What is the problem with always online consoles?

[JmezR]

Hello Escapist Chums,

A genuine question here: why does everyone seem to have a problem with the concept of an "always online" next gen console?

Unless you are living in the dark ages and don't have the internet (in which case I'm sure you don't care about these console anyway) I for one can't see there being an issue.

Can someone at least sum up the argument here?

Cheers!

 

[Fappy]

Is this a legit question? I don't even know where to start. You do realize that not everyone in the world has reliable internet, correct?

And by that I mean, a large majority of Americans have shit internet and we're generally better off than your average Englishman.

 

[Zantos]

Because it's not unheard of for internet connections to go down. Your area could go down for maintenance, or because of a fault. Maybe you've just moved house and it can take up to a month for a connection to be set up. You might not have had these problems, lucky you, but some people do, and it's just a damn annoyance when you can't play a game that doesn't actually have any need to be online just because they want to check that between the last time you played and now you haven't discarded your legal copy in favour of an illegal one.

 

[madwarper]

a) Not everyone has reliable, fast connections to the internet.
b) Ever hear of the game SimCity? The one EA just released, that required an always be online for it to work? And then, they couldn't keep their servers up, so no one could play?

 

[shrekfan246]

My internet is slower than 71% of the US.

It frequently likes to cut out while I'm trying to download things, and slows to a crawl if it's doing anything while downloading or buffering videos.

I also have no reliable Wi-Fi, so I rarely connect my consoles to the internet because I prefer the utility of having my computer hooked up. The only time I'll ever connect a console is when I want to check out the Xbox or PS3 stores.

 

[General Twinkletoes]

Have you not considered their internet going out? The Diablo III and Sim City fiasco's were from their servers fucking up, which will happen no matter how good your internet it.

 

[Kyrdra]

Didnt the Jimquisition handle that topic a few weeks ago? Yes it did. Here have the video:

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/jimquisition/7100-Why-An-Always-On-DRM-Console-Would-Be-Dumb-Dumb-Dumb

 

[Comocat]

Always online means you play how the console/developers want you to play. For example, in Simcity if I want to name my town "Penisville DLC" it shows up as "*****ville ***" (yes DLC is censored). Also, suppose I want to download a mod to cheat or tweak the game to make it more fun. I spent countless hours as a kid tweaking the hex codes in Civilization to do all sorts of crazy shit, now with always online I'm a filty hacker. Always online means development resources are spent making sure people cant cheat rather than making sure the UI is optimal. Always online means a company is constantly watching how you play, that way they can make sure you are having the proper amount of fun. There's more to always online then the fact I live in the middle of one of the most populated cities in the United States and $40 a month for an unstable 3Mbs/s (which is literally the fastest internet I can get).

TLDR; Companies now control how you have fun with always online.

 

[KarmaTheAlligator]

Some part of the world might not be able to afford having a bloody connection, but even if they can, there's no guarantee that it'll be 100% stable, and when it isn't, your shiny new toy is just a big expensive paperweight.

 

[Maximum Bert]

Because its another restriction, they are taking away the options you have thats why its annoying their is no plus side to this for the consumer. Having the option to go online thats cool forcing you to do so is definitely not especially when it is not a necessity, always online is not there to help customers it is there to control and monitor them.

 

[teqrevisited]

It's another link in the chain that can and probably will break at some point. They'll already have had your money and you'll have a £300 brick sitting under your TV for as long as it takes them to sort it out.

They'll try and dress it up as something like "Chat and share with your friends" which you can probably interpret as "People you don't really care about will message you whilst you're trying to enjoy a singe player game, which arbitrarily requires you to be online because you're a filthy pirate who needs to be watched constantly."

 

[Korten12]

I live in the US and will be living at college dorms for the next couple of years or so... and the internet sucks. I can barely connect to Xbox Live and PSN as it is...

 

[Nomanslander]

Unless you are living in the dark ages and don't have the internet
Cheers!

Go to rural America, over there people have to spend 150 dollars a month for LIMITED internet service because they can't get DSL and have to go satellite (which is the most unreliable service ever)!

Oh, and what about some kid in Mexico getting a Xbox One, and in his area there's no service in all. What's he suppose to do, huh?

So to answer your question, YES! Some people do live in the Dark Ages, actually I'd say 75% of the human population still does to some degree. You live in a fat privileged westernized world where you can't imagine other people being lesser well off then you, but trust me, they are. And you don't even have to go over the US boarder to see it.

 

[Casual Shinji]

When I moved, I didn't have internet for a good two weeks. Thankfully I had my trusty not-DRM consoles to help me pass the time.

Get it?

 

[Fappy]

Unless you are living in the dark ages and don't have the internet
Cheers!

Go to rural America, over there people have to spend 150 dollars a month for LIMITED internet service because they can't get DSL and have to go satellite (which is the most unreliable service ever)!

Oh, and what about some kid in Mexico getting a Xbox One, and in his area there's no service in all. What's he suppose to do, huh?

So to answer your question, YES! Some people do live in the Dark Ages, actually I'd say 75% of the human population still does to some degree. You live in a fat westernized world where you can't imagine other people being lesser well off then you, but trust me, they are. And you don't even have to go over the US boarder to see it.

I think you quoted the wrong person there >.>

 

[Genocidicles]

Worst of all is that in ten years or so Microsoft could decide they don't want to pay for the servers any more and just switch them off, practically bricking the console.

 

[Imper1um]

1. Internet only covers a small percentage of the world.
2. In the places that the internet DOES exist, only a small percentage of that has a decent amount of internet.
3. In the places in which you have internet, reliability can fluctuate, based on real problems (natural disasters), money problems, and other things.

 

[Nomanslander]

I think you quoted the wrong person there >.>

lol... didn't catch that.

fixd

 

[Jindrax]

OP found out his question was retarded... never replied back.
How backwards do you have to be to not see the problem with always online.
Anything that has ever come out that has always online got massive critique and problems.

Diablo 3
Simcity...
any MMORPG during the first month.

I mean common dude