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Resetting Xbox

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Re: Resetting Xbox

#701

Post by sensanaty »

fodkodrasz wrote: post #350
PaulHoule wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know if I care about the features, what I do care about is the games and a lean-back experience which is not sweaty. I play games to escape the drudgery of software development and the last thing I want to do is mess with an .INI file. I love the Steam Deck because it feels like a consumer electronics device: it has the reliability of Linux but not the sweat. The Steam Deck is the only device I've seen that w…

> Steam Big Picture turns my big Windows machine at home into a game console and does the same for my Mac Mini. Well it turned mine into a 2000s linux/wine debugfest flashback when I wanted to play GTA IV: Ballad of Gay Tony... Also don't get me started on having to keep the poweroff button pushed on the xbox controller for mouse emulation for games not having controller support in the menus. It is far from the polis…

GTA IV even on regular old Windows is a shitshow to get working to be fair, so I'm not too surprised that it's not great on the deck

Re: Resetting Xbox

#702

Post by slg »

Gareth321 wrote: post #655
slg wrote: post #641

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is a low profit margin a problem for consumers or is it the company's "money grubbery" of not being satisfied with that profit margin that is causing the problem?

When XBOX fires a bunch of people and shutters studios leading to fewer games with worse support, that's a problem for consumers. I think people often forget that in a society we rely on companies making and serving things. They make our food and our medicine and build our homes and make our games. It's a good thing when their finances are healthy. It's a bad thing when they form monopolies and rent-seek.

Once again, what is the actual problem here? The company was making a profit at their current employment level. They are laying people off and shuttering studios because that profit isn't enough for them. This entire argument keeps coming back to "money grubbery".

Re: Resetting Xbox

#703

Post by slg »

LtdJorge wrote: post #661
slg wrote: post #630

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>We want to do more with fewer resources. Who is the "we" here? Because the profit margin not being high enough is certainly not a problem for consumers. The only people who should care about that are the company's shareholders and "shareholders" certainly isn't synonymous with "society".

Of course it is a problem for consumers if it bankrupts the company. Healthy company is better than no company. And I mean healthy, not greedy.

It's pretty difficult to go bankrupt turning a profit.

Re: Resetting Xbox

#704

Post by zeratax »

Flere-Imsaho wrote: post #305
nkrisc wrote: post #214

Reading this made me remember why I stopped playing my Xbox One: never-ending updates. I never played it very frequently so I disabled the sleep mode so it wouldn’t just stay on in my media cabinet heating my house. But of course that meant any time I spontaneously felt like using it there were 10 minutes of updates to download, so I would get annoyed and just do something else. Oh it can also play movies? Sorry movi…

> Reading this made me remember why I stopped playing my Xbox One: never-ending updates. My experience with Steam is very similar (I don't have it run on startup because I like my PC to do other things from playing games). Online updates really have ruined gaming for a lot of people. Just like vinyl, humans seem to prefer a physical "thing" they pick up - put in the machine - and instantly have access to the "thing".…

steam does not force you to update though. you can just start the game without updating. if it's multiplayer ofc it might require an update anyways

Re: Resetting Xbox

#705

Post by freedomben »

Cthulhu_ wrote: post #683
tracker1 wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To me, the graphics abilities have been there for a decade... what we need are better games and gameplay. More fun games without gotcha, pay to win, loot box efforts. Too much effort is going for dazzling graphics at the expense of overall gameplay. How many people are still playing CoD, WoW and so many other games from over a decade ago? How many refreshes of Final Fantasy have we seen? The graphics can only carry y…

It's... odd that while Steam is the biggest PC gaming platform and the biggest platform for new, unique, interesting games ever, Microsoft isn't investing more in the people developing games for it. Microsoft can use it to filter out the slop, make offers to the best games, offer help with porting to consoles, and (probably most importantly) offer to put them into the xbox live program, because the xbox live subscrip…

> Access to Steam's library for a fixed monthly price would be huge. Actually I'm surprised Steam/Valve isn't offering that yet, it'd be huge, and for their new consoles it would be a perfect fit.

As a consumer, I really hope they never do that. I hate subscriptions and strongly prefer to just buy games. Once there's a subscription option, I would imagine the great sales would get significanty watered down. If you're a game seller and you can get that sweet sweet recurring revenue, it's too strong a temptation. We've seen that story play out time and time again in SaaS (and even some desktop applications now).

Re: Resetting Xbox

#707

Post by average_r_user »

Krasnol wrote: post #678
Gareth321 wrote: post #655

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When XBOX fires a bunch of people and shutters studios leading to fewer games with worse support, that's a problem for consumers. I think people often forget that in a society we rely on companies making and serving things. They make our food and our medicine and build our homes and make our games. It's a good thing when their finances are healthy. It's a bad thing when they form monopolies and rent-seek.

How is making more and more every fiscal year "healthy"? This is madness and it doesn't make any sense besides the one case where you pursue a monopoly. All of this has nothing to do with the consumer of the product besides the fact that he'll get a worse and worse product while simultaneously being forced to pay more and more. Enshitification is aresult of this "healthy" business culture.

I agree. The numbers need to go up every year without thinking about the health of the economy, and the Average Joe is delusional.

Re: Resetting Xbox

#708

Post by refurb »

slg wrote: post #703
LtdJorge wrote: post #661

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course it is a problem for consumers if it bankrupts the company. Healthy company is better than no company. And I mean healthy, not greedy.

It's pretty difficult to go bankrupt turning a profit.

Making a thin 3% profit that can go negative when the wind blows

Re: Resetting Xbox

#709

Post by refurb »

account42 wrote: post #645
mike_hearn wrote: post #628

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Margins that low are dangerous because businesses can often see year to year margin variance higher than that.

So? Why is it impossible for businesses to do long-term accounting?

Many reasons:

- Investors bail - You run out of cash

Re: Resetting Xbox

#710

Post by account42 »

Gareth321 wrote: post #658
chrisfosterelli wrote: post #265

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, I agree. I empathize with Phil in spirit on it. He's a real gamer and tried to create a space for the developers to do their own thing and create what they want. But it doesn't seem to have been great business.

I remember the glowing praise at the time for the policy of being hands off and allowing studios to cook. Gamers all over the world were very happy about that approach. Unfortunately it looks like many studios do in fact require hands-on management to make tough calls and keep things moving. I'll remember this next time studios complain about management interference.

We already saw this during the Kickstarter era where all the temporarily confused AAA studios sold themselves as having been held back by unreasonable publishers all this time only to produce the most bland and still unfinished games now that they were funded directly by fans.
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