Stadia, Subscriptions, And The Death Of Game Ownership (The Jimquisition)

In a sick way a part of me honestly kinda hope it comes to that. At the very least it would allow these companies finally quit using their God-awful, nausea inducing PR doublespeak, as if anyone with half a brain can't tell exactly what they're REALLY saying and doing. It'd be the final nail in the coffin for the gaming industry, but at least they'd finally be honest.

Bloodhawk

One day in a not very distant future, a game making company will just say: "We've did so many sly underhanded things to erode the position consumers have. We can't keep it up. We're tired of it.....let's just outright demand their money and disingenuously thank them for giving it". And the saddest part is...no one will try to stop them anymore

Tobias Bruinsma

Regarding the move Microsoft made to try pushing Xbox One as a digital only console: Is it just me, or is this new "cheaper" Xbox One S All-Digital model, where they "remove the disc drive in order to push down the price" (literally, the price difference is 1 release price "AAA" game) nothing more than them testing the waters to see if we're gullible/distracted/greedy/blind/normalized/apologist enough to not react to it being exactly the same as they did before?

Ivar

The way that EA lady seemed to shudder at her own words, makes me imagine she rushed directly from the hearing to her hotel room, to take several consequtive showers, and scrubbing, and scrubbing, and scrubbing her skin raw, but the dirt just won't come ooofffff! :P

Jonny Johansson

Yeah, if I can't own a physical copy of a game, the most I'll buy it for is about 7 bucks. Canadian. I buy things to own them, I'm not indefinitely renting them. It's why I still buy books and DVDs. I don't care what's on Netflicks now, I want to watch something when I want to, not when they rotate it in.

Trevor Bond

Although I am very skeptical about the whole concept of Stadia, I can kind of see what Google is gunning for. Video game industry has grown significantly in recent years, but video game as a culture/hobby is still relatively niche compare to others. One of the main entry blocks that keep people away from it is gaming hardware. It is hard to deny that if you want to enjoy video game as main hobby, you do have to invest fair bit of money just for a set up alone. If Stadia comes out as good as Google has advertised, it would be far easier to convince general public to enter video game market since they do not have to worry about hardware requirements anymore. Plus, general public rarely care about all of the shenanigans going around in video game industry so it would take less hassle to make them spend money.

It was making me think that GOG.com is the only way I know of to actually legitimately get an independent working copy of a game, where you know if you've got it on your computer you'll always be able to play it. I'm hoping for a DRM free version of Skyrim to be possible eventually. I'm already a little uneasy about digital purchases on my PS4, as even if you have got the game files, you can't play them unless you're logged in. I realise I'm partially resigned to this, where I tell myself if I get my £15 quid out of a game I've got my money's worth, but then that's exactly where the publishers want things - a license to consume content.

Nathan Shepperd

Same. I was disappointed there wasn't more carnage. (Still glorious, though!)

Twit In A Hat

Why does the game industry have to take every good tech idea and turn it into a shitty Black Mirror episode?

noxamillion

Oh my god I SO thought that the Surprise Mechanic was gonna just put that wrench through that window before the watermelon came into frame and I was like "OH GOD JIM NO WHAT ARE YOU DOING" XD

Pidge Gauss

Also the Stadia joystick at 11:10 looks like a cock gag.

Twit In A Hat

Welcome to the hell of "software as a service". You, the consumers, were warned long ago, but you just had to lap up the promise of convenience, and now the train shows no sign of stopping. I'm amazed it has taken this long for the game industry to get onboard.

Twit In A Hat

I've been trying to coin "The War on Ownership." It applies to more than just games, too.

Ryan Bloom

When will we get to see a wrestling match between the Surprise Mechanic and the Corn Flake Homonculus? Jim . . . you must make this happen!

Brendan K McBride

It was cut to account for the structure change of the episode. I wanted to lead with the intro, and having the long title sequence after that would be weird. Every now and then I cut down the intro to change the flow of the show.

Jim Sterling

I’ve been thinking about this very topic now for most of the year now. The subscription market over the next year will become very oversaturated I do hope we get to see more of the surprise mechanic Thank god for Jim!

Thank god for Jim! Also is there a reason this episode was missing the intro? It's like when you're favorite cartoon suddenly changes their theme song D:

Alicejack Airheart

I think Stadia will end up having no subscription fees. As can be read here https://www.androidpolice.com/2019/06/06/stadia-pricing-model-leaks-monthly-subscription-plus-full-cost-for-most-games/ they already plan to have a free tier in 2020, they would not plan that if their goal is subscription fees for all. Perhaps publishers will do a subscription fee program, but they can (and do) already do that now. I think that the reasons game makers seem to be jumping on this platform are: - FOMO, fear of missing out in case this new platform hits it big. - Huge potential market of people not willing to invest in gaming hardware. - But most importantly: Killing of the piracy market (and on not PC the second hand market), if the games live only in the cloud they cannot be pirated.

As far as Stadia is concerned, this is what makes me dismiss it immediately: https://killedbygoogle.com/ Google, as soon as it decides that something isn't worth their time, will kill it off without any mercy. They've done it to many of their services used by a lot of people, and to hardware products as well. Why would Stadia be any different? We've seen how the games business usually requires companies to be in for the long run to find success, and I just don't see Google interested in beating any challenges.