Why Game Exclusivity Deals Are Feeding the Hate 205
Parz writes "The recent announcement that the upcoming Ghostbusters game will be a timed PlayStation exclusive in the PAL territories — revealed a mere month before release — has set a nasty precedent which could have long-term repercussions for the industry. This Gameplayer article explores how this generation of gaming has spiraled into a tit-for-tat war on third-party exclusivity deals instigated by Sony and Microsoft, and the effect it is having on the psychology of the consumers. The Ghostbusters developers aren't pleased by Sony's deal, and the Guardian questions whether the game will be big enough to really affect console sales."
Stupid article (Score:5, Insightful)
So when Sony does it, its bad; but when Microsoft does it, its ok?
Seems like the author is just pissed that he has to wait for the game.
Now you know how PS3 owners felt about Bioshock, Fallout 3 DLC, etc.
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BioShock had Xbox DLC? If I recall it was the PS3 that got the bonus levels, all 350 owners got was horse armor and post-it notes -er bonus plasmids and achievements.
Re:Stupid article (Score:5, Informative)
It was an Xbox360 exclusive for a year. I think that's what he's referring to. Not the DLC.
Waiting a year but getting a couple of extra levels? I would take the earlier launch date.
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I think he meant the game asa whole getting a big delay for the PS3 and the port being crap AFAIK. Dunno why you'd buy that for a console anyway, the PC version is a LOT cheaper...
Re:Stupid article (Score:5, Insightful)
This is very different. Bioshock for example was originally developed as a 360 game, which was later ported to the PS3, by a different developer. This is a situation where the games are finished, one month before release, and Sony decides they want to screw european gamers.
And it's the regional nature too. If Sony had managed to secure a worldwide deal, I might have more understanding. But selectively screwing european gamers is just very poor.
I never heard anyone praising cash-buyout exclusivity, apart from Sony fans defending screwy deals like this one.
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Screwing the entire world wouldn't make it any more right. I suspect Sony would have done it if they could have worked it out. Licensing and retail deals makes these kinds of deals complicated over multiple regions.
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Well, then it means that those of us in europe will just have to import american copies of the game in order to play it... I travel on business quite a lot so that really isn't an issue for me.
But in order to play copies we bought legitimately in the US, we have to have a modchip...
But since we have a modchip anyway, it just becomes more convenient to download the us version rather than buy it.
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They made mod chips illegal in the UK [zdnet.co.uk] back in 2004, though they are legal in Spain and Italy.
Phillip.
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No, this is generally NOT OK.
I am really angry at many game companies. They make really cool games, but don't care to make them available everywhere.
Game consoles have regional restrictions. The "EU PAL region", I am living in, gets cool games about 11 months after the US/NTSC region. And now I am still waiting for my game that was release in September last year in US. It won't come anymore, the company (well known) told me. Instead they released a boring childish one here as an alternative that the US regi
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I agree with you totally...
This is 2009, not 1980, worldwide communication is common and affordable, as is worldwide travel. I have tons of people i speak to online who are in foreign countries, and i often use websites (slashdot being one) that have content contributed by people all over the world. If a game comes out somewhere else and it's any good i will come across people i know playing it, i don't want to be told i can't play this game because i'm a foreigner... That's racial discrimination and should
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- Since Europe and the US have citizens from every race on the planet (and perhaps a few off-planet...) I don't know how you can say that. Perhaps you mean "geographical discrimination"?
- "Should be illegal" - why? As an owner, you may decide how your work or art is displayed, sold, licensed etc. Why must you be forced to distribute it in a certain geographic region (especially when you have to cover the cost of manufacturing, distribution, merch
Region coding (Score:2)
Why must you be forced to distribute it in a certain geographic region (especially when you have to cover the cost of manufacturing, distribution, merchandising etc)? Would get us rapidly to the point where nothing would be created as the cost of being forced to distribute it (as it would be "illegal" not to do so...) in every territory that wanted it would be prohibitively expensive.
So you choose not to spend money on distributing a work in a given territory. In a free market, people in that territory could import the product from a territory where you do distribute it. Region locking is the only thing standing in the way of this. So how is it cost prohibitive not to region-lock a game, unless it's for Wii?
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That's just being silly.
I make games, and they get a worldwide release on the first day.
But *IF* I wanted to only sell my games to people who live in a specific geographical area, that's up to me. it's MY product, I made it, not you.
if you cook some roast chicken, do I barge into your house and start telling you how much to put on which plate? of course not, it's YOUR meal.
you might think I'd be stupid to only sell to specific groups of people, and you might be right, but I defend my right as the creator of
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The whole PAL/NTSC issue is really caused by differing video standards - the frame rate is usually no biggie for games (the engine can adapt), but the resolution difference is a tricky one as it requires most bitmap data to be resized, ruining pixel-perfect graphics and fine details.
The good thing about HDTV is the resolutions are now the same, only the framerates differ (50hz vs 60hz). This should greatly minimize the technical justification for region coding. It doesn't address the political reasons, bu
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It might also be why PS3 games are not region coded.
In fact, there are already threads discussing importing the US version of FFXIII to the UK when its released, instead of waiting the inevitable 6-12 months for Square to finish all the language localizations for the Europe release.
Re:Stupid article (Score:5, Insightful)
Now you know how PS3 owners felt about Bioshock, Fallout 3 DLC, etc.
Or in regards to Fallout 3; those of us who bought the game via Steam and then wanted to buy the DLC as it arrived.
For those that don't know Microsoft has retained exclusive distribution rights for Fallout DLC; which means that there are no DLC for PS3 what so ever (from what I have read and heard) and if want to buy the DLC for the PC version you have to do it through Games For Windows Live. Something that means (if you bought it the game through Steam) that you have to install the GFWL client stuff and mess around with that.
My personal experience was that first the "Live" button inside the Fallout menus would send me to the xBox Marketplace and not give me ANY information on how to go to the PC Marketplace; eventually I start the client through Windows and get the correct list of software; I search through and find the Fallout DLC; but when I press the "buy Microsoft Points" button (yeah you can't pay with money directly for reasons that appear to be entirely motivated by the desire to suck more out of their customers) it sends me to my Hotmail inbox in another browser window (happend over and over). So you know what? I decide that the DLC is TOO much trouble. I wanted to play through Fallout 3 again with the DLC, but it just turns out of be more aggravation than it is worth; and because I now have a faulty GFWL program installed my Fallout 3 version now refuses to Save games until the GFWL servers start working properly and authenticates my KEY (and remember this is my legal version running through Steam that GFWL decided to "lock").
In short, hurray for greed motivated distribution that directly hinders or counter a potential customers desire to enjoy a product.
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Gee, I wonder why PC game sales are dropping.
No moron (Score:2, Insightful)
Its bad when anybody does it (especially Microsoft)
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ow you know how PS3 owners felt about Bioshock, Fallout 3 DLC, etc.
PS3 owners were pretty stupid to have bought those games on a console instead of the PC. They got what they deserved.
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I was unaware that they had Fallout 3 for OpenBSD, nor did I know that Bioshock runs natively on Ubuntu.
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and the GTA4 DLC
Thank you for this post, I don't have mod points today so a response will have to do.
I also own a PS3, I love it, I'm very happy with it but apparently if we get something exclusive then companies are EVIL yet ironically if Microsoft gets something exclusive they are business savvy!
Jesus christ...
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The whole deal is fanboy fodder (Score:5, Insightful)
You're damned if you do and you're damned if you don't.
I can't count the number of people complaining about lost exclusives and lack of obtaining them... now that they are stepping up, the stories come out on how it's bad...
So you have a choice. Piss of fanboys by not getting exclusives or piss off fanboys for getting them and obtaining sales.
I'm not a fan of exclusiveness in itself. It limits consumer choice. Choice in the best hardware to run their favorite games in this case. I personally think there's only one company right now that can win that war, and it's not Sony.
Expectations (Score:5, Insightful)
A big, shiny prize was dangled in front of people and it's been snatched away at the last second. Of course people are going to be angry.
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Where are my mod points when I need them?
+1 Insightful. (and probably +1 Incite-ful also :) )
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Give examples, or I'll assume you're full of shit. When has a multiplatform game turned timed exclusive a month before release?
I have never seen anything like it in my entire life, so give me a list of the "lots of times". Really, go on.
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I personally think there's only one company right now that can win that war, and it's not Sony.
One company has already won it and it's Nintendo.
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I can't count the number of people complaining about lost exclusives and lack of obtaining them
Can't count them but I'd estimate their number to be less than 5% of people who are annoyed by exclusives. You have to be REALLY into the pointless console wars to crow that people like you who bought console A get to play a game before people who bought console B. Most gamers actually aren't.
The problem is that those people who are dumb enough to like it when they can play it and the other console cant, are also people who don't know when to shut up, or actually don't care but are trolling. People who d
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I can't count the number of people complaining about lost exclusives and lack of obtaining them
Can't count them but I'd estimate their number to be less than 5% of people who are annoyed by exclusives. You have to be REALLY into the pointless console wars to crow that people like you who bought console A get to play a game before people who bought console B. Most gamers actually aren't.
Exactly; fanboys always overestimate their own importance and how much of the market they make up. Or they think they "deserve" something for this downright sad and uni-directional loyalty to some corporate entity and a piece of hardware.
Some people will latch onto anything for the tiniest sense of tribalism, but that doesn't make it any less pitiful.
And if someone whines because their own pathetic sense of self-worth by proxy (not that it's about the console really anyway- that's just a means to an end
Microsoft Invented It (Score:5, Insightful)
Schwab
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Re:Microsoft Invented It (Score:5, Interesting)
Halo was going to be a Mac game until Microsoft bought Bungie. Then it was an Xbox exclusive for awhile and was later released on both PC and Mac.
Re:Microsoft Invented It (Score:4, Insightful)
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You have to understand, Bungie was one of the last great Mac developers and have proven themselves numerous times. Even if Halo was scripted at the time, it was a big carrot showing what was to come.
Making excuses, you are doing it right. (Score:2)
Sorry, no. It wasn't. It was FIRST supposed to be a PC shooter with a Mac client as well. NO x-box. That was in fact the reason Halo was seriously delayed, because MS insisted they suddenly re-develop the product to fit on the X-box. A major task as the x-box even at its peak was seriously underpowered compared to a PC.
But hey, not only do you get the facts wrong. You also then still make excuses because Mac isn't that big a market and you handily skip the fact that the PC version was shipped ages later de
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Didn't Nintendo invent it with the NES publishing contract requiring that the game is NES-exclusive? Ironically they seem to do the least to bribe third parties into Wii exclusivity now though the different hardware still leads to plenty of exclusives.
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Nintendo only forced companies to buy carts only from them and in certain quantities and they limited how many games a company could publish in hopes to keep the quality high. Which is what lead to Konami creating the Ultra brand.
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Given Nintendo's 2 year lead on the master system in Japan and it's year lead on the 7800 and the Master system meant they had more than enough time with no real competition establish the clear lead and in turn use it to do things like bully retailers.
Which gets back to my orig
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Didn't Nintendo invent it with the NES publishing contract requiring that the game is NES-exclusive?
Yes, and Nintendo got in antitrust trouble for locking out NES developers from making titles for Sega Master System, Atari 7800, or TurboGrafx-16.
Ironically they seem to do the least to bribe third parties into Wii exclusivity now though the different hardware still leads to plenty of exclusives.
Among console makers, Microsoft makes it easy for a smaller game developer to publish on Xbox 360; Apple copied Microsoft's XNA model for its App Store. Nintendo, on the other hand, has stated on warioworld.com that it doesn't want to deal with the riff-raff.
Comment removed (Score:5, Informative)
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Problem is this exclusive thing only works if it is on a worldwide scale. If sony tries to pull that off for Europe only, almost all the people interested into the game simply will get an iso of the PC version of the game from a torrent tracker!
Sony after 15 years in the console business still has not understood a single thing how region zoning does not work and how does it work!
The only ones getting really screwed by the deal are the developers! I hope sony paid Atari enough to recoup the losses by the inc
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Keep in mind MS's lead over Sony isn't *that* big considering the year lead over them. If Sony can start taking even more sales in territories where MS isn't that strong then they're left only have to go after America which will be easier after having the others.
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English is not my native language.
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Exactly, every hardware vendor knows that exclusive titles can mean the customer buys more than one console if a game they REALLY want is only available one the one they don't currently have
OTOH, timed exclusivity like this one (the other platforms will get the game within 6 months, apparently) are less likely to have this effect. I don't know about you, but there are few games I want enough that I'd shell out for a new console just to be able to get 'em 6 months earlier.
Cheaper would be to buy a mod chip
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Cheaper would be to buy a mod chip and import the US version. (I'm not a big console user these days, but I assume this is still possible).
Why would you do this for the PS3 unless you want to pirate the game. All PS3 games are effectively region free and the only issue you would find is if you only had a standard Def TV but since the PS3 and the Xbox360 support High Def TV's there is no issue with importing PS3 games from anywhere in the world. Using a PS3 or Xbox360 on an SDTV IMHO is just a waste and in some cases the result is not that good.
Personally I don't mind waiting for a game since PS3 and Xbox games normally drop in price by 50% o
Twilight Princess was part of the Wii jailbreak (Score:2)
Using a PS3 or Xbox360 on an SDTV IMHO is just a waste
If you have 500 dollars/euros budgeted for a game console + controllers but not 1,100 dollars/euros for a console + controllers + a new TV, and not 1,800 dollars/euros for a set of PCs,[1] what should you buy?
(I am still waiting for the "Twilight Princess" to drop at least 50% for the Gamecube)
At GameStop, The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess stayed near full price used for so long because a buffer overflow in its saved game loader was used as part of the Wii jailbreak throughout the Wii Menu 3.x series. Likewise, the used prices of Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories and Lumines were
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Anyhoo, the last time the exclusivity deal hit me was Munch's Odysee, the "next gen" 3D version of Abe's Odysee which I loved. It was sup
Re:Incredible, you don't say... (Score:5, Informative)
The films and the overall "Ghostbusters" IP are in fact owned by Sony and Columbia Tristar. (a division of Sony)
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It's GHOSTBUSTERS... (Score:2)
... this is not a big deal. It's a move game, why would anyone really care if it's multi platform or not? Unless it is the best game in the universe (doubtful).
Seriously from a developer standpoint unless Sony ponied up enough money for the dev team to never have to work again after completing the game, WHY would you ever go exclusive?
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The developer might never see a penny from this deal, as the fact that they have spoken out against it suggests.
And the reason why most Movie tie-ins suck is because they are developed hastily to time with movie releases and commissioned by the rights-holders. This game is from a 25 year old movie and started by game developers.
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The developer might never see a penny from this deal, as the fact that they have spoken out against it suggests.
And the reason why most Movie tie-ins suck is because they are developed hastily to time with movie releases and commissioned by the rights-holders. This game is from a 25 year old movie and started by game developers.
Im pretty sure the developers are heavily shafted due to this deal, because the number of pirated PC version copies will skyrocket in the PAL territory. So additionally to seeing the XBOX and PC sales within the PAL territory (which is combined the biggest one) later, the PC sales definitely and to some degree the XBOX sales will be way less than they could be because of this stunt and the obvious piracy enforcement this will bring on.
Now my personal guess is that the devs get a share of each copy so they b
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It's a move game, why would anyone really care if it's multi platform or not? Unless it is the best game in the universe (doubtful).
GoldenEye 007 for Nintendo 64 was a movie adaptation that didn't suck. But I will grant that it was an exception.
This will probably never change (Score:4, Interesting)
It could well be argued that the PS1 was the run-away success that it was because of exclusive Final Fantasy and Metal Gear Solid franchises. For the PS2, it was much the same, except that it had then gained Grand Theft Auto (yes, I know it came to the PC and 360 later, but by then it really was a one horse race).
There were times when I looked at the games on the 360 and Wii, that weren't coming to the PS3, and wondered if I would be better off buying one of them instead of waiting for the PS3 to come down in price. It wasn't long though before Oblivion, Lost Planet, and Bioshock did actually come to the PS3, with the addition of features that trumped the original release.
Rather ironically, I felt that only one of them was actually worth the wait, in the end...
Re:This will probably never change (Score:5, Insightful)
It could well be argued that the PS1 was the run-away success that it was because of exclusive Final Fantasy and Metal Gear Solid franchises. For the PS2, it was much the same, except that it had then gained Grand Theft Auto (yes, I know it came to the PC and 360 later, but by then it really was a one horse race).
PS1 succeeded because of rampant piracy, then network effects. every man and his dog mod chipped his ps1, and bought a few legit games and downloaded a lot. Also legitimate game prices, ps1 games were a lot cheaper being on cds than their cartridge equivalent.
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I second that, it is one of the known facts never admitted by Sony that the main reason the PS1 won was the easy pirating of CD games. It was just the correct middle ground between piracy and making it hard enough for enough users so that the games still sold well besides that the console was way cheaper than the Dreamcast which also was easy to get copied games for, but if you have two system with easily pirated games, people get the one being cheaper. The biggest looser was Nintendo who basically sunk the
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PS1 succeeded because of rampant piracy, then network effects. every man and his dog mod chipped his ps1, and bought a few legit games and downloaded a lot. Also legitimate game prices, ps1 games were a lot cheaper being on cds than their cartridge equivalent.
Err no! Rampant piracy would kill the PS1 since software houses would not make games for this console because they would not make any money. People chipped their PS1's so they could play imported or region locked games. Sure there was piracy but this was fairly small since CD burners and even the media in the the mid to late 1990's were not that cheap.
You are correct in that CD's were much cheaper than cartridges at the time but the CD could hold over 600MB compared to the Nintendo Cartridge of approx 30M
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I doubt it. Most people never chipped their playstation. CD burners still cost a lot and so did media (although of course a lot less than a game - but good media when the PS1 came out? Five bucks a piece for anything that might still be readable today, retail. so the average consumer was dissuaded.) Seriously, it was at this time that I got my FIRST burner, a Phillips SCSI drive the size of a desktop PC that had been upgraded to 2x... and then I got a SCSI OMNIwriter thereafter, a 6x2x2. I was a LITTLE behi
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For the PS2, it was much the same, except that it had then gained Grand Theft Auto (yes, I know it came to the PC and 360 later, but by then it really was a one horse race).
You seem to misremembering. GTA [wikipedia.org] was released on PC first, and PS_1_ several months later. There was no xbox release.
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He's talking about the PS2 games, not the first GTA.
This is the stupidest move I have seen (Score:2)
In a long time, if it will be PS3 eclusive in Europe only, I imagine everyone in Europe will just download the PC version from the nearest Torrent tracker and additional person will by a PS3 for that. Besides that I hardly imagine Ghostbusters being an AAA title to justify the buying of a console!
My condolescenses to the hard working developers who again got screwed up by another publisher after Activision had pulled a stunt on them earlier!
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"Atari is committed to maximising the launch of the Ghostbusters videogame across Europe," offered Jim Wilson, VP of Worldwide Marketing for Atari.
I don't know if you can read that the release of Ghostbusters is European only and even if it was you can import the PS3 version to any country in the world since it will be region free. The only problem you would find is the language or localisation, so you would have to be particular from which country you import the game from. The PS2 release will be locked to regions (it always was) so you have to be careful here.
I imagine everyone in Europe will just download the PC version from the nearest Torrent tracker.
If they were going to pirate the game they would do it anyway no matter if
slashdot, don't publish this fanboy nonsense (Score:2, Informative)
After his asinine last article he comes back and writes a worse one explaining that Sony users are just mad because Sony isn't doing well for them this generation.
Whoa, weren't these two whining articles written by an angry 360 fanboy, not a PS3 fanboy?
This business has been going on since MS started moneyhatting developers to get a quick leg up on Sony's (at the time) deep roster of 1st party games (remember MS buying Bungie after Halo was first shown on a Mac?). It's not time to suddenly say it's turned t
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It's apparently only turned to madness when Sony does it. Never mind the fact that they've done it plenty of times before (Final Fantasy, GTA, Metal Gear, Ridge Racer, etc.)
All the current
Ghost busters (Score:2)
I've been a huge fan pretty much since birth and all this makes me think is that I won't be buying the game. I picked the 360 because it had more games and content I wanted to play, I was quite looking forward to the game but a year+ delay just means by the time it has a 360 release I will be buying something else and the game will be long forgotten. It's a shame that Sony are trying to sell their console instead of selling a game, their first priority should be to making profit and making successful games,
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Same with Hulu (Score:5, Insightful)
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Who outside U.S. cannot Hate Hulu for saying "this movie can't be played in your region".
Easy to bypass as long as you know what you are doing, same goes for this Europe only Exclusive, the only users this will hurt are the XBOX ones, the PC gamers simply will download a pirated copy of the US version even before the PS3 exclusive version hits Europe.
My personal opinion is that console only owners nowadays are pretty stupid. A decent PC graphics card which can do the latest games is around 100$ and the games usually are 20-30% cheaper.
And if someone wants to pull a region stunt on the PC there
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I just get a friend from the states to buy the game on steam and send it to me as a gift :)
But this will be one game I will likely skip.
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Yeah, but some of us prefer not to pirate games, and pirated games are the only ones that *work* on the PC (because of the DRM for shop-bought games being so picky and borderline malware).
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A decent PC graphics card which can do the latest games is around 100$ and the games usually are 20-30% cheaper.
Yeah, but some of us prefer not to pirate games, and pirated games are the only ones that *work* on the PC (because of the DRM for shop-bought games being so picky and borderline malware).
I thought so too before I picked up pc gaming again about a year ago when the next gen graphics cards became cheap. Actually the entire DRM issue while it is there is not that bad anymore. The only title having serious issues I recall was GTA4, a title I was not even interested into remotely! It really helps that most games nowadays come out on consoles first, so the console owners have to iron out the bugs. The entire PC situation has become way more interesting the last year, because the games are cheaper
Hate Hulu ? Why ? (Score:3, Interesting)
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Hulu is owned [wikipedia.org] by NBC, News Corp, and Disney. The same people who own and control Hulu are the people who own and control the content. It's totally fair to hate on Hulu for arbitrary region restrictions.
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You don't know how to bypass that? hand in your geek card at the door.
It's a trivial protection designed for the masses, and to keep their content providers happy.
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But those that do hate Hulu for that are directing their hate at the wrong organization. But given that they've only been in full operation for just over a year, expecting them to operate in every country is too much. They need to set up organizations to solicit advertising for each additional country and get deals with the sublicensees on a country basis. Their objective is to make money, but they can't do that so well with the rights deals that have been in place, and they can't do that by just giving
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But those that do hate Hulu for that are directing their hate at the wrong organization.
Not they are not, they are directing it at the agent closest to them. This is natural, it happens all the time. It's Hulu's job to provide the content and to deal with the licensing and it's mere buck-passing to say that consumers should deal directly with the industry. This wouldn't work at the car-rental counter and it doesn't work with Hulu.
Your comments about advertising and such are a red herring. You think Hulu is
Gargoyles?? (Score:2, Funny)
It will still be available to all... (Score:2, Interesting)
I can see why the developers are pissed off at this one.
People who wanted it on the PC platform in the EU will have two choices now: wait until Sony dictates they can join the party or get a crafty copy from someone state-side over them there h'interwebs.
The PAL/NTSC thing makes bugger all differece to people playing game on a PC so unless there were some local specific changes planned for the game (translations being the only likely one and that isn't a major draw as most of Europe, for instance, can speak
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There's nothing good about this (Score:2)
Oh, exclusive games? That? Mostly a "who cares" these days. I think most serious gamers probably have 2 or 3 consoles since the used/refurb prices of them have now dropped enough to make it feasible to own at least two. For more casual gamers, they've made their choice of consoles, and they're probably happy. Exclusive games have been around since there's been game consoles. There's actually only a few exclusives these days, and they tend to break down based on the markets associated with each console
Old hat. (Score:2, Insightful)
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Which console does Apple sell again?
iPhone. More a hand held really...
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You are seriously comparing a AAA console title to tower defense and labyrinth?
Re:While Sony & MS battle... (Score:4, Funny)
Re:While Sony & MS battle... (Score:5, Funny)
I played Ghostbuster on the Commodore 64 when it first came out. No way in heck will that ever be AAA title. :P
Also suspect there's no way in hell this new version will be as good.
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Man, that's really crap-looking. On the other hand, Ghostbusters for the Sega Genesis [youtube.com] was pretty good.
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The amiga version was pretty good too, couldnt find a video of the first one but ghostbusters 2 had much better music...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iv9mLcI8dlc [youtube.com]
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Yeah, a phone where a tiny percentage of the userbase plays cheap flash games. If you want to make a decent point, use Nintendo who really is eating Sony and MS for lunch. Over 100M DSes and 50M Wiis sold. THat's more than 2x the PSP and almost as many as the 360 and PS3 combined for the Wii.
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Of those sales of the 360, how many were due to people buying a replacement unit for one that failed?
I know quite a few people who have done that...
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They got almost all of the original cast of the movies... I plan on getting it and am damned glad I have an NTSC XBox.
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I plan on getting it and am damned glad I have an NTSC XBox.
That's nice but what has that got to do with the article since there wasn't any mention of the US getting the Ghostbusters game exclusively. Having an Xbox (this is dead anyway) or Xbox360 NTSC or PAL will still require you waiting six months or more. I have said this many time before that having a HDTV sort of negates the NTSC or PAL formats unless you only have a SDTV and then why would you have a PS3 or an Xbox360? Of course the PS2 and the Wii (again at least another six months wait) is still either NTS
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Actually this console exits it name is PC. The hardware update cycle has slowed down to that degree that if you count in the price difference console-pc the pc is up to par to a console or even cheaper if you do not run after the latest graphics card or highest power processor (which you wont need after about a year the last console generation has been released)
Nowadays you can go for a mid to low range processor and a 100$ graphics card and you will get a system which stomps both the PS3 and the XBOX and t