The console wars are benefiting no-one in the long run. It's annoying, infuriating, and borderline illegal, that a company can actually pay another company to reduce the content a competitor gets, call this content a 'bonus' for having the 'right system'. You'd think Pepsi would get in trouble if they paid ShopRight not to carry Diet Coke, specifically, then claiming Diet Pepsi is exclusive content from the supermarket. Yet Sony and Microsoft can continuously screw each other over, even tough it hurts the industry and the consumer more than anything else.
Exclusive games are one thing, but this content BS doesn't generate new customers, it drives those that don't like you deeper into the opposite camp.
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+1 Well said!
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Soooooi true
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the pepsi/coke scenario is one i wouldn't have thought of and a great way to explain my gripe
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Actually, restaurants do this now. It's more a matter of a supermarket needing choices and a restaurant knowing you're going to buy something regardless, so they can choose one brand over another.
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This preferential treatment is fine, since a restaurants are service industry. Even though you receive a product, a restaurant is providing the service of preparation, location, quality control, and labor. Both video games and my example are products, falling into the market as consumables as opposed to services. By creating a situation where a developer allows or is forced by one market (PS or Xbox) into have a 'better product' available for an equivalent product, the markets are, in a way, product tampering. That's why I didn't say ShopRight was boycotting Coke. Different situation, and has a whole different set of connotations. They are specifically being paid to prevent a part of a product line from being offered, and by a competitor of that product.. Maybe a better example is this: Walmart gets to carry Diet Coke, but no one else does, because they paid Coke. And this is a huge issue many people have with this company in real life, aside from the essential rights and benefits they deny their workers. I know many organizations won't deal with them because they often insist on exclusivity.
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That practice is rather commonplace, actually. The biggest example I can think of, because I work in the field, is with cell phones. ATT has exclusive phones that Verizon doesn't have. Verizon has phones that ATT doesn't have. Happens with collectables as well. Walmart and Target get exclusives in trading card lines. Toys R Us gets exclusive things. Not saying it's right, but I think the ship has sailed on it not being that way. It's already engrained in the economy.
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Thanks, use it all you want.