Tijdens de E3 liet Microsoft de lippen op elkaar rondom haar DRM-beleid. Sony kondigde echter aan dat je gewoon met tweedehands games aan de slag kon gaan, games uit kon lenen en niet online hoefde te zijn. Microsoft kreeg een golf aan kritiek over zich heen. Albert Penello, director of product planning bij het bedrijf, had deze reacties niet verwacht.
People got in their minds that what we were trying to do was evil or anti-customer when, in fact, we were looking at what Steam does, we were looking at what iOS is going, we were looking where the customers were going and saying ‘I think we can actually give you a better all-digital experience.’ So was I surprised that people had a reaction to it? No. I mean, we knew it was going to be a controversial decision. Was I surprised how negative the reaction was going to be? Yes. We were surprised at how vocal it was, we were surprised at the reaction and the assumptions that people had about what we were trying to do. So we did the famous ‘180’.
If I had to go back and wish that I could rewind time and redo one thing, that would be the one thing. I think with time, people have understood what we were trying to do, and in fact I’m sure you’ve seen it with the fans. They were saying, ‘God, I wish some of this stuff would come back’.
Nobody debates there’s going to be a world, whether it’s this gen, or next-gen, that discs are going to go away, it’s gone away in just about every medium. I think if anything we thought it was going to happen sooner than the customer. We took a hard stance on it. I hope that in some point in the future some of those cool features – some of the Family Sharing, the household sharing stuff, the games are always with you – we want to bring that stuff back.
