A Rebuttal to Brenna Hillier

Since the earliest days of home consoles there have always been system wars and debates over the merits of which gaming platform is superior to all others. Most of the time this has revolved around simple preferences for one set of exclusive games versus another, and as advances in internet technology have evolved the debate has evolved alongside it to include service platforms and multiplayer infrastructures.

But a curious thing has happened in regards to the forthcoming generation which will see Sony's Playstation 4 engage in direct competition with Microsoft's Xbox One. The battle this time around isn't as much about exclusive vs. exclusive, or Playstation Network vs. Xbox Live or even technical specs like GDDR3 RAM vs. GDDR5 RAM. No, this time around due to completely opposing philosophies in the design of the operating systems we have a war between one company saying that we get to own the discs we pay $60 for and do with them as we please once the first sale has been made, and another saying that they control our access to the games we pay money for. 

While one of the platforms will continue on with game sales and operation in the manner we have always been accustomed to, the other will enforce a new paradigm for physical copies in that their permission is needed to play the titles, that we have limited options for trading, selling and sharing games and that essentially all discs are nothing but unlock keys for digital copies, ensuring that we don't own anything. With such a vast difference in these platforms the lines have been quickly drawn for the gaming audience and many are choosing sides based not on what games were impressive at E3 or the various reveal events, but based on where they as a consumer are willing to give and where they will put their foot down in regards to their views on ownership rights. Needless to say the conversation has been quite heated with Microsoft and their Xbone console receiving a less than warm reception as details of their DRM and online connectivity requirements surface.

It's within this controversy regarding the next-generation systems that I read an article posted at VG24/7 by Brenna Hillier titled "Console Wars: you're going to buy an Xbox One" (link here) which about made me want to smash my head against a wall before I decided I'd openly rebut the article here. So without further ado, I'll begin here:

 "I’m no Xbot, kids; I was a rabid Sony fangirl before I saw the light of platform agnosticism (otherwise known as tax deductible hardware purchases). It took me years to pick up an Xbox 360 and I barely use it, since I don’t like the control pad (small hands, see) or have time for many multiplayer shooters. But I know I’m going to get an Xbox One eventually, and truly I think if you are the kind of person who invests in more than one console, you probably will too."

"Platform agnosticism"  is an odd choice of words. Agnostic is a word most associated with debates over beliefs and knowledge claims in regards to Gods and Godesses, and while some may mistakenly think agnostic is halfway between the theist and the atheist, a fence-sitter shrugging their shoulders, the truth is that gnosticism and agnosticism apply to claims of knowledge and not belief. One can be a believer but still claim to not know for certain, thus being an agnostic believer. Agnosticism doesn't mean sitting perpetually in zen-like emptiness of bias and subjective opinion, forever on a fence of perfect objectivity. Agnosticism is simply claiming a lack of knowledge of the topic at hand.

So in regards to platform preferences, the agnostic wouldn't be the undecided person or the person who wants to be extra careful to hide any appearance of subjectivity and bias, it's the person who has no knowledge of the details about the differences between PS4 and the Xbone. A person with no knowledge of the differences in $60 ownership of game discs or $60 in permanent rental ecosystems is not who Hillier is addressing here, and I maintain that for any person who takes a good and hard look at the facts in regards to these platforms there really is no actual middle ground. Maybe, just maybe, if you get your systems and games for free as part of the industry you can have a perpetual position of shrugging your shoulders and ignoring the debate, but for those of us who have to pay for these things and deal with the long-term consequences I cannot fathom anyone still being completely objectively neutral. The details of both platforms' positions is crystal clear, we know exactly where Microsoft and Sony stand.

  "Sure, the Xbox One online stuff is inconvenient but just look at these games"

I seriously hope so few people are so wowed by a couple of videogames that they're willing to tell the entire games industry, which has spent years scapegoating it's own customers for it's self-inflicted financial woes and perfecting pitiful schemes to loot it's own fanbase's wallets, that we will gladly piss away our ability to use the things we purchase in a manner of our choosing over some shiny CGI promises of yet another installment in the Halo or Forza franchises. You give this industry an inch of rope and it doesn't take a mile, it takes a lap around the fucking planet, and then blames you when the rope costs too damn much.

 "But “quite annoying” could also easily be applied to PC gaming. Many of the restrictions Microsoft is introducing have been common in PC gaming for years, where the idea of trading used games is only just cropping up as a possibility again."

Oh boy, here we go with trying to compare the closed monopolistic ecosystem of Xbox with the open and competition-filled realm of the PC gaming industry. Are you fucking kidding me?

I already addressed this pitiful argument before (link here), but just for the sake of further argument let's pretend there's a valid comparison between Xbone and Steam. Who do you trust more between Valve and Microsoft to take care of customers? Last time Microsoft ran a DRM-laden download service, called MSN Music, they decided to close it and completely fucked over all the customers who had paid for content by shutting off all downloads and offering no DRM-removal options for the things people had saved. They basically rode off into the sunset with a fatter wallet and not a single fuck given about the customers whom they had done a disservice to.

Microsoft can't be trusted at all in this regard, but let's say Valve turns just as evil to compare the situations on even ground. At least on PC I can back my games up and crack the DRM, but under Big Brother Orwellian Microsoft's check-ins I'd have no way of doing that for Xbone software at all. After all, their 24 hour parole check-in is designed to prevent exactly those types of things from ever happening.

"If you were there, if you dipped into the oily vitriol that greeted Steam’s debut, did you ever expect things to turn out like this? Maybe it shouldn’t have. Maybe we should all be die-hard anti-DRM advocates. Maybe DRM really is purely anti-consumer in all its forms. I’m in two minds on that issue, and I’m not interested in debating it here. What I am interested in is whether the same thing is going to happen to the Xbox One. Will this storm blow over, as so many have before it?"

The DRM on Steam merits higher leniency of thought because it's got workarounds and they sell games oftentimes at prices comparable to consumable items, not the premium prices seen on consoles. We already know that next-gen console games are beginning once again at the $60 price point, and given Microsoft's online pricing record on XBL it;s highly suspect we'll see anything at all resembling the massive blowout sales seen on Steam, Good Old Games, Amazon or Greenman Gaming. Perhaps Microsoft can surprise us, and I'd be the first to eat crow if they did. But until I see some evidence of them taking initiatives like this before the Xbone launches I find no reason to believe they will once their new ecosystem is up and running. Microsoft hasn't showcased a reason for people to quiet their strong opinions on the subject, and what they have said and shown to us is worthy of the backlash they're suffering through.

"Apart from a few vocal outliers, nobody inside the industry really seems to want used games to go away."

If you think the people inside the industry who want used games to die out completely or be a shell of what they are now are outliers, and not just carefully hiding their opinions to avoid the hornet's nest that Microsoft has smacked wide open, then I have a bridge to sell you.

"it’s entirely possible that Microsoft is actually ahead of the trend in chasing a digital future – as it was when it focused on online multiplayer, coming into this last generation well ahead of Sony."

Microsoft is perpetually behind in anything relating to the digital future. Sure Xbox Live got a head start on making online console gaming more streamlined, but it was merely implanting features seen in PC gaming into the console space. Beating conservative Japanese companies like Nintendo and Sony to the punch in this regard is not that impressive a feat.

If you want a glimpse of who is really setting the tends in digital futures, take a step away from consoles and look at the tech sector as a whole. Microsoft only wishes it were on the ball like Apple and Google. Microsoft's business under the reign of Steve Ballmer has displayed nothing but failure after failure in trying to compete against those two companies. Given the pitiful revenue intake and corporate status of their entertainment division which houses Xbox, I highly doubt the Xbox brand will stick around if it ends up selling at the rates the WiiU is currently selling at, or the rates the PS3 did circa spring 2007.

"No matter how strongly we rail against the Xbox One, how much we all focus on the negatives instead of embracing the positives, the Xbox One will sell and it will be successful. After all, it’s got Halo. It’s got Titanfall. It’s got all your Xbox Live friends. And it’s got your Gamerscore. Eventually, it will have you."

And here it is folks, the coup de grâce! If you are one of the core gaming audience who Microsoft is wanting to sell a $500 gaming device to (and at $500 the core is pretty much the only audience) then you are part of a vocal minority who likes to complain and you don't matter! Don't you just love how this narrative keeps popping up in games journalism and from industry types? It's so easy to dismiss everything with the wave of a hand, claim that the views of those who are critical don't represent and important group and then go forth with proclamations that the critics are all a bunch of sheep who will piss their money away against their own self-interests because of Halo 5 or Titanfall.

Don't make any mistakes, I admit there's a good number of fools who support the absolute worst cash-grabs the AAA Gaemz Industree™ comes up with, and there will be people who buy and support this DRM-infested shitstain of a console. But to claim that those who are planning on avoiding financing the fleecing of an entire userbase will relent because of shiny mechs and Master Chief is straight out of the condescension playbook currently being used by arrogant Microsoft executives, and once employed by a Sony exec named Ken Kutaragi who found himself out of a job when the Playstation brand went from 85%+ console marketshare to sub-33% in the space of one single console transition. 

Is it possible that the Xbone will be a hit? Well yes, there's always a possibility of anything, but the probability seems to decrease day after day as each bit of news hits. As mainstream outlets like Wall Street Journal, Forbes, BBC and NBC criticize Microsoft's plans, as pre-order numbers and launch allotments skew more and more in Sony's favor and as news of Xbone needing an entire year to even hit some regions comes to light, the probability of this console succeeding like the 360 did continues to shrink. This is especially noteworthy with so much of the negativity centered in the US and UK markets, the only ones where the Xbox brand ever had any real traction to start with.

But in spite of all of that, the narrative is being built that says the gamers are just whiners; simplistic and primitive troglodytes in this new digital era who hate change. The fence-sitters who cringe at any negativity, no matter how justified, will call for people to wait and see while more and more of the entities who run the AAA Gaemz Industree™ continue to manage themselves into bankruptcy and then try to shift blame to the customers rather than shitty planning and management skills. 

Let me make this clear: If harsh criticism of Microsoft upsets you or makes you uncomfortable, place the blame on them and not the critics. It's not the critics who decided to try and ram anti-consumer initiatives down the market's throat by brute force. It's not the critics who decided that the reveal event for a games device should have almost no footage of any actual games being played, but plenty of The Price is Right. It's not the critics who decided an implied rape joke against a female player during the Killer Instinct demonstration was a funny bit of griefing. It's not the critics who are implementing systems that will screw over small businesses, smaller publishers and long-term game collectors and preservationists just to appease bloated corporate entities that can't sustain themselves through making better products at more efficient costs.

Those of us casting negativity at Microsoft right now do so because Microsoft decided that this was the device to display to the world and the means of displaying it. Now that they've played their hand the whole world is responding in the marketplace of ideas and Microsoft is deservedly getting thrashed. As Jim Sterling put it, Microsoft didn't decide to wage a war on Sony and Nintendo, they decided to wage a war on consumers. Well, the consumers are fighting back, and as far as I'm concerned the fence-sitters trying to maintain the image of perfect enlightened and detatched objectivity while criticizing the positions of those who have chosen to participate in the discussion unfiltered and uncensored have no intellectual ground to stand on. By all means defend whatever merits you think the Xbone has. Buy one come launch if you desire to. Go forth and debate with those who differ with your stance until your fingers go numb, but don't try and act like you're above the fray just because some people say something mean to a soulless profit-driven corporation. Microsoft brought all of this heat onto itself, and it's too late to call a time-out.

History Repeats Itself?

"It’s probably too cheap…"

-Former Sony executive Ken Kutaragi in regards to the announcement of the PS3 launching at $599

"…for consumers to think to themselves ‘I will work more hours to buy one’. We want people to feel that they want it, irrespective of anything else."

– Ken Kutaragi, again, attempting to justify the $599 price tag


"We do not care."

– Kaz Hirai, then President of Sony's gaming division, on the Wii and 360

In 2005 and 2006, Sony, who was riding high on the dominance they had with the Playstation 2, displayed an incredible amount of arrogance in regards to the upcoming Playstation 3. Now that seven years have passed and we've seen Playstation go from the top of the world to circling the drain and then rise up again in an epic comeback, it's interesting to note the parallels between the statements coming from 2006 era Sony executives and those coming from Microsoft execs in 2013.

But don't take my word for it, take theirs at face value:  

"I think it's fair to say there's a segment of consumers at this show in particular who really pay attention, who are very passionate about all aspects of gaming, and that we listen to closely. In a broader set of community, people don't pay attention to a lot of the details. We've seen it in the research, we've seen it in a lot of the data points."

- Xbox Chief Marketing and Strategy Officer Yusuf Mehd, downplaying the outrage over the Xbone as irrelevant since most consumers don't pay attention anyways 

“I don’t think,… I mean we’re really not going to change anything we’ve done with Xbox One. We’re very happy,… did you see the games on stage during our briefing? Did you see the exclusives? I mean we’re really really proud of the system and the games that are coming out. When you look at games like TitanFall,… have you gone through Titanfall yet? Enough said. Conversation over"

-Xbox Live Director Larry Hryb, aka Major Nelson, regarding the disparity in recption at E3 between the Xbone and the PS4 

"Fortunately we have a product for people who aren't able to get some form of connectivity, it's called Xbox 360"

-Don Mattrick, head of Microsoft's Xbox division, responding to concerns of gamers in the military who don't have access to first-world internet much of the time

Notice in both batches of quotes the assumption from the execs that we're all fucking stupid and will buy anything just because they hype it. Notice the levels of condescension in their words and the dismissal of all contrarian concerns.

Sony had to crash pretty hard before they straightened themselves out. The spring after the PS3 launch, when it was selling at or below 80K units a month in the US marketplace and getting trounced by the soon-to-be-retired Gameboy Advance monthly, it almost looked like the PS3 would go the way of the Virtual Boy, the Dreamcast and the Dodo bird.

Now, seven years later, it appears Microsoft is following the 2006 Sony strategy of thinking they can ignore criticism because they will steer us lowly customers to buy into their grand visions and dreams, no matter how often the marketplace trends show that we simply want a box that plays the latest game software, and plays it well, and that alternate functionality is a take it or leave it proposition which is nice to have, but not if it costs us an arm and a leg or our freedom to use the things we buy in the manner of our own choosing.

Take heed Microsoft, you're walking a path that may threaten the entire Xbox division. Many of your investors don't like the entertainment section of Microsoft as is, due to years of losses in the billions of dollars, the history of failed products like Zune and Windows Phone and the low revenue and profit of the division when compared to products like Office.

When Microsoft Can't Control the Questions...

...this is what happens:

One of the most annoying aspects of modern gaming is that most of the outlets for the discussion of and spreading of information oftentimes act like they are arms of the PR departments of the platform holders and largest publishers. We the readers/watchers receive PR approved statements and fluff that don't amount to anything of use except to convince the easily swayed to spend their money foolishly.

Normally when we're discussing the realm of games journalism most would say this is truly a first-world problem, that it's not important to society at large, and that if you want to attack or call-out pseudo-journalism you should focus on things that truly matter such as a mainstream news outlet like Fox News basically acting as a propaganda machine for the Republican Party. I can't say that the people making these types of statements are wrong, because even though it's common knowledge that many of the reviews you see of major AAA game releases on Metacritic are boosted by publishers gifting ethically bankrupt promoters to write  glowing recommendations of products that may not be worth the cost of the optical disc on which they are printed, it's hardly a concern for most when compared to the verbal diarrhea that emanates from the likes of Sean Hannity and Bill O'Reilly every night under the guise of being a news source.

But alas, this is not a blog about politics and world news, this is a blog about videogames, the videogame industry and the culture that surrounds gaming. So when I see something rotting within this culture I feel the need to call it out and expose it because gaming is not a cheap endeavor and there's not many voices speaking on behalf of the average game purchaser. Between the costs associated with acquiring platforms at $350-$500, new games at $60, used or discounted games still sold at higher prices than any other media form out there, nickel-and-diming downloadable expansions and subscription fees for services, this is one of the most expensive forms of entertainment to keep up with.

Within this environment I find that so much of the so-called gaming journalism space is occupied by sycophants; corporate apologists who grovel at the feet of multimillion-dollar businesses out of fear that offending someone in a boardroom may damage their access to free review games, early reveals and previews and all that free swag that gets sent to reviewers to help insure that a favorable number is attached to the grades that get posted on Metacritic. Sure, there are exceptions to the rule even on well-known sites; Jim Sterling of Destructoid would be one example of someone who doesn't pander to the pitiful corporate hivemind and calls out the absurd when he sees it, but he would definitely be in a minority class for his profession.

Sometimes, in order to buck this sort of incestuous echo-chamber and get through the manufactured PR bullshit, you need an outsider to come in and disrupt the process. You need someone who hasn't been groomed in the corporate newspeak and the accepted rules of compliance who can bring some real questions to the table and press for real answers without just swallowing the load like so many want to do. In that regard, YouTube gaming personality Angry Joe officially wins this E3.

In the weeks leading up to E3 Microsoft, facing an intense level of backlash over their anti-consumer DRM in the Xbone, began to circle their wagons and cancel most of their interviews. Only certain outlets would get access to Microsoft employees, and most of those interviewers would go rather soft on pressing the PR puppets too hard. Angry Joe, an unrestrained wild card, managed to get through and snag some time with Xbox Minister of Propaganda Major Nelson.

Angry Joe may not be the smoothest or most skilled interviewer, but his blunt questioning and choices of topics rattled Major Nelson to the point where he became visibly frustrated and annoyed. For someone who has been giving carefully scripted canned PR bullshit to Xbox customers online and pseudo-journalists and podcast personalities inside the E3 halls, this must have been quite a disruption to his message building. It was clear that Nelson had lost all credibility in sustaining his bullshit at the moment he grabbed the microphone out of Joe's hand in an effort to shut him down with some barely contained alpha-male rage posturing. While most of the journalist types at E3 tried to ride on the fence and were afraid to call out Microsoft's bullshit, often attributing the controversy to "misunderstandings", "bad methods of messaging" and in the worst cases blaming gamers for being a bunch of old-fashioned troglodytes, Angry Joe, unpolished as his delivery may be, managed to get in the way of the constant spinning and do more actual fucking journalism than many of the people who claim they are journalists!

If only the professionals who do this sort of shit for a living could grow a pair and perform their jobs with the same earnest effort and honesty as this modest YouTube personality did, perhaps the amount of bullshit that gets circulated around would be drastically lower than it is now.

Kudos to you, Angry Joe.

A Message to Cliff Blezinski: "TOO BAD MOTHERFUCKER!"

 "TOO BAD MOTHERFUCKER!" -Cliff Bleszinski, in a post on NeoGAF responding to a critic

So today on Twitter former Epic games designer Cliff Bleszinski took to defending Microsoft's anti-consumer bullshit in a series of Tweets that demonstrates just how fucked up the thinking is of the people who are part of the AAA Gaemz Industree™ culture.

"You cannot have game and marketing budgets this high while also having used and rental games existing. The numbers do NOT work people."

Bullshit Alert! Bullshit Alert!
The truth is that nearly 70% of the money Gamestop pays out in the US to people selling their disc games is used by those same customers to pay for copies of new games. The truth is that there is no causal evidence showing that used games significantly disrupt the sales of new games enough to cause the financial hemorrhaging the games industry is seeing in recent years. If there were we wouldn't see things like each Call of Duty title stay at the top of NPD's top 10 for months on end while used copies occupy space on Gamestoip's shelves at prices far less than MSRP.

Used games are not responsible for marketing budgets so large that they in many instances double or triple the cost of releasing a big-budget title. Used games are not responsible for developers and publishers deciding to take franchises with a historic sales ceiling of less than 2-3 million units per release, spending $50-$100 million in trying to capture the sales numbers seen only by the likes of Call of Duty, Grand Theft Auto or Halo, and then scrambling to find any excuse they can as to why they're in the red when they don't meet sales numbers that were unrealistic to start with.

"The visual fidelity and feature sets we expect from games now come with sky high costs. Assasins Creed games are made by thousands of devs."

I'm sorry, but this is more total bullshit. Graphics are important, yes, but to say you need a team of thousands to make a nice-looking game is ridiculous. Dark Souls is a very pretty game with amazing art direction, and it costs a fraction of what comes out of the mega-publishers like EA. The Witcher 2 was allegedly made for less than $15 million, it's got far superior graphics to any console game of this current generation, and the developer made quite a bit of money selling the game DRM-free and not treating it's paying customers like potential thieves like so many in the industry want to do.

And just what is this about "feature sets we expect"? Nobody asked for multiplayer in the Uncharted games, Bioshock 2, God of War: Ascension or the Tomb Raider reboot, but the developers spent time and money putting it in anyways. Nobody asked for Resident Evil 6 to become even more scripted and "cinematic" on a scale requiring hundreds of developers to create an interactive film, thus leading to Capcom needing a base of more than 6 million unit sales just to break even. Game developers and publishers are in a self-created arms race to outdo the other mega-publishers as they overspend on things they think will get them higher Metacritic ratings and trying to ram their way to the top of the AAA heap. Instead of being smarter, they just spend harder and cast blame on the gamers for being "entitled" or "too demanding".

"Newsflash. This is why you’re seeing free to play and microtransactions everywhere. The disc based day one $60 model is crumbling."

Oh my, did he actually finally say something in his Twitter spree that makes logical sense? Could it be that he's realizing that trying to sell every game imaginable at $60 is not sustainable?

"Those of you telling me “then just lower game budgets” do understand how silly you sound, right?"

Nope, guess I was wrong!
He immediately follows that Tweet that showed hints of mental clarity with this dud. Apparently to Cliff, proud alumni of the AAA Gaemz Industree™, the very idea of spending realistic amounts on a game is unthinkable! We need moar and moar money to sell our homogenized, overpriced and uninspired products! We need moar restrictions on gamer freedoms as we ram in things they didn't ask for! We need moar and moar money to hit 9-10 scores on Metacritic!

Won't someone please think of the poor developers!? For only $60 per non-transferrable disc plus the price of DLC, you too can help keep a starving AAA Gaemz Industree™ developer from having to sell their sports cars! Please, think of the poor CEOs and staff at the mega-publishers, and donate today!

What Bleszinki seems to not grasp is that most of the problems the publishers and developers face are things they imposed on themselves instead of working smarter, analyzing the marketplace conditions better, understanding the actual value their IP holds rather than the inflated value they think it holds and budgeting according to realistic sales and production goals. The industry bigshots instead continue to over-extend themselves trying to hit 10 million in sales for franchises with a maximum ability to appeal to maybe 2-3 million customers. So given all of that, and the notorious efforts of so many industry shills and puppets doing whatever they can to blame and pass the cost off to us, all I can say about the negative reaction to DRM and the financial bleedout seen by AAA Gaemz Industree™ publishers is "TOO BAD MOTHERFUCKER!"