Current Events > Do people actually enjoy paying for Xbox Live Gold and PS+?

(+) Yeah! (+)

Like are there people out there who think
"this is good value for money"

Why?
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Free games every month easily cover the cost.
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FREE GAMEs!!!

fuck... too late
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gmanthebest posted...

Free games every month easily cover the cost.

They're not free. You're paying for them. As soon as you stop paying you lose them all.

Besides it doesn't seem like people even like most of the games they put on this service.
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It's kind of necessary. It's a billion dollar industry and they cover online costs

(don't bite my head off CE)

Xbox Live helped online gaming in general . even if PC is the way to go now.
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Do Americans really clap when they subscribe to online video game services?
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No not really but the free games lessen the pain.
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who the fuck enjoys paying for things
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TroutPaste posted...

It's kind of necessary. It's a billion dollar industry and they cover online costs

(don't bite my head off CE)

Xbox Live helped online gaming in general . even if PC is the way to go now.

What online costs are they covering? Multiplayer games are generally peer to peer. Multiplayer games are also often adding microtransactions and DLC to pay for post-launch support.
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Do I enjoy paying for it? Of course not. But do I find value in the limitless hours I can kill by playing online against others for, what, like $8/mo? Yes.

Do I wish it was free? Of course. But this is America. Corporations always win. I just try to get by.
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Asherlee10 posted...

Darmik posted...

As soon as you stop paying you lose them all.

I don't think that's the case for Xbox.

Kinda. You keep 360 games.
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_Near_ posted...

who the fuck enjoys paying for things

The games aren't bad. Yeah, they're usually garbage but if you can get two or three a year that you're interested in, that's enough.

Eh, I've paid more for less.
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Antifar posted...

Eh, I've paid more for less.

Like what?
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Also PS+ gets better sale prices during sales sometimes so that softens the blow a bit
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I think Xbox justifies it slightly more since they actually spend a lot of time making games BC. So you could argue that this is only possible due to userbase subscriptions. Sony doesn't really do all that much for the PS4 that is comparable.

Still not great though.

Touch posted...

Also PS+ gets better sale prices during sales sometimes so that softens the blow a bit

I don't see why that requires a subscription. It's not like Sony eats the cost there.
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...Because it's one of the perks to subscribing That's usually how they get you to subscribe. With perks.
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DezCaughtIt posted...

...Because it's one of the perks to subscribing That's usually how they get you to subscribe. With perks.

Withholding sales (which are digital) from people who don't pay for a subscription isn't really a perk.

The whole thing is just a bit of a rip-off. They could even offer people $15-20 a year for people who are only interested in online multiplayer and discounts. But they won't do that.

This is what I'm talking about really. Does anyone legit think this crap is good value?
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i know people like to talk about how PC gaming is free online, but honestly XBL and even PSN are better services.

on PC your games are split across different platforms (origin / steam / bnet / LoL / etc) so your friend list gets fragmented, and then when you do play with people it's not always so easy to invite people.

then you have my biggest complaint which is that there isnt really a good chat program that's consistent on PC. back when i played WoW every raid group & guild used some kind of different chat program, so there was teamspeak, mumble, vent, skype, etc. now i think people use Discord but my serious PC gaming days are over so I havent tried it.

now you finally get to the actual programs themselves and they're hit or miss. I hate Steam (not intuitive and feels like it is from 15 years ago), Bnet is good but I have to reinstall the launcher after updates sometimes, etc.

the tl;dr is that i think (to an extent) you get what you pay for. I hop on Xbox or Playstation, my friends are there, my games are there, it's easy to navigate stuff, I can play & communicate easily, and that's it.

it's not rocket science to get a PC game going but convenience on consoles is nice
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Romulox28 posted...

i know people like to talk about how PC gaming is free online, but honestly XBL and even PSN are better services.

on PC your games are split across different platforms (origin / steam / bnet / LoL / etc) so your friend list gets fragmented, and then when you do play with people it's not always so easy to invite people.

then you have my biggest complaint which is that there isnt really a good chat program that's consistent on PC. back when i played WoW every raid group & guild used some kind of different chat program, so there was teamspeak, mumble, vent, skype, etc. now i think people use Discord but my serious PC gaming days are over so I havent tried it.

now you finally get to the actual programs themselves and they're hit or miss. I hate Steam (not intuitive and feels like it is from 15 years ago), Bnet is good but I have to reinstall the launcher after updates sometimes, etc.

the tl;dr is that i think (to an extent) you get what you pay for. I hop on Xbox or Playstation, my friends are there, my games are there, it's easy to navigate stuff, I can play & communicate easily, and that's it.

it's not rocket science to get a PC game going but convenience on consoles is nice

If you stick solely to Steam it's the same thing. And Steam as a service is way better than Xbox Live and PS+. It's also completely free.

PC being an open platform is a different argument. Paying for a subscription on a PC service wouldn't change that at all.
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You get some pretty nice free games for only 60$ a year. 2 free games a month, 24 a year. That easily a steal for gamers.
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Darmik posted...

DezCaughtIt posted...

...Because it's one of the perks to subscribing That's usually how they get you to subscribe. With perks.

Withholding sales (which are digital) from people who don't pay for a subscription isn't really a perk.

The whole thing is just a bit of a rip-off. They could even offer people $15-20 a year for people who are only interested in online multiplayer and discounts. But they won't do that.

This is what I'm talking about really. Does anyone legit think this crap is good value?

It's literally one less coffee a month if you buy the yearly subscription and one less takeout meal a month if you go monthly to get access to games you may not have given a chance before, the occasional AAA title, better sales, and online play.

I'm not shilling for it and I'd rather not pay anything but damn you act like it's a 100% ripoff when people have saved a good bit of money with the service

A yearly subscription has also been on sale for $40 about three or four times this year as well. I've more than likely saved well over $60 in deals and games that I actually played from the service. JC3 and Second Son alone would've ran me $50
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Darmik posted...

If you stick solely to Steam it's the same thing. And Steam as a service is way better than Xbox Live and PS+. It's also completely free.

PC being an open platform is a different argument. Paying for a subscription on a PC service wouldn't change that at all.

cool, didn't know Steam had a party chat. usually I'd just communicate through the game.

agree to disagree on steam, though. I just think it's a bad program. very little (besides the storefront!) is intuitive, it's loaded with half-baked ideas that never leave beta (Steam controller, big picture, etc) etc. when I look at another program like Spotify it's astounding how behind in design and user experience steam is.

as i said before, not a big deal (I still use Steam) but it's the little things that stick with you and since gaming is not a big or important thing in my life (it's my preferred time waster), i dont want to have to put in any effort to do what i want to do with a video game lol
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- Online play doesn't justify the cost at all since it's not dedicated servers. The service improvements for the PS4 specifically are all on the hardware side too. It's not like they do a shitload of OS updates for the benefit of the consumer
- Getting a lucky dip of games each month isn't something that should be tied to the service by default. You can often get these games for like $5 too. But chances are I bet most people don't even play most of them. And as soon as you stop subscribing you can no longer access them (360 games on Xbox One is the only exception). These games are also forever attached to your account like you own them when you stop subscribing.
- The "it's only a coffee a month" argument doesn't mean it's good value. If it cost me $2 to turn my console on at all I wouldn't consider that good value because it's cheap.

My argument here is if you are going to charge $60 a year (an amount that constantly increases) you should have something there to justify it. Charging for stuff that is free on other services isn't good value.
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There's plenty of ways they can add value to the service too

Having to pay $60 to get a game 75% off because a sale is on is a bit shit. Why not a benefit like 10% off every game on the storefront? This is what Humble Bundle does? Or why not a rebate of like $5-10 for every $100 spent? This is what Nintendo did with the digital deluxe program on Wii U. Something that actually feels like a universal benefit.

If Google or Apple had this same service for their app stores people would think it's absolute shit too. Only consoles get away with it.
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60 dollars a year isn't an issue. if i had to pay that every month then i'd have a problem.
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I'd actually rather have free online and no games tbh.
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_Near_ posted...

who the fuck enjoys paying for things

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-Gavirulax- posted...

Not really.
The ONLY reason I pay for PS+ is to back up my saves.

And thank fuck I did because my PS4 decided to have a fit earlier this year - while I had to redownload everything again (great fun when my account is US and with Australian Internet) it wasn't nearly as bad because I kept my save files - as someone who plays JRPGs a lot....it's a must.

I am very interested to see what Nintendo do with their service though.....I wish I had faith in them.

I hate how cloudsaving is locked behind PS+. It's especially painful to think of how Vita games are tied to their save data so if you clear a game to make space for something else, which is common because of the ludicrously expensive larger proprietary storage options, you either need to do a really inconvenient PC backup or pay for PS+.

Like I love my Vita but holy shit Sony did everything they could to just make some godawful decisions.
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SGT_Conti posted...

-Gavirulax- posted...

Not really.
The ONLY reason I pay for PS+ is to back up my saves.

And thank fuck I did because my PS4 decided to have a fit earlier this year - while I had to redownload everything again (great fun when my account is US and with Australian Internet) it wasn't nearly as bad because I kept my save files - as someone who plays JRPGs a lot....it's a must.

I am very interested to see what Nintendo do with their service though.....I wish I had faith in them.

I hate how cloudsaving is locked behind PS+. It's especially painful to think of how Vita games are tied to their save data so if you clear a game to make space for something else, which is common because of the ludicrously expensive larger proprietary storage options, you either need to do a really inconvenient PC backup or pay for PS+.

Like I love my Vita but holy shit Sony did everything they could to just make some godawful decisions.

Yeah that's ridiculous. Vita was just a mess too. Why does the download list include PS3 games?

Stuff like this makes me more salty that they didn't support the Vita with basic OS updates. I'm paying for a god damn PS+ subscription that includes Vita games. Fix your shit.
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Freddie_Mercury posted...

_Near_ posted...

who the fuck enjoys paying for things

If I feel like I'm getting good value for my money I do enjoy paying for things yeah. Especially if it's on sale.

This topic was inspired by a user who used Xbox Live Games with Gold as a benefit over PC gaming.
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Darmik posted...

Yeah that's ridiculous. Vita was just a mess too. Why does the download list include PS3 games?

Stuff like this makes me more salty that they didn't support the Vita with basic OS updates. I'm paying for a god damn PS+ subscription that includes Vita games. Fix your shit.

You couldn't even sort the list, last I checked. I've got a metric shit-ton of stuff in that list and it's all sorted by purchase date. I think I was trying to download FFX-2 once but it doesn't show up individually on the PS Store, so I had to look through my download history to get to it. If not that game, it was something else I couldn't find in the store.

Darmik posted...

This topic was inspired by a user who used Xbox Live Games with Gold as a benefit over PC gaming.

lol wut
I can understand people not liking the multitude of platforms like uplay and Steam and Origin, but most of my friends have migrated toward Discord as a central hub anyway so there's a unified friends list there.
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SGT_Conti posted...

You couldn't even sort the list, last I checked. I've got a metric s***-ton of stuff in that list and it's all sorted by purchase date. I think I was trying to download FFX-2 once but it doesn't show up individually on the PS Store, so I had to look through my download history to get to it. If not that game, it was something else I couldn't find in the store.

Yep. My list always seems to start with a shitload of Virtua Fighter 5 DLC for some reason. Such a huge pain to download a game. I usually just have to find it on the store. I didn't even think of games that aren't listed on the store like that...
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Man some of you are acting like 60 bucks a year will bankrupt you.
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NINExATExSEVEN posted...

Man some of you are acting like 60 bucks a year will bankrupt you.

Or like I get great sales all the time and free online on Steam.
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I've gotten plently of awesome free games from it and a ton of solid deals. It's completely worth it.
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Romulox28 posted...

i know people like to talk about how PC gaming is free online, but honestly XBL and even PSN are better services.

XD
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No one enjoys paying for anything
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I have only ever paid for Gold once and that was for 3 months. Its mostly because Im just not interested inplaying games online on Xbox.

I will be paying for Switch online when that starts
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No but if I want to play online it's just one of those things mayne
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Darmik posted...

gmanthebest posted...

Free games every month easily cover the cost.

They're not free. You're paying for them. As soon as you stop paying you lose them all.

Besides it doesn't seem like people even like most of the games they put on this service.

As soon as you stop paying you only lose some Xbox games. 360 games are yours to keep forever. I think I have like... 20 360 games that are 'free.'
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