Microsoft, Nintendo, Sony Disagree On Demos For Downloadable Games

Over the last few weeks MTV Multiplayer has been asking top people at Microsoft, Nintendo and Sony about game demos for the downloadable games offered via Xbox Live Arcade, WiiWare and PlayStation Network.

MTV Multiplayer can't get the same answer twice.

Short version of this post:
- Microsoft: yes, demos are a must
- Nintendo: no, demos are not required
- Sony: sometimes demos are good, sometimes bad

[InMyOpinion]

The more demos the better =)

I have been convinced to buy many games purely from trying demos.

[kevoncox]

Agreed,
MS has gotten alot of things right with their online.
I realize that PVP vs. Dedicated servers is a 2 edges sword but...
outside of that.... MS having demos for everything is amazing. I don't understand how Sony and Nintendo can say otherwise. How can I know if I like the game without trying it myself?

[ruibing]

It's a double-edged sword. It depends on how well the demo represents the full game. Demos have made me purchase PSN games a couple of times, but they have also turned me away a couple of times as well.

[Death]

Dedicated servers are not always better. Once you hit a devs servers, who is to say they do not set you up on a peer to peer basis? I think most people are under the illusion that PSN is better because it is free and you play on dedciated servers. I don't think these so called dedicated servers are any different then the dedicated Live servers that are used for matchmaking. We all know some games on PS3 play on dedicated servers, but the ability for devs to allocate their own dedicated servers over Live also exists, it just isn't justified in many cases. As an example, I remember playing on dedicated servers in Halo2 for quite some time.

The differance between PSN and Live is Live servers give you access to content like PSN, but they also set up games and track stats. You are never leaving Live's network. When you play online with the PS3, you can access PSN for their downloadable content or you can start a game and jump on the devs servers instead. I believe this is why Sony has not given us in game XMB access or friends requests while in game-cross game. You can only be on one network at a time. If I had to huess, Home will be a program that is used to try and tie it all together.

-Death

[JasonXE]

there first party games have dedicated servers and the rest don't except for maybe 1 or 2.

[Bubble Buddy]

Aha, everyone disagreed. But Microsoft is right here, with the price of games these days, we need to have a little taste of the game, whether it'd be sweet or sour.

[barom]

Dedicated servers are ALWAYS better, they are way more stable as you can see with Resistance: Fall of Man it can hold 40 players and be lag free. And apparently Resistance 2 is suppose to hold 60 players lag free. The dedicated servers you're talking about is not dedicated servers. A dedicated server is a server dedicated to that particular game (hence the name).

It's true though that Xbox Live can hold dedicated servers and Frontlines is proof of that. But the difference here is, that you pay for Xbox Live. There is actually no reason for MS to take your money. Everything Xbox Live does is automatic and programmed. And to top it off, they put ads on XLive. They SHOULD be putting up dedicated servers for all the money they get.

Though it's true that not all PS3 games uses dedicated servers. As some COD4 developer explained (and if I understood it right). The real difference between COD4's online is that Xbox Live uses P2P and shares information between the players, in a sense everyone playing is a part of the server. While the PS3 version will set up one random person as the server and everyone else connects to this person's PS3. And I would believe most games.

What's better and wutnot is up to each person really. On PS3 if the host leaves, the game will end (this won't happen on XLive). On XLive one person laggs and everyone laggs (this won't happen on PS3, only that one person will lagg unless its the host). But both works most of the time.

[Death]

You are describing how Live works. The player with the best connection is the one that actually hosts the game. The service is smart enough to switch between hosts to find a better connection. It's a very cool system. Lag on Live should be no different then lag on PSN, if your connection sucks, it sucks. A dedicated server doesn't help your lag and can make it worse. A simple example would be a one on one game. There is less packet loss if the connection is between 2 people. If you add a server, you not only have a third branch, you also need to transmit redundant data. This isn't to say that Resistance doesn't benefit from servers. By having a dedicated server you can increase the amount of players in the game. It's not as simple as people believe.

-Death

[c-redz]

most of you people are blinded.. if a game sucks you really think more people are going to buy it if you put out a demo. thats the direction i think sony was going not in its a bad way for people but for companys

[TheHater]

I have to agree with MS. Demos are a must because of this generation and the price of games.

[sonarus]

going with msoft on this one. IMO all games should have demos. Games are expensive and nothing more annoying than putting your faith in a game only to be dissapointed 10mins into the gameplay. Lair, kane and lynch e.t.c. Reviews are nice but i like to form my own opinion. Demos for all games.
I would have preferred for a demo of AC at least i could have had an idea of the crap that i was in for. I am glad i got a demo for burnout. Was a long time burnout fan but imo burnout is about 2 player split screen racing with friends. Once they took that out my interest was pretty much gone

[eagle21]

buggy, uninspired, old build demos will tarnish sales. The demo must portray the final build of the game or a "taste" of it. Anything that does not do the final build justice is a waste of time. :)

[kevoncox]

How could you be...You're a gamer not a developer.
You want the best product. This isn't about regular games this is about Arcade and PSN titles. Right now Psn titles are a complete shot in the dark. You have to hope they are good and worth it. WTF is this 1992?

[toughNAME]

I was interested in Turning Point, I wasn't sure about Bioshock

There's your answer

[PSWe60]

Demos are needed.

[Equinoxe_7]

Demos are very important, it´s like a free minigame, but it´s not always needed, I think the library in ps store will be too big.

But a demo like assasins creed would have been cool, so it´s hard to ague agains it.

[Vicophine]

It depends on the type of game. All FPS's should have a demo. RPG's on the other hand..wouldn't require one.

[Salvadore]

Demos, as the Sony executive mentioned, can hurt the titles, but I do believe they should be available to gamers because in the end it boils down to your own personal preference and not review scores.

[Alcaponeyou]

it depends

[Vicophine]

Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo all disagree?!?! WTF. /sarcasm.

[THWIP]

..Xbox LIVE is king.

[Lord Vader]

Demos are a must. Alot of games that dont do demos dont see my money. On the other hand, I have bought many games because I liked their respective demo...

I believe that almost every next gen game HAS some form of demo so reviewers can get hands-on with a near final product. Some publishers chose not to release said demo to the public...

Not releasing a demo shows a lack of faith by the developer themselves, with the only exception being large sandbox/Rpg type games that coding a demo for would be extremely difficult.

[grimygunz]

most PSN titles do have demo's at some point sometimes later then the game is releasd. and from my experiance with live demos I come to the conclusion that live has alot more games then the PSn but about the Same percentage of good games. both PSN and live have about 35% of the games are good and worth a try while they both hava game that arne't worth it. The Wii on the other hand only currently have VC games and you have to compare that to the PSN's PS1 games and Xbox orignials none of which have demos. once Wiiware is out we can see if nintendo ends up releasing demos for thoes games.

[DailyAddict]

I'm sort of with Sony. Demos help a lot, as it gives you the chance to try out the game before it's released. But, problems can happen with demos as well.

Depending on the game, a demo can actually ruin a future experience. For example, a demo for a game like DMC4 is easily done, as you only really need to put in a section of the game that focuses on fighting and not particularly anything related to the story (which is exactly how they did the demo).

But, turn that around and think about a game like MGS4. You can't really "demo" this game without giving away some part of the story. Everything you see is a huge part of the game (the area, the people, etc.). At CES, Konami was at Sony's booth with what they said was a demo, but it was easy to tell it was the final copy of the game and they sat next to people as they let them try out the game. They basically let you run around in the areas that most of the screenshots have shown and when you started moving past, they stopped you. Basically, you got to explore, kill a few people and that was it. OVerall, the demo was boring, despite the fact that the game is very good. But, you put out a demo like that and most people will be bored.

So, it depends on the game and therefore I agree with Sony on it can be good or it can be bad.

[fjtorres]

Developers who trust (or know) they have a good game *want* you to have a demo; developers who fear (or know) they have a turkey, don't.

Tells you why Nintendo doesn't want demos and Sony says sometimes yes--sometimes no.

Its like movies: duds are never offered for early review.

[Skerj]

If it weren't for the demo I'd have bought Rocketman, and many things would have been destroyed in the wake of my purchase of that game. However I purchased 9 other PSN games without demos and I enjoy them all, so it's welcome but it's not absolutely necessary for me. I do like that there's a demo for every game on XBLA though.

[Surfman]

Microsoft and Sony are right. Demos are a must to test the game before buying it, but sometime a game cant have a demo, like for GTA4, few RPGs, etc.

[Figboy]

a lot of gamer are P*SSIES nowadays.

when i was growing up, we had no choice whatsoever but to buy the game. there was no such thing as a demo for an NES game, or an SNES game, etc, etc.

you either had to play it from a friend who was bold enough to pick it up himself, or you had to man up yourself and take a risk buying it yourself. and the games were just as expensive then as they are now (NES games were $50. SNES games were $50, certain SNES games, ie, Square games, were $64 dollars back then).

nowadays, gamers are *SPOILED. they rely too much on reviews (in which most reviewers forget that a gamer is playing the game to have *FUN, not to nitpick things like "length" and "variety"), and they rely too much on demos.

personally, i like demos. i think they are a good thing, sometimes, but can also be a negative.

for example, the good:

i never would have bought Pixel Junk Monsters if i didn't have the demo. i had played my roommate's Pixel Junk Racers, and i *HATED it. out of curiosity, i tried the Monsters demo. i absolutely loved it, and bought it asap when it released.

the bad:

a lot of gamers judged Heavenly Sword and Uncharted harshly based off of the demo, when the actual full games are infinitely more rewarding and fulfilling experiences.

the demos of those games hurt more than helped.

the trick is, developers never know *WHAT demos will help or hurt a game, so they can either just release the demo, and cross their fingers, or *NOT release a demo, and hope that those gamers that were interested to begin with, outweigh the gamers that were skeptical and needed a demo to either confirm, or refute, their skepticism (ie, like me and Pixel Junk Monsters).

there was no demo for the game Lair.

despite the completing reaming Lair got from reviewers, i was interested in the game because of it's subject matter (dragons!), and i bought it on day one.

contrary to popular belief, i really enjoyed Lair. i thought the motion controls were enjoyable for the most part (though i'd have preferred the OPTION to use analog sticks), and despite one particularly frustrating mission, i had fun, and i beat the game (eventually, i traded it in for something else, maybe Warhawk, i can't remember).

point is, despite the reviews and overall hate for everything Playstation 3 at the time, i took a risk, bought the game that I WANTED TO BUY, because of nothing more than my own personal interest (not hype or anything like that), and had a good time.

i think a demo of Lair may have helped it more than hurt it, because so many people were taking the word of mouth from the *MEDIA (most of the gamers who had actually played Lair and enjoyed it, were shot down by the haters, because, "well, IGN gave it a 4/10, so that means Lair is teh suxxorz!"). if there was a demo, and more gamers got a chance to play it (as long as it wasn't the mind-numblingly frustrating mission 5), they would have realized that it wasn't the big fat ball of "crap" that many reviewers were labeling it, and probably picked it up.

most gamers nowadays don't do take that risk and buy the games that *THEY WANT. they rely too much on other people's opinions to make up their minds for them, and base their entire opinion of a game on a three or four minute demo. in short, they buy what other people say they should buy. it's kind of silly to me, honestly.

demos have their place, of course, but gamers just don't have the backbone that they used to.

i think that media hype or lack of hype should also be factored into the decision to release a demo or not.

GTAIV, for example, is not getting a demo. why? well, because the game is going to sell on hype alone, but also because the series has a known pedigree of quality. so GTA fans don't need a demo to entice them to buy the game. even the non-GTA fans may give GTAIV a try, simply due to the media hype surrounding it.

Metal Gear Solid 4 is another game that doesn't necessarily need a demo because of hype, but every single previous MGS game on consoles have had a demo released. MGS1, 2, and 3, all had demos. just based on precedent, a demo would have been expected. even without, however, this game is going to be huge.

on the flip side, a game like Prototype, or Haze, *SHOULD have a demo, because i think a lot of people, while interested, may not quite be willing to part with their money for them. a demo of both games could help. but then again, they could also hurt it.

games met with a general skepticism from the media (ie, Haze), should probably have a demo. why? because that general media skepticism tends to carry over into their final review of the game, and it could taint perception.

a demo for the game could circumvent that, and let the consumer decide, but it could also backfire, if the media has already planted a negative seed about the game in an earlier preview.

[kingtigar]

the sony quote is right.