How can this be?

The war is on since XBox details started to surface and the doubts were shattered on this week's E3 conference. I never owned an XBox (the market here is quite small for that platform), but surely the whispers that sounded after the Playstation announcement of the PS4 seemed too bad to be true. The worst fears were indeed confirmed this week, making the XBox One the new item people love to hate.

Basically, do you have internet? Good for you! you can consider having an XBox One. You don't? Oh... sorry about that... This means many people will be left behind with this restrictive strategy. Sure, it depends on where you live, but it's plain wrong, in my opinion. 

The explanation by Microsoft: “Xbox One is designed to run in a low-powered, connected state. This means your system, games and apps are always current and ready to play—no more waiting for updates. While a persistent connection is not required, Xbox One is designed to verify if system, application or game updates are needed and to see if you have acquired new games, or resold, traded in, or given your game to a friend. Games that are designed to take advantage of the cloud may require a connection.”

“With Xbox One you can game offline for up to 24 hours on your primary console, or one hour if you are logged on to a separate console accessing your library. Offline gaming is not possible after these prescribed times until you re-establish a connection, but you can still watch live TV and enjoy Blu-ray and DVD movies."

Microsoft added "because every Xbox One owner has a broadband connection, developers can create massive, persistent worlds that evolve even when you’re not playing."

Apart from this, you can't give away a game to a friend. And gifting is restricted to some rules. You can only give your games once and only to a friend in your friends list for at least 30 days. Isn't that a little... stupid? Yes. Stupid. Call me old school, but what's the harm in borrowing games from friends? Why do I have to carry the console to a friends house if I want to play? What if my friend doesn't have internet at home? Oh, that's right... I can't do that. Borrowing games it's a no-no for now... But Microsoft is "exploring the possibilities" with their partners.

The point is, Microsoft may have shot their feet with these features and point blank ignored all the gamers opinions. We'll see how it goes from now...