KOTR PC delayed due to M$?

So says the recent copy of CGW:

“PC players have to wait until November, because Microsoft paid LucasArts extra to delay it on PC. Thanks a ton, guys. Really.”

Hey, at least it’s not like the 2-year delay between Halo (Xbox) and Halo (PC).

Or Grand Theft Auto III and Vice City. Wait a minute, we’re bashing Microsoft here right? Sorry.

This is what MS needs to do. Sony does it all the time just look at GTA.

– Xaroc

I think maybe we’re bashing Bioware and Rockstar and Bungie.

MS really does need to lock up more exclusives. And not just these 3-month ones. They need to get some concrete exclusives.

I know that Ubi was offering them the Splinter Cell franchise as a Xbox-only kidna of thing, but the asking price was too high and MS settled for a 4-5 month exclusive. But the Tom Clancy line of games may be something worth paying for. At work the other day, this incredibly tubby 7-year old who probably just sits around all day stuffing his hole and playing video games was amazed to see a bunch of books written by Tom Clancy. “Mom, Tom Clancy’s the guy who does all those games. He writes books too?”

Which I (and his mom) though was a pretty sad state of affairs for her kid. She told him “Yes, I was reading his books before you were born.” We had to explain to him that Tom Clancy was an author, not a video game maker. But there’s an entire generation of tubby American kids like him out there who only know Clancy by the video games, which they play.

That reminds me of a theory I had too: one day, I imagine these tub-o-lards will start sueing the video game companies for making them fat. “I didn’t get out and excercise because of KOTOR!”

I doubt Sony paid Take 2 to delay a GTA3 PC port. It’s more likely that the PC version was never a big priority. No one knew the game would sell like it did.

What the hell do you people mean, MS “needs to lock up more exclusives?” How does it possibly benefit you, the game player, to have a game locked to a single console for longer?

I think they mean that more exclusives would be good for MS, not that they would be good for gamers. Though I guess you could argue that more Xbox exclusives would be better for Xbox gamers, in the sense that what’s good for the long-term viability of the console is also good for the people that bought it.

OMG, Microsoft acts in its own best interest!

In other news, the sun rose this morning and people were overly dramatic on message boards!

XBox owners face shipping bugs so YOU don’t have to.

Think about it, they took the bullet for you, and you’re complaining?

Bioware would have done it to maximize their sales anyway, they’ve already proved they don’t care about pissing off their fans :)

BioWare would have limited their game to a single platform in order to maximize sales? Sheer financial genius!

Probably true. But why was Vice City delayed just as long then?

Heh, talk about your horrible conflicts…

Though seriously, when people talk about this its normally “MS needs to do so-and-so, and I approve!” It’s just wierd.

A lot of people on this board work in the industry, so it’s not unusual to see speculation from that perspective. “What does MS need to do in order to strengthen their game business?” Or “MS needs more exclusives in order to compete with the other consoles.” And so on.

I haven’t encountered any bugs. I have, however, encountered one incredible game. Sour grapes?

In our vague hazy rose colored memories of consoles past, isn’t it always the exclusives that define a console? Wouldn’t a fairly expensive piece of consumer electronics benefit from a little association by exclusivity to some AAA games?

It is kinda weird that practically all the best Xbox games are/will be available on other consoles or the PC.

I’ve got a Cube and a PC, but I’ve still got the best of the Xbox library covered pretty well. Panzer Dragoon Orta is the holdout.

It doesn’t affect Xbox owners, though. But the console doesn’t really have an identity other than PC Lite. Maybe Fable, Halo 2, and a few other big games will change that.

Well, Halo 2 will probably be ported to the PC as well, and Halo is really a PC style game anyway. Fable, however, does seem to be more traditionally console-like in style.

But I disagree with you overall. Maybe the games you are interested in are PC-friendly, but I also like sports titles, which I can’t stand to play on my PC. I play sports only on my consoles. The environment seems better and I like the control. It also has nice action-style games, like Buffy and Otogi, which just don’t work well on the PC. KOTOR seems to be a console style RPG as well, though it should play fine on the PC. It’s closer to Final Fantasy than it is to Morrowind.

Also, for those who just want to play games the XBox is cheaper and more efficient than a PC. The graphics are great, especially if a person isn’t cheap and can afford HDTV or plasma. But I think for those who don’t want to spend $1500+ for a decent gaming PC, the XBox is ideal. For the games that you are talking about (and there are plenty), they get PC style games in their living room for cheaper than you or I pay to play basically the same stuff.

So, for many people, I think your argument holds, but the XBox is still a console and the games and the experience are both very different than just having a PC-lite.