Michael Noire
(?)Community Member
Offline
- Posted: Fri, 26 Dec 2014 20:30:26 +0000
For the past few days, The Playstation network, along with some other console systems have been suffering from a total or near total blackout and inaccessibility for the MMO community. This kind of technology has always been subject to the whims of cyberattacks, but only recently has the vulnerability been exploited on such a scale with sufficient political and media attention.
20-30 years ago, console systems allowed gamers to enjoy hours of entertainment each day from the privacy of their own homes, often entertaining guests. The technology even back then allowed for 2, sometimes four different players in the same room on the same system. The Arpa net and various Telnet systems existed, and people used to play Multiuser dungeons through the phone lines, but the large focus was on the video graphics of things like superfamicom, Nintendo, Sega, and Atari.
The notion of massive multiusers, in actual practical play is largely a farce. Typically, a massive multiuser roleplaying game breaks up the number of users into servers, and those servers can be subdivided by zones, so on average, you have far less than 200 people to interact with, despite millions of people on the same video game. When Queing for dungeons or other limited event content, it is quite common to have only 4 or 8 people participating. Friendship circles in otherwise massive Guilds, Companies, or Alliances are still typified by a half dozen or less actual people you spend frequent time with, while the vast bulk of remaining people might as well be background noise and scenery.
In other words, while potentially we have games now with millions of users, instead of the 1980s-1990s model of 2-8 people, in reality, people are still spending most of their online content with 2-8 people. We haven't really grown much except for extremely rare events like Raids and similar massive swarm efforts.
I suggest at this point, that content designed to satisfy the customer could gain a great deal by emulating the old 'home console' models of content distribution, where a chip or disk and "save" features are combined to allow people to play their games, either alone, or in a small group with multiple controllers, even if they are in some cabin somewhere with no internet connection.
The fragility of online networks does not speak well for Cloud Content Gaming. The inability to play your game that you pay money for, when you want to, because of some malicious hacker, or update, or change in company policy, or some international politics or censorship, this is not a satisfying experience for what should be an entertainment business.
Rather What I propose is more like games (such as RPGs, sports games, fighter games, etc.) where the bulk of content is local, in your own disks, chips, etc., and you can play offline, but then you can "dock" with those characters, teams, etc. and que into the virtual worlds and events WHEN THEY ARE UP. But you would not be hyperdependent on the online aspect of the experience to continue playing normally. Your game would not become a "dud" because of some server issues. Your console would not be "blue screen" because its waiting for some update or hotfix.
I think it is time we embrace this hybrid console again. Better graphics and large crowds, sure, but that doesn't mean that if the internet connection goes down you now have a worthless pile of plastic and wires. We should stand against this online-only policy, and let Dual Use Home-Online hybrid consoles and more importantly, Hybrid Games be the wave of the future.
I was at a cotsco not too long ago and looking at a flash drive sale, and the amount of data they can store has grown to terabytes. The notion that we can't make a video game cartridge capable of storing 'the whole game" is bullshit. You need to call them on this. And as for piracy?
The bigger the video games, the harder they are to pirate. You go ahead and try downloading a terabyte tonight. Tell me how many minutes it takes. I'm not saying its impossible, but what I am saying is there's good reasons to have giant games on tiny portable cartridge devices, proprietary or otherwise.
At the end of the day, I just want to be able to turn on my console and plug in my game and saved data and have some fun. I think most people want the same thing. This online only crap has got to go. It may be the trend, but its the wrong trend. Let's make a new trend.
20-30 years ago, console systems allowed gamers to enjoy hours of entertainment each day from the privacy of their own homes, often entertaining guests. The technology even back then allowed for 2, sometimes four different players in the same room on the same system. The Arpa net and various Telnet systems existed, and people used to play Multiuser dungeons through the phone lines, but the large focus was on the video graphics of things like superfamicom, Nintendo, Sega, and Atari.
The notion of massive multiusers, in actual practical play is largely a farce. Typically, a massive multiuser roleplaying game breaks up the number of users into servers, and those servers can be subdivided by zones, so on average, you have far less than 200 people to interact with, despite millions of people on the same video game. When Queing for dungeons or other limited event content, it is quite common to have only 4 or 8 people participating. Friendship circles in otherwise massive Guilds, Companies, or Alliances are still typified by a half dozen or less actual people you spend frequent time with, while the vast bulk of remaining people might as well be background noise and scenery.
In other words, while potentially we have games now with millions of users, instead of the 1980s-1990s model of 2-8 people, in reality, people are still spending most of their online content with 2-8 people. We haven't really grown much except for extremely rare events like Raids and similar massive swarm efforts.
I suggest at this point, that content designed to satisfy the customer could gain a great deal by emulating the old 'home console' models of content distribution, where a chip or disk and "save" features are combined to allow people to play their games, either alone, or in a small group with multiple controllers, even if they are in some cabin somewhere with no internet connection.
The fragility of online networks does not speak well for Cloud Content Gaming. The inability to play your game that you pay money for, when you want to, because of some malicious hacker, or update, or change in company policy, or some international politics or censorship, this is not a satisfying experience for what should be an entertainment business.
Rather What I propose is more like games (such as RPGs, sports games, fighter games, etc.) where the bulk of content is local, in your own disks, chips, etc., and you can play offline, but then you can "dock" with those characters, teams, etc. and que into the virtual worlds and events WHEN THEY ARE UP. But you would not be hyperdependent on the online aspect of the experience to continue playing normally. Your game would not become a "dud" because of some server issues. Your console would not be "blue screen" because its waiting for some update or hotfix.
I think it is time we embrace this hybrid console again. Better graphics and large crowds, sure, but that doesn't mean that if the internet connection goes down you now have a worthless pile of plastic and wires. We should stand against this online-only policy, and let Dual Use Home-Online hybrid consoles and more importantly, Hybrid Games be the wave of the future.
I was at a cotsco not too long ago and looking at a flash drive sale, and the amount of data they can store has grown to terabytes. The notion that we can't make a video game cartridge capable of storing 'the whole game" is bullshit. You need to call them on this. And as for piracy?
The bigger the video games, the harder they are to pirate. You go ahead and try downloading a terabyte tonight. Tell me how many minutes it takes. I'm not saying its impossible, but what I am saying is there's good reasons to have giant games on tiny portable cartridge devices, proprietary or otherwise.
At the end of the day, I just want to be able to turn on my console and plug in my game and saved data and have some fun. I think most people want the same thing. This online only crap has got to go. It may be the trend, but its the wrong trend. Let's make a new trend.
