Universal gaming devices

[LAGG]

Once stuff like the various steamboxes become more popular, developers will take them in consideration for making games that run just fine in those landmark setups.

 

[obsolescence_is_drm]

Once stuff like the various steamboxes become more popular, developers will take them in consideration for making games that run just fine in those landmark setups.

Yeah, whatever happened to the steam box? wasn't it supposed to be beta tested in Q1 2013?

Anyway, while I agree the PC is the closest to a universal gaming device with multiple content providers (Steam, Amazon, GMG,etc), PC gaming comes with its own set of problems. Localised monopolies such as EA's Origin, Battle.net will mean putting up with all sorts of DRM.

In addition, while knowledgeable PC gamers may know what to purchase or how to assemble a PC, the average consumer (or even gamer) will not be able, to say purchase a HP or dell PC and be assured that it will run the games they want to play, which pretty much will prevent widespread adoption from happening.

 

[WeepingAngels]

If I want to get the most recent Zelda or Mario, I have to buy the horridly designed Wii U or else I can't play those games. How exactly is that consumer-friendly?

If you want to get a Mustang, you have to get it from Ford. Do you expect the government to tell Ford that they are required by law to let GM build their own Mustang?

If I want to watch Spiderman 2 I don't have to put it in a DVD player made by Sony.

Well, can you buy the Warner Bros DVD or the 20th Century Fox DVD if you don't want to give Sony any money?

If there was a universal system, Nintendo would actually have to make their consoles good, or at least economically sound for the bargain buyers.

You don't like Nintendos' offering, don't buy it.

Basically, you're arguing for Nintendo to have the freedom to make poorly conceived and poorly optimized product because they know people will buy it to play the games.

Yes, that's correct. I don't really think Nintendos' products are poorly made, they run the software they are meant to.

There is also precedent for this. A long time ago, Nintendo (that's NES) Games had a chip in them that the system would recognize. If the chip was not present, the console refused to play the game. Another company (I forgot who but I don't have time to look it up again) began manufacturing products with a false chip that tricked the system into playing their games. Nintendo sued them but the court ruled that Nintendo was in the wrong by providing unfair barriers to the video game market.

Yes, let's go back to the Atari 2600 days where anyone can put anything on a console and sell it to unsuspecting buyers. What if you buy a game that breaks your console? That is one purpose of licensing.

 

[obsolescence_is_drm]

Well, it would seem to me that if gaming adopts a universal standard, there would be more competition among console providers (Sony, Samsung, Nintendo, etc) as well as content providers (game studios). True, there might be a patent fee to be paid to the creators of the new universal standard, which would be fair anyway for R&D efforts.

Eventually, competition and ease of consumer adoption would drive prices downward. I mean, whether it be blu ray or digital downloads, you can pretty much pick up those cheaply now.

The 3DO console attempted to do just that. The design was licensed to Panasonic, Sanyo and GoldStar, among others, who manufactured it. Unfortunately, it still cost $700, in 1993. Partly that's because the device was maybe a little too powerful, but partly because their whole business plan revolved around charging for the console, rather than game royalties.

Interesting. I am quite ignorant about the 3DO. So the idea of a widely-adopted universal standard has been tried and failed. But if Android can succeed in the smartphone arena, perhaps a new gaming standard would stand a chance?

 

[WeepingAngels]

You are free to add features of your own to the list. Those are examples. Use your imagination. Go nuts. The idea is any game should play on any platform, especially consoles, since those are modeled on set top boxes. That doesn't mean that the game will look precisely identically, or have the same default controllers, or built in options, etc. In other words the question is why do consoles get to be different from literally everything else.

One thing I did not mention before, the original Family Computer in Japan, while being the NES in the United States was actually a specification that anyone could manufacture. There are many different variations that coexisted happily along with Nintendo's own units.

EDITED: The first quote was an accident, but I see my screen name in there, so I will second the case that Nintendo by isolating itself, is largely locking itself out of the culture.

Any gaming features Nintendo adds to universal hardware will either be ignored or games will be made that only operate on Nintendos' version. A game console is not like a DVD player.

Now I know that you don't like the Wii U, neither do I but under this universal system of yours....would all handhelds be like the 3DS or like the Vita?

 

[obsolescence_is_drm]

An analogy would be blu ray/dvds for the movie industry. You buy a blu ray/dvd from any studio and it will work on any number of blu ray players manufactured by different companies

Because it doesn't take much to play a video. You can do it on anything. As much as it infuriates the "hardcore gamers" processing power matters. You also have to factor in price. Sure they could make a console with the power of an Nvidia Titan but not a lot of people would want to spend that much money. You thus have to find a balance between specs, price, and features. Therefore we have options with pc being the closest thing to universal platform. Except its only universal if you only want to use Windows and install whatever drm client the publishers demand

I would argue that to get a "good enough" gaming experience, you certainly do not need an Nvidia Titan. A mid-range card (660 perhaps) will be sufficient. Isn't that exactly why the most successful PC games are Sims, LoL and WOW? Becuz they are hardly resource taxing. If there were a universal standard adopted widely by multiple manufacturers, surely the economies of scale would push prices of mid-range components down to a level where consumers are willing to take the bait.

 

[WeepingAngels]

You are free to add features of your own to the list. Those are examples. Use your imagination. Go nuts. The idea is any game should play on any platform, especially consoles, since those are modeled on set top boxes. That doesn't mean that the game will look precisely identically, or have the same default controllers, or built in options, etc. In other words the question is why do consoles get to be different from literally everything else.

One thing I did not mention before, the original Family Computer in Japan, while being the NES in the United States was actually a specification that anyone could manufacture. There are many different variations that coexisted happily along with Nintendo's own units.

EDITED: The first quote was an accident, but I see my screen name in there, so I will second the case that Nintendo by isolating itself, is largely locking itself out of the culture.

Any gaming features Nintendo adds to universal hardware will either be ignored or games will be made that only operate on Nintendos' version. A game console is not like a DVD player.

Now I know that you don't like the Wii U, neither do I but under this universal system of yours....would all handhelds be like the 3DS or like the Vita?

Not all DVD players are alike either, but they all play DVDs.

Game consoles are not as simple as DVD players.

So....are you going to answer the 3DS or Vita question?

 

[WeepingAngels]

You are free to add features of your own to the list. Those are examples. Use your imagination. Go nuts. The idea is any game should play on any platform, especially consoles, since those are modeled on set top boxes. That doesn't mean that the game will look precisely identically, or have the same default controllers, or built in options, etc. In other words the question is why do consoles get to be different from literally everything else.

One thing I did not mention before, the original Family Computer in Japan, while being the NES in the United States was actually a specification that anyone could manufacture. There are many different variations that coexisted happily along with Nintendo's own units.

EDITED: The first quote was an accident, but I see my screen name in there, so I will second the case that Nintendo by isolating itself, is largely locking itself out of the culture.

Any gaming features Nintendo adds to universal hardware will either be ignored or games will be made that only operate on Nintendos' version. A game console is not like a DVD player.

Now I know that you don't like the Wii U, neither do I but under this universal system of yours....would all handhelds be like the 3DS or like the Vita?

Not all DVD players are alike either, but they all play DVDs.

Game consoles are not as simple as DVD players.

So....are you going to answer the 3DS or Vita question?

Games are no different from movies. In movies you have buttons, play, rewind. In games you have buttons. In movies you have pictures, in games you have pictures. In movies you have sound, in games you have sound. This is a non argument.

3DS and Vita are the same. 3DS has some tacked on 3D function and another screen. You can read a book on a reader with one screen, or two screens (like a book usually has.)

LOL, movies and games are the same. The 3DS and the Vita are the same.

Are you trolling me?

Whatever, you win and I am done.

 

[PoolCleaningRobot]

An analogy would be blu ray/dvds for the movie industry. You buy a blu ray/dvd from any studio and it will work on any number of blu ray players manufactured by different companies

Because it doesn't take much to play a video. You can do it on anything. As much as it infuriates the "hardcore gamers" processing power matters. You also have to factor in price. Sure they could make a console with the power of an Nvidia Titan but not a lot of people would want to spend that much money. You thus have to find a balance between specs, price, and features. Therefore we have options with pc being the closest thing to universal platform. Except its only universal if you only want to use Windows and install whatever drm client the publishers demand

I would argue that to get a "good enough" gaming experience, you certainly do not need an Nvidia Titan. A mid-range card (660 perhaps) will be sufficient. Isn't that exactly why the most successful PC games are Sims, LoL and WOW? Becuz they are hardly resource taxing. If there were a universal standard adopted widely by multiple manufacturers, surely the economies of scale would push prices of mid-range components down to a level where consumers are willing to take the bait.

So what you're saying is, because a lot of people like something everyone should conform to that? How about fuck no. People can have their Sims and Wow, other people can have their Crysis's and Arma 2, and still others can have Angry Birds and Pokemon. All these games are suitable for different people with different wants on different platforms

There's no reason to have a universal system unless you just want every game to come out on every platform and the different in needs between them is too vast to satisfy everyone. I still use consoles cause I hate Windows' interface and I prefer physical games as opposed to drm clients. Others want hardware they can put together themselves. Some people want to game portably on touch screen cell phones and some people want a 3DS or Vita with games made for a specific set of hardware.

 

[Bad Jim]

There is also precedent for this. A long time ago, Nintendo (that's NES) Games had a chip in them that the system would recognize. If the chip was not present, the console refused to play the game. Another company (I forgot who but I don't have time to look it up again) began manufacturing products with a false chip that tricked the system into playing their games. Nintendo sued them but the court ruled that Nintendo was in the wrong by providing unfair barriers to the video game market.

Yes, let's go back to the Atari 2600 days where anyone can put anything on a console and sell it to unsuspecting buyers. What if you buy a game that breaks your console? That is one purpose of licensing.

I think the free market would take care of that problem. There is no centralised quality control on PC games either, yet there are many great PC exclusive games. Yes, there is also Big Rigs, but PC gaming has not drowned in a tide of shit and disappeared. And consoles are not immune to shit games, like Aliens Colonial Marines or Duke Nukem Forever.

There were other reasons for the video game crash of 1983. Many games Atari made were also shit. And the consoles of the era were shit as well. Story was impossible, levels large enough for meaningful exploration were impossible, and graphics realistic enough that you could see what they were meant to be without consulting the manual were rare.

 

[WeepingAngels]

There is also precedent for this. A long time ago, Nintendo (that's NES) Games had a chip in them that the system would recognize. If the chip was not present, the console refused to play the game. Another company (I forgot who but I don't have time to look it up again) began manufacturing products with a false chip that tricked the system into playing their games. Nintendo sued them but the court ruled that Nintendo was in the wrong by providing unfair barriers to the video game market.

Yes, let's go back to the Atari 2600 days where anyone can put anything on a console and sell it to unsuspecting buyers. What if you buy a game that breaks your console? That is one purpose of licensing.

I think the free market would take care of that problem. There is no centralised quality control on PC games either, yet there are many great PC exclusive games. Yes, there is also Big Rigs, but PC gaming has not drowned in a tide of shit and disappeared. And consoles are not immune to shit games, like Aliens Colonial Marines or Duke Nukem Forever.

There were other reasons for the video game crash of 1983. Many games Atari made were also shit. And the consoles of the era were shit as well. Story was impossible, levels large enough for meaningful exploration were impossible, and graphics realistic enough that you could see what they were meant to be without consulting the manual were rare.

You can justify the shit on the 2600 all you want and you can believe that it can never happen again. I believe otherwise.

 

[Bocaj2000]

Honestly, I see the OP's idea as the inevitable conclusion. Exclusives have no practical reason to exist anymore due to cross-platform porting being easier than ever before. This is especially true if they are using the same type of disk. Publishers aren't stupid enough to exclude an entire portion of their audience due to brand loyalty anymore. With the next gen of consoles, you're no longer paying for the exclusives, but the services. You are now asking yourself, "What is the PS4 doing that the XB1 isn't?" and vice versa. When the public deemed Sony's service better than Microsoft, they changed policy. We are closer than ever to eliminating exclusives entirely, and it's a future I'm looking forward to.

EDIT: I'm seeing the word Monopoly thrown around a lot. This is an uneducated assumption about universal formats. Many companies make USBs, CDs, DVDs, and VHSs. Even if they didn't there are numerous companies that produce machines to run these formats.

 

[WeepingAngels]

Honestly, I see the OP's idea as the inevitable conclusion. Exclusives have no practical reason to exist anymore due to cross-platform porting being easier than ever before. This is especially true if they are using the same type of disk. Publishers aren't stupid enough to exclude an entire portion of their audience due to brand loyalty anymore. With the next gen of consoles, you're no longer paying for the exclusives, but the services. You are now asking yourself, "What is the PS4 doing that the XB1 isn't?" and vice versa. When the public deemed Sony's service better than Microsoft, they changed policy. We are closer than ever to eliminating exclusives entirely, and it's a future I'm looking forward to.

EDIT: I'm seeing the word Monopoly thrown around a lot. This is an uneducated assumption about universal formats. Many companies make USBs, CDs, DVDs, and VHSs. Even if they didn't there are numerous companies that produce machines to run these formats.

So you think that because Microsoft changed the One to please consumers, that they will now be releasing Halo on the PS4 and/or Wii U?

 

[Bad Jim]

There is also precedent for this. A long time ago, Nintendo (that's NES) Games had a chip in them that the system would recognize. If the chip was not present, the console refused to play the game. Another company (I forgot who but I don't have time to look it up again) began manufacturing products with a false chip that tricked the system into playing their games. Nintendo sued them but the court ruled that Nintendo was in the wrong by providing unfair barriers to the video game market.

Yes, let's go back to the Atari 2600 days where anyone can put anything on a console and sell it to unsuspecting buyers. What if you buy a game that breaks your console? That is one purpose of licensing.

I think the free market would take care of that problem. There is no centralised quality control on PC games either, yet there are many great PC exclusive games. Yes, there is also Big Rigs, but PC gaming has not drowned in a tide of shit and disappeared. And consoles are not immune to shit games, like Aliens Colonial Marines or Duke Nukem Forever.

There were other reasons for the video game crash of 1983. Many games Atari made were also shit. And the consoles of the era were shit as well. Story was impossible, levels large enough for meaningful exploration were impossible, and graphics realistic enough that you could see what they were meant to be without consulting the manual were rare.

You can justify the shit on the 2600 all you want and you can believe that it can never happen again. I believe otherwise.

There main thrust of my argument is not that a second crash is impossible. I am saying that an open platform will not cause another crash. The PC is open and has not caused a crash. The Commodore 64 and Amiga were open platforms which were mainly used for gaming and they did not cause a crash. Nor did any other home computer, which were pretty much all open platforms.

You are ignoring all these open platforms that did not cause a crash, and focusing on one open platform that caused a crash, and somehow concluding that all open platforms will cause a crash.

 

[Imperioratorex Caprae]

One thing I like about Nintendo is that they try to raise the bar with every console. They aren't carbon copies of their competitors, they do attempt to break the mold and the competition tries to parrot them. Innovation to differentiate their product makes them forward thinkers. It doesn't always work, but they still have the most successful handheld in the market, and the Wii despite its awkward control scheme did very well. Maybe motion controls aren't your bag, thats fine and dandy... there's two other consoles for you.