5 ms·
Isn't that basically the same Nintendo and Sony? Save for the cloud platform.
by jpablo 5y ago
Isn't that basically the same Nintendo and Sony? Save for the cloud platform.
- smileybarry 5y agoSony practically owns their cloud platform too, with their Gaikai purchase a decade ago[1] and PS Now being "PS3/PS4s in the cloud". [1] https://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2012-07-03-sony-acquisition-of-gaikai-a-genius-move https://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2012-07-03-sony-acqui...
- brendoelfrendo 5y agoThis is actually an area where I think Sony has dropped the ball; PS Now is an interesting service, and they have a pretty interesting catalog of older games from the PS2/PS3 era. But they don't advertise it well enough, and I don't think they put enough focus on new releases and keeping them available the way Microsoft does with Gamepass.
- Hamuko 5y agoThere's rumours of them revamping PS Now and PS+ into a new service.
- brendoelfrendo 5y agoI've heard these, and they should! It would give them direct competition to GamePass Ultimate, which is a tier of service they don't currently offer (unless you buy PS+ and PS Now as separate subscriptions).
- phatfish 5y agoI assumed Sony were migrating to or already using Azure at this point. https://news.microsoft.com/2019/05/16/sony-and-microsoft-to-explore-strategic-partnership/ https://news.microsoft.com/2019/05/16/sony-and-microsoft-to-... At the time Microsoft where not throwing so much money at games development an IP ownership. I wonder how Sony feel about this now.
- smileybarry 5y agoI see. But because they're maintaining datacenters for PS3/PS4 streaming I think they have the potential to go hosted, at the end of the day multiplayer servers are developer-controlled and network servers (e.g.: PSN, Xbox Live) are mostly identity services and such. (Even matchmaking isn't the network's job anymore)
- curiousllama 5y agoNintendo yes. But they've long been a closed, relatively niche ecosystem. Their entire market cap is less than the value of this deal. Sony, perhaps. But I do think the cloud platform is a critical piece, because it is a huge source of value capture (e.g., all CoD compute on Azure is no small deal). It also allows significantly more dominance in distribution via cloud gaming - and coincidentally, Microsoft has been much more aggressive about owning distribution with Xbox Game Pass. This is all on top of the fact that Microsoft influences the PC and console markets, not just the console market.
- djtango 5y agoActivision are much better at monetising than Nintendo. Think candy crush and loot boxes vs fun single player mario games
- ghostly_s 5y agoPretty sure Nintendo operates their cloud platform as well, though it's hardly comparable as it only offers NES + SNES roms.
- sbelskie 5y agoIt offers some n64 titles now as well.
- everdrive 5y agoSadly, these are emulated quite poorly.
- tata71 5y agoWord of Dolphin hasn't made its way to Nintendo HQ yet?
- astrange 5y agoIt's pretty difficult to emulate an N64 with both accuracy and speed because its GPU is strange and flexible in all the wrong ways. And its game catalog isn't that large, so not worth the engineering effort. The games people care about deeply like SM64 have remakes that aren't that hard to get.
- the_only_law 5y agoI saw an SGI Indy on eBay today, that had some sort of N64 development device it came with. Not sure if it actually contained an emulator or maybe just a header for an onboard debugging port though. Sadly it was priced wayyy higher than the Indy I just bought so I ignored it.
- everdrive 5y agoI’d be more inclined to agree except that emulation of the same exact games went much better on the original Wii. Nintendo just phoned this one in.
- aparticulate 5y agoNintendo operates on different rules due their absurd array of reliable IPs. I get the sense that MS, Sony are still trying to sort out their own "Mario, Zelda, Pokemon" clone with mainstream movies/merch potential and all that entails.
- xeromal 5y agoHalo is probably the closest thing they have to a Marioesque IP.
- farisjarrah 5y agoI'm not that big on FPS games. When I play Nintendo I generally play things like Mario Party or Mario Kart. A friend recently gave me an Xbox Series S, and off the top of my head I couldn't think of a single multi-player party sorta party game. I'm sure there are plenty of these games, but they definitely don't have the same type of draw as Mario.
- dont__panic 5y agoThe major non-Nintendo consoles have de-emphasized splitscreen and party games for a long time -- once we hit the PS4 and Xbox One era, it felt like most games didn't even support splitscreen at all, aside from a few indies. I think those games tend to rely on in-person interaction to boost the fun, and MS/Sony have decided to prioritize selling additional consoles instead of making one usable for multiple people.
- xeromal 5y agoThe halo universe is pretty big. There are about 20-30+ books that I can recall, a phone game, and 2 RTS games on top of the FPS games we know and love. There is a TV show releasing this or next year. The universe of Halo is one I've grown up with and can't stop waiting for the next piece of lore to come out. There's a lot to enjoy in the Halo universe even if you don't play FPSes. The books themselves are solid though a solid % is just your run-of-the-mill fiction.
- 5y ago
- ouid 5y agoAbsolutely not, Microsoft owns your operating system on your general computer. At least you could argue that I am, in some sense, willingly entering the ecosystem by buying an xbox. Blizzard and Minecraft are primarily PC games.