What have people got against exclusivity?

[pulse2]

Exclusivity isn't necessarily a bad thing, but not everyone has the money to pay for every console under the sun.

/thread, as far as I'm concerned. Look, if I really want to play a game, I can set aside 60 euro in a month for a game. Setting aside enough money for a console that costs as much as my monthly rent + 60 euro is just not going to fucking happen. I don't get how this is not clear to anybody.

But then nobody is forcing you to do so, it's entirely your choice in the matter, if you felt a single game as opposed to various games was enough to make you buy a console, then that is your prerogative, no one has the right to tell you that that is a stupid idea for you will find value in that idea that no one else will find in the same way a female may want an expensive handbag from a different brand when she already has expensive handbags from other brands.

People upgraded and bought new PCs just to play Crysis . Not something I quite understand, but hey, who am I to judge? At least they can say that in doing so, they used the new specs to play other games within that graphical capacity afterwards as well in the same way I would think someone who buys a console initially for 1 game may find more games they like as well, thus their purchase has MORE value.

But this is speaking as if any of that is relevant to you or anyone else who thinks buying a console for 1 game is fine or stupid.

 

[Mylinkay Asdara]

I don't mind the exclusivity of an entire title or series to a specific platform (console, handheld, PC, etc.) - what gets under my skin is DLC and bonus content that is exclusive to a platform on a game that is multi-platform.

Both consumers paid for the same game, expecting the same opportunities to expand it, and had no way of predicting that the game would be "better" on one system or another with exclusive content. That's a big F-you to me as a consumer, where having your whole enterprise exclusive to a platform your company chooses in advance (with, in other words, my full knowledge before my own purchase commitment) is not.

 

[Callate]

Because it's often little more than an attempt to enforce brand loyalty at the customer's expense.

Not always. If your game really needs a hard drive, or a Kinect, or a Sixaxis controller, or a mouse-and-keyboard interface, or a certain amount of computing power, I don't hold it against anyone. I also recognize that there are additional costs in making a cross-platform title, and depending on demographics and so forth it may well be recognized that it simply isn't a good investment. I also think most gamers would agree that given a choice between a really good game on one platform and a severely compromised one on three or four because of trying to stretch a development budget and shooting for the lowest common denominator rather than optimizing on a system-strength-by-system-strength basis, it would be better to make a really good game for one platform.

If someone in the back room simply bribed or threatened the higher-ups in a development team to gain bragging rights on a promising title, though... I don't have a lot of patience for that. There are an awful lot of good games that have just about zero credible reasons to be exclusive in the ways that they are, and a lot of games that never get played by people who would appreciate them because of business dealings that had squat-all to do with the games themselves.

It's a pity there hasn't been a straight-up legal console emulator for the PC since the freaking 3DO... Imagine how much complaining we could do away with if it weren't for all this jockeying for position in consumers' homes and hearts.

 

[teebeeohh]

if a whole franchise is exclusive to a platform i don't care, what annoys me is when it's sequels and such. Also: did PC gamers start hating the old west while i wasn't looking or why is there still no PC version of RDR?

 

[pulse2]

So I ask you this escapists, is exclusivity all that bad? In what cases do you think it is a stupid decision and what benefits do you think all games and dlc (in an ideal world) being multiplat would have?

Heavenly Sword was also one of the few ps3 launch titles and vaguely reminded people of gow.
Personally I don?t understand how any gamer can appreciate exclusives when ?exclusivity? does absolutely nothing for the consumer unless said consumer is some really obnoxious fanboy who loves shadenfreude more than the actual games. All it does is create this absurd system wherein the consumer might have to purchase a few different consoles to play the games they want to play.
It?s amazing people put up with it.
Can you imagine what would?ve happened if dvd players only played dvds from certain studios? We would still be watching vhs tapes. And e readers would?ve never caught on if some publishers only published on one companies readers.

While I appreciate your point, I do tend to think that our buying habits are largely based upon what we PERSONALLY desire, if everything were the same thing and did the same thing, there would be no business competition and to be honest we as consumers would feel bored. Lol, while the competitive spirit is in all of us whether we like it or not, I suppose it would be nice if we had nothing to compare, but then buy having nothing to compare in games, we'd find to compare in other trivial things.

I suppose if I was to be annoyed by exclusivity it would be more that fact of 'buying' exclusivity as opposed to 'making' ones own exclusive titles in the same way Nintendo does with theirs because at the end of the say, consoles NEED exclusives whether we like it or not in order to survive. Why spend the same amount on console A when console B has the same games, feature + more? We like more, we don't like less, otherwise we wouldn't be buying new phones to get all the latest stuff, we'd just stick with our old phones for convenience and cost saving.

So when we going to buy a console, whether we like it or not, we look at the games, oh but wait, they have the same games, so why should I buy one over the other? Well because console C has games and features more fitting to my taste then A & B do. Simples

It may come across a bit fanboyous, but it makes us who we are, I certainly don't like all the same games and features as you, I can almost guarantee that.

 

[FinalHeart95]

I don't hate exclusives, but I don't necessarily enjoy them either.

I just don't like when people actually prefer exclusives because they like seeing people miss out on games. That annoys me.

 

[FalloutJack]

I'm afraid exclusives are the symptom of a strange disease where the developers of a game seem to become allergic to money. You see, the point of a developer is to make money by creating games and selling them. The more you do, the more that you're likely to make. If you exclude an entire HALF of the possible revenue you could be getting for this game by not making it for Playstation or X-Box or something, you have obviously beaten your head in stupid with a brick at some point.

Remember the creators of Oddworld? Remember how they sunk very very VERY fast as soon as they went "Hi! We're developing exclusively for Microsoft now!"? They had such huge plans for Oddworld and they still do, but it's never going to happen because they haven't wised up yet. Many exclusives are like this, and while some are successful still...you just know they could've been twice as great at least if they weren't exclusives at all.

But for some reason, some strange reason, the people in charge get this idea that somehow...one system is going to sell better than the other and the rest are somehow gonna bomb. I think we know that this is not the case. Ah, correction... I think anyone of us who aren't ridiculous elitist know-it-alls are aware of this fact. Yeah, see... It's reasonable for one game to be done on another system, so I don't see any logical course for exclusives at all.

 

[pulse2]

I'm afraid exclusives are the symptom of a strange disease where the developers of a game seem to become allergic to money. You see, the point of a developer is to make money by creating games and selling them. The more you do, the more that you're likely to make. If you exclude an entire HALF of the possible revenue you could be getting for this game by not making it for Playstation or X-Box or something, you have obviously beaten your head in stupid with a brick at some point.

Remember the creators of Oddworld? Remember how they sunk very very VERY fast as soon as they went "Hi! We're developing exclusively for Microsoft now!"? They had such huge plans for Oddworld and they still do, but it's never going to happen because they haven't wised up yet. Many exclusives are like this, and while some are successful still...you just know they could've been twice as great at least if they weren't exclusives at all.

But for some reason, some strange reason, the people in charge get this idea that somehow...one system is going to sell better than the other and the rest are somehow gonna bomb. I think we know that this is not the case. Ah, correction... I think anyone of us who aren't ridiculous elitist know-it-alls are aware of this fact. Yeah, see... It's reasonable for one game to be done on another system, so I don't see any logical course for exclusives at all.

Well in the case of the Oddworld series and developers, it's not so much that they went exclusive, its the fact they went exclusive on a launch console that few were interested in buying at the time, not only that, changed the entire 'fun' aspect of the Oddworld games for the sake of 3D graphics etc.

Exclusivity isn't always a bad thing, nor does multiplatform automatically = success. More multiplatform developers have gone bust then exclusive platform developers. Why? Because everything is far more expensive then it used to be, so when Sony, Nintendo or Microsoft come up to you and say "Hey, we like your idea and we realise it will be expensive to make and market on our console, how about we help you out, give you cash to get it going, give you the best tools to make it perfect AND we handle all the marketing for you, all you need to do is go exclusive", is that so irrational? From a developer's standpoint, that right there = more chance of your game doing well as opposed to you handling it yourself + cost cutting. If multiplatform games made so much more money then exclusives, why is it all the big multiplatform gaming developers keep coming out with a loss on this and a loss on that. Square just suffered major losses despite making FF13 multiplat and it wasn't JUST because of FF14. Disney got hit with losses despite releasing Split/Second multiplat which sold a measly 500k or something, barely hitting a mill, yet in comparison a single motostorm game sold at least thrice that despite being exclusive.

For consumers, it makes the choice of picking a console forsomething or another a little easier though it may not have a DIRECT positive factor for consumers.

 

[GonzoGamer]

So I ask you this escapists, is exclusivity all that bad? In what cases do you think it is a stupid decision and what benefits do you think all games and dlc (in an ideal world) being multiplat would have?

Heavenly Sword was also one of the few ps3 launch titles and vaguely reminded people of gow.
Personally I don?t understand how any gamer can appreciate exclusives when ?exclusivity? does absolutely nothing for the consumer unless said consumer is some really obnoxious fanboy who loves shadenfreude more than the actual games. All it does is create this absurd system wherein the consumer might have to purchase a few different consoles to play the games they want to play.
It?s amazing people put up with it.
Can you imagine what would?ve happened if dvd players only played dvds from certain studios? We would still be watching vhs tapes. And e readers would?ve never caught on if some publishers only published on one companies readers.

While I appreciate your point, I do tend to think that our buying habits are largely based upon what we PERSONALLY desire, if everything were the same thing and did the same thing, there would be no business competition and to be honest we as consumers would feel bored. Lol, while the competitive spirit is in all of us whether we like it or not, I suppose it would be nice if we had nothing to compare, but then buy having nothing to compare in games, we'd find to compare in other trivial things.

I suppose if I was to be annoyed by exclusivity it would be more that fact of 'buying' exclusivity as opposed to 'making' ones own exclusive titles in the same way Nintendo does with theirs because at the end of the say, consoles NEED exclusives whether we like it or not in order to survive. Why spend the same amount on console A when console B has the same games, feature + more? We like more, we don't like less, otherwise we wouldn't be buying new phones to get all the latest stuff, we'd just stick with our old phones for convenience and cost saving.

So when we going to buy a console, whether we like it or not, we look at the games, oh but wait, they have the same games, so why should I buy one over the other? Well because console C has games and features more fitting to my taste then A & B do. Simples

It may come across a bit fanboyous, but it makes us who we are, I certainly don't like all the same games and features as you, I can almost guarantee that.

People buy new phones because the tech progresses. I have nothing against new consoles when the tech progresses enough.
I think that if all the game content was the same, people would still find other reasons to buy one console over another. When I bought my ps3, the 360 had all the big exclusives including the ?exclusive? dlc for gta4 - the first game I wanted to buy.
But I got the ps3 anyway because it didn?t have a 50% fail rate, there was no monthly fee, I got an hdtv & wanted a BR player, and they were saying that games would connect with the psp. So that last feature was immensely disappointing but it still illustrates my point: the consoles should distinguish themselves by features not ?exclusive? games. If the features defined the console we would see more interesting ones and when a feature is exploited we would probably see it fixed rather than taken out completely like OtherOS.
There are tons of companies that make money manufacturing dvd players, mp3 players, ebook readers, and yet all the actual media is interchangeable.
Which brings me to the subject (a llittle off topic sorry) of an industry standard. If all consoles used the same software, developers would spend less in development and platform developers would be trying harder to make their console worth buying. We would also probably have the benefit of additional companies making consoles, further bringing down the prices for all of us.
Choices always benefit the consumer however, it seems like the games industry is intent on giving us fewer choices and only because enough of us seem to put up with it.

 

[FalloutJack]

I'm afraid exclusives are the symptom of a strange disease where the developers of a game seem to become allergic to money. You see, the point of a developer is to make money by creating games and selling them. The more you do, the more that you're likely to make. If you exclude an entire HALF of the possible revenue you could be getting for this game by not making it for Playstation or X-Box or something, you have obviously beaten your head in stupid with a brick at some point.

Remember the creators of Oddworld? Remember how they sunk very very VERY fast as soon as they went "Hi! We're developing exclusively for Microsoft now!"? They had such huge plans for Oddworld and they still do, but it's never going to happen because they haven't wised up yet. Many exclusives are like this, and while some are successful still...you just know they could've been twice as great at least if they weren't exclusives at all.

But for some reason, some strange reason, the people in charge get this idea that somehow...one system is going to sell better than the other and the rest are somehow gonna bomb. I think we know that this is not the case. Ah, correction... I think anyone of us who aren't ridiculous elitist know-it-alls are aware of this fact. Yeah, see... It's reasonable for one game to be done on another system, so I don't see any logical course for exclusives at all.

Well in the case of the Oddworld series and developers, it's not so much that they went exclusive, its the fact they went exclusive on a launch console that few were interested in buying at the time, not only that, changed the entire 'fun' aspect of the Oddworld games for the sake of 3D graphics etc.

Exclusivity isn't always a bad thing, nor does multiplatform automatically = success. More multiplatform developers have gone bust then exclusive platform developers. Why? Because everything is far more expensive then it used to be, so when Sony, Nintendo or Microsoft come up to you and say "Hey, we like your idea and we realise it will be expensive to make and market on our console, how about we help you out, give you cash to get it going, give you the best tools to make it perfect AND we handle all the marketing for you, all you need to do is go exclusive", is that so irrational? From a developer's standpoint, that right there = more chance of your game doing well as opposed to you handling it yourself + cost cutting.

For consumers, it makes the choice of picking a console forsomething or another a little easier though it may not have a DIRECT positive factor for consumers.

Hey, I understand you're opinion and all, but as soon as I read it, my mind went Star Wars on me and said...

It's all very tempting, but you see it is a fact that businesses are suppose to handle their own marketing and blah anyway, so a major company holding your hand as long as you stick with them and no other can be construed as a bad thing. That is my opinion.

 

[pulse2]

So I ask you this escapists, is exclusivity all that bad? In what cases do you think it is a stupid decision and what benefits do you think all games and dlc (in an ideal world) being multiplat would have?

Heavenly Sword was also one of the few ps3 launch titles and vaguely reminded people of gow.
Personally I don?t understand how any gamer can appreciate exclusives when ?exclusivity? does absolutely nothing for the consumer unless said consumer is some really obnoxious fanboy who loves shadenfreude more than the actual games. All it does is create this absurd system wherein the consumer might have to purchase a few different consoles to play the games they want to play.
It?s amazing people put up with it.
Can you imagine what would?ve happened if dvd players only played dvds from certain studios? We would still be watching vhs tapes. And e readers would?ve never caught on if some publishers only published on one companies readers.

While I appreciate your point, I do tend to think that our buying habits are largely based upon what we PERSONALLY desire, if everything were the same thing and did the same thing, there would be no business competition and to be honest we as consumers would feel bored. Lol, while the competitive spirit is in all of us whether we like it or not, I suppose it would be nice if we had nothing to compare, but then buy having nothing to compare in games, we'd find to compare in other trivial things.

I suppose if I was to be annoyed by exclusivity it would be more that fact of 'buying' exclusivity as opposed to 'making' ones own exclusive titles in the same way Nintendo does with theirs because at the end of the say, consoles NEED exclusives whether we like it or not in order to survive. Why spend the same amount on console A when console B has the same games, feature + more? We like more, we don't like less, otherwise we wouldn't be buying new phones to get all the latest stuff, we'd just stick with our old phones for convenience and cost saving.

So when we going to buy a console, whether we like it or not, we look at the games, oh but wait, they have the same games, so why should I buy one over the other? Well because console C has games and features more fitting to my taste then A & B do. Simples

It may come across a bit fanboyous, but it makes us who we are, I certainly don't like all the same games and features as you, I can almost guarantee that.

People buy new phones because the tech progresses. I have nothing against new consoles when the tech progresses enough.
I think that if all the game content was the same, people would still find other reasons to buy one console over another. When I bought my ps3, the 360 had all the big exclusives including the ?exclusive? dlc for gta4 - the first game I wanted to buy.
But I got the ps3 anyway because it didn?t have a 50% fail rate, there was no monthly fee, I got an hdtv & wanted a BR player, and they were saying that games would connect with the psp. So that last feature was immensely disappointing but it still illustrates my point: the consoles should distinguish themselves by features not ?exclusive? games. If the features defined the console we would see more interesting ones and when a feature is exploited we would probably see it fixed rather than taken out completely like OtherOS.
There are tons of companies that make money manufacturing dvd players, mp3 players, ebook readers, and yet all the actual media is interchangeable.
Which brings me to the subject (a llittle off topic sorry) of an industry standard. If all consoles used the same software, developers would spend less in development and platform developers would be trying harder to make their console worth buying. We would also probably have the benefit of additional companies making consoles, further bringing down the prices for all of us.
Choices always benefit the consumer however, it seems like the games industry is intent on giving us fewer choices and only because enough of us seem to put up with it.

But there you go, don't you see that the introduction of features does EXACTLY what you want less of, it encourages 'more' exclusives.

The reason you will see few DS games multiplat on PSP is because DS uses two screens, touchpad, camera etc, all of which the PSP did not have, thus people bought DS because it had a vast array of interesting and unique games. Doing exactly what I just pointed out, people buy based on personal preference. I wasn't interested in Touchscreens and duelscreen nonsense, I wanted Monster Hunter, I wanted Portable ops, I wanted God of War, so I bought a PSP.

Like I said, adding features just leads to more exclusivity because if all games went multiplat, console developers would be forced to distinguish themselves as far from their competition as possible because there would be just that, no competition, which is unhealthy for business. Besides, we are supposed to be buying consoles for gaming first and foremost, everything else should simply be a bonus. It just so happens that my PS3 has free online and Blu-ray, but it doesn't have party chat and Kinect. Do I care? No. Why? Because I only ever switch on my PS3 to play games on it and occasionally watch a Blu-ray film, everything else I have a perfectly good PC for :/

 

[pulse2]

I'm afraid exclusives are the symptom of a strange disease where the developers of a game seem to become allergic to money. You see, the point of a developer is to make money by creating games and selling them. The more you do, the more that you're likely to make. If you exclude an entire HALF of the possible revenue you could be getting for this game by not making it for Playstation or X-Box or something, you have obviously beaten your head in stupid with a brick at some point.

Remember the creators of Oddworld? Remember how they sunk very very VERY fast as soon as they went "Hi! We're developing exclusively for Microsoft now!"? They had such huge plans for Oddworld and they still do, but it's never going to happen because they haven't wised up yet. Many exclusives are like this, and while some are successful still...you just know they could've been twice as great at least if they weren't exclusives at all.

But for some reason, some strange reason, the people in charge get this idea that somehow...one system is going to sell better than the other and the rest are somehow gonna bomb. I think we know that this is not the case. Ah, correction... I think anyone of us who aren't ridiculous elitist know-it-alls are aware of this fact. Yeah, see... It's reasonable for one game to be done on another system, so I don't see any logical course for exclusives at all.

Well in the case of the Oddworld series and developers, it's not so much that they went exclusive, its the fact they went exclusive on a launch console that few were interested in buying at the time, not only that, changed the entire 'fun' aspect of the Oddworld games for the sake of 3D graphics etc.

Exclusivity isn't always a bad thing, nor does multiplatform automatically = success. More multiplatform developers have gone bust then exclusive platform developers. Why? Because everything is far more expensive then it used to be, so when Sony, Nintendo or Microsoft come up to you and say "Hey, we like your idea and we realise it will be expensive to make and market on our console, how about we help you out, give you cash to get it going, give you the best tools to make it perfect AND we handle all the marketing for you, all you need to do is go exclusive", is that so irrational? From a developer's standpoint, that right there = more chance of your game doing well as opposed to you handling it yourself + cost cutting.

For consumers, it makes the choice of picking a console forsomething or another a little easier though it may not have a DIRECT positive factor for consumers.

Hey, I understand you're opinion and all, but as soon as I read it, my mind went Star Wars on me and said...

It's all very tempting, but you see it is a fact that businesses are suppose to handle their own marketing and blah anyway, so a major company holding your hand as long as you stick with them and no other can be construed as a bad thing. That is my opinion.

Haha, yeah agree, but like you said, MONIES!!!!!!!! YAAAAAAYYY!!!!

"Whats that? You can give me savings on what I would spend AND I still get my profits if I lick your ass? DEAL!" Typical minds of business people

Even now a friend of mine is trying to sell seasoning and Sainsbury's thinks it will do well, so they are asking her if she'd be willing to make it exclusive to their stores and they will sort out the manufacturing and just about everything else. She could be stubborn and say no, but if they hit her with a deal like that + profits, she'd be stupid to say no

 

[Azure-Supernova]

I've got no beef with exclusives. A great deal of Sony's better exclusives are published by Sony in the first place so I don't expect them to be on other consoles, likewise with some of Microsoft's. Also they're exclusives for one reason, they're a nudge to buy this console... you know 'just because it has X on it'.

Now what does piss me off is when a series slash dots its way through. The first Halo, Gears of War and Fable all had homes on the PC. Never again were they heard from; well okay untrue in Fable's case as the PC got a purpose built edition. But my point remains. Why start a series on multi-platform and then all of a sudden remove it?

 

[GonzoGamer]

So I ask you this escapists, is exclusivity all that bad? In what cases do you think it is a stupid decision and what benefits do you think all games and dlc (in an ideal world) being multiplat would have?

Heavenly Sword was also one of the few ps3 launch titles and vaguely reminded people of gow.
Personally I don?t understand how any gamer can appreciate exclusives when ?exclusivity? does absolutely nothing for the consumer unless said consumer is some really obnoxious fanboy who loves shadenfreude more than the actual games. All it does is create this absurd system wherein the consumer might have to purchase a few different consoles to play the games they want to play.
It?s amazing people put up with it.
Can you imagine what would?ve happened if dvd players only played dvds from certain studios? We would still be watching vhs tapes. And e readers would?ve never caught on if some publishers only published on one companies readers.

While I appreciate your point, I do tend to think that our buying habits are largely based upon what we PERSONALLY desire, if everything were the same thing and did the same thing, there would be no business competition and to be honest we as consumers would feel bored. Lol, while the competitive spirit is in all of us whether we like it or not, I suppose it would be nice if we had nothing to compare, but then buy having nothing to compare in games, we'd find to compare in other trivial things.

I suppose if I was to be annoyed by exclusivity it would be more that fact of 'buying' exclusivity as opposed to 'making' ones own exclusive titles in the same way Nintendo does with theirs because at the end of the say, consoles NEED exclusives whether we like it or not in order to survive. Why spend the same amount on console A when console B has the same games, feature + more? We like more, we don't like less, otherwise we wouldn't be buying new phones to get all the latest stuff, we'd just stick with our old phones for convenience and cost saving.

So when we going to buy a console, whether we like it or not, we look at the games, oh but wait, they have the same games, so why should I buy one over the other? Well because console C has games and features more fitting to my taste then A & B do. Simples

It may come across a bit fanboyous, but it makes us who we are, I certainly don't like all the same games and features as you, I can almost guarantee that.

People buy new phones because the tech progresses. I have nothing against new consoles when the tech progresses enough.
I think that if all the game content was the same, people would still find other reasons to buy one console over another. When I bought my ps3, the 360 had all the big exclusives including the ?exclusive? dlc for gta4 - the first game I wanted to buy.
But I got the ps3 anyway because it didn?t have a 50% fail rate, there was no monthly fee, I got an hdtv & wanted a BR player, and they were saying that games would connect with the psp. So that last feature was immensely disappointing but it still illustrates my point: the consoles should distinguish themselves by features not ?exclusive? games. If the features defined the console we would see more interesting ones and when a feature is exploited we would probably see it fixed rather than taken out completely like OtherOS.
There are tons of companies that make money manufacturing dvd players, mp3 players, ebook readers, and yet all the actual media is interchangeable.
Which brings me to the subject (a llittle off topic sorry) of an industry standard. If all consoles used the same software, developers would spend less in development and platform developers would be trying harder to make their console worth buying. We would also probably have the benefit of additional companies making consoles, further bringing down the prices for all of us.
Choices always benefit the consumer however, it seems like the games industry is intent on giving us fewer choices and only because enough of us seem to put up with it.

But there you go, don't you see that the introduction of features does EXACTLY what you want less of, it encourages 'more' exclusives.

The reason you will see few DS games multiplat on PSP is because DS uses two screens, touchpad, camera etc, all of which the PSP did not have, thus people bought DS because it had a vast array of interesting and unique games. Doing exactly what I just pointed out, people buy based on personal preference. I wasn't interested in Touchscreens and duelscreen nonsense, I wanted Monster Hunter, I wanted Portable ops, I wanted God of War, so I bought a PSP.

Like I said, adding features just leads to more exclusivity because if all games went multiplat, console developers would be forced to distinguish themselves as far from their competition as possible because there would be just that, no competition, which is unhealthy for business. Besides, we are supposed to be buying consoles for gaming first and foremost, everything else should simply be a bonus. It just so happens that my PS3 has free online and Blu-ray, but it doesn't have party chat and Kinect. Do I care? No. Why? Because I only ever switch on my PS3 to play games on it and occasionally watch a Blu-ray film, everything else I have a perfectly good PC for :/

If we?re only buying consoles for gaming then they should be a hell of a lot cheaper. And even if that was the case, that?s no reason for exclusives. Once again, every other media player, has access to all the media available to that type, I don?t understand why game consoles should be different other than the fact that gamers put up with it.
I?m talking more about hardware features more than software features (the psp connectivity wasn?t to change the games but to act as supplementary output: a great use would?ve been as a pip boy monitor in the new Fallouts - you would still access the pip-boy on PC and 360 but the psp would lend continual access - just an idea I had) to differentiate consoles. To give you an idea of what I?m talking about. When I decided to get the ps3 I was considering the 360 because I liked some of the features it offered (like custom soundtracks for every game - that?s only on the 360) but I went with the ps3. Many dvd/mp3 players have different features from one another and even have different input but they all still play the same media. The video game model isn?t acceptable by most consumers which is why we no longer have Beta Tapes, Sony?s proprietary music files (forget what they were called), HDVD, and 8 tracks.

 

[CLEVERSLEAZOID]

Exclusivities don't really bother me too much. Most of the franchises I still enjoy these days are either available on 360 or I can get them on my PC one way or another.

The only franchise stuck to a Sony console that I went out of my way to play was Metal Gear Solid 4. Luckily my Dad had a PSX+PS2 so I could play MGS/2/3 without much care. Then I accidently convinced my Dad that Microsoft were better a few years back, and now he has a 360 as well.

So I asked a friend if I could borrow his PS3 for a week, playing MGS4 non-stop, completed it, and gave my friend back his console.

Success, I got to see how one of my favourite game franchises ended [don't care for the new MG Raiden game] and I did it without forking out loads of monies.

 

[TheDooD]

I'm afraid exclusives are the symptom of a strange disease where the developers of a game seem to become allergic to money. You see, the point of a developer is to make money by creating games and selling them. The more you do, the more that you're likely to make. If you exclude an entire HALF of the possible revenue you could be getting for this game by not making it for Playstation or X-Box or something, you have obviously beaten your head in stupid with a brick at some point.

Remember the creators of Oddworld? Remember how they sunk very very VERY fast as soon as they went "Hi! We're developing exclusively for Microsoft now!"? They had such huge plans for Oddworld and they still do, but it's never going to happen because they haven't wised up yet. Many exclusives are like this, and while some are successful still...you just know they could've been twice as great at least if they weren't exclusives at all.

But for some reason, some strange reason, the people in charge get this idea that somehow...one system is going to sell better than the other and the rest are somehow gonna bomb. I think we know that this is not the case. Ah, correction... I think anyone of us who aren't ridiculous elitist know-it-alls are aware of this fact. Yeah, see... It's reasonable for one game to be done on another system, so I don't see any logical course for exclusives at all.

^
This seriously...

Also when a good game gets stuck on a single console and it doesn't sell well. You'll see publishers drop it when it was their faults for being greedy and taking that money early on just to be exclusive, then get angry when the game doesn't break even. Yet you keep hearing fans that they don't want to buy this console just to play that game. Like the Wii's sleeper hits like Madworld, No More Heroes 1&2, Last Story, XenoBlade, Muramasa: Demon Blade. All these games would sell better if they wasn't stuck on the Wii (I know NMH is on the PS3) Or how some popular titles on PS3 and 360 really shouldn't be exclusive and it would be good for the game to be on the other console like InFamous, and Gears's, would be good on either console. They should also factor in that gamers may hate the controller (Xbox to PS to Wii) or control layout of a console.(analog to motion) Like if the Move or Kinect got a great game that would be MUCH better without the motion controls and it doesn't sell because they don't add it.

 

[DracoSuave]

The only time they bug me is when it's part of a series, like the last Tales rpg was xbox exclusive, the ones before that PS2, and before that Gamecube. Right now it's stopping me from buying Mass Effect 2, because I have a PS3, so I can't play part one.

Except the last Tales game was Xbox exclusive only in north america, and the exclusive one for gamecube came out on PS2 as well.

But yeah, that.

 

[Zhukov]

It is utterly beyond me how any gamer can defend exclusivity.

Well, except for rabid console fanboys of course. But they're another matter.