Console Wars Thread! PS4 vs. Xbox One vs. Wii U Fight!

I know this is extremely obvious, but since this is a Wii U (ha!) vs XB1 vs PS4 discussion, I'd like to add the recent talk about disappointing Wii U sales.

Nintendo slumps as Wii U's flop sparks pressure to exit hardware business

I say they should go the way of Sega and make their games cross platform

 

Not sure where this should go (possibly in a new thread, but might as well just leave it here for now), but more bad MS PR:
http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2014/...osoft-paying-youtubers-for-xbox-one-mentions/

Read the article for more details.

edit: The guy who does the "Francis" videos (boogie2988) commented on this at NeoGAF:
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=97851491&postcount=1041

Youtube video:
<iframe width="560" height="315" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/yxGwkS8R0Ms" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

 

Last of Us is boring? Wow. All those sites that named it the game of the year must be idiots.

I am little intrigued by Titanfall and that's it. No other game on XBox has ever drawn interest from me aside from Mass Effect. Gears of War was a decent game, but nothing that hooked me.

I can't take you serious dogging Uncharted. That's just craziness to me. Enjoy your games man. I'll enjoy mine.

 

It has long been known that you can't trust YouTube reviews, you just can't. Nearly every popular Youtuber is in strict contracts which limits what they say and how they say it. Machinama and other channels like it are the worst thing to happen to the gaming industry in the past decade.

 

As boogie points out, this controversy kind of shows it isn't well known (though I guess well known != long known). Probably should have been, but regardless, I think people are becoming more aware of it now.

Props to Youtubers like him for being honest about it. The MS news is interesting (and the PR certainly won't help them), but yeah, this isn't really anything that new I guess. I'm more interested in seeing if this changes things for Youtubers.

 

This might apply if both consoles had near identical amount of quality and varied exclusives. Unfortunately it's nothing like that.

360's exclusives amounted to a FPS series and a TPS series. Oh and a Gran Turismo wannabe in Forza.

If you're the world's biggest Halo and Gears fan, fine. Totally legit reason to buy the console. But don't pretend there were plenty of 360 exclusives to choose from.

 

The VAST MAJORITY of games are available on both systems. The exclusives make up a very small portion of the games you can buy.

You have a shot at Forza, and thats cool. You don't like it. Ive played both GT and Forza and feel that Forza is more fun to play while GT kinda went stale and as the graphics power of systems improved lost that edge it once had being the best looking driving games by a long way.

If I had to choose between Forza and GT, I'd go with Forza. personal preference!

Sony has some great games it has claimed as exclusives. Xbox has some too. I'm a little surprised that both systems don't push for exclusive titles more often to be honest. You'd think that with a really good game the exclusive rights fees would pay for themselves with console sales.

To say one system has terrible exclusives and the other has great exclusives is just silly though. They both have great games that they can claim as exclusives. If you don't like the ones MS puts out thats cool....but don't deny their quality. Thats just fanboy rubbish.

 

Just curious, whats the main difference between two popular racers such as GT and Forza? I'm confused as to how you can say that GT got boring but Forza didn't. Aren't both games pretty damn similar? I don't play racers, so I wouldn't know.

Although I may give Forza Horizon 2 a try since it is an arcade racer.

 

I wouldn't call it a total flop yet -- it has only been out for 13 months or so. Didn't the 3DS sell poorly and then start selling well? I know there are people waiting for a new Zelda title and new smash brothers game before getting one. Nintendo should have never called it wii U, I think marketing was their biggest flaw. Most people probably think it is just an upgrade to the old wii and not a standalone console.

 

I wouldn't be surprised, though it isn't particularly relevant at this point. Microsoft got caught, and they are being criticized for it (rightfully so IMO). When Sony (or Nintendo, EA, Google, Samsung, Apple, etc.) get caught doing it, they too will be criticized (and rightfully so). Letting it go because "well, they all do it!" lets some of these companies off the hook too easily IMO.

Though to my earlier point, that is just a smaller point of the overall "controversy." Regardless of whether people SHOULD have known about this, it seems like they are learning about it now, and it will be interesting to see how things unfold in the industry regarding this kind of thing.

Shame on MS for doing it, shame on the other (as of yet unnamed) companies for doing it, and perhaps shame on us for pretending not to notice it before.

 

Boogie pretty much said that everyone does it, but that Microsoft was more aggressive than others. This isn't anything new, all of this came out originally when YouTube cracked down on game video/stream trademarks - and required peopled to be a part of multi-channel networks and/or get express written permission from the IP owners.

Riot put a stipulation in their contract for pro's that they couldn't even stream any other games but League of Legends. They backed off when pressure mounted from the community, but it is the same sort of crap. Someone in marketing or management came up with the brilliant idea without thinking it through, I'm sure.

Boogie also did what was basically a commercial for Xbox One on his channel, with Larry Hryb (MajorNelson). I think most viewers probably assumed that he was being paid by Microsoft anyway - I'm a MS fan and I certainly did. YouTuber revenue depends on views and private contracts, so if you think they are impartial you're fooling yourself.

 

Boogie's commercial wasn't really an issue IMO since he disclosed everything that went on IIRC (same for the Sony "commercials"). I think that was his point. Youtubers need to be doing more of that. It is OK to promote product as long as you disclose any such deals with that product's company.

But many of them do not disclose those details, and that is where the problem comes in. Again, you can just say people should have known this was going on, but it seems they didn't. News like this helps people realize the truth.

 

This is the reason I don't understand people's loyalty to YouTubers. They're in it to make money and they aren't going to bite the hand that feeds them. Even if Boogie didn't like the Xbox One, do you think he'd really bash it knowing it would cost him future paydays? I don't think so, he's human.

Now I know he's an honest guy so I don't think he'd say it is amazing if it truly did suck - but when there is "wiggle room" I have no doubt he, and others take advantage. He even states this in the posted response. If he knows he'll like a game he signs these "I can't bash it" contracts.

Long story short, this is the same kind of issue that has been going on in game magazines for decades. Publications have been paid to give good reviews, or at least to not openly bash terrible games. Heck, Giant Bomb was formed because writers were tired of the practice.

 

I've always preferred Forza to Gran Turismo. And I do think Forza has a few different gameplay elements... not to mention the Top Gear crew.

They both look amazing, so there really isn't a comparison there I think it just comes down to the type of racer you like. Microsoft's old Project Gotham games looked great, but something was just off about the gameplay. With realistic racers, "the feel" has a lot to do with it IMHO.

 

In Boogie we trust!

 

I like the dude, we need more like him in the gaming community.

 

Yeah, Boogie seems like good people. Happy for him and his success.

FWIW, there's been a few more details today. We've seen some similar deals from Machinima for promoting other things (e.g., E3), though those deals seem to require the user to disclose the details of the deal (or at least say they are being paid for this).

But it seems we also have details from an EA promotion deal like this, and they too require the user to NOT disclose any details of the deal (i.e., it is like the deal MS had).

I don't really mind it if the user is required to disclose those details, but yeah, the requirement to keep that stuff hidden is pretty shady to me (and really does seem to be against the FTC guidelines). Shame on EA as well as MS!

 

Yea *** em, basrards shamelessly getting paid to pretend to be excited to play some online only 6 on 6 with AIs. Im not falling for that crap.