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Forums - Gaming Discussion - In some ways Microsoft have the right idea

As we know MS has drifted away from traditional exclusives on console in favor of service exclusives, UWP being their service. However, I am still in favor of keeping games exclusive to a console for having a reason to buy it sort of thing. Though I do think MS have one thing right, and that's building up their ecosystem, mainly with backwards compatapility.

While it's true not everyone cares about this feature, it's more of a long term plan. They are growing closer and closer to having all the best 360 games playable on Xbox One, and soon probably the rest of UWP where ever it may end up. And not only can you insert your 360 discs but they are also on Xbox live and purchaseable with their achievements in tact. This is building a massive library to boot and as a result they have a massive head start on Sony.

Imagine if Sony took to bringing PS3/PS2/PS1 BC to PS4 with every game worth their salt on the PSN Store. Not even bringing it to PC, but exclusive to Playstation hardware. It would be their own way of competeing with not only UWP, but Steam, with the added advantage of needing their hardware to access this vast library. This would give PC's a run for their money too since there's a whole lot of games on Playstation consoles over the years that aren't on PC. If I want to play a game like Klonoa on my PS4 I can just download it and do so, or Pandemonium, Xenogears. Some of these could rake up 100's of thousands of sales each. And they could carry over for good since everything Playstation going forward will be X86, same with MS.

What do you think? Should Sony be focusing on an ecosystem instead of resetting their library every generation, falling behind the competiton in choice?



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Sony has the most diversity architecture wise (PS1 & PS1 = MIPS, PS3 = CBE/PowerPC, PSV = ARM, PS4 = AMD64), but they could technically emulate all of these. They also have in my opinion the better system (FreeBSD based). BC is certainly possible in the long term.

UWP isn't really a threat to Sony in the short term since it uses the Microsoft Store and the MS Store is simple terrible.



Yeah but where are the new games?



Bandorr said:
I'm going to go with UWP being a horrible idea.

Instead of them bringing their games to steam, they go to the windows 10 store. Which is a disaster.

Microsoft isn't bringing many new games, so they are trying to just bring old games. BC is great.. if you have the support of NEW games.

The wii U had full Wii BC. The PS3 fat had full ps2 and Ps1 BC. Not this very slow trickle of BC that MS is doing.

I know what you're saying, and certain things about UWP annoy me like basically killing much of the reason to own an Xbox console for a start. But their method of BC might actually turn out to be the most effective in the end. Because that BC is universal, it could carry over to anything they put their UWP service on. And 360's library on UWP is an instantanious advantage over Steam. Eventually everything worth owning on 360 will be playable on Xbox One if it's not there already. It's all on MS to sort out their service and make it as user friendly as Steam. If they can't do that then stupid them.



LethalP said:
Bandorr said:
I'm going to go with UWP being a horrible idea.

Instead of them bringing their games to steam, they go to the windows 10 store. Which is a disaster.

Microsoft isn't bringing many new games, so they are trying to just bring old games. BC is great.. if you have the support of NEW games.

The wii U had full Wii BC. The PS3 fat had full ps2 and Ps1 BC. Not this very slow trickle of BC that MS is doing.

I know what you're saying, and certain things about UWP annoy me like basically killing much of the reason to own an Xbox console for a start. But their method of BC might actually turn out to be the most effective in the end. Because that BC is universal, it could carry over to anything they put their UWP service on. And 360's library on UWP is an instantanious advantage over Steam. Eventually everything worth owning on 360 will be playable on Xbox One if it's not there already. It's all on MS to sort out their service and make it as user friendly as Steam. If they can't do that then stupid them.

Spoiler alert: They can't. MS can't commit to anything on a long term basis. The UWP is a dud on the PC side of things.



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If Sony brought all their games to PS4 it wouldn't change much to me, I rarely go back to my old games and I keep my old HW as well.



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Ka-pi96 said:
Gamers have proven time and time again that they're willing to rebuy old games on new platforms though.

Besides that, there's all kinds of licencing issues for older games. Last gen isn't so bad, but older than that can get kind of tricky, especially with all the companies that have closed down or sold off their IPs. I'd love to see more games added to PS4s backwards compatibility, but the slow trickle that we get from a select few publishers is likely all it will ever be.

And we can still have remakes and stuff, all this means is that they must put more effort into them instead of something shitty like GoW III Remastered where they just uprezzed it. Give people a reason to buy Crash Bandicoot N Sane Trilogy over the PS Classics, and I think they have. It shouldn't effect the remake market if it's a well done remake.

The best way to go about BC is to not think of it as BC, but more like actual additions to the Xbox/PS library. Like we don't go back and play Half Life 1 on Steam and say it's backwards compatability, it's just an old game we can download at any time for our leisure. Sony should do the same for their old library and I believe MS are already in the process of doing so.



The Windows based games are going to fail because they're not on Steam.  I made the mistake of buying Gears 4 and Forza recently and simply dont play them as they are not on Steam.  Out of site, out of mind.  I wont make that mistake again.  



Ka-pi96 said:
LethalP said:

I know what you're saying, and certain things about UWP annoy me like basically killing much of the reason to own an Xbox console for a start. But their method of BC might actually turn out to be the most effective in the end. Because that BC is universal, it could carry over to anything they put their UWP service on. And 360's library on UWP is an instantanious advantage over Steam. Eventually everything worth owning on 360 will be playable on Xbox One if it's not there already. It's all on MS to sort out their service and make it as user friendly as Steam. If they can't do that then stupid them.

It's not really though. As soon as they realise it's not doing as well as they hoped they'll scrap it and then that bc is gone, not universal at all. They did it with GFWL, no reason to think they won't do it again.

It's an x86 based (what every Xbox going forward will be) Xbox 360 emulator that will forever have the ability to play 360 games and will only get better and more compatible as time progresses. Why would they just scrap it? I'm telling you MS have it right, they are building up their ecosystem to create one huge Xbox library that's accessable on Windows devices. Their investment in first party in the future is where you should worry about MS. I'm just saying Sony would benefit from having their own Steam exclusive to PS hardware.



Bandorr said:
Old games mean very little to me for two reasons 1) I've played those games most likely. 2) I can just go ahead and play them right now.

I don't need to wait for Tales of vesperia to end up on Xbox 360 BC (it won't but lets assume it could). I can just go plug in my xbox 360 and play it right now.

BC is a nice bonus - it is not the selling point. BC is nice for that transition from one system to another. Oh all my games work on the new system? I will get the new system.

If in two years the new system is lacking in games I'm going to wonder why I got it. I get new systems for new games.

I have a Voodoo 5 1GHz PC with Windows 98 on it, still functioning. I could go and play Half Life 1 on it right now... or I could just play it on Steam on my current PC.

I get it, BC is useless until Sony or Nintendo get on it. But this isn't just about BC, it's about your overall library. And the method MS are using right now will carry over to all future Xbox's (and in their case, probably PC). It's like what Phil Spencer said, a ''Netflix of games''.

I agree MS is a shitstorm when it comes to new games, that's why the title says 'In some ways' rather than 'MS has it ALL right'. They don't, far from it. But 360 BC doesn't just benefit Xbox One, it benefits their online ecosystem in the long run. They are building their own Steam.