The new Xbox: Always online?

And on the third day, the Xbox sub-forum rose again!

I was looking through some gaming news today and I came across this thread on NeoGaf, detailing the tweets of a senior Microsoft guy. If you can't be arsed clicking the link, the gist of it is that in an entirely rude manner, this Microsoft chap fully defended the rumours that the new Xbox will require you to always be connected to the Internet, adding some legitimacy to those rumours in doing that. Some choice quotes from this: "[People with crappy Internet] should definitely get with the times and get the Internet. It's awesome", "Every device is 'always on'. That's the world we live in. #dealwithit" and in response to someone bringing up the fact rural areas often have poor connectivity, "Why on earth would I live there?"

This crap really makes my blood boil. For one, we have a total asshat defending an asinine idea. There's plenty of evidence that the always online mantra is a stupid stupid idea. SimCity, Diablo 3, both of these titles recently suffered horrendous launches because they tried to force through this crappy way of enforcing anti-piracy. Two, so even if you have decent Internet, you'll still be bombarded with ads on the Xbox Dashboard for a service people are expected to shell out £40 a year for.

It's a terrible idea, and in my opinion it'll kill the new Xbox if it turns out to be correct.

Thoughts, good forumites?

PS4's confirmed as not having always online, right?

It seems that as Sony have been getting their act together, Microsoft is growing more and more complacent. I haven't bought Xbox Live Gold for a good year and a bit now on the merit that it's not worth the money. Why should I have to pay another fee to watch Netflix, a service I already pay for, on my Xbox? Sony's model of not having to pay for online play, but if you want to pay you can get some really sweet extras - now that's an incentive.

I really don't know if I'll bother with it anyway, I've barely played any games on my Xbox, the exclusives just haven't gripped me enough. Plus with Rare being wasted on Kinect rubbish I've not got something awesome like Viva Pinata to grab my attention.

I wouldn't bother with it anyway what with my attention not wide enough to use more than one console at a time. But perhaps Microsoft is just fooling us and is trying to cause a bigger build up than sony did by self-spreading rumours of things users may not feel very pleased about just to shock us all the more when its just an xbox 360 with a drinks holder and free cookies for life, besides if these not-too-sturdy rumours are true and we really can't play its games without the not so trusty interwebz than those without good connection won't miss out on anything by getting PS4 or the sleek and snazzy wii U everyone loves so much over at cvg. However, some will still buy it and it may still sell quite well in well developed city areas, like America.
Either way I don't see much hope of Microsoft attempting to bring this to Japan, they never did like Microsoft....

Well, thats my weekly intelligent comment done :idea:

I wont be buying if always on or if it doesnt play used games.

masofdas wrote:

or if it doesnt play used games.

I'd forgotten about this rumour! This trend in gaming really pisses me off. They've tried to hinder used gaming by including a code with new copies to play online with, and if they take it further by having each game only playable on one console, that'll be a retro gamer/PC gamer/perpetual Nintendo gamer for this generation.

Hmm... I really hope it's not. My connection's not consistent enough. Sometimes it cuts out for a fraction of a second, and that's enough for my 360 to disconnect (whereas the web browser on my PC will cope). It's stopped me playing games like the Sensi remake, as that kicks you out of your current match. A survey was done indicating that a large proportion of the 360-owning population never connected theirs to the internet anyway.

I'm not really thinking of getting the next Xbox anyway after the sharp decline the 360 has had in the past year, I am not really sure if it is a game-console or advertisement for Love-film.

If you always have to be connected to the internet, surely it will be impossible to play an EA game?

Two words: Phillips Connection.

If there's a grain of truth in any of this, I think Microsoft should just pack it in. They've annoyed core gamers by dossing about with Kinect and those Mii rip-offs this generation, and now there's a chance that the next Xbox will be useless without the internet? I can't see that going down too well with less fortunate core gamers, let alone casual gamers.

And wouldn't this effectively kill Nextbox as a future retro console? Twenty-four years after I bought it, I still dig my original Game Boy out every couple of months to play a few of the classics. Not gonna happen after Nextbox's servers are shut down in 2021... without an apologetic u-turn, at least.

Way to go, Microsoft. Way to go.

Stu_the_great wrote:

And wouldn't this effectively kill Nextbox as a future retro console? Twenty-four years after I bought it, I still dig my original Game Boy out every couple of months to play a few of the classics. Not gonna happen after Nextbox's servers are shut down in 2021... without an apologetic u-turn, at least.

This is true! I'm current planning to go on a PS1 collecting and gaming spree, couldn't do that with Nextbox.

Although, that's probably so they can sell Nextbox games digitally again through the Nextagainbox.

JayMoyles wrote:

Although, that's probably so they can sell Nextbox games digitally again through the Nextagainbox.

Once again, my intense dislike of cloud gaming is refreshed. Even with 3DS, it concerns me that one day my handheld might conk out and all my classic eShop games and saves are lost. Lost! Forever. This isn't a problem with discs and cards/cartridges (unless they're lost or cruelly taken from you).

Breaking news: Nintendo to send hired goons and Reggie to seize any and all boxed games, quoting "the need for a push towards a fully digital medium" as reasoning.

Hired goons? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HKSnRkARktk

I'm hoping it's just a case of everyone misinterpreting the meaning of "always online" and that it just means a console that is always connected to the internet, if you happen to have an internet connection. Just like our PCs, our smartphones, our tablets and even 3DS with SpotPass.

If I'm wrong then that's a bit of a bummer, as requiring an internet connection - while not an issue for me since I never use any of my modern consoles without one, neither do I my phone - just psychologically bumps up the feeling that I don't actually *own* any of my digital content (not that I ever did, ironically Nintendo's tied-to-your-console DRM is the closest I've ever felt to owning a physical product and not a license!).

If it's a move to delight publishers such as EA, then Microsoft really should implement it for publishers who want their games to support the functionality. It seems odd that they'd implement it only on their new Xbox system rather than some of their recent new platforms that host Xbox content on systems that always have an internet connection (such as Windows Phone and the Windows 8 Store), but I guess this is Microsoft battling with physical boxed games and their resale.