The recent reports regarding Microsoft are getting more and more interesting by the minute. If murmurs in the industry are to be trusted, the company is currently engaged in designing not one, but two next gen conoles - a stand-alone box as well as a dedicated cloud-based console codenamed "Scarlett". Certain aspects of gameplay such as the controls, collision detection and simple game logic could be processed locally while the bulk of the processing would be offloaded to Microsoft's servers, enabling end-users to purchase a significantly cheaper system at the cost of being always online. Rumour has it that Microsoft has been working hard to diminish the obvious problems springing from lag and managed to provide an acceptable player experience on their new low-power hardware, similarly to how Sony delivers PS3 games over their PS Now streaming service. While not necessarily appealing to hardcore gamers, such a low-cost alternative would provide an entry level gaming device for those who only play a handful of games.

What are your thoughts? Would you trade your stand-alone box for an online only console provided it gave you the same experience at a fraction of the price? Have you ever used any game streaming services? Discuss!

Source

 

[Foxi4]

Fortnite is a free to play game....

Why do you think Pokemon Gold/Silver had a box with code in store? because it's eshop VC game that normally wouldn't get a physical release and they want to advertise it in store because they know it will sell WAY MORE.

Fortnite makes money through V-bucks, Battle Passes, skins and all of the assorted nonsense, and kids buy that stuff in droves. The majority of PC games "in boxes" that you see in stores are just codes. You are actively cutting the branch you're sitting on - up until now you were saying that digital games couldn't be sold by retailers in the same fashion as digital copies, as it turns out, a bit of cardboard negates your point. Which one is it then? You can't hold these two points of view simultaneously, they're mutually exclusive.

fortnight is a free game... same for PUBG and they are online multiplayer games... and yes they released gold and silver and mario tipping stars that way, doesnt mean it sold well but was to increase awareness that the game existed.


every online only multiplayer game has no need to have a physical release because it only works online either way same for online only mmos.

PUBG is not a free game. Fortnite isn't free either, Battle Royale is free, and even then, kids buy buckets of V-bucks. This isn't an argument.

 

[Deleted User]

Fortnite makes money through V-bucks, Battle passes, skins and all of the assorted nonsense, and kids buy that stuff in droves. The majority of PC games "in boxes" that you see in stores are just codes. You are actively cutting the branch you're sitting on - up until now you were saying that digital games couldn't be sold by retailers in the same fashion as digital copies, as it turns out, a bit of cardboard negates your point. Which one is it then? You can't hold these two points of view simultaneously, they're mutually exclusive.

CONSOLES

You have literally made zero points this entire time that haven't been retorted

 

[pedro702]

The majority of PC games "in boxes" that you see in stores are just codes. You are actively cutting the branch you're sitting on - up until now you were saying that digital games couldn't be sold by retailers in the same fashion as digital copies, as it turns out, a bit of cardboard negates your point. Which one is it then? You can't hold these two points of view simultaneously, they're mutually exclusive.

pc games sell horribly in stores lol just look at the numbers. most pc games end up on bargain bin on every electronic store here not sure how its in your country but here most electronic stores only have a tiny shelf for pc games by tiny i mean smaller than the vita that is a dead console lol.

Also your not a busness man or else you would know what your saying is stupid.

Even if only 20% of game sales are physical in the future that is 20% profit lol why would you kill your 20% profit? Same reason why xbox keeps releasing consoles in japan, they barely make an impact on sales for xbox but profit is profit, you dont just give up even 1% profit lol you want them all.

If what you say its true and they dont care about small % microsoft would have never released xbxo1 on japan at all.

Profit is profit, there is no way to not want it.

 

[Foxi4]

CONSOLES

You have literally made zero points this entire time that haven't been retorted

There is absolutely no difference between PC and console gaming besides the platform. You haven't refuted anything, you're just stubbornly rejecting reality and ignoring industry trends, which is fine, albeit naive.

 

[pedro702]

There is absolutely no difference between PC and console gaming besides the platform. You haven't refuted anything, you're just stubbornly rejecting reality and ignoring industry trends, which is fine, albeit naive.

p c games have tiny space on every eletronic store compared to consoles, they sell like crap just go to any store and ask...

 

[Deleted User]

There is absolutely no difference between PC and console gaming besides the platform. You haven't refuted anything, you're just stubbornly rejecting reality and ignoring industry trends, which is fine, albeit naive.

I've literally giving you stats to back up everything I've said. THERE IS A HUGEEEE DIFFERENCE from PC and consoles you live in complete denial my friend. Industry trends point to physical being the dominate sales force for consoles many years to come.

 

[Foxi4]

pc games sell horribly in stores lol just look at the numbers. most pc games end up on bargain bin on every electronic store here not sure how its in your country but here most electronic stores only have a tiny shelf for pc games by tiny i mean smaller than the vita that is a dead console lol.

Also your not a busness man or else you would know what your saying is stupid.

Even if only 20% of game sales are physical in the future that is 20% profit lol why would you kill your 20% profit? Same reason why xbox keeps releasing consoles in japan, they barely make an impact on sales for xbox but profit is profit, you dont just give up even 1% profit lol you want them all.

If what you say its true and they dont care about small % microsoft would have never released xbxo1 on japan at all.

Profit is profit, there is no way to not want it.

I actually work in the industry, I know very well what I'm talking about, what the margins are and what the priorities are. In order to make that "20%" the console has to be fitted with a mechanical drive and the relevant controller circuitry, the very moment fitting every single system with a reader becomes more expensive than the revenue from physical copies is when the drives go bye bye. You're not looking at this from a broad perspective, it's more than just distribution, it's also design and manufacturing, and logistics on top of that. Microsoft doesn't actually make a whole lot of money per game sold, so that profit margin must necessarily justify fitting consoles with drives, otherwise there's just no point. PC games make little money for stores because gamers migrated to Steam, consoles will go through the same transition eventually. I'm old enough to remember the exact opposite situation - stores full of PC games with a small cabinet for console releases, but the times have changed.

 

[tech3475]

I actually work in industry, I know very well what I'm talking about, what the margins are and what the priorities are. In order to make that "20%" the console has to be fitted with a mechanical drive and the relevant controller circuitry, the very moment fitting every single system with a reader becomes more expensive than the revenue from physical copies is when the drives go bye bye. You're not looking at this from a broad perspective, it's more than just distribution, it's also design and manufacturing, and logistics on top of that. Microsoft doesn't actually make a whole lot of money per game sold, so that profit margin must necessarily justify fitting consoles with drives, otherwise there's just no point. PC games make little money for stores because gamers migrated to Steam, consoles will go through the same transition eventually. I'm old enough to remember the exact opposite - stores full of PC games with a small cabinet for console releases, but the times have changed.

The situation is a bit more complicated because they don't want to alienate both consumers and retailers who want physical media/DRM.

Look at what happened with the PSP Go and Xbone DRM announcement.

I can see a transition happening at some point, but they likely wont transition until the majority of both parties are ok with going DD only.

 

[Foxi4]

The situation is a bit more complicated because they don't want to alienate both consumers and retailers who want physical media/DRM.

Look at what happened with the PSP Go and Xbone DRM announcement.

I can see a transition happening at some point, but they likely wont transition until the majority of both parties are ok with going DD only.

Of course. As I said, it's not going to happen tomorrow, but it's an eventuality that we should get comfortable with. As I mentioned before, in one or two generations from now, or 10 to 20 years, I just don't see how the transition won't be inevitable. Don't get me wrong, as a collector I'm dreading the death of physical media as I enjoy having my games on a shelf, but I understand that in the future it simply isn't going to be an option anymore, for a variety of reasons that we've discussed ad nauseam. At the end of the day the disc drive is the most unreliable part of a modern console as it's one of the few mechanical parts in it, and the profit margins aren't favourable either, so it's not ideal both from a technical and a retail perspective. I don't see it as a positive or a negative, it has pros and cons and the final estimate depends on who you ask, it's just the direction things are going. I see it as an evolution of the medium, nothing more and nothing less.

 

[geodeath]

It failed before its even been revealed!!!!!

A new low for microsoft confirmed.

this is not a new low for MS or anyone else. It is simply the 'next' technology everyone is playing around with, these days. With VR and Motion Controls exhausted and hardware being the only way to play new titles every few years, it is obvious that they are doing this. Everybody is onboard by the way, Biohazard 7 is going to be released in Japan for the Switch this way. So if you want to brand somebody as doing a 'new low' count them all in.

This is the natural next step, after all digital... sadly or not...

 

[Foxi4]

this is not a new low for MS or anyone else. It is simply the 'next' technology everyone is playing around with, these days. With VR and Motion Controls exhausted and hardware being the only way to play new titles every few years, it is obvious that they are doing this. Everybody is onboard by the way, Biohazard 7 is going to be released in Japan for the Switch this way. So if you want to brand somebody as doing a 'new low' count them all in.

This is the natural next step, after all digital... sadly or not...

I would like to think that alternative distribution models open up the market. There's tons of smaller indie titles that are really enjoyable, but they would never warrant a full physical release. A digital download cuts out the retail middleman to a large extent and allows such releases to be more sustainable for developers and more accessible for gamers. Many of them actually end up blossoming into a retail release in short order if they become successful enough, I see that aspect as a positive outcome of digital distribution. These days even a tiny studio can release a game for the big three consoles, just two generations ago that was unthinkable once you took into account the hefty licensing fees, a cut for the publisher and another cut for the retailer, manufacturing and distribution costs aside. Those tiny studios only start small, but they have to start somewhere. Not only that, digital distribution also enabled the Early Access model - while that's not always a great thing, it does enable studios to simultaneously work on the game as they sell it, making it better over time as opposed to sinking their life savings into a project that may or may not pan out day 1.

 

[netovsk]

We have yet to see how they pretend to advance the streaming technology. They could keep core game functions local as to keep input lag low (and Microsoft is wary about that, which is good), and stream whichever assets are non-essential to gameplay.

But it has been told that "Scarlett" stands for a family of devices. If it's an OPTION for people who'd prefer to invest less upfront and allows more people to game, why not? The more the merrier.

They're doing a pretty good job on making gaming more acessible with the game pass. I think a cheaper console is the next step forward. Kudos to Xbox.

 

[Foxi4]

We have yet to see how they pretend to advance the streaming technology. They could keep core game functions local as to keep input lag low (and Microsoft is wary about that, which is good), and stream whichever assets are non-essential to gameplay.

But it has been told that "Scarlett" stands for a family of devices. If it's an OPTION for people who'd prefer to invest less upfront and allows more people to game, why not? The more the merrier.

They're doing a pretty good job on making gaming more acessible with the game pass. I think a cheaper console is the next step forward. Kudos to Xbox.

This is a very important point. There's no reason why the box couldn't deal with the game logic while the server deals with what's resource-consuming - the rendering. It would only be a matter of synchronisation, that's where the ping of your connection comes into play. It's certainly interesting as what the rumours describe doesn't come across as standard streaming, it seems to be a mix of local and cloud processing.

 

[GBADWB]

although I'm never a fan of a streaming only device, there are actually some pros to having an all stream service:

Companies are more prone to sell games by pass rather than per title, so if your the type of gamer that goes from one game to the next, it can theoretically be cheaper in the long run.
Local storage is minimized since games are installed in the cloud. this also means 0 installation time since the user does not download the game they are trying to stream.
removes a lot from the hardware cost so that it focuses solely on software only.

Online gaming, depending on the game can theoretically be better. Since cloud servers host online game sessions, all of the map calculations are done on the server side. The server only needs the inputs as upstream from the devices, which is a much smaller amount of data compared to sending other pieces of information like collision data and client sided effects. (this of course puts a burden on users downstream)

This also severely limits and hampers potential hacking, as everything outside of inputs would be server sided.

It's also immune to hardware advancements in performance. A streaming device has only a set resolution, framerate and color gamut it will output. As long as you are fine with the settings for your television, generational upgrades are non-existant, unless you want to pick up other features that come with panels(e.g HDR capability, Adaptive Sync). Games will look as good as whatever server is rendering it which at its top potential, is typically faster than what 99%+ of consumers have

 

[Foxi4]

although I'm never a fan of a streaming only device, there are actually some pros to having an all stream service:

Companies are more prone to sell games by pass rather than per title, so if your the type of gamer that goes from one game to the next, it can theoretically be cheaper in the long run.
Local storage is minimized since games are installed in the cloud. this also means 0 installation time since the user does not download the game they are trying to stream.
removes a lot from the hardware cost so that it focuses solely on software only.

Online gaming, depending on the game can theoretically be better. Since cloud servers host online game sessions, all of the map calculations are done on the server side. The server only needs the inputs as upstream from the devices, which is a much smaller amount of data compared to sending other pieces of information like collision data and client sided effects. (this of course puts a burden on users downstream)

This also severely limits and hampers potential hacking, as everything outside of inputs would be server sided.

It's also immune to hardware advancements in performance. A streaming device has only a set resolution, framerate and color gamut it will output. As long as you are fine with the settings for your television, generational upgrades are non-existant, unless you want to pick up other features that come with panels(e.g HDR capability, Adaptive Sync)

The Scarlett streaming box doesn't have some of those advantages as it supposedly processes some game logic on the actual system, not just the inputs. The idea is that games are spliced into things that can be processed locally and things that are to be handled by the server as opposed to the client sending inputs to the server and the server running capture of the actual software. Most of your points remain true though.

 

[|<roni&g]

Streaming only? Hope it fails which it will.

 

[eriol33]

Why don't they just make a game streaming app on smartphone?

 

[thekarter104]

This will fail even more than the most failed console ever existed.

 

[DinohScene]

Streaming games.
Hell no.

Call me old but I like to have a disc in me hands :c

 

[jumpman17]

They can't even release Crackdown 3 with it's supposed cloud based multiplayer, how do they expect to run a whole gaming service on the cloud?