"Scobre;c-17276415" wrote:
"darrenfroggy;c-17276406" wrote:
@Scobre Just to touch on the cloud gaming part of your post: I honestly hope that won't happen.
Sure, a lot more people have online access these days than 5 years ago but there are still a lot of people with two issues: no coverage for access that would allow cloud gaming and providers who make that access impossible due to its cost.
In an ideal world, with Net Neutrality (which is a whole different conversation that doesn't belong here, so I'm not going to get into it) being the norm, cloud gaming would be great. As it is, it's likely to make a game as inaccessible as requirements that are too high for anything but gaming rigs.
It's a fine balance to aim for, honestly, when it comes to being accessible to players who are and aren't hardcore gamers (unless, of course, they choose to only target one side of the spectrum).
To touch on the other part of your post: the scary thing is that nowadays there are too many people who put too much weight on being right, even when they know they're not. In all sorts of discussions and situations, not specific to gaming or politics or anything else.
Oh a little more about cloud based gaming. I have G-Force Now beta which is free.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cloud_gaming
So someone could game with their cellphone on a Wi-Fi spot in public. I know Africa has much cheaper data plans than the USA so Sims could open up so much more worldwide. Sims 4 isn't no internet access at all either. You still need internet to access the Gallery and the patches. But imagine being able to game on your tv, mobile device, console or computer and have it run just as good and look as good on any of those devices. It is still in beta mode of course but it will be game changing when it takes off and becomes mainstream. VR gaming could even be possible for Sims at a cheaper rate being able to play it on mobile, but I hope that they do allow it to turn on and off like first person view for the Sims 4. So no you won't need an expensive gaming rig or internet connection. You could even play in between classes at university. Facial recognition software and procedural generated worlds could also benefit the franchise too and cut EA production costs down.
Some of that sounds intriguing, sure. But personally I have zero interest in investing in a game that the company has that much control over. Cloud-based anything has the disadvantage of the company having free reign to pull the plug whenever they please on whomever they please. While right now I can go offline and keep playing my game as much as I want and only sacrifice new content and patches, with cloud gaming, what happens if their servers go down? What happens when there are political tensions between countries?
I think a big warning sign is what happened with Adobe products just recently: they pulled the plug on every user in a country due to politics.
Another is the shaky backup solutions with other cloud-based software (Cloudflare goes down and half the internet is broken).
I know the software world is heading in that direction. For me, there are just too many potential downsides to it for now.