July 14, 2023

Phil Spencer isn’t going to fuck you

The console war never changes

Well, it looks like Microsoft is going to buy Activision. While the FTC still has an antitrust suit in the works, the judge in the trial tried to pause the merger sure doesn't think it matters.1 I've made my disdain for this entire deal well known a bunch online, I'm no fan. But, the corporations won - unsurprisingly - and I don't see much worthwhile in trying to analyze how (in case you were wondering it was the FTC not coming in prepared beyond talking about Call of Duty.)

That said, something that has been biting my ass from the moment this merger was announced is how fucking embarrassing it is to talk about. Pull up any commentary or reporting on this topic and you'll immediately see it: the console warriors2. The commenters who invoke Phil Spencer like some kinda ubermensch, call anyone who's ever looked at a DualSense a "pony," and are convinced Starfield invented space. That sword cuts both ways, and there are plenty of equally numeric PlayStation owners saying shit about Redfall like Sony didn't publish the digital atrocity that was Drawn to Death.

In fairness, some of this is my own fault for having an addiction to Twitter Dot Com, a website any Tom, Dick, and Nazi with an email address and a 2nd grade reading level can access. Twitter's increasing inability to share information instead of bullshit makes it a perfect breeding ground for fans to find each other's empty heads to scream into. While the hellsite sure hasn't done this issue any favors, I also am just so frustrated that the medium's culture hasn't outgrown its original fandom issue.

As most of us poisoned by video games know full well, the "console war" is shorthand for the perceived competition between the remaining hardware manufacturers in gaming. For the less initiated, the term and the audience's place in it go back to the early 90's and the marketing battle between Sega and Nintendo. In those days, the marketing (and even game design at times) was just as much about slagging off their competition as it was telling you what a Genesis was. Shit was savage, from Sega's "Genesis does what Nintendon't" campaign to Nintendo just straight up lying3 about Sega's hardware. This persisted just long enough for Sony to enter the fray by finding ways to fuck with both companies - under cutting the Sega Saturn's price and actively using the fallout of their partnership with Nintendo against the big N to get big titles. There's even an ad of a guy in a Crash Bandicoot suit dicking around outside of Nintendo of America.

And this nonsense worked, not necessarily because it was inspired marketing - though they were advertising exclusively to young and teenage boys. It worked because video games consoles were fucking expensive and there were huge differences in those consoles. Contrary to Nintendo's insistence, the Genesis was genuinely more powerful than the SNES. Exclusives weren't just certain titles -even multiplatform titles could be entirely different. Controllers were drastically different too, which mattered more because chances were good your parents were going to go third-party for the second controller. You know, because this shit was expensive.

As the lyric goes: "Super Nintendo, Sega Genesis, when I was dead broke, man I couldn't picture this."4 Buying one console was often a family's yearly splurge. Getting two was literally hip hop fantasy. This is really where the marketing took root. If you could only have one game machine, you had to be sure it was the right one. It makes a twisted sense - a lot of your/your parent's hard earned cash went into your games, what if it was a waste? So instead, the identity of the Gamer became tied up in their hardware's brand. Because the Genesis was actually more powerful, your Super Nintendo wasn't worth it, right? 

While buying hardware for game hardware is far more mainstream - to the point where many of us buy multiple platforms - the dynamics have shifted in a way that ultimately exasperates the issue. Long gone are the major hardware differences between consoles, to the point where AA and AAA games are regularly developed for both Xbox and PlayStation at parity. Realistically, you should be able to be content with either. But now, there's a service layer on top, and this is where the fighting happens. Gamers aren't just nationalizing and defending one purchase - they're defending their monthly commitments, the libraries of digital games they can't take to another platform or sell, their friends lists, their achievement records. These fanatics aren't just fans of the hardware, they're shackled to it. The sunk-cost fallacy on overdrive. So, anything that makes the grass look greener is seen as a threat.

For Xbox fanatics, that threat has been in the form of Sony's sizable investment into quality games. Spider-Man, the God of War reboot, Naughty Dog's various Game Awards bait, and all the cash thrown at studios for timed contracts - all of it does make someone who's invested in the Sony ecosystem look spoiled for choice. So to them, the idea of a "Sony Pony" looking across the yard to see them enjoying Starfield or the unlikely future Activison game that is actually good and feel left out is the win. Even though they've gained nothing - seriously, which Activision game was going to be fucking PlayStation exclusive - they can cheer on their brand of choice.

To bring it all back around - that is what is so fucking embarrassing. It was embarrassing then, but twice as much now. At least back then these were debates about different technology and design. Now, we have grown people yelling at each other over which shit PowerPC has the better arbitrarily locked software behind it. No, I don't think it's cool that anyone who wants to play Final Fantasy XVI this year has to buy a $400-500 machine, but it is just as if not more pathetic to cheer for Microsoft's massive consolidation play - something which success will only push for more across the entire industry for literally no extra benefit to their biggest loyalists. Instead of realizing the technology in games could be used to expand beyond platforms, we've allowed them to box us in further - and people are cheering for it. Truly embarrassing.

Especially since the only good reason to buy a console is to play the AAA games Valve won't check before selling on Steam.

We’re pro-union over here on this blog, so solidarity to the WGA and SAG-AFTRA. Here’s a link to one of the ways you can materially support their efforts.

Speaking of corporations and what they think about us, did you know most video games are pretty much lost to time?

This FD Signifier video about anime and its appeal to men is very good and productive to such conversations.

Friend of the program and InBetweenDrafts EIC Allyson Johnson is correct about Pacific Rim.