The latter two being microsoft's pointless inventions.

A game is either exclusive, that means is being made with a certain hardware and certain capabilities in mind and for a certain audience which dictates how several aspects of the game will take form, or it is not an exclusive.

It differentiates the systems. If every system has the same games it would be retarded. And no matter what anyone says, it always stings to have a game you thought was exclusive *on your preferred system* go to another console as well.

You are aware that those early FFXIII photos were target rendered CG right? The 7950 GPU in the PS3 could never put out graphics like that in real time, ever. There was never a change made. I can't believe that there are people who still think that Square went back and downgraded the graphics of FFXIII for the PS3 when they ported it to the 360.

Vanilles necklace is completely round. That is near if not completely impossible to do even on current GPUs with Tesselation.

The only one of those they really complained about was NBA Jam and that was because they were shafted on features for no reason before the game even hit the market. The content issue is the generally the only thing they will complain about.

Anyone who complained about the others was part of a small minority that is not the least bit representative of the average Nintendo fan.

After rereading the OP, I see what you're saying. Understand that I was simply responding to the poster who said games shouldn't be multiplat 'period'.

To respond, because I think you have some valid points, the thing about exclusivity is that there are some very legitimate reasons for a 3rd party studio making exclusive games. First, it builds hype better than multiplat announcements. This will in turn sell more units, because you will likely also get the fanboys involved.

Second, it helps create branding, which if you're a developer who makes RPGs, you know to go to the console who is known for an RPG library. This gives the dev a much better feel for the market. (for example, with final fantasy, they've sold what, 2m units on 360? They overestimated how many they would sell because they looked at the overall install base rather than the branding)

Third, the console owner is more likely to help out the dev with some funding and coding help, along with other benefits such as advertising campaign, bundling, etc. More deals are worked out when exclusivity is on the table, than without.

Fourth, exclusive games tend to be able to avoid comparitive console shots, avoiding later "lazy dev" accusations, and port status.

Generally, a good rule to follow is, if you are a third party, you should consider exclusivity if:
a) You are a rather small company, or are a large company releasing a brand new IP
b) Your sales are hard to determine, ie, you don't know the size of the market for your niche game
c) Your game fits into a "branded" category
d) You are new to programming with said console

The pros are that you tend to save money, get more deals with the publisher, establish a foothold in the market, get hype for your game, you also tend to sell more units on the exclusive console than you would on said console going multiplat. We once did a research on it I believe and it came to a 10-20% boost.

The cons are that you don't sell as many overall games, you don't get the coding experience, and it can be slightly riskier (though offset due to deals with publisher)

What you say would be considered offensive to many. Just because a game is is exclusive doesn't make it amazing. This generation proved that 3rd parties had a lot of talent. Games like Mass Effect series are in my book better than anything available on either platform and so are Darksouls, Bayonetta and many more.

Just because COD (if that's what you're talking about) is the biggest 3rd party seller doesn't mean 3rd party games are not as big as "your" exclusives. PC games compete with one another, companies want to sell their games so they do what they can it has nothing to do with being exclusive or not. Halo 4 goes in competition with COD this year, it's not going agains't PS3 still COD sells 360s and so does Halo. But the games are what people want, the console is what allows them to play.

Movie companies go all out to make as much money as they can and videogame companies are the same except that some of them recieve an amount of money to make it exclusive it doesn't mean the devs become superior the day they become exclusive... that weird thinking.

Feeling ripped off when your choice of console (if you're limited in those you can afford) was based on an exclusive that jumped.

Also, wanting a console to have a certain flavor and seeing that diluted in the marketing of other platforms.

Let's not lie people, It's because of people are a fan of a company and not gaming in general.

You're missing the point once again, and I have no idea what you're talking about regarding 'offensive'.

You talk about some ideal that all consoles should play the same games, but you really haven't fleshed that idea out. What you end up with is a hardware war rather than a software one, and then you have every company with some extra cash making one as well. I can't even begin to explain to you how bad that idea is, because I'm not sure you're interested in listening.

Your comparison to movies is laughable, and the only weird thinking is your own. You obviously are extremely misinformed about exclusivity. Look it up, there are many devs who attest to exclusivity and explain reason for reason why exclusivity is a good idea. Examples include getting optimization, funding, help programming, expert advice, liberal game engine use, etc etc. So yes, your game does stand to improve quality the minute you go exclusive because the console publisher is willing to lend its system designers to assist you with the code, workarounds, and optimization.

I'm sure you're used tgo arguing the merits of exclusivity among whatever group it is that you discuss things with, and the group think has you thinking that you all siply know better than the industry, but take it from someone who has done the research and done the arguing, exclusivity serves a very good purpose.

ugh, it wasnt "free" it wasnt like I could go on PSN and just DL it. YOu still had to buy DS2. Its no different than exclusive content that has been going around this gen, and if you wanted just that game its still 15 on PSN