The Defining Moment of E3 2013

When E3 2013 is all said and done, one thing will stand out in most people's minds above all others, and it happened last night at the Sony press conference.

Of course, it wasn't just at the conference that Sony rubbed the salt in Microsoft's PR wounds:

I imagine Redmond isn't a happy place right now.

Don Mattrick Interview With the BBC

"BBC: The preowned debate has really really run on and on. What assurances can you give that the publishers will allow to trade games freely?

Mattrick: Well look we have an ecosystem. There's 4 key participants in that ecosystem: consumers, content creators, retailers and Microsoft. So we have to come up with a set of policies that harmonize the interests of everyone. That allow us to work together. We've been working with our key retail partners. They're pleases with what we're doing. I think they're a great barometer for what I perceive consumers are going to take a look at so we've given a lot of detail about what people can do. We support resale. Uh, I don't know what else to tell you. Those business models exist today and they'll exist in the future."

For the full interview, with accompanying video, go here.

A set of policies that "harmonize the interests of everyone" eh? Up yours fucker, the only thing you people have done is walk all over your paying consumers and force them to bear the burden on behalf of Microsoft's interest in controlling all our access to the things we pay money for.

The Xbone DRM has NO benefit to the consumer and it has NO benefit to retailers who aren't part of your corporate oligopoly. It only benefits the sickly mega publishers who can't manage a checkbook and need as many strawmen as they can possibly conjure to avoid personal responsibility for running multimillion-dollar corporations into financial pits. It also only benefits the greedy control-obsessed executive assholes occupying the head offices of Microsoft in Redmond, who want to turn all sales into rentals and want us to check in like parolees just to use our electronic devices.

Seeing Don Mattrick's body language and his nervous behavior brought to mind an old rap song by Mobb Deep called "Shook Ones Pt. II"

" 'cause ain't no such things as halfway crooks
scared to death, scared to look, they shook
'cause ain't no such things as halfway crooks
scared to death, scared to look"

Microsoft Press Conference Recap

- Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain began the show, with Hideo Kojima taking the stage after a new trailer. The game is a next-generation title running on the Fox Engine.

- The Xbox 360 is getting a new revision, this time it's outer case resembles that of the Xbone. No word on a price drop for the now 8 year old console.

- From July until November XBL Gold subscibers will get 2 free games per month from Games on Demand, sort of like the giveaways Sony does with PS+ on the PS3 and Vita. No word on what games will be available for this offer.

- World of Tanks is coming to the 360 as a free to play title.

- Rounding out the Xbox 360 content, a new Dark Souls II trailer was shown and the September release of Grand Theft Auto V was mentioned.

- Ryse: Son of Rome, which was once a 360 Kinect-only title in past E3 shows, is now a CryEngine made Xbone game that appears to have a controller based hack and slash mechanic.

- Killer Instinct is getting rebooted as an Xbone exclusive. Madcatz is developing a companion arcade stick for the release of the game.

- New Forza 5 trailer with promises of adaptive AI that learns your playstyle and goes off and races for you while you're away.

- Quantum Break is apparently a mixture of a sci-fi TV show and decision-based game mechanics that affect how the story of the show plays out.

- Insomniac, the once Sony-exclusive developers of Resistance and Ratchet and Clank, are making a new Xbone exclusive open world FPS titled Sunset Overdrive.

- D4 is another Xbone exclusive with cel-shaded visuals. Nothing to indicate what type of game this is or how it plays was shown.

- Project Spark is a user-generated content creation game made with elements similar to Spore and Modnation Racers. It apparently incorporates a good deal of Smartglass technology.

- The Xbone exclusive Crimson Dragon was announced. It is made by the creator of the niche cult-hit Panzer Dragoon Orta and appears to be reminiscent of the prior Panzer Dragoon game mechanics.

- Smartglass can apparently be used to set up XBL multiplayer games while you play another singleplayer game on the console. It seems to have Marketplace access as well.

- Streaming functionality is now part of the Xbone via Twitch.

- Increase in the number of XBL friends and MS Points are now being converted to standard currency.

- Dead Rising 3 in-game demonstrated on-stage. Apparently an Xbone exclusive, incorporates Smartglass options into the game mechanics.

- Witcher 3 is now officially coming to consoles via Xbone.

- Battlefield 4 is coming to Xbone, with exclusive downloadable content.

- A CGI trailer announcing Halo 5 as an Xbone exclusive was shown, with a speculated release date in 2014.

- As seen in the leak from Game Informer, Respawn's first game is Titanfall, a sci-fi FPS set in a world with mechs. Titanfall is coming to Xbone, Xbox 360 and PC.

- The Xbone hardware will release this coming November at a whopping $499.99.

Pre-Microsoft Conference Rumors

 

A notorious leaker of games industry info popped up out of nowhere early this morning and offered the following tidbits online regarding Microsoft, Xbone and their conference which is now 4 hours away as I type this:

-Microsoft is spending alot of money to keep 3rd parties from mentioning PS4 versions of multiplatform games. Unless a 3rd party game is specifically and unequivocally mentioned as an Xbone exclusive, assume there is also a PS4 version they are hiding from the show.

-Microsoft's reveal of the official DRM policy last week was stage 1 of their plan to spin info for the public. Stage 2 will happen at Gamescon. They have no actual plan for rentals and none are being pursued, so they are going out of their way to avoid questions on the subject.

-The cloud MS advertises was designed from the start primarily for their DRM and product control programs. Unlike previous speculation elsewhere it was Microsoft, not 3rd parties, who generated the idea of the DRM and took it to publishers. EA and Ubisoft have become the biggest supporters of the DRM since MS presented it.

-According to the post by the leaker, the DRM on Xbone is actually worse than what has been revealed but he can't get solid info on specifics because his sources are afraid for their jobs.

-At the MS conference will be Mirror's Edge 2, Dead Rising 3, exclusive DLC for another Capcom game, a Phil Spencer title and a new Prince of Persia game.

-"Live paywall": Now whether this means XBL Gold is required for all services or if it means that online multiplayer is still in need of subscription is unclear to me. If it's the former then yes, the DRM on Xbone is actually getting worse and worse as time goes on.

Finally, the source of these leaks has posted a couple things about Sony as well:

-No online paywall for Sony

-Sony's E3 showing is secured so tightly that info is hard to come by.

All we can do now is wait and see if this source, who has accurately leaked info in the past such as the Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas voice actor cast and Xbox 360 technical specs, has done it again. Some of the info is so awful though I think it would be better if he was wrong.

The Calm Before the Storm

 

Today is the final day of relative peace and quiet before E3, and for the first time I'm not excited by the prospect of what I'm going to hear. I should be, considering that we have 2 brand new consoles debuting and we have a contender who's not doing so well right now and knows they need to knock it out of the park with killer games to stop the stagnation of their recently launched platform. This should be a grand show with the blockbuster announcements from all those hungry to get a foothold in the hearts and minds of the gaming audience as the new generation descend upon us.

But thanks to the malicious activity of the industry of late I'm filled with dread instead of hope. The WiiU is DRM-free but 3rd parties have all but abandoned the device. Microsoft is going forth with a horrible DRM platform on Xbone that virtually ensures I won't ever own one so long as that software is a "feature". It's still unclear how Sony is proceeding on the DRM front. If Sony advances a DRM scheme similar to Microsoft I may just call it quits on console gaming altogether. Even if they announce that the forever-in-development games The Last Guardian and Final Fantasy Versus XIII, the upcoming Metal Gear Solid 5 and speculated unannounced games like Kingdom Hearts 3 are now being designed for the Playstation 4, I would be hard-pressed to find justification in buying the machine to play them. And yes, if Sony has DRM similar to Xbone on the PS4 they will receive just as much hatred as Microsoft has in my future ranting blog posts.

So we now stand on the eve of E3, with both the Microsoft and Sony conferences happening tomorrow. I find myself wondering, as I did in one of the very first blog posts I wrote here, if the AAA Gaemz Industree™ which is pointing a gun at it's own head will squeeze the trigger and pre-emptively ruin the entire next console generation before it even starts. Is there is anyone coming to their senses before they ruin things? Microsoft can choose to remove the DRM if they want to, Sony can choose to not implement it at all, the question is will they? The ball is now in their court and all we can do is wait. 

The storm is coming my friends, the storm is coming.

Propoganda, For a Good Cause

The Ballad of the AAA Gaemz Industree™

gave up trying to figure it out but my head got lost along the way
worn out from giving it up my soul I pissed it all away
still stings these shattered nerves
pigs we get what pigs deserve
I'm going all the way down I'm leaving today

come come come on you've gotta fill me up
come come gotta let me inside of you
come come come on you gotta fix me up
come come gotta let me inside of you

still feel it all slipping away but it doesn't matter anymore
everybody's still chipping away but it doesn't matter anymore
look through these blackened eyes
you'll see ten thousand lies
my lips may promise but my heart is a whore

come come come on you gotta fill me up
come come gotta let me inside of you
come come come on you gotta fix me up
come come gotta let me get through to you

this isn't meant to last
this is for right now

I know it's all getting away and it comes to me as no surprise
I know what's coming to me is never going to arrive
fresh blood through tired skin
new sweat to drown me in
dress up this rotten carcass just to make it look alive

come come come on you gotta fill me up
come come gotta let me inside of you
come come come on you gotta fix me up
come come gotta let me get through to you

this isn't meant to last
this is for right now

I wish I could put the blame on you
I want you to make me
I want you to take me
I want you to break me
then I want you to throw me away

This preceding musical interlude of the song "Last", courtesy of Trent Reznor and Nine Inch Nails, is dedicated to our dearly beloved AAA Gaemz Industree™.

Today Microsoft confirmed most of the horrible anti-consumer policies that were speculated on for the Xbone on their official website. As we witness Microsoft conspire with the mega-publishers to create complicated systems to limit user freedoms and punish end consumers, all in a desperate bid to stop the financial bleeding from our dear friends at the likes of EA, Activision and Ubisoft, let us ponder the lyrics to this song and see just how much of it describes the rotting mindset of an industry that is killing itself.