MS Bans you from Ownership?

[Minute]

Just when I thought I couldn't hate MS any more..



So if you get banned you not only lose online rights, but rights to your purchased games too? Please tell me there is something off here?

[Xican]

Holy shit, I did not even think about that. I understand the knee jerk response from loyalists will be; "Well, if you behave properly you won't get banned, so it shouldn't be an issue." But I don't buy that. There's always exceptions in this crazy e-world of ours.

Sony should have that tweet on the packaging for the PS4. Seems like MS shot themselves in the foot this week. Then reloaded and fired a few more rounds into their leg for good measure.

[Kulaf]

Steam does the same thing:

https://support.steampowered.com/kb_art ... _faqid=589

[Ddrak]

No, Steam does NOT do this. A ban will restrict you from logging into VAC servers (as the link shows) but won't affect non-VAC play or single player games. Steam has made a point of not taking away anyone's ability to play games they've paid money to license. People have actually had their accounts frozen so they can't buy anything more but (to my knowledge) have still been able to play stuff they already have.

Also note that Steam games need to be activated *once* and then can be played completely offline.

Dd

[Harlowe]

Kulaf you seem to be defensive about MS.

[Kulaf]

Just paddling against the tide of misinformation and overreaction. People at E3 saw a slide where MS said they were leaving DRM up to the developers and read all kinds of between the lines to somehow get to MS was doing this....and MS was charging fees for transferring games, etc. etc. It gets really silly year after year to put up with the same crap.

I'll be honest and say that I like Sony. I have always liked their products. However I do not like the controller for the PS so I never bought one.

I like Microsoft. Hell I have made a very good living in the IT industry supporting their products. And I like the controller on the Xbox and will be buying an XB1 after passing on the 360.

The Microsoft hate is just like all of the SOE hate that went on back in the day. It was BS then and it is BS now no matter who it's aimed at.

[Ddrak]

I listen to the language from Microsoft and it's largely aimed at pleasing publishers.
I listen to Sony and it's largely aimed at the gamer (probably in a reaction to Microsoft's bad press).

Microsoft also is coming off incredibly full of themselves with the "We have a product for offline use - the 360" bullshit. That's never good PR or even good company positioning.

Dd

[Kulaf]

And see that is what I am talking about. The question posed to the MS rep was about a guy who wanted to play in the Navy on a Nuclear sub. So the rep suggested that the 360 is still going to be sold and would be an excellent option and everyone puffs up and hears Marie Antoinette telling the peasants to go eat cake.

With regard to whom MS is trying to please, well I think you are right......it is not gamers. But the reason for that is quite simple......MS is not trying to position the XB1 as solely a gamer platform. When you read about all of the other features you can see that slowly MS is positioning the device to be a whole entertainment experience delivery system.

[Ddrak]

The problem is they've been doing enough of that sort of thing (eat cake/anti-consumer) over XB1 that the "where there's smoke, there's fire" precept comes into play. If it were Apple under Jobs, people would have been fired all over the place. I can't see why someone hasn't stepped in to rescue the situation.

Dd

[Fallakin Kuvari]

I can't see why someone hasn't stepped in to rescue the situation.

Dd

Because Gates isn't at the helm anymore.

All this makes me think they have an emergency vote of the board and put him back in place.

[Harlowe]

Their PR has been horrendous. Some kind of hammer better drop soon.

[Freecare Spiritwise]

A recent statement from MS said:

This is a big change, consumers don't always love change, and there's a lot of education we have to provide to make sure that people understand.

They are starting to sound like Apple. They made the above statement, but this is what I heard:

This is a big change, consumers don't always love getting fucked, and there's a lot of spin we have to provide to make sure that people understand that they're screwed no matter what, so they might as well just accept it.

Some big developer today was running his mouth about how if they didn't kill the used gaming market, all these huge, mega studios wouldn't be able to make bloated, big budget, over-hyped crapware. I'm paraphrasing of course.

But none of this is really new. All manner of book, media, TV and game companies have been trying (and mostly succeeding) to take ownership away from us for products and services we have purchased for quite some time now.

[Minute]

Their PR has been horrendous. Some kind of hammer better drop soon.

That's what they get for hiring Kulaf as their entire PR division.

[Fallakin Kuvari]

But none of this is really new. All manner of book, media, TV and game companies have been trying (and mostly succeeding) to take ownership away from us for products and services we have purchased for quite some time now.

This is why I download any Kindle book I get and strip the DRM.

[Kulaf]

Their PR has been horrendous. Some kind of hammer better drop soon.

That's what they get for hiring Kulaf as their entire PR division.

Most of it is just rumor and misinterpretation from people who haven't done any research on their own.

[Harlowe]

Most of it? That's not true at all. It's what people are hearing from MS.

[Freecare Spiritwise]

But none of this is really new. All manner of book, media, TV and game companies have been trying (and mostly succeeding) to take ownership away from us for products and services we have purchased for quite some time now.

This is why I download any Kindle book I get and strip the DRM.

That's exactly what my wife does with her Kindles.

[Freecare Spiritwise]

Their PR has been horrendous. Some kind of hammer better drop soon.

That's what they get for hiring Kulaf as their entire PR division.

Most of it is just rumor and misinterpretation from people who haven't done any research on their own.

Yeah, it's not like there's any way to know what a giant corporation says publicly on the record.

[Ddrak]

Microsoft reversing game licensing policies:

http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2013/06/r ... -policies/

Dd

[Kulaf]

Most of it? That's not true at all. It's what people are hearing from MS.

Yeah I hear it works the same way when discussing politics. Everyone hears about an issue directly from the source and then comments about it.