The Next Game Crash. You Are At Fault. [Archive]

Gunstarhero

12-30-2003, 05:58 PM

Every few months you can count on a topic about whether or not there will be another 'Video Game Crash' like the one in 1984. It's not an unreasonable question by any means, but there is an inherent flaw in the discussion every time, which I just realised today.

The focus of the discussion is always based on Game companies/developers, because by all rights, these guys were the cause of the Crash the first time. Flooding the market with total crap at ridiculous prices. The question is asked "are they repeating themselves?"...yes and no. Yes, they are flooding the market with crap. Ridiculous prices? Thats an opinion, but doesn't matter in terms of this discussion today. Another crash will not happen because of the amount of crap hitting the market, as Game developers have figured out how to market to the lowest common denominator, i.e. Casual Gamer/Mainstreamer. This customer brings so much revenue, it doesn't matter what the niche gamers are buying...they are just extra revenue on top of the base customer, i.e. lowest common denominator.

My theory on what will cause a new crash, is something that cannot be stopped, and is something that gamers will not stop due to lack of ethics, scruples and all around cheapness. Your probably saying to yourself "OMG here comes the anti-emulation BS". Kinda sorta.

First let me say I have no stake in the future of what is now our Modern game machines, I am interested in Cartridge systems so my time has come and gone. So really I could care less anymore what you guys do to your XBox. This thing is dangerous, and nobody sees that. It's dangerous because of it's ability to emulate just about everything that a PC can so far. Someone tell me, is it running an N64 yet? Well, emulation on this thing isn't a rare thing, everybody who's anybody is running every classic game emulator they can find, adding an 80Gig harddrive, making it a consolized PC basically.

Think about this for a minute, what if someone figures out how to run a PS2 emulator on there? Download the Roms onto your 120gig HD = free new games. I'm not totally up to date on the capabilities of the Xbox emulation 'scene', but I havent read that a PS2 emulator is running on it. But something like that happening would be devastating, most gamers don't give a shit about the 'evil' corporations, they just want the games the cheapest way possible, and they WILL take as many free games as they can get without batting an eyelid, again pointing to the general lack of ethics, scruples, and all around cheapness of your average gamer.

I don't know if it could happen with this generation of consoles, but with the new batch being obviously more powerful, it might not take very long for some computer hack/wiz to figure out how to make one console run the competition. Xbox seems to be a good candidate though, considering its architecture and its proven ability to run numerous emulators and its huge memory capacity.

The idea of the XBox is whats dangerous, and its a catch 22 for consoles. Game companies have been creating ways to fight emulation for years and years, and now they've gone and made a console that is their enemy. Strange happenings indeed. But my point here is that it will be the GAMERS who create another game crash, if indeed there is one. It will not be the fault of the 'evil' 'greedy' corporations this time. Rather it will be the 'greedy' gamer who has to have it all for free that will ruin his own hobby.

Phosphor Dot Fossils

12-30-2003, 06:18 PM

Yep, banning the Xbox is obviously what needs to happen here. :eek 2:

I don't think the Xbox is going to be able to emulate PS2 games. I'm not even sure that the Ybox/X2/Xwife/XYZPDQ or whatever it's called will be able to do that.

For the record, this month alone I've spent damn near $200 on games and accessories, including buying a whole new system and starting to work toward getting another. The fact that a collectors' market exists for old cartridges and CD-based games, and the fact that in some cases there's real money to be made at it as a seller, kinda works against the assertion of most gamers being cheapskates. I've forked over money for no fewer than three different iterations of Pac-Man this month: Pac Man Vs. for the GC, the Namco 5-in-1 joystick, and Pac-Man Collection for the GBA...surely I could be getting my Pac-fix in MAME, and yet I keep pouring money into the little yellow guy.

So much for my parents thinking that getting me that Odyssey2 20+ years ago would put an end to me blowing tons of money on video games in the arcade. LOL

RoboticParanoia

12-30-2003, 06:50 PM

I was thinking about this today, actually.

Emulation will probably create the next crash. But of course, it's possible that this is total bullshit...there are a lot of pirated/"shared" music, but the music industry hasn't crashed yet.

My view is that all the hubub of controversial video games will destroy the industry. If developers focus away from "adult" situation, it won't get the interests of that age group (for shame!) and the teenage age group that tries to be like the adult age group. So, they have to focus on family games, which'll get them unpopular (Nintendo, anyone?). Thus, without the adults, then the video game industry will cripple. Think of Prohibition...except of course, the alcohol never stop...maybe the same thing will happen, from Chinese pirates or something.

Duncan

12-30-2003, 06:56 PM

My own opinion follows, as always. And, like all of us, I am entitled to it. So there. :p

Total wild-ass guess here, but I'm thinking that the thousands upon thousands of people who picked up an Xbox Holiday Bundle over the Christmas break are not all going to rush out and have it MAME-ized. Most people just want to play Madden or Need for Speed, and they will do so happily.

I would venture so far as to say that, in a crowd of 10,000 people who play console games, not even five would even have the slightest clue that the Xbox is capable of being modded the way some people have done. Yes, the potential is certainly there, and it is either scary or fascinating depending on your outlook (I tend to take the latter view). But potential does not immediately translate into action, as any scientist or psychologist can confirm. Besides that, most people won't want to void their precious warranty just to play an arcade-perfect port of Pac-Man.

One more big prediction. Now that the video game industry has finally gone mainstream (to a certain extent), I think the possibility of a major crash happening like in 1984 is minimal. Certainly, there's a chance that one of the big players in today's market could take a serious dive (and before you say "Nintendo", realize that Microsoft still has a long way to go). And there's always the chance that Sony might delay too long before bringing out the PS3, thereby causing a "wait-and-see" attitude among the competition.

What we certainly won't see again is any serious competition from home computers for the public's video gaming dollars. Computers themselves are still too expensive and complex to serve as a viable console replacement, and the constant hassle of upgrading from year to year basically guarantees that the majority of gamers are sticking with consoles for good.

Finally, I don't care what the magazine or web site reviews claim from week to week -- on the whole, most games are a lot better than they ever were in terms of play quality and value for money. Most assuredly, there are the odd few games in every bunch that truly are a waste of plastic, but even the marginal titles on today's consoles tend to be at least a little entertaining. Most reviews tend to be either absolutely glowing or filled with schoolyard-insult-style commentary. There isn't a lot of middle ground. Thus, you can rest assured that when you buy a game for $9.99 or $14.99 these days, it will at least be worth its purchase price. The days of doorstop-worthy crap like Sssnake or Fire Fly seem to be long gone.

Again, the preceding remains nothing more than my opinion. Your cooperation is appreciated. :)

Flack

12-30-2003, 10:01 PM

Isometric_Bacon

12-30-2003, 10:31 PM

I agree and disagree with Gunstarhero. I agree that gamers have the power to bring about the next videogame crash, but I don't think it will be through emulation, but rather through good ol' piracy.

Not to turn this into PS2 Piracy 101, but with a mod chip (that becomes easier to install each generation), a CDR drive, and a cable modem, you can download and burn a new PS2 game every day of the week, whether it's from newsgroups, file sharing, or whatever. Almost every game that comes out is "ripped" so that it will fit on a regular 80 minute CDR -- if they won't fit, they can be spanned across multiple CD's. Those with DVD-R drives can download complete versions. I have friends with hundreds and hundreds of copied PS2 games and think nothing of it, because "they're things I wouldn't have bought anyway."

Think about the process involved there. You'd have to be fairly knowledgeable about the internet, have access to newsgroups, be in a "l33t" circle of people. Hell even I don't know how to access a piracy newsgroup, and I go on the internet all the time. Sure there is a significant portion of people who do this, but in comparision to the thousands of casual gamers out there who simply think PS2 burning is impossible without the right equipment or DVD Burners, and simply settle with games for Xmas...

Look at the PSX, it's games simply needed to be put in a CD burner and hit *copy* and legions and legions of crappy publishers released equally crappy games, (Mary kate and olsen, anyone?) and they were guaranteed at least some profit. Almost everyone I know (i'm the only hardcore gamer I know :( ) had tons of burned games in that generation, and now we're in the next, most of them aren't even aware that they can play burned games on their consoles, much less the methods to do so.

I think the people that are playing MAME on their XBox are mostly hacker types anyway -- people that are pretty likely to have emulated games on their PC anyway. Personally, I think the real threat is the rate and ease that these console games are broken and pirated.

I agree totally. As for the argument about the power of emulators, you must realise that ALOT of work and hard coding goes into these things, they're not simply a matter of the computers sharing the same processing speed... up until a year ago only the most modern computers were able to handle the processing power of a gameboy advance emutlator... and the modern NES emulators probably couldn't be run on a first generation Pentium.

An emulator is exactly what it name is. It emulates. It tricks the CPU and ROM images into thinking they're being played on the hardware. Thus it has to pretend it is the hardware, copying it's every process from it's sound board and graphics chips into its own language, and that takes alot of processing power. I don't think there will be a console capable of running current system games for at least another generation or two, and even then it will take it a long while for them to be up to playable and perfect standards.

Personally, I think it's just too big an industry to go downhill at this point of time. I could see one singular company pulling a Hollywood example in pooling all it's money into one particular game, that doesn't sell well and ending up destitute, (Square pictures, anyone?) but I really don't see a collapse in the industry, unless something else comes along to capture the attention of thousands of gamers away from their screens.

leonk

12-31-2003, 09:19 AM

In my opinion, the idea that emulation will cause another crash is total BS..

Emulation to most degrees emulates hardware that has already left main stream, or close to its end (in the case of Neo Geo). When I say main stream, I mean "stop any kid on the street and ask them if they know, own or know where to buy a brand new system X".

Most people don't mod their systems, most people buy their games. Modding systems, and copying games is not as simple as downloading MP3's from the web, so your typical person will not do it.

As far as I know, there wasn't a great lot of ROM pirating pre-1984 crash. But there was a big amount of modded PS1's and copied CD's, yet Sony still did amazingly and the PS2 is still #1.

Also, every time I go to EB-Games, the lineups just keep getting longer, and new titles are always sold out.

If there is a dying breed out there, it's the arcade.. but it started dying long before MAME 0.1. It was only time before home systems were as good if not better than arcade hardware.

YoshiM

12-31-2003, 10:23 AM

Piracy will always be there, but emulation is NOT gonna bring this bigger-than-Hollywood industry down.

Yes an Xbox can be modded. Big deal. With all the hub-bub we hear from Slashdot or game news sites about hacks and mod chips we seem to think that practically everyone and their uncle is having this done. Reality check: not everyone mods their systems and I'm willing to bet my left shoe that the numbers of actual hacked Xboxes is low. Not everyone wants to be a solder-monkey or want to rip apart a brand new Xbox and screw up a $170+ investment.

The emulation of current consoles ON current consoles is NOT going to happen. Period. Bleem couldn't come through with an all-encompassing emulator for the Dreamcast and had to settle with emulation packages for specific games. That's how tough it is on a "locked down" platform. And what did that give you? The ability to play games on the last generation of game system. Now forget the easy-to-program (and probably figure out, emulation wise) PS1 and let's focus on the PS2 with it's different processors and steep difficulty. Remember and emulator has to make the platform it's on "pretend" it's a completely different platform and that takes resources. Trying to emulate a PS2 with its specific and customized processors will probably slow the Xbox to a crawl and produce an experience that's less fun than watching flies fornicate on the wet paint that's drying. And emulating Gamecube? Not with its reverse spinning-AFAIK you can only emulate GC games ON a GC using a network connection. The only platform that has fear of losing cash through emulation on a console is the GBA as it IS of lesser techology and thus easier to emulate properly.

The REAL threat of lost sales through emulation is on PC. These days a PC isn't all that expensive-$500 gets you a complete system that can easily run a GBA emulator. For less than a thousand and a buddy who will assemble it for beer you can have a cutting edge machine that, if there are emus out there, could probably run current generation console software. True not many are just going to buy a machine JUST to play emulated games BUT many do buy PCs because it too is a mainstream item. Surf the web, keep in touch with friends, download and burn music (legally or illegally, both are easy), play games, edit and print photos and more are some of the reasons people plunk down cash for a machine and playing emulated PS2 games (if possible) is a curiosity and a perk of the purchase. Remember the hoopla when the N64 emulator was released when the N64 WAS STILL OUT? If you have a decent machine (which then wasn't TOO expensive) and a good internet connection you could download an N64 game and it will look BETTER than it does on the actual machine.

Basically, I wouldn't lose sleep over Xbox mods or emulation causing a crash. The day the industry loses THAT much money over emus/piracy is when we know society really is in the toilet.

omnedon

12-31-2003, 10:27 AM

Most "casual" console gamers (by far the majority) can't use their PC's and the internet to a sufficient degree to be effective at any kind of piracy.

As a repair guy, I can say for certian that mods are useless to Joe Gamer, unless he has a buddy or unscrupulous businessman handy to 'buy' burned games from, which come close to defeating the purpose in the first place (pirated games being cheap instead of free).

Piracy was around on the fringes in the eight bit days, and it's on the fringes today. You hear more about it today because:
1) Companies are PR'ing us to death with their 'losses' (RIAA anyone?)
2) Internet forums like this one allow for a far greater awareness of all facets of gaming, including piracy.

Awareness is not ability.

My 2 cents. :)

Spoony Bard

12-31-2003, 10:31 AM

I think the argument needs to be made that some 85% of all pirates wouldn't have bought the game in the first place, and another 10% would buy it if they had the money (poor college students, etc.).

Nature Boy

12-31-2003, 10:57 AM

Piracy will *never* go away, but I don't think it will cause another crash. The only thing that would cause another crash, IMO, would be losing the mainstream audience.

The argument that pirates wouldn't purchase the games in the first place is a faulty one. Sure you can argue that there wouldn't be revenue as they wouldn't buy the game - but I'll argue right back that costs are higher because of the time and money spent trying to keep people honest.

Jorpho

12-31-2003, 11:14 AM

Piracy was quite rampant on the Commodore 64, if I am not mistaken. Some companies like Epyx supposedly even suffered greatly. It didn't really lead to a "crash", though, did it?

I'd say a crash is unlikely in this day and age. The market of parents willing to buy all kinds of things for their children is enough to sustain the industry.

zmweasel

12-31-2003, 02:31 PM

Emulation will probably create the next crash. But of course, it's possible that this is total bullshit...there are a lot of pirated/"shared" music, but the music industry hasn't crashed yet.

Depends on your definition of "crash." Music sales are *way* down, CD-R sales are booming, and record companies and retailers are scrambling to come up with solutions to the piracy problem: suing the shit out of people, copy protection, legal online-music sources, bundling DVDs and Willy Wonka-esque "golden tickets" with CDs, et cetera. Nothing's worked yet, and nothing likely will.

My view is that all the hubub of controversial video games will destroy the industry.

Nah. M-rated games are here to stay, and the ESRB system, while flawed, is doing its job of informing clueless parents. The majority of best-selling games are T- or E-rated anyway; GTA3 and VC are the exception.

-- Z.

zmweasel

12-31-2003, 02:39 PM

Piracy was quite rampant on the Commodore 64, if I am not mistaken. Some companies like Epyx supposedly even suffered greatly. It didn't really lead to a "crash", though, did it?

It didn't lead to a crash, but it certainly had a considerable effect. Dani Bunten Berry liked to point out how literally *everyone* in the early '80s seemed to have played M.U.L.E., despite a modest number of copies being sold. Commodore Amiga publishers also blamed rampant piracy for that platform's lack of success in the States.

-- Z.

Gunstarhero

12-31-2003, 02:59 PM

I must have a romanticized view of how easy it is to manipulate an XBox into a multi-system emulator. From just reading gaming newsgroups though, I gather over half of XBox owners(online) are getting their units all equiped with the various MAMEulators. I think its easier to do than some of you are making it out to be. And who's to say it won't become easier? Right now you can buy a CD on ebay that includes the emulator software and all the games of 'pick-your-system'. Nothing complicated about it, just boot up the CD, install the software and wala!, you got the whole NES collection.

Don't think for a second that there aren't hacks out there trying to create a process like this for the XBox, for their profit. I won't be suprised if there are DVD's made in this manner in the near future.

This problem has never been up for discussion in the past because it's just now coming to light. There was never a console until the XBox that was capable of such things. I don't think something like the PS2 being emulated on the XBox will happen this generation, but as the next generation of systems becomes more and more powerful, whats to stop it? Each year, PC hacks acheive greater goals in the emulation field, ever closing the gap that consoles have from being emulated. As already mentioned the N64 was emulated before the machine was dead!

Look, when NEO GEO roms are being dumped to the internet before the game is even out in arcades, you can rest assured that there are people dedicated enough to want to emulate and pirate anything they can, classic or modern. It's easy to shrug off because the market is so good right now, it's so good that how can one possibly believe there is a problem? I'm just trying to gaze into the future here. The more powerful the consoles get, becoming more like PC's, this is going to be a problem you'll have to face. I'm sure Microsoft never dreamed that their XBox was going to be turned into a MAME cab. Sure that might help sell systems to hacks, but software is what brings in revenue.

I understand your average gamer probably doesn't know about modding their console etc...But, make it easy and widely available then you've got a problem, like before I mentioned there will probably be a disc available soon that contains the emulation software and games all in one easy installation. Sold for $5 or something, there you've just given the mouse a cookie.

I'm of course thinking worst case scenario here, as I'm feeling a bit overtly-cynical here at the end of the year. I'm still serious though, as none of this is impossible. Whats really interesting is with higher advancement of this design of consoles(harddrive, DVDrom etc..), you won't have any lingering competition like we did in the past. For instance the NES hung around in the market until the SNES came out in 1991, amidst stiff competition from the Genesis, but it was still a money maker. Now, lets say the XBox2 comes out, and someone quickly trains it to emulate the GC or PS2, they have no choice but to upgrade hardware.

Just wonder how long it will be until the big 3 will be emulated on the PC, if some haven't been functioning already that I'm unaware of. It'll happen. It always happens.

Flack

12-31-2003, 03:25 PM

Just wonder how long it will be until the big 3 will be emulated on the PC, if some haven't been functioning already that I'm unaware of. It'll happen. It always happens.

Exactly. It *does* always happen. It just takes time for the hardware to blow past the console's specs. I'm sure those of you who have followed emulation for a while remember the painfully slow NES and SNES emulators. N64 was considered "impossible" at the time -- now, that and PSX run perfectly. When we all have 10ghz machines on our desks, we'll think nothing of running PS2/Gamecube/Xbox games on our PCs. I'm actually pretty surprised no one's done Xbox on a PC yet, since the platforms should be pretty similar.

And I'm with you Gunstarhero, I must just be desensitized to the piracy scene. Alt.binaries.playstation2 fills with games every day. Those too afraid or inexperiences to mod their own consoles can buy them premodded.

I think one thing this might lead to in the future is more proprietary systems. If Microsoft gets tired of people hacking the Xbox, maybe version 2 won't have a removable HD, or even an IDE interface. One of the common problems with these seems to be that you can read the discs on the PC. The Dreamcast stood for a long time. So did the GC. What about a system that uses a different network protocol or something? I don't know what the answer is, but if your console is made with PC parts it makes sense that it'll be modified.

omnedon

12-31-2003, 03:34 PM

But, make it easy and widely available then you've got a problem, like before I mentioned there will probably be a disc available soon that contains the emulation software and games all in one easy installation. Sold for $5 or something, there you've just given the mouse a cookie.

DivX caps of Family Guy episodes abounds, if you know where to look. I had 'em all. Family Guy is on DVD, now. Bought 'em all, and I love it! Deleted all my DivX caps.

The solution is as simple as the above. These Atari and IntelliVision compilations are smart. In my opinion, they only GENERATE interest in The Real Thing, as opposed to killing it. It's easy to beat the pirates, just give people what they want, in a convenient way, at a decent price. You'll win over 90% of consumers every time, and make a mint doing it.

When you make it easier to pirate than to acquire legally, the copyright owner is begging for trouble.

Dangerboy

12-31-2003, 03:48 PM

Maybe it's just me...but I always figured it would be the companies that make the market crash. I mean, look it how bleak everything looked back in the 3DO / Jaguar days. I almost left gaming because there was squat coming out that impressed me, and the prices ($700 3DO!?!) were not justifiable. It took the near perfect PSX port of SF Alpha for me to get back into gaming.

I think those same lingering doubts and fears are happening again, but only in the *true* gaming circles. Now that we have companies gearing their products towards the mainstream rather than the hardcore, a LOT of series have seen a huge drop in quality (Final Fantasy 8, X, X-2, Ridge Racer going Simulation, most 2D fghters that went 3D, etc...)

Those of us that want that old feeling back aren't exactly getting it in today's titles, hence why we flock to the classics and such. Metroid Prime and Metal Gear Solid 2 aisde, I can't remember the last game I played 'hardcore' style . Most I play for a few hours, and tossed aside because it's just like every other damn game on the market. Hence why I stick to the older stuffs. They actually tried to do something.

Besides, if I remember the original crash, it wasn't piracy that took it down; to recreate it accurately we'd need Microsoft to print 5 million copies of a crappy Halo 2 for 3 Million Xbox systems ;D

YoshiM

12-31-2003, 03:50 PM

This problem has never been up for discussion in the past because it's just now coming to light. There was never a console until the XBox that was capable of such things. I don't think something like the PS2 being emulated on the XBox will happen this generation, but as the next generation of systems becomes more and more powerful, whats to stop it? Each year, PC hacks acheive greater goals in the emulation field, ever closing the gap that consoles have from being emulated. As already mentioned the N64 was emulated before the machine was dead!

Actually there was a machine that was capable and that's the Dreamcast. Yeah it took a while but there are a bunch of retro emulators available for that platform. I think you can even run Linux off of it. Yes I said the N64 was emulated (UltraHLE) but that was in 1999 and you needed a Voodoo/3DFX card and one heckuva machine to even THINK of running it. Nintendo WAS pissed but the likelyhood of this emu doing any damage to them was fairly nil. There was also a pretty solid Gameboy emulator since way back in 1996/97. Didn't stop things there, the Gameboy sales are still busting charts.

I'm of course thinking worst case scenario here, as I'm feeling a bit overtly-cynical here at the end of the year. I'm still serious though, as none of this is impossible. Whats really interesting is with higher advancement of this design of consoles(harddrive, DVDrom etc..), you won't have any lingering competition like we did in the past. For instance the NES hung around in the market until the SNES came out in 1991, amidst stiff competition from the Genesis, but it was still a money maker. Now, lets say the XBox2 comes out, and someone quickly trains it to emulate the GC or PS2, they have no choice but to upgrade hardware.

Not really "worst case scenario" but more like "illogical extreme". We still have lingering competition...sort of. There are still PSOne games still being made (at least there were recently). Basically, it's the stance that once something new comes out the previous product is (typically) "dead" in the eyes of consumers. With the scenario of an "Xbox2" being trained to emulate the GC or PS2: "IF" something DOES come out (may be difficult as the future platform is going to be VASTLY different) by the time it does the GC and PS2 and going to be antiquated by the mainstream standards and it won't be perfect until some time after. Again, nothing to loose sleep over.

Dude, I think you may be blowing this way off the deep end.

ianoid

01-01-2004, 08:19 AM

Sorry guys, there will be no video game crash.

Piracy is a thorn in the side of all digital media. No sooner will there be a crash in DVD movie sales will there be a crash in Video Game Sales. There may be ups and downs, but nothing as drastic as the brief few years of the original crash of '84.

Video games are a part of modern cultures, loved by children and adults alike, and no longer a simple trend.

This is the dawn of interactive entertainment! Enjoy while you still can't!

ian

Jorpho

01-01-2004, 10:14 AM

Come to think of it, last time I checked there still wasn't a very good Saturn emulator out there, even though the Saturn specs probably are very inferior to most modern PCs.

TheCrow

01-01-2004, 10:50 AM

I doubt there will be another game crash as in '84, but i'm sure they'll be a slump at some point when the new generation of systems come out. I blame this on Nintendo being to proud to bow out of the console war. The market can't support 3 systems and if the Phantom turns out to be real and comes out that will make 4. People don't buy systems due to capabilities or gameplay these days, there simply loyalists. They simply want what's most popular at the time. Nintendo should keep Handheld support and concentrate on being a 3rd party developer for the next generation of systems, they should just come to grips with reality and concentrate on making good games like Sega.

SoulBlazer

01-01-2004, 01:33 PM

No, the Saturn has not been emulated. I'm waiting for a good one so I can save some money and just buy the games instead of the system and everything else that it needs.

The Dreamcast does'nt have one either, and of course the modern systems can't be handled on the current systems.

calthaer

01-01-2004, 01:47 PM

I don't think emulation or piracy has anything to do with it. There will only be another crash if and when the generic consumer gets savvy and stops forking over money for shovelware. I don't see that happening any time soon.

NE146

01-01-2004, 01:49 PM

Think about this for a minute, what if someone figures out how to run a PS2 emulator on there? Download the Roms onto your 120gig HD = free new games. I'm not totally up to date on the capabilities of the Xbox emulation 'scene', but I havent read that a PS2 emulator is running on it. But something like that happening would be devastating

It aint happening. Click the link if you want to read more.

"Basically...here is the gist of what I just said...PS2, Dreamcast, and especially Gamecube emulation is not going to happen on the XBox. It just can't handle it. Granted one could be made, but it would be so slow and ugly it wouldn't even be worth the effort." (http://forums.xbox-scene.com/index.php?act=ST&f=17&t=55857&s=5742702082cd3893c01b3ca5cea9ba98)

Ed Oscuro

01-02-2004, 12:42 AM

Quite an interesting take on the issues plaguing the industry.

Game companies alone are responsible for all the crap out there now...it's unfortunate that 2 million+ sales is the figure required to constitute a real hit these days, but that's the cost of making games for the new platform. I'm not sure if budget releases are the way out, either...Nintendo realizes that if you can sell a lot of very small, made-in-a-day games on a cheap format (e-Reader) that you can possibly make a bunch of money, but I'm not sure if they've used that as they would like to. I'm not sure, but I'm wondering if the release of Zelda Four Swords for GameCube is the beginning of a trend for Nintendo to start selling retro-style games. It would be very cool, the games wouldn't be as costly to produce (though some requirements, such as CD audio, won't change...the reduction in price wouldn't be as small as you might expect), but it's hard to say that would work, either.

Essentially, the cost of the format is as big an issue as anything these days. Smart software companies are still flocking to the GBA because it's a relatively simple platform to develop for.

Look, when NEO GEO roms are being dumped to the internet before the game is even out in arcades, you can rest assured that there are people dedicated enough to want to emulate and pirate anything they can, classic or modern. It's easy to shrug off because the market is so good right now, it's so good that how can one possibly believe there is a problem? I'm just trying to gaze into the future here. The more powerful the consoles get, becoming more like PC's, this is going to be a problem you'll have to face. I'm sure Microsoft never dreamed that their XBox was going to be turned into a MAME cab. Sure that might help sell systems to hacks, but software is what brings in revenue.

I would like to see a study done on how much emulation and piracy hurts the industry. I will say that figures for the Neo Geo should be compared separately to GBA which in turn shouldn't be lumped with figures for classic games (emulating which hurts sales of classic games compilations), or current gen console piracy.

The Neo Geo is indeed in an unfortunate situation, which is undoubtedly a core reason why SNK seems to be looking at the Atomiswave as next system of choice. I don't think SNK can complain about users who emulate both Samurai Shodown 0 (or Spirits V, whatever) and SvC Chaos, but buy one of them. They have a right to punish all the folks who emulate both games, though...these types unfortunately outnumber the people who buy games legitimately. I will say that the Neo Geo scene and cart pricing is comfortably high for collectors, but from the POV of somebody who wants to get in the hobby, being able to find old Neo Geo games for $20 but being assured new releases will be out of your price range forever is ridiculous. I'd like to see a home Atomiswave system from a gamer's standpoint, but that would of course be screwing over your arcade operators. Would that be profitable in the long (and short) term? Probably not, but it might be possible to make more money off players. The issue, however, is (once again) that of cartridge pricing for the Atomiswave system.

Oy vey...

Final comment, however, is that I find it rather humorous that the topic title is accusing everybody here at the forums of being contributors to the decline of gaming in recent years...the system is screwed up, and if you aren't emulating old games, you're missing out on a lot. I don't much respect those who don't actually make a commitment to go out and buy the actual games, but I don't much care for new compilation packs either(unless you're an arcade operator with a MAME cab...license that thing!) because they aren't the real thing.

One thing is true: game development companies are fighting with the basic issue that games are supposed to be fun and "come from the heart," but that they must meet market demands and set up a virtual assembly line...their projects must be very complex to even compete with other titles out there. Then, their users hinder them. It's as perfect a human tragedy as you could possibly create.

ianoid

01-02-2004, 02:21 AM

What is all this talk about shovelware?

There are plenty of FANTASTIC titles out there, and constantly more on the way. If we survived the FMV of the 90s, we'll survive any misdirected trend in gaming from here on out.

Even bad games are enjoyed by the multitudes. It's not like bad music ruined the music industry.

Video Games are here to stay boys. Put down your 'end of the world' signs.

nesuser2

01-02-2004, 03:02 AM

i'm not going to read all the replies. So, if i repeat what somebody has already said, just skip it. So here goes:

You will never be able to emulate a system, on another system from the same generation. You sure can't play N64 on a PS1, the power just isn't there. If you can't play genesis or snes on a ps1....that should say enough. the newer consoles stepped up quite a bit in power which will leave it's likelihood of being emulated in the far future(emulated on another system or machine). the ps2 and xbox run around 700 mhz, so if the next console was around 2.5 ghz.....it could be possible. i'm not sure, but i was thinking the cube was around 500mhz.....I can't back that in any way, it just seems right, or close. And, the NES will run on virtually anything because it only ran around 10mhz, and I'm not sure on that. But it is something near that. So anything around 100 mhz should run it, given the right emulator. Some emulators require more juice for all the features they contain. I do know for a fact that the NES emu Nester(no longer updated) ran on my original Pentium(166mhz) flawlessly, so NES emulation takes very little. And it runs on PS1 which runs around 33mhz...and I am pretty sure about that.

Meanwhile, back at the xbox scene. You will never see ps2 on an xbox, because they are having extreme difficulty running N64 and PS1 games on it. It IS happening, slowly and not surely. Some run, some don't. It's very shakey right now. I happen to emulate an awful lot of stuff and I think those that emulate things have full intention of spending the money on the stuff when it is available to them. I have loads of NES roms and the ones that I actually play, or plan to. I do own them, I just found another NES game, via emulation, that I really thought was cool. I now have intentions of buying it. I probably won't play the game for another 6 months, and I will probably obtain the cartridge in the next year.

While there are lots of emulation lovers, like myself, that are willing to pay big bucks for the xbox mod(yes, it does cost a good amount of money and time) and at the same time willing to go buy the real deal.....there will always be a good share of people that will sell all their old systems and pay for the xbox and the modification. These are the same people that sold their collection when they found emulation for the pc. I truely enjoy owning the real deal. I would much rather play an NES game on my top loading NES but sometimes space restrictions don't allow. I don't have room for all the clutter, so as it sits in boxes.....I still get it out a couple of times a year to play it. Usually around christmas when my friends come around and it's much more fun with the real controller in hand, IMO.

I don't see a video game market crash, but I was born during the first one, so my opinion really doesn't mean anything. I think it would be caused by all these crap games that come out if it did happen. I'm not going to go pay for these crap games that I want to test out when I get them for free....but when I truely love a game, I am more than happy to go and pay good cash for them. I have a gamecube collection, 41 games or so at last count. And I just bought a gamecube this past fall, before the price drop, I might add. Which says that I've spent some big bucks on GC games, I would lean towards atleast $600 since I blew $200 in one week on roughly 8 games. I love GC so much recently, and I blame it on the fact that all the crap never makes it to GC. So, Nintendo's misfortunes, IMO, really did help them. If you look at how many total crap games are released for the PS2 or Xbox, versus the GC....it's amazing, to me. There are lots of high quality, exclusive titles, for GC and I really love it. Viewtiful Joe and Mario Kart come to mind....

But that's just my own two cents and I probably left something out, but that's all I have to say...

Iron Draggon

01-02-2004, 05:18 AM

If anything can stop this industry now, I would say it's anti-piracy efforts. If the industry's methods of attempting to prevent piracy become too much of a burden on the honest consumers, they'll simply boycott the industry until it gets over itself. That's why CD sales are down right now. The people don't give a fat rat's behind if the RIAA "lost" money that it never would've made anyhow to piracy, anymore than they care at all if any other industry suffers a "loss" for the same reasons. The hype about piracy is just that, it's HYPE.

Industries want to whine and complain about not being as rich as they think they should be, and point the finger at everyone but themselves, because they know it's their own fault, they just don't want to admit it. If your prices are reasonable, people won't feel compelled to steal from you. If your prices are insane, people will find ways to screw you right back. And whining about it is only gonna make them that much more likely to hit you where it hurts.

Of course I understand the industry's position, but they fail to understand the economy. Joe Public is not a bottomless pit of cash burning a hole in his pocket. That's what the industry is. So when the industry complains about how much money that it "lost" while still making an insane profit, this means about as much to the average consumer as a politician's campaign promise.

What I see happening is the digital industries getting so paranoid about some people getting stuff for free that they're alienating their paying customers. Nobody wants to have to enter an authorization code every time they want to play a game, and nobody wants to have to pay a fee every time they want to play it either, but the industry honestly thinks that this sort of thing is the answer to their "problems". So what's gonna happen is they're gonna come up with all these new inconveniences for the honest consumers, the pirates will still hack their ways around them all, and the only thing they're gonna accomplish is irritating their paying customers to the point that they're not willing to pay for their products either. And then what will the industry complain about? Who will they blame? Well of course it will still be the fault of piracy, because that's what made them do it in the first place. ROFLMAO

Just lower your prices, and get over the competition from piracy. If you sell your stuff as cheap as the pirates do, what makes you think that people are still gonna prefer pirated goods over official goods? The average consumer will always prefer the real deal over the knock-offs, but as long as the cheap imitations are virtually indistinguishable from the originals for a fraction of the price, most people are gonna save as much of what little money they have as they can. It has nothing to do with ethics, it's all about economics, baby!

On a side note, the whole thing is mostly just a big scam that the industry itself is playing on the people anyway. They whine a complain about piracy being the reason why their prices are increasing, and yet the pirate's only source for their wares is the industry itself. How can anything be leaked to the internet before the official version is even released, if someone in the industry doesn't supply it in the first place? I realize that sometimes things are stolen to facilitate piracy, but more often than not, it's an inside job. The pirates pay their moles less than the moles get paid by the industries they work for, and yet piracy still thrives because again it's all about economics. There will always be people who will do anything for a quick buck, just as there will always be people who will do anything just to save a few bucks.

However, I would venture to say that with all the hype going on about piracy these days, it's probably an actual unofficial part of the industry's business model. They supply the pirates with their goods to keep them in business, so they can keep raising their prices for the sake of "fighting" them. It's the same scam that our own government has been pulling on us for years. Supply the drug cartels with whatever they need to stay in business, so they can keep raising our taxes to "fight" the war on drugs. The guilty dog barks first. Piracy is a problem because the industry wants it to be a problem. Without the "threat" of piracy constantly looming over the average consumer's heads, how will the industry justify raising it's prices? That's precisely why we're hearing so much more about piracy now than we were in the past. It's no more prevalent than it ever was, it's just a side business for the industry itself now, but they want us to think it's a threat.

Just watch. Even after they've implemented all these expensive new tactics for "fighting" piracy, it will still be an even bigger threat than it was before, because somehow those darn pirates will still be making more money than the industry itself is. They will never admit that they are the true pirates!

Zubiac666

01-02-2004, 09:02 AM

Wayne Ryder

01-02-2004, 09:46 AM

I'm sure there'll be a slump, but not so sure of a crash. Everything goes in cycles, skateboards, BMX, YoYos, Tamagotchis, Pokemon & so on. Sooner or later, people will become bored with the current trend, whatever it is.
There are too many lookalike 'me-too' games on the market. Developers are having to limit themselves to what they know the publishers will be interested in marketing, so the industry will spiral down and bite its own butt. Today, you'll have a hard time pitching a brand new type of game with anything less than a very broad appeal.

I can only play a game so many times, no matter what it looks like. Unreal Tournament and Quake III were excellent, MOH was nice, as was Voyager Elite Force and AvP2. But they were essentially the same game in different clothes. So I'm jaded myself.

It's unfortunate that the machine's gears and cogs work this way. As games need more staff and more money to produce, the price on the High St. remains high. As niche-market games are cancelled in favour of mainstream guaranteed sellers (licensed titles & Lara Bloody Croft), the view gets narrower, the games just clones of one-another. It's not a good time to have a truly original idea for a radically different game.

Maybe a break will do the industry good. Perhaps there are too many PS2s in circulation and the kids could do with a little sunlight and exercise.

(edited to improve grammar)

Jorpho

01-02-2004, 09:50 AM

Those main CPU specs are rather meaningless when shown together. Clock speeds are hardly comparable between different processor architectures. (A 1 GHz Pentium III is going to be a lot more than five times faster than a 200 MHz Pentium I.)

By the way, weren't several of the most recent Neo Geo games encrypted? How come that didn't stop anyone?

nesuser2

01-02-2004, 09:55 AM

the ps2 and xbox run around 700 mhz, ..... but i was thinking the cube was around 500mhz..... the NES will run on virtually anything because it only ran around 10mhz, and I'm not sure on that.

uhh
those numbers are not really true O_O

The following are just main-cpu specs (no co-cpus,graphic processors etc)

X-box: 733 Mhz
Gamecube: 485 Mhz
PS2: 300 Mhz
NES: we.. 10 Mhz would be awesome but the reality is 1,79 Mhz

I stand corrected, and I just remembered the NES being pretty darn slow. I also knew the xbox was around 700, and I thought the PS2 was around the same. But it's obviously not and I knew that the GC was around 4-500. The NES figures for 10 must have come from one of our members that was trying to juice the core of his NES, if anybody remembers that. I'm pretty sure he got his going around 10 mhz, so that games like SMB 3 didn't have that nasty slow down. But I do stand correct and I was somewhat, in a way....reasonably close on my figures with a few being way off....but it doesn't hurt the picture or my message that much as a whole.

BoOchan

01-03-2004, 09:17 AM

I personally don't think there will be a Large Market Crash, but possibly a small one that would have minor effects. As the Giant Electronics/Computer companies take over gaming once and for all (/me puts on Flame Retardant Suit on, Sorry Nintendo Fanboys) people will still be buying games. Gaming is in the mainstream enough now in ways moreso the the last 2 Generations, it's back to the Insane popularity of the NES. Compare the PS2 and the Nes, they're the most technologically Uncapable, but are winning due to sheer popularity and outside support. M$ Have an unlimited bank account and are going better then nintendo at the moment, so they aren't going. The only Crash that may happen is in Portable Gaming, because Sony May dominate that Ala PSP. That would be a definate loss, losing Nintendo, because It would just be sega all over again...

Emulation cannot kill the market, because only Full Geeks use Emulators. Mr Average Joe Gamer doesn't know a thing about emulators, so there is no harm in that.

Bottom Line, The Market in no way is heading for a Crash