Bit-Tech: The rumour that the next Xbox won’t have an optical disc drive is, in reality, of little surprise. Recently, we’ve seen Sony remove the disc option from the PlayStation Vita console, instead urging us more towards downloading our games. Sony is still selling games in stores on cards, but you do get the impression that its heart is hardly in it. Mind you, the price it’s charging for storage cards may yet kybosh the latest part of its plan to get us downloading Vita titles.
The Xbox 720/Xbox 3/Whatever It’s Called is a different proposition entirely, though. Not wishing to slight handheld consoles in any way, when serious gamers look to a games machine outside of the PC, they invariably look at the kind of machine that can sit under the telly. So, the PlayStation 3, the Xbox 360, and the Nintendo Wii. Each of these has an installed userbase of over 60 million worldwide, and each is attracting major, blockbuster games, costing tens of millions to produce.
As part of its plans to cut 1,900 jobs, Microsoft has reportedly shut down operations at Bethesda France, letting go roughly 15 people
Bethesda France was made up of roughly 15 people... they couldn't of being doing much
Bethesda France mainly did publishing and marketing within the region
that's a shame for you to say that, i'm sure Elite loves hearing what you just said.
Bethesda France focused on publishing and marketing in the region. And 15 people lost their jobs as part of the closure.
I wonder if this is part of Microsoft's strategy to abandoned physical media or possibly gamepass advertising makes their roles redundant you don't need to market a game as hard when the majority of players get the game as part of a sub which already promoted upcoming games
It's France too, there's a high likelihood only 1-2 people on the team even had an Xbox.
Tbh Microsoft I think Bethesda being 3rd party same with Activision would probably more competitive than thus scenario imo
I think it would have been better for all parties really especially gamers
The recently purchased Activision French offices might take over all the licensing and marketing for Microsoft in France from now on.
Sony has recently published a new patent that wants to dynamically handle the games' difficulty and gameplay based on the player's emotions.
This is something I might use. Sometimes I play some good games but they don’t have difficulty option and are a little too easy.
Hanzala from eXputer: "The cruel hammer of Nintendo has fallen. Farewell, 3DS and Wii U, you surely brightened my life and many others; you won't be forgotten."
Personally I think if they do that they will end up selling less consoles.
I probably wouldn't get one, granted I could be persuaded. I mean steam doesn't let me sell my games. That's alright though because I almost only buy games on sale from steam.
If I get the games for low enough I don't have a problem not selling or trading them.
With my consoles however I often trade in games I don't play. They games are too expensive, even when their old. On steam I got fallout 3 for 7.99 on sale, and new vegas for 9.99. Both of those are 14.99 for a console in store used, I think new copies cost a bit more.
Even the online stores of sony, microsoft and nintendo overprice compared to their competition. There's not much of a digital discount, their sales are much less than the competeing services, and their base prices are just hire.
Compare games that are on smart phone app markets that are ported over to the consoles. Their often five to ten times as much.
I know thats largely because there's a high price for the dev kits of consoles. That is the fault of the console manufacturers though. For some reason developing on consoles is like a premium area where you often end up paying many thousands of dollars for a dev kit and the right to develop on them. I think this will increasingly become a problem for consoles.
This is an area where pc's are beginning to shine more and more. There are lot of truly innovative pc only games, made or being made by insdie developers. Which cannot be said of most consoles. Except the xbox with xna, which has problems and barriers of it's own.
No because the nextbox won't remove optical disk drivers.
we’ve seen Sony remove the disc option from the PlayStation Vita console, instead urging us more towards downloading our games. Sony is still selling games in stores on cards"
They removed the UMD because the vita cards are way more effecient, smaller and doesn't require a battery hungry, noisy disk driver.
The day when Sony or Microsoft have no optical drives in their consoles is the day I won't buy either of them . I do believe Microsoft will be first to do it because they have proved this gen that really they have lost sight of their core audience . All this kinnect stuff lately is an indication of their next direction . Casual games for casual core gamers anyone ? .
Dude seriously why do people think if ms goes digital only we will have to use the marketplace, stores will probably sell download codes for games and you can buy your stuff off amazon. Yes you wont be able to trade you games, but I have never sold or bought a used game. The bad thing of this is that you wont be able to take games to friends houses and play them with them. The only reason I have bought several games and have been introduced to their series is through friends. I would have been introduced to the fallout series if a friend hadent lend it to me and then I wouldnt have gone on to buy fallout nv. I probably wouldnt have bought bf3 if a friend hadent lend it to me. But why do we need to kill second hand gaming when most games have online passes anyway? They should just make their online store better to convince people to buy from them.
Wait do vita games only work on one vita?
I don't see it happening games keep increasing in size needing larger space for data.Higher quality sound need massive amounts of space.High detailed textures take up more space then low detailed textures.
Disc are cheaper to manufacture then cards.Gig per dollar disc wins hands down.Ms may want to push digital but money is always the main goal.It will cost more then Bluray so I don't see MS taking that route.