Xbox One users will have to pay extra for Skype and gamer-gratifying DVR Microsoft has released the first unboxing video of its forthcoming Xbox One console, along with details on its pricing policy. The bad news is that gamers will have to pay extra for some features, but on the plus side they get a free mono headset. When the Xbox One was shown off for the first time, Microsoft's Don Matrick, …
"PS4 is the better value for the moment. + NO KINECT!"
But Kinect 2 is far more powerful than anything the PS4 has in that space - and the price gap is less than the retail value of Kinect 2 - which as Kinect 1 was £130, we could assume is at least the same....So the Xbox One seems better value to me. The PS4 is the poor man's choice...
But is it powerful enough? Few of us have had a chance to use it. John Carmack says it is (a) laggy; (b) like using a no-button mouse. I gather it can track arm positions, but not fingers, so no good way to "click" at a point. I hope it turns out to be better than it sounds, but currently it does not appear to be an asset worth paying the extra money for even if you liked that kind of thing.
Sony have always responded to the problem by, in effect, cheating and solving an easier problem. Their old Eye controller had a big sphere on it, so the camera could recognise it from any angle and deduce distance from its size. The new controller has bar light on it with known shape and colour, to similarly make life easier for the system. PS4 may be "less powerful", but if it works more effectively in real living rooms, it could be the better option.
Doesn't really matter how powerful it is if no one wants to use it. So far there's been almost no interest in the dev community and there's not even much sign of pressure from above to do interesting things with it. Just like Kinect on 360, it looks destined to be ignored by game developers.
There's also talk that the improvements aren't in practice very useful. The oft repeated 'give commands to your team with finger gestures' example, someone with access to Kinect 2 claims it can't actually track fingers to do that!
We also know that the few attempts to make interesting Kinect games for core gamers were an absolute disaster, unreliable and laggy. No core gamer is going to willingly abandon low latency, reliable joypad control for 60ms of Kinect2 lag.
It's another feature that Microsoft needs but no one else does. It's going to be a great remote control for XBone as a media centre. And that's all it's ever going to be used for.
>Doesn't really matter how powerful it is if no one wants to use it.
I agree with you, but Kinect does seem to be advancing the state of the art in these types of controller. Just like the WII did.
Doesn't mean I will buy anything from MS, much less an XBOX, unless it is really compelling, but think of what an Oculus Rift + a decent positional controller could do if well-integrated into a hack & slash RPG.
Could be Snow Crash all over again, no? So don't knock them for trying.
Kinect 2 hardware accelerated, is less laggy than the PS Eye, and has 1080p resolution and a depth sensor compared to 720p only on the PS Eye so will be significantly more accurate (not to mention tracking multiple points on up to 6 people at once versus one or two points)...
>The PS4 is the poor man's choice...
I can comfortably afford both of them and had planned on getting both, but I've only pre-ordered the PS4 because there are just too many unknowns about privacy and hidden charges with the xBone, so I've decided to adopt a "wait and see" policy for it.
*If* there are no stories about people being secretly videoed or spied on in their own homes by the xBone in the first 12 months, I'll probably buy one. Until then I see the PS4 as the smarter choice which just happens to be cheaper.
Oh Padawon, your training as a Level 4 consumer is complete. You are now fully comfortable to throw away your money on worthless crapola. You display the full awareness of the 'nothing' that a consumer wanders in daily. The willingness to spend spend spend, shows your leveling up to Level 4 is totally warranted. Yes, don't save for college, don't donate any time to volunteer services, don't contribute to society. These are the true attributes the 'corporation' is looking for. Soon, you will start constructing your gold credit card for purchasing worthless crap all over the galaxy.
Duuuuuuuuuude, how many bad moves can a company make from 3 product lines (tablet, OS, gaming)...and still not make a right decision? I guess we'll find out.
Little 8 year old Bobby wants to record his Minecraft session and invite Timmy over to his house to watch it on the weekend. Of course, of course he'll need an internet connection and a 60usd subscription...why wouldn't he? :-/
To be fair, I don't know how the Sony "share" feature works, it could be the same. However, if it was, after this news it probably is now offline and free.
Bobby doesn't need it if his dad has one, as was also announced at E3 (but because its a good feature the press won't bother mentioning it) is that one Xbox Live Gold account registered on the console will allow other members of the household access the features without needing to have one, while still using their own profile.
Its like they never mention that if I purchase DLC or games directly from the console (haven't tried other sources), my son has access to them too.
Right now me and my son have separate Gold accounts on the 360, when the new one comes out I can let his expire.
FAIL. In our house, little Bobby has almost exclusive use of the game console(*) in the small amount of time when the rest of the family aren't watching actual TV programs on the TV. His dad does everything he wants, gaming included, on a proper computer, away from the TV.
There is no way his dad will be shelling out on annual subscriptions for console gaming.
(* currently a PS2, which is still going strong!)
fugly offspring of a PS2 and a VCR
Nice PS3 touch sensitive button to switch on too
I owned every UK games console released since (and including) the NES before I emigrated to Aus and there's not a thing that's made me want to buy a current generation games console since I got here and the next generation leaves me so far actively disliking it.
Think I'll hang out more at SG bar in Sydney who have an Atari 2600 (with original wooden veneer finish) set-up and running in the back
The actual complaint was that users existing headsets wouldn't work with the new socket. I guess they decided pissing off 360 owners who'd bought better headsets wasn't important compared to throwing another freebie at new owners. So that's a whole pile of existing core gamers required to spend more money buying a headset plug adaptor and new owners that probably would have been happy with Kinect audio getting another reason not to use Kinect!
Demonstrating Microsofts infallible ability to hear feedback then do anything but address the problem. They just keep digging.
Pay for Skype and DVR content? No thanks, we can already get these services for free through a multitude of devices, a Sky HD box, Freeview, a Freesat HD Box and number of PC's tablets and smartphones.
As for 4k HD, well there aren't that many HD channels to start with (no I don't pay a Sky subscription so that I can watch re-runs of stuff that I already have on DVD and Blu Ray, and prefer a weekly cinema visit and the odd budget blu ray purchase), so not holding my breath on that one.
As for even pricier Xbox Live, I'm already paying about 65 quid a year for two subs for my offspring, however as they have now exhausted the Halo series, they've now switched to PS3 on-line titles that are free to play. They'll be no renewals.
Let's see where the Xbox 1 and PS4 get to in a years times, barring some stunning games, I can't see what these have to offer over the Xbox 360, Kinnect and PS3 we already have. With the recent news that MS are going to 'overclock' the Xbox 1, it does remind me that our Xbox died no less than 5 times. The first of these deaths and the subsequent lengthy repair wait meant that we bought a PS3. That was in early in 2007, that PS3 still works fine, and doesn't 'need' 'replacing' with a PS4 yet, or for quite some time. 'Replacing' as the new consoles are not backwards compatible.
Where did you get that idea?
This IS the XBox Live charge. What we see here is just more people whining about it. Anyone who actually cared about $63/year bought their subscription half-price on Ebay or got a PS3 instead and those people - who clearly weren't in the market for an Xbox One anyway - are the ones shitting themselves over this "extra" (but actually completely unchanged) charge.
"Xbox Live Gold now includes Skype and some other shit as well as what it already supplied" isn't such a click-baity headline, though.
The separate power brick is a common design shortcut. It makes it easier to get the safety approvals (UL, CE, etc) for the console box because it's all low voltage. They design one power brick and get it certified for all the high voltage shock & fire safety tests, then they can make all sorts of console variants without having to re-certify the power supply.
Actually it's not just the "one certification" of a PSU, if you have an internal PSU the rules are more strict too.
Two possible reasons for this:
1. Internal PSU may get hotter due to less airflow etc.
2. Internal mains wiring could detach and touch the metal case (okay, not applicable to a plastic console).
Only if your source of information is that bluushit Wikipedia article, where most of those studios listed have unamed projects and games nobody has ever heard of.
Spend 5 minutes weeding out the bullshit, and it's quite clear the black and white difference between 1st party studios of Microsoft and Sony.
"Yep, that's how Sony have ended up outselling the Xbox360"
That was purely because the PS3 included a BluRay drive - which is what many PS3s are only used for.
Next generation Sony don't have that advantage anymore.
nb - the Xbox seems to consistently have games higher up the charts and sell more games than the PS3....
Have you tried using Lovefilm on a PS3 without creating a "PS Online" account? No, didn't think you had.
(BTW you can't.)
I really can't understand the fanboi nature of this - they are both pretty much the same. I'll get both cos I want to be able to play the best games on whatever platform has them.
I love the Halo franchise and my 360s (Had two, including a launch machine that STILL WORKS, crazy huh?) but for me the best game so far is The Last Of Us - the only game I've played to the end on my PS3, as it's main duty is being a Blue Ray player.
"They will sell or flop based on the games available."
That's not necessarily the case. Most PS3s were used primarily as Blu Ray players - and Microsoft are heavily targeting the entertainment market with the Xbox One, so if their technology works well that alone will drive sales...
So we have to pay for a gold account to use skype...
Don't we already have to have a gold account to use anything worth while on the internet with the current one. The price seems about the same as.
Also if your paranoid about having the xbox one camera in your living room, unplug it when your using it.
You can't unplug Kinect 2 - it's required for the console to work.
You can disable various features such as video in the privacy settings, and if you don't trust that for some reason, its not hard to point it at a wall or put a duster over it while wearing your tin foil hat...
"You can disable various features such as video in the privacy settings, and if you don't trust that for some reason, its not hard to point it at a wall or put a duster over it while wearing your tin foil hat..."
Actually, I don't think that this is a tin-foil hat type argument at this point in time.
Really, when you consider the size and scope of the newly revealed spying and intelligence gathering operations especially in the US, and add in that Microsoft is an American company (at best subject to the laws that enable that scheme and at worst an active participant in them) and about to place mandated (for the console to work) HD video cameras in many living rooms and bedrooms around the world, it's not a paranoid leap to get to a thought that those video cameras could be used by the US intelligence services in some way.
Especially when you consider that the recent revelations are probably just the tip of the iceberg and of projects started some time ago - other newer ones will already be running too.
Is this even news? Anyone with half a brain won't be going anywhere near the Xbox One with it's dumb DRM (even the cut-back DRM).
If you want some real news, rather than talking about how the PS4 doesn't come with a Kinect gimmick, how about that Sony are rumored to be offering up a killer PS4/Vita bundle for only a little more than the standard price, or how the Vita can be used as a controller/2nd screen.
http://www.videogamer.com/news/ps4_and_ps_vita_bundle_coming_for_around_500_rumour.html
"Like how pretty much any tablet or phone can via SmartGlass on the Xbox One you mean?"
No, because the Vita is a proper console not a screen. You can walk away and take the game with you, play on the move and then come back and contine with the full blown console version.
So on a very basic level, it's like the Wii-U, Smartglass, PSP/PS3 combo. But so much more besides.
It's called "Cross Play".
http://www.vg247.com/2013/05/29/ps4-ps-vita-cross-play-support-mandatory-for-all-games-report/
"Anyone with half a brain won't be going anywhere near the Xbox One with it's dumb DRM (even the cut-back DRM)."
But plenty of us with an entire brain remaining have worked out that the proposed changes are actually an advantage to most users...
To be able to lend your games to multiple users without having to give them a disk and play your games anywhere without the disk would have been great....
As seems exactly the same policy as on the existing Xbox360.
I switched back to my PC for gaming a few years ago and just let my gold subscription lapse. No problem, if I want to play online games I'll sign up again.
Recently signed up to Netflix and thought "Oh, I think my 360 supports that" - installed the client and was promptly told that it wouldn't run until I purchased gold.
You might not like it, but Xbox policy would seem to be "anything that comes over that network socket, apart from game purchases and patches requires gold"
Personally don't really have an issue with it - just if they came out and simply said it, then life would be easier for all.
Is that actually the Playstation Plus sub? They've just rolled online MP requirement into that?
Disingenuous is the word for sure. Mostly, though, because although online gaming may now have been made pay-to-play on PS4, like XBOX360 has always been and XBOX One will continue to be, the writer failed to mention it was PS+ and that PS+ itself is pretty damned good value.
I must have had over £200 of top notch commercial games from the last year of PS+, including stuff like Battlefield3, The Cave, LBP Karting and some others I already had like Infamous, Bioshock, Assassin's Creed and so on.
So, rolling online MP into PS+ as a requirement is a bit of a blow to folks enjoying free MP on the PS3 admittedly, but I doubt everything else they discover comes with PS+ will keep them frowning for long.
Of course if it isn't part of PS+ (can't see it being a separate paid-for thing) then that's different.
Yeah PSN+ is actually worth the price of admission, if you approach it like the old Sega Channel of the mid 90's. Right now MicroSoft are supposedly giving away Two Games each Month up to the launch of the next FailBox. I don't know if you get to keep these or not though. The bigger question is what happens after the launch, of the FailBox, and PS4?
The differences between Xbox Live Gold and Playstation Plus are gettings smaller all the time.
You may like to know that Microsoft have recently launched something they are calling Games for Gold that gets you free games if you have an xbox live gold account. They are releasing a different game for free every 2 weeks. So far I've had Fable 3, Assassins Creed 2 and Crackdown. Next week it should be Dead Rising 2.
Microsoft need a better marketing department because only 1 of my friends with Xbox live gold had heard about it before I told them.
The real news story should be the PS4 will start charging for things that are currently free on ps3 like online games.
I'm glad I'm not planning to buy either for at least a couple of years, they will both be down to sensible prices by then and I can make a decision based on what games are available rather than a list of similar numbers and a price.
If this means we will be getting more games servers I do not mind, PSN+ free games are worth it, I joined to get a few just over a month ago. (ICO & LBP Karting)
I told my wife I had joined PS+.
Then she saw the free games, asled how much and was gobsmacked at £4 a month.
Currently playing Spec Ops the Line before the Survivor play through of TLOU
It's been pretty common knowledge that these features would require Xbox live gold. The DVR saves are stored on the cloud storage, last time I checked that cost money. why should freeloaders and people who do not wish to pay for a service get the same features as people prepared to pay for Xbox live gold. the way this is reported its as though MS is charging more for XBL gold when it's the same price
Because Microsoft made them pay for it from the start. Including stuff like Netflix and Lovefilm where they get the privilege of paying _again_ for stuff they already paid for elsewhere.
The more sensible question should is 'Why should XBOX players have to pay for stuff other console gamers get for free, especially if they already paid the provider for that feature/service elsewhere'.
Why the feck is this 'Game DVR BS' even a thing? Who the hell has been screaming for this?
Its not like you can post your crap on YouTube anymore without having EA, MicorSoft, Nintendo or S0NY sending out a C&D Letter to Youtube.
Beside if this really IS YOUR SATURDAY NIGHT THING, there are 1000's of other ways you could to the exact same thing, and never need an XBL! Gold Account...
So Microsoft continues its current policy of requiring an XBOX Live subscription to do anything online, suprising no one, and THAT's where you think the story is?
Whereas Sony abandoning its current policy of not charging for online gaming, and starting an identical subscription service, thus undoing much of the goodwill they gained, and removing one of the main reasons for getting a PS4 over an XBOX 180, that's deemed of such little importance it just rates an single sentence towards the end of the article?
Seriously, get your priorities straight. You completely missed the real story here.
No - Sony are not "starting an identical subscription service". They are making a PS+ subscription mandatory for most* online play. That's not great, though the PS market at large seems to have looked at it, decided that the subscription offers good value, and given a collective "meh, ok" response.
As far as anyone knows, and some of this has been confirmed by Sony, a PS+ sub will not be required for all the other online features. By contrast it looks like a Gold sub will be pretty much required if you want to do anything more than just play games on the Xbox**
Me, I won't be getting either at launch. I still haven't managed to play all the games I've already got.
* Apparently free to play games will also be free to play online
** I must be getting old, I still actually consider a games console to be a thing to play games on
The main difference between PS and XBOX networks is XBOX you need to pay to use things that you're already paying for (your internet connection) where as PS you need to pay for PSN infrastructure (multiplayer gaming) it's also disingenuous to talk about the PSN cost with out saying it allows you to get some very good deals on content.
Its also disingenuous to talk about Xbox live cost with out saying it give you discounts on arcade games not available to non gold customers, special offers on dlc and allows you to download 2 free games per month.
So Xbox live charges for Netflix (don't care, pirate bay is still free), Skype (Thats what I have a PC for) and Recording Videos of your games (don't care).
What do I get from PS+ for the extra £5 it currently costs from Amazon?
It's not surprising really, chances if you're going to be recording gameplay you'll already be on Xbox live gold anyway.
Any word on if Sony will do the same? They are charging for online play now at least.
I didn't subscribe to Xbox live back when I used to have a 360 and remember most services weren't available. I think they even wanted you to have to have gold to watch the iPlayer at one point.
I remember a there was talk of a subscription subsidised price that was going to be for the Xbox One that is the only way I could justify having both Xbox live and an Xbox One.
I thought at launch they annoyed & confused all the gamers by saying that it was not going to be a gaming centric device but more a total media system for the whole family - the centre of the living room etc... etc...
Making people (particularly non-gamers) pay twice for internet access, streaming services & skype doesn't strike me as a very clever way to achieve this? Unless most of their customers are morons of course - which thinking about it isn't an uncommonly held point of view.
Timmay you are wrong. Since there are other ways to access that content ie using pretty much every other connected device on the planet, they can't prevent you from accessing them in other ways.
Cable or Satellite channel provision is not at all like the internet. One is a broadcast content delivery system, The other is a (two way) communication network. Just because you can use the internet to also consume content doesn't make them in anyway the same thing.
I got the Xbox360 when it first came out, the PS3 didn't come out for over a year so I'm glad I did.
This time the next gen consoles will be released about the same time - nd there is likely to be a shortage on release.
I think the bundled Kinnect is well worth the £80 price differential so price isn't really an issue.
I think I'll wait for the reviews when they have both been released but I'm sure gatherer will just be a lot of bickering like there is here, over things that of very little importance to me.
Unless the PS4 is stunningly better than the XBOne I will probably go Microsoft again because I like the Kinnect.
There're really doesn't seem a lot of difference, I would probably be happy with either but will leave it a while before succumbing and buying one or the other. I'll probably walk into a shop and see an offer of a bundled game with one or the other and buy that one because its shiny.
I've got a PC. Windows XP (with Windows 7 and Linux as triplebooting depending on what I want to do). It's cost me a lot of money- but spread over about 10 years of upgrades. It'll play any game these new consoles can, and it'll play them better. BluRay? Check- I can even write them! Skype? Yup, and it's free. Internet connection? No... additional charge, that is! Of course it has an Internet connection.
Library of games? Oooooohhhh yeeeeaaaahhh. 20 years worth of top quality games, with emulators for the previous 20 (give or take...).
3D? Yup, since long before it was cool and, to some extent, built into any Direct3D (and probably OpenGL) game. Built in webcam? Only if I don't disable it. This is admittedly a complex procedure... *yoink on USB cable* Oh, no it isn't.
"But!" I hear you cry. "The PC doesn't have Kinect!" Yes it does, I retort. My PC has two of them plugged in simultaneously. And connects to Wiimotes. It'd use 'Move' controllers as well if they had any selling point ever.
Anyone buying a Console these days is in need of some serious head-checking. The PC is, was, and always will be (excluding a concerted effort from the manufacturers) the Very Best games platform there is. Microsoft could have beaten Sony into the ground if they'd just released a standardised-hardware 64-bit Windows 8 PC with a few bits to make it look 'game console-y'.
The Xbox has an external power supply for this reason:
The Leprechauns who make the power supply work are sensitive to the radiation emitted from the Kryptonite inside the console. Hence, MS had to locate the Leprechaun Power Generation unit outside the console.
The leprechauns can enter the console by climbing down the power cable, but they have to wear special hazmat suits and can only withstand the environment for a few minutes at a time.
Leprechaun Power Generation units can also be found in some modern cars. These are the cars fuelled by "LPG".
:)
This post has been deleted by its author
Your first point; you're bitching about Microsoft because the non-Microsoft games developers don't include split-screen gaming in their games? I've just checked my 16 Xbox 360 games, and 11 of them do allow split-screen gaming, so I'm not sure what games you have.
Your second point about gaming in the same household is a valid one, though I thought some games did allow LAN-multiplayer gaming. However, I do that so rarely nowadays I can't recall whether that's still common.
This post has been deleted by its author
Got to love how Microsoft are charging for stuff that is free to use.
You cannot watch Youtube videos or use Skype, or even Netflix etc without paying for a Xbox Live account.
Well that has just decided it for me, I was going to get one but since they are turning in to another Apple then I am not going to buy one.
I will instead build a media pc which will be capable of much more, and won't cost me a yearly subscription to something that shouldn't be required.
What is it about Videogames that makes my fellow gamers turn into rabid baboons intent on murdering each other and shoving their big red asses in everyone's face?
Analysts had been saying for months that Sony were missing out on significant revenue by retaining a free online model, especially when taking into account server costs and other online services its users could get for free. In fact, a lot of gaming journalists (actual journalists, not those hacks at kotaku, ign, etc.) were supportive of the idea, because it would allow a gaming company to remain in the game and possibly produce better products.
I have no ill will for microsoft other than that they seem to be trying to take their customers for a ride; Sony is a bit more open about their policies and practices, and seem to have less restrictions in place.
When will my gaming brethren finally grow the fuck up and start acting like a mature customer base that rejects paid game reviews, rightfully criticizes DLC without simply buying it outright because of the effort involved in actually making a stand, and not settling for regurgitated adaptions of the same god damn thing (NFL, Madden, CoD, Battlefield, the list goes on).
Gaming should be treated in much the same fashino as is cinema, but for some reason, despite having been around for many years, people (including those who love the medium) don't seem to be taking it seriously.
This post has been deleted by its author
Have you even been reading the comments? It's come up in at least 2 or 3 of the different threads, although your wording is not entirely accurate. FYI, PS4 will require a PSN+ subscription for most online gaming, which includes other benefits. They aren't just "charging $50 for multiplayer".
Dear God, reading the comments so far I feel like I've wandered into a BBC Have Your Say section at the bottom of a mildly controversial story.
You have one comment saying black is white, gets 20 upvotes, 2 downvotes, the following reply says no way man, white is totally black, gets 25 upvotes and 4 downvotes. Are you people just agreeing to ALL the shit that's being spouted in here, is that what happens on Fridays??
The Register 
Biting the hand that feeds IT
Copyright. All rights reserved © 1998–2024
