I agree that it was Microsoft's messaging that blew it. They blew it by not coming out with a complete, clear message about how the "DRM" worked and what the benefits were for consumers (e.g. being able to sell your *digital* copy, being able to lend your copy to a friend remotely, etc), and they blew it by letting the message get completely away with itself.

The 24-hour call-in was over-reaching, but instead of doing a complete about-face on the matter, changing it to a one-time call-in at install, or even a call-in every 2-4 weeks, would have allowed us to keep the intended benefits while still silencing the majority of concerns (read: almost anyone who isn't confined to a naval vessel for months at a time).

Wow, people complaining about upgraded hardware with more expanded features. Kind of ridiculous.

"Oh no, upgraded hardware! Egads, it's not evolutionary at all! Oh no! No more DRM, can't have that!".

Yeah, except now that's all it is. The consoles have pretty much the same distribution model they had in the 90's.

You guys are angry that you have to put discs in the console? Really?

I find it pretty interesting that they've done a complete and total backflip... not trying to ease their restrictions, or find a balance between old and new, but completely throwing out all of their new DRM work and falling back entirely to the old DRM system.

I'd be ok with the "always online" DRM, if you could avoid it by simply putting the disc in... When moving house here, you're usually without (land-line) Internet for about 2 weeks - having my gaming console refuse to work for that period even though all the discs and equipment are present would induce quite the ragerant.

Even with their total backflip, the FUD from their initial announcements won't just go away; there'll be rumours of "always online" requirements an "no trade-ins" floating about until well after the console hits the market... plus they've thrown out any of the positives that they could've pointed to with their new system, like the weird family sharing deal.

Meanwhile, Steam looks like they're positioning to adopt some of the positive aspects that the Xbone was trying to deliver, like the ability to share digital versions of games with your friends:

http://kotaku.com/steam-might-soon-let-you-share-your-games-with-your-fri-514219133

"Oh no, I have to use a disc!". A real shame, that.

"Oh no, I can sell my games back to Gamestop! What a terrible travesty as that's going to wreck the industry!" said no one ever, who enjoyed getting at least something for a used game they didn't play anymore.

"Oh no! I have to share games by sharing the disc, instead of the terrible limit of one share per friend per account! What sort of hell is this?!" A pretty good peak into heaven, me thinks.

1) People have complained THIS GENERATION that having to have a disk in the machine to play in installed game is dumb.
2) You could still sell your games except the plan was instead of Gamestop pushing used copies over new (so more $$$ for them) the people who made the thing would get a kick back instead. This in turn could have been reinvested and better games come out...
3) It was never 'one share per friend per account', yes you can only share the game with one friend at a time (much like now with disks) but if you want to share the game with a friend who lives on the other side of the country you have to send 'em the disk; with the system was it was going to be they could have downloaded a copy and played locally.

1. who, and where? if anything, i've always understood why they require the disk in the system, even with an installed copy.
2. perhaps this is more of a sign that games need to be more competitive pricing schemes. if microsoft had said "also, this drm scheme will reduce the price of X1 games by 10-15$", i'm sure people woudn't be up in arms about it. but when games like CoD: Black Ops are still prices at 50$ new, that's not being competitve, that's just making me want to buy a used copy.

edit: also, let's stop using gamestop as an example, what about services like gamefly?

3. yea, have fun with low data caps downloading that 20GB game. you might be fine with it, but downloading that game would cost me 4x the price of the game new. also, was this ever actually made clear by microsoft officially, or is it now wishful thinking?

Even living in the UK if I wanted to share a game with a friend it would have taken a day or more to get to him assuming I sent it on a week day and would have cost me money. With the proposed system I could have digitally lent it to him whenever and he could have downloaded and started playing right away.

I'd like to honestly ask if you do this now? or is just a hypothetical that would probably never come to pass?

You all can say what you want about the Xbox One's reversal being a horrible move, but seriously, it's a HUUUGE step in the RIGHT direction.

It's not a step at all, that's the point.. it's a continuation of the status quo.

it's a step for consumers. it means a company as big as microsoft is willing to hear the complaints, and take a step back before going under, and being completely. hell, didn't the sega dreamcast(or w/e their last console was) place the bar way ahead as well, but failed because of over-pricing, and low adoption rates. that imo is what microsoft was just about to set themselves up for.

And how come nobody complained that the PS4 was offline-ready and able to share game discs, but now that MS have reversed their stance it's a bad idea and made the console "worse"?

Because there was no discussion over this issue on the PS4 which was a loud. A few of my friends expressed a desire to get the Xbox over the PS4 because of things like no disk in the machine while playing so for them it's a step backwards.

The PS4 was what it was, a faster PS3-style console.. MS tried something new, people moaned, so now we have a faster XBox360.

If that's what people want then that's what people apparently want.. but they HAVE stripped out features and some selling points which does, in a real way, make the Xbox worse than if it had had those features.

those features, imo, made the X1 worse. microsoft could still take step forwards by re-thinking how they deliver that experiance. but they made bad moves, bad pr, and it's blowing up in their face. this is practically the only way they can save face at this point.

...snip...

I don't lend games to anyone now. It's simply not feasible to send someone in a different state a disc and expect them to send it back once their done. I've given games away to some friends that way, but I certainly didn't expect them back. With a feature like this, I would have obviously been able to share and borrow games MUCH more frequently.

but that comes back to my second point, huge game downloads are completely impractical for someone in my position. I can play multiplayer easily, and do the daily checks. but digital sharing/downloading is way outside of my reach.