It was long. All the warning signs were there the minute they announced any of their new ideas. But yes, I realize such a reversal can take time to implement, especially for a company of Microsoft's magnitude. But it's more than the fact that Microsoft simply planned the changes, or that it took them until now to change them, it is the way it has acted in the interim. Frankly, I think everything that has come out of the Xbox One camp for the past month, especially at E3, has been laughable in the extreme. After hearing them tell that the Xbox 360 is a perfect alternative for anyone without an internet connection, I simply have such a bad taste in my mouth that a mere reversal isn't enough. If there is a bully at your school who beats you and steals your money every other day for months, and then he suddenly has a change of heart and tells you that he will no longer do such things, is everything suddenly mended and forgotten? No. I'm not forgiving enough to praise or think any better of Microsoft for doing what it can to save its ship, and they'll have to do far better to return into my good books. I can only hope that enough other gamers share my feelings to leave Microsoft with a bruise.
False. Or rather, true, perhaps, in the case of Origin, but that is another service that I do not use and will not use, even though there are a couple games that interest me on it. But when it comes to Steam, the major difference is that even though games can't be traded, they are as cheap or cheaper than anything that can be bought used. According to the latest update, it might be getting share functionality anyway, it has always permitted offline play, certainly has no Kinect, and hasn't made a string of ludicrous statements. And all of that is more than enough to make me forgive it for being a form of DRM, or not allowing a used game market. If anything, Steam makes me think even less of Microsoft, because it means that Microsoft was not trailblazing a new method of doing things, simply fucking up an already well established and successful one.
