Kotaku: Next Xbox will require online connection to start games

Hoo-doo said:
How about kids bedrooms and such, or locations where a connection just isn't available like when you take your 360 to a friend's house. A network outage, your Wi-Fi signal dropping, your router dying.
There are plenty of times when people aren't able to get connected, hell there's apparently 30+ million Xbox 360's that have never been online if the numbers are to be believed.
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Xzibit will not be able to put Nextbox in anyone's car
 
PopcornMegaphone said:
Yep. I hate how the good paying customer gets screwed with stuff like this.

I'm reminded of this gif:

drm.gif
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love it
 
RetroStu said:
Also Microsoft better make sure its pretty clear that this is whats going to happen when they start advertising this thing because i can imagine a lot of casual gamers that don't look for gaming news on the net are going to be pretty pissed off if they buy a 720 without knowing this, i could see a pretty big backlash.
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I can see this happening too. People buying it, turning it on then realizing they cant play a thing if its not connected
 
dreamfall said:
Rumor or not- putting trust in Gies or Kotaku never seems like the right path to take.

Speculative as the rumor is, if this is true, my goodness. It'll be really problematic when losing connection in the middle of a session, or having trouble shooting protocols while turning on the Console.

Sigh.
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I'm the first against the "online required to play", I don't like sht like this, but a rumor is not a confirmation, and leaks (as the development documentation) don't said anything about online required to play. What I'm reading is some people "believing" the rumor as a "confirmation".
 
None of my friends are gamers which is why I'm hardly online on PSN when not playing any MP match with randoms and don't even have a Live account despite having owned a 360 for 4+ years and just recently selling it,so there's no point for me to 'stay connected'.I'd rather use the bandwidth for anything else.
 
Derrick01 said:
Sounds like something they're going to try and then when the massive backlash hits they'll quickly turn it off through firmware, hoping that it will save the console.
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Entirely possible. It will of course be too late to save the console. They were extremely lucky that the console survived the RROD fallout, but they wouldn't survive something like this, especially with a desperate Sony on their backs.
 
UrbanRats said:
1) A lot of people don't keep their consoles connected to the internet, either because they can't or because they don't want to.

2) It's been proven time and again, that problems do not only originate from the user's end, but the company's.
If they have a problem with their servers and as a result everyone is unable to play their singleplayer games, that's an issue.

It has happened very recently with SimCity and Diablo 3.
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1 ) If you can't sustain an internet connection then you aren't valuable to Microsoft next generation. Simply an online user is a lot more enticing than an offline one, you'd be able to generate usage statistics and actively feed them ad content and retrieve instantaneous response.

2 ) They need to be able to feed a stream of ad content to you. So Microsoft will make damn sure their servers have a thorough uptime because downtime is a literal loss of income.
 
Plinko said:
You do realize EDGE online, who nailed the PS4 stuff, also reported this months ago, right? It's not just Kotaku.
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Every single time this rumor has been recycled has carried the proviso of it being based off 2012 information and it being painfully simple for Microsoft to correct.

Even if it was true at a time, that the story is unchanged now (in light of the SimCity debacle) is unlikely. I'm not buying Durango, but Microsoft aren't as stupid as many here would like them to be.
 
Plinko said:
So, in addition to the leaks/rumors last year and earlier this year, there's obviously more than 3.

I just don't get why some have heard about it and others haven't.
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How do we know these are actually separate sources? There is no one on record saying they could use their name to confirm. I'd give it to you if there was at least a name within the industry attached to it, but no dice. NDAs pretty much kill this news and put it in the 'rumor' category until the NDA lifts and Microsoft says 'yay' or 'nay.'
 
If this really is legit, then Microsoft must have something really fucking special planned for this console to make people not care it has to have an Internet connection.

Just seems like too dumb an idea otherwise.
 
Hopefully Microsoft has the good sense to add a visual indicator on the console to let me know the Internet is down.

Perhaps a red square. Or a red octagon. Some kind of shape.
 
WalkMan said:
1 ) If you can't sustain an internet connection then you aren't valuable to Microsoft next generation. Simply an online user is a lot more enticing than an offline one, you'd be able to generate usage statistics and actively feed them ad content and retrieve instantaneous response.

2 ) They need to be able to feed a stream of ad content to you. So Microsoft will make damn sure their servers have a thorough uptime because downtime is a literal loss of income.
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Yeah, but the user asked why it was a big deal.
The reasons why Microsoft are doing it are another thing altogether.
 
To the people who think this is too crazy to be true: This industry in general is pretty crazy, every gen we see something wacky that either does work or totally falls flat on its face. I would not put it past MS to try something like this

Since EDGE has been reliable regarding next gen consoles and they reported this, with now more of the same rumors being spread i am starting to really entertain this rumor.

I am at a stage where i will actually be shocked if this is not true at this point, but we still have to wait for official confirmation.
 
i-Lo said:
If you can shell out for a console then you surely can fork a fraction of that price for value added service courtesy of GOLD.
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It's not a fraction of the price over time. Also, it's not about what one can afford, but what is total bullshit. Also, some people are given consoles as gifts. Also, you're wrong about just about everything?
 
This news sucks. Not everyone has a decent Internet connection or an Internet connection at all. Some people have a decent Internet connection but only in certain parts of their home.

MS is making a big mistake here. For starters, if they're really going to go through with this, the "720" better have built in wi-fi and a good one at that. They better not make people go out and buy a wi-fi adapter like the 360.

Still, it's inexcusable.
 
soul creator said:
cool, I guess they've gotten better over time (admittedly I could be confusing it with another company...I vaguely remember something being once per year)
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Nah, you're right. They changed it.

private400 said:
Gamestops excitement for WII U also wasn't speculation.
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Two totally different things. Both have the goal to hype people up and pre-order there, but why would they so if a console blocked most of their revenue?
 
some countries and some places in some countries just don't have the infrastructure for broadband places like India (which I would assume a console maker would want to sell in to)
 
Anyone remember Sony's server woes caused by hackers? This would be on an astronomically worse scale if it happened on nextbox because no one could play single player to pass the time away.
 
Alebrije said:
I do not like this future , I still enjoy plug my old NES or ATARY 2600 an play them like 20 years before ( or more) .

Saddly it seems from now on we will have consoles with "expiration dates" like fruits or food.
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Same here, and it really is unfortunate. Hopefully in the future the games industry actually starts to care about preservation.
 
These persistent Xbox rumors, WiiU's current state, and Sony's February event make the PS4 sound like the second coming of Jesus.

#TeamHyperbole
 
Always online doesn't bother me at all. I don't play offline. As long as I can play used and rental copies of games, I'm fine with it.
 
Adamm said:
Sony confirmed it
http://kotaku.com/5985874/ps4-will-not-require-an-always+online-connection
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I think people need to read a little more carefully into what Sony is saying. From that same article.

UPDATE: More relief... At a roundtable this morning, Sony's game studios chief, Shuhei Yoshida, told reporters that any requirement for users to register a game online in order to play it would be left to game publishers. Sony won't require that.
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This means that Sony won't be requiring it at the platform level. It's a publisher choice.

That means that some games on PS4 will work offline, but more than likely the bigger titles will still require a connection.

Also, I don't think it's an apples to apples comparison with Sim City or Diablo 3 to what's happening here, if it's true. I completely agree that as consumers, we deserve to have a working product day one. Having an online only requirement does not necessarily preclude that. It just makes it a lot harder for devs/testers, and we start getting into unfamiliar territory with developers who have never launched and maintained a service which must run 24/7. MS has this experience across the company. They've been running XBL since 2002 with very few outages (that holiday outage a few years ago was the worst one I can recall), even though millions of people use the service every day. I very much doubt they are going to make the same mistakes as two games and rush load testing or go cheap and not have enough servers on launch day.
 
I'm just taking the stance of there isn't smoke without fire.

How so many people are defending this doesn't necessarily surprise me, just disappoints me.
 
LOL, we turned our webfilter back on at work and imgur.com links are blocked due to being "Adult Oriented."

Oh and back on topic, that's a poor decision Microsoft.
 
MS got away charging people for XBL for a decade. They probably figure people will be mad, but get over it anyways and just deal with it

Iced_Eagle said:
I think people need to read a little more carefully into what Sony is saying. From that same article.



This means that Sony won't be requiring it at the platform level. It's a publisher choice.

That means that some games on PS4 will work offline, but more than likely the bigger titles will still require a connection.

Also, I don't think it's an apples to apples comparison with Sim City or Diablo 3 to what's happening here, if it's true. I completely agree that as consumers, we deserve to have a working product day one. Having an online only requirement does not necessarily preclude that. It just makes it a lot harder for devs/testers, and we start getting into unfamiliar territory with developers who have never launched and maintained a service which must run 24/7. MS has this experience across the company. They've been running XBL since 2002 with very few outages (that holiday outage a few years ago was the worst one I can recall), even though millions of people use the service every day. I very much doubt they are going to make the same mistakes as two games and rush load testing or go cheap and not have enough servers on launch day.
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I honestly think Sony will have a pass to pay in order to play used games. Think of it like the online pass that started with PS3 and PSV, but taken to work even with SP games and consoles that are 100% offline.
 
Iced_Eagle said:
I think people need to read a little more carefully into what Sony is saying. From that same article.



This means that Sony won't be requiring it at the platform level. It's a publisher choice.

That means that some games on PS4 will work offline, but more than likely the bigger titles will still require a connection.

Also, I don't think it's an apples to apples comparison with Sim City or Diablo 3 to what's happening here, if it's true. I completely agree that as consumers, we deserve to have a working product day one. Having an online only requirement does not necessarily preclude that. It just makes it a lot harder for devs/testers, and we start getting into unfamiliar territory with developers who have never launched and maintained a service which must run 24/7. MS has this experience across the company. They've been running XBL since 2002 with very few outages (that holiday outage a few years ago was the worst one I can recall), even though millions of people use the service every day. I very much doubt they are going to make the same mistakes as two games and rush load testing or go cheap and not have enough servers on launch day.
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Registering a game is still not remotely the same as requiring a constant connection.
 
Interesting that Kotaku breaking news about the PS4 controller's touchpad and share button, breaking news about Doom 4's troubled development cycle, showing video and images from Star Wars: First Assault, breaking news about LucasFilm shuttering LucasArts and canceling their games, showing concept art from the Boba Fett version of Star Wars 1313, telling the story of what really happened to Aliens: Colonial Marines, and many, many more stories just weren't enough to get some NeoGAFfers to trust that maybe we know what we're doing.

But hey, we'll just keep on keeping on. :)
 
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