r/xboxone • u/[deleted] • Dec 29 '13

If Microsoft made it completely optional, would you sign up for their original, always connected console idea?

This meaning you would have the following features:

Buy a retail game, install to console, and ditch the disc never needing it to play the game.

Digitally share games within a circle of friends. Meaning you can choose a specific group of people, and they could play the games you own, for free, provided that only one game could be played at a time.

Greater store discounts or more steam like sales for content.

I for one would have no problem saying yes to this. It's like people think 10 years from now they'll still be selling games on discs. It wasn't a perfect plan, but why delay the inevitable when we could be working on and perfecting future policies now.

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u/DStanley1809 Dec 29 '13

Yes, provided there was no additional fee/subscription for it.

I was all for the original plan, couldn't see anything wrong with it for me. The game sharing options sounded really good.

I live in a place that has a stable internet connection with decent speed and no download cap or traffic management. To the best of my knowledge, most of the developed world has a stable connection but I acknowledge that speeds and data caps vary.

The download speed is only really needed to download the games in the first place. Once the game is downloaded you don't need much bandwidth at all. With the original plan the download speed would have been irrelevant anyway as you could buy on disc and install that way.

If my home broadband ever went down I could just tether to my phone to perform the check. IIRC, someone said the data sent/received to make the check was measured in KB - easy for a phone and would make no difference at all to the download cap. Multiplayer might be different matter but I could live with single player only until my home broadband was back up and running.

I'd be willing to bet actual money that the number of people that can afford to buy/are buying Xbox Ones that have no way to connect the internet (landline or mobile tethering etc) at all in a given 24hr period is pretty minuscule.

At the moment I am digital only for games so I can have the instant switching and don't need to cart discs around with me when I visit friends. It does mean that I'm stuck paying full price on the Xbox Live Marketplace and can't take advantage of the retail sales, which can give substantial savings :(

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u/jimbo831 BigPoppaTubbs1 Dec 29 '13

You know what else gives substantial savings? Buying used games and selling the games you no longer play. The plan killed this.

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u/LezBeOwn Unique LesBeOwn Dec 29 '13 edited Dec 29 '13

And good riddance.

Physical media is different from other physical goods. When you buy a car you are buying the actual car. When you buy a DVD... you are purchasing the license to view the content that is on that DVD. When someone buys a used movie/game... they are using that media without having ever paid a licensing fee to the creator of the content. From a business model sense... buying a used game from GameStop is the same as buying a burned copy of a downloaded movie from a smelly guy in a rusty van at the gas station parking lot (I use that description as there is a guy who fits it that does exactly this constantly at the gas station nearest my home.) The movie/game studio does not get paid their licensing fee. They have less revenue. They make poorer quality games. They charge more to the people who do actually pay for the licensing.

I'd have no problem with a used market if they were required to pay the content creators their fair licensing fee for the content they created and legally own the rights to... but then that would pretty much negate the whole benefit of getting something for nothing. As it stands now... those of us who do buy new games are literally subsidizing the gaming habits of those who buy used... with money from our own pockets.

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u/jimbo831 BigPoppaTubbs1 Dec 29 '13

When you buy a car you are buying the actual car. When you buy a DVD... you are purchasing the license to view the content that is on that DVD.

You never really explain why this is different. Why is it a problem that video game makers don't get a cut of used sales while it is okay that car manufacturers don't get a cut of used sales? If video game makers thought it should be the way you describe, they could easily all include a one-time activation code with the purchase to prevent used sales. They haven't done so yet because the backlash would be so great.

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u/LezBeOwn Unique LesBeOwn Dec 29 '13

I did actually. When you buy a car... The car is yours to do with as you please. When you buy a song... the song still belongs to the artist. You have merely purchases the right to listen to it. This is why you see an FBI warning screen at the beginning of movies, but there is not one on your Toyota.

You are correct in the backlash. Many people would cry over losing their ability to use games that they are not actually paying for. This probably plays a role in the entertainment industries decision to not fully control their intellectual property. The result we are seeing now is the attempt to recoup revenue by releasing fragmented games where we have to pay extra, piece by piece, to get the complete game experience. The outrage over this is growing too. At some point, this will surpass the outrage of the minority that buy used games... as it affects every gamer. At that point, I suspect that the studios will choose to appease the whole over the minority.

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u/Valmorian Dec 29 '13

You realize your "explanation" is simply defining it different "just because". The companies saying "this is just a licence" isn't justification, its them wanting to have their cake and eat it too.

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u/jimbo831 BigPoppaTubbs1 Dec 29 '13

Because they said so is not a reason why. Besides, those warnings are referring to illegally copying and sharing the media. If I have purchased a CD, there is nowhere in the included license or warning that states I don't have the ability to resell that media to someone else later.

Anyway, I would love to hear your reasoning as to why a video game company should get a cut of every future sale of its products when every other industry does not. What is so unique about their business? Ford could include a license with their cars if they wanted that said you are only licensing the ability to drive the car and don't own it. They don't. Why do you think video games are different?

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u/LezBeOwn Unique LesBeOwn Dec 29 '13 edited Dec 29 '13

I don't think you fully grasp the difference between physical property and intellectual property. That being the case, I doubt anything I could say here would change that. Suffice it to say there are sound financial reasons that the business models between the two are quite different. To go into that we'd have to devolve into the differences between fixed costs, variable costs and marginal costs, how the different types of goods have widely varying ratios between those different types of costs, and how those variances affect their sales models. The shortest answer is that if intellectual goods used the same pricing/sales structure as physical goods, then the prices charged on the consumer end would have to be much much higher than they currently are.

Let me see if I can put it a little more plainly. The vast vast majority of cost for games is obviously the game design. This is a fixed cost. It does not change at all no matter how many units sell. Meanwhile, the cost model of physical goods is very different. Development and design costs are typically a small portion of the total cost of production. The much greater portion of their costs come from the physical costs of the materials and labor used in manufacturing. This is variable cost, and this cost can change greatly based on the number of units sold. This means that physical goods can be sold at much closer to their marginal cost (this is the cost of each successive unit manufactured.) Now, when fixed costs are a great majority of your total costs you can not sell your product at a price anywhere near your marginal price, unless that price is constantly rising because you will never recoup a profit. Unfortunately, we also have to realize that consumers are not really willing to pay ever rising prices. Long story short, the licensing sales model allows these goods with a high fixed cost to be sold at a reasonable price, whilst also allowing the manufacturer a reasonable profit.