Reasons for why Microsoft has timed exclusives (NO TROlLS OR HATERS HERE)

[Reasonable]

r505Matt said:

Reasonable said:

r505Matt said:

Reasonable said:

 

I always enjoy our discussions!

I guess it's down to personal preference.  If a company either owns the studio and IP or comissions and supports it fully then I figure fair enough, even though that limits titles to certain platforms.  Timed exclusives for me are simply missleading for the consumer.  You see 'Only on 360' etc. then suddenly it's 'not really, sorry, we meant multi-platform'.  In the end you're playing to without information from the end consumer, which is what I don't like.

Obviously in business there's always some element of trying to hold back the competition and give yourself a favourable edge, be it exclusive content, features, or whatever, but it becomes a concern for me when it so obviously affects the end customer and not in a favourable manner.

I don't know though, I don't really think it's misleading. When some limited exclusive game was released, and it says "only on xbox", that's a truthful statement. It's not like they're saying "will only be on xbox, ever", there's a big difference. It would be silly to hold that kind of double standard to everything. You can only judge this sort of thing based on the present. To judge it beyond that is kind of unfair, and unreasonable.

I disagree completely.  Take Bioshock.  It launched as a 360 exclusive, every impression given was that it wasn't ever going to be on the PS3.  At the time that was the only impression given, and it was misleading as it was coming to the PS3 after a period of contracted exclusivity which forced this information to be withheld from the buying public.  This sort of thing has to be judged as it was, not in retrospect when we know it was timed.  I think you know as well as I the impression given in these cases, particularly early on before it became apparent that many of these so called exclusives were in fact only timed.

Even with DLC such as GTAIV the impression is that the DLC is for 360 only, paid for by MS, etc. then low and behold it's not - it was timed.  This misleads the consumer, period, which is why it is a poor business practice, whoever does it, whether Sony with Ghostbusters in Europe or MS with titles like Bioshock globally.

It's clear many people thought these titles/DLC would never hit the PS3 and were therefore mislead by the nature of the timed exclusive - look at the Japanese resoponse to ToV, etc. in that region I'd say once the whole timed approach was exposed it hurt the 360's brand due to the negative perception of the tactic.  Those consumers sure felt mislead.

It's not whether for that period it's only available on one platform, it's the fact it's known to be coming to another and that fact is surpressed that clearly misleads.

 

 

You talk about impressions as if they're factual statements given by a company, but people assume whatever they want from these impressions. It shouldn't be on the company to lay everything out for you cut and dry, especially when such things would hurt their business.

Just like when companies like Sony almost lie to their investors "We'll turn profit next quarter". They spin it so that they can restore investor confidence. MS doesn't even spin anything (in regards to this exclusive thing at least), they just omit certain things. Spinning the truth, or omitting parts of the truth, which do you really think is worse?

As for the Japanese response thing, the Japanese seem to hate everything MS anyways. It doesn't matter what they do over there, the Japanese will probably never trust MS anyways, which is just silly to me.

In the end, all companies do whatever they can to get ahead. Even Sony and Nintendo and plenty of other companies resort to these tactics. At the end of the day, mostly all that matters is money. As long as you understand and appreciate that, then something like this whole timed exclusive thing shouldn't even faze you.

 

MS haters will always be MS haters, and they like these sorts of things to justify their disdain. Most people don't even care about all this. "Oh Bioshock is on PS3 now? Cool"

See, you're just plain not getting - or refusing to - my point.  I don't care about the business.  I care about the consumer.  I back regulation of business and I back businesses having restrictions on what constitutes fair or unfair advertising, trading activities, etc.  Also, this isn't bashing MS specifically but timed exclusives.  It's the case that MS has more than any other competitor this generation, so of course the bulk of the examples come from them, but if it was Sony or Nintendo I'd feel the same.

The practice is misleading from the consumer viewpoint, it is exploiting what the average consumer will assume when they see the adverts, etc. and that's all there is to it and I would be very happy if the practice was degreed as unfair trading and prevented or if any timed exclusive had to be openly declared as such up front.