The democritization of our streaming future depends on next gen backwards compatibility.

I made the decision to click through with a razer's version of the el gato purchase. I had grand plans to stream a couple games as the quarantine was winding down in my state. Mixer (remember them) had a small enough viewership that a stream of only 15 or so viewers could be considered as trending. To my dismay my backwards compatible ps3, normal ps3, and ps4 could not be streamed. I had grand plans to play through the last of us 1 and then last of us 2 on the impending launch. Nothing worked. I was thwarted by HDCP. So my concern is without a beefy backward compatible model coupled with native streaming we will be forced to deal with front pages (i guess only on twitch now) that are dominated by the free-to-play du jour games and whoever has the best marketing deals. I don't just want AGDQ to be the only way i appreciate older games. How beefy do you expect each console to be? I expect the full catalog (xbox, 360 and, xbox one *not kinect games.. duh*) from day-one on Xbox Series X. I expect scraps from PS5.

I think there used to be a way to thwart the HDCP on the ps3 with an hdmi switcher hooked to an Elgato. I remember doing it back in 2015 on a stream.

PS4 has a toggle for HDCP in the system settings. It stops video streaming apps (Netflix, Amazon Video, etc.) from working, but games can be fed out to an Elgato.

@thisisacooltag: I made my best effort to no avail. I was mainly looking to do PS3 games. My xbox can do all current gen and the backwards compatible games is a nice streaming treat. Since mixer is done i really dont care about streaming anymore. People said you can stream through discord but i really liked effortlessly having xbox live friends see i was streaming. I'm not about daisy chaining devices, computers, twitter, notifications, and all that nonsense for somebody watch me stream From Russia with Love for 30 seconds before i get bored. It's just nice to have seamless streaming out of a console that at most has a power cord, controller, and hdmi cord attached.

@fourthline: The problem you're having is you need a grounds up democratization of the encroaching downturned streaming options for end users. Each time you press play and are faced with the man on the yacht saying yes please to his champagne glass there won't be room for alternatives on the streaming sea. Companies need to provide us (yes please) with unlimited streaming options and not just a two one death march in their Ninja simulator future.

@humanity: I'm so turned off to videogames right now. Subscribing to Giantbomb was a good remedy to a pandemic that i came to 10 years too late. If i never watch another stream from some nitwit on youtube or twitch it will be too soon. I've been watching bimbos do an apple watch unboxing because it's actually more quality in entertainment than TechGuru69 reading off product specs and making complaints about engineering feats that he couldn't even design the cardboard packaging right for without it causing cancer and potentially starting a fire.

I remember being an impressionable youth that wanted deodorant and cologne before it was even needed. It saddens me to look at the viewer numbers for some of these streamers. Each 1 represents someone probably that's probably 5 to 10 years younger than they claim and really think this is the path to ... anything. Look at hollywood and california. It (not speaking of all citizens) is the urine catcher under the urinal for people that think they can do or be what they see on television. Our car dealerships are full of athletes that thought they could be the next whatever and now their name only has enough value to sell a 2007 Camry, at a discount.

@fourthline tone it WAY the fuck down right there. I get you are cranky because hdcp sucks but there really is no cause for that level of vitriol and elitest behavior toward the people who DID figure out how to set up their rigs. And random people who seem to have wronged you? I can't really tell where that was going but it was shitty as hell.

That aside: I kind of disagree with the premise of the thread. Or, more pointedly, I think it is missing the point. The folk who want to put the effort in can always find ways to make compatibility work. And the people who just want to hit a button have more and more built in streaming options that are pretty much plug and play at this point.

Where things become kind of messy is when you go back just far enough that "it should work" but not so far that you are doing completely crazy stuff to get it working. In terms of backwards compatibility for gems it was always funny how windows 95/98 stuff was the hardest to play because dos/3.1 you would just dosbox and 2k and on didn't need any compatibility. But god help you if you wanted to play Chaos Gate on vista...

And that is kind of where we are with streaming. Plenty of folk have setups to get video out from their nintendos and the like. Others might just have OBS capture the emulator's window. Where things get messy are ps3/360 where they are new enough that emulators aren't a great option but old enough that you still need to jump through a few hoops and talk to a few people who know some people.

But as with everything console: the answer to "I want to do something that isn't standard" is "do some crazy shit and probably use a PC". Whether that is getting external streaming hardware or emulating an older console because it is more reliable than the decade or two (or three) year old hardware.

@gundato: Maybe i can get a worm light for my gameboy and a power brick while i'm at it. As i make console purchasing decisions (a PC is my 9-5) I'm already spoiled by my smart TV and really dont even want to hook up a console. I loaned my xbox to my dad and my roommate because I'm tired of just playing games in this pre console limbo we are in. If i never purchase a PC again i will be okay. What am i doing my taxes? Printing out yard sale fliers? Maybe i can get some sick clip art on disc. The amount of crap you have to put together to get a thing to do a thing is obnoxious. I'm probably going to skip out on next gen entirely because I've got sports back on TV and i played what would have been about 5 years of my natural gaming tendencies during quarantine so i think im good. Nothing new is coming down the pipeline anwyay. The goldmine is in the titles that i didn't play. My gaming knowledge of the past is similar to how commercials have tons of sound bites.. and you've actually never heard the whole song. I want backwards compatibility.. not the remix of the same junk. Give me the original junk.

Would your streams feature your relentless conscious thoughts?
If so i'd tune in to that, there's only so much mayhem i can receive from text.

@cikame: thanks for the support. Question mark? I’m thinking about writing game reviews framed around movies I just watched. I really have to get my head wrapped around it. Let me stream of consciousNess that. So I saw ‘My friend Dahmer’ last night. Not a great movie. It’s got that whole actor doing physical acting overemphasizing someone’s gait or really going for an accent when they themselves (irl) are Irish playing a German Klingon. I hate that. So if I want to write a review for Wolfenstein the New Order id say... i struggle here... I’m taking a shower and it will hit me ... then a commute. I expect while I get the caramel machiatto from mcCafe I always get I can sort this out. I’m still on the toilet let me flush and grab my towel for a shower.

Super cereal now. Got it. Friendful, focused, and on a sustained rage. BJ blaskowitz is not Jeffre Dahmer. A high school campus is very much like Nazi germany of 1946. In this alternate universe where 1 or 2 of Germany’s extracurriculars proved fruitful enough to sustain them through 1945, 1946, and beyond. German fines themselves king of the lunchroom. Able to convince everybody that their spasms are genius and their flair is worth documenting. (One of Dahmers friends likes to draw scenes of him as heros or inanimate objects)

Yeah I’ll work on this and get something out by Friday. When reviews of Hexic are climbing the top of the charts you gotta do something. All talk no write from the peanut gallery.