An explanation from a Alleged Microsoft Engineer

I am not going to comment on any of these controversial issues because I personally don't care either way. I won E3. So many great games. That being said, this piece of work brings clarity to Microsoft's approach. I also want to mention that I doubt this is a Microsoft employee. The spelling isn't what I would expect from a Microsoft employee. It makes sense though regardless. What he (whoever this is) is saying is logical. I was left with two questions: 

1. How is this different from Sony's approach? It seems to me that Sony has the capacity to do a lot of the same things in the digital distribution sector. That being said, I do not know Sony's digital licensing structure compared to Microsoft's (which is actually quite lenient IMO). 

2. Is this desirable for the consumer? We love this model. I used it religiously this cycle. I played literally every game to ever come out w/ renting and used games. Developers and publishers say it sucks, whereas the Steam model makes EVERYONE happy. Again, if X1 is like Steam, then where does Sony fit in? What are Sony's digital distribution policies? This will be important moving forward in the next generation. 

    The thing is we suck at telling the story. The whole point of the DRM switch from disc based to cloud based is to kill disc swapping, scratched discs, bringing discs to friends house, trade-ins for shit value with nothign going back to developers, and high game costs. If you want games cheaper then 59.99, you have to limit used games somehow. Steam's model requires a limited used game model.
 
    The thing is, the DRM is really really similar to steam... You can login anywhere and play your games, anyone in your house can play with the family xbox. The only diff is steam you have to sign in before playing, and Xbox does it automatically at night for you (once per 24 hours)
 
    It's a long tail strategy, just like steam. Steam had it's growing pains at the beginning with all it's drm shit as well. [...] For digital downloads steam had no real competition at the time, they were competing against boxed sales. At the time people were pretty irate about steam, (on **** too...) It was only once they had a digital marketplace with DRM that was locked down to prevent sharing that they could do super discounted shit.
 
    Think about it, on steam you get a game for the true cost of the game, 5$-30$. On a console you have to pay for that PLUS any additional licenses for when you sell / trade / borrow / etc. If the developer / publisher can't get it on additional licenses (like steam), then they charge the first person more. [...] If we say "Hey publishers, you limit game to 39.99, we ensure every license transfer you get 10$, gamestop gets 20$" that is a decent model... Microsoft gets a license fee on first and subsequent game purchases, compared to just first now? That's a revenue increase.
 
    Competition is the best man, it helps drive both to new heights. See technology from the Cold War. If we had no USSR, we'd be way worse off today. TLDR: Bring it on Steam :)
 
    2/4
 
    Yeah we passed that around the office at Xbox. Most of us were like "Well played Sony, Well played". That being said they are just riding the hype train of ZOMG THEY ARE TRYING TO **** US FOR NO REASON. Without actually thinking about how convienent it would be for the majority of the time to not find that disc your brother didn't put back... [...] just simpleminded people not seeing the bigger picture. Some PS4 viral team made them all "U TOOK R DISCS" and they hiveminded.
 
    Everyone and their mother complains about how gamestop ****s them on their trade ins, getting 5$ for their used games. We come in trying to find a way to take money out of gamestop, and put some in developers and get you possibly cheaper games and everyone bitches at MS. Well, if you want the @#$@ing from Gamestop, go play PS4.
 
    The goal is to move to digital downloads, but Gamestop, Walmart, Target, Amazon are KIND OF ****ING ENTRENCHED in the industry. They have a lot of power, and the shift has to be gradual. Long term goal is steam for consoles. [...] If you always want to stay with what you have, then keep current consoles, or a PS4. We're TRYING to move the industry forwards towards digital distribution... it'sa bumpy road
 
    Publishers have enourmous power. Microsoft is trying to balance between consumer delight, and publisher wishes. If we cave to far in either direction you have a non-starting product. WiiU goes too far to consumer, you have no 3rd party support to shake a stick at. PS4 is status-quo. XB1 is trying to push some things, at the expense of others. We have a vision, we'll see if it works in the coming years
 
    Living room transformation. We want to own the living room. Every living room TV with an XBox on input one. It's the thing that gives the signal to your TV, everything is secondary. The future, where games, TV, internet telephony, all that shit happens magically on some huge ass screen with hand / voice gestures... That's our goal.
 
 
    3/4
 
    Google TV + PS4 + Minority report level gestures, that combined with a sick second screen experience (which is really hot for TV, I know I know.. tv tv tv tv tv... but it's ****ing sick when you have it). Games will be the same, there are more exclusives to MS then PS atm, and Kinect 2 makes Kinect 1 look like a childs toy.
 
    By default it's on, listening for "Xbox On". You can turn it off tho, and turn the console like OFF off. OFF off is required for Germany / other countries that require it (no vampire appliances) [...] It has to be plugged in for the console to post. You can turn off everything it does from the settings. Think of it like airplane mode for the iPhone. You can't just unplug the cellular radio, but you can turn it off.
 
    Instead of 10mins, is 24hrs for your console, and 1 or 2 at a friends house. Really the majority of people have a speck of internet at least once a day. And if you don't. Don't buy an Xbox 1. Just like if you didn't have a broadband connection don't get Live, and if you don't have an HDTV the 360 isn't that great for you either. New tech, new req. This allows us to do cool shit when we can assume things like you have a kinect, you have internet, etc.
 
    Current plan is basically you're ****ed after 24 hours. Yeah... I know. Kind of sucks. I believe they will probably revist the time period and / or find a diff way to "call in" to ensure you haven't sold your license to gamestop or something... but there is no plan YET. I'm hoping the change it, but I don't work on that so I don't have much influence there /sigh
 
    If the power goes out you ain't playing shit. I'm assuming you mean the internet goes out but you have power for TV and Xbox. Yes, You're ****ed for single player games. Again, that's the PoR (Plan of record), but I expect it to change after the e3 cluster****
 
    What fee? There is no fee to play your games at your friends house. Never has, never will. Even x360 digital downloads could do that.
 
 
    4/4
 
    The cloud capabilities is the shit they like the most. We basically made a huge cloud compute shit and made it free. What people are doing with it is kind of cool. THe original intention was to get all the Multiplayer servers not requiring 3rd party costs (Like EA shutting down game servers to cut costs), as well as taking all the games that servers hosted by the clients (Halo, etc), and have all that compute done in the cloud allowing more CPU cycles for gameplay. That will really expand what developers can do. Anything that doesn't need per frame calculation and can handle 100ms delays can be shifted to the cloud. That's huge.
 
    SmartGlass + IE is going to be pretty freaking sweet. 1 finger cursor, 2 finger direct manip. Basically if you think of a laptop trackpad where your phone/ slate is the trackpad and the monitor is your TV... it's that. The tech is there, just needs to be applied. There is some really cool shit going on with Petra + controllers that pairs people with controllers. So if person with controller two trades controlers with controller 1, their profiles magically switch. It's sick. What does this matter? Now if you lean left/right it knows which person is leaning, even if 4 people are all int he same room. It's awesome.
 
    New service using Azure for cloud compute. Allows developers to not use clients for hosting multiplayer servers, or other tasks that do not require per frame calcuations. It's pretty sweet.
 
    Honestly, if you care about anything other then pure games AT ALL. Xbox 1 > PS4. If all you do is play games, and nothing else, PS4.
 
    This was all from the Microsoft engineer that was on /b/ last night.
 
    It's not worth my time to prove it, or risk my Job. I work in Studio A, 40th ave in Redmond, Wa. The thai place in the studio cafeteria has double punch wednesdays. Go ahead and call them and verify if you want.

He doesn't really expect us to believe that they're planning to lower game prices, does he?

Ginosaji

He doesn't really expect us to believe that they're planning to lower game prices, does he?

Ginosaji

[QUOTE="Ginosaji"]

He doesn't really expect us to believe that they're planning to lower game prices, does he?

FoxbatAlpha

He doesn't really expect us to believe that they're planning to lower game prices, does he?

Ginosaji

as much as i want to click my ruby slippers together 3 times and chant " they will be priced like steam, they will be priced like steam, they will be priced like steam."

i know that shyt is a fantasy.

[QUOTE="FoxbatAlpha"][QUOTE="Ginosaji"]

He doesn't really expect us to believe that they're planning to lower game prices, does he?

L0mak

[QUOTE="Ginosaji"]

He doesn't really expect us to believe that they're planning to lower game prices, does he?

Riverwolf007

as much as i want to click my ruby slippers together 3 times and chant " they will be priced like steam, they will be priced like steam, they will be priced like steam."

i know that shyt is a fantasy.

[quote="alleged MS employee"]

The only diff is steam you have to sign in before playing, and Xbox does it automatically at night for you (once per 24 hours)

Gama_Forever

Steam has an offline mode, which doesn't require online check in every 24 hours. I just played all my non-multiplayer steam games just fine, with no internet at all, for the last 2 weeks, while moving between a couple houses, before getting internet set up at the new place.

What an idiot.

[QUOTE="Gama_Forever"]

[quote="alleged MS employee"]

The only diff is steam you have to sign in before playing, and Xbox does it automatically at night for you (once per 24 hours)

the_bi99man

Steam has an offline mode, which doesn't require online check in every 24 hours. I just played all my non-multiplayer steam games just fine, with no internet at all, for the last 2 weeks, while moving between a couple houses, before getting internet set up at the new place.

What an idiot.

[QUOTE="Ginosaji"]

He doesn't really expect us to believe that they're planning to lower game prices, does he?

Riverwolf007

as much as i want to click my ruby slippers together 3 times and chant " they will be priced like steam, they will be priced like steam, they will be priced like steam."

i know that shyt is a fantasy.

[QUOTE="Ginosaji"]

He doesn't really expect us to believe that they're planning to lower game prices, does he?

Riverwolf007

as much as i want to click my ruby slippers together 3 times and chant " they will be priced like steam, they will be priced like steam, they will be priced like steam."

i know that shyt is a fantasy.

[QUOTE="the_bi99man"]

[QUOTE="Gama_Forever"]

[quote="alleged MS employee"]

The only diff is steam you have to sign in before playing, and Xbox does it automatically at night for you (once per 24 hours)

Ninja-Hippo

Steam has an offline mode, which doesn't require online check in every 24 hours. I just played all my non-multiplayer steam games just fine, with no internet at all, for the last 2 weeks, while moving between a couple houses, before getting internet set up at the new place.

What an idiot.

No you don't, unless something changed in the past two weeks.  I just moved house and didn't have the internet for a few weeks, I could play FTL through steam in offline mode without ever connecting.

[QUOTE="Ninja-Hippo"][QUOTE="the_bi99man"]

Steam has an offline mode, which doesn't require online check in every 24 hours. I just played all my non-multiplayer steam games just fine, with no internet at all, for the last 2 weeks, while moving between a couple houses, before getting internet set up at the new place.

What an idiot.

1080pOnly

No you don't, unless something changed in the past two weeks.  I just moved house and didn't have the internet for a few weeks, I could play FTL through steam in offline mode without ever connecting.

    Honestly, if you care about anything other then pure games AT ALL. Xbox 1 > PS4. If all you do is play games, and nothing else, PS4.

He basically just admit himself that PS4 is superior.

[QUOTE="the_bi99man"]

[QUOTE="Gama_Forever"]

[quote="alleged MS employee"]

The only diff is steam you have to sign in before playing, and Xbox does it automatically at night for you (once per 24 hours)

Ninja-Hippo

Steam has an offline mode, which doesn't require online check in every 24 hours. I just played all my non-multiplayer steam games just fine, with no internet at all, for the last 2 weeks, while moving between a couple houses, before getting internet set up at the new place.

What an idiot.

You have to do that one time, ever. What part of "I played my steam games for 2 weeks with no internet at all" didn't you understand? You are absolutely not "****ed" if your internet drops, unless you're playing a multiplayer game, in which case, steam isn't your problem.

Anyway, one interesting quote:

"That will really expand what developers can do. Anything that doesn't need per frame calculation and can handle 100ms delays can be shifted to the cloud. That's huge."

I've been saying this for some time. The cloud can't handle fundamental processor calculations due to the latency. 100ms is like a lifetime compared to the picoseconds which processors normally deal with. Basically, the cloud can only handle calculations which has nothing to do with graphics or physics - ie. useless from a rendering standpoint.

PS. Far too many unacceptable grammatical errors and spelling mistakes. Maybe he's a foreign worker

[QUOTE="1080pOnly"]

[QUOTE="Ninja-Hippo"]With Steam you have to use the internet to sign in and enable offline mode before going into offline mode. So if your internet drops, you're ****ed. Ninja-Hippo

No you don't, unless something changed in the past two weeks.  I just moved house and didn't have the internet for a few weeks, I could play FTL through steam in offline mode without ever connecting.

[QUOTE="Ninja-Hippo"][QUOTE="1080pOnly"]

 

No you don't, unless something changed in the past two weeks.  I just moved house and didn't have the internet for a few weeks, I could play FTL through steam in offline mode without ever connecting.

nethernova

If you aren't automatically logged in, then you need internet to sign in.

just simpleminded people not seeing the bigger picture.

And screw you right back MS !

Anyway, one interesting quote:

"That will really expand what developers can do. Anything that doesn't need per frame calculation and can handle 100ms delays can be shifted to the cloud. That's huge."

I've been saying this for some time. The cloud can't handle fundamental processor calculations due to the latency. 100ms is like a lifetime compared to the picoseconds which processors normally deal with. Basically, the cloud can only handle calculations which has nothing to do with graphics or physics - ie. useless from a rendering standpoint.

PS. Far too many unacceptable grammatical errors and spelling mistakes. Maybe he's a foreign worker

jhcho2

Pricing has NO relation to cost of production except that the cost of production tends to establish a minimum price.

If you believe that a company, particularly a company that is used to monopoly rents like Microsoft will lower prices due to some relatively small drop in cost of production then you're betting against hundreds or thousands of years of evidence to the contrary. Removing competition does nothing to lower prices, it raises them. Nor is Steam a good comparison: it has competition. Depending on the game this can be from retailers, developers, other digital storefronts, or some combination of those.

So you can choose to believe that all you like, but you're going to be mugged by reality soon enough and I just hope your doe-eyed credulity doesn't drag the rest of us down with you.

Pricing has NO relation to cost of production except that the cost of production tends to establish a minimum price.

If you believe that a company, particularly a company that is used to monopoly rents like Microsoft will lower prices due to some relatively small drop in cost of production then you're betting against hundreds or thousands of years of evidence to the contrary. Removing competition does nothing to lower prices, it raises them. Nor is Steam a good comparison: it has competition. Depending on the game this can be from retailers, developers, other digital storefronts, or some combination of those.

So you can choose to believe that all you like, but you're going to be mugged by reality soon enough and I just hope your doe-eyed credulity doesn't drag the rest of us down with you.

Aidenfury19

[QUOTE="Aidenfury19"]

Pricing has NO relation to cost of production except that the cost of production tends to establish a minimum price.

If you believe that a company, particularly a company that is used to monopoly rents like Microsoft will lower prices due to some relatively small drop in cost of production then you're betting against hundreds or thousands of years of evidence to the contrary. Removing competition does nothing to lower prices, it raises them. Nor is Steam a good comparison: it has competition. Depending on the game this can be from retailers, developers, other digital storefronts, or some combination of those.

So you can choose to believe that all you like, but you're going to be mugged by reality soon enough and I just hope your doe-eyed credulity doesn't drag the rest of us down with you.

always_explicit

While I'm probably wasting my time with you, it's not contradictory at all, it's how things work. The point you choose to miss is that companies aren't charities, and they aren't interested in you for any reason other than an expectation of profits, which in a capitalist economy are expected to grow and grow faster than the rate of inflation if you don't want to be punished by investors.

The end result here is that companies will NEVER lower prices without a strong profit motive compelling them to do so and typically that is due to poor competitive positioning, or low sales leading to higher than desired inventory. By forcing digital only you remove both parts of that equation. Any suggestion that Microsoft will lower prices is wishful thinking at best, particularly given the higher than expected cost of the console itself.

Look up company towns if you want to see just how swimmingly monopolies work out for everyone OTHER than the company.

[QUOTE="jhcho2"]

Anyway, one interesting quote:

"That will really expand what developers can do. Anything that doesn't need per frame calculation and can handle 100ms delays can be shifted to the cloud. That's huge."

I've been saying this for some time. The cloud can't handle fundamental processor calculations due to the latency. 100ms is like a lifetime compared to the picoseconds which processors normally deal with. Basically, the cloud can only handle calculations which has nothing to do with graphics or physics - ie. useless from a rendering standpoint.

PS. Far too many unacceptable grammatical errors and spelling mistakes. Maybe he's a foreign worker

always_explicit

Nobody here said that language literacy had anything to do with one's knowledge or understanding of something. You're simply making assumptions. However, language literacy does affect one's credibility. If he's American, then there's no excuse for making such mistakes, considering that he's educated enough to land a job in Redmond. However, if he's from India or some other country in which English is not his first language, then it's more understandable.

Him being an employee IS relevant. Just like how everyone waited for MS to make an official statement on their DRM stance. By your logic, fanboy speculation on MS's direction would suffice. Everything is mere speculation unless it comes from MS or any of their employees.

[QUOTE="always_explicit"][QUOTE="jhcho2"]

Anyway, one interesting quote:

"That will really expand what developers can do. Anything that doesn't need per frame calculation and can handle 100ms delays can be shifted to the cloud. That's huge."

I've been saying this for some time. The cloud can't handle fundamental processor calculations due to the latency. 100ms is like a lifetime compared to the picoseconds which processors normally deal with. Basically, the cloud can only handle calculations which has nothing to do with graphics or physics - ie. useless from a rendering standpoint.

PS. Far too many unacceptable grammatical errors and spelling mistakes. Maybe he's a foreign worker

jhcho2

Nobody here said that language literacy had anything to do with one's knowledge or understanding of something. You're simply making assumptions. However, language literacy does affect one's credibility. If he's American, then there's no excuse for making such mistakes, considering that he's educated enough to land a job in Redmond. However, if he's from India or some other country in which English is not his first language, then it's more understandable.

Him being an employee IS relevant. Just like how everyone waited for MS to make an official statement on their DRM stance. By your logic, fanboy speculation on MS's direction would suffice. Everything is mere speculation unless it comes from MS or any of their employees.

[QUOTE="FoxbatAlpha"][QUOTE="Ginosaji"]

He doesn't really expect us to believe that they're planning to lower game prices, does he?

L0mak

[QUOTE="always_explicit"][QUOTE="Aidenfury19"]

Pricing has NO relation to cost of production except that the cost of production tends to establish a minimum price.

If you believe that a company, particularly a company that is used to monopoly rents like Microsoft will lower prices due to some relatively small drop in cost of production then you're betting against hundreds or thousands of years of evidence to the contrary. Removing competition does nothing to lower prices, it raises them. Nor is Steam a good comparison: it has competition. Depending on the game this can be from retailers, developers, other digital storefronts, or some combination of those.

So you can choose to believe that all you like, but you're going to be mugged by reality soon enough and I just hope your doe-eyed credulity doesn't drag the rest of us down with you.

Aidenfury19

While I'm probably wasting my time with you, it's not contradictory at all, it's how things work. The point you choose to miss is that companies aren't charities, and they aren't interested in you for any reason other than an expectation of profits, which in a capitalist economy are expected to grow and grow faster than the rate of inflation if you don't want to be punished by investors.

The end result here is that companies will NEVER lower prices without a strong profit motive compelling them to do so and typically that is due to poor competitive positioning, or low sales leading to higher than desired inventory. By forcing digital only you remove both parts of that equation. Any suggestion that Microsoft will lower prices is wishful thinking at best, particularly given the higher than expected cost of the console itself.

Look up company towns if you want to see just how swimmingly monopolies work out for everyone OTHER than the company.

[QUOTE="Aidenfury19"]

[QUOTE="always_explicit"] HAHA so you say pricing has no relation to cost of production.....EXCEPT that the cost of production tends to establish minimum price. You contradict yourself In the same sentence??? The cost of development and the physical cost of production will be weighed against the number of projected units sold and they will set a retail price based on this. If the cost of physical production is substantially lower because it would be digital it stands to reason the retail price will be substantially lower because the margin for profits will be larger. They are not trying to remove competition they are trying to shut off the used game market...which is a hinderance.always_explicit

While I'm probably wasting my time with you, it's not contradictory at all, it's how things work. The point you choose to miss is that companies aren't charities, and they aren't interested in you for any reason other than an expectation of profits, which in a capitalist economy are expected to grow and grow faster than the rate of inflation if you don't want to be punished by investors.

The end result here is that companies will NEVER lower prices without a strong profit motive compelling them to do so and typically that is due to poor competitive positioning, or low sales leading to higher than desired inventory. By forcing digital only you remove both parts of that equation. Any suggestion that Microsoft will lower prices is wishful thinking at best, particularly given the higher than expected cost of the console itself.

Look up company towns if you want to see just how swimmingly monopolies work out for everyone OTHER than the company.

Except your post said nothing of the sort, it said price WILL be lower which hasn't been proven by anything. Now you're backtracking on that, so which is it?

tl;dr version?

tl;dr version?

Chutebox

[QUOTE="always_explicit"][QUOTE="Aidenfury19"]

While I'm probably wasting my time with you, it's not contradictory at all, it's how things work. The point you choose to miss is that companies aren't charities, and they aren't interested in you for any reason other than an expectation of profits, which in a capitalist economy are expected to grow and grow faster than the rate of inflation if you don't want to be punished by investors.

The end result here is that companies will NEVER lower prices without a strong profit motive compelling them to do so and typically that is due to poor competitive positioning, or low sales leading to higher than desired inventory. By forcing digital only you remove both parts of that equation. Any suggestion that Microsoft will lower prices is wishful thinking at best, particularly given the higher than expected cost of the console itself.

Look up company towns if you want to see just how swimmingly monopolies work out for everyone OTHER than the company.

Aidenfury19

Except your post said nothing of the sort, it said price WILL be lower which hasn't been proven by anything. Now you're backtracking on that, so which is it?

Sony fanboy usual....

blah blah blah gif gif gif blah blah blah.

Threads about as boring as the PS4 is 

[QUOTE="Aidenfury19"]

[QUOTE="always_explicit"] Wasting your time with me, you pretentious prick. You think I am stupid, I said in my post IT STANDS TO REASON that if distribution is digital the savings SHOULD be passed to the consumer....much like steams. I dont need you to tell me companies like money thanks sweetheart. always_explicit

Except your post said nothing of the sort, it said price WILL be lower which hasn't been proven by anything. Now you're backtracking on that, so which is it?

Then you're arguing a hypothesis (if used games go away prices will be lower), while in your response to my post contradicting that you used the word should. These are distinct words with very different meanings, the former is unproven and therefore nearly worthless as an assertion (particularly given the historical evidence to the contrary), while the later is nearly meaningless.

Get back me to when you have some proof to back up the idea that prices will be lower, until then the default position is disbelief.

[QUOTE="always_explicit"][QUOTE="Aidenfury19"]

Except your post said nothing of the sort, it said price WILL be lower which hasn't been proven by anything. Now you're backtracking on that, so which is it?

Aidenfury19

Then you're arguing a hypothesis (if used games go away prices will be lower), while in your response to my post contradicting that you used the word should. These are distinct words with very different meanings, the former is unproven and therefore nearly worthless as an assertion (particularly given the historical evidence to the contrary), while the later is nearly meaningless.

Get back me to when you have some proof to back up the idea that prices will be lower, until then the default position is disbelief.

[QUOTE="always_explicit"][QUOTE="jhcho2"]

Anyway, one interesting quote:

"That will really expand what developers can do. Anything that doesn't need per frame calculation and can handle 100ms delays can be shifted to the cloud. That's huge."

I've been saying this for some time. The cloud can't handle fundamental processor calculations due to the latency. 100ms is like a lifetime compared to the picoseconds which processors normally deal with. Basically, the cloud can only handle calculations which has nothing to do with graphics or physics - ie. useless from a rendering standpoint.

PS. Far too many unacceptable grammatical errors and spelling mistakes. Maybe he's a foreign worker

jhcho2

Nobody here said that language literacy had anything to do with one's knowledge or understanding of something. You're simply making assumptions. However, language literacy does affect one's credibility. If he's American, then there's no excuse for making such mistakes, considering that he's educated enough to land a job in Redmond. However, if he's from India or some other country in which English is not his first language, then it's more understandable.

Him being an employee IS relevant. Just like how everyone waited for MS to make an official statement on their DRM stance. By your logic, fanboy speculation on MS's direction would suffice. Everything is mere speculation unless it comes from MS or any of their employees.

As a software engineer working in IT, i can tell you engineers (myself included) have terrible language skills. You communicate informally via IM and email all day or you're writing technical documents. If anything it makes him more credible that he was writing off the cuff and not being  stickler about spelling and grammar.

[QUOTE="Ninja-Hippo"][QUOTE="the_bi99man"]

Steam has an offline mode, which doesn't require online check in every 24 hours. I just played all my non-multiplayer steam games just fine, with no internet at all, for the last 2 weeks, while moving between a couple houses, before getting internet set up at the new place.

What an idiot.

the_bi99man

You have to do that one time, ever. What part of "I played my steam games for 2 weeks with no internet at all" didn't you understand? You are absolutely not "****ed" if your internet drops, unless you're playing a multiplayer game, in which case, steam isn't your problem.

If this is true, it could potentially be huge for Microsoft. They are right that, at least initially, people despised steam. I know I did myself, but that's all changed thanks to the amazing deals, workshop, and overall stability. There seems to be two ways the xb1 could go: it's either gonna be a huge failure or a huge sucess that completely transforms the console space into something more akin to the PC market. 

Either way, both companies seem to be looking to steam and the PC market for inspiration. Sony adopted the PC/Steam's openness towards indies and F2P, and Microsoft adopted a Steam-like DRM which could potentially lead to a price plummet on DD games sold on the XB1

He seems pretty delusional. The reason Steam has these sales is because consoles have such a healthy used game market. There's more value in owning a physical copy of any game, and they are easlily found in the bargain bin or online. Steam has to cut those prices to compete and publishers like to have that final cash out to recoup costs.

If MS succeeds in killing used games, I suspect publishers will feel confident enough to keep prices higher for longer, and eventually raise them. What's stopping them? Nothing.

People are acting like Sony doesn't do digital. They were doing day 1 digital before MS. Sony just gives you the option, Warhawk was released same time on psn and disc like 6 years ago. Sounds like MS is even copying Sony's share system (only after all the backlash they've received, it obviously wasn't planned).

[QUOTE="Gama_Forever"]

[quote="alleged MS employee"]

The only diff is steam you have to sign in before playing, and Xbox does it automatically at night for you (once per 24 hours)

the_bi99man

Steam has an offline mode, which doesn't require online check in every 24 hours. I just played all my non-multiplayer steam games just fine, with no internet at all, for the last 2 weeks, while moving between a couple houses, before getting internet set up at the new place.

What an idiot.

[QUOTE="the_bi99man"]

[QUOTE="Gama_Forever"]

[quote="alleged MS employee"]

The only diff is steam you have to sign in before playing, and Xbox does it automatically at night for you (once per 24 hours)

Ninja-Hippo

Steam has an offline mode, which doesn't require online check in every 24 hours. I just played all my non-multiplayer steam games just fine, with no internet at all, for the last 2 weeks, while moving between a couple houses, before getting internet set up at the new place.

What an idiot.

[QUOTE="Gama_Forever"]

[quote="alleged MS employee"]

The only diff is steam you have to sign in before playing, and Xbox does it automatically at night for you (once per 24 hours)

the_bi99man

Steam has an offline mode, which doesn't require online check in every 24 hours. I just played all my non-multiplayer steam games just fine, with no internet at all, for the last 2 weeks, while moving between a couple houses, before getting internet set up at the new place.

What an idiot.

Yeah please you can stop telling BS on this forum.

Most of the games on steam show an error if you try to play a game in offline mode. That you need to go online.

[QUOTE="Ginosaji"]

He doesn't really expect us to believe that they're planning to lower game prices, does he?

FoxbatAlpha

[QUOTE="the_bi99man"]

[QUOTE="Gama_Forever"]

[quote="alleged MS employee"]

The only diff is steam you have to sign in before playing, and Xbox does it automatically at night for you (once per 24 hours)

speedfog

Steam has an offline mode, which doesn't require online check in every 24 hours. I just played all my non-multiplayer steam games just fine, with no internet at all, for the last 2 weeks, while moving between a couple houses, before getting internet set up at the new place.

What an idiot.

Yeah please you can stop telling BS on this forum.

Most of the games on steam show an error if you try to play a game in offline mode. That you need to go online.

[QUOTE="the_bi99man"]

[QUOTE="Ninja-Hippo"] With Steam you have to use the internet to sign in and enable offline mode before going into offline mode. So if your internet drops, you're ****ed. mayceV

You have to do that one time, ever. What part of "I played my steam games for 2 weeks with no internet at all" didn't you understand? You are absolutely not "****ed" if your internet drops, unless you're playing a multiplayer game, in which case, steam isn't your problem.