Xbox Series X & S to Raise Prices Again This Year!
(www.cnbc.com)
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Steam doesn't charge a monthly/yearly fee (yet) for multiplayer.
Xbox live does.
Plus Microsoft can't stop crowing about how they are gonna police speech over microphones & messages even harder by... auto-monitoring gamers.
Why would someone want to buy an Xbox right now?
Xbox specifically is the reason why multiplayer has a subscription model, as well as most small form DLC.
Never forget that PS3 had free multiplayer, while Xbox didn't. Which caused Sony to just say "well they seem happy to pay for it, free money" in the PS4 generation.
And then when Valve, back when they made games, worked on maps for L4D after release intending to give them for free, Xbox demanded it be charged for on their platform to not "set a bad example" by giving it out without a cost. Likely because they were trying to use that "mappack for 10-15$" model on Halo at the time.
Not to mention that Horse Armor, the originator of basically all bad microtransactions and "skinpacks for money instead of earning in game" game about on Xbox with Oblivion. Bethesda, being who they are, were happy to join them in doing so.
So not only is Xbox not worth it, and hasn't been for over a decade, they are literally responsible for most of the cancer that we rail against right now. And not in a general sense, but actively and directly caused it.
Funny how it changed so quickly... i blame fortnite for making it acceptable. It always existed, but people dumped loads of money into fortnite and companies saw this and followed.
Fortnite is just following the path GTA5 set for it.
I knew middle school boys back in the day working full time outside school doing every job they could get for money to spend on GTA nonsense. They made so much money on that game that you could feel companies shifting gears to try and replicate it.
I'm incredulous sometimes when I try to fire up a game like PvZ Garden Warfare, only to forget that I'm locked out of it unless I pony up another 60 bucks a year to make the game functional.
This is a new kind of FOMO. Before, sure, there was the tradeoff of “not there at the start” vs. “but I got it cheaper.” With this generation, it was either “buy on release” or “pay hundreds more later.”
It's not new, that's just hyperinflation. Be prepared to see more "buy now save now" behavior as our money gets devalued into worthlessness.
Surely that will convince gamers to go buy a console with no good exclusives.
Why do people give even the slightest fuck about exclusives? Maybe I'm just too old to get it. If it's available, maybe I play, otherwise no big deal. It's just a game, life goes on without it.
I grew up playing Nintendo but haven't owned one of their systems since 2000. So, I don't play Zelda or something, eh. Other than on Nintendo, exclusives are dying.
I remember when Epic tried holding games hostage for a year or so. That died pretty quick. None of the publishers are willing to leave money on the table so Xbox or Playstation can say EXCLUSIVE anymore. That and the lawsuit that's essentially forcing them both.
Because the hardware is pretty near functionally identical, as far as performance goes. Without exclusives, there's no real reason to pick one console over the other, or to even pick a console at all instead of just using a PC.
Reasons not to care anymore. The only thing left is fanboyism.
And laziness. Alot of guys just want to plug and play and cant be bothered to tinker with stuff. They will drop 1k on a consolol + controllers and a headset just so they can eat Doritos on the couch while playing Goy of Duty.
For a long period of history the console, accessories and game was cheaper than the PC alternative. Simply because most games of quality didn't run well on lower end PCs, so you had to buy much stronger stuff compared to the console guaranteeing it for a fraction of that price.
There was even that short period where console functionality as a "multimedia box" made it the much smarter option for getting bang for your buck.
That hasn't been the case for some years, as PC parts have gotten cheap enough that you can run most new games on ones that are close enough to consoles in pricing. And the console price raising making that difference even narrower to a point of "paying the same for a lesser product."
When I worked retail I tried to explain to some men and they just didnt care. It was part of their comfort routine and even as the prices spiked, they were still willing to cough up the cash.
Its not like its an absurd scam level problem. The difference between a console and a simple PC is probably pretty small depending, especially if you need to buy keyboard/mouse/monitor as well. And for a lot of guys whose entire library is "CoD, NBA, and a few others" its not even a real loss of opportunity as those games will always be on those platforms in their most updated form. The vast majority of console guys are only "gamers" in the loosest sense, and that will always be the case.
Difference is, they were raised on consoles. Its much harder to break habits, however that group is continuing to shrink because the price disparity is so notable and just keeps getting worse for consoles.
Yep. It's a sign consoles are dying.
Although they've given up on exclusive games, Xbox does have some killer exclusive features, like Quick Resume, Play Anywhere, Smart Delivery, Game Pass, multi-generational backwards compatibility, etc.
Honestly, Quick Resume alone would be enough for me to rebuy a Series X if I had to do it all over again. Probably my favorite feature added to console gaming since the online gaming.
That's because they were fronting the money to basically compensate for the fact that everyone knew it was going to be a huge sales loss. They can only toss money into a pit for so long before people start getting mad.
And between the bad press, lawsuits Epic was specifically in, and that companies figured out they could do "early access" on Epic while taking their money before releasing fully on Steam as it ended it was clear even the devs were taking advantage of them.
Wow. There was a day I had consoles and never thought I'd be in on PC, but my budget grade PC I built over three years ago could be built for less today at least. It's also perfectly fine. I'd considered wanting to upgrade a bit around this time when I built it, but I haven't even slightly felt a desire to do so.
Consoles stopped being consoles a long time ago and gave up their advantage over PCs as a direct result.
There is a reason why, for all Nintendo's faults, they still have "fans." Because they are the only one in the game still making consoles for gaming and their gimmicks push towards that functionality instead of trying to be something else.
Nintendo has 900 of its own problems we can harp on, but that's the one thing they have over their competition.
Serious response:
Who would pay for an xbox, price increase or otherwise, when you know the kind of people working there, and they've said they're going to monitor a service you have to pay for, just in case you say no no words, so they can mute and/or ban you, and the console.
Joke response:
What if MS put an e in there for series s and x.
lol exs xbox. too many xboxes. lol.
are there even any games you can play on Xbox that you can't also play on pc? at this point you can get a gaming worthy PC for about $500
Halo 5 is one. It's ten years old at this point, but I still play it every day. It's got the best multiplayer FPS gameplay I've ever played.
I bought a Series S for $150 a few years ago on Craigslist. I literally bought it for one game series and never play online. Microsoft hates me.
If you're not paying a bit more for a PC so you can pirate terabytes of games/movies/media/etc for free then I genuinely think you're a zoomer, a nig, or just completely hopeless at this point.
For 5 year old hardware. LMAO!
Yeah, hhahahaha, crazy!