Post by: MLS_man_64 on October 19, 2007, 07:56:30 AM
Post by: Maverick on October 19, 2007, 08:49:34 AM
Seriously, the market can obviously handle this kind of competition. Besides, that was extremely vague, what is it exactly that he's suggesting? Different companies making different boxes that play the same software? One company destroying the others and having a monopoly on consoles?
Post by: bustin98 on October 19, 2007, 09:06:25 AM
And now that EA has Peter Moore, who has overseen two console launches (was he invovled with the original XBox launch?), they have the know how of pulling it off.
The only stumbling block is Japan, same as Microsoft. If EA were to buy up some Japanese devs that would increase cred.
Post by: GoldenPhoenix on October 19, 2007, 09:22:59 AM
Quote
Originally posted by: bustin98
While it wouldn't hurt Nintendo all that much, imagine if EA created their own machine and did not release their titles on any other. The Madden freaks would pick it up instantly. And other titles like Bioshock, and now titles from Bioware and Pandemic... It could quake Sony and Microsoft down to their core. Add to it Ubi-Soft titles and the momentum picks up.
And now that EA has Peter Moore, who has overseen two console launches (was he invovled with the original XBox launch?), they have the know how of pulling it off.
The only stumbling block is Japan, same as Microsoft. If EA were to buy up some Japanese devs that would increase cred.
If EA entered the market I think Sony would be shoved out. I could see a Nintendo vs MS vs EA war.
Post by: ShyGuy on October 19, 2007, 09:25:52 AM
Post by: that Baby guy on October 19, 2007, 09:52:27 AM
I mean, DVDs VS. DivX, DVDs won easily.
Video Tapes VS. Betamax, VHS won fairly easily, as well.
But here we are with Blu-Ray and HD-DVD and Videogame consoles not being able to wok itself out. It's aboot as ridiculous as Canada having two official languages. Except it doesn't make any sense, unlike Canada in the off-season.
The losers in a race like this are the consumers. It forces at least an extra couple hundred dollars each time a new format is released. If a format upgrades, there's always a power struggle to overcome. But that's the thing: traditionally, in movies, someone wins out, right? So why not now? And why not in video games?
I think the answer is that formats are being upgraded too constantly. There's too much improvement in the field over such a low rate of time, that it's senseless to stick with one for too long of a time. In this respect, I understand the "proposed" idea of the PS3: There is a machine that will not need to be updated for ten years. The problem is that this isn't true, it's a lie to get us to buy it until Sony unveils PS4, and we see through it. However, if it weren't a lie, the PS3 would be in a much higher status. If we knew that HD DVD or BD would be around for a long time, we'd settle with one, but neither will, so we won't.
I don't know, I just lost my train of thought in this one. I'll have to come back to finish it up.
Post by: Ian Sane on October 19, 2007, 10:09:14 AM
Hell I've seriously thought about what a universal controller on a single standardized console would have to look like and what I've thought of doesn't even cover the Wii because I can't think of way for the remote functionality to fit. You think I trust a bunch of business who don't play games? Stuff like the Up-start code not working for the Mortal Kombat games in Midway Arcade Treasures 2 or the infamous Mega Man button reversal shows what kind of slack attitude corporations have about this stuff. This isn't like movies or music where it just has to play sound or show a moving picture. Games are so much more complex and need more attention to detail. If Nintendo can't even make a controller that plays N64 games correctly, a console THEY MADE, then what chance does anyone else have?
Plus I figure a standarized console should work with solid state media as load time issues could screw up historic games. The problem with this is the solid state has to be affordable and capable of holding probably a maximum of 9 gigs, likely more if Sony is filling those Blu-Ray discs.
I do think however that one standard console that doesn't get replaced every five years and isn't owned by one company would bring games in the mainstream more than anything. Imagine if games were just like DVDs or CDs. You just go to the store and buy a game and that's it.
Though we'll never truly have a universal standard because we also play games on non-gaming hardware like PCs. A game is a program so they can't "block" games from being made on a computer. The "standard" immediately fails.
Post by: that Baby guy on October 19, 2007, 10:10:52 AM
Post by: Mashiro on October 19, 2007, 10:17:27 AM
What's the push then to advance the gaming genre in any specific way? There is none. If it's one company and only one company that dominates things they will give us what they want and we have to like it.
No competition is a horrible horrible idea.
EA fails AGAIN.
Post by: AgentV3 on October 19, 2007, 10:20:46 AM
Post by: bustin98 on October 19, 2007, 10:53:16 AM
We all know that Nintendo would never ever go with the idea because they want to control every aspect.
So should we imagine playing a 360 game on a PS3, only you can't connect to Live? Or play Liar on the 360 but find it unplayable due to the lack of the 6axis controller?
I think EA is getting to the point that Nintendo is at: a stable of IPs that has worldwide recognition and a desire to streamline a process. There is more than licensing fees involved with making games for multiple systems. They could create one company wide engine and cut costs of development dramatically. Nintendo has shown you can make a profit on hardware. And with prices always coming down EA could create a box similar to the 360 in power but sell it for above cost.
I wouldn't bet against EA making their own system, or they will join a number of 3rd parties to create a standards and then we'll see non-traditional manufacturers coming in with their own machines. Its a sweet pot, this video game market and others are looking to see how they can get their fingers in it.
Post by: Ian Sane on October 19, 2007, 11:03:03 AM
How is that any different than playing it on the PS3 but finding it unplayable due to it requiring the 6axis controller?
"We all know that Nintendo would never ever go with the idea because they want to control every aspect."
I figure such a major change would kill Nintendo off. They would want to make their own console and literally no one else would support it.
One potential problem with this is the whole Atari 2600 issue where anyone could make a game for the console and thus tons of total crap showed up. That helped contribute to the industry crash. With one standard there would have to be no limits and this same problem would come up. Would it have a similar negative effect?
Post by: Strell on October 19, 2007, 11:05:34 AM
Quote
Originally posted by: Ian Sane
look at how the classic controller handles N64 games. It lacks the six buttons so we have to use the second analog stick which isn't an ideal solution.
God, Ian. So much fail for one little man.
Post by: UltimatePartyBear on October 19, 2007, 11:08:02 AM
Post by: bustin98 on October 19, 2007, 11:12:46 AM
The game market would change, and for the worse. I agree, but that's from our point of view. Look at it from a PL spreadsheet and all of a sudden there's a potential goldmine just waiting to be dug up.
Post by: Spak-Spang on October 19, 2007, 11:16:10 AM
They would just partner with a company like Microsoft to help design the system of their desires and release all their games on that system exclusively.
I am sure they could partner with Microsoft to get no licensing fees. Or if EA really wanted to shake things up, develop the console themselves and promise 3rd party developers zero licensing fees. Wait until it can launch its new system with an exclusive sports lineup of Madden, Baseball, Basketball, and Modern Warefare 2, and you would have a killer launch lineup...specially if you make all those games exclusive.
That is what is really scary...EA is so big that it could pull so many must have AAA titles to become exclusive on their system.
The bad news is, that would open real competition against EA in the Sports Gaming market again, because Microsoft, Nintendo and Sony would all have to fill the void the EA games left. It could hurt them more than help them.
Post by: Ian Sane on October 19, 2007, 11:16:35 AM
I'm not little.
Do you have anything to actually contribute or did you just join the discussion to dump on me?
Buttons - any combo of them can be pushed together
Analog stick - can only push the diagonals for combos. Can't push up and down at the same time. Can't push left and right at the same time. Can't push three or four buttons at the same time. It is missing functionality of what it is trying to replace and thus is not ideal.
Post by: Strell on October 19, 2007, 11:49:05 AM
Or try to change the camera both up and right all at once?
The majority of games that used the C buttons used it for the camera. Hence "c buttons." And the stick replicates that just fine, if not better than buttons.
You're just doing some more of your sensationalism.
Post by: Mashiro on October 19, 2007, 11:52:39 AM
Quote
Yes, the concern of a flood of crap on a universal gaming system crossed my mind. Again though, look at the DVD market. There is a flood of crap, only most people don't know its crap until its too late.
There is a vast difference between the DVD market and gaming market.
DVDs primarily consist of either TV shows or movies being put onto the retail market. Outside of the "straight to video" releases, the content is pretty much ready made and good to go.
Games are completely different.
Post by: bustin98 on October 19, 2007, 12:00:02 PM
Then there are the releases that are looking to cash in on a name. No extras, the video has not been cleaned up, sound has been left in mono hell with pops and background hiss.
I concede its a limited comparison but its enough to show the direction games can go in.
Post by: Ian Sane on October 19, 2007, 12:11:59 PM
Doesn't matter. You make assumptions like that and then certain games you didn't think about stop working. It's the simple logic that a joystick being used to replace buttons provides less functionality than buttons themselves and thus is not an ideal solution. Okay solution? Sure. But not IDEAL. Was only four face buttons a GOOD idea? The best arguement I've heard is that's not that bad. Defense of it seems more like "how dare you be negative about Nintendo" stuff.
And in this case we're not even talking N64 where maybe we're safe. If you were making a big universal console this short-sighted method would start falling apart because the Saturn, Xbox, N64 and six button Genesis controller all use six face buttons which increases the possibility of certain games not controlling well or some not working at all.
A six button layout is also very Gamecube friendly since the Gamecube button arrangement is "hidden" within the two rows of three buttons.
Post by: Strell on October 19, 2007, 12:28:18 PM
I want a full list, you're so smart.
Post by: Ian Sane on October 19, 2007, 01:02:00 PM
This sort of talk is exactly why I don't trust anyone to make a decent game console standard. Cutting corners on the assumption that it will work out okay is a dumb way to design it.
Post by: NinGurl69 *huggles on October 19, 2007, 01:23:38 PM
Post by: ShyGuy on October 19, 2007, 01:33:59 PM
Post by: ThePerm on October 19, 2007, 01:53:50 PM
Imagine filming a movie and then sticking your card into your pc or your console and editing, your games work on copy protected version of the same medium. All on something no bigger then a credit card.
Nintendo is almost there, now it just has to wait for card technology, and graphics technology to catch up.
Imagine 2 generations from now, Nintendo decimates its competition, Sony and Microsoft move their games to a future Nintendo system and release their respective controllers for a Nintendo system, while backwards compatability is emulated across all systems.
Post by: stevey on October 19, 2007, 01:57:20 PM
Post by: BigJim on October 19, 2007, 02:14:05 PM
But it wouldn't kill innovation if they at least based their core technologies on similar architectures, rather than going down these proprietary paths. Output will be reaching diminishing returns anyway, so I don't see what harm it'd really cause. Unless you're Sony and dead-set on pushing an architecture you spent billions making.
I don't mean identical hardware, but for example a PPC-based CPU (excluding monster-freak Cell-like concoctions) with Radeon-family GPUs could be "similar enough" while they continue with their own personal agendas (blue-ray, digital distribution, waggle stick, etc)
Post by: Caliban on October 19, 2007, 04:21:21 PM
Post by: Chozo Ghost on October 19, 2007, 04:55:25 PM
I'd also hope the OS involved is Linux or some other open thing. That way no company would be able to control and dominate things. You'd also have no licensing fees, which is pretty much a good thing for everyone.
Post by: King of Twitch on October 19, 2007, 07:20:11 PM
"We want an open, standard platform which is much easier than having five which are not compatible,"
Microsoft will first ask nicely via EA, then it will go straight to congress. After 6 years it is tired of having to compete like a normal business.
Nintendo should say F- no to any sort of merger deal, and recognize this as a last gasp of desperation from a crumbling empire.
And I'm not sure EA could maintain its own console. For one, it thrives off the creativity of others, and license fees from movie tie-ins and sports franchises might rise if they were valuable enough to appear on only one system, but I'm not sure on that one. And as Spak said the other console makers would quickly divert resources into their own sports games. Why would EA want the headache of spending extra R&D time and money, and have to decline the moneyhats that would inevitably try and talk them out of it? Then again, maybe that is the perfect extortion.
Post by: Crimm on October 19, 2007, 07:47:13 PM
On the converse, the publishers would be at the mercy of the platform maker when it comes to license fees.
Post by: Adrock on October 19, 2007, 09:18:08 PM
Wait....... let me rephrase that. Why is everyone dumping on EA about this? It's not like the single platform thing is a novel idea. Didn't Denis Dyack bring this up not to long ago?
In any case, a single platform would never work. And I don't think EA would ever launch their own console. It's too risky and EA is probably pretty comfortable publishing the same rehashed crap every year. Thing is, it works...... every single year. A single platform would be easier for them, but the multiplatform strategy has worked for them since forever ago so it begs to reason that it won't stop working.
Post by: KDR_11k on October 19, 2007, 11:36:55 PM
Problem with a standardized console would be that console hardware has to be fixed and you'll have a hard time getting a bunch of manufacturers agree on a specific hardware leayout. Unlike movie players there's no point where a console is good enough, you can always use more power. Then you'd have to agree on a standard controller (Wiimote? dualshock? GC? 360?) and common menu controls (X confirms, /\ or O cancels, depending on the game?). And then you'd have to hope that thing actually works well enough that e.g. Nintendo won't just make their own thing and beat the "standard" console.
Post by: Gamebasher on October 20, 2007, 05:50:24 AM
"Problem with a standardized console would be that console hardware has to be fixed and you'll have a hard time getting a bunch of manufacturers agree on a specific hardware leayout. Unlike movie players there's no point where a console is good enough, you can always use more power. Then you'd have to agree on a standard controller (Wiimote? dualshock? GC? 360?) and common menu controls (X confirms, /\ or O cancels, depending on the game?). And then you'd have to hope that thing actually works well enough that e.g. Nintendo won't just make their own thing and beat the "standard" console."
OK, I have read enough about EA´s dangerous idea.
I think that there will never be any one standardized console. It all sort of reminds me of the scene in the first Lord of the Rings movie - the meeting headed by Lord Elrond where the leaders of the various races of people met at Imladros to discuss the fate of the One Ring. And what did we get? A huge fight, instead of an accord. All because of the question of who would bring the Ring to destruction. None of most of the delegates trusted any of the others, and accused them of what they were themselves: hungry for the power they thought the Ring would give them. As we learn from watching the extra-material included in the trilogy, Tolkien himself based his inspiration for the creation of the LotR story partly on the experiences he had undergone as a soldier in WW1 where the true nature of human beings for good and for bad was revealed to him. He incorporated that into the struggle between good and evil in a tale inclusive of his own languages about a dark lord and a Ring of Power this despot had created to gain final dominion of all life.
So that story is usefull here, to describe what I think will happen if they ever try to get the multiple gamemakers to agree on a standardized console: war, that leads to nothing. The delegates in the LotR story were fortunate to have Frodo, for without him there would have never been a carrier of it. And it would most certainly have fallen into Saurons hands somehow.
If EA ever has their way, despite my prediction, I believe it will soon be toppled by some sort of coalition of gamemakers who will fight it for the reason that they can see its massively destructive implications on the market long-term. And after they manage to topple the seeming "coup-attempt" by EA, the market will suffer from chaos as gamers will fight among themselves for- and against the one console system. This will directly hurt profits from console makers, as they now have to fight 1)the ocean of crap games flooding onto the one console that made it to it prior to the undoing of it, and 2) a divided gaming world hurting profits enourmously, and 3)their own inability to convince the gaming public that good games will "soon" be back on new consoles. The damage will be done, and it will take years of PR repair before people will again trust games. In the time that follows such a scenario, more and more gaming companies will go under in the profitless time, and this will have even more impact to the negative for creativity which formerly enriched the videogame market appealing as it did to every taste in games. The result will be a 2. collapse of the videogame market which will teach people that multiple consoles is the only way or no way.
This whole "one machine to control all games", reminds me of communism. At first the founders of communism was agreeing to be fair and square in their handling of absolute power over the lands they had under them - which they didn´t keep. Instead they began to fight among themselves over petty power, and winded up becoming awefully corrupt, and soon strayed from every promise they ever made. This is vividly demonstrated in the cartoon "Animal Farm", which is an allegory referring in its simplicity directly to the complicated, but fatefull events that took place in the Russian communist party and which lead to total collapse of any democratic future for that country. I use that example because I don´t ever believe in anything such as one power, or console, controlling all.
If the people that run the game industry have learned anything from history, they will ignore the EA idea as fantasy and move on.
If anything, there will at the very end instead be only one or two consolemakers, and the name Nintendo will definitely be the one or one of them. Now I will go back to my Wii, and play away.
Post by: bustin98 on October 20, 2007, 06:16:12 AM
EA's next aquisition: Silicon Knights. Wouldn't that be a hoot?
Post by: AgentV3 on October 20, 2007, 04:47:10 PM
Quote
Originally posted by: bustin98
But a one machine future is not what EA is proposing, Gamebasher. Only to have one standard for all machines. Either way, as long as Nintendo is in business it will never happen. And looking at the handling of Windows OS is probably a good way to judge how Microsoft likes to play nice with open standards.
If this was the Gamecube generation I'd be more inclined to agree with you, but in this generation, the Wii is using a lot of industry standards. It's memory cards are SD cards instead of some proprietary standard, they're using DVDs instead of something like the Gamecube Optical Disc or cartridges, it has USB ports and internet over 802.11g wireless.
I think you picked up on what EA was asking for the same way I did, that they want all the console makers to at least use more standardized parts instead of coming up with what they did now, using three different architectures with completely different instruction sets. They want what the PC industry does now. Even though AMD and Intel use different sockets (AM2 and LGA 755 respectively), they understand the same x86 (or x64 code now) instructions, they both use DDR2 memory, and they both use PCI Express x16 for graphics output over a common graphics API (DirectX, and to a lesser extent OpenGL).
That's what EA wants, to be able to use the same game engine between all consoles, regardless of how much power they harness.
Post by: SixthAngel on October 21, 2007, 03:14:47 AM
Quote
Originally posted by: KDR_11k
We call that a PC.
EA would benefit the most from an open format because they would no longer have to pay licensing fees like every third party does now.
Agent, it seems pretty obvious they aren't talking about consoles using similar components but about an "open system" that all games would be on so that the buyer wouldn't even realize or care what brand name he was buying since all games would work for every system.
Post by: KDR_11k on October 22, 2007, 07:12:52 AM
Post by: Gamebasher on October 23, 2007, 06:18:04 AM
I will keep my fingers crossed for Nintendo´s continued existence as a console maker, then, and trust they will continue as market leader as well. It took a while for them to get there. But I think they will stay ahead for years to come.
Post by: Plugabugz on October 24, 2007, 02:06:15 AM
Unless they overlap with another company doing the same thing, there is no real reason to invest in R&D and pushing forward at the same current pace than when there is only one system to work with. If this were nintendo, or any other company, they would just get lazy. Potentially you could wind up with a successor to Wii only being 20% more powerful and 30% more expensive.
