[zmmmmm]

They create dedicated hardware designed to excel at gaming and then sell it at or near cost. In a very real sense they create the market that games producers sell into, and the business model is explicitly centered around those software sales. They participate in marketing, branding, etc. There's a genuine holistic value exchange that happens. Apple's value exchange is almost negative. They invest nothing in gaming as an industry, charge a premium for the hardware and then add burdensome restrictions on how the software is delivered. And then they try to take the same cut that authentic gaming ecosystem players have as their whole revenue source.

[dwaite]

> They create dedicated hardware designed to excel at gaming and then sell it at or near cost. In a very real sense they create the market that games producers sell into, and the business model is explicitly centered around those software sales.

So like Apple releasing the iPhone, increasing graphics performance by double-digit percentages consistently year after year?

> They participate in marketing, branding, etc. There's a genuine holistic value exchange that happens.

You would need to give me examples for non-AAA games of console makers providing exceptional value here. My understanding is that this is primarily the role of the publisher, not the console maker.

Apple does showcase _certain_ apps on stage at keynotes, during commercials, with prime placement on the App Store, promoting special events, and so on. This is the level of promotion that I'm used to with game consoles as well.

> Apple's value exchange is almost negative. They invest nothing in gaming as an industry, charge a premium for the hardware and then add burdensome restrictions on how the software is delivered.

What is Playstation's big investment into gaming as an industry, if not for the hardware and the platform creating an ecosystem for games the same way iPhone/iOS have?

Microsoft created DirectX the same way Apple created and promoted Metal. Could you elaborate on the differences?

> And then they try to take the same cut that authentic gaming ecosystem players have as their whole revenue source.

Yes, could you elaborate on what additional work console makers have done here to justify their cut that Apple hasn't?

[Rohansi]

Just wanted to point out that Metal is another source of lock in from Apple. Although DirectX is Windows-only you can still use Vulkan natively.

[jsheard]

Kind of... Windows itself actually has zero native support for Vulkan, it's all implemented through backdoor APIs exposed by the three major graphics drivers. In practice that works well enough in Win32, but it doesn't work at all in the UWP sandbox, so if UWP had succeeded in the way Microsoft wanted it to then Vulkan would be locked out. Luckily UWP was a complete flop.

[fennecbutt]

Apple make a huge profit on the iPhone, they make back R&D costs and then some, just from hardware sale. The same cannot be said for the game console industry. Don't be disingenuous.