Just another way to get kinect shoehorned into the big titles see: forza 4, ME3.

They pay for it by purchasing a 360, exactly. And by paying for Live.
Just because Microsoft offers a perk to its customers that Sony doesn't offer doesn't make it illegitimate. Microsoft paid Bethesda for the right to get the content first. That money came from 360 customers and was for the benefit of 360 customers. That's all there is to it. Money is money.

360 Customer to Microsoft to Bethesda = 360 Customer to Bethesda.
They paid for content. Just like a C.E.


Also, I really think it's inconsistent for people to argue that the exclusivity is favoritism, but the Kinect Support and the CK or the High Def Texture packs are not. They are all the same thing, platform-specific exclusives.

I'm sorry, but simply purchasing the system doesn't earn them the right, so to speak. It's no different than the people who bought the PS3 or a PC. The only difference is that Microsoft forked out a lot of cash and Bethesda took it. Kinda like a bribe. Hence the selling out.

And no, the CK is not the same thing. The reason the CK isn't on the 360 or PS3 has nothing to do with favoritism or exclusivities or the likes. The reason is that the 360 and PS3 CANNOT run the CK. It simply isn't an option for them. If it was, I'm sure they would have gotten it, too. However, those platforms simply are not capable of running it. Same with the HD textures, for that matter.

That's too funny. The little ninja icons remind me of Mysterion from South Park's Coon and Friends.

Why not?
Any time you choose a service provider for anything, you select the perks and options that come along with it. If you rent your movies from Netflix or Blockbuster or Hulu, you select different packages of perks all to watch the same movie or show. Content providers are perfectly entitled to give their customers a little something special if they have the cash to do it. This is how it has always been, in every entertainment industry since the original theater. Front row seats, anyone?

It has nothing to do with favoritism. It has everything to do with "that's how the industry works."
If you aren't happy with the Movies on HBO, then get another premium movie provider. Simple as that. Always was, always is.


Just because the consoles aren't able to run the CK doesn't make the CK suddenly non-platform-specific. It is still exclusive to the PC, regardless of the reasons why. The reason has nothing to do with the fact that the PC gamers get something extra for the same game.

As I've said before, if Bethesda wanted to level the playing field, they certainly never had to release the CK. By just ignoring that altogether and working on some DLC that could be used on all three platforms, they could have avoided creating any difference between the three versions. But they didn't do that. Instead, they put time and effort into creating a modding tool that would only work on the PC, and that's the only fact that matters.

They had a choice between making the games the same, and making them not the same. They chose not the same. Exclusive content is exclusive.

If you haven't tried the Kinect feature I can understand why you say you don't care. If you did I think you might possibly change your mind since it works great. There is no shouting for me as I have my Kinect fairly close and I can speak in a normal tone and it works almost flawlessly. Yea I'd probably rather just hit a button but since that just isn't an option on the 360 this is so much better than jumping in and out of menus every time I want to switch a spell, save the game, use a shout, or take a potion. As many commands as they included there's no way possible to do it all with a controller. Even with a keyboard you'd be hard pressed to add all this functionality. They did a really great job on it and that's what got me excited. It transformed the game play for me especially on my mages where I can now quickly switch spells mid battle without ever going into a single menu. I love that.

Bah, I already get sorting options (and a MUCH better UI) thanks to SkyUI. Why do we need Bethesda to add a sorting option when modders can do it better? All Bethesda has to do is to release the CK for each game. That's enough for PC gamers and modders.

I have no problem with companies trying to provide perks for using their service, but Bethesda is not a part of Microsoft. My problem is that Bethesda tossed out their integrity and took the money.


But the reasons are everything, here. The CK is exclusive because of technical reasons. The other platforms can't run it. The 360's 30-day exclusivity is not technical. It's because Microsoft paid Bethesda off.

And you seem to have ignored what I said earlier about the CK. Yes, they pretty much did have to release it. And the CK is not some tool they built from scratch just for the PC gamers. It's a modified version of the tool they used to make the game, a tool they already had and without which the game wouldn't exist at all.

I am sorry but the PS3 is in no way a "smaller" cooler than the Xbox. Harder to program for, perhaps, but not any less capable if programmed properly. Just look at the good job Obsidian did of porting Oblivion to the PS3 -- I have Oblivion on both PS3 and Xbox and it runs better overall on the PS3, but only the Xbox gets the horse armor, the extra houses, Mehrune's Razor, etc. There is no reason they could not have provided that stuff to the PS3.

Or were you making the PS3 a "smaller" cooler solely because it does not have the voice recognition capabilities of Kinect? Cause that does not answer the question of why I cannot sort my PS3 inventory by weight. You don't need to shout at the TV for that.

No it doesn't mean what you're saying. They are out to make money. If a company pays to have a game released on their system first or for something like this sort option then thats how it will happen. It doesn't mean they are in their back pocket. It means money talks thats all. They code the games for the 360 because its the easiest. They'd probably code it for the PS3 if it wasn't a software companies nightmare of a system to code for. You just see what you want to see. The PS3 version of skyrim svcked more because.... the console is a pain to program for. It was a huge headache for them having to fix the problems the PS3 created. It's more powerful and has better visual capabilities but its not a programmers dream.

PS3 IS a smaller cooler then both PC and Xbox. Not because of the overall power but because of its difficulties in programming. Also it doesn't pay extra for things Microsoft does. For the most part PC and 360 are both Microsoft platforms so programming for the two of them is not only easier but extremely similar and the majority of TES loyal fans have also been PC gamers who own a 360 or just PC gamers so it takes care of most of their fan base. It's not Bethesda's fault. It's Sony's though. They make it more difficult without offering anything extra to them. So when Bethesda doesn't cater to PS3 owners and wipe their little tushies when the go poo they should blame Sony not Bethesda

Eh, um... movie makers aren't part of Netflix or Hulu either. Those content providers have to negotiate for the rights to show their content, and often have to pay money to get different release times. Similar to how movie theaters pay to have a movie "in theaters" for months ahead of it coming out for rent, which is months before coming out for purchase. Netflix, Youtube, Hulu, On Demand, they all have to squeeze in between there somewhere, and it has everything to do with how much money they pay.

In this scenario, Bethesda is like the Film Studio. They produce the content, and they can release it to whomever they like whenever they like, based entirely on how much money they get. That's how this business works.

Radio works like that, and theater works like that too. Plays come out on Broadway well before they get released to lesser theater groups. Why? Money.
This is just the industry.



Hmm. No, I don't think we will be able to agree on whether the reasons matter. They don't, according to me, for this reason:

Choosing to do something is exactly the same as choosing not to do something.

In that sense, you can characterize the CK as either a choice to release the CK, or as a choice not to do some other alternative.
Because of this, I equate releasing the CK with the DLC exclusivity because there's no difference in the end result.
In both instances, Bethesda either choose to do something or not do something that resulted in one platform having content that the other won't.

You are absolutely right that Bethesda has huge incentive to release the CK. It would be bad business for them not to.

How is that any different from the 360 exclusivity on DLC? They have every reason to do that too. And, in both cases, it's the same reason.

Money.

I would love it even more if half the things I said worked!
Sometimes shouts will work even if they worked just 2 mins ago yet if I say "equipt right weapon" it says "equipt left weapon" X no....

But ya idk just alot of bugs in it I think maybe the Fear spell isn't in the game yet but even when I went down the list, saw the Frenzy spell and said it how it was written down it STILL didn't use or equipt it >.<

So ya maybe fix the bugs first before adding more stuff

I think we're just going to have to agree to disagree. Whether the reasons matter or not is rather pivotal. If we can't agree on that, there isn't much point in going around in circles about the stuff that follows.

Really? Comparing your not having a Kinect to the Civil Rights movement? That's just laughable. I agree that it would be cool for all to have the sort option, but if it's not possible, and you really want it, get a Kinect. You can find them cheap on eBay.

Yeah, I don't know. I had a http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LaserScope back in the 8-bit NES days so the novelty of voice commands wore off a long time ago.

Well, maybe so. However, I think one thing that I'd like to try and convey is that Bethesda didn't have to release the CK. That's a very important point to my whole argument.
You say they had to, but that's not really true. They wanted to, and it made sense to, but they didn't have to.

At the end of the day, even the reasons you cited for them releasing it all boil down to one thing, they get more money by doing so.

We are agreed on this point, yes?

And as I said, yes, Bethesda pretty much did have to release the CK, which invalidates that point. People on the PC have been modding Bethesda games since Morrowind. It has become a core aspect or feature of the game. You do NOT not release something that central.

Personally, I place exclusives due to technical limitations and exclusives to to someone forking out money (bribing) into different categories. If all these voice features are built using the Kinect's SDK, I can understand why it's a 360 exclusive and I have no problem with it. Of couse, if it's true that they released the game with such a crappy UI just so they could release the Kinect support later to increase 360 sales... that would be another matter. That sounds very conspiratorial, but if it would true, I'd also say that Bethesda was squarely in Microsoft's back pocket.

Well, I mean they release the game for the PS3 and the 360 without the CK, and knowing that there never will be one. It's clearly not that central to their entire franchise. 2/3 of their platforms don't use it at all. So I think this "invalidates that point" more than anything.

I see your argument that it's almost necessary to release the Ck. However, I don't think you have it quite right. The CK is a good selling point, but it's certainly not a necessity. Again, for proof, see console sales of Skyrim.

That said, my entire argument rides on top of that. They release the CK as a bonus, a selling point, a feature. That's it, nothing else. It's a perk for buying on PC. How is that any different for any other platform perk?

And I think we agree as to the Kinect. The Kinect itself does the voice processing, so it's clearly another example of a platform perk.
I don't think they gimped their interface on purpose in order to add functionality to the 360 later, but it's possible.

I am not a proponent of equality between the platforms. The different platforms have different strengths and I think games should be designed to fully utilize those strengths. For the PC that means you get things like the CK and the game should take advantage of it's greater processing power. For the 360, it's things like the Kinect. It seems a bit gimicy to me, but it's something the platform is capable of and people seem to like it. For the PS3... I'm not real familiar with the system, other than that they should do a better job optimizing it for the platform.

Well, I would have thought the same thing about spellmaking, attributes, classes . . .

I'd argue that's it's even more central than those are.

And keep in mind that while the PC is only one of three platforms, it is not such an insignificant amount that they'd want to ignore it.

I'm not either. But if you take that concept to its logical conclusion, you'd be looking at 2, maybe 3 different games.

Maybe that's not a bad thing, but we aren't at that point yet. Power PCs can do so much more than the consoles that you are looking at creating a spinoff series just for that.

... Also.. I want this to happen to xbox,I mean hope you dont think every xbox player have kinect? :/

I only played Oblivion on the pc, and you could sort everything if i remember correctly, straight out the box. The inventory now has no rhyme or reason. Just categories.

Not really. It's more like you're looking at one game with two or three distinct variations. Their core is still the same, though.