anyways. And that's what would happen if Exclusives stopped existing, It'd be the late 80's all over again...

 

[Doom972]

Yes their is. IF they want my money then they had better give me a reason to buy their systems (aka the exclusives).

You'd have to pick one system to play your games on anyway, unless you found a way to interface directly with game discs using special powers. If exclusivity didn't exist, you would just have to pick a system based on its own merits, rather than what games it holds hostage.

I have to ask, do you consider PC exclusive games as being held hostage? If you don't then why is that not being held hostage where as a console exclusive is being held hostage?

When a game is exclusive to a certain console, it is usually because of a deal between the publisher/developer and the console maker: The console maker pays the publisher/developer for its exclusivity, and in turn the exclusivity has the potential of selling more of that specific console. PC exclusivity always a matter of personal preference or convenience. No company will pay a publisher/developer to make their game PC exclusive, because there's no single company that makes PCs. So in the case of the PC, I can't call it being held hostage. It's also worth noting that if a PC exclusive game does well, it usually gets a console version. Those that do not are games that can't be played effectively with console controls, such as RTS games.

 

[Doom972]

You'd have to pick one system to play your games on anyway, unless you found a way to interface directly with game discs using special powers. If exclusivity didn't exist, you would just have to pick a system based on its own merits, rather than what games it holds hostage.

But I have to ask: What if there is only one real choice? What if that one choice is still the worst to pick from? Let's say that Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo all make Consoles, but that Microsoft is the one with the most Consoles out there (Let's say 80% of Consoles on the Market are Microsoft made), and let's say their next Console version of the Console is akin to their original idea for the XBone, but with the added bonus of signing a Contract that says "You can't sue us for a faulty product, and we can spy on you 24/7". Nintendo and Sony don't have these restrictions. However, the XBone is only 99$, has the best Operating System for a Console, has the most customers and brand loyalty, so anyone picking another console is "Uncool", and that it has the best Resolution and Technical Spec. Is there still a real choice in the matter? Do you want the best machine that treats it's customers like crap, or do you want a console that, while it can still play all the same games, is more expensive, harder to use, is branded as "Uncool" to have, makes all those games look worse, and the only reason you'd buy it because of policies they might have to end up getting?

There's no real choice if one Console ends up dominating anyways. And that's what would happen if Exclusives stopped existing, It'd be the late 80's all over again...

But why do you think that with no exclusives a single console will dominate? There will be competition between console makers and you'll have the console makers doing their best to create their console, and you'll get it for a good price.