I disagree with Square-Enix 100%

[+Cafeman]

I don't think I've ever bought or played a game from Square/Enix.

 

Funny, I was thinking about buying my first PS3. Is PS4 due?

 

I love being behind the curve on new systems because I can take advantage of great deals on games. But it does seem about time for a new system to hit the stores. Now that we have had (for years) fantastic graphics , frame rates, and sound along with full multi-player online gameplay, what can the new Xbox and PS really bring to the table ? Will their visuals really be so awesome that we run to the stores with our wallets, drooling? At least Wii U offers the same thing Wii did - something different.

[onmode-ky]

What I find most strange about the Square Enix officer's statement is that he's actually not talking about things from either a technology OR consumer standpoint. He's not saying at all that the current consoles are out of date, nor is he saying that consumers are eager for new systems. Instead, his claim is that developers who couldn't make it with the current generation normally waited until the next generation started to try again, but due to the length of this generation, they didn't wait and instead migrated to platforms like Web browsers and iOS, from which they will not return to console hardware.

 

Is it just me, or does that not make any sense? It sounds like he's saying that developers who didn't make it on, say, the PS1 sat on their butts and twiddled their thumbs until the PS2 came out. Really? Absurd much?

 

The NES was a premier system from 1984 (?) through at least the rest of the decade until the Super NES came out.... that seems a lot longer than the xBox 360, isn't it?

 

How so? The Xbox 360 is finishing its 7th year. There is likewise a 7-year gap between the releases of the Famicom and the Super Famicom (and about 6 years between NES and SNES).

 

I barely got in to the Gamecube before the Wii hit, and it felt like the XBOX was out for about a year when the buzz was all about the XBOX360.

 

You must have been a late adopter, then. There were 5 years between the releases of the GameCube and Wii and 4 years between the Xbox and Xbox 360.

 

onmode-ky

[godslabrat]

You must have been a late adopter, then. There were 5 years between the releases of the GameCube and Wii and 4 years between the Xbox and Xbox 360.

 

You're right, but I think StanJr is talking more about the consumer/developer focus than the actual console availability. The Xbox 360 was a pretty hot topic as early as 2004, even though it wasn't released until years later. Remember that Microsoft was still fairly new in the console market, and everyone was watching them to see if they'd sink or swim. The original Xbox was only successful because it was subsidized by Microsoft's deep pockets, and the follow-up console would be the real test of the company's viability. So yeah, people were looking forward to the 360 for a number of reasons. The fact that the original Xbox ceased production almost immediately after the release of the 360 only added fuel to the fire.

 

The Wii was a bit different. The Gamecube underperformed in the public mind, and Nintendo was very eager to get people excited about their offerings again. They had the perfect ammunition with the then-new motion controls, and as soon as they were willing to make it public, they caught quite a buzz. Pretty much everything about the Wii (including it's name) was either brand-new or at least highly unorthodox, so gamers had a lot to talk about. Even thought the Gamecube hadn't been around super long, it already had the reputation of being "a smaller and kinda gay Xbox".

[StanJr]

Yeah, I'm talking about buzz. Honestly, I remember my buddy getting the XBOX soon after launch and almost immediately he was telling me all about the 360. That pretty much guaranteed that I was not going to get the currently system, even if I wanted it.

 

I was longer before the Wii came out, but I felt like the Gamecube was vastly underrated and quickly marginalized. But I was in the minority who didn't need my console to go online or play games where the goal was to steal people's cars and shoot hookers...

[+Random Terrain]

But I was in the minority who didn't need my console to go online or play games where the goal was to steal people's cars and shoot hookers...

 

No, you have that all wrong. You shoot the cars and steal the hookers. Once you collect enough hookers, they form Hookertron (a giant hooker). You control Hookertron by inserting your stinky stick into a special slot. Once you gain control, you can smash all of the buildings and step on the screaming people below like you're in a Godzilla movie.

[82-T/A]

What I find most strange about the Square Enix officer's statement is that he's actually not talking about things from either a technology OR consumer standpoint. He's not saying at all that the current consoles are out of date, nor is he saying that consumers are eager for new systems. Instead, his claim is that developers who couldn't make it with the current generation normally waited until the next generation started to try again, but due to the length of this generation, they didn't wait and instead migrated to platforms like Web browsers and iOS, from which they will not return to console hardware.

 

Is it just me, or does that not make any sense? It sounds like he's saying that developers who didn't make it on, say, the PS1 sat on their butts and twiddled their thumbs until the PS2 came out. Really? Absurd much?

 

 

I guess I can understand where he's coming from. As a programmer who's programmed on everything from systems dating back to the early 60s (cept i used them in 2001-2005), web, H/PC Windows CE apps in the late 90s, Pascal, C# / .NET, Assembly, blah blah... even Android... I know that better programmers than myself would not have the slightest problem going back and forth between platforms. However... I tend to think that the Facebook / Mobile market has REALLY captured a ton of the market for game development. I was at InterOp earlier this year (wasn't really that great of a conference) and the CEO from Zynga was going on and on about the insane rapid growth of games for mobile apps. Basically... people's cell phones are essentially PSPs... (or Atari Lynxs... for this crowd... heh). I'm going to go out on a limb here, but I suspect the market for games on mobile devices (as a whole)... might even be larger than it is for video game systems. Well... I mean, I KNOW the market itself is larger... but I almost wonder if there are more smartphone users playing games on their phone than there are people who are playing them on systems?

 

Anyway, I wonder if that's what he means. While those developers CAN go back to writing these huge fancy games... they can stay where they are, writing small flash games and iOS / Android games for mobile devices... making a ton more money. Those games are so much less complex than a whole video game... and a larger, immediate, market.

 

It seems to me that you always have your phone on you unless you work in a SCIF, and most people with smart phones have full connectivity. They can buy these games for usually less than $5 bucks and can play them when they're board... IE: sitting on the train, subway, cab... or while wildly driving down the highway in the left lane. With a video game console... the cost per game, both for the consumer and the supplier is vastly more.

 

 

 

How so? The Xbox 360 is finishing its 7th year. There is likewise a 7-year gap between the releases of the Famicom and the Super Famicom (and about 6 years between NES and SNES).

 

 

Geeze, seriously? 7 years? Damn... you're right... I guess when you get older, you get a different perspective on time. In 1984... imaginging 7 years from them would basically have doubled my age.

[cybercylon]

I don't think the current generation of consoles has lasted too long... they more capability built in and untapped potential before any consoles that came before them, so the longer shelf life shouldn't be a surprise. If Sony and MS are just making money now, it would be senseless to introduce something new in the near future.

 

That is not to say we cannot benefit from better graphics and frame rates, but there would need to be a huge leap forward in those departments for people to part with their hard earned cash.

 

And I don't think he is too far off the mark about developers that have moved on to the iOS and Android platforms. They probably wouldn't come back to expensive consoles. I can think of two big reasons:

 

1. The economy is still in the crapper, so cheap, easy to make touch screen games are a win win for the developer and the consumer.

 

2. I don't want to speak for the rest of the world, but your average American has a very short attention span. Everything has to be NOW with immediate gratification with little thought given to tomorrow. Fewer people have the attention span to sit through a long, 60 hour game. Developers know this, so why bother when you can hit everyone with the cheap fix and rake in cash.

[onmode-ky]

The Xbox 360 was a pretty hot topic as early as 2004, even though it wasn't released until years later.

[. . .]

Pretty much everything about the Wii (including it's name) was either brand-new or at least highly unorthodox, so gamers had a lot to talk about.

 

I think there's some time perception compression going on due to the years that have passed since these events, or perhaps due to the PS2's domination over the Xbox and GameCube during those years. The Xbox 360 being a hot topic in 2004 (which sounds accurate; Wikipedia puts actual hardware design as starting in 2003) puts it 3 years after the release of the Xbox and only 1 year prior to its own release. The Wii's controller was revealed late in 2005, which is near the Xbox 360's launch and 4 years after the GameCube's release, and the Wii's final name was revealed a bit before E3 2006, about half a year before its own launch.

 

So, while the Xbox and GameCube may feel like they were quickly pushed aside to you, they were actually on their own, without news of successors, for a few years each. Personally, I remember several years of games only for the PS2, Xbox, and GameCube, with no talk of the next generation (outside of pure speculation).

 

I'm going to go out on a limb here, but I suspect the market for games on mobile devices (as a whole)... might even be larger than it is for video game systems. Well... I mean, I KNOW the market itself is larger... but I almost wonder if there are more smartphone users playing games on their phone than there are people who are playing them on systems?

 

Anyway, I wonder if that's what he means. While those developers CAN go back to writing these huge fancy games... they can stay where they are, writing small flash games and iOS / Android games for mobile devices... making a ton more money. Those games are so much less complex than a whole video game... and a larger, immediate, market.

 

The part I'm saying is absurd, though, is not the part about developers flocking to non-console platforms. That part is definitely true. The Square Enix official is claiming, however, that the reason this is happening is because this round of the console cycle has gone on too long, that the length of the round has been the driving factor behind the success of Web and mobile gaming. He's arguing that if the next Xbox and PlayStation systems had launched in, say, 2010-2011 (meaning buzz from system reveals in 2009-2010), Web and mobile gaming would not have grown into the behemoths they are now because developers who had failed on PS3 and Xbox 360 would be instead trying again on the new-generation consoles. This doesn't make sense to me. The whole claim about "devs failing on a generation will wait and try again on the next generation" makes no sense because this means they go for years without doing anything and then spend a ton of money (that came from where, exactly?) to retry on the next generation. Developers who had given up on the PS3 generation would not have had the money anyway to join the theoretical PS4 generation. Web and mobile development is widespread because it's cheap and already has a large consumer base. The lack of availability of an expensive option is rarely what causes the popularity of a cheap option. Who says, "I would have chosen the much riskier, costlier option had it been there for me"? Compulsive gamblers aside. Moreover, when in history has the new generation launched with a greater rate of game releases than the then-current generation's rate? He claims developers who failed and gave up on one generation would come back for the next, which would mean that the size of the developer pool for next-generation systems would exceed the size of the current-generation systems. This has never happened.

 

Web and mobile gaming are popular, yes. Would they not be popular if the next Xbox and PlayStation systems were already out? No.

 

onmode-ky

[82-T/A]

The Xbox 360 was a pretty hot topic as early as 2004, even though it wasn't released until years later.

[. . .]

Pretty much everything about the Wii (including it's name) was either brand-new or at least highly unorthodox, so gamers had a lot to talk about.

 

I think there's some time perception compression going on due to the years that have passed since these events, or perhaps due to the PS2's domination over the Xbox and GameCube during those years. The Xbox 360 being a hot topic in 2004 (which sounds accurate; Wikipedia puts actual hardware design as starting in 2003) puts it 3 years after the release of the Xbox and only 1 year prior to its own release. The Wii's controller was revealed late in 2005, which is near the Xbox 360's launch and 4 years after the GameCube's release, and the Wii's final name was revealed a bit before E3 2006, about half a year before its own launch.

 

So, while the Xbox and GameCube may feel like they were quickly pushed aside to you, they were actually on their own, without news of successors, for a few years each. Personally, I remember several years of games only for the PS2, Xbox, and GameCube, with no talk of the next generation (outside of pure speculation).

 

I'm going to go out on a limb here, but I suspect the market for games on mobile devices (as a whole)... might even be larger than it is for video game systems. Well... I mean, I KNOW the market itself is larger... but I almost wonder if there are more smartphone users playing games on their phone than there are people who are playing them on systems?

 

Anyway, I wonder if that's what he means. While those developers CAN go back to writing these huge fancy games... they can stay where they are, writing small flash games and iOS / Android games for mobile devices... making a ton more money. Those games are so much less complex than a whole video game... and a larger, immediate, market.

 

The part I'm saying is absurd, though, is not the part about developers flocking to non-console platforms. That part is definitely true. The Square Enix official is claiming, however, that the reason this is happening is because this round of the console cycle has gone on too long, that the length of the round has been the driving factor behind the success of Web and mobile gaming. He's arguing that if the next Xbox and PlayStation systems had launched in, say, 2010-2011 (meaning buzz from system reveals in 2009-2010), Web and mobile gaming would not have grown into the behemoths they are now because developers who had failed on PS3 and Xbox 360 would be instead trying again on the new-generation consoles. This doesn't make sense to me. The whole claim about "devs failing on a generation will wait and try again on the next generation" makes no sense because this means they go for years without doing anything and then spend a ton of money (that came from where, exactly?) to retry on the next generation. Developers who had given up on the PS3 generation would not have had the money anyway to join the theoretical PS4 generation. Web and mobile development is widespread because it's cheap and already has a large consumer base. The lack of availability of an expensive option is rarely what causes the popularity of a cheap option. Who says, "I would have chosen the much riskier, costlier option had it been there for me"? Compulsive gamblers aside. Moreover, when in history has the new generation launched with a greater rate of game releases than the then-current generation's rate? He claims developers who failed and gave up on one generation would come back for the next, which would mean that the size of the developer pool for next-generation systems would exceed the size of the current-generation systems. This has never happened.

 

Web and mobile gaming are popular, yes. Would they not be popular if the next Xbox and PlayStation systems were already out? No.

 

onmode-ky

 

Ok, yeah... it makes sense what you're saying. It doesn't make sense what he's saying unless he kind of misrepresented in his comment about what he was trying to say?

 

We certainly know a lot of developers have moved to the quick and easy mobile market... which they may or may not return from... but as you say, that would have probably happened regardless....

[StoneAgeGamer]

Yeah the leaps between generations (graphically) is becoming less noticeable. Honestly the last big graphics jump I think of was from PS / N64 / Saturn to Dreamcast. The first 3D systems games have not aged well. Super blurry/pixelated textures or sub-30FPS.

 

Now it seems its basically about better lighting and physics. Graphics do improve as well, but its more in the details, but poly counts. Eventually poly counts (do they even call them poly counts anymore?) will be so high you won't even notice them. Which is kind of scary when you think about it because games seems to be a big driving force right now pushing computer technology. Not the only one of course, but a big one. I would hate to see it become stagnant.

[Mendon]

Now UBISoft is also claiming that the long time between console releases has "penalized both developers and consumers" and "has stymied creativity and led to companies resorting to making sequels".

 

http://www.ign.com/articles/2012/07/23/ubisoft-industry-penalised-by-long-console-cycle

 

As a consumer, I call BS on this article just as I did with the Square-Enix article.

 

Sorry, but if companies want to spend hundreds of millions of dollars on development and production for every title they release, then they shouldn't blame their lack of turning a profit (or their lack of taking creative chances) on MS-Sony-Nintendo because its been longer than 5 years between console releases.

 

 

Mendon

[cimerians]

It doesn't help when they release a game at 60 bucks with a good portion of the game locked away as "DLC". People aren't stupid.

 

Especially when the game comes out months later as a complete edition.

 

I mean how many titles are MUST HAVES on day one? Not many anymore. At least not for me. I can only think of a handful. As much as I'm enjoying Dragons Dogma, that game is filled with on-disc DLC.....so I bought it used. Screw them.

 

They did this.....and now they bitch and blame everyone except themselves.

[Rex Dart]

...the long time between console releases has "penalized both developers and consumers" and "has stymied creativity and led to companies resorting to making sequels".

 

So... make 'em for PC instead. Problem solved.

[cimerians]

...the long time between console releases has "penalized both developers and consumers" and "has stymied creativity and led to companies resorting to making sequels".

 

So... make 'em for PC instead. Problem solved.

 

I agree but it makes me laugh......LOL....the two companies who really suck on making PC games. Square-Enix with the turd that is Final Fantasy 14 and the DRM filled Ubisoft line of PC ports which nobody wants to buy and be tethered to the internet.

[ninjarabbit]

No one is stopping Square-Enix and Ubisoft from releasing their own consoles if they really feel that strongly.

[madmax2069]

...the long time between console releases has "penalized both developers and consumers" and "has stymied creativity and led to companies resorting to making sequels".

 

So... make 'em for PC instead. Problem solved.

 

I agree but it makes me laugh......LOL....the two companies who really suck on making PC games. Square-Enix with the turd that is Final Fantasy 14 and the DRM filled Ubisoft line of PC ports which nobody wants to buy and be tethered to the internet.

 

That's why I fell out of the continued loop if upgrading my PC, they really have PC gaming on lockdown with all this DRM crap. The last game that I bought for my PC was CS:S after that I got out of PC gaming with modern titles and just stuck with the mass amount of older titles I own.

 

I ended up moving back over to console gaming for modern titles. The way its going now I am starting to play my older consoles now more then my current ones.

[Spoon]

The ironic thing to me is the fact that Square-Enix will be releasing the FF11: Seekers Of Adoulin expansion next year...for the PS2.

[xg4bx]

speaking of ubi-

 

"Assassins Creed 3 DLC may be linked to Season Pass".

 

http://www.ripten.com/2012/07/24/assassins-creed-iii-dlc-may-be-linked-to-a-season-pass/

 

see, that doesn't get me excited. all that says to me is that the $60 disc you're buying is going to have the shit butchered out of it. ac3 has become a "pick up for $20 during a gamestop sale" title to me.

 

cry moar ubisoft.i've been basing all my purchases on pre-release dlc announcements. if it seems like theres an awful lot, the game gets skipped. i suppose this is the console makers fault too.../s

[potatohead]

Re: New Console

 

I think that is precisely what Valve is doing. Look for Steambox, or something like that. They recently hired a whole ton of people that add up to a console type effort. I think they still are gathering troops.

 

New consoles are double edged swords. On one hand, the tech update is good. On the other, it's expensive. IMHO, this is a scapegoat piece. Gaming being mediocre has very little to do with the actual hardware out there, particularly now. It's all about being in a rut, and frankly, way too much emphasis on building IP, not building games, which indirectly builds IP when successful. That's the problem they have. Expectations are too high in the consistency department. So much is put in that success is mandatory, which limits the scope of innovation considerably. Somebody needs to crack that nut.

 

Smaller scale gaming is where it's at, and it's there because of that dynamic being far less of an influence. A small team, even single person can do something notable and get it out there on mobile. There is a Kickstarter project for an Android console. They hope to leverage that into a nice casual / semi-serious gaming platform. I didn't contribute because I don't have time to jump on and do stuff with a new release console, but I am watching it closely to see who does.

 

The skills required are not significantly different than we see used to do new classic projects. Could be really great!

 

http://www.kickstart...eo-game-console

 

These two efforts tell me more than a few people get what's making gaming stale. There is a total vacuum growing out there right now, somebody will fill it, and it won't be the majors, though they will likely jump in once it takes hold.

[godslabrat]

Expectations are too high in the consistency department. So much is put in that success is mandatory, which limits the scope of innovation considerably.

 

Let's look at some older franchises: Mario. Zelda. These two franchises have spawned an absurd number of sequels and spin-offs. How did they get started? Look at the first four installments of each, and you'll find not just innovation, but RADICAL experimentation between each installment. In some cases, sequels were so different that they were barely within the same genre.

 

Now these franchises are so ridiculously successful that a lot of us are sick of seeing them. That's a fair point. However, they got to where they are today by trying different things. Today's developers should take note.

[madmax2069]

The ironic thing to me is the fact that Square-Enix will be releasing the FF11: Seekers Of Adoulin expansion next year...for the PS2.

 

But only in Japan from what I hear.

[Mord]

Now UBISoft is also claiming that the long time between console releases has "penalized both developers and consumers" and "has stymied creativity and led to companies resorting to making sequels".

 

Ubisoft is full of it. They've all been making sequels to sequels LONG before this generation.

[onlysublime]

Ubisoft has lived for being among the first to a new platform to generate new revenue among minimal competition. That's why Ubisoft made Rayman for the Atari Jaguar. Why they did Splinter Cell for the Xbox1. GRAW and Rainbow Six Vegas for the 360. A bunch of Kinect titles. The first Wii U titles.

 

So they live for new consoles more than most companies.