Xbox One will force gamers to stay online after all

[Passnot]

You gamers are forgetting something crucial in this debate: YOU are the minority.

If Microsoft can rope even a quarter of the players they had with the 360, they'll STILL stand toe to toe with Sony, and perhaps (which is my prediction) even surpass them. Why? It's simple: The Xbox One will appeal to EVERYONE else outside the gaming circle.

The casual gamers (which most, believe it or not, are), the moms, the dads, the aunts, the uncles, the grandparents, the shop owners, the university lecturers. How is this possible? Duh. Because it's a platform to do a heck of a lot more than just GAME on, and it's a platform that will allow people to do it with ease.

This is the price you gamer fanboys (again I'll remind you that you're in the entertainment minority) have to pay for gaming going mainstream: it's no longer an industry just for you. The whole world is in on this now.

I agree. We live in a world motivated by capitalism and justified by the free market. Every corporation is out to get whatever income you can spare for their product. Sony is no different than Microsoft. Both companies want your $$$, not your friendship. The only difference between them is how they go about reaching the "targeted" audience. Sony believes if they go after the hardcore gamers, the rest will fall like dominoes. Microsoft wants to have it's cake and eat it too. Cake being hardcore and casuals.

This new generation of console's is not your grand daddy's atari anymore. Neither are so many other things that never used to use the internet either. Phones, cars, typewriters(old pp's computer)...etc.

It sucks when the power or internet is down, but if you can afford either, not being able to play your $400 console is the least of your problems.

 

[Darth Shiv]

Because it's their system, they have their reasons (multimedia integration, piracy prevention, game sharing limitation) and that's how they want it. You don't like it? Don't buy it. Pretty simple.

Indeed. I won't be buying it.

 

[Darth Shiv]

It sucks when the power or internet is down, but if you can afford either, not being able to play your $400 console is the least of your problems.

Traditionally, the always online requirement has not existed. Why are these freedoms being eroded? What are we trading here? We are receiving worse restrictions in exchange for what? Microsoft and not the consumer are gaining here. Some people don't agree with this ideologically.

 

[Androsszit]

For the armed service people, you got me there. For the supposed "millions" on dial up still, no there are not many people left on dial up. There is almost no service providers left that even allow dial up.

Incorrect. Dialup is still very common among Americans. In fact there are still many Americans without any access to internet at all (if we don't include satellite which has tiny bandwidth limitations and a high setup / subscription cost).

http://gizmodo.com/5929710/3-million-suckers-still-pay-for-aol-dial+up

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/media/jan-june13/broadband_03-22.html


Microsoft and those claiming the always online setup to be no big deal need to pull their heads out of their a** and realize not everyone has a stable or affordable connection in their area. But I guess that means they don't deserve to be gamers then, right?

 

[dividebyzero]

Because it's their system, they have their reasons (multimedia integration, piracy prevention, game sharing limitation) and that's how they want it. You don't like it? Don't buy it. Pretty simple.

You and I both know that a huge chunk of the target audience will be compelled to buy into the latest pacifier console, and that the inevitable decline in support+games for earlier Xbox will inevitably squeeze people into upgrading.

Living in a country with first world pretentions and third world infrastructure should make for some interesting raging against our monolithic ISP's. Lengthy loss of internet connection is a way of life here- between seismic activity, poor roading, and ISP's who outsource their service/support to any country that can offer a lower wage scale than Turkmenistan, we could see mass rioting against the Telco's....well, there would be a potential for mass rioting if the console gamers could be bothered getting off the couch.

 

[Puiu]

I completely agree here. in order to protect the developers of used games, always online is going to be required. (DUH!) publishers will PREFER to do business with Microsoft instead of Sony (if sony doesn't match MS on this), and you know what makes good games? Having publishers/dev on your side!!!

bring on the always online - im connected to a fiber line, why would I ever disonnect it anyways? bring on the cloud era.

I laugh because people thing cloud is bad now....wait until it hits full force in 5 to 10 yrs

by then we should probably be thinking of the new generation.
the whole "you can't play if you don't phone us every 24h" is just too stupid even if you don't care about always online. my internet is also really good (I can get 100mbps in my country and around 35mbps from the uk), but even so I have sometimes problems, 2-3 times per month, where I have to reset my router or just the ISP having a problem.

 

[Guest]

If I want internet at home its either satellite or dial up and I have neither. I only net from work. The rural county I live in is around 35000 people in total. The main town in this county and the only one which has dsl only caters to around 8000 people. Theres alot more people than you think going without broadband in the home. So XO is not going to be in my house or anyone else I know either.

 

[SirGCal]

I laugh because people thing cloud is bad now....wait until it hits full force in 5 to 10 yrs

You are free to think that but some of us like having physical access and control of our own data!

No joke; that's why I have one 12TB Raid 6 array and am currently building another 24TB array... (Actively testing the HDDs as I type this... Dang it takes FOREVER to validate 4TB drives... holy crap...). But people act as if the 'cloud' is something new... As if mainframes, servers, "internet" never existed before... Hang a catchy name on it and suddenly it's worth $... Ugg... And no, I do NOT pirate anything... Personally can't stand people who don't pay for their own stuff... I have a considerable BluRay collection of my own as well as home videos of my twins which is growing out of control (don't buy the wife a new video camera and promise to keep everything in full definition when she has unlimited access to your seemingly endless storage arrays... OMG she can put a serious hurting on it... Hours and hours and hours... Especially all at 1080p/60... Dumping the camera's drive is a nightly occurrence anymore... /cry)

As for the 'One... I'm a PC person myself... But was looking forward to this actually. Haven't used my 360 in 3+ years... Just formatted it to take it in to sell it or give it away... But the fact that 1) it doesn't support FLAC or MKV (or other very common media formats other then MS's own flavors...) and they expect it to be the media 'center'... (or at least didn't at the last press release I saw it at, maybe they updated it. doubt it.) 2) Always on is just bad simply because there are plenty of places without reliable internet. I'm not one of them but plenty of my friends are. They live in the boonies and just don't have any high-speed internet at all and/or are stuck with satellite internet which is notoriously horrible for any sort of 'gaming' situations (pings in the 2-3 second range, though the stay alive might still work but... Only one of them even bothers with this internet at all...).

These are people with a LOT of $. Million dollar homes on much more valuable land. Just out of reach of internet. (happens when you own a few thousand acres...) They actually just use their unlimited cellphones almost exclusively for internet save enormous downloads but you'd be surprised what 4G LTE can really do, especially when you have a tower on the back of your property... But even they aren't going to get them. They decided also to go PS4 this time around just for that reason. And granted it's only a handful of families in this case, but they would have bought a few dozen units total to be used as media boxes, gaming boxes, etc throughout the house(s). Not to mention how many, always new, games they would buy their kids or selves regularly... In my book, that has to be considered a fat loss. I just don't understand what M$ is thinking anymore...

First W8 then this... And when administrators screamed about 8, nothing. Then the users really complained about it with metro and the menu... nothing... Then finally 8.1 which is bringing... Ohh.. really nothing... Then the 'One. So many great potential ideas, so many thoughts and progress in the field... Then they shoot them selves in the butt dropping ogg, flac, mkv, etc. and then forcing always on and leaving no-poor internet users out in the cold... Heck, even here in the big city, my insanely awesome internet is a mind-blowing 30M/5M setup... hold me back... wee... Not to mention effectively half duplex. But it's the best available... Comeon Fiber!!!

Sorry for the rant...

 

[treetops]

I said it before and I will say it again, unless they make it very very easy to plug your cellphone in to give you this once every 24 hours internet this will be a disaster. And they must make it very very clear to the public this is a option.

 

[Percy PKS]

This is just crap. Microsoft digging their own grave.

 

[Burty117]

Ok, hold on a second, if gamers are a "minority" in this decision, why on earth are people, like my parents (who don't play games except for the Wii sometimes), going to buy this box? It will force them to get a gold subscription for them to watch Netflix, is going to cost them quite a bit anyway for the box AND it wants them to check in regularly?

Some people on here really aren't getting this, If gamers are not the target audience, who is? because I'm pretty sure this will annoy non gamers as well and especially casual gamers, imagine playing viva pinata and the internet goes out or you need to re-authenticate, first question that would pop up in the users mind will be "why the hell do I have to re-authenticate every bloody day!".

Seriously Microsoft, what the hell are you thinking...

 

[Nobina]

If you don't like Xbox One, don't be stupid and don't buy it to show Microsoft that you are not an ***** and you won't let them **** on you.

 

[cliffordcooley]

Before I say anything, lets make it clear. I do not own a console and don't plan on buying a console.

In other words, offline play is over, whether you like it or not. Much like how parents place restrictions on their children’s internet usage by setting maximum time limits, Microsoft is requiring Xbox One owners to connect to the web at least once every 24 hours, or else your gaming privileges are cut-off.

I will not be purchasing anything that requires a daily phone-home to function.

We all have devices that require Internet connections to do certain task. However there are other task that can be done without the Internet connection. None of these devices require a Internet connection much less a phone-home connection to function. Anyone believing this is not a big deal, has their priorities screwed up.

Go ahead and let this become a reality. Next you will be complaining your tablet has been disabled, because you can't find a WiFi hot-spot for Windows to phone-home.

 

[stonarda]

Im going to hate having the console hooked up to the internet when taking ti round a friends, and that anti-piracy and fees for reselling games - Oh wait, I have a PC, pick that over a console any day!!

 

[avoidz]

I laugh because people thing cloud is bad now....wait until it hits full force in 5 to 10 yrs

You are free to think that but some of us like having physical access and control of our own data!

No joke; that's why I have one 12TB Raid 6 array and am currently building another 24TB array... (Actively testing the HDDs as I type this... Dang it takes FOREVER to validate 4TB drives... holy crap...). But people act as if the 'cloud' is something new... As if mainframes, servers, "internet" never existed before... Hang a catchy name on it and suddenly it's worth $... Ugg... And no, I do NOT pirate anything... Personally can't stand people who don't pay for their own stuff... I have a considerable BluRay collection of my own as well as home videos of my twins which is growing out of control (don't buy the wife a new video camera and promise to keep everything in full definition when she has unlimited access to your seemingly endless storage arrays... OMG she can put a serious hurting on it... Hours and hours and hours... Especially all at 1080p/60... Dumping the camera's drive is a nightly occurrence anymore... /cry)

As for the 'One... I'm a PC person myself... But was looking forward to this actually. Haven't used my 360 in 3+ years... Just formatted it to take it in to sell it or give it away... But the fact that 1) it doesn't support FLAC or MKV (or other very common media formats other then MS's own flavors...) and they expect it to be the media 'center'... (or at least didn't at the last press release I saw it at, maybe they updated it. doubt it.) 2) Always on is just bad simply because there are plenty of places without reliable internet. I'm not one of them but plenty of my friends are. They live in the boonies and just don't have any high-speed internet at all and/or are stuck with satellite internet which is notoriously horrible for any sort of 'gaming' situations (pings in the 2-3 second range, though the stay alive might still work but... Only one of them even bothers with this internet at all...).

These are people with a LOT of $. Million dollar homes on much more valuable land. Just out of reach of internet. (happens when you own a few thousand acres...) They actually just use their unlimited cellphones almost exclusively for internet save enormous downloads but you'd be surprised what 4G LTE can really do, especially when you have a tower on the back of your property... But even they aren't going to get them. They decided also to go PS4 this time around just for that reason. And granted it's only a handful of families in this case, but they would have bought a few dozen units total to be used as media boxes, gaming boxes, etc throughout the house(s). Not to mention how many, always new, games they would buy their kids or selves regularly... In my book, that has to be considered a fat loss. I just don't understand what M$ is thinking anymore...

First W8 then this... And when administrators screamed about 8, nothing. Then the users really complained about it with metro and the menu... nothing... Then finally 8.1 which is bringing... Ohh.. really nothing... Then the 'One. So many great potential ideas, so many thoughts and progress in the field... Then they shoot them selves in the butt dropping ogg, flac, mkv, etc. and then forcing always on and leaving no-poor internet users out in the cold... Heck, even here in the big city, my insanely awesome internet is a mind-blowing 30M/5M setup... hold me back... wee... Not to mention effectively half duplex. But it's the best available... Comeon Fiber!!!

Sorry for the rant...

tl;dr

PS. Stick to blowing your own trumpet in your diary or something.

 

[ReederOnTheRun]

You beat me to it! I'm guessing the people who are so adamant that the 24 hour check-in is no big deal still live in the basement of their parents' house and have never EVER had to endure a move? Because they would realize that is one huge and VERY common situation where you can be without internet (and/or something like your Xbox) for days, even weeks depending on how (and how far) you are moving. I just moved 10 miles and was without internet and my media/gaming setup for 2 days. And I was prepared!

As others pointed out, you can look to bad service areas, or natural disasters and other acts of God for outages. But something as simple as moving is a common issue that nearly everyone has experienced... The lack of even basic consideration of simple facts like that, and calling people "whiny brats" for being concerned about it, indicates a pretty substantial level of immaturity.

O.M.G. 2 days without the internet?!? That would mean like 1 day without Xbox!! Wow, yeah you're right. I don't know how someone would survive that.

And yeah, what if there's a natural disaster or act of god or something??? Because everybody knows the first priority in any disaster situation should be how you're going to get access to your video games.

People just need to think man. At least you and I get it.

 

[Tolrem88]

If my internet is down for 24hrs I'm not going to be worried about gaming, Ive got real life work related requirements for a connection that actually matter.

 

[cliffordcooley]

It's not about people that have Internet. It's about the fact Microsoft is requiring Internet for their box to function. I don't see how Microsoft can justify disabling their gaming console, if the consumer decides they can't afford Internet for a few month's. The whole idea behind requiring a service thats not completely needed is absurd.

 

[Tygerstrike]

First to the PC ppl out there who are nice enough to post thier views. really...what about the ppl who can not afford a gaming level PC? just because YOU can afford to have it and a super stable connection, doesnt mean everyone else can. Sometimes a console is all a family can afford. To blame ppl for not having the PC setup you do is assinine. It really goes to show exactly how snobbish and stuck up you really are. It also goes to show how much you pay attention to the world around you. Just because someone cant afford that super alienware computer,l doesnt mean they dont have the right to play games and enjoy themselves. But wait, knowing the PC mentality anyone who doesnt have the money to buy the PC shouldnt be playing games and should slave harder.
As for dial up, there are still tons of ppl on dial up. There are many places that have 50,000 ppl in it but only 10-15% have GOOD internet access. Also depending on the service you have and the time of day, you might try and log on and simply cant because of ALL THE TRAFFIC!! SO where always online might seem no problem to those ppl who have stable connections, it can be an impossibility for some. Not everyone lives in a metro area. In fact there are a lot of ppl out there who never go to a large city. SHould they be punished too because of where they live??

 

[brskeen]

The brave men and women of the armed forces, who don't have a reliable internet connection, and the millions of Americans still on dial-up who also want to enjoy gaming would like to have a word with you.

For the armed service people, you got me there. For the supposed "millions" on dial up still, no there are not many people left on dial up. There is almost no service providers left that even allow dial up.

119 million Americans don't have access to broadband and many live in areas where they aren't in range of a cell tower. You can try as hard as you like to minimize that, but for Microsoft to write off 1/3 of their potential customers in their strongest market is baffling. I've lived in places where I didn't have broadband and periods of time where I couldn't justify the cost when medical issues in my family and the associated costs made the expense unfeasible. Gaming has always been a haven and a means of entertainment when times were hard. If you're privileged enough that that's not an issue then I envy you, but there are others who aren't as well off.
Cutting people out of the potential community of gamers is a bad idea, especially when it seems to be motivated more out of paranoia and a desire for control than out of any consideration for what it adds to the experience. This is a bad move on the part of publishers and Microsoft and it'll do them more harm than they realize. It's very easy to say, "You can't play your game for a few hours or days? WAAAAAH!" but you need to understand that this entirely about tightening the screws on their customers and trying to find a technical means of nullifying First Sale rights and the rights to sell, loan and rent that gamers have traditionally enjoyed. I've spent alot of time on 360 this gen but nothing that I've heard from Microsoft in the last few weeks has made me want an Xbox One. Quite to the contrary, in fact.

 

[treetops]

119 million Americans don't have access to broadband and many live in areas where they aren't in range of a cell tower. You can try as hard as you like to minimize that, but for Microsoft to write off 1/3 of their potential customers in their strongest market is baffling. I've lived in places where I didn't have broadband and periods of time where I couldn't justify the cost when medical issues in my family and the associated costs made the expense unfeasible. Gaming has always been a haven and a means of entertainment when times were hard. If you're privileged enough that that's not an issue then I envy you, but there are others who aren't as well off.
Cutting people out of the potential community of gamers is a bad idea, especially when it seems to be motivated more out of paranoia and a desire for control than out of any consideration for what it adds to the experience. This is a bad move on the part of publishers and Microsoft and it'll do them more harm than they realize. It's very easy to say, "You can't play your game for a few hours or days? WAAAAAH!" but you need to understand that this entirely about tightening the screws on their customers and trying to find a technical means of nullifying First Sale rights and the rights to sell, loan and rent that gamers have traditionally enjoyed. I've spent alot of time on 360 this gen but nothing that I've heard from Microsoft in the last few weeks has made me want an Xbox One. Quite to the contrary, in fact.

I knew a single mother of 3 children, there is no way in hell she would ever buy a console that requires the internet. She simply cannot afford it. Maybe if she could simply plug her cell phone into it once a day with ZERO hassle to give it internet. I dont even think she had the internet on her phone.

 

[Kneep]

Relax people, this just means someone will hack the xbox one within' a month after it's release to avoid this hideousness from M$

 

[backo]

The only issue I see is that you may not have access to content you paid for due to circumstances that are out of your control.
If I understand the text correctly games on XBox One will come with licencing agreement... like any other software and this will give them the legal grounds needed to restrict you. Gamers are used to owning their games. If all games switch to licencing agreements this will no longer be completely true.
I personally do not have a problem with online check (technically), my internet connection is stable and this shouldn't cause me any problem. But I disagree to what the check stands for. I do believe you should have access to the contact you paid for no matter what. I will give Steam as an example... internet connection is needed to download the game (duh!) and that's about it. You can enjoy Skyrim for 60 hours straight without internet connection is you want.

 

[Guest]

Its 2013 everything should be connected....I wouldnt expect anything else
I assume all the winning is about having slow internet connection or no connection at all...

 

[cliffordcooley]

Its 2013 everything should be connected....I wouldnt expect anything else
I assume all the winning is about having slow internet connection or no connection at all...

Way to go! Start with 100% pure arrogance, and finish with a non-sympathetic comment toward your fellow not-so-fortunate neighbor.

The only way I would ever be tempted to agree with you, is if basic Internet was a free service worldwide.