My proposed solution to gamers upset with Microsoft: reduce the price of new games

[Keith Wallace]

You know what MS should do?

They should have some sort of option where you could turn your cloud access to each game on or off.

If it's "on", then you get all the benefits of having a mobile account. You can access your games from anywhere.

If it's "off", then the game is only accessible from that console. But you'll be able to play offline.

It would need to do an online "check in" when you toggle this function on or off, so the cloud service knows what the status of your game is. So you'd have to make the decision about the game while you have an internet connection.

I think that might be the winning model right there. It solves the concerns of all parties involved. All you have to do is require an initial check-in for the first-time use of a game, to prove it's a valid code (meaning no one else is using it), then allot the preferred online/offline option to be chosen. The one concern would be that if you went to another's house, you'd have to make sure to check all of the games you wish to play as "online," before you could do anything, meaning if you forget to do that when you leave the house, you can't play any games while you are gone.

 

[SnailUK]

I think that might be the winning model right there. It solves the concerns of all parties involved. All you have to do is require an initial check-in for the first-time use of a game, to prove it's a valid code (meaning no one else is using it), then allot the preferred online/offline option to be chosen.

The "Off" option would have to force you to use the disk. Otherwise everyone would buy a couple of games, authorise them for offline gameplay, then sell them instantly, and keep playing offline.

 

[curseoftheninja]

I think that might be the winning model right there. It solves the concerns of all parties involved.

...unless you are have it in the "on" position and you lose internet for a significant amount of time. You couldn't then switch it to "off."

 

[Reflexx]

The "Off" option would have to force you to use the disk. Otherwise everyone would buy a couple of games, authorise them for offline gameplay, then sell them instantly, and keep playing offline.

You wouldn't be able to sell something that is marked "off." It is registered as off on your account, and must be marked "on" to have the ability to sell the license.

 

[Reflexx]

...unless you are have it in the "on" position and you lose internet for a significant amount of time. You couldn't then switch it to "off."

Then it would be a good idea to make sure you have at least one single player game set to "off" just in case.

 

[Keith Wallace]

...unless you are have it in the "on" position and you lose internet for a significant amount of time. You couldn't then switch it to "off."

Actually, fun solution: Allow for phones to be read as removable media. Allow the user to store a state change on a removable device, plug into the console, and update the on/off switches that way. If my Internet went out, I could get on my Lumia 920, sign in to the Games hub and change the on/off states. The phone could then receive a small file that the Xbox One could read, you plug it into the console, go into the console settings, choose something like "manually update game preferences," and it would check the phone for the file, and update as necessary.

Actually, now that I think about it, with a Windows Phone (or any smartphone), it could be simpler than that. If they allow you to connect to SmartGlass with WiFi direct, you could power up SmartGlass, do the preference changes over cellular Internet, then push them via WiFi direct and SmartGlass.