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Extra bits and pieces seem to be being added to consoles left, right and centre these days, but like Robocop having a marshmellow toaster attached to his head, they’re not really any good unless they are considered useful.
Look at it this way (tilt head to the side…) Consoles are there to play games. Anything that helps them do this is a GOOD THING, so that includes a nice array of joypad ports and access for memory cards, as well as support for decent sound systems and an assortment of connections to TVs and monitors. What I’m more concerned about is the ‘extras’ that console makers are now seeing fit to add to their machines, both in the package with the console and afterwards.
Look.
If you add more hardware to a console, you are going to increase the price. DVD players are great if the games come on DVD and utilise the space on the shiny disc, but if they have to have extra lasers and mechanics to play movies, then the cost is going to rocket and people are going to be put off of buying the machine. OK, so you find that most of your customers really do want a DVD player, and don’t want to go out to the shops and get a good quality, cheap stand-alone player, so what do you do? Put a good quality DVD player in your machine, making it easily rival other cheap players that you could have bought if the console was any cheaper? Don’t be silly, you put a sub-standard player in and still charge a lot for the machine.
Ok, next. When you have any peripheral that becomes part of a machine when you use it all the time, the games are going to be bound to use this as a main feature of their game play. This is especially true when the maker or even the licenser of the games is the same person who released the peripheral in the first place. Extra hardware, like Hard Drives for instance, will automatically be supported by the top games and, if successful, will be used as a necessity for them, thereby making the owners of that console go out and buy the hardware, whether they want to or not. This has happened before and will happen again. If too many pieces of hardware are then released, the cost of owning the machine will eventually be sky high if you want to play the latest games, and it will also increase incompatibility problems with third party games, both new and old.
So how can console producers win? Well, stick to the basic principal that a games machine is just that, a machine for playing games. Adding other bits and pieces to download stuff from the net or do your mother’s knitting for you may sound an attractive proposition at first, but your’ll soon find out that these peripherals from hell are not selling because people simply can’t afford them, support them as ‘standard’ hardware and you’ll have a queue of angry customers carrying torches outside of your head office.
Look at it this way (tilt head to the side…) Consoles are there to play games. Anything that helps them do this is a GOOD THING, so that includes a nice array of joypad ports and access for memory cards, as well as support for decent sound systems and an assortment of connections to TVs and monitors. What I’m more concerned about is the ‘extras’ that console makers are now seeing fit to add to their machines, both in the package with the console and afterwards.
Look.
If you add more hardware to a console, you are going to increase the price. DVD players are great if the games come on DVD and utilise the space on the shiny disc, but if they have to have extra lasers and mechanics to play movies, then the cost is going to rocket and people are going to be put off of buying the machine. OK, so you find that most of your customers really do want a DVD player, and don’t want to go out to the shops and get a good quality, cheap stand-alone player, so what do you do? Put a good quality DVD player in your machine, making it easily rival other cheap players that you could have bought if the console was any cheaper? Don’t be silly, you put a sub-standard player in and still charge a lot for the machine.
Ok, next. When you have any peripheral that becomes part of a machine when you use it all the time, the games are going to be bound to use this as a main feature of their game play. This is especially true when the maker or even the licenser of the games is the same person who released the peripheral in the first place. Extra hardware, like Hard Drives for instance, will automatically be supported by the top games and, if successful, will be used as a necessity for them, thereby making the owners of that console go out and buy the hardware, whether they want to or not. This has happened before and will happen again. If too many pieces of hardware are then released, the cost of owning the machine will eventually be sky high if you want to play the latest games, and it will also increase incompatibility problems with third party games, both new and old.
So how can console producers win? Well, stick to the basic principal that a games machine is just that, a machine for playing games. Adding other bits and pieces to download stuff from the net or do your mother’s knitting for you may sound an attractive proposition at first, but your’ll soon find out that these peripherals from hell are not selling because people simply can’t afford them, support them as ‘standard’ hardware and you’ll have a queue of angry customers carrying torches outside of your head office.
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Anyway, for people who DO want a console and DVD player in one. Nintendo have allowed Panasonic to make a DVD Gamecube too.
I.E. Nintendo players get the choice rather than having it force on them. :-)
I.E. Nintendo players get the choice rather than having it force on them. :-)
Just to take this down a slightly different alley - how about when they bundle games and accessories together?
DK64 with Expansion Pak, when the Expansion Pak has already been out a year, more expensive game, stupid idea! How many didn't buy it because they didn't want a second Exp. Pak?
DK64 with Expansion Pak, when the Expansion Pak has already been out a year, more expensive game, stupid idea! How many didn't buy it because they didn't want a second Exp. Pak?
Your Honour wrote:
> I can;t
> afford a console AND a DVD player, yet I want both.
Of course, the arguement with this is that if the PS2 was sold without DVD ability, it may be £150 by now (admitedly not when it was first released) so you could still afford a fairly good £150 DVD player too.
Let me just say that I'm not against the PS2 (as many of you should know) and it has some good games. If it were cheaper, I'd even buy the darn thing! I'm against the constant marketing craze of adding bits and pieces to consoles all the time and then watching as it either sinks the console like a man in a rowing boat whose had too many pizzas, or pushes the price of owning the console up further, even if the hardware is seperate from the machine itself (more software supporting the extra hardware)
> I can;t
> afford a console AND a DVD player, yet I want both.
Of course, the arguement with this is that if the PS2 was sold without DVD ability, it may be £150 by now (admitedly not when it was first released) so you could still afford a fairly good £150 DVD player too.
Let me just say that I'm not against the PS2 (as many of you should know) and it has some good games. If it were cheaper, I'd even buy the darn thing! I'm against the constant marketing craze of adding bits and pieces to consoles all the time and then watching as it either sinks the console like a man in a rowing boat whose had too many pizzas, or pushes the price of owning the console up further, even if the hardware is seperate from the machine itself (more software supporting the extra hardware)
BFG, you make some good points.
I think essentially that Sony and MS are releasing "entertainment systems" rather games consoles. Simple because thats what the mass market want.
I can;t afford a console AND a DVD player, yet I want both.
The XBox will allow me to do both (watch DVDs and play games), the 'Cube won't. This is the same thinking of most people I would imagine.
To be fair, with the 'Cubes price, and the lower costs of DVD players, it may be possible to get both for £300, but then you need to find room for two machines in front of your telly instead of one.
I agree that it's getting a bit silly with all the extras that are available, but if the mass market want it, it will be done.
I think essentially that Sony and MS are releasing "entertainment systems" rather games consoles. Simple because thats what the mass market want.
I can;t afford a console AND a DVD player, yet I want both.
The XBox will allow me to do both (watch DVDs and play games), the 'Cube won't. This is the same thinking of most people I would imagine.
To be fair, with the 'Cubes price, and the lower costs of DVD players, it may be possible to get both for £300, but then you need to find room for two machines in front of your telly instead of one.
I agree that it's getting a bit silly with all the extras that are available, but if the mass market want it, it will be done.
Nice topic pb.
I was actually thinking to myself the other day “are we coming to the end of good gaming because companies are adding too much to game consoles?”
I’m not sure about all of you, but when I buy a games console I buy it too play games and nothing else.
Years ago, people would go to their local game store to buy a games console. The console would be a something where you insert games into it, and a controller or two and that’s basically it. Now days, this has changed, but it is for the better or not?
Some may agree others will disagree with me when I say that the way consoles have changed over the years is for the worse. Obviously it hasn’t all gone down hill. The good things with the changes have been mostly the ability to have much, much better graphics and sound quality. All of which change the way we play games. On the other hand there have been some changes that I have not been to keen on.
I have been fortunate to buy a Dreamcast and a Playstation2. I wasn’t going to buy either because the price is, IMO, ridiculous! I really did want the two consoles, as I knew that they had superb games on them, not for the ability to play DVD’s or music CD’s. I all ready have a CD player and also had a DVD player, so when I found out that the reason the price was so high was because of the ability to play DVD’s and music CD’s I was livid!
As time went on, and I still didn’t have either console, I decided to swallow my pride and buy the console, only to play games on it though! And to this day, I have never played music or films on it, just games! So, you could say I wasted my money, because let’s face it, the reason why the PS2 is so expensive is partly because of the DVD player and CD player built in.
Maybe I’m just getting old (at 14?) but I don’t like all the fuss over game consoles being able to play more than games. I wish we could go back to the days where the Mega Drive was alive and kicking! Now that was a great console, and loved by thousands! Now, the reason why it was loved wasn’t because it could play films or CD’s on it, but because it only played games, and good ones at that. If the MD was released in today’s gaming world with the facility to play films and music, the price would be much higher, and many people would buy the console, not to play games but to play films on it. To me, this is a very worrying thought because I believe that there are so many people that are buying games consoles just to play films and music on there.
People have forgotten the fact that games sell a console, not weather it plays films or not. Also, I think some people are starting to lose interest in games because they are to busy playing their favourite films.
I feel that the GAMECUBE is going to be very successful and for two main reasons. 1) The average gaming person will think that the GAMECUBE is the cheapest 128-bit console out there, which has the best looking future. 2) The hard-core gaming person will love the GAMECUBE because it plays games, and games only. I am sure that sales will back my point up when the GAMECUBE is released.
What is the world coming to though? People buying a GAME console and not buy a single game on it. This is true for the PS2 because it is proven that people have bought PS2 to play films on, and that’s it. I’m not sure on weather company’s are making their consoles DVD compatible just to be able to sell more units or to increase the price, but what I do know is that it’s damaging the gaming world.
Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo (not Nintendo so much) need to get their priorities right, games first or the industry will be pushing daises from 6ft under! If we manage to get rid of DVD’s and music CD’s on game consoles then we could be looking at a brighter future. The hardware will be cheaper, and with the hardware being cheaper, the company would get a bigger user base attracting the neutral developers and the customer could buy more games, have more fun and in turn making money for game company’s.
All in all, I am hoping that game consoles will be only game compatible and therefor be dropped in price.
I was actually thinking to myself the other day “are we coming to the end of good gaming because companies are adding too much to game consoles?”
I’m not sure about all of you, but when I buy a games console I buy it too play games and nothing else.
Years ago, people would go to their local game store to buy a games console. The console would be a something where you insert games into it, and a controller or two and that’s basically it. Now days, this has changed, but it is for the better or not?
Some may agree others will disagree with me when I say that the way consoles have changed over the years is for the worse. Obviously it hasn’t all gone down hill. The good things with the changes have been mostly the ability to have much, much better graphics and sound quality. All of which change the way we play games. On the other hand there have been some changes that I have not been to keen on.
I have been fortunate to buy a Dreamcast and a Playstation2. I wasn’t going to buy either because the price is, IMO, ridiculous! I really did want the two consoles, as I knew that they had superb games on them, not for the ability to play DVD’s or music CD’s. I all ready have a CD player and also had a DVD player, so when I found out that the reason the price was so high was because of the ability to play DVD’s and music CD’s I was livid!
As time went on, and I still didn’t have either console, I decided to swallow my pride and buy the console, only to play games on it though! And to this day, I have never played music or films on it, just games! So, you could say I wasted my money, because let’s face it, the reason why the PS2 is so expensive is partly because of the DVD player and CD player built in.
Maybe I’m just getting old (at 14?) but I don’t like all the fuss over game consoles being able to play more than games. I wish we could go back to the days where the Mega Drive was alive and kicking! Now that was a great console, and loved by thousands! Now, the reason why it was loved wasn’t because it could play films or CD’s on it, but because it only played games, and good ones at that. If the MD was released in today’s gaming world with the facility to play films and music, the price would be much higher, and many people would buy the console, not to play games but to play films on it. To me, this is a very worrying thought because I believe that there are so many people that are buying games consoles just to play films and music on there.
People have forgotten the fact that games sell a console, not weather it plays films or not. Also, I think some people are starting to lose interest in games because they are to busy playing their favourite films.
I feel that the GAMECUBE is going to be very successful and for two main reasons. 1) The average gaming person will think that the GAMECUBE is the cheapest 128-bit console out there, which has the best looking future. 2) The hard-core gaming person will love the GAMECUBE because it plays games, and games only. I am sure that sales will back my point up when the GAMECUBE is released.
What is the world coming to though? People buying a GAME console and not buy a single game on it. This is true for the PS2 because it is proven that people have bought PS2 to play films on, and that’s it. I’m not sure on weather company’s are making their consoles DVD compatible just to be able to sell more units or to increase the price, but what I do know is that it’s damaging the gaming world.
Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo (not Nintendo so much) need to get their priorities right, games first or the industry will be pushing daises from 6ft under! If we manage to get rid of DVD’s and music CD’s on game consoles then we could be looking at a brighter future. The hardware will be cheaper, and with the hardware being cheaper, the company would get a bigger user base attracting the neutral developers and the customer could buy more games, have more fun and in turn making money for game company’s.
All in all, I am hoping that game consoles will be only game compatible and therefor be dropped in price.
PB seems to be in support of the Gamecube's "games only" ethics.
It's clearly best for the hardcore gamers as it gets them what they want for the most efficient price.
The real money is in supplying to casual gamers who make up larger numbers than the hardcore minority.
That's where the DVD option sounds more attractive...
It's clearly best for the hardcore gamers as it gets them what they want for the most efficient price.
The real money is in supplying to casual gamers who make up larger numbers than the hardcore minority.
That's where the DVD option sounds more attractive...
Damn. Only he can see the humor in that joke.
Turbonutter wrote:
> Hillarious, wasn't it!
*Waits for Stick474 to arrive*
He doesn't seem to come on anymore...
> Hillarious, wasn't it!
*Waits for Stick474 to arrive*
He doesn't seem to come on anymore...
Hillarious, wasn't it!
*Waits for Stick474 to arrive*
*Waits for Stick474 to arrive*
Turbonutter wrote:
We wait with baited breath as because Shigeru
> Miamoto is making it it MUST be absolutely fantastic!
Ho ho!
We wait with baited breath as because Shigeru
> Miamoto is making it it MUST be absolutely fantastic!
Ho ho!
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