Rumors about the next generation of consoles have been circulating ever since the current gen consoles were first released, but with the formal unveiling of the PS4 and the “New Xbox” all set to happen within the next few months, the rumors are starting to get more and more plausible and more sources are starting to confirm what we’ve all been hearing for months. Edge has put up a report of what we can expect from the next Xbox, according to info that they say has been confirmed by multiple industry sources who have “first hand experience” with Microsoft’s new console.
According to Edge, the Next Xbox will use new, higher capacity 50GB Blu-Ray discs licensed from Sony. Microsoft basically had no choice but to use Sony’s format, since the competing HD-DVD format that Microsoft backed has been dead for years, and plain old DVD’s don’t have the capacity needed to house a next-gen game.
Unfortunately, Microsoft will apparently disable users’ ability to buy and sell used games with the Next Xbox: all games for the system will reportedly come with one time use access codes that link the game to your Xbox Live profile, meaning the game disc will be useless if somebody else on a different system or with a different account tries to play it. The system would also be required to always be online, since even single player games would be unplayable without access to your XBL account.
This rumor syncs up with a recent patent that Sony filed that would register games with the first console that they were used on, which strongly suggests that the PS4 might also use a similar system to disable the ability to play used games.
While I tend to buy most of my games new nowadays, I still want the freedom to trade in my games or let my friends borrow them, so the news that both the Next Xbox and the PS4 might lock games to specific consoles is really worrisome, and I hope that this is one rumor that ends up not being true. It sounds weird to say it, but it’s starting to look like the Wii U might be the last home console that’ll allow users to buy and sell used games.
