How To Be A Mug By Taking Lessons From Adam Orth

Does Contain Language. And some bad jokes. So watch out.

People often ask me: Mike, as you are the most muggish person I know, how do you be a mug? How do you really be a real mug? You know; not fake, I’m talking the REAL thing. I’m guessing Mr. Orth from Microsoft gets this question a lot too.

What I don’t get about this recent Adam Orth Twitter rant is that he made it so blatantly obvious that the next gen Xbox is going to be always online that I don’t know why Microsoft are still denying it. Or at least not confirming it.

Oh, by the way; in case you are from across the seas and do not quite get a couple of the terms I just used as they might be a bit ‘English’, let me just explain. Mug means fool, basically.

Now, let us continue! 

If you don’t know, Mr. Adam Orth recently took to Twitter to voice his, uh, views on the possibility of always online systems. Not necessarily an always on Xbox, just the concept in general, although being from Microsoft everyone instantly took what he said was about Microsoft’s upcoming console. And why not? If everyone thought that the PS4 was going to be always online, he wouldn’t be defending it would he? He’d be making people hate it more so they bought Xbox instead.

It’s such a sensitive issue with gamers I have no clue why he even brought it up. Just leave it alone man. Bottom line is gamers hate – HATE – things that require constant internet connections in order to function. I can still use a third of my apps on my tablet without any internet. I can use my 3DS to the fullest without a connection too. Same goes for a lot of technical products. 

We are not in an age that accepts always online as an option. In fact; until there are satellites circling us constantly in the skies that are giving everyone 5 bar signal on all their mobile and online based products: no one is going to be happy with it.

It just won’t – and doesn’t – work. Sure, the internet gives you more options with products, however there is no way people want to have to rely on it to use the entire item itself. What’s more; the internet is way too unreliable. We may be in the age of technology and advancing all the time, but Orth can fuck off if he thinks that the internet is good enough to the extent where we can constantly rely on it.

What’s more people just don’t have good internet connections in every part of the world, if any internet at all. OK, OK, so let’s assume that the Xbox is only really relevant in internet based countries; even then it would suck. I don’t know where on earth Orth lives or what planet he is on, however there is no way, unless you live in a fibre optic or seriously high quality internet area in general, that you can get a constantly reliable signal. It’s just not possible. Sorry.

Orth actually suggested in his twitter posts that people should MOVE if they wish to get better reception, which is an utterly absurd and incredibly disrespectful thing to say. So people should move just to accommodate the shittly built console they bought? Or they could just buy the PS4 instead?

Now admittedly I’ve been a little bit harsh. A little bit one sided here. I haven’t given online only an inch. So let’s do that. Let’s give this seemingly ludicrous idea the opportunity to prove itself. So, always on, what have you got in your defence?

Actually, in reality, a console that needs to be constantly connected to the internet wouldn’t be totally atrocious. When you think about it: so long as your internet is active, you always connect your console to it, right? And it works, right? Regardless of your signal? Whether you have 1 or 5 bars of signal you will actually always be able to connect to Xbox Live; the quality of your signal is what determines the overall quality of online play, which will not change or be affected if it becomes online only. So while you can connect to XBL with minimal internet quality; it’s the actual online gameplay that will be the thing that suffers. And it will stay that way whether the console is online only or not. In truth, think of it this way: always online = the same as it is now, only you can’t use the console if you have no internet. Not so terrible? Right? RIGHT? No.

The recent Sim City game proved even more that always online is a rubbish option. Why? Because it doesn’t even matter if the next gen Xbox would be more consistent than EA’s recent Sim City game; the bottom line is that one issue – ONE ISSUE – and you are fucked. Up the ass. Hard. With a massive dildo. Studded, dildo. And not 12 inches. More like 22 inches. Yeah. That kind of fucked. OK sorry about that crude metaphor, but you get what I’m saying.

If Xbox Live gets screwed up these days, you simply continue the fun offline while Microsoft work their asses off to fix it. But if the system changes to ONLY online, then when that one problem does arise you are going to be unable to use your gaming device. In fact; this is such a liability I imagine that it would be a hacker magnet. Any hacker group is going to take a good, hard look at Xbox Live and know that if they screw that up, they’ve just virtually fucked millions of people. Is it really worth the risk of going always connected? REALLY? And what are even the benefits of always online anyway? Give me one good reason why it’s good? Exactly.

I also want to remind Microsoft, and Orth, that a console is NOT a game. The next gen Xbox is NOT a joke or a $60 game release. It is an at least £200 console. AT LEAST. And it’s one that we’ve been waiting for, for 8 years. If you release it always online only and it does a Sim City, you can’t simply aplogise. You can’t do an EA and say ‘here’s some free stuff!!! Are we cool now?’. If it fails; You. Are. Fucked. It would be UNFORGIVABLE to release it like that only for it to completely suck. You would be letting down and ripping off MILLIONS of people. Remember that, Microsoft.

I’ve done enough ranting about the next gen Xbox though. Before I leave this I just want to touch on Orth a little big more.

Brilliant

 

What he did is unacceptable. He kind of reminds me of one of those movie characters who thinks he is doing an awesome thing that will impress his superiors and earn him a promotion by defending till the death what his company are doing, when in reality everyone is face-palming as he humiliates both himself and who he is representing. And he is representing them. Microsoft can try to distance themselves from Orth as much as they want, however he isn’t some gaming journo or a tech specialist; he is a Microsoft Xbox EMPLOYEE. What he says and does, to a certain extent, represents what company he works for. Until he apologises himself and explains his disgraceful and uncalled for outburst, this will hang in the air like a God-awful smell. And even if he does say sorry; what he said in his tweets cannot be erased. He has made a lot of people angry, offended and worried about the next gen Xbox. Microsoft needs to deal with this better than how they have done so far.

To wrap this up, let me say this: Orth is a fool and an online only Xbox is a stupid idea. Let’s hope Microsoft are just playing us all in an attempt to get us more excited for the Xbox reveal and it isn’t really always on. If it is then I will be very disappointed with MS. 

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