Microsoft Prattle v2

[vivisectvi]

http://ca.ign.com/articles/2013/07/16/forza-motorsport-5-requires-one-time-internet-connection

Flagship Xbox One launch title Forza Motorsport 5 – which will make extensive use of the console’s cloud capabilities and always-online functionality – will also be playable offline now that Microsoft has changed its policies. However, it will require a one-time connection to Xbox Live before you can play.

In an interview with IGN, Dan Greenawalt, the studio head at Forza developer Turn 10 Studios, clarified how their day-one racing game will work if your Xbox One isn’t connected to Xbox Live.

“So when you first boot up the game, we’re going to ask you to log in,” he explained. “And when you log in you’re going to get the Drivatars and you’re also going to get a whole bunch of content: tracks and cars. Our production schedule is such that we are putting them in as late as possible and that means making them free as downloadable content on Day One.

“[But] that is required content to play the game. We basically have designed the game to work with all that content no matter how late is coming in, in order to make the biggest game possible.”

In other words, because games have to be submitted to Microsoft testing, certified, and then pressed onto discs and shipped, Forza 5 has to be done much, much sooner than November. By requiring part of the game as a download on launch day, it gives Turn 10 extra time to finish everything. And so what you get on the disc you buy at the store won’t be the entire game. You’ll need to download the rest of it from Xbox Live (which should be possible to occur as you play, Greenawalt clarified).

After that, Greenawalt said, Forza 5 is like your refrigerator. “You have to fill it up with food the first time,” he explained. “And from then on, you connect whenever you want when you want to update your food. The Drivatars are as fresh as they are. It’s not like they’re going to degrade, but when you’re looking for new stuff – fresh stuff…it’s going to keep evolving. That’s the nature of this Drivatar system.”

Drivatar is Forza 5’s attempt at next-generation AI in that there is no pre-programmed artificial intelligence. Instead, a ghost version of yourself races on your behalf, using your repeated behavior and tendencies to mimic how you’d race if you were actually playing. Drivatars of random gamers all over the world are what you race against in your single-player campaign.

To that end, Greenawalt told us, “You do have to connect the game in order to get the latest Drivatars, because we need as many people training them as possible. And so rather than having just a launch-day set that was created by us, every day that people race is going to make the Drivatar set that much more accurate, that much more diverse, that much more interesting.

“All of the cloud and online features make the game far, far better,” Greenawalt summed up. “In fact I’d even say revolutionary. The things we’re doing with opponents and Drivatar are not something that anyone can envision unless you’ve played it. But we’re trying to get as much of that into the unconnected, offline mode as well.

"We’re not making a launch game. We’re making Forza 5, at launch."

 

[bps21]

It's hard to be angry at them when Microsoft changed the rules this far into development. I hadn't thought about how poor people people without internet would affect the games built from the ground up for an at least occasional connection.

 

[Sabre]

There is going to be some very angry consumers come christmas morning whom may not have Internet (some I work with still use the pay as you go dongles)

 

[vivisectvi]

I think with something like this, it's less about someone not having the internet and more about how selling an incomplete game is becoming a bigger trend. Current generation is "release and patch day one" and it looks like this is moving toward "release and download day one". I also think it's kind of shitty that one day that game disc will be rendered useless when their servers shut down.

Also that refrigerator metaphor sounded like something someone came up with while very, very high.

 

[sbofn]

So uh...Magic: the Gathering.

I'm like the only person playing that here, aren't I?

I'm playing it, but it's hard to get excited this time around. The tweaks they made to Multiplayer really killed the idea of playing against someone else. It's closer to "let a random person choose the opposing deck, then play the computer."

"Sealed" was supposed to revitalize MP, but it's pretty fucking limited. Even buying new decks only gives you a few more packs, and the cards aren't very exciting.

 

[bps21]

I think with something like this, it's less about someone not having the internet and more about how selling an incomplete game is becoming a bigger trend. Current generation is "release and patch day one" and it looks like this is moving toward "release and download day one". I also think it's kind of shitty that one day that game disc will be rendered useless when their servers shut down.

Also that refrigerator metaphor sounded like something someone came up with while very, very high.

I get that...and you can always tell shovelware taking advantage from a AAA title...but I'm inclined to believe that a part of the future of games is a changing experience that would need connectivity to be delivered. If you're the Forza guys, and you make great games, and you are designing your game for a console that you know will require internet connections...it's not even a thing to have content that will be delivered for free at launch. Now if it was something like a game based off of a movie coming out that didn't have co-op ready at launch...but not a company making a game from the ground up with a set of console rules in place that were broken 4 months out from launch. We're probably only a couple of game cycles away from a first party developer using cloud computing and persistent internet to deliver something special...and because people whined so much about...what was it? The military getting to play it? Or the one week after someone moves that might cause an issue? I'm confused where we landed on extreme cases that have nothing to do with me... Microsoft folded and stunted game development growth so that everything fit into a little green box. That's so last gen.

I truly have grown to hate that they wimped out in the end.

 

[AnonymousBroccoli]

Developers are still free to make games that require an internet connection. My understanding is Titanfall is one such game.

 

[bps21]

Yes but there is a major difference between knowing what every consumer has off the bat and not. It's why they packaged the Kinect so there is a 100% adoption rate and developers will know that they won't be catering to just a small base of people that can even use their game. They planned on doing that with internet too so that games, like Titanfall, could use cloud computing and know that every single person with a system would have the ability to use it. Now...Titanfall is a little special because it's always online anyway...but most games aren't online multiplayer only. Developers aren't as likely to sink time and money into a product they know only a certain amount of people will be able to use. Take generation 1 Kinect. PS: I hate using Kinect as an example because I hate Kinect...but it's why it's packaged in now.

The Microsoft plan was to know that people using their machine had, to a man, 100% adoption rate of the Kinect and the cloud...and then when people cried about hypotheticals they cowarded up and went back to the same model they already had. They did that because despite specs 95% of games are exactly the same on either system and they wanted to have the base to make the experience different in any way.

I am not one of the masses who believes that having the same thing you've always had is a good thing.

 

[AnonymousBroccoli]

Even with the original spec, there was still that potential 24-hour internet-less window developers would have had to work around. They still have to deal with internet hiccups, and hopefully not have the game just refuse to work if a ping fails. I feel like Kinect is a little different, because it's safer to assume that if it's connected to the system, it will always work. You can not make the same assumption with internet infrastructure.

They still had to have a version of the game that was fit to be certified, and print and ship on a disc, to some degree. That's not so different from the way it is now. I think most customers will appreciate that to have an ideal version of the game, you'll need to be online—at least occasionally, for updates.

There are already console games that are made with an internet connection in mind, and kinda sorta require one. Rock Band Blitz's power-up system runs on server-side coins, and you can't use power-ups without that connection to the server. You can still play the game offline to some degree, but not with any expectation of the full game, or high-score-capable.

I know games like Journey and Demon's/Dark Souls use some sort of non-traditional online interactions, though I'm not sure if you can still play the game offline.

I think my overall thought is that it's far better for individual games to be exclusionary based on certain requirements, than the entire platform.

Also, as it is, Xbox One still requires an internet connection—if only for that initial update to say that it doesn't. I'm sort of curious whether that will continue going forward, or if eventually they'll ship every Xbox One with the no-net-required firmware.

 

[vivisectvi]

I know games like Journey and Demon's/Dark Souls use some sort of non-traditional online interactions, though I'm not sure if you can still play the game offline.

Those are all definitely playable offline.

Also, this Forza things gets better. Apparently the day one download isn't required to play.. but it is if you want to experience the endgame/career mode content.

http://ca.ign.com/articles/2013/07/18/forza-motorsport-5-install-offline-details-clarified

 

[bps21]

Again...they were developing a game with the understanding of required check ins. Calling them out for policy changes beyond their control seems odd. We aren't allowed to have new ideas because sometimes people move.

 

[vivisectvi]

Right, but we are many months away from the game going gold, and those policies have since been reversed. Would it not make sense to fall in line with the new policies and include the entire game you're paying for on the disc?

 

[bps21]

Without knowing the intricacies of the design or implementation of what they're doing...im going to say apparently not.

 

[bps21]

It actually speaks to my bigger issue with the change. What you were supposed to be getting was more than the disc...an extended evolving experience. People didn't want that..so now they get what they get.

 

[vivisectvi]

http://kotaku.com/report-indies-will-be-able-to-self-publish-on-xbox-one-898158357

Report: Indies Will Be Able To Self-Publish On Xbox One [UPDATE]

Update: Microsoft has largely confirmed the information in the Game Informer report in the following statement:

Our vision is that every person can be a creator. That every Xbox One can be used for development. That every game and experience can take advantage of all of the features of Xbox One and Xbox LIVE. This means self-publishing. This means Kinect, the cloud, achievements. This means great discoverability on Xbox LIVE. We'll have more details on the program and the timeline at gamescom in August.

 

[Broward83]

IMO, the bigger part of that story is that essentially EVERY retail XB1 can be tuned to work as a dev kit.

 

[bps21]

I guarantee you right now that the best use of kinect comes out of someone developing from their living room.

 

[vivisectvi]

That's huge, IMO. I can't wait to see what some of the homerbrewers do with it.

 

[vivisectvi]

Self-publish and "any XBO being a dev console" won't be available at launch, but apparently is coming "within the first year" of release. They're also apparently really pissed at Game Informer for breaking this news as it was going to be a surprise for Gamescom.

Microsoft's Marc Whitten just told us that devkit functionality will be added at a later date.

Xbox One self-publishing won't be ready at launch, but will hit within the first year we're told sbn.to/18AdPca via @Polygon

More at NeoGAF: http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=633496

 

[bps21]

They should be pleased as punch someone wrote the first article in this whole process that didnt piss people off.

 

[Edwin]

I guarantee you right now that the best use of kinect comes out of someone developing from their living room.

Cue drunk developers making virtual boning games and naming them things like Vaginecraft and XCUM.

 

[vivisectvi]

lol Vaginecraft (I'm hearing that in a Borat voice)

 

[KingPK]

Apparently Crackdown is the next free game. I haven't played that in a long time (I think it was one of the first games I bought for 360) but I remember enjoying it a lot, so OK.

 

[Sabre]

Is it wrong that I really didn't feel the crackdown love?

 

[bps21]

Crackdown was fun for a while. It wore thin when it just became "you beat 17 enemies...try 18!" by the end. And fuck them for thinking I was going to collect all of those orbs.

 

[KingPK]

Once you leveled up to the point that you could leap to the roof of a 20 story building just running around the city was fun.

 

[fazzle]

I remember having the most fun trying to find ways to break the game in multiplayer

 

[KingPK]

Crackdown and Dead Rising 2 (along with Case Zero) are August's freebies.

 

[cobainwasmurdered]

I want to kill my xbox right now. I turned it on to play an hour ago (after using it earlier today just fine) and got Error Code 8015D003 when I tried to sign into my account. I tried all the stupid solutions I could. I read that it might be unfixable and I could lose access to my profile forever...unless it decides to fix itself at some random time in the future.

 

[DrVenkman PhD]

I blame the dog.