Sad that companies these days get huge applause for simply not fucking over the customer. God forbid anyone actually do anything to improve the customer's lot.
Sad that companies these days get huge applause for simply not fucking over the customer. God forbid anyone actually do anything to improve the customer's lot.
Respect to Microsoft (And sony) for pricing their consoles only a hundo more expensive in Australia, at least. The last generation's release prices were ludicrous - a grand for a PS3, and 600+ for the 360.
Why would a company with shareholders ever take any action that did not increase shareholder value?
It wouldn't. The problem is that what companies and shareholders believe will increase value is often wrong, or only right in the short term.
A business strategy of pleasing customers, if successful, increases value. You can see this in companies like Valve. Yes, that's a private company. But they act in the interest of their customers as much as possible, and it pays off. If they had shareholders, they would be raking it in even though the company was putting customers interests first.
Now imagine you are a short term shareholder who only cares about the next quarter exceeding estimates. There isn't much a company that makes customers the top priority can do to increase value every single quarter. To please customers you have to spend and invest a lot into products and services, and then wait for those products and services to become popular and beloved. That can not possibly happen in a single quarter.
The only ways to increase your values in that short term are by doing certain actions on paper. You can lay people off. You can cut production costs by making the existing products cheaper or shoddier. You can rip off customers by raising any "rents" that exist, such as a phone company adding fees. None of these options are really anything that make customers happy or help in the long term. If there was something you could do to please customers and shareholders short term, every company would be doing it.
If shareholders were forced to have long term interests, then their value would be synonymous with the customer's values. Then you would see a lot of things become awesome.
The only ways to increase your values in that short term are by doing certain actions on paper. You can lay people off. You can cut production costs by making the existing products cheaper or shoddier. You can rip off customers by raising any "rents" that exist, such as a phone company adding fees. None of these options are really anything that make customers happy or help in the long term. If there was something you could do to please customers and shareholders short term, every company would be doing it.
If shareholders were forced to have long term interests, then their value would be synonymous with the customer's values. Then you would see a lot of things become awesome.
truth!
And we can see this in games like Call of Duty, Madden, Fifa that come out every year with very small iterative changes and no real appreciable additive value, yet each year they're finding ways to chop up the content into DLC and charge more for it.
There are XBox "customers" who do not want to buy an Xbox, but they do want to buy access to the people who do. User facing cameras and online data collection and whatnot are extremely attractive things to corporate citizens with vast amounts of money to give to Microsoft.
There are XBox "customers" who do not want to buy an Xbox, but they do want to buy access to the people who do. User facing cameras and online data collection and whatnot are extremely attractive things to corporate citizens with vast amounts of money to give to Microsoft.
*fires up Steam* Oh WOW is that another new Minecraft clone?? AND it's 30% off? Yeah I gotta get this. And oh shit, a puzzle platformer with hand drawn pixel art and a custom chip tunes sound track?? PC gaming is the life for me...
*fires up Steam* Oh WOW is that another new Minecraft clone?? AND it's 30% off? Yeah I gotta get this. And oh shit, a puzzle platformer with hand drawn pixel art and a custom chip tunes sound track?? PC gaming is the life for me...
Looking at that list I spotted eight games that I'd like to play and few more that I might be interested. Not that many, but add in all crossplatform games that are not on PC and I don't have on 360 yet and getting an used PS3 at some point seems like decent investment. For me at least.
PC gaming is not just Steam. A modern PC can play every PC game ever created going back to Spacewar! The PC game library includes the entire NES library. The entire SNES library. The entire MAME library. The entire every platform that can be emulated library. It includes every DOS game, every Windows game from 3.1 through 8. It includes all of Kongregate and every other game you can play in a web browser.
The only games you can not play on a PC are exclusive games for PS3, XBox 360, XBox One, PS4, Wii, WiiU, 3DS, and OSX (are there any?). Some of the new arcade games, especially those with custom interface devices, that are not available in MAME. Also maybe there are some PS2, Dreamcast, GameCube, or XBox games that do not work properly in emulators.
The list of PC exclusives is so incredibly long it's not even humanly possible to try and figure it out. It includes everything from Dwarf Fortress, to X-Com, to 3-D Ultra Pinball, to WoW, to Tribes 2, to Abobo's Big Adventure, to every mod ever for everything that can be modded.
Yes, I know that. Everyone knows that. Well, not everyone, but everyone relevant. And I have PC that I play games with, a lot. Doesn't change the fact that there are console exclusive games that I'd also love to play.
Also Wii emulation is still totally a thing, so you can play Wii exclusive games on PC.
Yes, I know that. Everyone knows that. Well, not everyone, but everyone relevant. And I have PC that I play games with, a lot. Doesn't change the fact that there are console exclusive games that I'd also love to play.
Also Wii emulation is still totally a thing, so you can play Wii exclusive games on PC.
Wii Emulation? OH SHIIIIIIIIII
The one real issue I see with emulating more modern games is storage. That free download of Fable III yesterday was over 5 gigabytes. With Steam I can uninstall games I'm not playing right now because I know I can redownload them. This works especially well for single player games. But if I go through the effort to download an obscure console ROM or disc image, I feel I have to save that forever.
PC storage is effectively free at this point you can get a 3 terabyte external drive for freaking 100 dollars...
I have an 8TB NAS, of which 6TB is usable space. In my PC I have two SSDs and 1.5TB of magnetic discs. These things get filled up with downloaded animes, HD GoPro recordings. RAW photos, and games installed through Steam. I can't really fit that many PSX games, let alone PS2 or greater.
This brings me to yet another critical flaw in PC gaming. With a good comsole gaming machineyou have a smaller yet dedicated gaming harddrive. However, if I wish to install games onto my computer, I have to share the harddrive space with my massive collection of hardcore pornography. Sure, I could buy another harddrive like every other day, but frankly, it just makes a lot more sense to have one machine dedicated to games and another dedicated to pornography.
This brings me to yet another critical flaw in PC gaming. With a good comsole gaming machineyou have a smaller yet dedicated gaming harddrive. However, if I wish to install games onto my computer, I have to share the harddrive space with my massive collection of hardcore pornography. Sure, I could buy another harddrive like every other day, but frankly, it just makes a lot more sense to have one machine dedicated to games and another dedicated to pornography.
3TB $150. For the Price of one PS4 you can add 7 TB of storage to your PC.
Also, clearly your technical skills are very low if you are downloading porn and storing it locally. In the year 2013 you stream porn. The only people who store porn locally are pedophiles, and people who are using PirateBay to download professionally produced full length porn movies.
Yeah, let me just go ahead and watch some sub SD porn streams and completely waste the insane resolution and color quality of my expensive home pornography theater projector.
Yeah, let me just go ahead and watch some sub SD porn streams and completely waste the insane resolution and color quality of my expensive home pornography theater projector.
If you can afford an HD projector, and know how to set it up, then you are smart enough to get a PC to work and are pretending to be dumb.
Yeah, let me just go ahead and watch some sub SD porn streams and completely waste the insane resolution and color quality of my expensive home pornography theater projector.
If you can afford an HD projector, and know how to set it up, then you are smart enough to get a PC to work and are pretending to be dumb.
Comments
A business strategy of pleasing customers, if successful, increases value. You can see this in companies like Valve. Yes, that's a private company. But they act in the interest of their customers as much as possible, and it pays off. If they had shareholders, they would be raking it in even though the company was putting customers interests first.
Now imagine you are a short term shareholder who only cares about the next quarter exceeding estimates. There isn't much a company that makes customers the top priority can do to increase value every single quarter. To please customers you have to spend and invest a lot into products and services, and then wait for those products and services to become popular and beloved. That can not possibly happen in a single quarter.
The only ways to increase your values in that short term are by doing certain actions on paper. You can lay people off. You can cut production costs by making the existing products cheaper or shoddier. You can rip off customers by raising any "rents" that exist, such as a phone company adding fees. None of these options are really anything that make customers happy or help in the long term. If there was something you could do to please customers and shareholders short term, every company would be doing it.
If shareholders were forced to have long term interests, then their value would be synonymous with the customer's values. Then you would see a lot of things become awesome.
It only demonstrates mistrust between consumer and company.
And we can see this in games like Call of Duty, Madden, Fifa that come out every year with very small iterative changes and no real appreciable additive value, yet each year they're finding ways to chop up the content into DLC and charge more for it.
Games on the list I want to play:
Initial D Extreme Stage
Need way more quality titles for me to even consider 'upgrading' to the new box.
I'm currently happy with my current PC, 360 and original DS.
The only games you can not play on a PC are exclusive games for PS3, XBox 360, XBox One, PS4, Wii, WiiU, 3DS, and OSX (are there any?). Some of the new arcade games, especially those with custom interface devices, that are not available in MAME. Also maybe there are some PS2, Dreamcast, GameCube, or XBox games that do not work properly in emulators.
The list of PC exclusives is so incredibly long it's not even humanly possible to try and figure it out. It includes everything from Dwarf Fortress, to X-Com, to 3-D Ultra Pinball, to WoW, to Tribes 2, to Abobo's Big Adventure, to every mod ever for everything that can be modded.
And I have PC that I play games with, a lot. Doesn't change the fact that there are console exclusive games that I'd also love to play.
Also Wii emulation is still totally a thing, so you can play Wii exclusive games on PC.
The one real issue I see with emulating more modern games is storage. That free download of Fable III yesterday was over 5 gigabytes. With Steam I can uninstall games I'm not playing right now because I know I can redownload them. This works especially well for single player games. But if I go through the effort to download an obscure console ROM or disc image, I feel I have to save that forever.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holographic_Versatile_Disc
Also, clearly your technical skills are very low if you are downloading porn and storing it locally. In the year 2013 you stream porn. The only people who store porn locally are pedophiles, and people who are using PirateBay to download professionally produced full length porn movies.
So anyway, the PC is the best console or the Bestest Console :-p