9 ms·

I still find it unbelievable how console manufacturers managed to convince people its normal to pay more money just to use their internet connection.

simias 6y ago
Indeed. I think gamers are an easy target because they've collectively very little impulse control. Every single time there were talks of boycotts nothing really happened as far as I recall. For instance the justification for "paid online" is usually server costs, but that's forgetting that not so long ago most (non-persistent) online games let you host your own servers if you wanted to. So they moved away from that in order to gain more control and give themselves more opportunities for monetization (loot boxes etc...) and then they use that as an excuse to ask money for online. And it worked. Meanwhile, gamers: https://pcinvasion.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/modernwarfare2-boycott.png https://pcinvasion.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/modernwarf...
- atomicnumber3 6y ago
  I say this as a somewhat reluctantly self-identified "gamer". Big agree on the impulse control. It's worsened by the fact that, for lots of gamers, gaming is their strongest form of escapism. But I think it also compounds with this tendenct for gaming to suffer from a lot of the same polarization that's happening in politics. It's like it gets at the same core part of your lizard brain. Instead of Red vs Blue, it's Green vs Blue (and Nintendo stands off to the side, having fun with its family in Wii Fit, and PC is in a basement garbed in dark blue worshiping GabeN and trying to summon HL3). And people will look the other way to an excessive degree while "their" team does bad stuff. I will say that one thing gaming has that politics doesn't is "the only thing we hate as much as the other side is our side". Obviously even microsoft fanboys will be quick to turn on Microsoft if they do something obviously anti-gamer, since gamers also love to be victims.
- throwaway894345 6y ago
  It's not some nefarious plot, it's just regular economics, the same kind that is motivating a trend away from on-premise software and toward SaaS. The justification was never 'server costs' but rather the costs of the services that xbox provides (text and voice chat, moderation, player profiles, friends lists, matchmaking, video capture and sharing, software update channels, etc).
ChrisLTD 6y ago
Microsoft still provides an entire infrastructure for communication and multiplayer games. In any other industry, I suppose the cost of that service would be rolled into the price of the device. But since consoles are often sold for a loss, Sony and Microsoft are likely compelled to charge for whatever add-on services they can.
- alpaca128 6y ago
  On PC that infrastructure exists as well, for free. For communication you can choose between things like Discord, Teamspeak or maybe just the ingame voice chat. And you don't need to pay for those Battlefield online servers. All while PC games are cheaper than the console versions.
  - hobs 6y ago
    Someone does, because you generally cant host them in the client (wrt battlefield) there's plenty of games where that's not a problem, but BF has famously made it harder and harder for private hosters so they can sell those servers.
- Someone1234 6y ago
  XBox games utilize P2P communications, which means that players are actually providing much of the heavy infrastructure ("game servers") whereas Microsoft is responsible only for match-making/routing. Microsoft has public documentation that describes how it works: > The session host is the console or device that runs the game play simulation for titles built on a host-based peer-to-peer network architecture. This console or device is typically the same as the arbiter, but it does not have to be the same.[0] [0] https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/gaming/xbox-live/features/multiplayer/concepts/live-multiplayer-concepts https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/gaming/xbox-live/features/m...
  - Thaxll 6y ago
    There are less and less p2p usage, most serious games have moved to dedicated servers. And your definitation of heavy is very much incacurate.
CryptoGhost 6y ago
Why is it unbelievable ? The business model involves not charging enough for the console and some big titles to lure in customers and then later capturing profit from things like DLC and peripherals. It was quite common in the history of PC gaming for the players to have to pay for their own servers for network play.
- flohofwoe 6y ago
  At the time when Xbox Live was started, by far most console multiplayer games had p2p architecture and only required central infrastructure for matchmaking though (and this was about the only service provided by Xbox Live). I don't know how common client/server games are nowadays where the servers are part of the Xbox Live infrastructure.
  - throwaway894345 6y ago
    The servers aren't part of the XBox Live infrastructure, but XBox Live provides infrastructure for friends lists, matchmaking, p2p text and voice communication, moderation (banning players), video recording and sharing, etc. They also provide a website, mobile apps, and of course the console experience to interface with these services. $5/month isn't an unreasonable price tag for these features, and I would happily pay double if it meant that xbox would actually remove some of the hardcore stalkers and overt pedophiles. By which I mean the networks of grown men who coordinate to target certain minors (even though the minors appear offline and block the stalkers) by fanning out across game servers. Microsoft knows about these players because they've been reported so many times and by so many different players that they have the worst Reputation Scores. This isn't to speak of the "ordinary" sexual harassment, trolling, cheating, and "unsporting behavior".
willis936 6y ago
Is it also unbelievable to charge for access to an IP library?
- kevinschumacher 6y ago
  Of course not, but that's not what the service is, or primarily is marketed as (you may be thinking of Xbox Game Pass?)
patja 6y ago
I'll admit I pay it just to hang onto my ancient 3 letter gamertag.
alexfromapex 6y ago
I feel the same way about people who pay for cable only to see commercials on all of the shows
throwaway894345 6y ago
They're not paying to use their Internet connection, they're paying to use the XBox Live infrastructure, just like any SaaS business.
numpad0 6y ago
Or maybe it is an ongoing mistake that HTTP 402 is left as it is. “Everything on Internet should be free(-beer)” is such a load of BS.
zxcvbn4038 6y ago
I think it’s incredible that ad supported games are a thing - you are going to support your game by showing ads for someone else’s game? If the ads are effective and people go play that game, then they are not watching ads during your game anymore. Didn’t think that one through.

simias 6y ago

Indeed. I think gamers are an easy target because they've collectively very little impulse control. Every single time there were talks of boycotts nothing really happened as far as I recall. For instance the justification for "paid online" is usually server costs, but that's forgetting that not so long ago most (non-persistent) online games let you host your own servers if you wanted to. So they moved away from that in order to gain more control and give themselves more opportunities for monetization (loot boxes etc...) and then they use that as an excuse to ask money for online. And it worked. Meanwhile, gamers: https://pcinvasion.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/modernwarfare2-boycott.png https://pcinvasion.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/modernwarf...

atomicnumber3 6y ago
I say this as a somewhat reluctantly self-identified "gamer". Big agree on the impulse control. It's worsened by the fact that, for lots of gamers, gaming is their strongest form of escapism. But I think it also compounds with this tendenct for gaming to suffer from a lot of the same polarization that's happening in politics. It's like it gets at the same core part of your lizard brain. Instead of Red vs Blue, it's Green vs Blue (and Nintendo stands off to the side, having fun with its family in Wii Fit, and PC is in a basement garbed in dark blue worshiping GabeN and trying to summon HL3). And people will look the other way to an excessive degree while "their" team does bad stuff. I will say that one thing gaming has that politics doesn't is "the only thing we hate as much as the other side is our side". Obviously even microsoft fanboys will be quick to turn on Microsoft if they do something obviously anti-gamer, since gamers also love to be victims.
throwaway894345 6y ago
It's not some nefarious plot, it's just regular economics, the same kind that is motivating a trend away from on-premise software and toward SaaS. The justification was never 'server costs' but rather the costs of the services that xbox provides (text and voice chat, moderation, player profiles, friends lists, matchmaking, video capture and sharing, software update channels, etc).

ChrisLTD 6y ago

Microsoft still provides an entire infrastructure for communication and multiplayer games. In any other industry, I suppose the cost of that service would be rolled into the price of the device. But since consoles are often sold for a loss, Sony and Microsoft are likely compelled to charge for whatever add-on services they can.

alpaca128 6y ago
On PC that infrastructure exists as well, for free. For communication you can choose between things like Discord, Teamspeak or maybe just the ingame voice chat. And you don't need to pay for those Battlefield online servers. All while PC games are cheaper than the console versions.
- hobs 6y ago
  Someone does, because you generally cant host them in the client (wrt battlefield) there's plenty of games where that's not a problem, but BF has famously made it harder and harder for private hosters so they can sell those servers.
Someone1234 6y ago
XBox games utilize P2P communications, which means that players are actually providing much of the heavy infrastructure ("game servers") whereas Microsoft is responsible only for match-making/routing. Microsoft has public documentation that describes how it works: > The session host is the console or device that runs the game play simulation for titles built on a host-based peer-to-peer network architecture. This console or device is typically the same as the arbiter, but it does not have to be the same.[0] [0] https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/gaming/xbox-live/features/multiplayer/concepts/live-multiplayer-concepts https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/gaming/xbox-live/features/m...
- Thaxll 6y ago
  There are less and less p2p usage, most serious games have moved to dedicated servers. And your definitation of heavy is very much incacurate.

CryptoGhost 6y ago

Why is it unbelievable ? The business model involves not charging enough for the console and some big titles to lure in customers and then later capturing profit from things like DLC and peripherals. It was quite common in the history of PC gaming for the players to have to pay for their own servers for network play.

flohofwoe 6y ago
At the time when Xbox Live was started, by far most console multiplayer games had p2p architecture and only required central infrastructure for matchmaking though (and this was about the only service provided by Xbox Live). I don't know how common client/server games are nowadays where the servers are part of the Xbox Live infrastructure.
- throwaway894345 6y ago
  The servers aren't part of the XBox Live infrastructure, but XBox Live provides infrastructure for friends lists, matchmaking, p2p text and voice communication, moderation (banning players), video recording and sharing, etc. They also provide a website, mobile apps, and of course the console experience to interface with these services. $5/month isn't an unreasonable price tag for these features, and I would happily pay double if it meant that xbox would actually remove some of the hardcore stalkers and overt pedophiles. By which I mean the networks of grown men who coordinate to target certain minors (even though the minors appear offline and block the stalkers) by fanning out across game servers. Microsoft knows about these players because they've been reported so many times and by so many different players that they have the worst Reputation Scores. This isn't to speak of the "ordinary" sexual harassment, trolling, cheating, and "unsporting behavior".

willis936 6y ago

Is it also unbelievable to charge for access to an IP library?

kevinschumacher 6y ago
Of course not, but that's not what the service is, or primarily is marketed as (you may be thinking of Xbox Game Pass?)

patja 6y ago

I'll admit I pay it just to hang onto my ancient 3 letter gamertag.

alexfromapex 6y ago

I feel the same way about people who pay for cable only to see commercials on all of the shows

throwaway894345 6y ago

They're not paying to use their Internet connection, they're paying to use the XBox Live infrastructure, just like any SaaS business.

numpad0 6y ago

Or maybe it is an ongoing mistake that HTTP 402 is left as it is. “Everything on Internet should be free(-beer)” is such a load of BS.

zxcvbn4038 6y ago

I think it’s incredible that ad supported games are a thing - you are going to support your game by showing ads for someone else’s game? If the ads are effective and people go play that game, then they are not watching ads during your game anymore. Didn’t think that one through.