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Angry Joe: Major Nelson Interview (Xbox One) E3 2013

Dodging a lot of the questions by Major Nelson but Angry Joe cut him off A LOT. Not a great interview technique there by him.
 
Good interview.

Yeah major nelson stated many of his answers with PR twist/terms but that's his job.

Overall, it still seems to me that Xbox is giving more people options to share digitally than physically while it's vice versa for the PS4.

Sony would never allow a family plan similar to what's (supposedly) coming on to the Xbox One. The PS4 is already opened as it is when it comes to physical discs. The Xbox One could do things like the family share plan because of its restrictions on discs.

If the PS4 had the family plan ON TOP of not having any restrictions on games on discs, then things would be too opened. Keeping things the way they are now with discs + the family plan = a ton of people sharing/pirating games instead of buying them. Publishers wouldn't support the PS4 at all if that happened.

The Xbox One could drop the DRM issues but if they did, the family plan would have to go (for the same exact reasons I stated above).

But yeah, it seems like this next gen is physical (PS4) vs. digital (Xbox One). Choose what's best for you and then go from there.

Or, if you want all of the games, get both. :)
Maybe already mentioned by someone else, but the family plan could still apply for downloaded games only even if the disc based games didnt have that DRM. I'm pretty sure that every Xbox One game will be available as digital download as well (all disc based games are being fully installed and can be shared digitally afterall, meaning that a digital version of the game excist).
 
OWN IT man everyone knows you're more of an Xbox guy, it's cool, just own it, because it's so transparent.

MS is counting on A LOT of people buying it out of brand loyalty due to the 360s popularity. Amd frankly, Sony has an uphill battle even though they have a cheaper, more poweful system with no draconian DRM.

It is extrmely possible MS still walks the floor with Sony in U.S. and Europe on brand loyalty alone.
 
Nope it applies to all digital purchases and you keep saying family plan when the plan is only one family member can play at a given time so thats not really sharing is it? On current PS3 policy which i'm sure will carry to PS4 as it is also currently on PS Vita, You can purchase a game from PSN and play on any 4 compatible devices at the same time.

To clarify, last time I checked it was 2. Sony cut it back but you are still grandfathered into all the games prior to the new policy of 2 shares so if you shared all the content between 5 people before the policy, that still stands. If you reset all your activation's then all of your content is 2 activation's including the grandfathered content from the first 4-5 years when it was 5 shares. I know because I called so see if I can reset it but went back on it or 3 of my friends wouldn't be able to play my older purchases. So from the last 2 years , I've shared mainly with 1 person to keep things clear.

Again, I'm still not clear if this is the case with big MP games like CoD or BF3.
 
Dodging a lot of the questions by Major Nelson but Angry Joe cut him off A LOT. Not a great interview technique there by him.

that is the only thing that joe needs to work on he cut him off way to much and I think thats why Major look irritated cause he couldn't answer before being interrupted.
 
"Oh, you can buy a 360", and "Oh, you can tether it to your phone" are some of the lamest, most asinine statements I've heard that try to put a happy face on the situation.
 
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MS is counting on A LOT of people bying it out of brand loyalty due to the 360s popularity. Amd frankly, Sony has an uphill battle even though they have a cheaper, more poweful system with no draconian DRM.

It is extrmely possible MS still walks the floor with Sony in U.S. and Europe on brand loyalty alone.
I think you mean the UK specifically.

Mainland Europe is Sony land.
 
It is extrmely possible MS still walks the floor with Sony in U.S. and Europe on brand loyalty alone.

Its really not looking that way to me. Most core gamers seem to be interested in the PS4 and their friends will follow them when they eventually move on. There's also all the bad press the system is getting, pricing, and the fact that the PS brand is pretty powerful in its own right.
 
that is the only thing that joe needs to work on he cut him off way to much and I think thats why Major look irritated cause he couldn't answer before being interrupted.
To be fair, Nelson's rebuttals were weak. Are you a lawyer? Are you on the PR team? Do you want to go to the future with me?!
 
Dodging a lot of the questions by Major Nelson but Angry Joe cut him off A LOT. Not a great interview technique there by him.

To be fair to Joe, MJ was wanting to move on from several questions and they flat out had a slight moment of silence and outright moved on from a question fairly early on. I'm dumbfounded at this.

Joe, you held it together very well considering the PR behind the scenes and MJ semi-pushing back. Imagine if you got your other questions through. You earned some points with me for doing that and props again to MJ for doing it even if doing some dodging.
 
Wish Joe would have known more about Steam. When Nelson brought up the Steam comparison, Joe should have responded with saying that "Steam has an offline mode, you don't need to be connected online to play your games offline". Overall good interview.
 
MS is counting on A LOT of people buying it out of brand loyalty due to the 360s popularity. Amd frankly, Sony has an uphill battle even though they have a cheaper, more poweful system with no draconian DRM.

It is extrmely possible MS still walks the floor with Sony in U.S. and Europe on brand loyalty alone.

But the PS3 sold better in Europe than the 360 did. Brand loyalty you said?
 
Huh, Joe actually did pretty good here. Yeah, he's more calm and nice in his composure, but if you pay attention to how he actually words his questions, he is not really softballing him. Hell, when Nelson was not giving a coherent answer about the military issue, Joe was like "wait, what?" quite a few times before PR person seemingly stared daggers into him.

Joe just needs to work on not cutting people off in mid-answer (or at least finding better places to cut someone off when they're rambling or not making sense).
 
It's scary how Microsoft still doesn't know how it's own game sharing system works. Shouldn't they have decided upon a cohesive policy before announcing it?
 
To clarify, last time I checked it was 2. Sony cut it back but you are still grandfathered into all the games prior to the new policy of 2 shares so if you shared all the content between 5 people before the policy, that still stands. If you reset all your activation's then all of your content is 2 activation's including the grandfathered content from the first 4-5 years when it was 5 shares. I know because I called so see if I can reset it but went back on it or 3 of my friends wouldn't be able to play my older purchases. So from the last 2 years , I've shared mainly with 1 person to keep things clear.

Again, I'm still not clear if this is the case with big MP games like CoD or BF3.

2 console 2 portables so 4. There are PSN games that are compatible on both PS3 and Vita, Pinball for PS4 is cross buy between PS3, PS Vita and PS4 for example. It applies to retail, PS1, PS2, PSN, PS Vita, PSP games last time i checked.
 
I think you mean the UK specifically.

Mainland Europe is Sony land.

As a whole, MS made up huge ground in both Europe and the U.S. last generation. Sony had a practical monopoly going into the last gen and they lost a shit ton of ground everywhere but Japan.

MS brand popularity is on the rise everywhere but Japan and continued to rise all of last gen. Sony's continued to side. The only reason they still eeked out a win in Europe overall is because of where they where last gen. When their bran popularity is in decline they very well could lose everywhere except Japan.

Note: I am not sayi g they should. They are making all the right moves. But I've seen this story before when it was called the Dreamcast with a brand in decline despite doing everything right.
 
Correct - so we actually learned two things:

-Used game can only be given to a friend once and this friend is stuck with the game
-Only one person in a "Family" can play a game at a given time - no concurrent usage as many had hoped

Yeah that's what I got from this interview too.


Check this follow up video, Joe has more info about the family pack.

http://youtu.be/OPC4XzyE3Gc

Says he later found out that Larry was slight mistaken, it is 2 people at the same time. But when 2 people are playing at the same time its for singleplayer only. Also the other 8 people are not locked out from playing other games in the shared library. DLC is also shared.

oh, so now it's 2 people
 
Basically what I expected from Major Nelson, I'm sure he's a nice guy but I don't know how anyone can be fooled by his constant spin. Same thing with Aaron Greenberg, I don't even know if he's with xbox anymore but good lord, he always came off as such a condescending jerk.
 
You also understand that with all this UNWANTED red tape that MSFT is putting you through that it also alienates many good to do consumers that either have shady internet and limited money.

Why in Gods green earth should we accept what MSFT is trying to push on us here. Can you not see how bad this is in part due to MSFT's piss poor explanation methods and these Q&A's have often left us asking more questions.

MS is pushing people to go digital without making the console full on "digital download only".

I personally think that this is needed for a better transition since 10 years from now, physical media will more than likely be gone completely in terms of games. A "transition system" that's good for bringing people from physical to digital is better than releasing an opened physical media system and then releasing one right after that's just digital download only.

That's just how I feel.


And you say this family share feature is the reason to for you to go over PS4? Without getting into a laundry lists of pluses about PS4, I can't accept that answer.

In terms of what system I'm buying first, yes. I will still get a PS4 later on though more than likely for exclusives.

And you "can't accept that"? Haha, okay? Why should I care if you can't accept that? I personally compared both systems, realized that I'm more interested in Xbox One's early exclusives than PS4's early exclusive's, realized that the digital share plan of the Xbox One would be good for my group of friends/family personally, and made the decision on what to get first.

Don't see why that's such a problem for you.

I'm not even getting into how MSFT interviews have been so opposite of the Sony guy interviews. I'm sorry if it was the other way, I would be panning Jack Tretton or any of the other guys but where are you as a gamer when these Sony guys are championing used games, championing the consumers rights, and stating this is about making gamers and devs happy?

They are "PR people" as much as MS PR people are "PR people".

I've accepted the fact that we are soon going to go into a digital download only future.

Sony's PR is saying "You buy it, you own it.". BUT that is only true unless the game on the disc mostly requires online connectivity, therefore making the game either useless when its servers go down or completely unplayable. I personally can already tell that MANY games next gen (whether physical or digital) will be this way.

I'm pretty sure that anyone thinking that a huge portion of games on the PS4 or Xbox One will be exactly the same when they pop that disc in 10 years after release is going to be disappointed.

Heck, that's already the case now for some PS3/Xbox 360 games -- and that's within the course of this gen.

The contrast is so stark it's paramount. MSFT is busy sending all these messages and even confusing themselves with all these weird answers.

I just see one side doing MUCH better at PR than another. I'm not going to let that be the sole reason of dictating what system I buy though.
 
I'm about done thinking and talking about this but could you watch this interview here with Scott Rohde and see the contrast in how these interviews are done?

Can you at least see the contrast between how one guy who is deep in PS development acts vs MJ in this interview. If MSFT didn't put these stupid policies in then we wouldn't be having the same conversation.

^^ Fair enough, I won't push back more but I can't agree with your reasoning so please don't mistake my contrast with your view as hating you personally :)
 
So thats the line.

Online required, 24 hour phone-homes in exchange for the benefits of physical property, like sharing and resale.*

To repeat: The online-only requirement is necessary in order to enable us to use games like we currently do at this moment.*

This is being described as "the future".

* Subject to publisher approval and regional laws.
 
Wait, huh?

So it sounds like it's up to publishers/developers to determine whether people can buy and trade used game discs? When Joe asked him using CDPR as an example, MJ answered that if developers want to do that, they'll work with them...
 
Can't really expect him to do much else - he has no say on these policies, and if he wants to keep his job he has to defend them. I kinda pity him, his higher ups cancelled their interviews and have essentially left him to deal with all this shit.

It's always the middle man who takes most of the shit. Yeah I feel for Major, before all of this drm stuff he always came off like a decent guy and I always thought is was genuine and not just an act; I just think the heat he's taking right now is starting to get to him, and is why he started to lash back a little in this interview.
 
Sony would never allow a family plan similar to what's (supposedly) coming on to the Xbox One. The PS4 is already opened as it is when it comes to physical discs. The Xbox One could do things like the family share plan because of its restrictions on discs.

What a hot steaming load of bull shit. The DRM on physical disks and the "family share plan" are in no way connected. "Hey guys, share your games with strangers who live 3,000 mile away. But you sure as fuck better not share your disk with your friend who lives 3 doors down, or try to sell that disk!" DRM is pure pandering to big publishers, that's why MS and EA are tight as glue right now.

If the PS4 had the family plan ON TOP of not having any restrictions on games on discs, then things would be too opened. Keeping things the way they are now with discs + the family plan = a ton of people sharing/pirating games instead of buying them. Publishers wouldn't support the PS4 at all if that happened.

That's "supposedly" happening on the XBone right now. Disk copies work the same way as digital copies, so while can't share the disk, but you can just as easily share the digital version. So why would publishers be ok with Microsoft letting customers share digitally but not locally? You said it yourself, you were going PS4 but changed minds because the family share plan sounds so good to you, ie "I won't have to buy games as often". You don't think publishers see this? Sony had a far more restrictive ability to "share" games on the PS3 and indie developers HATED it, so much so that Sony had to restrict it even more. And that wasn't even designed to let people share games, it was for multiple console owners to play all there games on all their consoles.
 
MS is pushing people to go digital without making the console full on "digital download only".

I personally think that this is needed for a better transition since 10 years from now, physical media will more than likely be gone completely in terms of games. A "transition system" that's good for bringing people from physical to digital is better than releasing an opened physical media system and then releasing one right after that's just digital download only.

That's just how I feel.




In terms of what system I'm buying first, yes. I will still get a PS4 later on though more than likely for exclusives.

And you "can't accept that"? Haha, okay? Why should I care if you can't accept that? I personally compared both systems, realized that I'm more interested in Xbox One's early exclusives than PS4's early exclusive's, realized that the digital share plan of the Xbox One would be good for my group of friends/family personally, and made the decision on what to get first.

Don't see why that's such a problem for you.



They are "PR people" as much as MS PR people are "PR people".

I've accepted the fact that we are soon going to go into a digital download only future.

Sony's PR is saying "You buy it, you own it.". BUT that is true unless the game on the disc mostly requires online connectivity, therefore making the game either useless when its servers go down or completely unplayable.

I personally can already tell that MANY games next gen (whether physical or digital) will be this way.

I'm pretty sure that anyone thinking that a huge portion of games on the PS4 or Xbox One will be exactly the same when they pop that disc in 10 years after release is going to be disappointed.

Heck, that's already the case now for some PS3/Xbox 360 games -- and that's within the course of this gen.



I just see one said doing MUCH better at PR than another. I'm not going to let that be the sole reason of dictating what system I buy though.

Sony introduced Day 1 digital on the PS3 with certain titles, and if you want to go all digital with the PS4 you can choose to do that also. The PS3 digital games in the early to mid cycle you were allowed to share 1 game with up to 5 people and that was for each game in your library. So stop it with this future stuff, it's not about future its about control.
 
For a non-professional it was a fair enough interview. AJ was blocked and dodged whenever Hryb felt uncomfortable. It was really cringeworthy but not for Joe. Quite a good job for an untrained interviewer.
 
"I know its very simple to disable the online 24 hour check in"

"Do you? Are you on the development team?"

Its like I'm on GAF

Any programmers want to weigh in here?

If it's written in C or a C derivative then I think it's pretty simple to remove.

Assembly? Harder but the right dude would make short work of it.

I'm speaking as a web developer myself.
 
What a hot steaming load of bull shit. The DRM on physical disks and the "family share plan" are in no way connected. "Hey guys, share your games with strangers who live 3,000 mile away. But you sure as fuck better not share your disk with your friend who lives 3 doors down, or try to sell that disk!" DRM is pure pandering to big publishers, that's why MS and EA are tight as glue right now.



That's "supposedly" happening on the XBone right now. Disk copies work the same way as digital copies, so while can't share the disk, but you can just as easily share the digital version. So why would publishers be ok with Microsoft letting customers share digitally but not locally? You said it yourself, you were going PS4 but changed minds because the family share plan sounds so good to you, ie "I won't have to buy games as often". You don't think publishers see this? Sony had a far more restrictive ability to "share" games on the PS3 and indie developers HATED it, so much so that Sony had to restrict it even more. And that wasn't even designed to let people share games, it was for multiple console owners to play all there games on all their consoles.
These 2 points are the brick and mortar of what I'm wondering as well. While it's hip to share your digital library 3k miles away, there are rules which prevent me from just lending that physical copy to as many friends as I want to spread the word on a good game.

The rest you already said articulately enough minus the occasional curse word :P
 
lol I still don't understand this shitty 24h/1h check for offline games. When I'm offline, I just want to play the goddamn game and don't be bothered with any connections at all. Like fuck how infuriating it would be, when I couldn't be playing ANY of my games, just because my connection is fucked up, regardless of what side has the issue. It's MY damn offline game, just check this DRM shit, when I decide go online with my system for fuck's sake!
 
Guess Joe did what he could given the short improvised interview.
Anyway again a lot of usual PR dodges, shitty features (power of the foggy cloud, family excuse of a plan), and some bad confirmation mixed with no responses on the rest of the crap that make people angry at them from the beginning.

Above all the "you don't know what you're talking about" attitude coupled with the "we're the future so we don't need to even reflect on anything even once" make me want to throw up.
 
MS is pushing people to go digital without making the console full on "digital download only".

They are going full digital. You have to be connected to play and the disc is just a way to install the game to your HDD incase your internet is slow(er) or maybe you don't want to wait to download when you go to a friends house and log in under your XBL name.

No offense but you seem to be grabbing at straws. If someone prefers the xbox one, good on them, it's their/your choice but don't try to spin some nonsense jargon, it just makes you look like a fanboy.

Besides, PS3 has offered Day 1 digital for quite a while so there isn't a gap with Sony on digital/physical, the WiiU and 3DS even offer day 1 digital, as does the vita, psp...Claiming that the "family plan" is more open/better, etc. sounds incredibly silly. Everyone has already said it but it really is just PR spin.
 
He's not saying its hard to take the online check out of the code.

You take the 24 hour phone home out and there are repercussions to gaming their sharing/resale system. Thats what makes things more difficult for them.
 
Any programmers want to weigh in here?

If it's written in C or a C derivative then I think it's pretty simple to remove.

Assembly? Harder but the right dude would make short work of it.

I'm speaking as a web developer myself.

It's just a variable - can be changed at will - depending on their implemention this isn't even hardcoded but can be adjusted via GUI or config files. If they wanted they could up this to 6 months in literally 1 minute.
 
MS is counting on A LOT of people buying it out of brand loyalty due to the 360s popularity. Amd frankly, Sony has an uphill battle even though they have a cheaper, more poweful system with no draconian DRM.

It is extrmely possible MS still walks the floor with Sony in U.S. and Europe on brand loyalty alone.

eh, no. Brand loyalty can only get you so far don't be ridiculous.
 
Sony introduced Day 1 digital on the PS3 with certain titles, and if you want to go all digital with the PS4 you can choose to do that also. The PS3 digital games in the early to mid cycle you were allowed to share 1 game with up to 5 people and that was for each game in your library. So stop it with this future stuff, it's not about future its about control.

I've told him to stop making up stuff but he still continues.

1. PS3 was a very free console that allowed sharing of digital games to 5 consoles and allow all 5 to play the same game at the same time later restricted to 2 consoles and 2 handhelds.
2. PS3 was the first console to introduce day and date retail and PSN release and PS Vita took it further.
3. PS3 is the first console to introduce game renting in PS Plus
4. PS4 will be the first console to allow game streaming of old titles via gaikai

Digital future, Digital future, Digital future, Sony has been leading that front.
 
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