7 ms·

Microsoft Is Removing Xbox One DRM

48 points by rkudeshi 13y ago

revx 13y ago
Is this totally confirmed? This seems hoax-y to me right now.
- squidsoup 13y ago
  Yes, confirmed: http://news.xbox.com/2013/05/qa http://news.xbox.com/2013/05/qa
  - deleted 13y ago
    [deleted]
    - arrogant 13y ago
      That FAQ is from last month. The update from today specifically states: > After a one-time system set-up with a new Xbox One, you can play any disc based game without ever connecting online again. There is no 24 hour connection requirement and you can take your Xbox One anywhere you want and play your games, just like on Xbox 360. http://news.xbox.com/2013/06/update http://news.xbox.com/2013/06/update
timdorr 13y ago
This is a pretty bold move by them. They're essentially getting rid of all the changes to the DRM set up from the 360 (which also has DRM; this isn't a complete removal), including all the beneficial changes. Of course, they weren't that compelling to me and introduced a lot of confusion about how they would work and exactly what limitations would be put in place. Looks like they're still going to struggle with the Kinect privacy concerns, but that's more of a PR battle than an actual privacy one. You can turn off Kinect, but you couldn't turn off the Xbox DRM system.
- philwelch 13y ago
  Bold? More like desperate. Not doing this would have killed Xbox.
- HelloMcFly 13y ago
  > Looks like they're still going to struggle with the Kinect privacy concerns I can't help but wonder. Of all of the issues with the XB1, that one seems like my candidate for biggest disconnect between what people say online and what popular perception actually is. I know I don't care, nor do any of my gamer friends, nor my brother.
  - chokolad 13y ago
    Do you own an iPad or a laptop with a web cam and microphone?
    - falcolas 13y ago
      Not with one that's active 100% of the time. Which may not be completely accurate, the XB1 mic is on all the time by default, but I'm not sure about the camera. The benefit of my laptop webcam though is the hardware light built in to indicate when it's active.
      - makomk 13y ago
        Some of those hardware lights can actually be controlled from software, unfortunately.
    - mercuryrising 13y ago
      iPads and laptops aren't sitting there, listening to everything you say, waiting for you to say 'xbox, on!'. It listens to everything you say while waiting for that one command (like Glass, too). It'd be easy to give someone a hook for that audio stream, given the right motivations.
      - HelloMcFly 13y ago
eof 13y ago
Next all we need is for the government to do an about face for the things people are fussing over!
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
sivam 13y ago
Previous discussion from a few minutes ago, not on front page anymore. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5907976 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5907976
nrivadeneira 13y ago
I'm not all that thrilled about this. I wanted to see where Microsoft would go with this. It would have been great if we could transition to a pricing and distribution model similar to Steam. I saw this as a step towards weening console players off of physical media.
- Pxtl 13y ago
  The difference is that Steam has to compete with other online retailers as well as hard media. Consoles are more of a captive audience... obviously some folks have multiple consoles, but most of the core audience will only be buying one console at launch. So even if MS grossly undercuts the competition in their e-shop like Steam does, game prices don't appear to be a big point of competition in the console-vs-console war. And either way, developers doing cross-platform releases don't let Steam do those kind of deep cuts on new titles. If they're only reaping the benefits on older games? That could be a hard battle to win.
  - nrivadeneira 13y ago
    I don't believe Steam has their crazy sales with the primary focus being on undercutting competition. Generally, the sales are for slightly older games (1 year or older). These games have likely seen a dramatic drop in sales. Even as low as Steam reduces the price point to, I'm willing to bet the revenue bump is huge. It's an effective way to derive profits from otherwise low volume titles. "Instead what we saw was our gross revenue increased by a factor of 40. Not 40 percent, but a factor of 40." http://www.geekwire.com/2011/experiments-video-game-economics-valves-gabe-newell/ http://www.geekwire.com/2011/experiments-video-game-economic...
  - InclinedPlane 13y ago
    Steam's sales have nothing to do with competition and everything to do with leveraging digital distribution and maximizing benefit for everyone, including publishers. MS might be too wedded to old norms to understand that being able to lower prices can actually dramatically increase total revenue in a digital world but Valve very much does. Here, read this: http://www.geekwire.com/2011/experiments-video-game-economics-valves-gabe-newell/ http://www.geekwire.com/2011/experiments-video-game-economic... That's some background about Valve's early experiments with Steam sales. Early on their preliminary research indicated that sales would pretty much leave total revenue unchanged, with the increase in purchases balanced by the reduced per-game revenue. However, they found out quickly they were very wrong. What they found was that with a 75% reduction in price their total revenue increased by 40 times. Not 40%, a factor of 40, 4000%. And not sales volume, total revenue. Which translates to much higher profit in the digital realm where per-sale overhead is small. Game makers and publishers who actually understand economics, instead of companies like MS who merely pretend to, have the opportunity to greatly advantage both consumers and game makers. Cheaper games means more people can play them, but it turns out it also means more money in the hands of people who make games. Which helps those companies survive and makes it that much more possible for them to make more games.
notjustanymike 13y ago
"Thank you again for your candid feedback. Our team remains committed to listening, taking feedback and delivering a great product for you later this year." Translated: "Please stop telling us to burn in the 9 circles of Hell. Our team would also like it if you stopped threatening their families."
kryten 13y ago
They forgot to turn off the telescreen though... i.e. it won't boot without the Kinect plugged in.
smegel 13y ago
Good move, but I can still see the one becoming this generations Wii. Sort-of gaming system mixed up with home entertainment and novelty controllers...going up against the PS4 which has similar guts but is designed as a no-compromise gaming system. The Wii did OK to begin with, but was then smashed by 360, I suspect the PS4 will do same to One.
Zenst 13y ago
WOW, maybe the hope of DRM being redefined as Dynamic Response Marketing over the more common Digital Rights Managment (We not only know what you did last summer but can dictate all yoru summers), has hope. If anything it shows a more consumer responsive Microsoft, which can't be a bad thing.
hayksaakian 13y ago
> "Xbox One games will be playable on any Xbox One console — there will be no regional restrictions." this is pretty big
- Narishma 13y ago
  Not really. It's the norm on Sony consoles since the PS2.
Jare 13y ago
I am more sad at all the potential advances that have been lost / delayed: These changes will impact some of the scenarios we previously announced for Xbox One. The sharing of games will work as it does today, you will simply share the disc. Downloaded titles cannot be shared or resold. Also, similar to today, playing disc based games will require that the disc be in the tray The last thing that next-gen consoles need is to remain anchored to last-gen practices. The road was going to be bumpy but, as many have said before, so was Steam and now everyone loves what it's become.

48 points by rkudeshi 13y ago

revx 13y ago

Is this totally confirmed? This seems hoax-y to me right now.

squidsoup 13y ago
Yes, confirmed: http://news.xbox.com/2013/05/qa http://news.xbox.com/2013/05/qa
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
  - arrogant 13y ago
    That FAQ is from last month. The update from today specifically states: > After a one-time system set-up with a new Xbox One, you can play any disc based game without ever connecting online again. There is no 24 hour connection requirement and you can take your Xbox One anywhere you want and play your games, just like on Xbox 360. http://news.xbox.com/2013/06/update http://news.xbox.com/2013/06/update

timdorr 13y ago

This is a pretty bold move by them. They're essentially getting rid of all the changes to the DRM set up from the 360 (which also has DRM; this isn't a complete removal), including all the beneficial changes. Of course, they weren't that compelling to me and introduced a lot of confusion about how they would work and exactly what limitations would be put in place. Looks like they're still going to struggle with the Kinect privacy concerns, but that's more of a PR battle than an actual privacy one. You can turn off Kinect, but you couldn't turn off the Xbox DRM system.

philwelch 13y ago
Bold? More like desperate. Not doing this would have killed Xbox.
HelloMcFly 13y ago
> Looks like they're still going to struggle with the Kinect privacy concerns I can't help but wonder. Of all of the issues with the XB1, that one seems like my candidate for biggest disconnect between what people say online and what popular perception actually is. I know I don't care, nor do any of my gamer friends, nor my brother.
- chokolad 13y ago
  Do you own an iPad or a laptop with a web cam and microphone?
  - falcolas 13y ago
    Not with one that's active 100% of the time. Which may not be completely accurate, the XB1 mic is on all the time by default, but I'm not sure about the camera. The benefit of my laptop webcam though is the hardware light built in to indicate when it's active.
    - makomk 13y ago
      Some of those hardware lights can actually be controlled from software, unfortunately.
  - mercuryrising 13y ago
    iPads and laptops aren't sitting there, listening to everything you say, waiting for you to say 'xbox, on!'. It listens to everything you say while waiting for that one command (like Glass, too). It'd be easy to give someone a hook for that audio stream, given the right motivations.
    - HelloMcFly 13y ago

eof 13y ago

Next all we need is for the government to do an about face for the things people are fussing over!

deleted 13y ago

[deleted]

sivam 13y ago

Previous discussion from a few minutes ago, not on front page anymore. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5907976 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5907976

nrivadeneira 13y ago

I'm not all that thrilled about this. I wanted to see where Microsoft would go with this. It would have been great if we could transition to a pricing and distribution model similar to Steam. I saw this as a step towards weening console players off of physical media.

Pxtl 13y ago
The difference is that Steam has to compete with other online retailers as well as hard media. Consoles are more of a captive audience... obviously some folks have multiple consoles, but most of the core audience will only be buying one console at launch. So even if MS grossly undercuts the competition in their e-shop like Steam does, game prices don't appear to be a big point of competition in the console-vs-console war. And either way, developers doing cross-platform releases don't let Steam do those kind of deep cuts on new titles. If they're only reaping the benefits on older games? That could be a hard battle to win.
- nrivadeneira 13y ago
  I don't believe Steam has their crazy sales with the primary focus being on undercutting competition. Generally, the sales are for slightly older games (1 year or older). These games have likely seen a dramatic drop in sales. Even as low as Steam reduces the price point to, I'm willing to bet the revenue bump is huge. It's an effective way to derive profits from otherwise low volume titles. "Instead what we saw was our gross revenue increased by a factor of 40. Not 40 percent, but a factor of 40." http://www.geekwire.com/2011/experiments-video-game-economics-valves-gabe-newell/ http://www.geekwire.com/2011/experiments-video-game-economic...
- InclinedPlane 13y ago
  Steam's sales have nothing to do with competition and everything to do with leveraging digital distribution and maximizing benefit for everyone, including publishers. MS might be too wedded to old norms to understand that being able to lower prices can actually dramatically increase total revenue in a digital world but Valve very much does. Here, read this: http://www.geekwire.com/2011/experiments-video-game-economics-valves-gabe-newell/ http://www.geekwire.com/2011/experiments-video-game-economic... That's some background about Valve's early experiments with Steam sales. Early on their preliminary research indicated that sales would pretty much leave total revenue unchanged, with the increase in purchases balanced by the reduced per-game revenue. However, they found out quickly they were very wrong. What they found was that with a 75% reduction in price their total revenue increased by 40 times. Not 40%, a factor of 40, 4000%. And not sales volume, total revenue. Which translates to much higher profit in the digital realm where per-sale overhead is small. Game makers and publishers who actually understand economics, instead of companies like MS who merely pretend to, have the opportunity to greatly advantage both consumers and game makers. Cheaper games means more people can play them, but it turns out it also means more money in the hands of people who make games. Which helps those companies survive and makes it that much more possible for them to make more games.

notjustanymike 13y ago

"Thank you again for your candid feedback. Our team remains committed to listening, taking feedback and delivering a great product for you later this year." Translated: "Please stop telling us to burn in the 9 circles of Hell. Our team would also like it if you stopped threatening their families."

kryten 13y ago

They forgot to turn off the telescreen though... i.e. it won't boot without the Kinect plugged in.

smegel 13y ago

Good move, but I can still see the one becoming this generations Wii. Sort-of gaming system mixed up with home entertainment and novelty controllers...going up against the PS4 which has similar guts but is designed as a no-compromise gaming system. The Wii did OK to begin with, but was then smashed by 360, I suspect the PS4 will do same to One.

Zenst 13y ago

WOW, maybe the hope of DRM being redefined as Dynamic Response Marketing over the more common Digital Rights Managment (We not only know what you did last summer but can dictate all yoru summers), has hope. If anything it shows a more consumer responsive Microsoft, which can't be a bad thing.

hayksaakian 13y ago

> "Xbox One games will be playable on any Xbox One console — there will be no regional restrictions." this is pretty big

Narishma 13y ago
Not really. It's the norm on Sony consoles since the PS2.

Jare 13y ago

I am more sad at all the potential advances that have been lost / delayed: These changes will impact some of the scenarios we previously announced for Xbox One. The sharing of games will work as it does today, you will simply share the disc. Downloaded titles cannot be shared or resold. Also, similar to today, playing disc based games will require that the disc be in the tray The last thing that next-gen consoles need is to remain anchored to last-gen practices. The road was going to be bumpy but, as many have said before, so was Steam and now everyone loves what it's become.