Cancel your PS4 preorders bitches

by stabbim , Des Moines, IA, USA, Wednesday, June 19, 2013, 15:05 (3958 days ago) @ Jillybean

Well, good on them for realizing this was the right decision to make. Should they have done it this way to start with? Yeah, probably. But still, mistakes are made sometimes, and it takes guts to realize them. Especially when you've already made a big public display, stating that said mistake is the way you're going to do things.

It's interesting (though not unexpected) that the disc-in-tray requirement returns as a result. I'd always figured that the originally planned licensing model was (at least partially) a requirement for being able to play without the disc. Oh well, it's what we're used to already. And since the games will be available for download on release day, it should still be possible to go mostly disc-free, provided one has a decent internet connection.

The shared library concept was cool, but inconsequential for my use case, so to that I also say "oh well."

As I've said before, I was always going to have one due to a certain racing franchise I'm fond of. But I am glad of this nonetheless, because it probably means fewer of my XBox friends will be jumping ship, and the system will be less of a pain in the ass for many people.

And as far as the Kinect goes, meh. I think it's funny that people insist on using the word "mandatory" constantly, as if they believe an XBox One exists somewhere without a Kinect, and they're just being arbitrarily forced to buy an extra accessory. The system is designed to have those sensors, in the same way an XBox 360 is designed to have controllers, a power button, and an IR receiver. Those are the controls and inputs the system has. It's not like a 360 where the Kinect sensor was just an add-on developed after the fact.

Now, the monitoring complaints I understand, with a few caveats. First, if you're imagining that your Kinect is recording video of you when it's off, consider that using ONE of the Kinect's sensors does not necessarily mandate that ALL of its sensors be turned on. It's highly unlikely that anything other than the microphone is on when the system is shut down (I say microphone because they've said it listens for an "on" command). I guess you could always just unplug it when it's not in use. Or, better yet (and I mean this as a serious piece of advice), get one of those power strips that turns everything else off when your TV is off! Heck, maybe you already have one, in which case you're fine.

Could it record you when it's sitting at the dashboard, or when a game is being played? I suppose so, if MS or the devs wanted it to. But the same could be said of your smartphone or PC webcam (frankly, those devices are MORE of a risk due to the higher prevalence of malware), yet I hear no one berating their smartphone or laptop manufacturer for including a "mandatory" camera. Like any of those things, it comes down to whether you trust the manufacturer, and the makers of the software running on it.

All that being said, I still like the PS4, and probably will have one as well.