Funny thing about Xbox backwards compatibility – the Xbox One uses an x86 cpu just like the original Xbox, and yet Xbox One cannot even play original Xbox games?  Considering that even the 360 with it’s PowerPC CPU supported some original Xbox games via emulation, this makes me think the lack of backwards compatibility is a deliberate decision by someone to not support older-gen games and not because of hardware compatibility.

Heck because the CPU architecture is the same, they wouldn’t even have to use emulation – they could use virtualizatoin.  This is even funnier because Microsoft already makes an x86 virtual machine – Microsoft Virtual PC!

This is a good point.

The bad news just doesn’t stop. Why can’t the game console just be a box we buy in order to get to a game?

http://www.wired.com/gamelife/2013/05/xbox-one-analysis/

Also, I agree the new Xbox has a stupid name (how do you go back to one when you’re on the third system?), and I also thought that it seems like a more modern CDi and 3DO.  Remember that chapter in “Game Over” where David Sheff ran all those quotes from Trip Hawkins where he couldn’t shut up about “multimedia” being the future of gaming (oh boy, oh boy!  I get to look at Encyclopedia CD-ROMs on my gaming system!  Just what I always wanted!)?  Boy did that ever blow up in Trip’s face.  I’m laughing at how Microsoft is repeating all the mistakes from the mid ’90s.  There is nothing new under the sun.

What I want to know is, if cable and satellite viewership is going down rampantly, why the hell is Microsoft investing so heavily in getting those services on their box?  If the Xbox 360 was a dumbed down PC, then the Xbox One is a over-glorified cable box.

Oh, and on another note, I’m laughing at how these “journalists” are already engaging in historical revisionism by running lines in their Xbox “reveal” stories claiming the Xbox 360 is the “market leader.”  How can it be the market leader when the Wii has still sold more than the Xbox 360 in total sales?

I suspect the Xbox gamer probably feels like the PlayStation gamer did prior to the PS3 coming out.  The PS3 was Sony’s heavy handed attempt to trojan horse non-gaming functions of its business (Cell chip, Blu-Ray, etc.). Xbox Dumb seems like a heavy handed attempt with the same mentality.

Out of everything I have ever read or learned about the game console business, the business guys are never interested in gaming on the consoles. It is always stupid movies, music, Anoter-Way-To-Access-Facebook, etc. Hiroshi Yamauchi knew what a game console was. It was a box you bought in order to get to a game. Since Yamauchi’s retirement, everyone (including Nintendo) is trying to make the game console do things we don’t want it to do.

It’s not so much that they are adding junk we don’t want, it is that the sense that gaming, as a medium, is beneath the company. Did Microsoft seem proud of gaming in the Xbox Dumb reveal? Or did it seem like they were more excited to show off Steven Spielberg?

Here’s how it works:You have to install the game to your hard drive. Once it installs, it is now linked to your Live account. To install the game on a different Erxberx Wern, you have to pay a fee.

 

http://www.theverge.com/2013/5/21/4352314/xbox-one-hard-drive-game-installs

 

In unrelated news, Sony’s stock jumped 8% after the reveal.It seems strange that Microsoft would block used games but Sony wouldn’t. Before people start putting down pre-orders for PS4, they better make sure used games can work on the system.

BTW, what was going on with COD: GHOSTS? How are the developers so out of touch? Instead of something like female soldiers or something, they give us dog soldiers. WTF?

Can someone open the door? I must rush out and buy a Call of Duty with dog soldiers.

Details 2-4 are discussed in this article.\

1. The name. The second I saw the name, I thought that, in addition to a new system, they were doing a redesign and re-release of the first Xbox. That could be a neat idea, but I quickly realized that’s the name of the new system. A few minutes later, I wondered if others would have the same confusion, and we might have another “This is a whole new system, everyone!” problem (particularly since Sony still used the “PS One” brand with digital re-releases of PS1 games)..
2. No backwards compatibility, even download titles. I figured this. It just means more 360 owners will be reluctant to upgrade.
3. Mandatory install if played off a disc. Yeah, this is just going to be a dumbed-down PC.
4. The install will also check if a disc has been installed on another account. Any other accounts will have to pay a fee. Yeah, trying to fight used sales (as piracy will certainly look for ways around that). Also, will this mean disc games can’t be played without being online for the install?

The Playstation 4 doesn’t have backwards compatibility due to the cell screwing it up, but it’s still trying something to let players try the old games. If the PS4 have a good price point, Sony will be in the better position this time.

Ahh, you know it is the season of E3 when announcements come out, and you can see everything just ripple.

We still don’t know the price point of Xbox Dumb or all the games that will be on it. (How much will those games cost? $70? $80?)

But I don’t see Xbox Dumb outselling Xbox 360 for Generation 8 even without an economic depression. Why would anyone buy this machine!?

I watched the ‘Xbox Revealed’ presentation.

Microsoft somehow came up with a worse name than Wii-U with the name of ‘Xbox One’ for a game console. Can you imagine how confusing that is going to become? When I watched Microsoft’s presentation, it is clear to me that managers or overseers of Microsoft are not interested in gaming but in ‘entertainment’.

As gamers, it is common to see business guys try to talk less of gaming and talk up the ‘non-gaming’ forms. Xbox One, or Xbox Dumb as I call it, is the definitive Non-Gaming Machine. It follows the same mistakes that the Xbox 360 made, the PlayStation 3, the CD-i, and the graveyard of consoles that tried to be something other than gaming. We now know where the soul of the PSP went; it went into the Xbox Dumb.

“You get to have a personal relationship with your game console.” I don’t want a relationship with my game console. That sounds creepy. “You get to talk commands to the Xbox.” Who wants to have conversations with their game console?

“Xbox: Watch TV.”

“Xbox: Watch Movie.”

“Xbox: Start Game.”

“Xbox: Go offline.”

Ooops! I didn’t hear that last command. Gee, I wonder why?

The Xbox presentation reveals the upper management of Xbox being completely out of touch with what gamers want. Gamers don’t want all this non-gaming media stuff. Gamers do not want their game console to become a ‘water-cooler’. The EA Sports shown excited no one. The racing game seemed like we have seen it before. It felt forced, as if someone was trying too hard. And Call of Duty is an old man’s franchise. Gamers need fresh, need new.

What gamers saw was a game console that plays games tired old series they aren’t excited for and does non-gaming media that they don’t want the game console to do. I was looking at the message forums and the comments during the presentation (I was so bored), and everything I read was negative.

After Xbox Dumb, gamers are going to be very receptive to PS4′s presentation. And I can’t blame them.

UPDATE: Apparently, it is confirmed that Xbox One will block all used games. Xbox Dumb indeed.

Go to any gaming forum at the moment, and you will see the hardcore proudly show off their ramen noodle meals while they watch the Xbox propaganda.

I keep thinking the hardcore will exhaust anything to mock them with, but they come up with new stuff.

I can’t stop laughing. For the ‘pre-show’ of the Xbox Reveal, places like IGN are creating a sports environment where guys and Peter Moleyneaux are sitting there with suits ‘discussing’. Screens behind them show ‘XBOX REVEAL’. Then a blonde bimbo appears randomly to cheer lead for the ‘BIG REVEAL’.

“We need a system for proper AI, for proper simulations…” says Peter Moleyneaux with that voice. This is too funny.

Hi Malstrom,

 

  If studying health and fitness has taught me anything, it’s that bad advice and worse, bad information, is everywhere, coming even from “reliable” sources (ie not the fitness industry) who ought to know better. I think I got lucky in finding one or two sources who really knew what they were talking about, and helped me avoid making major mistakes when I started working out. (I lift three times a week, doing very minimalistic routines and I’m still outlifting the dubebros who are there for hours every day). But I’m getting off topic.

 

  I would like to start looking into investing, which, to someone with zero financial education is intimidating in and of itself. What I’d like to avoid is bad information. As with fitness, I’m sure there are tons of soundbytes that are repeated ad nauseam that are just plain false (“eat many small meals a day,” “a candy bar for breakfast is better than no breakfast,” “toning,” etc). I guess I’m contacting you because I give your advice much weight, and I would be interested in and grateful for any advice you have for someone who is looking into investing.

 

Thank you.Finances are not a series of exercises you do. When we talk about finances, we’re really talking about aristocracy (instead of working for money, you have money work for you). Working for money = peasant.

What you’re really asking is, “How do I cease to be a peasant?” It is a matter more than just money. Everything, including your attitudes, must change.

Quality financial information will never be given away easily or for free. This is not Google where you can type in ‘how do I get to be rich?’ and correct answers flow.

You want to make money? Then stop behaving like a peasant.

Malstrom the Master

 

Long time reader here. You quoted on of one my art work in Parody #3

 

This is an interesting question that I believe only Malstrom can properly answer. Is MLP a “blue ocean” product? I have seen so many pony on the internet lately, it seems as a massively successful franchise that developed a market. But I could be wrong because I didn’t do any study and don;t know how. Other place on the internet is not capable to think this problem with sanity, that is why I have to consult our entertainment business expert, Sean Malstrom.

 

I think this is one case where a blue ocean quickly turning red. It may be marketed to mass audience when it just came out, (I don’t know what they did so differently since I cannot stand watch 3 minutes of that thing.) but a group of retard people whom “discover the meaning of life” from the show is haling MLP as their new identity, they are what know as “bronys” they are the “hardcore” MLP audience. As more and more “bronys” join the franchise, the “culture” of that IP will gravitas more toward the “hardcore” “bronys”. Then the result is “pony” become our hardcore’s symbol of “cool and hip”. Then the blue ocean audiences, the little girls whom this show was supposed to target will freak out and left this retard franchise because “pony” means creepy guys. Then what will be left is self evident. This is just my 2 cent, I don’t know much about business, so what do you think?

 

How can so many male audience find this dumb show so appealing? And some of them even felt they get turned on, how is that even possible to get turned on by a creature that walks on 4? If this is not being a loser then I guess loser has no meaning.

 

Talk about Parody, I would like to see some more, haven’t had one in a year, and I also miss the kittens.I wish people would stop trying to link ‘My Little Ponies’ to the Blue Ocean. The Bronies are fans not because Ponies underwent a Blue Ocean but because Bronies are social outcasts.

Look at other cartoons who did the Blue Ocean right. Looney Tunes appears to beyond children. I could wear a shirt with Bugs Bunny on it, and everyone will think it is cool. Another instance of Blue Ocean would be Robotech in 1985 that created a ton of fans around adult content in animation (meaning war and death, not porno you sickos). The Blue Ocean eventually became known as the anime market in the West. In 1988, I believe, Disney put out much production money to create a highly produced cartoon shows we know today as Ducktales. Cartoons were low budget affairs so this high budget cartoon was attracting all sorts of attention other cartoons weren’t. It led to a series of Disney cartoons from Tale Spin to Darkwing Duck.

I’m sick to death of people trying to say the freaks of Bronies are representative of some Blue Ocean with the stupid pony show. Did you know there were intense male fans of the show Care Bears? Oh, yes. But there was no market there. The guys were just messed up. Who wants that type of market? Do you want to be around guys who are passionate fans of Care Bears? Do you want to sell to them? I don’t. Most companies wouldn’t.

It’s like saying guys who play with dolls are a ‘Blue Ocean’. That’s ridiculous. The guys are using the dolls the way they were intended. And just because some girls play Call of Duty doesn’t make them a Blue Ocean. Sheesh.

E3 should bring up opportunities for parodies and kittens.