Microsoft (Sorta) Addresses Big Xbox One Questions [UPDATED]

This all seems like a big mess, they're all saying something different and contradicting each other.

We can only hope that things get clarified now and/or Capcom and NetherRealm getting in touch with Microsoft, otherwise tournament organisers might as well prepare to buys PS4s and hope that Capcom games don't run poorly on it.

Does it require always on connection?

"No... but yes."

@mistersamman: Oh I think Valve has that covered... They don't need to do trades THEY JUST HAVE INSANE STEAM SALES.

Also HATS and TRADING CARDS.

This bewildering clusterfuck sounds like it's coming from publishers (because publishers love nothing more than a bewildering clusterfuck) rather than Microsoft.

I'd bet my liver that Sony are under pressure from said publishers to adopt exactly the same system. They're just smart enough to keep their damn yaps shut about it.

I could not have given less of a shit unless the next Xbox had been a cablebox.

Goodbye, Microsoft. Good riddance.

Okay, we've got "Effective Anti-Zombie Weapon", "Will Not Use Tear Gas On You", and "Potential For A Potential Game To Be Potentially Good". This is good guys. This is good. Keep em coming. We got anything else?

@jimmypancakes: I'd wager they just struck up a deal with Gamestop and are leaving consumers out in the cold.

He did clear up one thing, though, I won't be able to borrow any games off my friends.

The point is there is no point to borrow a game from your friend since it will cost you the same as buying a new one.

That is the point.

They aren't going to make the fee less than retail (or at least their share of retail) unless there is a system in place for deactivating the game on one system and activating it on another. Otherwise they'd sell one copy for $60 and then that guy's friends would all unlock it for whatever the fee is.

If they really wanted to troll retail they could make the fee ~$45. They'd undercut retail while still making more from an unlock fee than they would from selling a brand new copy at retail.

According to Harrison, you will have to pay a fee if you borrow a game disc from a friend, a fee that, at least for new games, will be the same cost your friend probably paid.

Umm, I've never borrowed an Xbox game but the fact that they're doing this makes me not want one now.

They better have some great games lined up for E3, cause they're pretty much hacking away at their customer base with required internet and US cable-box focus. But I guess it might catch on and sell a buttload over there, which is probably what they're aiming for.

Got an ugly feeling the US XboX/EU PS divide is gonna become way more prevalent this generation.

What's the betting that used-games-gate is how Microsoft managed to snare those 15 exclusives? Hell of an incentive for a publisher.

Microsoft: DERP DERP DERP DERP

Publisher: What's that, you say? Our games will basically be copy-protected?

Microsoft: DERP DERP DERP

Publisher: That's great! Sure, we'll sign an exclusivity agreement!

Microsoft: DERP

The deciding factor for me will be price. And I mean REAL price, no subcription, service plan, bullshit.

To stop used games sales. Just that MS is too spineless to go after the source, the retailers, so they'd rather attack their customers.

Ok, so the TV-features seem to be US-only (unsurprisingly). So PS4 I guess?

@ares42 said:

Yeah, that struck me through the whole press conference. I'm an Aussie and I seriously doubt that most of the 'entertainment' functionality will work outside the US, unless they double down on the 'Foxtel on 360' stuff (hideously overpriced at present, not really Microsoft's fault). There doesn't seem to be an easy way to get normal Free-to-air television (from an aerial) into the box unless you already have some kind of PVR setup and can use the HDMI connection. The games had better be compelling.

color me veryyyyyyy...unimpressed.....xbox one...really xbox one.......that names sucks donkey dick......sony u have officially won me over this generation, u have the set the bar..be it one a toddler could jump over..lol

So having discs w/ installs that make the disc worthless is Microsoft's way of easing people into a download only(steam style) future. I do like this, but it does bring up a pretty big question with their used games service. If the real thing being traded is the ability to download someone else's previously purchased "right" to download (making the first party's invalid), how is this a used game trade? They are just, in essence, switching contracts. Nothing "used" is being traded, b/c I assume this can be done over the internet (making the disc worthless). Does the previous "owner" get a kickback, w/ Microsoft taking a percent. Is the price, unless set by the original owner, really going to be that much lower as to warrant a "used" game purchase by the second party? Is there a difference in pricing from say, showing the game at a friend's house(rental fee?), and a straight up "I used to own/have the right to play, but you now have that right/own this game" fee?

There are too many unknowns with the way Microsoft has gone about this. Maybe I'm over thinking it and come the Holiday season it will blow me away; but I sincerely doubt it. One thing this press conference has done is made my decision about this gen a little easier. PS4 is looking like the superior candidate, but my PC is beast enough now that exclusives are all I'm really considering. So do I wait for Nintendo games to come out and pretend I'm 8 again, while using my PC for "Grown Men Things"? I don't know... I just don't know. But one thing is for sure, Microsoft is now at the bottom of my watch list for whatever this next gen is, and I'm strangely okay with that!

Those 15 exclusives include first party games.

Well sir, all your dreams are about to come true! With that increase in the max friends you can have, you will now fill up 1.3%. the other 98.7% of your new potential friends can be any one of the countless angry 13 year olds. #Xboned

I would have blown my stack over the single use code deal about a year ago, but having transitioned over to PC gaming and Steam, I don't see why people would freak out about this. All of my purchases the last year cannot be traded, sold or loaned to a friend, and it hasn't created one single problem.

I find it amusing that the majority of people have been buying games and apps on their PCs, iPhones, iPads and Androids for YEARS now that cannot be sold, traded or loaned, and not been the least bit outraged. I've never once heard a person furious that their $50 of Angry Birds apps and levels can't be traded in at Gamestop or played on a friend's iPad, yet Microsoft comes along and does the same thing and suddenly everyone's all "FUCK THAT, MAN!!!"

This is the reality of physical media going away, and we're entering the awkward middle ground where they still have to offer physical media for those without the bandwidth, but are artificially implementing the same restrictions digital content has had for years.

I do believe, however, that MS and Sony will need to be much more aggressive with the pricing of their digital goods (a la Steam) to remain relevant. Part of the reason I'm okay with not being able to resell Steam purchases is the fact I paid 1/4 (or less) of the console price, which works out to a better deal than $60 new - $20 trade back to Gamestop = $40 to play the game on console. Contrary to the commonly held belief that soaring dev costs will lead to $69.99 console games, I think the first company with the balls to offer digital downloads for $39.99 or less, at or near launch, will win the war.

The language I've seen used talked in terms of the console having the disc/game tied to it in a way similar to family accounts. So random people coming over to use the console and sign in to xbox live wouldn't necessarily have access to it.

A real stickler for any kind of tournament/lan event and also what remaining videogame rental services there are.

Only one thing is certain after the presentation of Xbox One. Is it about backwards compatibility? No. About having to pay a fee to play a used game? No.

It is the fact that they will be devestated by Sony.

Does this go for XBLA games as well?

Perfect summation of the clusterfuck, by fustacluck!

It seems like even high-ranking Microsoft employees aren't sure how this is really going to be handled other than there will be a fee of some sort involved.

I for one applaud both Sony and Microsoft's commitment to extreme, undisguised ventilation of their upcoming hardware. Naturally-aspirated game consoles.

*angry grumbling about things I don't like*

@kosayn: fuck that! I want twin turbos on my consoles.

Architecturized.

That's a good way to put it. I currently let my friends and cousins borrow my games for FREE without needing my profile on their system. Why would I suddenly want to pay a fee for what EVERYONE has done since the NES era?

@mrsmiley: Unlikely. If anything, the reverse would be true where they'd find a way to waive the fee so games could be lent to friends, while getting revenue from used game sales.

I was hoping to hear something about getting around the fee if the original registration code was used by someone on your friends list. After all, you'd be lending to a "friend" right?

I actually wrote this down earlier in the edited comment but I'll just remention it here. I think it wouldn't actually be a problem with the players though since you would just need the system to just be on with a game pre-installed and an account who owns the game already logged in (which is probably already done by default anyway). Also players who come in to play the game would already have a copy of the game at home and most likely have that game already tied into their account so if in case they would need to log-in into the tourney console, one of the players could just need to log-in with his/her account. I mean if you already own a copy of the game anyway, the tourney console wouldn't ask you to pay for it again just because it's a different copy and it's logged in with a different account.

@bbqbram: Yes. Downloadable or on a disc it's the same data, designed to work on the same hardware. Nothing will work, you have until they shut servers for 360 to enjoy them in full.

To be fair, I haven't kept up with PS2 emulation so I wasn't aware there was a new emulator. But I guarantee that the majority of PS2 games on that emulator have some form of glitchiness, be it poor framerates, random slowdowns or graphical artifacts, and that's not counting the 500+ games that flat out aren't playable. And that's emulating 15+ year old hardware on modern PCs, compared to the less than 10 year old 360 hardware on the XONE which is even now a year or two outdated.

My point still stands: emulation isn't purely about "Console X is faster than Console Y, therefore Y can play X games." The 360 was at least an order of magnitude more powerful than the first Xbox, yet Microsoft had to go through on an engine-by-engine basis and basically port it over to the 360 using software emulation. Even then, many games had serious issues, both in framerate and glitches (the burn-in issue with Halo 2 comes to mind).

The PS3 could originally play PS2 games. Why? Because the PS2 was so outdated at that point that they could shrink it into a single chip and literally put it inside the PS3. Note that as soon as prices started to drop, they axed that feature immediately, because it cost too much and was physically too difficult to keep including it in the box when they started planning the Slim.

Hardware emulation in the XONE would mean the console would cost a minimum of $100 more, be physically larger and be more prone to hardware related failures. Software emulation would mean that Microsoft would need to devote a team of developers and testers to go through and manually patch as many games as possible to the new system (when they could much more effectively be working on new games for the new console). Even if they did really commit to supporting software emulation, remember that every generation consoles get more and more complex, and the likelihood of even getting the 100-odd glitchy games we got from the Xbox-Xbox 360 transition would be a miracle coming from the 360 to the Xbox One. It would cost Microsoft and arm and a leg and a lot of development time, and for what? An extra bulletpoint on the box and an appeal to the fraction of a percent of the 360 fans for which this is a make or break feature.

You're better off buying whatever the next revision of 360 is, stockpiling your Arcade games onto your hard drive, and then keep that around for when the 360 Live servers get taken down in 3-5 years. It's a bummer, yes, and it would be great if every console could play every previous consoles' games, but that's barely even possible when fans devote endless man hours to PC emulation, so expecting it from a business with limited time and resources is crazy when the primary focus of this console launch is going to be a low price point and as many exclusives as they can possibly pump out.

Well 95% of the stuff they have shown wont work in Europe, so my enthusiasm for this is like 0. I like the rectangle shape tho, goes fine with my other devices that sit under the TV.

Just so you guys are aware, the Kinect they're currently showing is still an early prototype. Because I love all of you and want you to have access to the latest in tech gaming news, here's a photo of the final version that I was able to sneak out of a backroom showing.

@faroon: "Architected" is a perfectly serviceable word when you're trying to describe something as incredible like the "infinite power of the cloud."

Also I want to add that software emulation WORKS in the PC because it is an open-platform and more flexible, unlike a console which is pretty much a closed platform. If something breaks or doesn't work, a fix or a patch can be made for it by someone in the emulation community.

Depends. Im sure every backup console at a tournament wouldnt be licensed to have ever game. Some of the bigger tournaments probably have a storage room somewhere with consoles in them, some probably borrow consoles from players and workers. It will be a logistical issue for Tournament Organizers, who will now have to keep track of what consoles are licensed for the NeatherRealm Games, what consoles are Licensed for Capcom Games, what consoles are licensed for KOF, etc, etc. Then boil that down again by saying some Marvel players dont play Street Fighter, some Injustice players dont play MK. It probably wouldnt be a *huge* issue for TOs, just another small hassle that could scare them away from using XBONE because its another thing on top of the hassle of running a tournament. The really annoying thing is the fact that the XBONE will require a Kinect to function.

I imagine the people at Sony are doing a jig of some sort right now like hillbillies who found gold.

Architected is a real word.

My buying this fucking piece of shit of a console is not!

Kind of makes me happy that I sank $450 into a superclocked GTX 670.

I think I might let this one shake out for a few years until the first hardware revision. Microsoft isn't fooling anyone w/ that box - I had a VCR once already.

I'm a little creeped out about always-on cameras w/ sound, too. I give away too much marketing data already to have my Kinect detect a flutter in my heartbeat every time Major Nelson graces my screen.

One last open question: what do people think the over/under should be on the first box to overheat in an entertainment system cabinet and RROD or YLOD?

I think I'm out. I have preferred the last 2 Microsoft consoles but I'm getting fed up with all of this BS.

Ahh, yes. The real nub of it all. Anytime it thinks it hears an "xbox" from the crowd it will pause the fight :(

http://www.polygon.com/2013/5/21/4353010/kinect-trouble-xbox-one-reveal

While I don't do it very often on a philosophical and sentimental level I'll be pretty disappointed if the Xone and PS4 don't allow me to lend games to my friends that I've really enjoyed...

OH THAT'S RIGHT...I forgot about that. Now THAT is a problem for TO's. That would just take up a lot of space but then I could see it as a positive though. This is merely speculation but if the Skype app has a Public broadcast function and if there is Twitch.tv support, they can broadcast a camera view of the players AND have the game playing at the same time and people can watch the match from their own XBONE's (is that what were calling it now?) and have the Skype app running with the view of the players playing using the snap-in feature. If that is the case and it turns out that XBONE has Twitch support, that would be fucking amazing.

Or oil. There once was a story 'bout a man named Jed.

The whole it isn't always on, but requires an internet connection part is super confusing. Kotaku has a story saying that an exec said it needs to connect to the internet at least once every 24 hours...but it doesn't say what happens if you don't have meet the once a day connection requirement. Sounds like Xbox One was gonna be always online until the whole Adam Orth thing exploded on twitter.