Sony more open-minded about Physical Media than Nintendo and Microsoft?

[Soundwave]

spemanig said:

TheWPCTraveler said:

I guess you have a point, since I'm actually an advocate of how Club Nintendo worked!

But I really can't get into the idea of an all-digital platform since I simply prefer buying physical media - my idea of a Club Nintendo replacement uses physical media as a means to ease people into digital media in the form of sales and whatnot, after all.

I guess I should really just be saying that you'll stand to alienate less people if you use physical media to ease people into digital media services - just like what PS+ and XBL Gold are doing now, but in different ways.

Again, I think that most people, yes even the ones who prefer physical media, will just get over it when they see a game they enjoy on the platform. And as the NX gathers steam and is have a hardy installed base of people enjoying the platform, people who were initially reserved about digital media will give it a shot, and they'll realize how great digital is and how it aids the platform into being something it couldn't have been otherwise, just like with the iphone. Most people who buy the NX will not even once pay attention to the fact that it's digital only. When you use a smartphone, you don't constantly think about how it doesn't have a bluray player. But people watch the movies anyway, because Apple made it convenient and effortless to do everything on it.

People aren't going to look at the NX and think "OMG, that thing is digital only!" They are going to look at it and think "wow, that thing is so modern and convenient," and then people who think about it further will immediately understand how being digital only aided in that impression. It being digital only is only a big deal to hardcore gamers, but that's not where the NXs marketing focus will go at all, just like the first iPod didn't market itself by saying "fuck you if you like CDs!" It marketed itself by showing how convenient it is to be able to go through thousands of songs on the fly and near instantly, organize music by different catagories, create custom playlists, etc. But everyone who thinks about it knows that that was only possible because it was digital only. Digital only was a means to an end. But what an end.

That's what the NX's success will come from. Being modern and being convenient. That's all. The membership discounts and flexible pricing aren't an appology for being digital only - they are a natural luxury that being digital only affords. That's why I'm sure their biggest focus with the NX will be on the OS. Doesn't sound exciting at all, until you see it in action. I call it a smart console because that's basically what it is. Nintendo probably won't call it that, but that's the direction they're going in. Innovating not hardware or software, firmware.

Playstation and XBox are "smart" consoles too, they are very convienant to use and whatever feature a competitior may have for convienance sake is very simple to add into the hardware via firmware. 

I think this is kind of the problem sometimes (note I said sometimes) with Nintendo fans, they think Nintendo can or will do something soooo much better (ie: Miiverse is going to the Twitter of gaming!), the truth is Sony and MS are fairly competent companies, and generally speaking they will copy pretty much any notable feature. 

If you can play any video game of any reasonable complexity you can navigate and make use of virtually any console's features and really ultimately they all do the same basic shit, they're simple and easy to use, it's not like a PC.