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Hi everyone, I'm Christopher Price, CEO of MechaWorks. I saw some great questions here, and wanted to answer them directly.
First, I want to tackle System Requirements vs System Ratings. We aren't trying to replace the technical demands of games. We're creating a console-style approach to the myriad of system requirements out there.
The number one reason that game sales "fall through" is that the consumer doesn't understand the system requirements. They don't know the difference between a Radeon HD 2600 and a GeForce 9600. Many don't even know what's in their computer in the first place.
It's a huge problem in the industry.
We created System Ratings for this reason (and another I'll get to at the end of this post). Gamers will know from the moment that Full Circle is installed that "I have a mid-range PC, I can buy any game rated for mid-range systems." Or, "my netbook is a low-end system, I can buy any game that has a low-end rating, and sync it over to my mid-range desktop."
In short, System Ratings aren't for the 10% of consumers that know their GeForce GT 120 from their GT 260. It's for the 90% that won't ever understand that. We'll help them upgrade their computers effortlessly, by setting them up with a local PC tech to upgrade exactly what they need.
The "need" for gaming platforms is of course, relative. Our goal is to reduce royalties, make a hardware console that syncs games with Mac and PC, and eliminate the need to buy games multiple times (ask anyone that bought Halo for Xbox and then again for PC how that feels). But, in the process, we want to improve the quality of games... so that consoles don't wind up horribly out of date every 5-7 years.
I also want to tackle the question of if the operating system is a "limiting factor." And, that's a great question, that takes a little bit to answer.
Windows is pretty good with gaming. XP and 7 are both pretty good in terms of performance. We saw some drawback with Vista, but Microsoft is making amends. Mac OS X, there are a lot of multitasking issues, combined with the lack of OpenGL 3.
The problem with Windows is not the OS itself, but what the average gamer does with it.
Game developers do viability studies, to find out what is actually on the typical gamer's computer. And, unfortunately, most gamers have massive amounts of performance issues. The typical gamer just doesn't maintain their computer well, forcing developers to water down games. Full Circle gets Windows out of memory, solving this problem by putting the gamer in a managed environment.
For example, World of Warcraft would be much more visually impressive today, if Blizzard didn't have to worry about 30% of their customers having some form of spyware constantly interfering with the game. They have to buffer for that. Developers have to buffer for Aero, Spyware, Adware, Kludgeware, plus all the typical software that most gamers don't quit (IM clients, P2P software, etc).
For the elite gamers, these aren't limiting factors. Still, they suffer from it in the end.
Half-Life 2 got its textures scaled way down for this reason, for another example.
By taking Windows and Mac OS X out of memory, game developers will know that they have 100% of the resources on any mid-range system, that their own mid-range system can provide. Same with an Atom netbook on a low-end system rating, or a souped-up quadcore computer on the high-end system rating.
P.S. We also are sick of the royalty structure that the big 3 have built. Our hardware console's royalty structure is going to be up-front, no-hassle so anyone can build a game and be on a level playing field.
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