Any technical reason for the press start screen?

TheGreySpectre

TheGreySpectre

Limp Gawd
Joined
May 1, 2005
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439
It seems like a good portion of console games have a "press start" screen prior to the menu screen. I've noticed this on everything from Assassins Creed to Mirror's Edge to Bulletstorm to Crysis 2. Is there a technical reason games need that, it always seemed like an extraneous step to me. the screen shows it's head in PC games occasionally, but generally only games that were developed for console. I'm just curious if anyone knows the reason for the screen?
 
I don't remember where I read/heard this so it could be all wrong. But I seem to recall that it is a carry over from arcade games. The "start screen" would run with some type of video, gameplay or rendered, in the background. It would advertise the game and prevent burn in on those old CRT cabinets. In my mind it makes sense for an arcade cabinet that may be on for 12+ hours a day, where a static screen (player/level select) would burn in quickly. Nowadays I guess it's just a tradition thing as opposed to serving a real purpose.
 
give you a chance to load the game and it waits for you to come back in case you walk away while it loads?
 
You're not making any sense, if there is already a main menu, what do you need the Press Start screen for? They serve the same purpose.
 
To make sure your controller is connected and it's not simply the game freezing? lol :p
 
I can't think of any technical reason either, and am guessing that it's a leftover design from the arcade era as well. In my mind, I equate "Press Start" on console games to "Insert Coins" on coin-ops.
 
Cuzoe said:
I don't remember where I read/heard this so it could be all wrong. But I seem to recall that it is a carry over from arcade games. The "start screen" would run with some type of video, gameplay or rendered, in the background. It would advertise the game and prevent burn in on those old CRT cabinets. In my mind it makes sense for an arcade cabinet that may be on for 12+ hours a day, where a static screen (player/level select) would burn in quickly. Nowadays I guess it's just a tradition thing as opposed to serving a real purpose.
Click to expand...

I believe this is right and I think it's called the "attract mode" or something like that.
 
There are absolutely no reasons for the "Press start to play" screen, it's really pure historical from consoles. The first of these were games that were direct arcade conversions, while the arcade version would say like "Insert coin to start" that sounded stupid on consoles and so it was renamed to "Press fire to start" (Yeah there were times when console joypads did not have start buttons). It's really just sentimental crap, no technical reason for it today.
 
It's a cue for the user to load their profile. Not really necessary on modern consoles since user profiles are system-wide as opposed to being game specific in previous generations, except in cases when the user loads his or her game without signing in (at least on the xbox 360 and Wii; can't say if the same thing happens on the PS3).

edit: Besides, I would find it very annoying if my favorite game autoloaded Profile X when my profile is Y, especially since I share a 360 with my siblings.
 
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