This is the setting we have seen plenty of time and in all forms of situation. I scarcely wanted to believe what I saw, but the BBC might misrepresent things at times, but they never lie and as we see ‘Xbox caps cloud gaming at 15 hours a month for Game Pass subscribers’ is what I call pure treason. There is no question of funds, or limits and of settings as I personally see it and I am happy that I rejected the Xbox over 5 years ago. So as we see “Xbox is introducing strict monthly time limits for Game Pass subscribers who stream games online through its cloud gaming service.
The changes, which come into effect in November, will see a subscriber to the £16.99 Ultimate monthly plan able to stream games for up to 15 hours a month – before having to purchase additional cloud play time. Xbox said the limits were due to the rising cost of cloud gaming, and they would allow the firm to “continue to invest” in the service’s “reliability and performance”.” For reference I almost played 20-25 hours on my PS5 this Friday and Saturday. As such this limit would have been met within the first weekend of the month. So as we see “Asha Sharma, Xbox’s chief executive, told the BBC in an exclusive recent interview that the company and the industry as a whole needed to “start to innovate on affordability and efficiency,” amid a “crisis” in computing prices.” I think that this is not the whole story. Gamers are draining their AI token space setting and that needed to be culled (AI token space is perhaps not the best definition, but it is what I am working with) So what was once good is now no more. And for Xbox users (my personal view) is that this is a good reason to switch to another platform. We saw this setting in part when in 2012-2017 there was a trade agreement (I forgot the name and I can not find the article I wrote, I wrote over 4000 of them). But there was a setting where that agreement was setting in motion to take out 2nd hand games. In the last minute Sony gave a presentation where one Sony executive handed over the disc to another executive, all whilst Don Mattrick cut his fingers first in this. It was the end of him and Xbox. Now whilst we see that Sony is ending discs, Microsoft is setting in motion a transfer and trades from disc to digital. It is the beginning of the end, because when net neutrality ends, gaming is over, or you must be willing to pay for the plus hundred of hours a month and that will get expensive really fast. The stage I am unaware of is what will Nintendo do. We see the ‘Code in box” mentions, but that s not a guarantee that physical gaming is at an end.
There is no soft message from either Sony or Microsoft that is ever to be believed (like “We’ll sort something out” or “We will stand by you” that time is over and whilst there are options in a few ways there is no telling what 2027/2028 brings. And what is the betrayal of gamers (in my humble opinion?) It is the sentence that is embedded in the article “Both cloud gaming and AI use data centres to process information.” And as I see it, the noise around this (given below) is part of this.
And I have a problem with this. Microsoft insulated themselves by getting the IDC to ‘proclaim’ “By 2028, IDC predicts 1.3 billion Al agents will be embedded in enterprise workflows. The challenge is no longer adoption.” I personally think it should be in the meat section right next to the boloney. What data was used to give this prediction? Scare tactics to get into the AI agents or go under section? At present there are massive issues with the quality of technical support, customer care and a few other settings. As such there is no way that 1.3 billion AI agents will be used, unless you consider the AI agents cybercrimes set, is that an optional premise? There are massive issues all over the field, but as such Gamers can be cut from any agreement, because it is just not business. I haven’t figured out what disclose systems have to do with that, but usually limiting gamers is never good for the gamer. I am drawing in part a blank, but I have learned over the last few decades that it tends to be corporate greed, not corporate ability that limits a gamer. As such I would have to give my vote (for now) to Nintendo. But perhaps Sony wisens up in 2027, because that is where the hard numbers will take them. Microsoft is a lot cause, no doubt about it, but Sony could reset their systems. And yes, the PS6 is likely going to be more expensive. Fine. I have had my PS5 for years now and it has served my immensely. I would have that my optional PS4 will do the same. I still have me PS4 too. Some older games are still good and playable there. Not everything needs to port over (nice if it does, but reality tends to be different) and that is fine. Perhaps Bethesda will port more games and they might ask for a fee, I have no issues with that. I bought with great joy the remastered Oblivion and I never regretted that. Like some movies, you can upscale hardware, or you can get the 4K version. And so far that act has been amazing. As such I recon that players like Guerrilla Games might kick of the expanded Horizon 3 for the PS6 with Horizon 1 and 2 added and gamers will pay good money for that. It could become their most successful game ever. And lets not forget, that franchise game started on PS4 and it never, not once disappointed. There are more games and I reckon that Microsoft has its own champions there too. So at what point was it a good idea to stop disclose settings? If there is real truth in this agentic agents the need for Physical discs is clear, as such something does not add up. Perhaps I am not seeing it, but as I saw the treacherous sentence embedded in the BBC article, I got to think the worst of Microsoft (yes, it is possible for them to do worse) as such I reacted to that setting of gaming under a taximeter. And they know that, the average gamer spends 40+ hours a week gaming and that has been clear going pack to the original Xbox, so why the taximeter now?
And if this is the future of gaming, the disc-less setting starts making sense in a greedy corporate way, if it is storage for the PS6 games, there are other solutions (like two discs, one for installation) and gaming on the second disc. This has been done before but as I see it, the net neutrality is about to hand us gamers a bitter defeat and the rural gamers will be hit twice over. We need to do something and I am puzzled as to what could be done.
So back to the BBC article. We are also given “Jez Corden of Windows Central told the BBC the announcement showed that “absolutely nothing is safe from the AI-driven component crisis,” but he added it also highlighted “where Microsoft’s priorities are”.” And that is fine, but it also implies that Microsoft is deserting their gamers all for fake AI, because that is the silliest part, all AI is fake and when you consider the works of Alan Turing you will get that this world is not ready for anything real. The computers lack several components and when they have these components it is only for billionaires. Im not a billionaire and I reckon you aren’t either. There is more but that is well over a decade in the future, but these things are done now, as such we see people chasing phantoms in a system that doesn’t allow ghosts. What a funny situation.
So what kind of treason is self-delusion? Because that is also treason and people can say that it is all open me, that I am committing treason against myself. But consider what has happened and what is happening at present. I believe that I am right, even though I have a few banks on Microsoft, but I dumped that system years ago, so I do not care, but gamers have embraced the Xbox and gamers I care about. They can change system, but not everyone has that kind of cash, because the days of the $299 Atari 2600 are over. Today you need serious cash to embrace gaming and that is where the truncation starts. The lack of options. I gave an option to Saudi Arabia and I hope they embrace this setting, because they could gain billions of gamers and there is still the steam-deck, I never had one, because Sony made me happy, but there is a new wave forming. I merely hope it is a Japanese setting and not an American setting, because they are going from bad to worse. And there is still the Nintendo.
All choices and we must make up our minds. I merely hope that Sony comes to their senses (or better inform us) before December 2028. Have a great day and if needed find a console that doesn’t need a taximeter to play games. I just had an idea, what if SEGA relaunches his dreamcast? They had plenty of really good games. Its just an idea.
