Rumour: Xbox One family sharing was a "45min demo"


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This is why I very much doubt this rumor. With a time limit of how long you play the game, why the hell do you need to check in every 24hours? You don't. Which in turn, simply means this rumor is false. 

This sounds like a clear belittle of the family sharing program before it even came to light, because we probably never will see it.

Don't you think it's bit of an overly elaborate hoax, just to discredit something that doesn't even exist anymore. What would be the point in that?

 

Unless of course, it is actually a Microsoft employee, trying to soften the blow/prevent further backlash.

 

Conspiracy theories ahoy!!!

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Rumor. I don't believe it. Somone writing on pastebin or whatever is not a good source. I could've written it, pretending to be a MS employee. The last one looked like it was written by an angry 14 year old..

 

 

 

Why would we want to download 40gb if we could install from disc in 15 mins or whatever?  It's a difference between playing with disc and installing from disc.

 

Family sharing required you to download the game when you played it from any other console than the one you own, i.e a friend's. So yes, you would have had to download the 20+ GB game without the disc. The only positive in the scenario was you could begin playing before the download complete. Same goes for installing games from the disc, even after the policy changes iirc.

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I'm sure people would have tried to find ways to exploit the timer etc... the checkin may have been necessary to prevent that.

One thing that was very well known about the mysteries of the X1 was that the check-in just sent the UID of the disc to somewhere for it to check you was still the rightful owner or you are allowed to play it. If there's a limit to the time you're allowed to play the game, then there's no way you can exploit the concept of family sharing, and all the checking can be done locally. It means no-one else can own your game, and even if you took your game to a friends house, its still linked to your account.

 

 

Don't you think it's bit of an overly elaborate hoax, just to discredit something that doesn't even exist anymore. What would be the point in that?

 

Unless of course, it is actually a Microsoft employee, trying to soften the blow/prevent further backlash.

 

Conspiracy theories ahoy!!!

I've seen crazier things.

 

Honestly, if it was only a 60 minute demo, why would it be just restricted to the games your friends own and not all the games library of the console like it currently is on PSN+. That makes no business/logical sense.

 

Thinking about it more just pokes more holes.

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One thing that was very well known about the mysteries of the X1 was that the check-in just sent the UID of the disc to somewhere for it to check you was still the rightful owner or you are allowed to play it. If there's a limit to the time you're allowed to play the game, then there's no way you can exploit the concept of family sharing, and all the checking can be done locally. It means no-one else can own your game, and even if you took your game to a friends house, its still linked to your account.

 

 

I've seen crazier things.

 

Honestly, if it was only a 60 minute demo, why would it be just restricted to the games your friends own and not all the games library of the console like it currently is on PSN+. That makes no business/logical sense.

 

Thinking about it more just pokes more holes.

 

It's not like that on PSN+, never has been, never was, no idea why you think that.

 

You only get full game trials for games Sony offer you and it's very few titles at that, and I believe mostly 1st party. Xbox One solution sounds like it was mandatory for ALL games.

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It's not like that on PSN+

 

You only get full game trials for games Sony offer you. Xbox One solution sounds like it was mandatory for ALL games.

Its still the same principle.

 

Technically, if the game has a time limit there is no need for an online check-in because there is no way to exploit the system. The only reason the check-in was there was to check these things. 

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Its still the same principle.

 

Technically, if the game has a time limit there is no need for an online check-in because there is no way to exploit the system. The only reason the check-in was there was to check these things. 

 

Yes there is for the reason I quoted you just posts ago

 

We were toying around with a limit on the number of times members could access the shared game (as to discourage gamers from simply beating the game by doing multiple playthroughs). but we had not settled on an appropriate way of handling it.

 

 

If certain games were going to have different numbers of retries, the reset mechanism needs to be server side or it could well be exploited.

 

As I posted a few pages ago, MS already confirmed when you went around to your friends the 24 hour check in became 1 hour. Piece things together, it's not rocket science.

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If you were going to be able bound to a limit of the number of times you could reset the timer, that has to be phoned home to HQ does it not?

 

And you can play offline on a secondary console via Family Share for only 1 hour.

 

All matches up tbh.

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Yes there is for the reason I quoted you just posts ago

 

 

If certain games were going to have different numbers of retries, the reset mechanism needs to be server side or it could well be exploited.

 

As I posted a few pages ago, MS already confirmed when you went around to your friends the 24 hour check in became 1 hour. Piece things together, it's not rocket science.

You're not listening to me. I'm saying TECHNICALLY, as in there is no technical requirement. I could draw you up a flowchart if you wanted disproving you. The X1 would have local limits to stop the user playing the game which can't be surpassed, why would it need to check in every 24 hour aswell? There's no point. It would make the DRM invalid, everything just falls apart because its essentially the same business model. It'd just be a single added feature of playing trial full games. It'd be the same concept if you could buy XBLA games on disc currently. You get me?

 

Basically, if the X1 needs a 24 hour check-in with a partial libary of full game trials, so would the PS3.

 

EDIT: The only reason it would be needed would be for the complete digital game libary. Then again, there's solutions around that like you see in Steam for example, you can't play the game without the disc if you're not connected to live. That by itself isn't a reason to eliminate a big chunk of your market.

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No it's not the same as a demo. A demo is typically a segment of a game (can be from anywhere, start, middle, end) that you are restricted to play, everyone can only play the same amount of content. The demo doesn't even have to be from the final build of the game.

 

This is a full game download of a gone gold/retail title that you get a 45min-1hour timer on, so if you're good at games you could get further into the game than someone who sucks. Your achievements/save games are kept, and to keep playing you can buy the game after your time limit is up.

Xbox Live demos are from final builds I don't know why you think they are not. Demos are full downloads for XBLA and you pay to unlock full game and still get to keep achievements, progress etc. There is nothing new in this pastebin.

I had a doubt that family sharing wasn't fully fleshed out and even Microsoft didn't know what they could do (for whatever reasons including publisher agreements) but this pastebin just doesn't add up.

 

If you were going to be able bound to a limit of the number of times you could reset the timer, that has to be phoned home to HQ does it not?

You don't need online connection to limit trials, see any trial wares on PC. Sure it could be exploited when XB1's security is breached but then at that time you would hardly care about sharing games. :)

 

Family sharing required you to download the game when you played it from any other console than the one you own, i.e a friend's. So yes, you would have had to download the 20+ GB game without the disc. The only positive in the scenario was you could begin playing before the download complete. Same goes for installing games from the disc, even after the policy changes iirc.

You didn't need to download games if you had access to the disc.

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You're not listening to me. I'm saying TECHNICALLY, as in there is no technical requirement. I could draw you up a flowchart if you wanted disproving you. The X1 would have local limits to stop the user playing the game which can't be surpassed, why would it need to check in every 24 hour aswell? There's no point. It would make the DRM invalid, everything just falls apart because its essentially the same business model. It'd just be a single added feature of playing trial full games. It'd be the same concept if you could buy XBLA games on disc currently. You get me?

 

Basically, if the X1 needs a 24 hour check-in with a partial libary of full game trials, so would the PS3.

 

EDIT: The only reason it would be needed would be for the complete digital game libary. Then again, there's solutions around that like you see in Steam. That by itself isn't a reason to eliminate a big chunk of your market.

 

On the PS3 you aren't sharing anything with your friends/family, full game trials on the PS3 are tied to you having a PS+ account, and if you do EVERYONE with a PS+ account can access them on their OWN account. Without a PS+ account you cannot access them.

 

You should probably do some reading into how PS+ and PSN full game trials work, you're making quite a lot of wrong assumptions about the service.

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I'ts been a part of the PS+ for a very long time now. 2 years. But no one mentioned it because Microsoft's family sharing, which we now discovered is the same as the PSN's version, was tauted as something else. Being able to share your full games with 10 people.

Are you talking about sharing demos (from Audioboxer's reply to you)? Why do you even share demos? :unsure Can't user just download them on their own? (serious question, not a PSN user).

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On the PS3 you aren't sharing anything with your friends/family, full game trials on the PS3 are tied to you having a PS+ account, and if you do EVERYONE with a PS+ account can access them on their OWN account. Without a PS+ account you cannot access them.

 

You should probably do some reading into how PS+ and PSN full game trials work, you're making quite a lot of wrong assumptions about the service.

Stop beating around the bush. You're talking to me like I don't own a PS3. You download a trial of a game, play it for 60 minutes then you get linked to the marketplace to buy it. Whats hard about grasping that logic?

 

What I'm saying is, if that's the same system as family sharing but the only difference is that you only can partially download games which your friends own then why do MS need to check up on you? The X1 would be doing the work for them because the security is enforced locally. Hence no need for a 24 hour checkin. Can you get my analogy yet?

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Stop beating around the bush. You're talking to me like I don't own a PS3. You download a trial of a game, play it for 60 minutes then you get linked to the marketplace to buy it. Whats hard about grasping that logic?

 

What I'm saying is, if that's the same system as family sharing but the only difference is that you only can partially download games which your friends own then why do MS need to check up on you? The X1 would be doing the work for them because the security is enforced locally. Hence no need for a 24 hour checkin. Can you get my analogy yet?

 

Why don't you go with what MS said then, it's them who decided the Xbox One needed a 24 hour & 1 hour check in  :rolleyes:

 

"With Xbox One you can game offline for up to 24 hours on your primary console," reads Microsoft's statement.

 

If playing games on another Xbox One, such as a friend's or family member's, the console will require check-in with an active Internet connection every hour.

 

Microsoft adds that "offline gaming is not possible after these prescribed times until you reestablish a connection, but you can still watch live TV and enjoy Blu-ray and DVD movies."

 

According to the official details, this is required so that the platform can acknowledge and verify whether users require game updates or have traded in their games. Additionally, Microsoft says games that make use of the Xbox One's cloud technology "may" require a constant connection to the Internet.

 

 

Source: http://uk.gamespot.com/e3/microsoft-confirms-required-24-hour-check-in-for-xbox-one-6409419/

 

If you trade one of your games then it wouldn't be allowed in your family sharing portfolio. That cannot be handled locally.

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Stop beating around the bush. You're talking to me like I don't own a PS3. You download a trial of a game, play it for 60 minutes then you get linked to the marketplace to buy it. Whats hard about grasping that logic?

 

What I'm saying is, if that's the same system as family sharing but the only difference is that you only can partially download games which your friends own then why do MS need to check up on you? The X1 would be doing the work for them because the security is enforced locally. Hence no need for a 24 hour checkin. Can you get my analogy yet?

I think the 24hr check was purely due to used games and game "gifting". None of the other known scenarios would require it.

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Why don't you go with what MS said then, it's them who decided the Xbox One needed a 24 hour & 1 hour check in  :rolleyes:

 

 

Source: http://uk.gamespot.com/e3/microsoft-confirms-required-24-hour-check-in-for-xbox-one-6409419/

 

If you trade one of your games then it wouldn't be allowed in your family sharing portfolio. That cannot be handled locally.

Gifting a game digitally. You can't do that anymore. It needs someway to check-up on you because you're getting the full un-restricted game. If there was no check-in you simply go offline and boom, free game. 

 

Actually, brainwave. You could digitally gift a game which gives that person the full un-restricted game for their own use. Yet if the game is not gifted, you get a 60minute trial until you get kicked off. That would make sense.

 

I think people forgot about the rules which they announced regarding gifting and it only being able to be performed once. That makes total sense, maybe this rumor is right.

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Didn't we already know that there was a 1 hour limit? I thought that's what the 1-hour DRM check was for? Is the author simply misinterpreting what was written in the MS employee "confession"?

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If there was a limit, I think it would be just an annoying: "Hey, you can buy this game now...do you want to go to the marketplace?", you hit cancel, continue for another hour and recycle. Otherwise...you could do that for every single game out there as demos, and there's no incentive in just playing your friends. 1 hour vs. a demo (which doesn't necessarily need to have a time limit). That doesn't make sense. A repeating annoying factor does. The pastebin still doesn't have enough information. Oh well, won't know what they planned.

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this guy worked at Microsoft,on the xbox team as well,and he says the time limit thing is bogus.

 

heres his linkedin

 

http://www.linkedin.com/pub/shane-nokes/a/35a/682

 

and here are his comments

 

 


Shane Nokes ? 10 hours ago

That anonymous pastebin? Bogus.

 

Shane Nokes ? 10 hours ago

I worked on that feature until April...no it wasn't. That pastebin document was horse manure.

 

http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/story?id=19449001#.UcRTWMDD9dg

 

and

 

 


Shane Nokes ? 4 hours ago

This anonymous pastebin post is full of crap. I worked on the shared library feature, and no, that guy is just seeking attention.

 

 

 

http://microsoft-news.com/heartbroken-microsoft-employee-anonymously-posts-about-xbox-one/

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this guy worked at Microsoft,on the xbox team as well,and he says the time limit thing is bogus.

 

heres his linkedin

 

http://www.linkedin.com/pub/shane-nokes/a/35a/682

 

and here are his comments

 

 

 

http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/story?id=19449001#.UcRTWMDD9dg

 

and

 

 

http://microsoft-news.com/heartbroken-microsoft-employee-anonymously-posts-about-xbox-one/

Well, I'm just gutted that we've lost DRM again now.

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Honestly, did anyone think that 1 user could give full access of his library to 10 other users? Allowing them to complete his games without having purchased them? If the used gaming market was hurting the developers then this feature would kill them. 

 

Imagine, 1 person shares his gaming library with 10, Those 10 people share theirs with 100, those 100 with a 1000, those 1000 with 10,000, those 10,000 with 100,000, those 100,000 with 1 million.... It would be WORSE than piracy, because piracy requires a know-how and is a tad bit difficult to get into, you have to find the game, download it, crack it etc... But this "unlimited family sharing" would make it so incredibly simple to screw the developers.

 

Did anyone really believe the above was what Microsoft were going to allow. Not to the mention the developers?

 

 

It doesn't work like that, most likely you could only be in one share "circle" meaning you can't be in two families. and most likely only one person could play a game at the same time. and there was a chance that only one or two persons could access a shared library at once anyway.

 

which would make it no worse than sharing discs today for that, in some ways better for the devs, and in many ways better for the gamers. 

 

either way it wouldn't work like your scenario as even if you could be in multiple families, you couldn't re-share from one circle to another. 

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Well, I'm just gutted that we've lost DRM Library Sharing and Discless Play again now.

 

I don't usually FTFP, but I felt the need to point out that they are two different things.

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still you can't have one without the other...  well I'm sure you could get DRM without the other(and you do, disks still have DRM) but you know. 

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this guy worked at Microsoft,on the xbox team as well,and he says the time limit thing is bogus.

 

heres his linkedin

 

http://www.linkedin.com/pub/shane-nokes/a/35a/682

 

and here are his comments

 

 

 

http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/story?id=19449001#.UcRTWMDD9dg

 

and

 

 

http://microsoft-news.com/heartbroken-microsoft-employee-anonymously-posts-about-xbox-one/

that name sounds familiar, didn't he post here under the same name?

Edit: He did, banned for some reason.

post-62693-0-54090900-1371825616.jpg

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this guy worked at Microsoft,on the xbox team as well,and he says the time limit thing is bogus.

 

heres his linkedin

 

http://www.linkedin.com/pub/shane-nokes/a/35a/682

He posted on Neowin for quite a while and want to the extremes to defend anything Microsoft.

After he tried to convince me the 2.5" SATA hard drives Microsoft used in the Xbox 360 were special in some way, to ensure "data integrity & security on the platform" despite me showing him a 1TB internal drive in my 360 I didn't take anything he had to say seriously.

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still you can't have one without the other...  well I'm sure you could get DRM without the other(and you do, disks still have DRM) but you know. 

 

You could have both, the DRM would just have to be implemented differently.

 

Come on man, I shouldn't have to spell this ###### out to you.

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