Thoughts on Amiibo

Amiibos are out and it appears that Nintendo has what it wanted - an absurd demand for the figures that looks like it may pose a threat to Disney Infinity and Activision Skylanders. 

I for one think its a good thing.  It brings some sense of physicality back to an increasingly digital world.  The world of video games.  It gives players something to keep and cherish.  Perhaps even use as heirlooms to pass on gaming memories.  If you think it's crazy now, wait till they start releasing amiibo for all of the 700+ Pokemon.

While it is true that Nintendo vastly underestimated the demand for amiibo, (which is better than overestimating it, to be fair) there is something about the craze that I just don't get.  I'm talking about the people who insist on buying them all.  The fans who want to collect each and every figure, and are outraged to find a shortage of some and the fact that they have to put forth a little more effort to obtain some over others.

There is a rumor that Nintendo will stop producing less popular Amiibo (think Marth, Wii Fit Trainer, Villager) after the initial shipment.  While I don't think they will, even if they did, current amiibo technology only allows for 1 game to have read/write access per figure.  This means that only one game at a time will offer the full amiibo experience.  Any other games will only be given read access meaning you can unlock some basic stuff like items, money, costumes etc but nothing more.  I have heard amiibo described as "physical dlc" but this only really applies to read only NFC scanning.  Amiibo can be so much more than physical dlc when a game has full access.

Right now, the only game that can do this is Smash Bros 4.  That means that of all the current figures out there, they can only be used for the complete Amiibo experience to train and level up a character specific fighting CPU.  I don't care how big of a Nintendo fan you are, there is no reason to justify buying all of these figures just to use with this game.  It is simply a waste.  Most people are only decent with 2-4 characters, and some of those characters are probably from games that the person hasn't invested that much time into. 

I feel like some people think of amiibo as dlc, in that if they don't buy all of it, they are being deprived of something amazing.  When in reality, they are only missing out on a trainable CPU for characters they don't even play and  some extra rupees or costumes in other games.  It just doesn't make sense to get any more amiibos than (a) your absolute favorites and (b) characters you actually play in Smash Bros.

If you get an Olimar amiibo but you play as Captain Falcon in Smash, you better hope that you own Pikmin 3 and that Nintendo patches in amiibo functionality into it.  Otherwise it is dead weight to you until Pikmin 4 comes out (which it may never).  You're better off just buying a regular Olimar figure for much cheaper than the jacked up scalper prices you'll find online.

Which brings me to my next point: scarcity.  Nintendo is obviously manufacturing less amiibo of lesser known (let's call them B and C-list Nintendo characters). Now whether or not they stop producing certain figures after the first few waves, does not mean that they will NEVER print these characters again.  It is pretty obvious that Nintendo used Smash Bros to launch the amiibo platform, and for the most part all of these first few waves are primarily meant to be used in Smash. 

But to think that Nintendo will never re-release these characters again as amiibo is extremly naive.  If Nintendo releases a new Animal Crossing game in a year or two, you had better believe that they will release a slew of Animal Crossing amiibo to go along with it.  Probably with even more capabilities than the current generation of amiibo.  So even if Villager is really hard to find now, and may never be printed again, it doesn't mean that you won't be able to get newer, better, and more diverse figures later on.

And it's the same with every other game and series.  Unless you can think of a character in Smash who will never have another game in its series made (Game and Watch, Duck Hunt Dog) then there is no reason to freak out and get upset when stock runs out and the figures aren't reprinted. (Which is just a rumor at this point.  There is no reason to assume discontinuation as of now.)  And again I'll note, even if it were true, those figures would only fully be compatible with Smash anyway.

Maybe the hardcore collectors are just a very loud but vocal minority, but when I see pages and pages of comments on sites about people complaining about how they can't buy all of the figures right now because of being sold out, or are getting their preorders cancelled because of lack of stock, or scalpers, I just get angry.  Well, that's anough of this rant.  Later gators.

Next Generation Consoles Will Be Always Online and Have DRM. (Also, Fuck XBox One Sympathizers)

I am telling you now, that if there indeed are video game consoles after the Sony Playstation 4, the Microsoft Xbox One, and the Nintendo Wii U, that they will be crippled with DRM, non tradeable games, a dead aftermarket games industry, and always online requirements.  This is for certain.
Assuming that we still have home consoles being produced by these companies (or other companies) and are not all simply playing games on a computer through proprietary game streaming and cloud computing services, it will happen.  (Picture services like Steam, but for Nintendo, Sony, and Microsoft.  All offering to sell their games digitally and let you stream them.  They will probably have a monthly service charge, and each company will probably produce a controller specifically for their service.  But the base system will largely just be a computer.  This is a likely scenereo for video gaming to occur.  The death of the proprietary home console.  I digress)

What people cannot forget is that Microsoft tried to get all of this Draconian shit on their console.  They TRIED.  It doesn't matter if they backpedal now, they still had every intention to fuck the gaming public up until and for weeks after unvieling their platform.  They cannot ever be forgiven for this.  The only reason they had to abandon these policies is because Sony was keeping their shit in check.  They had their hands tied by forces outside their control and were forced to make these changes or bankrupt their gaming division.

We're Microsoft.  We don't fuck the world, we..well, wait.  Yeah.  We do fuck the world.

The point is, I guarentee you that if Sony had done the same thing, Microsoft would not have stopped their crippling anti-consumer bullshit.  Not for a second.  Alway remember how much Microsoft wanted to fuck you (and still does) when you think of buying an Xbox One.
Sadly, this might just be inevitable.  Assuming we don't go the streaming service PC route outlined above, the fact is that physical media is a dying notion.  Physical media represents the right of the consumer.  The right to call wht you have yours.  To say, "I own this game." (Even though you don't technically own the rights and are just licensing it, for all practical reasons you 'own' your copy of the game.)

It represents the freedom to take the game with you, over to a friends house.  To sell it.  Trade it.  Gift it.  The ability to buy it used at a reduced rate when it isn't as popular or current.  The ability to say "I have all of my data right here, right now.  I only need my console, a TV, and my game to play.  I do not need the Internet to play my game unless the company I bought it from is trying to fuck me."
But physical media is quickly becoming obsolete.  First, data transfer rates are increasing rapidly.  Look at Google Fiber.  Whereas before, it was unthinkable to be expected to download a 6 gigabyte game and not have a physical retail copy available, the time when it is feasible and reasonable is fast approaching.

Second, you have two forks in the road with regard to game storage.  On one hand, hard drives are getting bigger and cheaper.  To the point where a drive could contain dozen of games, if not more.  Most people would rather have their games on hard drive and easily accessable as opposed to toting around a bunch of discs/gamecards.  Even future hologram discs that hold terabytes of data.  The gaming market is aware of this and the technology is coming together.  And on the other hand, the notion of storage itself is being challenged with the advent of streaming.  It is possible for a computer cluster to host all of your games, then stream a broadcast of them directly to you.  Think of what Netflix did to movies.  Streaming will do the same to video games.

But with this technology, we find our rights as consumers stripped.  When our games are all digital, we have no claim to what happens to them, except that they are consumed by us.  Which is exactly what the companies want.  Full control of every aspect of their games, they want to spoonfeed us the content on their terms as if we were infants.

Without physical media, you cannot trade.  You cannot sell.  You cannot borrow (without physically moving your console or sharing your account info, the latter of which is easy for companies to control). There will be no used games market.  The only price for games will be whatever arbitrary price point the cmpany chooses to anchor to and sell at.

Streaming of course requires an always online connection.  And by the time these consoles are released, it will be assumed that everyone has an online connection.  So even traditional downloading of games and saving them to hard drive based consoles will enact an always online requirement to tackle DRM and ensure you are aways exposed to their storefront, and they can always monitor your activity and habits for marketing purposes.

And finally, the system itself.  With always online systems, you will be forced to accept any update or EULA or policy change they throw at you, or you will be unable to use the service.  And when the time has come for these services to be shut down, when keeping the servers up is no longer profitable, you will not even be able to play all of the games that you bought.
Even if they implement a system or patch right before the servers go down that let's you play all of your games offline, once that system's hardware fail, you're SOL.  Working offline systems will be like relics.  A Pandora's box of games only to be played until the hardware dies.  Never to be played again unless someone years and years from then creates an emulator.
Can you see the dystopian hell that ineviably awaits us all?