Microsoft fires the first shot in the "NEXT" generation.... - Page 101

Arthur Gies is lying and making stuff up.

Do people seriously believe shipping a new console is like going out and getting a new carton of milk? Launch a big new product like this takes years or planning and coordination with hundreds of parties. Do you seriously think something of this magnitude was completely in the dark till earlier this year when it was supposed to launch this year and then cancelled at the last minute?

What color is the sky in your world?

No, they make the plans and then do a final decision on what to do before all the plans are implemented. It's totally possible. There's no doubt that new hardware is being made, branding is being done, etc. The question is to pull the trigger. MS obviously (?) isn't going to.

But it might be a mistake. The April NPD numbers just came out. Software sales are down 42% from last year - 42%! Apparently the best selling game of April 2012 would've been 8th in April 2011. And this is with less new software.

Hardware sales are down 32%. And I know some people seem to think that is all the Wii, but no. 360 sales were down 20% too.

This hardware generation is flatlining. Christmas sales are going to be miserable at this rate (down 50% from last year?). 2013 might even start to look too far away for Microsoft and Sony. People are obviously bored of this generation, yet apparently we have another year and a half of it.

Blue. I'm guessing yours is sort of a dull and overcast grey?

I didn't hear the podcast so I can't comment on the accuracy of what Anthony said that Gies said, but if what he posted is accurate it's from a credible source, and it's plausible. Why don't you go call your inside contacts at Microsoft and ask them about it? lol

Let's not exaggerate. Xbox sales is down 14% from last year (April - the latest which is really expected after the hot sales after the launch of Kinect.

It takes years to get the factory ready and suppliers lined up. It also takes years for game developers to get the titles ready. You don't give them a date and change it at the last minute. It would have all kinds of financial implications that would ripple through the industry.

Anybody who does not think that is naive and has no clue what they are talking about.

potato

I don't know that I'd say people are bored. The economy, lack of jobs, high gas prices, those who do have jobs live with an uncertainty... Personally I've purchased one used game for $5 in the last 8 or 9 months and two full priced games in almost a year. I'm not bored just flat broke and don't have the means to buy like I used to. Everything is seeing a decline because of broke people. If times are tight the first thing you do is stop buying playthings and focus more on necessity.

If Sony and Microsoft are delaying their systems it's to get consumer confidence back up and to loosen wallets. You toss on all the tablets, smartphones, data packages, apps, DLC, map packs and people are nickel and dimed all day long. So we pick and choose our battles. Can only spend so much and with all the options to get games these days plus a bad economy dollars just won't be spent as freely as they have in the past.

These would have been release day purchases Skyrim, Prototype 2, Darkness 2, Gears 3, Max Payne 3, Uncharted 3, and on and on but too tight for me to spend that kind of dough now. Just pay my monthly Gamefly rental fee and play them that way. I like owning games, but can't do it anymore.

Over-saturation, poor release dates and, poor games aren't going to be fixed by a new console. And releasing a new console when the economy still isn't so hot is a very, very bad idea; especially since people have quite an investment in their current tech.

I'm still running through games (with no end in sight) from last Falls mega flood of AAA/AA titles (only one purchased day 1 @ $60 mind you)... And looking at the charts, has anything worth while been released since Jan? I'm talking AAA, hyped, widely acclaimed by gamers and reviewers alike?

You know it, but apparently a lot of people don't. This is a publishing problem, not a tech problem. The industry is eating itself and on a crash course, due to several factors and trends they refuse to stray from.


As for "game journalists", Long ago I learned to trust them as far as you can throw them. Paylola and page clicks is their industry. Don't feed them trolls.


Edit: Of note is Bioshock was just moved to a Spring 13 release date. I'm sure of that was a bit of extra dev time, but looking at their original release date I think they made the decision too many other publisher and devs are failing to make. When you up against 2-3 other big names weeks apart, releasing for xmas isn't going to make up a loss from fighting for sales in a saturated release window. Further, it just hurts you th other 9 months when you're releasing AA titles or shovel-ware.

Who's more likely to know what's going on on the inside, someone who does this for a living and has industry contacts, or armchair analysts on a forum?

When people who actually are in a position to know stuff instead of just guess at it start talking, I start listening. The consensus about a launch sooner rather than later is growing day by day.

"Simply stated, there were notably fewer" new game releases, said NPD analyst Anita Frazier.

"I think it's as simple as that, because when we see compelling content come into the market, the games are still selling as well as ever. We just saw a lot less of this in April as compared to last."

I know that economic figures say the economy is doing bad. But at the same time, the Avengers made $200 million in 3 days and people line up around the block to buy a new phone. It's weird right?

I too, have a lot of games I need to play. I think these publishers got this idea in their head that their 'brand' needs to be annualized, it needs a new game every year, it needs a comic book, it needs a bunch of DLC all year round, it needs a season pass, etc. It's just exhausting.

But I also think this effort is basically sucking up all the oxygen. In other words, the hype for yet another Assassins' Creed and Call of Duty and Halo (with their inevitable DLC packs and preorder bonuses and etc.) is basically turning the industry into this thing where people alternate between playing a game and waiting for its sequel.

But I guess, unlike many, I think new hardware is a way to clear that out. I do think people look for new experiences on their new hardware. I really don't think people are going to pay $400 or whatever to play the same Call of Duty they've been playing since 2007.

Ever work in an office? There's internal speak, and there's industry speak. Industry speak is all about positioning and creating reality and confidence for shareholders and other low information eyes.

If you don't think artificially limiting the big release window to 4 months around fall/xmas is hurting sales, I don't know what to tell you. There's been a noticeable change the last 3 years of doing this exclusively with almost everything AAA/AA, and there's been a notice slow down in sales and problems with sales in other months.

I don't remember any other generation where 10-20 must play items all hit Oct-Dec and then there's little else of interest the other 9 months. Or another generation where I literally have good games sitting unopened on my coffee table, due to lack of time to get to them all (and I game quite a bit). Or a generation where prices have dropped so precipitously after release just to sustain sales.

That ain't a hardware issue. A shiny ball ain't going to fix it, and blaming it on the consoles is a smart way of deflecting shareholder ire towards your operation. But thats not an argument that new hardware isn't coming, or that that industry speak won't push for it. Just that these issue will not go away, and might be even more prevalent next gen because the symptom was treated instead of the disease.


So, new IP's and AAA games are not being released in off season months anymore... which is my observation as well. And to be some of I get, since it's more risky to do so, especially with a new IP. But the model and aversion to rolling the dice, is producing some rather expensive, and bland games that are afraid to take risks that might offer bigger returns.

Too much monetizing the value of their revenue stream and not enough keeping the customer happy in my opinion. I'm also of the opinion that hardware doesn't really matter like it used to. It's what software it runs. This stuff is really hitting the masses now and they don't care anything about pixels per inch or MHz all they want is Angry Birds and Facebook.

And angry birds is one of a gajillion mobile games, the vast majority of which arent profitable. That market is beyond saturated. They're not abandoning their core audience to wade into that mess. MHz doesn't matter to everyone, but it does to a huge segment of MS's audience. Those people and their billions of dollars will head elsewhere if they're not served.

http://majornelson.com/

That answers why Activision and EA keep making it yearly. You have a set of gamers out of 67 million sold continuously playing those games. 4 COD games in the top 20. Those four games keeps people buying Gold which in turn the DLC which in turn season pass discount for the DLC they were going buy in the first place. Halo Reach and Halo 3 still being played. Consumers clearly like what keeps coming out. They must be giving the people what they want.

Yep, they are. I'm a big fan of some of these yearly releases, particularly the multiplayer ones. I wish they would be more spread out in the year myself, but the length of the release cycle isn't a problem at all for fans. Some people might feel left out of that I guess, but its hardly a destructive trend.

Yep. Die-hard fans would still play the next CoD or Halo even if; it only offered one map, was downscaled to 240p, lagged like crazy, and was full of bugs and/or cheaters. Those fans may want a new console to play their game, but they'll keep buying the next sequel every single year, regardless of what it's offered upon.

Just look at CoD on the Wii, even at 480p 30fps it still sells a million+ units.

I doubt that. Those series and others have those fans because they're serving those fans well. When that ceases, or something better comes along, they'll move on. The reason cod is still so popular is that nothing has beat it at its own game yet.

Take the same gameplay, the same quality/polish, but knock it out of the park on graphics or another significant area of appeal, and people won't care what you call it. A new console is often the place where that happens. Halo was that game. Even resistance looked like a real challenger for a while, but it just wasn't good enough.

BF3 does everything COD does and better. But it's not COD, and it doesn't do "it" as well.

Thing with games like COD is it's less about the game, than the social appeal around it. People know by default their buddy has it and they can all enjoy it. That feeds off itself, and it becomes what you buy for your FPS fix.

I don't know how else to explain how 6 years of yearly releases that amount of small map packs / expansion packs with no real improvements in the engine explains away a 3 billion dollar IP. My friends that play it, and have bitched about but bought every iteration can't either. They just do.

COD is it, and because it is it, it sells well. Some day it will be something else. COD isn't technically impressive, and is still running on a 10 year old engine who's only real claim to frame is running at 60fps, in a muddy texture, low poly, unimpressive world.

And it doesn't matter, people LOVE it.

And there' no guarantee people will love the next iteration on a new engine. It very well could lose "it" that makes it popular. And then on to the next thing.

COD is actually the post child for why new tech isn't going to save publishers. Content and costs are the issues, not the technology. COD wasn't technically impressive when it hit and it sure ain't now; but it's sold $3 billion worth of games. Content and hedging costs made it insanely profitable, along with a little luck and figuring out what gamers wanted.

COD2 definitely was technically impressive in its day. As was COD4. Tech opens the door, gameplay, polish and accessibility keep people coming back. The BF3 trailers had people going NUTS with their semi deceptive trailers. It was never going to look that good on consoles, but people wanted to believe it. That opened a lot of people up to a series that has been around longer and seen more releases than COD.

We're gonna see exactly the same scene when we get new consoles. People will go crazy seeing things they've never seen before. Itll energize the whole scene, and it'll be driven by tech. And the series that carries the flag forward will be the one where the gameplay strikes a chord.

COD4 was never impressive from a technical point of view. People were impressed with 60FPS, but that was more market buzz, then real difference as far as a normal gamer is concerned. And it was possible because they limited it's technical abilities quite a bit.

That's not to say it wasn't innovative, which it absolutely was. But technically impressive it was not.

That happens every gen. Look, last gen GTA was THE big franchise. Where is it now? It's certainly popular, but it's not the big franchise anymore. GTA 4 was generally regarded as a disappointment. Even Halo, while still extremely popular, definitely dropped off a bit.

I will stick to my guns - I do think people look for the next new thing when a new system comes out. They'll play the old stuff, but they are on the lookout for something fresh. Also what tends to happen is that, yea, the developers mess up a bit in some way, opening the door for someone else (see: Resident Evil 5).

I don't think old COD will strike the same chord, I really don't. It might early on, until someone else releases something materially better - and, for what it is worth, I don't think BF3 was materially better. Remember how Activision was merrily pumping out Tony Hawk games until Skate came along?

Nobody can possibly convince me that COD is as good as it will ever get and people will keep paying Activision yearly for COD for the next 20 years. The game industry just doesn't work like that!

Very well said. BF3 obliterates CoD in nearly every aspect, but there's a mindset of familiarity that many people can't seem to overcome. Once one person in a circle buys the game, their friends will follow and join the statistical herd. That said, BF3 has seen quite a few CoD converts in the past couple of months. (They're incredibly easy to spot, just look for the tents. )

CoD has felt old, stale, and worn-out for some time now, but it's the devil everyone knows. CoD:Next likely won't offer anything new in any way whatsoever either...but it will do 60.1 frames per second on the new console! "America! F*@k yeah!"

no, 60 fps rules. the smoothness of animation and the tightness of controls dominates. it just looks and feels so surreal. it's not just frames moving faster. it's more frames in-between leading to smoothness.

I love my 30 fps games. Gears of War 3, Halo, etc. No doubt restricting framerate to 30 fps lets you do cool things like HDR lighting, etc.

But when you see Pinball Arcade, Forza Motorsport 4, Modern Warfare, etc. running at 60 fps, it's just a new level. I look back at my HD gameplay recordings and it's such a stark contrast seeing the original video at 60 fps and then seeing what Youtube's 30 fps transcoding does to it.

It's the big advantage that PCs have. I used to be a PC gamer and going below 45 fps was considered horrible. I sacrificed frames per second when moving to consoles where almost all games are 30 fps due to lack of horsepower.

It very well could. Maybe not 20 years, but if they make the right leaps to next gen it could work. But with how Activision treats the IP there's a good likelihood of burnout.

A lot of time when a game jumps a generation they lose their feel, which is the #1 thing that will turn people off. Often because they jump to new engines, that while reaching the same ends, do things differently code wise and you can feel it.

Anyways, it's not a creed against COD. Just proving the point that there's plenty of money to be made if a developer can tap into the pulse of what the consumer wants, and keep them happy. COD never relied on next gen power, unless you think 60fps @ 600P is what people really thought "next gen" was going to give them. COD engine, as far as I know, IDtech3 with years of revisions. That's the same base engine that ran Q3A years ago. And it works, cause people overlook the tech, and even praise it, because of the whole package.

There's just no way cod continues to rule for the next 20 years. Eventually the rest of the industry will figure out what they already know. Im honestly shocked they haven't figured it out yet, it's ridiculous that this has gone on for so long.

Why are we even mentioning 20 years from now lol.

You use Twilight Princess as an example of the opposite of what you think MS would have done for Halo 4? Twilight Princess is the perfect example of what MS could have done. Which was not a whole lot of difference between the two versions(widescreen & controllers)

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When you consider that the Wii is basically an overclocked Gamecube, it isn't that surprising that they didn't do more.