Gabe Newell on Next Gen Consoles: Microsoft and Sony Need to Embrace Change
Valve’s Gabe Newell has grown quite frustrated with the closed console structure of the PlayStation and Xbox platforms, and has often spoken out about the problems of closed systems. As we approach the next generation, Newell has pointed out the importance for both Sony and Microsoft to embrace change, and the ramifications of failing to do so.
Speaking in a recent interview with Penny Arcade, Newell went so far as to say that if both Sony and Microsoft continue to remain close-minded about the future, they risk their relevancy in the industry.
I think that you either embrace the new approaches or you go away.
It’s not the games that are out there today, it’s the games that we [...] haven’t even thought of yet that are gonna end up being important.
I would push them very hard to stop thinking of themselves as being a platform for everything that already exists and start betting on the inventiveness and the benefits that you would get by embracing a more open approach to the internet and game delivery and game business models and things like that.
He also pointed out the progressive nature of the PC sector of gaming and how it gives us a glimpse into the future of where home consoles are headed.
I think the same thing happened in the past with a lot of hardware innovations. Nvidia and AMD existed in the PC space and that’s why they end up, you know, rather than internally developed proprietary graphics solutions on the consoles, they’re all gone. Everything in the console space is coming from the PC now.
I think that we really need to see the same thing in terms of just general attitudes about platforms and that whichever console vendor sort of embraces that, I think they’ll see huge benefits.
In the past, Sony’s PlayStation Network service has been much more open to change than Microsoft’s regulation-heavy Xbox Live, but still more closed than Steam or iOS and Android marketplaces. If Sony can continue to think outside of the box and do more things with Valve like what we saw with Steam integration via Portal 2, then Sony could be headed in the right direction.
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14 Responses to “Gabe Newell on Next Gen Consoles: Microsoft and Sony Need to Embrace Change”
I don’t know a single person who plays stuff on Steam. I’d much more prefer discs over digital crap anyday.
WTF, So you judge something you didn’t try first. Congrat dude. Keep going.
I do, but only when absolutely necessary (it’s only on steam), and here’s why…
If you think about how and what you purchase over digital distribution platforms, you’ll realize you never really own the software. You have purchased the ability to download the game from the distributor, and then play it as long as you’re able to verify through a connection with them that you have in fact paid for that right. As soon as Steam, PSN, XBLA, or any other digital distributor goes down the tubes (and don’t say it’ll never happen, giants rise and fall all the time) you no longer have access to that software – especially if DRM is in place that requires a connection to the distributor (Steam). Thus, you lose your purchased software, or only have it as long as the hard drive it’s stored on still works.
In the case of physical media, once you bought it, you own it, end of story. I still own tons and tons of games from a decade ago, that I can pop into whatever platform it runs on and it’ll work, without question. Of course, I have to take care of the discs for this to work, but without children running around my house to break everything, it’s not hard to do.
As it stands, all these digital distribution services are really expensive rental companies with an undefined lifetime. It’s a gamble – and most of us are gambling they’ll continue to succeed. However, with Sony losing money hand over fist for the past 5 years, I’m beginning to wonder when I’ll lose my $200 worth of PSN games for good.
Case No.1 : I buy a digital game. Then I regret buying it for ANY reason: I hate it, the game is broken (glitch fest), the game sucks, some event comes up in life and I need money, etc. etc. What am I to do? can I get my money back or trade it in the digital store for store credit? I’d really like to know.
DUDE, look at this:
Daily Deal – Just Cause 2, 66% off!
http://store.steampowered.com/news/7378/
Daily Deal – Wolfenstein, 75% off!
http://store.steampowered.com/news/7365/
Daily Deal – RAGE, 50% off!
http://store.steampowered.com/news/7306/
Midweek Madness – Killing Floor 85% off!
http://store.steampowered.com/news/7338/
And I can keep going for a long time.
So… paying your games at what… say between 5 and 15$ each and you want money back on this !?! Come on…
Well try this: when you buy a digital game, make sure you’ll like it, not just buy it on a whim, and find out you hate it, thats you’re own fault. Glitches and bugs? Most games get patches for those things, so be patient and wait for a patch to be released like the rest of us. As for selling a game for cash? Pretty much all the stores I know of dont offer cash for a trade in, they offer store credit only, so if you need money desperatley, selling you’re games wont help. Im not saying digital downloads are better, they’re not, but just think of the facts before posting.
bah, fuck digital then. If I pay for something, anything, it’s mine and I do it with it whatever I want, if I don’t want it anymore I will sell it or trade it to make back some of my hard-earned cash. Imagine everything worked the “digital way” even with physical goods? would you like that? Everybody is entitled to resell or trade stuff they legally paid for, and I don’t even need a reason for that, just because I feel like it, I paid for it, I’m not a slave of the product I bought or the company I bought it from.
I have Steam, as do many of my friends and family. Steam has an option to backup your downloaded games to either a hard drive or burn them to a disc. Also when you buy disc based games (Skyrim) it comes with a Steam activation code that allows you to download the game in case you ever lose the disc. I believe it shouldn’t be about one distribution type vs another, but finding the right balance of the two i.e. what Steam has done.
But what if I want my money back/trade the game?
As far as getting your money back, or trading the game in, that’s a convenience that the retailers provide, but is unnecessary. As long as people do enough research on games, be it reading a review, watching a video, or playing a friends copy then you will know if you like it or not. If you’re needing money back because you’ve hit hard times or unexpected bills then you should manage your money better beforehand (savings account). Granted this is all just my opinion and yours may differ.
@CryonicTech I’m not talking about retailers alone, I could sell or trade the goods with anybody. And nobody knows if they’ll like anything 100% for sure until they try it for a good while, and even then they may feel completely disappointed in the final product. Saving account? was that a joke right? heh-heh
Next time you buy something you don’t like or don’t want anymore think about this conversation. Imagine if you had no choice but to let it rot forgotten in a corner instead of making back some money you put into this stuff that is useless to you for whatever particular reason or trade it to someone who would give you something useful (of some value to you) in exchange. It’s called capitalism.
I only use Steam for the very low price deals that they have sometime, paid full price once and regretted it. So I won’t be doing that again. I did however pick up Portal 2 and it came with Steam cross over to PC version, it would have been a lot better if I could have used the PC copy of the game along with the PS3 version…they talk open minded, that would have been more open minded. Oh well, always the same, money money money.
Gabe Newell needs to embrace on Half-Life 2 Episode 3. Should stop messing around get to work on that.
Everytime Newell decides to be critical of something I always get the feeling he’s doing it because he’s upset that he can’t use it to his own advantage.