End of XSeed retail releases?

[omgfloofy]

Its not a been a "long time" sense DD went mass market, its been less then 10 years, [snip]

Using that argument, you can say that major advances in technology that we've had to this day are of the same issue. HD Telvision and digital broadcasting (not all nations have transitioned from analog broadcasting), hybrid vehicles and so forth.

Then again, DD has been on the mass market for awhile, thanks to Apple. It just hasn't been around much for games in particular. However now major markets are changed entirely by digital distribution of films (itunes, PSN, vudu, etc), books (amazon, apple), and music (itunes, Amazon)...

It really began to kick in for games, I think, with Steam, the Wii, PS3, and X-Box 360. We've had handhelds change a generation, as chaosblade pointed out, and we're about to have consoles themselves change out, with the Wii-U, and Sony and Microsoft's talks.

When the CD-ROM's came out and suddenly games started jumping to that- such as when Cyan released Myst, did people think that it wasn't going to be a 'smooth transition?' I think people jumped onto the CD drive quite eagerly, personally. Before you knew it, the Turbo CD and Sega CD came out. Look at what they did to gaming.

Or when DVD's started to come out in comparison to VHS tapes? This is just another change in technology. Technology changes all the time. There are going to be some growing pains here and there. ...and like any change out there, you're going to hit growing pains.

At my job, we had a lecture on the whole change structure (we're doing a massive structural change at my workplace), and that is causes a lot of problems, and shakes things up. People aren't ever comfortable with change. The important thing is to find out if that change is for the good for the future of who is involved in the change.

I think digital distribution is going to be a very good thing. It evens out the playing field, in a sense, when costs are enormous and mainstream publishers are looking for sales like what was earned recently with Mass Effect 3. (3.5 million units is insane!) Because of that, it's keeping smaller publishers and indy developers from really getting their own works out.

But since we're in that 'growing pains' phase, it's going to take time before people can come up with a stable medium. Everyone wants a say in it, and multiple mediums are going to be this way. (Look at digital media, anyway. Video files and their codecs, the arguments on HTML 5, Flash vs Director (does anyone here actually remember Director??), PDF and other document display formats...)

The best part of digital distribution is that it becomes possible for the little guys to join in. And when you have companies as small as XSEED trying to keep afloat... it's a weight off of their shoulders.

[DrROBschiz]

DSiware -> 3DS
PSP -> Vita

So far, console DD is not really showing much promise.

Sony's biggest issue is getting the same experience compatible across all platforms...

Nintendo's issue is lack of content.

Apple, Google, Microsoft, and Valve are all doing an amazing job and i expect them to carry their DD platforms into the next Gen hardware.

I'm starting to see a trend here where the japanese are struggling to make the transition which is odd.

[omgfloofy]

I'm starting to see a trend here where the japanese are struggling to make the transition which is odd.

I think this is because the Japanese are still very 'local shops' and so forth. If I recall correctly, they're very physical media. Manga publishers haven't done any digital distribution at all until recently. And I think Hulu's finally got a JP locale for television there. NicoDouga is showing more things digitally, also.

It's been a very slow transition for them since it boomed here.

[DrROBschiz]

I hope when they do make the transition..... that it speeds up the process of localizing games over here.

[omgfloofy]

I hope when they do make the transition..... that it speeds up the process of localizing games over here.

Well, with the localization process, you need to remember that you can only localize as fast as you can translate the script.

[Chaosblade]

Well, it could probably cut out manufacturing and shipping time. So you're looking at what, two to three weeks?

[Fabrizo]

Using that argument, you can say that major advances in technology that we've had to this day are of the same issue. HD Telvision and digital broadcasting (not all nations have transitioned from analog broadcasting), hybrid vehicles and so forth.

It's not so much about the amount of time, as it's an issue of hardware iteration. 3D, 4K, etc. are not going as smooth as people thought they would for TVs as an example.

Then again, DD has been on the mass market for awhile, thanks to Apple. It just hasn't been around much for games in particular. However now major markets are changed entirely by digital distribution of films (itunes, PSN, vudu, etc), books (amazon, apple), and music (itunes, Amazon)...

The difference is unlike games those are all using heavily standardized technologies, while games require a VERY complex set of technologies that chang dramatically for each console generation.

When the CD-ROM's came out and suddenly games started jumping to that- such as when Cyan released Myst, did people think that it wasn't going to be a 'smooth transition?' I think people jumped onto the CD drive quite eagerly, personally. Before you knew it, the Turbo CD and Sega CD came out. Look at what they did to gaming.

Or when DVD's started to come out in comparison to VHS tapes?

Now you're just trying to side step the real issues. CDRom is a media storage solution, and as such the only concern anyone at a consumer level would have had for it aside from monetary is "will it work with binary code, like every other media solution in existence?", with the obvious answer being "yes".

Looking at VHS to DVD, things would have been different if the transition meant "In a few years we're going to pull the servers that authenticate your VHS tapes, so if your deck breaks you'll lose access to your entire library. But hey, the pirates and hackers will be there for you! And we'll let you re-buy a select few we make available on our new service."

People aren't ever comfortable with change. The important thing is to find out if that change is for the good for the future of who is involved in the change.

DD is good for the industry, bad in many (but not all) ways for the consumer.

[Chaosblade]

DD is good for the industry, bad in many (but not all) ways for the consumer.

I'd argue that's only true for consoles, but I guess that's what most people on this forum care about.

[Fabrizo]

Yea I'm mostly looking at the issue from a console perspective; for PCs DD makes a lot more sense.

[omgfloofy]

It's not so much about the amount of time, as it's an issue of hardware iteration. 3D, 4K, etc. are not going as smooth as people thought they would for TVs as an example.

There was actually a pretty wild outcry over the transition of analog to digital televisions. The whole reason the government got pulled in was the people saying that they can't do this to consumers, and thus the allowance for the $40 for analog converter boxes got started. Like I said, some countries have yet to really make the transition as well, because of these kind of fears.

The difference is unlike games those are all using heavily standardized technologies, while games require a VERY complex set of technologies that chang dramatically for each console generation.

Video has no real standardizations. I know this for a fact as a multimedia and web developer. The people who are trying to get standardizations are trying to get standards set for codecs that require licensing fees to use. If you want to start a website not unlike youtube that uses HTML5, last I checked, you have to run it with the h.264, which means paying a large fee to be able to run it on a website of that scale.

There are also a TON of 'standards' for the web, as well. Hell, it's not even on most webpages. That's why web designers have to look at their own page work in Internet Explorer, Google, Mozilla, etc etc... Because not all browsers display the same.

Then I hear arguments about FLAC, versus mp3, versus mp4, ogg and whatnot for music formats. Some players play some, some play others. Because I have an ipod, I am required to stick to the codecs that my ipod reads (and as it's an old one, it's not really any of the lossless ones- I don't know if newer ipods can even read FLAC and whatnot anyway).

Now you're just trying to side step the real issues. CDRom is a media storage solution, and as such the only concern anyone at a consumer level would have had for it aside from monetary is "will it work with binary code, like every other media solution in existence?", with the obvious answer being "yes".

The problem with going to CD at the time is that people did not have the power to create their own storage off of it, or create their own software that utilized it. At first, there weren't CD burners. (I remember having the first CD burner in a house with two other computers. And it didn't even work very well, and took almost 40 minutes to burn a CD.) It was not a media solution that was free for consumer use. This is not sidestepping the issue at all, really.

Looking at VHS to DVD, things would have been different if the transition meant "In a few years we're going to pull the servers that authenticate your VHS tapes, so if your deck breaks you'll lose access to your entire library. But hey, the pirates and hackers will be there for you! And we'll let you re-buy a select few we make available on our new service."

Oh, of course not. If your VHS deteriorated, we are obligated to buy you a new one. Did you keep it in a car and it bubbled? Did your VCR eat it? VHS tapes had a LOT of risks as well, and it certainly was not a perfect medium. Tapes were fragile. I've broken quite a few of them. (My biggest heartbreak as a kid was when I broke a Danger Mouse tape I searched EVERYWHERE to find and begged my parents to get. I never got it back after it happened, since they used it as a lesson to be more careful with my stuff. And I was much more careful.)

DD is good for the industry, bad in many (but not all) ways for the consumer.

I believe that if people learn to handle their own data, then it is good for the consumer. Digital products can have value to them. (I mean, if you claim it doesn't, then suddenly ANY of the work I do, as a web developer, has no value to it at all. That's BS, because it's hard work to put it together.) - most services provide a means to backup what you purchase digitally. I have not deleted any of my PSP games off of my PS3. I have the hard drive space to keep them there, AND I can backup to an external hard drive and keep THAT out of use. The same with my Vita. I can backup anything I purchase on it and keep it safe should something happen to my system. Even in that case, Sony has shown that they can break the registration on games that have been tied to a particular console if it is ever stolen, as well.