Microsoft formally bans emulators on Xbox, Windows 10 download shops • Hacker News Board

Re: Microsoft formally bans emulators on Xbox, Windows 10 download shops

#121

Post by szatkus » Thu, Apr 06, 2017, 5:00 PM UTC

pjmlp wrote: post #108

Dylan16807 wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

99% of people are only buying one copy or the other copy. Your question is just as valid with the way nintendo chose to do things, and already has an answer. They don't make a meaningful amount of money by requiring some people to buy two copies on the same account. They make a marginal amount of money as a tradeoff for being visibly customer-hostile. > So all digital assets are supposed to be pay one take two model?…

So the next time you buy lets say a game on Steam, do you also feel entitled to have the same game for free on Wii U, Switch, PS4, XBox ONE, iOS and Android, regardless of the development costs and amount of people that worked across all those devices?

I get one for Linux and Mac OS X for free so it makes sense.

Re: Microsoft formally bans emulators on Xbox, Windows 10 download shops

#122

Post by rubatuga » Thu, Apr 06, 2017, 5:05 PM UTC

Declanomous wrote: post #119

asveikau wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you remember the days when it was hard to get Linux on a machine? When I started using it a majority of modems didn't have Linux drivers, so your average PC user could not get on the internet with Linux unless they very carefully selected a replacement. Then the same issue repeated itself with WiFi drivers in the following decade. We are at the mercy of hardware vendors to run open source OSes - they can giveth an…

Yeah, about WiFi. I wanted to bring my desktop somewhere where I wasn't sure I'd have ethernet. "No problem," says I, "I'll just buy a USB adapter." I have 802.11ac in my house, and it's pretty nice, so I thought I'd get an 802.11ac adapter. So I run down to the store, and pick up an adapter that says it works on Linux ON THE BOX. I look online, and it is using the RTL8812au, which people have reported working in Lin…

I'm totally feel you on the mind-numbing latency that seems to exist with Linux drivers and any sort of semi-modern technology. It's funny you mention Xorg breaking. It's unbelievable how fragile Xorg is. I remember a decade ago booting Ubuntu for the first time and struggling to get X working with an old nvidia mobile chipset, and any single change in the terribly complex Xorg conf files would cause a failure to boot, forcing me into console mode.

Looking back, Linux was quite unfriendly regarding drivers and support, but I feel it's made a lot of progress for more popular systems. It's an innate problem of Linux itself. Maybe we should focus on the systems that are certified or well-supported by Linux out-of-box like the dell xps series, similar to how people perceive macOS as part of a hardware-software amalgamation, even though a hackintosh community exists.

Re: Microsoft formally bans emulators on Xbox, Windows 10 download shops

#123

Post by jhbadger » Thu, Apr 06, 2017, 5:09 PM UTC

pjmlp wrote: post #101

izacus wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did you miss the fact that the game is actually release and runs on all those platforms?!

So if you buy a Square Enix game for iOS you feel entitled to have the same game for free on Android?

That's complicated because the Android and Apple app stores are run by different companies who have no incentive to cooperate. But some software stores do work this way. Steam for example. When you buy a game on Steam you are buying a license to all versions of the software -- you don't have a buy a Windows version, a Mac version, or a Linux version -- you get them all (if they exist). You even get versions that get released later. I've purchased games that only run on Windows and if they later get ported to Mac or Linux they show up in my library.

Re: Microsoft formally bans emulators on Xbox, Windows 10 download shops

#124

Post by vlan0 » Thu, Apr 06, 2017, 5:18 PM UTC

Dylan16807 wrote: post #114

vlan0 wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's questionable whether this is currently a slippery slope. There is no precedence for this move on the PC platform. That alone weakens the argument that Microsoft will eventually make that move. To be clear, it is still possible, but there is not enough evidence to build a case that guarantees your conclusion. Edit: You could argue that the ChromeOS platform is an example of a completed locked ecosystem. I've neve…

Under what context would a Chromebook not be a PC?

By the broad definition used to define a PC, a Chromebook is a PC. My perception of a PC is just skewed.

Re: Microsoft formally bans emulators on Xbox, Windows 10 download shops

#125

Post by pmarreck » Thu, Apr 06, 2017, 5:47 PM UTC

wpietri wrote: post #65

pmarreck wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's getting downvoted because there will always be open source OS'es that can run open-source emulators. Since all computers are also Turing machines. Dystopian reasoning in the 2 parent comments is slippery-slope fallacy.

I don't think "in theory you could be free, even if in practice you aren't" is much in the way of freedom. Is there even a full open-source OS for the iPhone? If so, I have never once seen anybody using it. In practice, Apple has full control over the apps their users run, and they are not shy about using it. It has been 10 years, and this picture has been getting worse, not better. Clearly other vendors have looked…

> Is there even a full open-source OS for the iPhone?

Heh, not officially, but this does exist:

https://ios.gadgethacks.com/how-to/exclusive-dual-boot-andro...

> because all he's really positing is that corporate control will continue to tighten at the current rate.

"The Net interprets censorship as damage and routes around it." - John Gilmore (https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/John_Gilmore) In this case, I argue you can replace "censorship" with "too much regulation" or "too many controls" or "too much DRM" or "too tight a walled garden" because what they all share, are being benefits to centralized control and profit at the expense of the convenience and joy of innocent users.

This was largely the promise (and threat) of Bitcoin, by the way. An Internet-native completely digital pseudonymous payment system that is nearly impossible to regulate. There is (or will be) a direct relationship between the stringency of capital controls and the below-the-radar usage of cryptocurrencies. If you expect capital controls of innocent people (which, disclaimer, I really effing abhor, as a person who once had their main bank account locked out for a month sans any evidence of criminality) to get worse/more onerous, and you want to make money off it, you should probably own some crypto.

Re: Microsoft formally bans emulators on Xbox, Windows 10 download shops

#126

Post by logfromblammo » Thu, Apr 06, 2017, 6:02 PM UTC

gdulli wrote: post #69

mmcconnell1618 wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It really takes away from the good will I might have toward the Nintendo brand. My son wanted the new Zelda game for his wii u. He earned it and we got a download code from Amazon. One week later, Grandma bought him a Nintendo Switch. Guess which downloadable game only works on the Wii U? If we want the same game (downloadable too) for the Switch that will be another $60! When I buy a game on my iPhone 6, it works on…

There are reasons Nintendo has burned a ton of goodwill to the point where it made the difference in my not buying a Switch. But buying a game on one console generation and having it work on the next has rarely been the norm. Nintendo did decide at one point to pour a lot of separate money into developing the Wii U game for the Switch as well. There's a lot going on behind the scenes to make a game work on multiple c…

You can play Game Boy and Game Boy Color games on a Game Boy Advance or SP or Micro, or even a SNES or GameCube with special hardware accessories. You can play Game Boy Advance games on a Nintendo DS or DS Lite. You can play GameCube games on a Wii, and Wii games on a Wii U.

There was a specific effort to include hardware from the previous generation in the next, for at least one step of backward compatibility. The GBA had a separate Z80 in addition to the ARM7TDMI to do that. The DS and DS Lite had dual processors and dual cartridge slots, but the DSi ditched the GBA slot. Thus, those were technically capable of running ROM images of GBA games if you found a way to load them and start the ARM7 processor in the correct mode. The 3DS can, of course, play DS and DSi cartridges, having both ARM11 and ARM9 processors.

So it is apparent that Nintendo has supported backward compatibility by essentially packaging two hardware systems into one box. That isn't what I would do, but that's what they did.

They burned goodwill with me for not writing decent SDKs for their hardware, such that about every game has to do a roll-your-own reach into the hardware. Which doesn't translate to the next generation of hardware. Stupid. Just write a damned SDK, and make the 3rd party dev shops hate you less.

I always keep my old cartridges, even though most of my old hardware is no longer capable. It's my proof of license, for when I download the ROMs to play on emulators.

Re: Microsoft formally bans emulators on Xbox, Windows 10 download shops

#127

Post by lettergram » Thu, Apr 06, 2017, 6:46 PM UTC

ysavir wrote: post #7

I guess in 10-20 years we will be telling our grandchildren about the old days, where you can do whatever you want on your computer, limited only the abilities of the hardware* . And they won't believe us. *Simplification, of course.

I don't know... I use Linux and have successfully transitioned some family to free alternatives.

I think what really needs to happen is someone develops and packages a Linux distribution as solid and as easy to install as windows. Honestly, it's nearly there and all it'll take is a few dedicated engineers creating a solid updating mechanic.

Re: Microsoft formally bans emulators on Xbox, Windows 10 download shops

#128

Post by Dylan16807 » Thu, Apr 06, 2017, 7:03 PM UTC

vlan0 wrote: post #124

Dylan16807 wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Under what context would a Chromebook not be a PC?

By the broad definition used to define a PC, a Chromebook is a PC. My perception of a PC is just skewed.

Okay, but what I'm curious about is what more narrow definition would exclude it. I'm wondering if it's something I haven't thought of, or whether you're underestimating them. For example, there are Chromebooks that can run most win32 programs.

Re: Microsoft formally bans emulators on Xbox, Windows 10 download shops

#129

Post by Declanomous » Thu, Apr 06, 2017, 7:40 PM UTC

rubatuga wrote: post #122

Declanomous wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, about WiFi. I wanted to bring my desktop somewhere where I wasn't sure I'd have ethernet. "No problem," says I, "I'll just buy a USB adapter." I have 802.11ac in my house, and it's pretty nice, so I thought I'd get an 802.11ac adapter. So I run down to the store, and pick up an adapter that says it works on Linux ON THE BOX. I look online, and it is using the RTL8812au, which people have reported working in Lin…

I'm totally feel you on the mind-numbing latency that seems to exist with Linux drivers and any sort of semi-modern technology. It's funny you mention Xorg breaking. It's unbelievable how fragile Xorg is. I remember a decade ago booting Ubuntu for the first time and struggling to get X working with an old nvidia mobile chipset, and any single change in the terribly complex Xorg conf files would cause a failure to boo…

Yeah, the weirdest thing is that the chipset this thing used was released almost two years ago.

Regarding drivers, it's always fun to plug something that is 20 years old in to my computer and have it work. I like showing off to my friends by using something that last had a supported driver for Windows 98. However it's a bit embarrassing when something that should work doesn't.

I'd love to contribute more, but I'm not capable of writing drivers from scratch, and a lot of drivers are just hacks built on top of hacks. I wish building drivers didn't involve hours of reverse engineering proprietary protocols.

For instance, I managed to get a dymo desktop label printer working, but only with one font size, and I can't actuate the cutter. I'd be more than happy to finish the driver if Dymo released the specs for their protocol, but as it stands I'm just happy I can get the minimum level of functionality out of it.

This entire conversation makes me realize why people think I'm a masochist for using Linux.

Re: Microsoft formally bans emulators on Xbox, Windows 10 download shops

#130

Post by mattdotc » Thu, Apr 06, 2017, 7:55 PM UTC

gdulli wrote: post #55

izacus wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having to rebuy the license to pay the same game over and over and over again so you can play it on a slightly updated and still working hardware is downright Kafkaesque. Nintendo and other copyright holders want to act like you're licensing software (so they don't have to be beholden to first-sale doctrine, laws concerning the ability to make local backups and other consumer protections), but they also want to preve…

Well, I've misplaced my receipt for The Legend of Zelda that I bought 30 years ago. Ideally they'd have had an infrastructure in 1986 to manage my ownership of the product in perpetuity across media and distribution channels. But they didn't, so I can either hold on to my feeling of entitlement that Nintendo owes me the virtual console version for free or I can pay $5 to play it on there.

I understand and agree with your stance on the sense of entitlement that some people have regarding software purchases, but I feel like you might have missed one of the finer points being made here. My response somewhat assumes that you either do not own recent Nintendo consoles, or at a minimum, are a very casual user of their platforms and are not aware of some of the shenanigans they've been up to due to negligence or incompetence in the digital space.

Purchases of their Virtual Console games for one console do not transfer across platforms. If you bought Mario 3 for Wii, you'll have to buy it again if you want to play it on the go for your 3DS. Furthermore, licenses for digital purchases on the 3DS (and maybe other consoles?) were tied to hardware IDs, resulting in a super-tedious license transfer process for anyone unlucky enough to need a repair or for those who had the nerve to voluntarily upgrade their system to one of Nintendo's hardware revisions.

So in some sense, they _do_ or, at least, reasonably _should_ have the infrastructure to manage digital purchases in a customer-friendly way, but instead settled for a system which forces people to re-purchase the same title for different platforms. Compare this to Sony and Microsoft, whose digital shops allow cross-platform purchases for many titles.

To add to all of this, Nintendo has a very confusing maze of different account systems for their different services and it is very tough to navigate which accounts serve which purpose. I have at least 3 accounts for Nintendo services at this point and it's still not clear to me what the deal is.

All of these factors combined make re-purchasing Zelda several times over a harder pill to swallow.