Ah QuakeCon 08, where boys will be boys, and John Carmack will talk at length about anything and everything! Carmack discussed briefly how the Xbox 360 version of Rage will look worse than any other version, after which he explained how Rage and Doom 4 won't appear on any digital distribution platform.
id's post-apocalyptic open-world shooter Rage (PC, PS3, 360, Mac) will look worse on Xbox 360 due to the compression needed to fit the game's assets on two DVDs, programmer John Carmack revealed at tonight's QuakeCon keynote.It looks like, at least for now, that there won't be any chance of Doom 4 or Rage making it to your digital distribution client of choice. You can read more over at Shacknews.
According to Carmack, the royalty fees to include a third disc in the Xbox 360 version would be so high that it simply isn't a feasible solution, with the programmer hoping for Microsoft to make a concession. He stressed that the issue is merely a storage problem and has nothing to do with the power of the Xbox 360 hardware, while adding that the PlayStation 3's Blu-ray format is Sony's one leg up on the competition.
Carmack also noted his belief that neither Doom 4 or Rage will be digitally distributed online, as id isn't looking into that sort of distribution for its major titles at this point.
During last year's QuakeCon talk, Carmack stated that the PlayStation 3 edition of Rage would ship on a single Blu-ray disc, with the PC and Mac versions likely to arrive in both Blu-ray and DVD form.