Live data from Hacker News

"Microsoft engineer" on Xbox1

pastebin.com

91–100 of 294 posts

Re: "Microsoft engineer" on Xbox1

#91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The fact Xbox tosses ads in your face on every single home screen except settings is also extremely distasteful, and MS burned a lot of goodwill on that. This is the single biggest thing that puts a bad taste in my mouth from my Xbox. Am I a customer or a product? Companies should pick only one. If I pay money, I don't want to be sold.

> Am I a customer or a product? Do you have Cable TV? 70% of America does, knowing that they are both customer and product.

Which is why the cable cutting movement is so popular.

Re: "Microsoft engineer" on Xbox1

#92
post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Halo: CE (i.e, Halo 1) didn't support online play, as it was released before Xbox Live was available. Halo 2 was released in 2004 (on the Xbox!), and the online play servers were just shut down earlier this year. Given that the platform it was released on has nearly been superseded twice by now (first by the Xbox 360, and soon by the Xbox One), I think they've given it a fair run. As far as I'm aware, all of the othe…

Wikipedia has Halo 2 multiplayer on the xbox being shut down in April of 2010 (while on the PC it lived until this year). That is not the sort of lifecycle I expect from a game that I enjoy (I still play Doom on occasion, and that was released two whole decades ago. Half-Life, from 1998, is still played online as well. Halo 2 was only from 2004, was massively successful, and is dead.)

Difference: if XBoxOne servers are ever shut down, single-player XBoxOne experience will be destroyed due to stupid DRM.

Re: "Microsoft engineer" on Xbox1

#93

I am a Microsoft Engineer so take what I am about to say as gospel: There's no way to know when someone claims to be something on the internet that they are that thing unless the company itself corroborates it. The pastebin was posted on 4chan... 4chan... And all of the information in it could have been gleaned from publicly available sources. We should at best discuss it like it is rumour, and much more realisticall…

His post was (largely) free of any supposed inside knowledge. It seemed like it was just an attempt at a possible justifications of the choices made for the Xbox one. It really doesn't make much of a difference whether he is a Microsoft engineer or just a canny outsider playing devil's advocate to all the (seemingly) blind rage flowing around consoles these days (and most days...).

Re: "Microsoft engineer" on Xbox1

#94
post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The colloquial naming will probably settle something like this: 2001 console: Xbox, Original Xbox 2005 console: Xbox 360, 360 2013 console: Xbox1, X-bone You will probably hear "Xbox" referring to the 2013 console in casual speech, but hopefully semi-formal and formal speech, e.g. articles, will distinguish.

> X-bone That is fantastic. Pronounced like the word "bone" I assume?

Its been all over the net for a few weeks now. XBone is the height of Microsoft Stupidity.

Re: "Microsoft engineer" on Xbox1

#95
post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is that they still charge $59.99 for Games On Demand. When Black Ops 2 came out digitally, that's what it cost. Same with lots of the Games On Demand - many are $10-$15 more than I can get the disc for new. Not used, NEW. In the shrink wrap. So you'll pardon me if I think this is full of crap. I want to see low priced games like on Steam. But until I see it from MS, I'll probably switch to full-time PC ga…

The games on demand pricing has to be that way though. If Games on Demand cost literally half the price Gamestop charged, the retailers would revolt, which would cause the publishers to revolt. The only reason Valve has the power to charge what they charge is because they incrementally built that power - retailers at one point threatened to pull games from shelves for using Steam's authentication!

There's also a difference between Valve and Microsoft (or any other "platform" owners) that they still have to deal with retailers to push distribution of the console itself...

Re: "Microsoft engineer" on Xbox1

#96
post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If I pay money, I don't want to be sold Ever watched TV? Ever been to the cinema? Ever read a newspaper or a magazine? Get real.

All four examples you gave are in decline. His viewpoint is shared by a growing segment of the population.

Advertisements are not the reason they're in decline. People don't sign up for Netflix because it's ad-free, they sign-up for convenience.

Re: "Microsoft engineer" on Xbox1

#97
That is all well and good, anonymous MS guy can claim that the games will be cheaper in the long run, citing steam as the model that works and drives prices down.

Not in Australia.

In Australia we pay 89.95 / 99.95 for a AAA game released on Steam, versus the USD price of 39.95 / 49.95 / whatever. It must be the shipping of the bits over the pacific that jacks the price up right?

Yes, eventually the prices drop, and you can buy a game that originally retailed for almost $100 for under $20, but that takes a long time. I just gave up on buying big studio games on steam. I only buy indie stuff now.

I was really excited about the xbone (day one owner of original xbox and 360), then the official word came out about it, and I decided I would buy the ps4 instead.

Re: "Microsoft engineer" on Xbox1

#98
post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Once the XB1 lifecycle is over, I have no guarantee I will be able to play the games I bought. Sooner than that though, right? Weren't they shutting off Halo servers when new Halo games came out during the same console lifecycle? Of course that is a problem you'll have with multiplayer on all the consoles I guess. Maybe gamers are okay with that. I would be bummed as hell if I couldn't play the occasional quake mat…

I think he means if they turn off all the servers , so there is nowhere for the console to "call home" to. So you will be unable to play at all. Hopefully they will just patch the console to enable offline play before this happens, but I guess you don't know for sure.

Why bother spending money to pay a developer to patch it for offline play? They already have your money.

Re: "Microsoft engineer" on Xbox1

#99
Even if used game sales would kill the business model and force AAA game producers out of business, I would say that the First Sale Doctrine is more important than the entire industry. If I buy a product, then I am free to use it, abuse it, break it, sell it, give it, modify it, or throw it away however I please.

If the AAA game industry cannot survive while used games exist, then I would rather the entire industry die than end up with a precedent of buying something yet not owning it.

Re: "Microsoft engineer" on Xbox1

#100

To be honest, the only thing that annoys me is the 24 hour check-in thing, and here's why... On average I've moved house once a year for every year since I moved to London in 2007. There was one place I stayed in for 18 months, but everything else was 12 months. In all these moves except one I've had to wait 3-4 weeks (sometimes more) to get my broadband connected, so essentially for 1/13th of a year the only interne…

And yet the 24 hour checkin doesn't make sense in the case of digital downloads, the other app stores dont require it. If a digitally signed receipt for the game is on your system, who cares if the next time you validate against MS servers is in 24 hours or 24 years.

It makes sense when you take into account the ability to sell your digital copies, which current solutions do not allow. Otherwise, nothing is preventing you from selling your copy of Halo 5, unplugging your XBO and playing it offline for 1-2 weeks before the next mandatory check-in.

It's annoying, but the 24-hour checkin is a requirement to have used game sales for the system. You can remove it if you want to get rid of any chance of reselling your games, but that'd cause even more outrage.

Post reply on HN