Tendo City

Yeah, so MS revealed the system with a 1-hour conference yesterday. And yes, I watched it, even though I wasn't expecting it to be all that great. MS's last few E3 conferences have been mediocre at best, after all.

And, well, my worst expectations were upheld. At the conference they showed very few games, and spent most of the hour on the numerous TV functions of the thing (watch TV and switch to a game with voice command in the of-course-mandatory Kinect 2! Respond to live TV, just like Nintendo and Sony are also doing this gen! Fantasy football on Xbox One! ESPN! Etc.). Yeah, it was pretty tedious.

As for games, the first actual games that were shown was an EA Sports trailer, with prerendered clips of Madden, FIFA, and such. Yeah. Awesome. Other than that, all they showed was no-actual-gameplay-just-in-engine-stuff-shown bits of Forza and the multiplatform COD: Ghosts. And that's pretty much it. Oh, and there's a Halo TV series upcoming.

They did not, of course, say at the conference anything about the always-online or anti-used-games elements, but outside of it, we've heard that the system will have to connect to MS servers at least once every 24 hours. So you can take it offline, but not for longer than a day if you plan on using the thing. That is quite draconian, obviously. The system also will have mandatory installs. Games don't play off of the discs, they play off of the HDD. That 500GB HDD it comes with by default is going to fill up VERY fast.

As for used games, MS claims that there will be some form of used-games support, but have refused to explain the details. We'll see, but I'm going to guess that either they won't have any after all, or there'll be some system where when you sell the disc to certain authorized retailers (who would be the only ones who could take them or something) they'll disable it from your console after you sell it, or something (remember, must call home every 24 hours!). Oh, and the person buying the used copy may or may not have to pay a fee to MS in order to switch over the license, if they allow used sales at all. We'll see, but it will definitely be the most locked-down console ever released. This is, obviously, very bad for consumers. Very, very bad. At least on the PC, even if used games are mostly dead, there are regular sales to get recent games for $5... I'd never expect that on consoles. Just full-price games which they lock to your system.

And as I said, the Kinect 2 is REQUIRED. Do not unplug it if you want to use the system. It's Microsoft's Big Brother in action! And yes, it works as the microphone for online games too -- there's no headset support, apparently. And as the camera costs quite a bit, the system's underpowered compared to PS4 -- the PS4's GPU is somewhere between 33% and 50% more powerful than the XO's. And for what, a camera that's moderately amusing for TV stuff and atrocious for games? I mean, I think the Wiimote is a good controller, but Kinect... no. Not for any serious game.

Oh, the Xbox One also has a poorly chosen name, too -- Xbox, Xbox One, there's no way people could confuse those, right? -- and is overly large, as well. It doesn't really look like a console, but like a set-top box.

But of course, given the focus of the presentation, that is almost certainly entirely intentional.

Finally, the event was held at MS HQ... and some press people (Adam Sessler, and others) have said that the frequent applause at the conference was not coming from the press section. So yeah, MS packed the back of the theater with employees and had them cheer, it seems. Otherwise it'd have been quite deservedly silent in there.

Overall though, the conference was well worth watching. It's interesting seeing this stuff live, even when it's as tediously boring and anti-consumer as this presentation was.



As for the controller, it's like a 360 controller but with a better-looking dpad and the Start and Back buttons were replaced with other things. I'm not entirely sure what they do, MS didn't explain at the conference.

Oh, and lastly... it might be HDMI-out only. Couldn't use it on my TV then, unless adapters work... my HDTV just has component (and composite, s-video, and rf).

For those who did not watch it, this video sums up the experience well.

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/KbWgUO-Rqcw" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

The device looks like my dad's old VCR. Basically, what all entertainment devices looked like when they ditched wood paneling. The d-pad, for the first time, looks like a d-pad. If it actually is what it looks like, I wonder how they managed it. Did they sign some sort of deal with Nintendo? Looks like they added rumble to the triggers on the device. Hmm... I mean, we've all talked about "real force feedback" before, where you might have to "fight the controls" on a plane or something. This isn't that, it's just rumble on the triggers. No hint of touch interface outside requiring the separate purchase of a smart phone to use their "smart glass".

The stats on the thing are pretty nice, much like the PS4.

The online functionality is getting some improvements, but I dislike things like "use our servers to boost game performance". That suggests that this console is some sort of weird hybrid with something like OnLive. That's the worst sort of hybrid. I want my game system's calculations to all be done right at home. They've confirmed that the system won't require an "always on" connection, but will require EVERY game to be directly installed to the hard drive (which means 500GB just got too small, considering this thing uses Bluray disks now) and then activated ala Steam. Steam activation is one of the more painless ways to do game activation, but the fact is, used gaming is dead on this system. MS just confirmed that if you trade the disk with someone else, they'll be paying full price on the store to "activate" that disk. Mah...

The hard disk took a generational step backwards. It is built into the hardware permanently, can't be upgraded, much like the actual XBox 1. You can plug in external hard drives, but even at USB 3.0, that's still under the transfer rates of a direct SATA connection. Nintendo's console behaves the same, but we sort of expect better from Microsoft's hardware division at this point. They really should have allowed the disk to be slid right out and upgraded by the user. As it is, I'm already seriously considering modding my original XBox so I don't lose my data to a hard drive failure (all hard drives eventually fail, it is only a matter of time, I may replace the existing drive with a solid state solution, I mean heck even a 32GB memory card would be 4 times the existing storage space on the original).

The interface focused a lot on TV. Again, this is a page from Nintendo's book. Most modern cable boxes have HDMI out at this point (surround sound systems do as well), so the second port handily solves the issue that Nintendo's lack of ports fails to address. All the same, I ditched cable some time ago in favor of using the internet for the scant few TV shows I want to watch (mainly, Daily Show and Colbert Report). Adding TV broadcast support feels a little anachronistic at this point. Heck, my cell phone is set up to receive emergency weather alerts, so I'm less and less inclined to care about broadcasts any more.

The people they set up to answer questions apparently barely knew anything about the system. One of them refused to answer something as basic as whether or not the Kinect could be removed and the system still function. Another said "no, it must be plugged in forever", or something like that. Microsoft really wants us all to use that thing to navigate the menu. Yes, the novelty factor of telling the xbox to start a game is nice, but it wears off. Using your hands to point to things or your voice to input commands is, simply, much slower and less accurate than using the controller. It probably always will be. Star Trek used the voice command thing a lot as a plot device, but realistically I'm pretty sure in actual space emergencies, it would simply be quicker to input the commands using their consoles than to navigate that phone tree of a voice system. For one, a line of text can be displayed all at once on a screen or input faster than speaking speed, but sound has to come out syllable by syllable, at a steady slow speaking rate. At the very least, we know that the system will not be backwards compatible with the 360.

Also, while they won't require an "always on" connection, they DID include functionality in the system for individual game developers (Ubisoft, maybe Capcom) to require that on an individual game basis. MS, that doesn't absolve you of responsibility. You might as well include electric shock pads in the controller, stating you'll never use them yourselves, but hey, if a 3rd party developer wants to, hey, they have the option.

The system apparently has the Windows 8 kernel built in. Okay then, why did you feel the need to tell me that? Unless you're telling me I can now run Windows games on the system (doubtful, the kernel is likely limited), this is nothing I really care about.

The 360 had an amazing interface when they did their second version of the built in OS. The third revision screwed it all up. The thing was messy to navigate and no longer put the important things like games front and center. Instead, it was all nested a few levels deep, and the top level stuff was mainly dominated by ads. Ads, on a service I'm already paying $50 a year for. Oh wait, not only did they add the ads, they raised, RAISED, the price of the yearly fee to $60 a year.

Nothing they've shown me of the new interface answers one simple question. Is the interface designed with the user's desires first and foremost, or the advertiser's desires? Frankly, I don't think Nintendo is willing to cut out all that ad revenue at this point. They swallowed that pill and now they're hooked. But it comes down to another matter. How long before ALL online services on the 360 are shut off? That's a hell of a bitter pill to swallow, but it may be inevitable. I can see MS simply stating "oh, well, in order to properly upgrade Live services, we needed to eliminate legacy code that was holding us back, so now you can have a friend's list higher than 50!". Why not? It's exactly the line they gave us when they shut off original XBox Live support (and I'll note they still haven't raised that friend's list limit, their original reason for shutting the old service off). I was annoyed with the shutoff of XBox Original services, but at the very least, I could count the number of online games on that system I actually care about on my fingers. There was so little extra DLC that MS could literally fit it all, plus patch data, on a single DVD if they were so inclined. However, this time around turning off 360 game support will be turning off a MASSIVE number of online communities, online games, and online services. At least with the original XBox, most games had basic LAN play, so they can still be played online through LAN spoofing. This is the sort of thing that makes me wish MS had required LAN play on the 360, because as it is, when the 360 finally goes dark, we will have no options. I just got Dead Space 3. Sometimes it takes a while to convince my friends to play a co-op campaign with me. It is entirely possible that I won't get to play that game online with my friends until their services go "dark", then I won't be able to play it online at all, ever again.

You want a reason why so many people got upset about things like dedicated servers when "their online service is way better than anything you could cobble together"? That's why. Some of us like playing retro experiences with friends, and this generation in particular has made such a proposition harder than it has ever been before. It's going to suck for game collectors in the future unless some novel hackers come along with a modified 360 interface to allow custom online servers. Even then, there will be difficulties, there will be problems, all because those hackers are going to be editing HEX code instead of working directly with the original source code.

The PS4 is looking like the better deal, but E3 will answer more questions there too. In the end, we may look upon the Wii U as the last true gaming console. Both the PS4 and XBox One are certainly going to be incredibly expensive, so Nintendo may yet turn their sales around completely. People may be perfectly satisfied with the "current gen" of graphics after all if the next big upgrade requires sacrificing so much.

The PC has been gaining a lot of traction lately. MS is fine with that, I'm sure. The PC may "take over" the role of system of choice, especially if well designed "system in a box" setups start taking off and Steam's "big picture" mode proves popular enough.

So, Microsoft has been giving some VERY mixed messages about the always-online and used-game fronts.

On always online, apparently the system will need to call the servers once per day. So you can take it offline, but only for less than 24 hours; if it's beyond that, it'll require you to hook it up before you can do anything. If you don't have online, or live out in the country where online access is bad... well, that's just too bad. Microsoft does not care about you, that's for sure.

As for used games, MS has been EXTREMELY evasive. I could link the various statements they have made, but none of them clarify thing much, so I don't think it's worth it. Basically they have claimed that you will be able to buy "used" games in some fashion, but have refused to explain how it'll work. It is possible that it might require a registration fee to "buy" a used game. Or maybe there won't be a fee; it's not clear. And maybe Microsoft and the developers will take a cut of the resale price, which would mean that only authorized resellers could resell the games, because they'd need new keys and such, so that the new owner could use the game. Or something. That latter one, of course, basically completely rips apart any shreds that were left of the idea of you actually owning anything you've paid for, and is completely ridiculous. I'm sorry, but no. Once I have bought something, the company that originally made it does NOT have a right to take a cut when I, or anyone else, sell it! But with how the courts seem to care more about companies than people, if this ever did go to court, I imagine that Microsoft would win. It's sad.

Oh, and how will they enforce that you can't keep the games you've sold, considering that all games are required to be installed to your hard drive? Well, it's not proven, but it's likely that there'll be some kind of check connected to that "you must connect once every 24 hours in order to use it" requirement the system has...

And I'm not even going to start on the rumors about Kinect camera-enforced DRM stuff. I just hope that never happens.

Quote: The system apparently has the Windows 8 kernel built in. Okay then, why did you feel the need to tell me that? Unless you're telling me I can now run Windows games on the system (doubtful, the kernel is likely limited), this is nothing I really care about.

I think the apps run in the Windows kernel -- Skype and such. Both OSes are running at all times -- the system dedicates 3GB of RAM and 10% of the CPU to the Windows and connecting OSes, so games can, while running fullscreen, only use 5GB of RAM and 90% of the CPU. The idea was to have greater support for social stuff and TV stuff and all that, at the cost of some game performance. Yeah, not exactly a design decision I, or many other gamers, think much of... you play console games to get away from that kind of PC-centric thing.

Quote: You want a reason why so many people got upset about things like dedicated servers when "their online service is way better than anything you could cobble together"? That's why. Some of us like playing retro experiences with friends, and this generation in particular has made such a proposition harder than it has ever been before. It's going to suck for game collectors in the future unless some novel hackers come along with a modified 360 interface to allow custom online servers. Even then, there will be difficulties, there will be problems, all because those hackers are going to be editing HEX code instead of working directly with the original source code.

Supposedly all games are going to have dedicated servers for online, so they're doing that. But yeah, future collectors? Unless the system gets completely hacked open, it's a horrendously bad future for everyone wanting to play Xbox One games, that's for sure. This generation started us on that path, with XBLA, PSN, WiiWare/VC, and such all being like that, but now on the XO (or whatever the acronym's going to be) ALL games are pretty much that. Yeah, it's pretty awful.

As for a 360 shutoff, I'd guess ~5 years, so I don't think it's imminent. Original Xbox's Live was only shut down in 2010. But it is coming eventually, and it'll take all legal XBLA purchases with it. As someone who loves buying older games, and who cares about game preservation, the DD future is not a good one.

Quote: Also, while they won't require an "always on" connection, they DID include functionality in the system for individual game developers (Ubisoft, maybe Capcom) to require that on an individual game basis. MS, that doesn't absolve you of responsibility. You might as well include electric shock pads in the controller, stating you'll never use them yourselves, but hey, if a 3rd party developer wants to, hey, they have the option.

On this point, I think Sony's going to do the same thing. Rumor has it that Sony might even allow developers to block used games/resale without a license fee if publishers want, thought they might not be doing it themselves, which would explain why Sony's been evasive about this... though there are Sony statements saying that they understand that not all people have or can have internet access and the PS4 will not be required to be online, so there's pretty certainly no system-wide online requirement with the system.

Quote: The device looks like my dad's old VCR. Basically, what all entertainment devices looked like when they ditched wood paneling. The d-pad, for the first time, looks like a d-pad. If it actually is what it looks like, I wonder how they managed it. Did they sign some sort of deal with Nintendo? Looks like they added rumble to the triggers on the device. Hmm... I mean, we've all talked about "real force feedback" before, where you might have to "fight the controls" on a plane or something. This isn't that, it's just rumble on the triggers. No hint of touch interface outside requiring the separate purchase of a smart phone to use their "smart glass".

Yeah, the thing looks like an early '90s media player, or something, just with slightly modern styling. And it looks big, too. It's clearly not a "game console" design, and that must be on purpose, but it doesn't make it look good.

The controller looks better than the 360 one, though, at least...

Quote:The stats on the thing are pretty nice, much like the PS4.

Actually PS4's looking like it's a good bit more powerful.

Quote: The people they set up to answer questions apparently barely knew anything about the system. One of them refused to answer something as basic as whether or not the Kinect could be removed and the system still function. Another said "no, it must be plugged in forever", or something like that. Microsoft really wants us all to use that thing to navigate the menu. Yes, the novelty factor of telling the xbox to start a game is nice, but it wears off. Using your hands to point to things or your voice to input commands is, simply, much slower and less accurate than using the controller. It probably always will be. Star Trek used the voice command thing a lot as a plot device, but realistically I'm pretty sure in actual space emergencies, it would simply be quicker to input the commands using their consoles than to navigate that phone tree of a voice system. For one, a line of text can be displayed all at once on a screen or input faster than speaking speed, but sound has to come out syllable by syllable, at a steady slow speaking rate. At the very least, we know that the system will not be backwards compatible with the 360.

I agree entirely -- voice is never going to be faster than buttons. It makes for a neat presentation, but it's not faster.

Quote: The PC has been gaining a lot of traction lately. MS is fine with that, I'm sure. The PC may "take over" the role of system of choice, especially if well designed "system in a box" setups start taking off and Steam's "big picture" mode proves popular enough.

I'm sure they are fine with that, but they've said that they don't plan on bringing much of anything other than browser and mobile and such games over to the PC. Real games are console only.

Quote: The PS4 is looking like the better deal, but E3 will answer more questions there too. In the end, we may look upon the Wii U as the last true gaming console. Both the PS4 and XBox One are certainly going to be incredibly expensive, so Nintendo may yet turn their sales around completely. People may be perfectly satisfied with the "current gen" of graphics after all if the next big upgrade requires sacrificing so much.

Yeah, that's got to be what Nintendo is hoping now... and it could happen!

Quote:The hard disk took a generational step backwards. It is built into the hardware permanently, can't be upgraded, much like the actual XBox 1. You can plug in external hard drives, but even at USB 3.0, that's still under the transfer rates of a direct SATA connection. Nintendo's console behaves the same, but we sort of expect better from Microsoft's hardware division at this point. They really should have allowed the disk to be slid right out and upgraded by the user. As it is, I'm already seriously considering modding my original XBox so I don't lose my data to a hard drive failure (all hard drives eventually fail, it is only a matter of time, I may replace the existing drive with a solid state solution, I mean heck even a 32GB memory card would be 4 times the existing storage space on the original).

Yeah, fortunately that's not all that hard to do.

Quote:The interface focused a lot on TV. Again, this is a page from Nintendo's book. Most modern cable boxes have HDMI out at this point (surround sound systems do as well), so the second port handily solves the issue that Nintendo's lack of ports fails to address. All the same, I ditched cable some time ago in favor of using the internet for the scant few TV shows I want to watch (mainly, Daily Show and Colbert Report). Adding TV broadcast support feels a little anachronistic at this point. Heck, my cell phone is set up to receive emergency weather alerts, so I'm less and less inclined to care about broadcasts any more.

And it's for live TV only -- anyone with a DVR has to use their DVR for anything there, of course. This is live-broadcast only. There's no way the XO could be a DVR, not with its install mandate and only 500GBs of HDD space.