Okay, I can sense in the Force that the time is coming when I'm going to have to make a choice. My son has a regular XBOX, so there is that to consider. Truthfully, I'm a PC Gamer, not a console guy. But the sad truth is that my PC is way behind specs on the current crop of hot games, and a lot of hot games don't even come out on PC any more. So, for all you console yodas, which is the way to go, and why do you think so?
***whoosh to press start*** I love my PS3, it is a gaming system with a Blu Ray built in. PS3 - no need to buy $100 wireless adapter - no $50 a year fee for online play - Blu Ray Player 360 - currently has a better game selection
If the Xbox 360 is backwards compatible, you could always sell the old Xbox to help pay for the cost of the new system.
I'm more of a casual gamer, these days. But correct me if I'm wrong, a PS3 also plays all the old PS2 games on it, right?
How much more expensive is it, roughly? It might be worth it- there are a LOT of old PS2 titles and some of them are probably pretty good, and can be had for cheap these days.
For what it's worth, I've been mostly happy with my 360 (of course, the first one died and was replaced under warranty) and I've finally adapted to playing first-person shooters on a console. If you happen to have an HDTV — it's a better experience than PC gaming. XBox Live has a lot of cool things going for it...including the ability to play demos and a lot of retro and smaller arcade games. And there's a lot of video options, too. Also, I'm able to stream music off my Mac to listen while I'm playing. PS3? Game selection seems small and I haven't been impressed with the render rates (in theory they should be a lot better than a 360) but maybe programmers haven't fully gotten the hang of PS3. Probably both are a good gaming experience...but you should go to Best Buy or Gamestop and play with both, use both user interfaces and figure out which one makes the most sense to you. That might be as good a way to pick as any.
The 40gb isn't backwards compatible and it goes for 400. The 80gb is 500 and is backwards compatible. I got on craigslist and got the 60gb version(not sold in retail stores anymore) for 350. It is backwards compatible but I am not interested in playing any of my PS2 games on it, the 3 games look soooo much better I'll never go back. Consider this... the 360 is 300-400 depending on the version you get, plus 100 to get it on the internet wirelessly, plus 50 more to be able to play it on the net. So you're looking at 450 minimum and if you happen to want the HD-DVD player to make it = to a PS3 you can add another 150. 360's cost more if you want them to be an equal to a PS3.
Believe it or not, some people don't want to play online. And some people will actually do the intelligent thing and hook a cable up to it, rather than pray that the stars are in alignment and the neighbor's microwave is off to push the bandwidth required for multiplayer gaming via Wi-Fi. By the way, free online play is just one less hurdle for total idiots who are going to scream "YOU FUCKING FAGGOT" into your ear over the mic. It's a blessing and a curse. Frankly, you don't need to make it technically equal to the PS3 - it's already beating it hand over fist in what actually matters - playing fucking games. People don't exactly like developing for that goofy-ass 3-to-7-if-you're-as-lucky-as-God core processor. The 360 simply has a bigger, more diverse library, and the PS3 isn't catching up. Here's the big thing for me. Microsoft just wants to make a profit, and they're giving it a fair shot. Sony thinks they're God's gift to electronics, and that's a dangerous sort of mentality. Leads to getting your ass kicked by an underpowered game console that lets you wave a hunk of plastic at the screen like a madman .
My Nephew wants a PS3 for Christmas. It really hurts to have to spend over $600 + games on something that won't be worth even 1/2 the purchase price within a year I'm still trying to get him to change his mind, but if I do end up being forced to bend over for the Gaming Gods to financially fuck me up the ass for this thing, he can be assured that this will be the ONLY thing he's getting from me this year. Whatever happened to the good old days when a $25 train set, $30 radio controlled car, and a $10 GI Joe Doll was all kids needed to make christmas great
Does your son already use his XBox online? If so he would have a cable and be used to a live account already so the wireless connectivity is not an issue. Would it primarily be used in a living area or his bedroom? If it is on a standard tv in his room then the PS3 Blu-Ray playback is largely irrelevant. Also, have you considered asking him which he would prefer?
I'll let him have a voice in the matter, but if I'm dropping more than 3 bills on a console the choice will ultimately be mine. Unless he wants it for Xmas or something. Neither one of us plays games online, at least right now. The hook up would be in a family room to a good TV. But I don't own any blu ray movies and DVD works just fine for me.
If only this were a red room thread... but since it's not... You can mute the mic retards, that's what I do. I assumed he had his own internet connection, probably wireless, and that his son was probably an xbox live player like most teenagers with an xbox. I agree that xbox has a better line up of games but the PS3 has more potential in the end because of that goofy-ass 3-to-7-if-you're-as-lucky-as-God core processor.
But mic retards are usually retards in general, shooting teammates, being assholes, etc. I've played enough XBox Live to see that - it scares me to think what would happen if you removed even that small barrier of entry. By the way, just a question about the PS3 online play - for player matching, does it allow you to submit both player reviews and to request that you not be matched to a player in the future? All I know is that it is a very valuable feature on XBL, and I hope it was also implemented for the PS3. First, I'd like to apologize for a bit of misinformation. In researching for this reply, it seems that Sony abandoned the idea of shipping consoles with fewer than six cores available for games. However, while the Cell processor can relatively gracefully recover from a core failure, they are still more likely to have core failures in the first place than traditional architectures. From what I'm reading, that means that, in all likelihood, if a core fails, it's time to send the thing back for warranty repairs. However, even with a standard number of cores, it doesn't change the fact that the architecture of the processor isn't programmer-friendly. Right now, games are still in a period of complexity that the processor can handle programming that, for the processor, is pretty inefficient. Once they start pushing beyond that, though, they're going to be getting into exceptionally complicated code, as the processor, to quote Wikipedia, "favors peak computational throughput over simplicity of program code." For PS3 exclusives, this isn't really a problem - it just means longer development times. However, in the future, I'd expect to see the end of "simultaneous releases" between the 360 and PS3, with the 360 version being released first, and the PS3 requiring a longer development time simply to push out a comparable product.
That is actually already happening. The 360 launched The Orange Box nearly a month before the PS3 and GTA4 got pushed back on the 360 so that it could release simultaneous with the PS3.
It depends on the game. In Call of Duty 3 you are just randomly paired with people for online play, team mates shooting each other was a problem. I haven't had this problem with Resistance. I play a lot of free for alls though, and your bullets won't hurt your teammates in team play. So there really isn't a point in trying to shoot them. You can screen people you play against, I just haven't really started messing with all that yet. Right now I'm satisfied with the FFA matches.
If you don't have a PS2, there is your answer right there. There are a ton of great games on the PS2 that you could literally play video games for 2 years and not ever have to play a 'bad' game. Definitely get the 80GB version. Another thing to consider, too, is HDTV. Sony comes build-in with Blu-Ray, wherelse the 360 has it sit awkwardly to the side, and is an additional add on. I've also heard that the 360 HD-DVD player does not do true 1080p. (Not sure whether it does 720p or 1080i) If you're a hard core online gamer, I've heard Xbox Live is better than Sony's online service, but again, you are paying every month for it. If you just casually play online, Sony's free online service should be good enough. M$ certainly has more games for their system, since they started a year earlier, but the big releases now usually come out for both systems anyways. In terms of backwards compatibility, I've heard 99% working backwards compatibility for Sony, and the 360 has 'hundreds of titles' that are backwards compatible.
Sony's backwards compatibility is falling with every hardware revision, whereas the 360's is improving every once and a while with an update.
I'm watching The Shining on Blu Ray right now and I'm amazed at the difference between Blu Ray and DVD. A year ago I was saying I didn't think the difference would justify the cost, now I will never go back. Marso, if you have an HDTV the bonus of getting a Blu Ray player built into your next console makes it worth while to go Sony. I know you say DVD is good enough, but just check it out in a store.
