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No X Box for Xmas?
occam writes "Nagging question in gaming console industry seems to be whether MS will make its Xbox launch in fall (as promised). Knowing MS, it seems unlikely, especially since an unstable console isn't nearly as useful as an unstable office PC (with an army of IT heads running around to support it). Plus, despite the heavy-hitting nVidia hardware in the Xbox, every month is ground lost to the PS2 and potentially also the Nintendo Cube.
Daily radar has a good piece on the hurdles (even) MS faces with its Xbox launch, and why they'll try like heck to make their fall date.
The 7 reasons why Microsoft cannot afford to push back the launch of the Xbox.
Ironically, release in time for Christmas is not mentioned! So, there's an 8th reason MS needs to release on time."
6. See comment #7. Yes, Nintendo will ship eventually no matter what. The only thing that will protect Xbox from Nintendo, is if the Xbox is a better console, not an early ship date.
5. I don't think this is a serious factor. Microsoft is a master at creating fake companies and organizations and planting news stories. They can make the public believe what they want whether its genuine or not.
4. If there's anything history has shown us in the console industry, its that prefering timing to quality never works out. Observe the Sega Saturn -- it beat the Playstation launch, but it was irrelevant because it didn't have enough quality titles. Similar problem with DreamCast.
3. During the majority lifetime of any console its technology is seriously obsolete. Consoles are sold on the quality of the content, not on the quality of the technology that makes them.
2. Not true -- first generation Xbox games are really going to be roughly 4th generation Windows games. Optimization for Direct X and x86 CPUs is a well known process with tremendous volume of industry experience available.
1. Microsoft care about its corporate image being tarnished by a delayed product???? You have to be kidding me.
Paul Hsieh, (who still does not know how to log into Slashdot without going crazy.)
Actually the reports so far indicate that it'll retail for $200, possibly less. Microsoft has more than enough money to sell the system at a loss to gain marketshare.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
I can't attribute to this, but I've heard that "ten thousand spoons when all you need is a knife" isn't ironic, it's moronic!
"Pinky, you've left the lens cap of your mind on again." - P&TB
"I can see my house from here!" - ST:
If you're the kind of person who judges the speed of a computer based on the "MHz" then sure, you'll think the X-Box is better hardware.
The PS2 is a completely different design. It has 10 dma channels with multiply-accumulate on the data stream, 3 vector processors configurable at runtime, and bus bandwidth that makes last years mainframes look rather average. It's a 2560 bit bus!
PS2 is doing everything correctly from a 3d streaming point of view: huge pipes and small buckets. The PC design that the X-Box uses is a flawed design: small pipes and huge buckets.
This isn't to say the X-Box gets lackluster performance. It's actually impressive. But it's a forced design. They compensate for the bad PC design by throwing more local texture memory onto the video processor, exploiting video processor features to avoid using the system processor, and generally doing everything they can to avoid the limited PC bus.
The struggle PS2 has is (a) people like you, judging computers based on mostly irrelevant figures like MHz and (b) games for the PS2 must be written to take into consideration the unique design.
PS2/Ethernet is coming Real Soon Now.
I believe we need to not just have 1 article feeling sorry for Microsoft we should have an entire website. VA Linux should underwrite "microsoftdotcom.org" because we're just not seeing enough attention given to the X Box. The reason the X Box hasn't materialized, indeed 99% of Microsoft's software hasn't materialized is because of the lack of fan sites. I'm now going to drive off a cliff out of sorrow for Microsoft.
There is absolutely no reason to assume that the Xbox will be delayed.
I'd say previous history <u>can</u> be a strong indicator, versus <b><i>absolutely no</b></i> reason.
Sure MS's latest OSs are an improvement, but keep in mind that W95 was supposed to be released in '94, Windows 2000 was originally slated to be released in '97, there is a history to consider. WinME was supposed to ship at the same time as W2K but there were problems there too.
I'm not saying that it will absolutely ship on time, but to say that there's no chance that it would be delayed is equally silly.
> Irony is, most commonly, "incongruity between
> the actual result of a sequence of events and
> the normal or expected result".
Lets use your definition, why don't we.
> * rain on your wedding day
Lets see. Do you imagine your wedding day will have rain? No, I believe the expected result of a wedding day is beautiful, sunny, life-affirming sunshine, perhaps with some brilliant and vast cloud formations on an almost blindingly blue sky.
Thunder and lightning on a continual background of a monsoon downpour is neither a normal nor expected image of one's wedding day. It's not even normal or expected weather in most locations on average, though it is known to happen ("I just never expected it'd happen to me!").
> * a free ride when you've already paid
Well, lets see. Consider a context in which you'd require a paid ride, i.e. a bus trip or a plane ride. Your normal and expected result if you *hadn't* paid was that you'd have been summarily kicked out and not given passage.
That you *did* pay, but turned out not being *required* to, *is indeed* neither normal nor expected.
> * the good advice you just didn't take
What's the normal expected result of receiving good advice? Isn't it following it? If you don't follow it, and get really hammered because of it, at the last second before the hammer falls don't you say, "Great, and I was actually *warned* about this...how ironic that the one time I recognize good advice, I don't follow it."
> * the black fly in your Chardonnay
I ask for a wedding ring. I receive a sekret decoder ring. Definitely not the normal or expected result.
Oops, not ironic. Fits your definition, but not ironic. Irony has some aspect of the betrayal by reality aspect which your definition doesn't cover.
Its when I ask for a wedding ring, the perfect size, the perfect model, everything is wonderful and I worked so hard to make it so...then it slips off her finger within 5 minutes and gets flushed down the toilet(in other words--I made it too perfect). That's irony--if I hadn't worked so hard, I'd have been happier.
It is indeed irony if you wouldn't have gotten a black fly in your drink if you hadn't ordered the Chardonnay, and is indeed *made* ironic that it's in the *more* expensive drink rather than in some cheap slop.
> * a death row pardon two minutes too late
Assuming a pardon is going to happen, it's normal and expected that it'll occur before the body is smoking with tens of thousands of volts.
If it happens after, *during* the process of execution...oops.
Remember, dramatic irony hinges on the fact that the reader knows something that the characters don't. A pardon must be delivered by someone--this someone doesn't know that the person is already in the process of being killed. An execution must be executed by someone--this person doesn't know that a pardon is forthcoming. The third party observer knows both, but can't do anything--thus the song.
> * winning the lottery and dying the next day
You finally get exactly what you want, despite its inherent rarity. Then you're hit by a bus the next day.
It's not normal or expected to win the lottery.
It's not normal or expected to get hit by a bus.
If you get the former(an extreme good), you *really* don't expect the latter (an extreme bad) to happen shortly. Therefore it's ironic, by your definition.
> * a traffic jam when you're already late.
Have you ever *been* in this situation? You've got it calculated down to the microsecond exactly how late you're going to be, presuming traffic follows normal patterns and you speed a little.
When you don't NEED it to be normal and smooth, it is. When you desperately REQUIRE it to be easily traversable, it gels into gridlock.
> * a no-smoking sign on your cigarette break
Obviously not a smoker. Throw in "biological demand and expectation." It's a goddamn *CIGARETTE BREAK*, you've got all of two words to find an expectation in there.
> * meeting the man of your dreams and then meeting his beautiful wife
Perfect mates are depressingly rare. The idea that you'd finally find one, only to learn that exactly what you wanted was no longer accessible to you due to someone more perfect for them than you is quite ironic.
It's the betrayal by reality that really defines irony. It's the satisfaction of expectations, *along with a twist that makes those expectations unsatisfactory*. "Be careful what you wish for, you just might get it" is a perfect illustration of irony, and is more selective even than your standard.
I do find it ironic that english professors insist with such regularity that something is not ironic when it rather clearly can be understood as so with a minimum of situational context.
Yours Truly,
Dan Kaminsky, CISSP
http://www.doxpara.com
> Ironic doesn't mean unfortunate.
> It means unexpected. It's unfortunate
> to have rain on a wedding day, not ironic.
Unexpected for who? My primary point, which I think I proved, was that a simple definition of irony as "unexpected" is insufficient, even by those who think Ironic Isn't.
This is an interesting case of local vs. global context. Can something be locally ironic but globally predictable?
It's clearly *more* ironic when *more* people don't consider something unexpected. But, again, dramatic irony involves one set of people knowing and watching and the other set unknowing and experiencing. So there's clearly an aspect of separated knowledge in terms of the concept of irony.
Effectively, my point is that Alanis is singing about the personal perception of expected result (rain free wedding) vs. realistic possibility that actually "happened"(monsoon, which never happens on TV).
If it happened TO YOU, you'd consider it supremely ironic. You'd expect an insect in your alchohol if it was from some shady dive of a brewery, but not from a Chardonnay. You'd expect rain any other day but the one day that was supposed to be perfect for the rest of your life. And for the love of god, you'd expect to get your pardon before the executioner pulled the switch!
Irony is the betrayal by reality to an individual. It's intensely personal, and while the situation you listed was indeed much more ironic...I'm unsure it's really necessary for the personal perception of irony.
You effectively marked "active participation against the circumstance, when such circumstance wouldn't have been suffered without it" as the ironic agent. This is a definite contributer to irony, but I'm unconvinced it's a required one.
Yours Truly,
Dan Kaminsky, CISSP
http://www.doxpara.com
> I think you are confusing "expected" (as in,
> average or mean value) with "desired" (as in,
> dreamed or wished)
That doesn't help your case. On average, it doesn't rain at most people's weddings. On average, there aren't flies in expensive drinks. On average, you're not going to meet the perfect person (though I suppose there's argument that, due to psychological misdefinition, they're almost certain to already have someone...that's *why* they're perfect.)
--Dan
It looks to me that with the X-box being a simply a PIII 700 with a GeForce 3, 64MB of Ram and 32 MB of video texture RAM, as well as Ethernet and USB I.O, that the hardware alone will sufficiently beat a PS2. The Playstation 2 lacks ethernet out, has only 8MB of texture and 38MB of system RAM. and firewire/USB out.
That said, I love my PS2. I plop a disk in and play, no screwing around. The biggest dissapointment came when I discovered that I can't attach a usb keyboard and mouse for use with Quake III Revolution, which is a problem with Quake III, not the PS2. I'm also dubious that Sony will sell an ethernet card which doesn't require Sony ISP service, or some other subscription model... so if the X box is open enough to allow me to hook it up to my home network and play across the Internet I'll consider it a significant improvement over the PS2.
Except for lacking Ethernet, the hardware differences between the two appear to be noise and not significant. However, I'm willing to bet that the ease of porting x86 games over to the X-box (almost no porting whatsoever) will give this system the majority of games titles very quickly. I just hope my PS2 purchase doesn't bocome obsolete as quickly as all those Dreamcast owners...
All that said, I still love my PS2 and I hope Sony does the right thing.
--Maynard
...is the position XBox developers will be in if it's not ready when they are:
They will have a product they cannot sell, which they've been wondering whether or not they should port to PCs. Their answer will magically appear: We have to!
The port to PCs will be easier than to other consoles. That's what they'll do to raise some quick get-us-through-'til-launch cash. The result: When XBox eventually launches, its exclusive games will no longer be exclusive. (Some will even have already been rejected by the marketplace.)
Releasing a limited number of consoles will be a safer option: Then the we're-willing-to-wait-all-night-in-line crowd will get them. Once you've made a fool of yourself buying console, you're not going to tell everybody it sucks (or that the games suck). You'd just look like a fool. Early adopters always evangelize.
Eternal vigilance only works if you look in every direction.
Hmm... I can't comment on any of the unsubstantiated claims in this post, but I can say one thing, with a high degree of assurance.
Nintendo have somewhere in the vicinity of 20 developers for GameCube, which pales in comparison to Microsoft's hundereds.
More developers != better product (note for logically-challenged: more developers != worse product either). Especially in hardware, where understanding the whole (or large portions of it) is important.
Witness K7 vs Willamette. Intel had more than 5x the developers on that project than AMD had, and the result is well documented.
Have a nice day.
The enemies of Democracy are
This article is pretty fucking retarded. Take their reason four for example. The Dreamcast was released according to the schedule Sega had followed for years! The Genesis was released (a technically inferior product) way before Nintendo managed to release the SNES. The SNES had a larger palette and could output more colours on screen (65,536 and 256 respectively) than the Genesis (512 and 64 respectively). Sega tried to outdo Nintendo by releasing their SegaCD but the idea flopped because it didn't add any graphical capabilities to the system, merely some extra storage. The Genesis came out first however and managed to get its foot in the door which kept it alive dispite the SNES whomping it in most areas iincluding licensees. Sega heard the rumblings of a 32-bit console from Nintendo and thus popped out the Saturn before Nintendo's planned release date, Nintendo's console however was scrapped and its partner Sony took the technology and made the PSX. The Dreamcast's launch was intended to give them a leg up on Sony and Nintendo with their 128-bit products. Lots of people buying the PS2 already owned another console many of these are Dreamcasts.
The Xbox definitely has its work cut out for it in proving itself to be a major player in the console market. I don't think the technology is as problematic for sales as Dan Egger suggests. Everything has to do with games. A console needs to be widely accepted (the Saturn obviously wasn't) in order for people like Konami to develop their blockbusters for it. The important factor the PS2 has right now is that alot of developers have already released games and have lots in the works. The Xbox needs to show people some production shots of games people REALLY want and they need to show them off soon. No one cares how good the graphics look if the game sucks. I'm going to be picking up a PS2 so I can play the Final Fantasy series, I got my N64 off eBay for Zelda. I don't see myself grabbing an Xbox because there aren't any games planned for it that I'm dying to obsess over (I knew i would own a PS2 because FFX and XI were announced for it).
I'm a loner Dottie, a Rebel.
Yeah, same here...I loved that show.
"Welcome to the House of Next Tuesday!"
-- Veni, vidi, dormivi
. . ."ten thousand spoons" is what our lawyers will use on you for quoting Alanis without compensation. You may then petition for a knife, to end it. . .
I do agree that the size of the entertainment console market is large, but finite, and that the sooner one of Sony, Microsoft, or Nintendo comes in and claims their stake, the sooner the next-generation console will be over. However, given that there are over 30 million PS1 units out there (not counting N64 and DC owners not owning a PS1, and not counting the substantial growth in the industry as a whole), it is evident that most customers are still sitting on the sideline, and not rushing out to purchase the PS2. With two more consoles coming out in the short-term, and very few great games available for the PS2 just yet, I think most consumers are taking a "wait-and-see" attitude.
Science, like Nature, must also be tamed, with a view turned towards its preservation.
I have a Super Nintendo console copier with a built-in cd drive for loading rom images...does that count?
"That's Tron. He fights for the Users."
Lik Sang (www.lik-sang.com) is where I got mine, but the listing on the site disappeared a week after I got mine...maybe I got their last one :).
Anyway, the product is called "Gamestation" and is basically a SNES board, Game Doctor SF7, IDE controller, and CD drive all in one unit. Unsure of the actual manufacturer...the box has nothing but the word "Gamestation" and a picture of the unit, along with "Super Family Computer Video Game."
However, for many hours of rom loading fun, you can still get Bung's DoctorGB Game Boy copier products from Lik-Sang. I've got one...it rules. 'Specially since (with a 64mbit flashcard) you can load up a shitload of older games. I think I have 40 or so on my current load. All the nieces and nephews loved me at the last family reunion.
"That's Tron. He fights for the Users."
Microsoft has admitted that the Xbox will not be released in Europe before 2002. Read this article:
http://www.vnunet.com/News/1115777
Actually, the bastards that came to install the dish (so called "free install") tried to rip me off, so I plan to install it myself this weekend. I haven't encountered the problem yet, nor have had the opportunity to download the patch.
As far as I know, Ulitmate TV doesn't have a box for regular cable. I bought it because for the price of a 20 hour Tivo, I get a 35 hour Ultimate TV recorder, a dual tuner satellite television system, and a usb port in the back of the box to connect my cable modem to (eventually).
As soon as there is a non MSFT option, I'll gladly throw the Ultimate TV thingy out the door, but until then, I'll be able to record NOVA and Tales of the Gun at the same time, and then watch whenever I want.
NOVA.
That's where the satellite system comes in. I'll be able to get WGBH out of Boston...
I'm not proud of buying a Micro$oft product, but in the PVR market, I was led to believe they had the best product/service combination.
Ultimate TV is a service offering from Microsoft, that like the X-box, has little to do with PC software. Well, I found out today that they fscked that up too.
Whaddyagonnado?
maybe if they spent more time on getting the xbox ready for release and less time doctoring photos it'd be ready to ship! But seriously, MS really needs to beat Metal Gear Solid 2 and Gran Turismo 3 out of the gate. Like a lot of people I bought stinky ZOE just to play the MGS2 demo and boy does it wail. GT3 looks equally as killer. Once sony gets a few titles like this out on the market, there'll be a point where MS won't be able to catch up. Sony's release games weren't great, they've been a couple alright titles since, but the time is ripe for MS (or nintendo for that matter) to really come in and clean house, but like they say time is money...and market share.
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum viditur
> Whaddyagonnado?
But a TIVO. I'm surprised anyone would say that ultimate TV is better than Tivo. The only angle microsoft has on Tivo is the fact that it can record two shows at the same time, theoretically. (In actuality, 99% of users wouldn't be able to use this feature, since they have only one cable decoder box. Since most cable is moving to digital cable where all channels are scrambled, you can only tune to one channel at a time through the ultimate TV box.) (By the way, isn't their ad campaign the WORST?)
I have a sixty hour phillips Tivo and I'm very happy with it. I just got the 2.0 software downloaded and they have made many improvements. Tivo even hosts a open forum where they host a "hacking Tivo" board. And it runs Linux. You should be ashamed, hacker, for even considering an evil MSFT device.
To be fair though, there are some problems with Tivo's, too. Some people with old Tivo's are having stuttering problems with the new 2.0 software.
- Twid
- "When you want something with all your heart, the entire universe conspires to give it to you" -Paulo Coelho
I meant acutal production parts in the development cycle. Most console video parts are the last thing to arrive, as was the emotion engine.
There is absolutely no reason to assume that the Xbox will be delayed. Unstable OSs are pretty much a thing of the past with Windows on the PC. On the Xbox, there is only one hardware set to support and no need for all of the extra crap that might cause any problems.
Aside from the fact that the video processor is arriving a little late (Which it does in most video console development, like the Dreamcast, PS2, N64, and GameCube.) there has been no evidence that this will hold back release of the machine. If anything, having a video processor from Nvidia makes it more likely that the machine will release on time, because of existing relationships with chip fabs that allow for higher volumes of chip production early on as compared to the problems making the custom chips for the PS2.
If you want to insult Microsoft, go after their shady, anticompetitive business practices. Stability is no longer an issue, and given all of their careful work and partners on the Xbox, assuming it will be unstable and/or late is just idiotic.
I read somewhere that the real irony of that song is that none of the things mentioned in it are ironic. Maybe Alanis is more clever than we thought. :)
"Destroy science and religion. Science would re-emerge exactly the same; but not religion." - Penn Jillette, paraphrased
There's nothing ironic about Christmas not being mentioned. Irony is, most commonly, "incongruity between the actual result of a sequence of events and the normal or expected result".
Here are some other things that are not ironic:
And I don't how the hell to classify "ten thousand spoons when all you need is a knife"
--
No, he didn't write for News Radio, he's just an unimaginative plagurist.
The only "intuitive" interface is the nipple. After that, it's all learned.
"The question of whether a computer can think is no more interesting than that of whether a submarine can swim" -EWD
Please name the time, place, and circumstances under which you said you saw MGS on Xbox. The director/producer has already said "We're working on PS2 first. We'll start working on Xbox near when PS2 is done." (paraphrasing) So, how did you manage to see it?
Further, the Xbox may cache things to the hard drive, but from what I've been able to get out of developers, the Xbox docs seem to indicate that the hard drive will house only preferences, high scores, saved games as persistent data. To get things cached onto the hard drive, you'll still have to deal with initial load times. That is, the hard drive is not some magical device that eliminates load times; it only mitigates them.
And as for "no reason to buy a PS2" here were my reasons:
Now stop trolling. Thanks.
Curmudgeon Gamer: Not happy
Worse, they're launching in a recession. Selling at $500-$600 might have worked last year, but it it isn't going to work this Xmas. Microsoft may try to buy market share by selling a $600 box for $300. But that has antitrust implications. And they'll have to squeeze the retailers hard on margins.
There is no good reason to buy a PS2. For one, the graphics so far suck. My dreamcast has better looking games. The antialiasing on the PS2 is pathetic. I was fortunate enough to see a demo of Metal Gear Solid on the XBox and it blew the PS2 version away.. the difference was incredible.
PS2 has the slowest freakin load times.. usually compensated in the games by long long lame ass teaser screens.
XBox will have a hard drive.. meaning I don't have to fork out another $30 just to save my games.. also the hard drive will be great for lowering load times.
The only thing Sony did right was build up a bunch of hype over the biggest dissapointment system of the year. I love my dreamcast and urge anyone with $300 to burn to buy a dreamcast, a couple controllers and a handfull of games for the same price you would pay for a PS2.
-gerbik
Hmm, who do you think a site like planetxbox is going to be biased towards? Maybe the XboX! The playstation 2 is no comptetition to eighther of them, but I have seen video's of both gamecube and xbox games and the gamecubes look better I think. I still think that the xbox will have a little more power in the end, but not a whole lot. The gamcube has a chip from ATI that hasn't been disclosed yet to the extent that the geforce 3 has so its anyone's guess. A 400Mhz powerPC is probably just as fast if not faster than a 733 pentium 3 too.
This Wiki Feeds You TV and Anime - vidwiki.org
It seems that most peiople are debating whether the ps2 is a threat or not. That's easy, it isn't and it won't be by the time the xbox launches at this pace. I want an xbox and especially a gamecube very badly, but I have no desire to get a ps2. The real competition is the gamecube and it should be obvious to anyone paying attention. Alot of people have said they don't care about the ps2 because they have a dreamcast and the games are better, and they are. The xbox might have more developers and probly will have more games at launch but that won't matter with the games nintendo will have. Mario, zelda, metroid, pokemon, waverace, and a star wars game. When people see these, not too mention that they will be able to use the already released gameboy advance with it, the temptation will be complete. The graphics look incredible, but the real kicker is of course the actual games. Banking on seeing character's everyone already loves in a new light is a good bet. What does the xbox have? Malice? I have never heard of any of the characters in any of the games that the xbox is going to be launching. Malice? never heard of it. Dead or Alive 3? Silent Hill 2? Maybe tony hawk and oddworld, but those are cheap gimicks compared to lineup of established games that are all but guaranteed to be of very high quality.
This Wiki Feeds You TV and Anime - vidwiki.org
Why do people forget that as failed as the Nintendo 64 was Nintendo still sold double the gaming software of it's closest competitor, EA? Sure, this is due in large part to Pokemon and the Game Boy, but don't forget that while the PSX outsold the N64 in units, the N64 sold more games for the past few years. Nintendo and Rare have made a good number of the best console games in the last generation and I can't wait to see what they do with the GC.
My point is this: Nintendo doesn't have to 'learn' anything. Some people just need to figure out that they really are in their own league. Sony and Microsoft are making computers to play video games, Nintendo is making games that just happen to run on a computer. I'm not saying Nintendo is going to "win" any kind of "console war", but they'll do just fine because they know how to make games that are fun, unlike a large number of the PS2's mature titles, which tend to seem like a chore you undertake just to get to the next cutscene.
The other thing that bothers me is the assumption that Nintendo's games are for kids. I'm 23, I've been playing video games since I was four, I play Q3A, UT, Metal Gear, Total Annihilation, and a whole bunch of other "mature" games, and I still think that Mario Tennis is one of the most fun games I've ever played. The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time is the best example of level design in any game, period. Video games are supposed to be fun, if they happen to have blood and guts or "mature" themes, fine, but that isn't necessary. However, if it makes you feel any better, there do appear to be a good number of rated M games headed to the Cube at or just after launch, although Nintendo will probably only publish one of those (Perfect Dark 2, maybe, although it's my candidate for 'most likely to be delayed').
As for the non-standard media, this is seen by many as a great move on Nintendo's part. Because you can't pick up black GameCube disks a Best Buy, it's harder to pirate the games (probably not impossible, but much harder). This is a nice selling point to developers trying to decide which console to publish for. Also, they are much cheaper to manufacture than the cartridges, and the licensing fees for the GC are said to be as good as, or better than the PS2 (source: IGN GC FAQ).
My other
Is it me, or does the average Slashdotter want to see the XBox fail? Personally, I don't like witnessing Microsoft assimilate large industries into their borgness... but isn't Sony an even more evil company to have control the game industry? I remember John Carmack saying something like that.
Amen to that! I played River City Ransom for a couple hours last night, on my Nintendo Entertainment System (NES). The NES comes from circa 1985, and can currently be had for around $20 off of Ebay, with the works (controllers, cables, etc...) The games have tons of replay value (I have been playing them for around 12 years now), and they can be had for around an average of $5 each.
Yes, having the latest and greatest is always a fun thing for the gamer... but when you find yourself sitting around bored, waiting for next-gen game consoles... you need to do a reality check, and ask yourself: Am I having fun?
Don't forget the classics.
...you're wrong! $300 is the suggested price.
It's not just you. What they are saying here is:
1) We've speculated wildly that since the European shipments are unlikely to make the deadline this will extend to the rest of the world. Of course, we are ignoring the fact that the chips are in manufacturing, samples have been given to the developers, and the GeForce 3 chip that was finished up only after NVidia was done on their XBox commitments will start appearing on AGP cards in the next few months.
After saying all this, however
2) Microsoft have denied the rumour as the bunch of factless speculation it is.
but
3) Another console company has a long history of missing shipping dates to release stable and good quality product!
therefore
4) We don't trust Microsofts denial, and our speculation must be true!
Journalism at its finest once again.
"I Know You Are But What Am I?"
Sure, there won't be any more games released after another year or so, but what you're not understanding is that if the system is really fun to use now, it doesn't matter what happens in the future -- it will *always* be just as much fun. Many have claimed that they've been playing certain titles for over a year without ever getting bored. The whole gist behind video games is the fun factor (tm), which is very high (just read the reviews and comments everywhere) for the Dreamcast. Sure, there's a fight for domination in the next generation of gaming consoles, but let's not be so hasty that we all forget about what's out there *now* and give up the chance for entertainment *now* just to *speculate* about the future (aka vaporware).
If you celebrate Xmas, befriend me (538
In the truth table for fun and entertainment, where the inputs are the various existing video game consoles as well as future ones, the X Box remains a don't care for me as long as Sega's Dreamcast keeps releasing games. With Dreamcast titles being sold for $10 and $20 *retail*, and the rave reviews for the large majority of these games, it doesn't matter when the X Box comes out; I'll still have my DC!
If you celebrate Xmas, befriend me (538
With that in mind, I expect Microsoft to meet their schedule the Sony way: release just a handful of consoles so that 31337s can flood Slashdot and other forums with declarations of superiority. Everyone else and their grandma will be on a waiting list and realistically, won't get their box before late spring--which might be a blessing, because by then some of the initial bugs will be worked out. People are more likely to wait it out once they see that some X-boxes have already sold, even if not yet to them: just a few months of gratification delay and they'll be blowing away their once-cool PS2 friends.
Sure, PS2s will sell between now and the X-box rollout date, but that might have the effect of being a dare to the rest of the kids on the block who don't have a game station from this generation yet. All those kids will want the X-box.
But here are some arguments against waiting that the article didn't consider:
1. There is finally a real stampede of consumers buying DVD players, and it's not over yet. But if you have a player in your system already, that's one less reason to buy an X-box. I think DVD functionality appealed to the "prudent" side of current PS2 owners. Several of my friends said "I'll wait to buy a DVD player and get the PS2 instead"--and they did. Who will wait for the X-box depends on how long the wait is.
2. Computers can come a long way in two quarters, and the longer Microsoft waits to release their console, the more reasonable it will seem to just upgrade your PC.
Others?
Spork
You already did apologize. Her name is Shania.
/Brian
But really, its a console... a fixed platform, as long as a developer thoroughly tests their game crashes (if any) should be VERY rare
This is the point I think a lot of people are overlooking. They hear "MS Console", and start talking about Blue Screen's and such, but I doubt you'll see much of it.
Dreamcast had some version of WindowsCE running it, and by all accounts it was very stable (if you don't count the bad batch of disks that went out at launch).
Really people, when you take all that shit out of windows and only run the core (no services, a couple processes, simple memory management), it's not that bad of an OS for gaming. As an Xbox developer, I haven't found that much to cry about - at all. There are some bugs, but they have workarounds and have to do with the graphics hardware. It basically feels like DOS with a bunch of Win32 libraries... You could never run Excel on it ;)
-- This sentence is false.
As we have discussed just a few hours earlier, it will be possible to turn the X Box into a useful Linux station, perhaps even without opening the case. Therefore, there's something useful to do with it.
Second point: I've heard that Microsoft's designated price for the X-Box is US $300 - which was considered a loss for Microsoft. More sales lead to more losses (well, I know that prices are affected by the demand, but there should be a few good months when Microsoft will lose money for every box it sells.
To summarize, the X-Box will be a bunch of cheap, groovy hardware (a rarity these days), and it will be bought just for that.
Here we go again, an anti-MS article that just bashes because there are rumors they may be too late to launch for the Xmas season (which BTW, happened to Sony last year). The reason why , which everyone here seems to neglect to check out, is that the main graphics chip has not even been made yet. On paper, it is supposed to be able to render 2.1 million polygons per frame. In comparison, each velociraptor in the original Jurassic Park required 300,000. Not bad. BTW, for those of you with itchy flame triggers, I am getting this information from this month's Wired.
So, jump off the bandwagons, dismount your highhorses, whatever, and realize that youve once again been suckered into looking like idiots. This is one of the most complex graphics chips ever envisioned and having to produce it in sufficient quantities for Xmas when the fabs arent ready yet is going to be tough.
Microsoft or not, Im looking forward to seeing what this thing can do...
The ivory tower has never had to reach so h
Hey, we're talking Micro$oft here. If it looks like they're not gonna make it they'll just release a calendar update for Windows marking Xmas 2001 somewhere in the summer of 2003 and within weeks everyone will have accepted it.
Or, on the other hand, it might be that there is a serious problem with the X-Box design requiring a rethink. Perhaps the green cylon light does not work. Gasp.
Or (and this is my personal theory) there really is no X-Box. There never was. It was all vaporware to compete with Nintendo and SONY's offerings, given an arbitrary product launch timeline to place it between the two products. From what I've seen on the gaming sites, the X-Box is just a screen-shot generating device invented by Microsoft's PR department.
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A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
No, they aren't. Irony is when what something seems at face value is actually opposite from the truth. Here are two simple examples of irony:
1. A giant man named "Tiny".
2. The song "Little Things" by Good Charlotte, in which they describe life-changing events, such as their Mother's mental problems, their father abandoning them, and the social humiliation of being poor as "little things".
By the way, "dramatic irony" is when the audience knows something the characters don't which enables the audience to interpret events differently from the characters.
Consider this:
- PS2 was a big disappointment everywhere in the world... it is not likely to pose a large threat or gain much more ground.
- MS have well over 100 developers developing games for X-Box, theres gonna be a flood of games (like the PS1) and most likely they'll all be of an unprecedented quality as far as console systems go.
- Nintendo have somewhere in the vicinity of 20 developers for GameCube, which pales in comparison to Microsoft's hundereds.
The Playstation 2 doesn't pose a threat to MS... when you look at the difference in graphics quality it is clear the X-Box is almost a full generation ahead of the PS2. What MS do want to be careful about however is the GameCube. Nintendo have been working on the GameCube alot longer than any other console thats due out and Nintendo are usually capable of delivering at least decent launch titles. As long as MS doesn't get the X-Box out too far after GameCube's launch they can really release whenever they like. It would probably even be best for MS to coincide with GameCube's release since the two machines will be side-by-side, and in comparison the X-Box ought to look technically superior.
Profits are made from licensing the games.
but I'm wondering why this place based an entire article on the following snippet:
"However, we've been lied to many times in the past by console makers (*coff* Nintendo), so we can't put too much faith in Microsoft's denials."
So, because we were lied to by Nintendo, this means that Microsoft saying they're going to hit their target is invalid? Considering we're talking about Microsoft, wouldn't it have made more sense to say "However, we've been misled in the past about Microsoft's ability to hit their ship dates, so we can't put too much faith in Microsoft's denials."
If you're going to get paid to do articles, at least base them on something directly relevant.
Dreamcast does not have WindowsCE running it. It is a Sega OS that is on the disks. The Dreamcast will support WindowsCE if the game disk uses it, but very very few did.
Specifically, the free ride, the pardon and the lottery ticket. Depending on the situation, the some of the others may be as well.
On another note: Did you used to write for "News Radio"? Because this exact same joke was on last night's (re-run) episode.
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