Too many articles nowadays are focusing on controls, there are a massive amount of articles especially about Natal lately. Controls is just one thing were console producers have been innovative this gen. In this article Xboxkings points out what the innovations have been this gen, what is planned and what according to XBK will be the next evolutionary or… Revolutionary innovation. Xboxkings mentions innovations on three area's: hardware, online and controls. Besides that XBK specifies which company according to them holds the best cards to fulfill these possible future innovations.
"Back in the innocent days of 2010, A World of Keflings was a fairly popular successor to A Kingdom for Keflings. I even wrote about it a few times in 2012! But the world of humans moved on, and NinjaBee's city-building/adventure game was last seen on the ill-fated Wii U in 2014. Fast-forward to the dark year of 2025, and not only is A World of Keflings coming to Steam, but there's already a playable demo! Perhaps the cheerful, no pressure gameplay that the Keflings bring is just what we need nowadays," says Co-Optimus.
From Horse Armor to Mass Layoffs: The Price of Greed in Gaming. Inside the decades-long war on game workers and the players who defend them.
maybe a real enemy is people who use terms like "the real enemy"
there can be more than 1 bad thing, t's not like a kids show with 1 big bad
This is very much a “dummy who volunteers themselves to the middle” comment.
The real enemy is a common phrase, people use it all the time.
Calm down.
You don't seem calm at all. Don't take this so seriously, you seem desperate responding to others defending your opinion that lacks any value or critical thought.
stop projecting
i'm not desperately dong anything, i'm tapping at keys on my keyboard bud
DEI was never the problem and it was an ignorant take to begin with.
DEI is why games like Kena Bridge of Spirits, South of Midnight, and Ghost of Tsushima exist.
DEI is why we have a huge resurgence in Japanese, Chineses, and Korean developers producing games like Stellar Blade, Black Myth, and why Nintendo & Sony exist.
DEI is why more and more games have HUGE accessibility options with both Sony and MS fully behind this.
DEI was never a bad thing, the entire purpose of DEI is representation of all people, genders, disabilities, etc…
The problem was people used DEI as a default derogatory term to describe what they believed was forced representation, which allowed colorist, racist, sexist, misogynist, homophobic, and xenophobic fools to run away with the negative DEI narrative.
Executives seem to often have an obsession with perpetual revenue growth. There is always a finite amount of consumers for a product regardless of growth. Additionally, over investment is another serious issue in gaming.
The fact that they also rarely have any real expertise in game development compounds things. They'll look at what's been successful elsewhere, lack the knowledge to properly understand why they have been successful and then force a team to 'reproduce' their badly interpreted idea of that success.
We see it so often with sequels to games that were successful too. The team are left well alone, they have a break through hit and all of sudden the money men descend on the IP and completely railroad the dev team's ideas. Usually winds up being 'make the same game but MORE'
This is true throughout all of the corporate and public sector organisations to be honest. CEO's generally move amongst the corporate world without any need to have experience of a particular industry, they simply need to rely on their senior leadership credentials. A CEO of a retail giant will just as easily transition to a CEO role in the energy sector for example.
Not defending CEOs here to be clear, I think it's a huge part of the reason the western world is so fucked up. CEOs don't need to care about the sector they work in, in fact it's better if they don't care if they want to screw everyone to make profits.
Companies don’t hire executives to break even. If the goal is breaking even then why start the company in the first place.
That's understood; it's getting record profits and expecting to always beat those record profits, and seeing anything less as a total failure. Then they lay people off and raise prices to reach those record profit levels again, just to sate shareholders. It's setting expectations way too high just to spike share prices, then inevitably falling short. It's feeling entitled to being more successful than everyone else. It's the CEOs doing all this to boost their own bonuses.
Growth benefits the company’s profits and therefore the company’s stock if publicly traded, which pleases the shareholders making them more and more rich, which is why Growth is always at the forefront of the vast majority of any publicly traded company.
More growth = More Money and the people at the top want all the money they can get. I can’t really blame them anyone would love to see their profits go from tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands, to multi-millions it’s almost like a gambling addiction.
But it also goes to show someone how morals can go out the window for a lot of these people, and how amazing some CEOs are when they catch this early and provide a balance solution that takes complete care of their employees across the board while keeping the business sustainable IE: Insomniac Games ALWAYS on the best places to work list. The rest of the industry could learn.
honestly, the "real" enemy of gaming, is ourselves
if nobody bought horse armor, shitty dlc would have died almost overnight
if we stood firm and nobody bought games from companies that were bad with layoffs, it would be solved
we're the idiots supporting awful business practices, we are the ones enouraging it
I think the reality that we don't want to convince ourselves of is that without the rise of "horse armor" and DLC, game budgets would have essentially stagnated (smaller teams/smaller games), or game prices would have risen much more dramatically than they have. There was an incessant drive for bigger worlds, infinite detail, and hundreds of hours of "gameplay" over the last two decades, that while perhaps a natural evolution of things, needed a suitable funding stream to accomplish.
What...CEOs make tens of millions and that doesnt include SLT etc etc...we now have multiple editions of games, in game currency, MT's, battle passes.....and what do we get..worse game than what was coming out 20 years ago....dont drink the cool aid, its this nickel and dime crap that is absolutely leading us to gaming destruction.
This is the worst possible answer to this conundrum. Blaming the masses is blaming the only people who are constantly “told” to buy.
Consumers are the only ones not to blame here. People make their own choices all the time. Disney movies are bombing and DEInis being blamed. Has that been enough to put Disney out of business? No and it never will.
Disagree. Businesses are able to do what they do because people are bad consumers and don't think critically about purchases. Disney got away with doing shit stuff for years and it's just the last year where people got tired of it. It's not like it didn't work for 5 years or so for Disney to do the things they've done. They'll just move onto another way to get people to see movies and it will be just as bad but more profitable until people wake up and realize it.
Consumerism drives business behavior. It's not so much "blaming" as it is observing behavior. The point I'm making is that the direction that games have gone are driven by the spending. Consumers are spending on DLC and they are driving the expectation of more glitz and padded out (lengthier) games. If they continue to pay, they will continue to drive that direction until a threshold is reached that forces a change in behavior.
Corporate advertising is the most powerful force on the planet.
This is N4G for god sake, every day there are arguments between people who are Team Xbox and Team PlayStation because they’ve been convinced that having an identity built on paying money to Sony and Microsoft matters more than having one as individual gamers who can play whatever they want.
And THEN we get to the corporate advertising part: to play whatever you want is to sink MORE into the advertising pits, making it so that you can more than one specific product.
ah you're right
they were told to buy it, it's clearly impossible to avoid that
if enough people stopped supporting, it would stop
disney not stopping would only be because enough people didn't stop
Agreed. I’ve been saying for years, announce you won’t be buying the upcoming game because of the practices of the previous game, then you only have to stick to your guns once, see how quickly things change for the better.
We have to unite in what we shouldn’t purchase.
just imagine a world, fifa came out worse, nobody buys the next one until they see proof it's better and stick to it
or games being forced online for single player and nobody buys it
things would change so fast
Greed and greedy people have and always will be the main issue for everything wrong in the world. Everything is a product to be exploited for monetary gain. Even when there are things that could help progress us along for the sake of making our lives easier that thing must be exploited for monetary gains. Anything that tells you otherwise is propaganda to make you complicit.
I've never thought "DEI" (although the way most people use it doesn't match it's real definition) is the problem with games. Good games have continued to be good when they have a diverse cast, and likewise, bad games have continued to be bad. There isn't a credible example I've seen where a diverse cast has been the direct cause of a game being bad.
It's been officially over 2,500 days since The Elder Scrolls 6 was revealed, and fans are still waiting for more than a logo and a mountain range.
It will come out in another 1000-2000 days or so. I’d rather they remake Morrowind. After they added quest arrows, sprint button, making stats lesser and the big nerfs to spells Elder Scrolls has been too simplified. They could change that with ES6 but I don’t have much faith in modern Bethesda. I would love to be wrong
And I can't wait to get Natal and see what innovative stuff the competition brings in to heat up the console race this gen...
I don't know though if I will get a Wii 2.0/Wii HD... I bought the Wii to softmod and run emulators for old consoles, but would I really want Mario HD enough to buy another Nintendo machine during this lifecycle around 2010?
WTF?
'Sony went into copy mode and made the wand'
Sony said that they've been working on the wands ever since they started eyetoy
'The less hassle with any TV makes the ANA chip a true great innovation on the 360.'
Yeah right, I'm playing halo with another buddy, the screen isn't even entirely used (making stuff messed) until I switch to 1 person, or 4 people playing (resolution is the 1650 or so thingy)
'Besides that NXE brings avatars, not liked and loved by everyone at first, but then again accepted in the end. Its that bit of personalization that the more casual gamer likes. Somewhat copied from the Mii’s on the Wii, but improved and taken one step further to actually let them play in games like 1 vs 100. Besides the visuals and the way you control the dash, also in functions its lightyears ahead. Including online features on Xbox Live.'
Yes, of COURSE (sarcasm being used) the dashboard is lightyears ahead,(sacasm ended)even though sony perfected the XMB already, so there wasn't anything to improve, oh, and the themes are free (except premium)
'Its almost 3 years since the launch of PSN and still the basic features aren’t done.'
Riiiight.... it's only missing 2 features
'Their overall strategy just goes all over the place, investing in stuff that differs too much.'
That's why I like it, variety.
'Natal will be backwards compatible with any game that receives a patch'
Have you heard of firmware updates?
'But games alone don’t make the total experience Sony.'
So if a console like a ps3 came out with almost no games, but loads of features, wireless, bluetooth, blablah, everyone would still buy it? Hell no, they'd go for the 360 or wii unless they want the best, and/or bluray
@ a_squirrel
"'Sony went into copy mode and made the wand'
Sony said that they've been working on the wands ever since they started eyetoy"
Oreally? Strange if they worked on it that long and they still had such a crappy prototype. It seems they put in some last moment stuff on E3. It looks so close to the Wiimote that I bet they're working on it a lot shorter. Don't believe everything Sony says...
"'The less hassle with any TV makes the ANA chip a true great innovation on the 360.'
Yeah right, I'm playing halo with another buddy, the screen isn't even entirely used (making stuff messed) until I switch to 1 person, or 4 people playing (resolution is the 1650 or so thingy) "
Resolution 1650 or so thingy? You mean playing on a computer monitor? Try to do that with the PS3 on that resolution. I bet you get no screen at all...
"'Besides that NXE brings avatars, not liked and loved by everyone at first, but then again accepted in the end. Its that bit of personalization that the more casual gamer likes. Somewhat copied from the Mii’s on the Wii, but improved and taken one step further to actually let them play in games like 1 vs 100. Besides the visuals and the way you control the dash, also in functions its lightyears ahead. Including online features on Xbox Live.'
Yes, of COURSE (sarcasm being used) the dashboard is lightyears ahead,(sacasm ended)even though sony perfected the XMB already, so there wasn't anything to improve, oh, and the themes are free (except premium) "
Sorry PS3 XMB isn't perfect, its the same old PSP XMB. Its not very approchable for new gamers and many things are hidden in bloody long lists. The 360 NXE is better then PS3 XMB period.
"'Its almost 3 years since the launch of PSN and still the basic features aren’t done.'
Riiiight.... it's only missing 2 features"
Its missing the crossgame invite en crosschat, but it misses more and soonish it'll miss even more with the August 360 update. And still then if it were only 2 features, they're very important ones. After 3 years still not done. Thats sad. They'll never happen then.
" 'Their overall strategy just goes all over the place, investing in stuff that differs too much.'
That's why I like it, variety. "
Its not about killing variety. Its about rather doing a few things good, then a lot of things badly.
"'Natal will be backwards compatible with any game that receives a patch'
Have you heard of firmware updates? "
Have games for the PS3 that are out have been given PSeye enable patches?
"'But games alone don’t make the total experience Sony.'
So if a console like a ps3 came out with almost no games, but loads of features, wireless, bluetooth, blablah, everyone would still buy it? Hell no, they'd go for the 360 or wii unless they want the best, and/or bluray"
Learn to read. Its not games ALONE. The games must be there, but its not the only thing that makes the experience.
Why buy 360? Halo, Halo 2 Halo 4 Halo 11, Microsoft is milking a good game to death, PS3 is better for its price because of all the hardware in it, free online play, being able to upgrade to a 1TB hard drive and the Bluray disc last alot longer then DVD or CD's.
In the end the PS3 is the most over power an most pack full system out their, I mean hack you can get Lunix on it and I wouldn't be shock if you can use the older Windows on it to.