Microsoft acted as patron for games such as this until it became easier to just throw moneyhats at Activision for timed-exclusivity of CoD map packs!

Sony Follows Microsoft to the Bottom in the Exclusive Content Racket

The fifteenth day of the eleventh month has come and gone, and with its passing has ushered in the beginning of a new console generation [no, we do not count the Wii U]. With a new console generation comes new console strategies – Microsoft has already revealed their hand with a reliance on television and NFL licenses, and now the pieces of Sony’s console strategy are also starting to come together, and the results are not entirely to one’s liking.

In order to effectively differentiate a new piece of hardware the vendor thereof must be able to depict it as being capable of functioning in ways that competing devices cannot, and the easiest way to do this is to secure some exclusive content that cannot be accessed on any other platform. Throughout the last generation Sony appeared to favour utilising company resources in order to secure wholly exclusive titles for the PS3, while Microsoft for their part quickly dispensed with acquiring entire titles outright in favour of purchasing exclusivity [or timed-exclusivity] of select chunks of content. The effect that this approach has is to effectively compromise the gaming experience that owners of the competing platform are able to have with the titles that they paid sixty dollars for, while at the same time doing very little to positively differentiate the character of one’s own gaming platform. Sony also did this last generation, but only [seemingly] as an afterthought.

This time around Sony appears to have gone after exclusive content in a very concerted fashion. The PS4 version of Assassin’s Creed 4 is set to feature sixty minutes of platform exclusive gameplay, with Ubisoft’s Watchdogs also in line to receive some manner of unspecified exclusive content. Metal Gear Solid: Ground Zeroes is also set to receive an exclusive mission which will see players take on the role of the PS1 iteration of Solid Snake in all his low resolution polygonal glory, while the PS4 release of Diablo III will see the introduction of all new mechanics. Meanwhile, PS4 owners will be granted first access to beta testing for both The Elder Scrolls: Online and Bungie’s Destiny. In all there are twenty publishers/developers who have signed on to deliver exclusive content to the PS4.

While one finds it morally indefensible to deprive someone who has paid full price of the content that is due them, that alone is not reason enough for consternation [they are Xbots after all]. Rather, it is because this approach only subtracts value for a competitor, rather than creating anything of positive value for one’s self – in short, it involves spending money in a way which will not produce anything of value for gaming.

A more regular roster of Japanese releases may ease the burden of the JRT.

Sony Supports the Localisation of Japanese Content

Sony are currently standing at the dawn of a whole new console generation with the launch of their PS4, while at the same time also supporting a hendheld system that is not doing so well in the sales department. On top of that their PS3 is still a going concern at a time when Sony will be looking to transfer the bulk of their support to the PS4. All of these platforms require content and bribing publishers for exclusive mission packs does not look to be capable of picking up all the slack, which is why it is most important that Sony be able to fully leverage the content that already exists for their platforms.

It is with this in mind that Sony established what they refer to as the third-party production team, a group dedicated to maximising the amount of regional content that is able to be localised into foreign markets. When individual gamers harangue Sony staff with their release-begging it is often intuitive to think that their wishes are being consigned to the waste paper basket of no fucks given, yet according to Sony’s Adam Boyes third-party productions director, Giovanni Corsi, has been monitoring social media and Sony blogs in order to compile a list of Japanese content that Western gamers would like to see given a local release – a list that is topped by the PSP releases of Final Fantasy Type-0 and the newest Suikoden title, along with the PS3 release of Yakuza 5, and a possible port of the Dreamcast’s Shenmue games.

“When we started the third-party production team, it was born out of necessity. We had a lot of publishers and a lot of content that had come out for various platforms and various territories that weren’t necessarily coming to our territory, platforms we’d love to see them on.

The key is to bring people that are fans of certain content great stuff. So if people are fans of Japanese content, you can imagine that’s a place we’re putting a lot of effort into. People who are fans of the Vita, you can imagine we’re putting lots of effort into that.”

The obvious candidate for Sony’s localisation efforts is Final Fantasy: Type-0, as the series already has a fanbase which numbers in the millions. The Vita may not be doing so well right now, but a PSN release of Final Fantasy: Type-0 might well provide the push that many PS4 owners need to pick up a Vita for subsequent use in remote play. It would make a lot of sense for this to be one of the titles that the third-party production team is working on, especially considering that Shuhei Yoshida tacitly suggested earlier in the year that something was being done on this front. At any rate, one considers a team dedicated to the localisation of Japanese content to be a thoroughly worthwhile endeavour, and something which stands to positively differentiate Sony from their rivals.

BAN THIS SICK FILTH!

Australia Requires a Molyneux Set of Ratings Guidlines

Upon the implementation of Australia’s very first R18+ rating for video games the celebrations were decidedly short-lived, as it quickly became evident that the misogyny-obsessed and utterly incompetent Gillard government had implemented some utterly arcane and borderline unworkable guidelines when it came to the depiction of female sexuality. Until now one of the most absurd casualties of these heavy-handed guidelines was Atelier Totori Plus, an anime-based game that had been determined appropriate for children under the previous ratings regime, yet earned an R18+ rating for sexual violence under the new botched legislation. Well, as it turns out Fable: Anniversary [the HD remake of Fable] is the newest game to be added to this absurd list.

While one finds it utterly delightful that Fable has been determined as being unsuitable for children of any age, it has nevertheless been designated as such on the most appallingly nonsensical grounds. One curio present in the Australian ratings system with respect to depictions of fornication and drug use, is that they are held to be many times more disagreeable in instances where their occurrence results in a reward for the player. Thus, if a Grand Theft Auto player avails themselves of the services of women of negotiable affections, only to have their health replenished, then this is something that is frowned on by Australia’s dour ratings guidelines.

It is the Grand Theft Auto scenario which appears to have been applied to Fable, only the sex in question consists in its entirety of the screen fading to black, while the player reward is nothing more than the birth of an in-game heir! Yes, that is right, Julia Gillard and her hopeless, bumbling thralls have succeeded in classifying the actual biological purpose of engaging in sexual intercourse as being objectionable contraband – to the extent that a more gratuitous sex scene could have been included in the game while incurring less of a ratings-penalty, provided that the game did not reward the player with the biological fruit of his loins. The original Australian rating of Fable was ‘M’ [the equivalent of America's 'T' rating], the HD re-release of Fable: Anniversary has been rated R18+ for “Sexual activity related to incentives and rewards” because idiocy. Sometimes one truly despairs.

World of Warcraft, the game that all other MMOs strive to knock off the mountain.

The Elder Scrolls Online has been a hotly anticipated title since its development was announced back in May of 2012. The Elder Scrolls series has been successful for quite some time, Skyrim sold over fifteen million copies, and the fans of the series have screamed for an online installment for years. Bethesda and ZeniMax, the producer and developer, respectively, for The Elder Scrolls Online dropped an apparent bombshell when they announced that the game would have a fifteen dollar monthly fee. To my surprise, the backlash from this announcement was enormous. Some other websites have even called this announcement a form of pre-launch suicide for The Elder Scrolls Online.

It appears that most people were expecting The Elder Scrolls Online to adopt a free-to-play model right out of the gate. Fans were fine with paying sixty dollars for the game, provided that they could choose to play the game for free. With the monthly subscription fee, ZeniMax and Bethesda are implementing the same base price that World of Warcraft and Final Fantasy XIV use. Fifteen dollars has become the acceptable monthly fee across the board as many MMOs use this amount for their monthly pricing. Besides WoW and FFXIV, Star Wars: The Old Republic, DC Universe Online and EVE Online all choose fifteen dollars as their subscription fee.

The Elder Scrolls Online will not be the first non-WoW, non-Final Fantasy MMO to go this route as Star Wars: The Old Republic and Star Trek Online began in a similar manner, opting for monthly subscription fees rather than a free-to-play model. Both games were unable to maintain subscriber numbers after launch, and eventually both had to change to free-to-play in an attempt to breathe life into the failing games. The failures of both these games should not be solely attributed to the subscription model. Both games suffered from many other issues, an inability to release fresh content, for one, that led gamers to feeling they were being robbed of their fifteen dollars each month. In the case of Star Wars: The Old Republic, another issue was that it borrowed too much from genre stalwart World of Warcraft, a game that many gamers had already spent hundreds of hours on.

Star Wars The Old Republic represents a potential path for The Elder Scrolls Online.

Unfortunately, those that choose to play The Elder Scrolls Online on the Xbone or the PS4 will also have to pay for the respective Xbox Live Gold or PlayStation Plus subscription. In the past, gamers have been able to play the few console MMO games on the PS3 without a Plus subscription, but that will be changed when the PS4 is released. These additional requirements raises the fifteen dollar mark a bit, and for the poor sap that only plays TES Online, puts it at twenty dollars a month. ZeniMax are working with Microsoft in an attempt to remove the Gold requirement, and if they succeed, I would not be surprised to see Sony follow suit. Although Microsoft has been desperate to please its consumers, I think ZeniMax will likely be unsuccessful in their attempt. Waiving the Gold requirement would mean that Microsoft would have to consider doing the same in the future for other MMOs. Of course, a few million dollars going towards Microsoft could help persuade them.

As with all newly released MMOs, The Elder Scrolls Online is facing a huge uphill battle. I do not think that charging fifteen dollars will handicap the game’s initial growth, provided it is full of good content. However, ZeniMax and Bethesda can not just include the same amount of content that is in a normal Elder Scrolls game, they will need much more. Furthermore, The Elder Scrolls Online can not be full of bugs like the rest of the series. As Lusipurr said numerous times during the Final Fantasy XIV launch, the MMO crowd expect a high level of quality, even from a newly launched game. With over six years of development time, The Elder Scrolls Online will need to be a polished and fun experience from day one. If TES Online fails to approach these expectations, it may not be long that gamers get their wish and the game goes free-to-play.

The Elder Scrolls Online remains high on many gamers list despite last week’s announcement. It is true that launching a subscription-based MMO is quite rare these days, but that does not mean it is instantly a bad idea. Utilizing the subscription model gives the companies behind the game an expected income since a player will have to remain subscribed if they want to keep playing. Should the game not succeed with the subscription model, there is the opportunity to switch to F2P the same way that Star Wars: The Old Republic did. I think that ZeniMax and Bethesda will have learned from their rivals pitfalls, and as long as they can find a way to keep the content coming, they should have no trouble delivering value for their customers on a consistent basis. The Elder Scrolls has a big fan base already, and as long as ZeniMax is able to keep that group engaged in The Elder Scrolls Online, they can survive without having to abandon the current model.