The hoopla over last week's Xbox One reveal was all about new hardware specifics and promised new features. Considering the news that came out during the following days, there seems to be more stuff that it can't than can do. Here is what we know won't be happening with Microsoft's next-gen console.
No Backwards Compatibility
Don Mattrick, President of Interactive Entertainment for Microsoft told The Wall Street Journal "if you're backwards compatible, you're really backwards." Now that's understandable considering that his studies found that only five percent of customers play games from previous generations when it comes to physical media. The question of the moment is what happens to downloadable games seeing that Xbox One is going for a new chip set architecture? They're gone unless a user keeps their original console.
Can't Play for More Than a Day Without Internet
Microsoft's Vice President Phil Harrison told Kotaku that the Xbox One can't be without an internet connection for more than a day.
"I believe it's 24 hours," said Harrison.
This means users who live in crappy rural areas suffering from unstable internet may be out of luck if its out for days. Having hard economic times and can't afford this month's internet bill? Sell your Xbox One and get a Playstation 4 because it's just that online dependent.
Won't do anything different next-gen than what's already been done
The next Forza's graphical prowess allows the Armor All on a tire to deteriorate overtime during a race, the undercarriage of the car's chrome muffler can reflect the concrete and all dumb visual trickery. This effects gameplay how? Will the series finally get things that affects a races outcome like night and day races or real-time weather conditions? Same model, new paint.
Friends can't borrow already purchased games
So your friend has Final Fantasy XX and wants to hand it over for the weekend. Not going to happen anymore if Microsoft has its way. Well, at least without paying a fee to do so. Those times of liking a friends game so much that you purchase the game yourself are over. I wonder how Gamefly and Redbox are going to handle game rentals from now on.