Why did Microsoft kill PC gaming with it's own xbox?

Quoting ZehDon,

Quoting Savyg,
reply 74
...If the gameplay is SPECTACULAR but I couldn't care less about the game world, what's the point?

Did you really care that much about Super Mario Bros.' gameworld on the NES? Of course not. You played it because it was fun. Why is a fun game not enough? Gameplay - as in, the act of actually playing the game - is the most important part of the game. Unfortunately, this seems lost on people, who simply want World of Warcraft and Call of Duty and mistake Marketing Hype for gameplay.

Which is really unfortunate. I play games really for only one reason, to have fun. I have fun with my Wii. I had fun with my SNES and my NES too. I also had fun with my Playstation. I play games to have fun, and preferrably, have fun with other people but really the keyword here is fun. I don't care if its innovative, a multi-million dollar project or some game some guy or gal cooked up in their garage. If it's fun, that's what matters to me. I look for and pay for games that provide entertainment, whether that's a new series, something that has been running around the gaming sphere since I was born... who cares. If it's fun; I'm there.

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Alstein

Join Date 07/2004

+55

Quoting Savyg,

reply 72

Anyway, Nintendo is pretty much the only company in the gaming/tech world I have such disdain for. They've done some unique things in hardware, but pretty much everything they release is a remake of something they did twenty years ago and they aren't even competing outside of that.

I can't respect a company whose claim to fame is riding a popularity wave....for twenty freaking years. The hardware thing is interesting, but how long can they keep it up if their competitors are on the ball?

Maybe the Wiis success will revitalize the company and I'll see something worthwhile come out of it. But so far it's just more of the same.

It works well for them. Probably works a lot better then making stuff with gray space marines. Nintendo's market is not the same market as the rest of the industry.

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Quoting ZehDon,

reply 75

Did you really care that much about Super Mario Bros.' gameworld on the NES? Of course not. You played it because it was fun. Why is a fun game not enough? Gameplay - as in, the act of actually playing the game - is the most important part of the game. Unfortunately, this seems lost on people, who simply want World of Warcraft and Call of Duty and mistake Marketing Hype for gameplay.

You know, I was eight years old when I played Super Mario Bros. I'm 31 now. Ask me 23 years ago what I liked about SMB and we'll talk.

There are hundreds of games fighting for my dollars and I can be as picky as I damn well please.

I own WoW but haven't subscribed to it in ages. I haven't played Modern Warfare 2 and don't intend to. Haven't played a Halo game since 2 (except a bit of 3 at a friends house.)

I do want gameplay. I also want new experiences. New characters. New worlds. Hardware that isn't five years behind the rest of the pack. That I prefer M rated games also has something to do with it (I generally avoid things rated below T.)

So gameplay? Yeah, I can go for that. As long as the rest is there to complete the package.

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Quoting ZehDon,

reply 75

Quoting Savyg, reply 74...If the gameplay is SPECTACULAR but I couldn't care less about the game world, what's the point?

Did you really care that much about Super Mario Bros.' gameworld on the NES? Of course not. You played it because it was fun. Why is a fun game not enough? Gameplay - as in, the act of actually playing the game - is the most important part of the game. Unfortunately, this seems lost on people, who simply want World of Warcraft and Call of Duty and mistake Marketing Hype for gameplay.

Its strategy that makes a game fun, strategy dictates how that game is played out. if you just have game play then all you have there is play and that is it. Many games have failed because thats all they really had was play. A lot of people get the strategy of a game and how it works and the gameplay confused really. Also, yea I did actually try to explore super mario brothers,that is how I found all the warps, that is how I knew which pipes I could go into, and so on.

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Quoting OMG_blackmage,

reply 79

Quoting ZehDon,
reply 75

Quoting Savyg, reply 74...If the gameplay is SPECTACULAR but I couldn't care less about the game world, what's the point?

Did you really care that much about Super Mario Bros.' gameworld on the NES? Of course not. You played it because it was fun. Why is a fun game not enough? Gameplay - as in, the act of actually playing the game - is the most important part of the game. Unfortunately, this seems lost on people, who simply want World of Warcraft and Call of Duty and mistake Marketing Hype for gameplay.

Its strategy that makes a game fun, strategy dictates how that game is played out. if you just have game play then all you have there is play and that is it. Many games have failed because thats all they really had was play. A lot of people get the strategy of a game and how it works and the gameplay confused really. Also, yea I did actually try to explore super mario brothers,that is how I found all the warps, that is how I knew which pipes I could go into, and so on.

I am sure you are not suggesting that a lot of Nintendo's first party games are failures when many of them are big successes, as in some of the only games that have never really dropped in price since launch and still sell very well?

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Quoting Nesrie,

reply 80

Quoting OMG_blackmage, reply 79

Quoting ZehDon,
reply 75

Quoting Savyg, reply 74...If the gameplay is SPECTACULAR but I couldn't care less about the game world, what's the point?

Did you really care that much about Super Mario Bros.' gameworld on the NES? Of course not. You played it because it was fun. Why is a fun game not enough? Gameplay - as in, the act of actually playing the game - is the most important part of the game. Unfortunately, this seems lost on people, who simply want World of Warcraft and Call of Duty and mistake Marketing Hype for gameplay.

Its strategy that makes a game fun, strategy dictates how that game is played out. if you just have game play then all you have there is play and that is it. Many games have failed because thats all they really had was play. A lot of people get the strategy of a game and how it works and the gameplay confused really. Also, yea I did actually try to explore super mario brothers,that is how I found all the warps, that is how I knew which pipes I could go into, and so on.

I am sure you are not suggesting that a lot of Nintendo's first party games are failures when many of them are big successes, as in some of the only games that have never really dropped in price since launch and still sell very well?

I would love to know how you

1. come to an assumption I was singling any one let alone nintendo's games out as a failure?

2. Do you get what I mean when I say "strategy dictates how that game is played out"?

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Quoting OMG_blackmage,

reply 81

Quoting Nesrie,
reply 80

Quoting OMG_blackmage, reply 79

Quoting ZehDon,
reply 75

Quoting Savyg, reply 74...If the gameplay is SPECTACULAR but I couldn't care less about the game world, what's the point?

Did you really care that much about Super Mario Bros.' gameworld on the NES? Of course not. You played it because it was fun. Why is a fun game not enough? Gameplay - as in, the act of actually playing the game - is the most important part of the game. Unfortunately, this seems lost on people, who simply want World of Warcraft and Call of Duty and mistake Marketing Hype for gameplay.

Its strategy that makes a game fun, strategy dictates how that game is played out. if you just have game play then all you have there is play and that is it. Many games have failed because thats all they really had was play. A lot of people get the strategy of a game and how it works and the gameplay confused really. Also, yea I did actually try to explore super mario brothers,that is how I found all the warps, that is how I knew which pipes I could go into, and so on.

I am sure you are not suggesting that a lot of Nintendo's first party games are failures when many of them are big successes, as in some of the only games that have never really dropped in price since launch and still sell very well?

I would love to know how you

1. come to an assumption I was singling any one let alone nintendo's games out as a failure?

2. Do you get what I mean when I say "strategy dictates how that game is played out"?

You must have missed the question mark at the end my sentence. I didn't miss yours, so I will actually attempt to answer your question. No, I do not believe strategy dictated the game play of SMB, so I don't know what you mean by that.

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SavyG has a point about Nintendo though...

Sure, the gameplay concepts in their newer franchise titles are generally new and 'fresh,' but Nintendo's also marketing to easily the most idiotic market on the planet... Kids.

Kids don't see the Gameplay, the Gameworld, or the Strategy of a game... They see Mario, Kirby, Sonic, what-have-you, and piss and moan until their parents buy them the game with their favorite character in it. This is obviously not their fault, however.

In reality, it's no ones fault exactly. Using that exact phrase is a misnomer in all honesty, but as I can't find the way I want to articulate this, I'm sticking with the fault thing...

It's the parents fault. PC Gaming 'dying,' Nintendo's Popularized Marketing, Developer and Publisher lack of commitment towards PC Gaming/Gamers... It's all a result of one thing... The Parents, and the blatant misconception many of them have about gaming.

"Gaming is bad." You would die if you'd heard this as many times as I have. Granted, I have thick skin in that regard thanks to where I grew up... Predominantly white community, (I'm white as they come,) heavy religious values, (as twisted as these particular ones are,) and a high priority on 'Over-Achieving.' If you can guess where I live without having prior knowledge, I'll give you a virtual cookie. BTW, this is a preface.

In this particular type of community, sports and family activities are the only form of 'Fun' that is broadly accepted. I have nothing against either of those things. Where I have a problem, is that the parents don't let their kids make their own choices, and furthermore, they refuse to help their kids make a good choice when it comes down to it. This is further preface.

Due to Parents lack of involvement, believe it or not, children look at video games as a way to shut off their brains and shoot shit. There is no real thinking involved in... I'd say 90% of today's video games, barring the Strategy Genre's entirely. How is this the parents fault though? Easy, I'll tell you. Rather than find good, intelligent games for their kids, games that might make them think, they've used video games for the last twenty years as a way to get them to shut the hell up for a couple hours. Most gamers don't come to this conclusion when thinking about why Video Games are 8 hour stints when they used to be 50-hour adventures that could take multiple weeks to complete. People in their mid-to-late 20's, their 30's, and their 40's right now, lived through what some of us might refer to as the 'Golden Age' of gaming, where, despite 8-bit graphics, Midi SFX, and having only 3 'Action Buttons,' games were a mental exercise, requiring you to think long and hard about how you approached every challenge, every puzzle, and then learn from your mistakes with each attempt.

Now, I'm almost 21, meaning that I technically did not grow up in that Golden Age. In fact, I grew up just after it's close. So how do I claim to know any of this? Well, I got lucky. First game I ever played was on an old something-or-other 1600. An F-16 Flight Simulator. Doesn't sound stimulating, does it? And it was mostly me crashing into Boeing 747's and the ground... Until my old man taught me how to fly. I would be hooked forever after that, and contrary to the touching nature of this story, my old man would come to resent that for the next 18 years. (Possibly longer, we'll see what he says about it on his death bed.)

Because of the nature of this encounter, which was my first memory ever, I've had the... Well, both the fortune, and misfortune, of being able to see both sides of the fence while remaining perched atop it precariously, and again, both fortunately and unfortunately, been able to appreciate both sides for what they are.

But because of my position, I can see the problems with both sides, and can tell you, the grass is greener on the Intelligent side... Until it gets frustrating. Mindless time-wasters are necessary to the gaming industry. But currently they dominate it, and that's not how it should be. They should be the games we're spending 2-5 hours a week on, and the Intelligent games are the ones that should be taking up the entire rest of that portion. Instead, people are able to Grind away at WoW for 30+ hours a week, or shoot people in the face over and over again for as long... All because Parents decided to not take an intelligent approach to the games they bought for their children... Now kids are desensitized to the mindless stupidity that is a weekend of WoW or Halo MP, and will probably never know the joy of a game like Quest For Glory. As a result of this, the Publishers and Developers can exploit this lack of sensitivity, requiring them to put no real effort into making good games... It just has to be 'Good enough.'

Granted, some people bring a whole new level of strategy, tactics, and planning, to games like WoW or Halo or what-have-you, but these are the exceptions, not the rule. We live in a culture where any slightly large-ish amount of gaming is considered bad, and believe it or not, I tend to agree, but not because of the nature of gaming. I agree because of the nature of the games themselves. It's true, that while I do look for intelligent games to play, being in the lovely position that I am, I also have my own collection of mindless hack'n'slash type games, or shoot'em ups... I even played Halo MP once upon a time.

But once I'd beaten the Story modes, I rarely played those games for any more than a few hours at a time. Only time I would ever consider spending a whole weekend on WoW is if I had a great group of friends to play it with. The same for a game like Halo. Because of the nature of my community, this has been an impossibility, and that has left me much time to contemplate these problems.

We need parents who are willing to say no to their kids, and when they ask why not, have the intestinal fortitude to respond, "Because it's stupid, there are bound to be much funner games out there." But before that, we need games, proper games, that these parents can allude to without being liars. See the paradox we've gotten ourselves into?

I hope, for the sake of my future children, that we can break this cycle... I'm not holding my breath.

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Quoting RikazeMA,

reply 83

SavyG has a point about Nintendo though...

Sure, the gameplay concepts in their newer franchise titles are generally new and 'fresh,' but Nintendo's also marketing to easily the most idiotic market on the planet... Kids.

Kids don't see the Gameplay, the Gameworld, or the Strategy of a game... They see Mario, Kirby, Sonic, what-have-you, and piss and moan until their parents buy them the game with their favorite character in it. This is obviously not their fault, however.

In reality, it's no ones fault exactly. Using that exact phrase is a misnomer in all honesty, but as I can't find the way I want to articulate this, I'm sticking with the fault thing...

It's the parents fault. PC Gaming 'dying,' Nintendo's Popularized Marketing, Developer and Publisher lack of commitment towards PC Gaming/Gamers... It's all a result of one thing... The Parents, and the blatant misconception many of them have about gaming.

"Gaming is bad." You would die if you'd heard this as many times as I have. Granted, I have thick skin in that regard thanks to where I grew up... Predominantly white community, (I'm white as they come,) heavy religious values, (as twisted as these particular ones are,) and a high priority on 'Over-Achieving.' If you can guess where I live without having prior knowledge, I'll give you a virtual cookie. BTW, this is a preface.

In this particular type of community, sports and family activities are the only form of 'Fun' that is broadly accepted. I have nothing against either of those things. Where I have a problem, is that the parents don't let their kids make their own choices, and furthermore, they refuse to help their kids make a good choice when it comes down to it. This is further preface.

Due to Parents lack of involvement, believe it or not, children look at video games as a way to shut off their brains and shoot shit. There is no real thinking involved in... I'd say 90% of today's video games, barring the Strategy Genre's entirely. How is this the parents fault though? Easy, I'll tell you. Rather than find good, intelligent games for their kids, games that might make them think, they've used video games for the last twenty years as a way to get them to shut the hell up for a couple hours. Most gamers don't come to this conclusion when thinking about why Video Games are 8 hour stints when they used to be 50-hour adventures that could take multiple weeks to complete. People in their mid-to-late 20's, their 30's, and their 40's right now, lived through what some of us might refer to as the 'Golden Age' of gaming, where, despite 8-bit graphics, Midi SFX, and having only 3 'Action Buttons,' games were a mental exercise, requiring you to think long and hard about how you approached every challenge, every puzzle, and then learn from your mistakes with each attempt.

Now, I'm almost 21, meaning that I technically did not grow up in that Golden Age. In fact, I grew up just after it's close. So how do I claim to know any of this? Well, I got lucky. First game I ever played was on an old something-or-other 1600. An F-16 Flight Simulator. Doesn't sound stimulating, does it? And it was mostly me crashing into Boeing 747's and the ground... Until my old man taught me how to fly. I would be hooked forever after that, and contrary to the touching nature of this story, my old man would come to resent that for the next 18 years. (Possibly longer, we'll see what he says about it on his death bed.)

Because of the nature of this encounter, which was my first memory ever, I've had the... Well, both the fortune, and misfortune, of being able to see both sides of the fence while remaining perched atop it precariously, and again, both fortunately and unfortunately, been able to appreciate both sides for what they are.

But because of my position, I can see the problems with both sides, and can tell you, the grass is greener on the Intelligent side... Until it gets frustrating. Mindless time-wasters are necessary to the gaming industry. But currently they dominate it, and that's not how it should be. They should be the games we're spending 2-5 hours a week on, and the Intelligent games are the ones that should be taking up the entire rest of that portion. Instead, people are able to Grind away at WoW for 30+ hours a week, or shoot people in the face over and over again for as long... All because Parents decided to not take an intelligent approach to the games they bought for their children... Now kids are desensitized to the mindless stupidity that is a weekend of WoW or Halo MP, and will probably never know the joy of a game like Quest For Glory. As a result of this, the Publishers and Developers can exploit this lack of sensitivity, requiring them to put no real effort into making good games... It just has to be 'Good enough.'

Granted, some people bring a whole new level of strategy, tactics, and planning, to games like WoW or Halo or what-have-you, but these are the exceptions, not the rule. We live in a culture where any slightly large-ish amount of gaming is considered bad, and believe it or not, I tend to agree, but not because of the nature of gaming. I agree because of the nature of the games themselves. It's true, that while I do look for intelligent games to play, being in the lovely position that I am, I also have my own collection of mindless hack'n'slash type games, or shoot'em ups... I even played Halo MP once upon a time.

But once I'd beaten the Story modes, I rarely played those games for any more than a few hours at a time. Only time I would ever consider spending a whole weekend on WoW is if I had a great group of friends to play it with. The same for a game like Halo. Because of the nature of my community, this has been an impossibility, and that has left me much time to contemplate these problems.

We need parents who are willing to say no to their kids, and when they ask why not, have the intestinal fortitude to respond, "Because it's stupid, there are bound to be much funner games out there." But before that, we need games, proper games, that these parents can allude to without being liars. See the paradox we've gotten ourselves into?

I hope, for the sake of my future children, that we can break this cycle... I'm not holding my breath.

Really, because where I from while people did love mindless shooters, the games that dominated were always sports games; NFL, Y2K, and so on. But, there was one game that dominated over any game you could possibly mention, and that game was monopoly. I had never seen a group of people get so wow until I was younger and sat with a group of people (friends, neighbors) and played with them. I still laugh at the very thought of some of the people would almost get into fist fights over fake money, and Uno was just as bad. Wasn't until recently I actually learned that everyone has their own underground rules for uno from where they came from.

Sidenote; F-16 Flight Simulator, are you serious, JR air force ROTC couldn't keep me away from their flight simulators.

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Quoting RikazeMA,

reply 83

SavyG has a point about Nintendo though...

Sure, the gameplay concepts in their newer franchise titles are generally new and 'fresh,' but Nintendo's also marketing to easily the most idiotic market on the planet... Kids.

Kids don't see the Gameplay, the Gameworld, or the Strategy of a game... They see Mario, Kirby, Sonic, what-have-you, and piss and moan until their parents buy them the game with their favorite character in it. This is obviously not their fault, however.

It's not just kids who are buying or influencing the purchase of Wiis and playing the games though. I understand what you are saying, and while I might partially agree, that doesn't change the fact that Wii is approachable and fun. I mean I really think it's that simple. I just got back form my aunt and uncle's house, and we spent a huge amount of time playing Mario Kart, Wii Fit and Rayman Rabbid games. Mario was the most successful for our group which includes myself, primarily a strategy game player, my uncle, also a strategy gamer and part of my L4D group, his son who is more than a decade younger than me and my aunt whose primary game is Farmville. Mario Kart is easy to play but not that easy to master so it offers enough for the person who can barely stay "in" the tracks and those of us battling for 1st and 2nd place through tactics and luck.There really isn't another console and certainly not the PC that offers this kind of group, easy to get into fun. Out of those three games, only one of them is a retake/remake of an older Nintendo game and one of them is eve a third party title.

Some people want to dismiss and belittle Nintendo and the Wii because it's not their thing (not necessarily referring to the personI quoted). I don't think it has to be everyones "thing" to be a successful and valuable "thing", and I don't think the fact that I love playing on the Wii means that I need dumbed down games or am sucked into clever marketing ploys or can't handle deep games. I wouldn't even be on these forums if there wasn't a deep game or two that guided me here.

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The reason microsoft pushes the Xbox 360 for gaming instead of the PC is that it is a proprietary system. The hardware, that is. That means they can - and do - get a share of every title sold on the Xbox, while they get nothing on PC sales. That is why both Sony and MS didn't mind selling the boxes on a loss.

Also, most obviously, titles like Mass Effect, Halo, and Gears of War were released on Xbox, taking a year before being released on PC. Obviously, that year was due almost entirely to marketing reasons. They were Xbox sellers. But that was when the Xbox (360) was new. Now the boxes has been sold, additional sales will be fairly minor, so this is not so big a concern anymore.

Microsoft wants money. This is no surprise, nor a bad thing, as such. The ideal situation for Microsoft would be:

1: Windows is the default OS for office machines.
2: Windows is the default OS for home PC's.
3: The home gaming platform of choice is the Xbox series. (Not PC).

However, there is reasons PC's are not going to disappear as gaming platforms. First and foremost:
The PC is the only feasible hobbyist development platform. Wether you're a modder or amateur game designer, you use a PC. That is the platform for which most game programmers and designers START OUT ON. That makes it the natural platform for game development for almost all programmers out there. And that means gaming will never STOP being a PC thing.

The reason for Microsoft's seeming confusion on the subject isn't. They are willing to spend resources to make some titles 'Xbox launch vehicles', but really, the Xbox is out, it's fairly ubiquitous, Microsoft just needs to let it remain that way, so they push nowhere near as hard now. And they don't MIND the PC being a gaming platform - that is partially the reason why PC won over MAC's on the home front, and Intel, Nvidia, etc. would be very cross with Microsoft if they tried to change that.

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kyogre12

Join Date 07/2008

+100

Quoting Nesrie,

reply 85

Quoting RikazeMA,
reply 83
SavyG has a point about Nintendo though...

Sure, the gameplay concepts in their newer franchise titles are generally new and 'fresh,' but Nintendo's also marketing to easily the most idiotic market on the planet... Kids.

Kids don't see the Gameplay, the Gameworld, or the Strategy of a game... They see Mario, Kirby, Sonic, what-have-you, and piss and moan until their parents buy them the game with their favorite character in it. This is obviously not their fault, however.

It's not just kids who are buying or influencing the purchase of Wiis and playing the games though. I understand what you are saying, and while I might partially agree, that doesn't change the fact that Wii is approachable and fun. I mean I really think it's that simple. I just got back form my aunt and uncle's house, and we spent a huge amount of time playing Mario Kart, Wii Fit and Rayman Rabbid games. Mario was the most successful for our group which includes myself, primarily a strategy game player, my uncle, also a strategy gamer and part of my L4D group, his son who is more than a decade younger than me and my aunt whose primary game is Farmville. Mario Kart is easy to play but not that easy to master so it offers enough for the person who can barely stay "in" the tracks and those of us battling for 1st and 2nd place through tactics and luck.There really isn't another console and certainly not the PC that offers this kind of group, easy to get into fun. Out of those three games, only one of them is a retake/remake of an older Nintendo game and one of them is eve a third party title.

Some people want to dismiss and belittle Nintendo and the Wii because it's not their thing (not necessarily referring to the personI quoted). I don't think it has to be everyones "thing" to be a successful and valuable "thing", and I don't think the fact that I love playing on the Wii means that I need dumbed down games or am sucked into clever marketing ploys or can't handle deep games. I wouldn't even be on these forums if there wasn't a deep game or two that guided me here.

I agree 100% There isn't really anything else I can say

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