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But of course they probably would have already abused that power in the way we presume Microsoft is considering for used games, in that an already-activated game would simply not work at all.
Still, it's scary and interesting to know it would only take a technology developed years ago for a simple optical disk to make this happen, as long as the console was connected to the internet (or, conceivably, a phone line)."
I was proud of being able to take multiple pictures of Kevin Butler and change them so he was always the same shirt and tie, though. And of course, the PSP Too image itself.
"
Some exerpts from the Wikipedia:
"...a customer would buy a DIVX disc (similar to a DVD) for approximately US$4, which was watchable for up to 48 hours from its initial viewing. After this period, the disc could be viewed by paying a continuation fee to play it for two more days. Viewers who wanted to watch a disc an unlimited amount of times could convert the disc to a "DIVX silver" disc for an additional fee.[1] "DIVX gold" discs that could be played an unlimited number of times on any DIVX player were announced at the time of DIVX's introduction, but no DIVX gold titles were ever released.
Each DIVX disc was marked with a unique barcode in the Burst cutting area that could be read by the player, and used to track the discs. The status of the discs were monitored through an account over a phone line. DIVX player owners had to set up an account with DIVX to which additional viewing fees could be charged. The player would call an account server over the phone line to charge for viewing fees similar to the way DirecTV and Dish Network satellite systems handle pay-per-view."
"Many people in various technology and entertainment communities were afraid that there would be DIVX exclusive releases, and that the then-fledgling DVD format would suffer as a result. Dreamworks, 20th Century Fox, and Paramount Pictures, for instance, initially released their films exclusively on the DIVX format.&quo"
Funny this article went up today, I just wrote a similar one, postulating a parallel world wherein consumers did push back against the Double-Dip, motivating Sony to continue to support backwards compatibility in both PS3 and Vita: http://bitmob.com/articles/sony-2012-the-road-not-taken
After all, the possible harm from used games sales is really no longer relevant to a publisher once a title is no longer available new, in its release window. Your categorical proof is really just empirical. I can name plenty of examples of kids off the street who would have bought a $60 title new but were instead talked into a $55 pre-owned version of it with an adiitional 10% discount. And yet we as consumers are finding even older titles commoditized into digital purchases that we must rebuy, even if we bought the original release new and never sold it back to Gamestop.
Publishers need to stand up to their true enemy, another large corporate entity, and start enforcing sanctions that reduce or eliminate the new inventory sold to Gamestop unless they agree on a release-window embargo for used sales of certain titles. All of these other tactics are introducing chicanery and inconvenience to their customers instead, and will only hurt them in the long-term."
I'm glad to see this team really embrace the fun of the fatality, especially compared to their previous efforts. Mortal Kombat: Deception was the last time they got it right at all, since Armageddon had the unsuccessful "Create Your Own Fatality" feature and MK Vs. DC Universe of course was tamed down for the Teen rating. They've got the right idea that a nice, dark sense of humor is how you get to the heart of a Mortal Kombat player (pun intended).
Check out this Youtube video someone lovingly made with 500+ "classic" fatalities from various fighting games. It's over two hours long! Fortunately it has a menu letting you jump to the fatalities from particular games (including the older Mortal Kombats).
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FRMU1YyB-18&feature=player_detailpa"
Recently, I also had an experience with Steam for Mac which, for some unknown reason, installs its games into a User folder rather than Applications or some other shared folder. Since my son and I share a lot of Steam games purchased individually for each of our accounts, this led to multiple downloads and installs both on our Mac.
Long story short, DON'T try to relocate Steam program files and leave a symbolic link behind pointing to the new location! In fact, my experience in general is to just accept default install locations where at all possible, because we're lucky if even that has been fully tested.
Thanks for the warning Jay!"
