Ty HarveyYay! Another piece of moderately butchered journalism! The goal with this segment is to more or less give you an insight into my mind, and for me to express my thoughts and opinions in a (somewhat?) intelligent way. Odds are, my opinions are going to differ from your own, so do keep that in mind before you head on down to the comment section to yell at me for thinking differently. Also, Happy Halloween!
The PlayStation 5 Isn’t ‘Next Gen’
Okay, so hear me out. The PlayStation 5 is obviously gonna be super awesome, but it isn’t a ‘next generation’ console. It’s a current generation console. Yup, you read that right. See, as far as I’m concerned, the 9th generation started in 2017 with the Nintendo Switch. No, the Switch isn’t super powerful, but that’s not what defines a generation. I mean, if power was what determined the gen, the Wii would be a part of the 6th generation, instead of the 7th, since it’s really no more powerful than a GameCube.
To go even further into this, the upcoming Xbox and PlayStation aren’t even the first ‘powerful’ consoles of the 9th generation. That title goes to Google Stadia. Now, love Stadia or hate Stadia, doesn’t matter. The fact is, it’s competing against consoles, and is freaking powerful. So yeah, Stadia is the first powerful 9th generation console, while the Nintendo Switch was what kicked off the 9th generation. Meaning, the PS5 isn’t next gen, it’s current gen.
Paid Online Is Anti-Consumer!
This is really one of my biggest pet peeves in gaming. Paying to play online on a PlayStation, Xbox, or Switch, is really freaking dumb! Sony doesn’t host your Call of Duty servers, so why are you paying Sony for the right to play on something they don’t even provide? It’s just anticonsumer, and I freaking hate it. Like, make multiplayer free, but give me the option of paying a yearly fee to get additional perks. Cloud saves, monthly game rotations, store discounts. You know, the stuff Sony actually provides themselves? Hell, that was the entire point of PlayStation Plus back when it first launched on the PS3. No paid online, just extra and optional perks. I’d be happy to pay for that, as it’s just beneficial to the overall experience. But paid multiplayer? Who the hell is that benefiting? The developers don’t get any of the money, nor are they offered any financial support from Sony, despite Sony charging the consumer a yearly fee to access servers that the developers and publishers are required to pay for themselves. Hell, it gets even worse when there aren’t even any servers at all. Peer to peer multiplayer is literally just you connecting to another player that acts as the host for the match. Why the hell should I pay Sony for that? If anything, I should be paying that one random 12 year old Call of Duty player that happens to have good internet. He’s the real MVP, not Sony.
It’s even worse on Nintendo’s side of it. I mean, have you seen state of Switch Online? Sure, it’s cheaper, but you also get significantly less. Most of the time, the online doesn’t even work right. Just take a look at Mario Maker 2, or Smash Ultimate. Mario Maker 2 in particular can’t even handle 4 players without lagging. And yet, we’re all just expected to pay for that trash? Why? Why is this stupid industry trend even a thing? It’s anticonsumer, and anybody willing to defend these practices should be ashamed.
Exclusive Games Are Also Anti-Consumer!
Oh boy, speaking of anticonsumer practices. Look, I get that consoles need exclusive games to survive. Xbox has Halo, Nintendo has Mario, and Sony has Nathan Drake. But like, come on! This is a textbook case of anticonsumerism at its finest! Like, it’s really straightforward here. Exclusive games such as Uncharted, are anticonsumer by definition. The entire point for these games, is to sell a system. If you want to play them, you need to buy additional hardware from a specific company. You can’t just pop Uncharted into your Xbox and call it a day. You must buy a PlayStation. And yeah, that’s literally anticonsumer by the dictionary definition. It’s a product created exclusively with the intention of making you buy another product, putting business above the interest of consumers.
Anyway, that’s about it for this article. If you have any thoughts, feel free to share them below.
I agree with the article except for the exclusive games part. I don’t see exclusive games as a gateway toward console purchase. I see it kinda the opposite way, where you look into the exclusive titles before you purchase your system. I’ve yet to buy a system and then see some exclusive games for another, and think well i have to go buy that system. However i do get what you were saying.
Exclusives are most definitely a gateway towards a console purchase, or at least a very heavy deciding factor on which console to buy first. There’s a reason games like Uncharted are “system sellers”. They’re specifically designed to sell a system. Hell, you can sometimes even buy a special edition console to go alongside the game, such as the God of War bundle, or the Spider-Man bundle.
The fact is, if you want to play the newest Spider-Man game, you must buy a PS4. There’s no real way to get around that. You either buy a PS4, or you don’t play the game you want to play.
If it were proconsumer, the game would be released onto as may systems as possible. PS4, Xbox, PC, and even the Switch, assuming the Switch is powerful enough to run it.
Like, say you for example could only pick a single console. Xbox One or the PlayStation 4. Would you not take the exclusive games into heavy consideration before making your purchase? A good, high quality game, can definitely sway your opinion over which console to throw your money at, and the fact exclusive games are intended to give the consumer an experience they can’t find anywhere else, thus forcing you to buy a new piece of hardware if you want to play it, is what makes them anticonsumer.
Games such as Uncharted or God of War are literally designed to sell PlayStation’s. If you don’t own a PlayStation, you’re out of luck. Either buy a PS4, or you’re never going to get to play some of the best games of this generation.
However you the consumer are still left with a choice, you don’t “have to” buy the games or consoles.
I still at 40 know two separate groups of players i grew up with that buy like a co-op every generation. Each person lists the system they’d prefer and once agreed upon they each buy into said system & exclusives, and then they either go to eachothers house or switch systems around at times. Plus at the end of each cycle they sell the systems and games to eachother. Their way of attacking both exclusives and economic stress allow them to play more games then most people.
I also have quite a few friends who are inhumanly patient and wait for new consoles to come out before moving to the next gen, they purposely stay a generation behind for the economic reasons. They also get to play a ridiculously larger amount of games, on multiple consoles, for less then the initial buy in of whatever the newest console is.
Plus, i see exclusive content the same as it is used in the car manufacturing world. Unless it is something that needs to be universal(say seatbelts or airbags) you have every right to come up with something new and keep it proprietary for the foreseeable future. Even our patent system supports that, you are allowed i believe 20 years before knockoffs can be legally made. I’ll admit the patent system has loopholes and isn’t perfect, but it works well for the most part.
And for me personally i’ve just never allowed exclusive content to influence my purchasing decisions. I loved Persona 1 & 2 on the PS1 and when the series just decided that they were gonna go to the handheld world, i stopped playing them. Same thing with Valkyria Chronicles and in another way the Harvest Moon series.
See i know i’m the customer. So as i see it, they lost a customer and i gained time to play other games and find other pieces of art to admire. There are just far too many games to play to allow a exclusive to influence me.
To the last part in the comment, that is purely subjective.