Slashdot Mirror
XBox Released
Gallowglass writes: "Salon has written a review of the Xbox which damns with extremely faint praise." There was a big hoopla in Times Square last night, but apparently no one pied Bill Gates. So, for all you poor souls who lined up to give money to the borg: does it work? Any blue-screens yet? :) Update: 11/15 15:23 GMT by M : Okay, I'm sorry. That's green screen of death, not blue screen.
Can I play pong on it? If Not why not?
The movie with the Riddler? Where he creates these boxes that sit on your TV and take over your thoughts? Are we sure that was Jim Carrey and not Bill Gates in that costume? :)
Microsoft: "What do you want to think today?"
Nosce te Ipsum
If the Xbox does not have GTA3 then it is not worth the money.....besides, we all know that it takes MS 3 times to get it right....to bad that in the console market a 3rd time can take you 10 years to get to....by then the Xbox will have been stomped on by PS5
I am the Alpha and the Omega-3
I own a PS2 and am quite happy with it. However, I plan on keeping an open mind about the Xbox and the GameCube. Anyone else remember the damning the SNES got when it first came out? And how popular did it get?
"All mankind is at the mercy of a handful of neurotics". - Norman Douglas
the register is also carrying a story about this. it talks about the uk release date as well as containing links to sites with more info on where to buy it and where you can test them out.
...take a look at C|Net's review of Microsoft's strategies with the Xbox. Bottom line of their article is that Microsoft has had to put on a completely different face to court developers for their game console, switching from monopolistic tyrant to play-nice we-want-to-help-you-succeed hardware investor. According to the quotes cited, it's worked, too. So far.
Last night, here in Columbus, they started advertising the games pretty heavily. I saw ads for "Halo", among others.
I don't know if it was just because of my cheap tube, but the images shown were a bit "grainy". Not exactly what I was expecting from a 21st-century gaming console.
"Send an Instant Karma to me" - Yes
People are going to find out pretty fast that it's a PC in dressup. Gimme a PS2 and some evil GTA3 action any day. I'll just go ahead and get a better video card for my existing PC...
Luck favors the prepared, darling.
I have it. I've played it. The bottom line at the moment is: *shrug*. It's extremely difficult to see how this is any different than a PlayStation 2. If you're expecting something miles beyond the PS2, then you'll be disappointed. From my point of view it's a PS2 with different games.
Halo is Yet Another First Person Shooter. I was expecting something revolutionary. Don't get me wrong, it's fun just like Half-Life and friends are fun, but it's simply other game of that style. It isn't a great leap forward. Arguably it isn't any leap forward.
The problem here is that people instantly lambash the box without thinking of the ramifications. Basically:
- It's a strong PC with great graphics. In the living room. The centerpiece of the family community.
- It is a console to actually push competition and strengthen games. Other consoles from here on out are going to have to consider putting an ethernet card on board. Or a hard drive. Competition is always good (even non-franchise reliant Sony is getting stale at this point).
- It's just another system. It's not the antichrist. Bill Gates personally doesn't take a cut on each box (in fact, cuts are probably taken out of HIM).
Let's think about that first one a good deal. A real PC. In the living room of thousands of people -- people, additionally, who wouldn't have thought of putting a PC in their living room. Why doesn't this get more people excited? It does for me. Naysayers like to tout X-Filish conspiracy theories about MS owning the world. It's not going to happen. Other companies are going to expand, reject, and strengthen parts of the box with 3rd party peripherals and software. The dream of having some kind of decent server in everyone's house will finally be realized.
Even if you completely reject the box and all it's strong points, you've got to admit THE CONVERSATION IS GOOD. Unfortunately, even with a thousand comments, Slashdot editors won't learn that this is one of the things we want to talk about. And quite frankly, I still like to follow the average Slashdotter's opinion over hype.
Now Gate's will finally understand failure!!!!
Oh, that's not fair. He understands it, alright. I've got one word for you: "Bob".
What's your damage, Heather?
Is this my imagination, or does slashdot take its anti-microsoft bias into everything they do?
I mean really, linking the xbox release with one totally negative article, while other sites have given it a much better outlook.
Please try to be fair here slashdot.
XBox's crash screens are Green, not blue. Unless that was a change.
XBox, Colecovision and 3DO M2 all prove that muscle != success.
Non impediti ratione cogitationus.
Microsoft always spreads fear, uncertainty and doubt (FUD) well in advance of its lame products, so as to dissuade early adopters from buying a truly excellent product such as Ken Kutaragi's Play Station Two with the Emotion Engine CPU chip. Now that an outside-Japan Linux add-on has been spoken of but not yet offered for sale, it is worthwhile to avoid the probably boring X-Box and wait for an awesome Play Station Two serving as an Internet-ready Linux workstation and DVD-player.
So should I upgrade my PS2 with the optional ethernet/HD? Do I order a new gamecube to play Luigi's Mansion? Do I contribute dollars to fatass Ballmer's checking account? If only we lived under the Taliban we wouldn't have these problems.
What's next, Ars Technica's take on national health care?? Tom's Hardware celebrity gossip? If you're going to post a hardware review, you should aim a little higher than the online version of "The Nation". Surely someone that knows what they're talking about has reviewed this product?
It just accured to me. Will M$ try to stop people from reselling Xbox games like they do when you try to resell thier software? Honest I'm not trolling I am really curious do you think they will try this? Because they won't make any money off of second hand games.
http://Lenny.com
4 great justice!
Once again Micro$oft figures out a way to screw a new group of people. They convinced most of the bands to give them the music for free. The story is here (NYTIMES reg req.). The bands did it for the publicity but guess what, there are no credits and you can replace the music with your own.
Last night I went to a local K-Mart to do some shopping. Turns out that although the sales guy said that they had piles (I think his exact words were "tons") of Gamecubes in the back, they only had one single XBox for sale. Some guys who came in right after I did were extremely relieved that I had no interest in the XBox. I guess I should have said that for $50 I'd leave and let them have it. Oh well.
-Steve
But if you like FUD, let it flow...
that was more an Idea from gates wife that from him. so realy, he has never had an idea that failed.....mmostly because he would push it and keep pushing it by way of brute force until enough people got the idea and wanted it.
I am the Alpha and the Omega-3
If I wanted a PC, I would've bought one. I'd rather have the Playstation, which plays both the new AND old games, DVDs and CDs. It looks cooler, to boot.
Microsoft sure is spending a LOT of money on advertising though. I keep seeing Xbox commercials (or rather games FOR the Xbox). Judging by the pictures though, I still think the PS2 blows it away.
Well, for the N64 at least, Goldeneye had crash bugs. Turok (both, I think) had crash bugs. Zelda:OOT had crash bugs.
Vintage computer games and RPG books available. Email me if you're interested.
At a bare minimum, this means that we're closer to Halo will shipping for the PC & Mac. I expect they'll start porting it within the next month, if they haven't already started. Of course, they won't release it for at least half a year to a year from now, but it's a start.
It's pretty sad when I have no interest in the system itself, but find more significance in the software that will become available for other platforms shortly after it's release.
As a gamer that hearkens from the 2600 days, I am far more excited about the Gamecube than the X-Box. I can't wait to experience Miyamoto's Pikmin, SW:Rogue Squadron II, Perfect Dark, and the next Zelda (I like the 'toon look).
The problem is that the X-Box stole Halo away from the PC and, more importantly, will have Shenmue II next fall, according to IGN.
*Sigh* It might warrant making a friend who owns an X-Box.
Ah, well. Here's hoping my Cube preorder gets shipped early.
quit your fucking whining.
update comments set karma=-1, reason='offtopic' where sid=26315
I remember when I had Iron Tank for the NES. There's one point where if you take the route to the left the game will ALWAYS lock hard as soon as you drive your tank over a specific point. Not Nintendo's fault of course, but irritating none the less. Especially with no way to patch it.
-Steve
All of the Xbox demos I have seen at various Targets (Midwest equivalent of Wal-Mart) have been locked up. Thiw was as of a couple of weeks ago. As an embedded engineer, I have always been surprised at the MTBF (is that metric work for consoles too?) of console systems. The XBox really is just Windoze and a Pentium, with some proprietary hardware thrown in; What does that equation add up to? Of course, Dreamcast was a Super-H + Windows box, and I don't remember it having painfully evident problems.
.\\12
You should have pre-ordered them, but you can still get in line to get your XBox Bundles.
I only post comments when someone on the internet is wrong.
I was in there this weekend and they had over 15 ft of shelf space dedicated to X-Box controllers. Another 5 ft dedicated to their paltry selection of X-box games. No X-Boxes of course (now they can really party!). They had their X-Box demo displayed front row of the store. I thought "well fine, its dumb to waste that much space, but its new"
Then I noticed they had both their Playstation and Playstation 2 demo machines disabled. WTF? Do you get special discounts from Micro$oft for that? Between that and their checkout monitor video displays and numerous store displays for Windows XP it was just icky.
Check this picture
Or this other one
More on The Register
I still can't, for the life of me, figure out why a game console would have a hard drive. That just says "complexity" to me. Something I definately DON'T want from a game console. Game consoles are designed to be played after smoking a bowl and curing up in front of the TV with a bunch of munchies. Besides, hard drives fail. They fail on a regular basis. What happens when the hard drive fails ina game console? I think I'll stick with my PS2. I'm very, very happy with it.
So, for all you poor souls who lined up to give money to the borg: does it work? Any blue-screens yet?
:-P
Can we be more dramatic??
A bit biased?
How about you give the world a day or two with it before we start condemning it, k?
And don't give me that "It crashed in the demos", cause when I worked for a software store when the DC came out, it crashed plenty (and the local stores didn't have any problems).
I'm going to give MS a fair chance, like a good un-biased person
Good quote, too many chars. Seriously, the slashdot 120 char limit sucks!
I've never heard so much moaning about competition. There's an article on The Register where Kunitake Ando of Sony pretty much admits XBox dusts PS2 and that Sony is already (reluctantly) looking into PS3. Here is Japan the feeling is that the Japanese own the console gaming industry and that U.S. software (and hardware) companies are lame, lame, lame, and just don't get it. Of course, they said the same thing about Korean LCD makers a year before Samsung and friends took over the LCD industry (previously dominated by the Japanese). At least the X-box gives the U.S. software gaming industry new impetus for some fresh gaming start-ups. Why cede the gaming industry to Japan?
X-box IRCC uses an Nvidia chipset. if NVidia sticks to it's tradition of not releasing the specs of the chips, only binary drivers, a port of linux to the X-Box is not a likelly thing to happen.
What ? Me, worry ?
(Redmond, WA) - Bill Gates, chairman of Microsoft, today announced a launch date for a second edition of the X-Box. At a press conference today, Mr. Gates described the intentions of his company in developing the Second Edition of X-Box. "The system, nicknamed 'Box the Second', or 'BS', will carry console gaming into new heights, and continue to develop the synergy that grows between computing and consoles." When pressed for specs, Mr. Gates gave a list of specifications that almost exactly matched that of the original X-Box. Except for one difference: "This one is purple."
"You're never ready, just less unprepared."
If so, ill give $1 to the first distro to supports the xbox arch.
Where he creates these boxes that sit on your TV and take over your thoughts?
That neon green Xbox logo sends out microwave pulsations to your brain to the beat of the Madonna song played on the WinXP commercials. Mysteriously, on our next visit to Best Buy, you pick up a copy of WinXP:
Wife: Honey, I thought you only ran Linux?
You: Microsoft for life, babe.
And on top of that, software faults are generally in direct proportion to the complexity of the software (barring some revolutionary software development technologies). I would not be surprized if there were some little faults hidden in the XBox just because it's that complex of a device, and it isn't of much merit for people to run in and claim that their Pong machine never crashed.
is the hardware itself..
:)
:)
The launch titles suck.. Rehashed fighting/racing/whatever games.. extreme sports, extreme driving, extreme first person shooters with a console controller..blech..
But what we've got is a pc.. Fast as hell nvidia chipset, hardrive, network card, dvd drive..
Tell me someone isn't going to turn that into some cool as hell hardware.. slap a bigger hardrive into, make an mp3 box.. slap an even bigger hardrive into it, turn it into a pvr..
Take it even further.. turn it into the convergence device people have been talking about for the past 10 years.. Except instead of paying 999.99 for it, buy it for 299 (or less when the price drops)..
I think as a piece of hardware its got great potential...
As a console.. well its motsos.. (More of the same old s..t)
lastly.. for your truly rabid anti-ms people..
The XBOX represents the only true way you can DIRECTLY damage microsoft through buying things.. Every unit they sell is sold at a loss.. Buy one.. Hack the hardware.. make it do stuff its not supposed to do.. And don't buy any software for it
Okay maybe the logic's a little spurious.. But it sounds good on paper
So, for all you poor souls who lined up to give money to the borg: does it work? Any blue-screens yet?
Yeah I don't like MS and I been a Linux user for 2 years not, but that don't mean I'm not going to go out and bash them left and right. Hell try out the Xbox and see if you like it. I don't like the price and the feel of most games because it's to PC like, but on the other hand I do like the joystick. When it comes to a game console it all comes down to is the games. Not what companies release the game console. Even though I would want Microsoft to get a hold the console market.
From Zero to Hero... Starbuck Zero
I never had my Nintendo crash during a game, but remember having to blow into the cartridges (because kids don't worry about getting real cleaners)? It used to take 6 or 7 tries before Super Mario Bros. would load up. But, I kept playing anyway.
Crashes during games would probably upset more people than crashes before games, I suppose. We'll see how it pans out.
But since MS is losing money on each unit sold, (at least it was reported that they are losing money per unit), isn't this like taking money from MS?
Looking for any old 8-bit Heathkit/Zenith software/hardware - http://heathkit.garlanger.com
I know it's just a matter of a few weeks before someone has linux running on it and the disk upgraded to 60GB.
The Dreamcast has had networking for years...
It's now the Green Screen of Death. :P
"Networking" can be achieved by hooking up multiple xboxs together, and they are going to have internet adapters by summer 2k2 (same page).
Good quote, too many chars. Seriously, the slashdot 120 char limit sucks!
Umm - I believe one of the features of the x-box is that it comes with a built-in network adapter.
Of course, I don't follow console wars that much since the demise of the Dreamcast.
X-box looks nice, somewhat large unit compared to gamecube;s small profile, but the graphics are nice, detailed and crisp (on the football game they had at bestbuy at least)
The controller is a little un-wieldly, if I were to get an X-box (my little bro wants it for christmas) I would definately buy different brand controllers.
I hope to die peacefully in my sleep like grandpa, not screaming like his passengers.
I think that our approach, as compared to some of the other console manufacturers, is to invite creative independence to come to the platform and really do some magic. To steal from film industry examples, I want 'Run Lola Run' . . . [and] 'The Blair Witch Project.' I want those types of zany things that don't really fit into the mold to find their way into Xbox. ...
It sounds like the strategy Indrema, the first linux-based console. Indrema is now dead
Hello? The Xbox is the only console out there that comes with an ethernet adapter *built-in*!!
What's up with that?
While GTA3 is a pretty impressive game, really how long can it carry a system for? I've never actually played it but merely read reviews, but it seems like the kind of game that would get tiring really quickly (i.e. I've read the AI players aren't AI at all: They're on rails doing the exact same thing every time. Coming from games like F1 2000 CS I would find that unbearable).
This situation really is a riot because technically the Xbox absolutely stomps the PS2 (and it demolishes the Nintendo. Despite the ramblings that they are "equal" on the Salon article, the reality is that graphics power is 95% of a game machine, and the graphics power in the Xbox brutalizes the Nintendo. That's ignoring the 3d audio processors, etc.) so it's just a matter of killer games (and some reviews have been falling overthemselves to proclaim Halo the best game ever, so perhaps it already has one). Now wait just one minute...where was that last time I heard that argument? Why it was with the PS/2 launch! For those with selective memories, the PS/2 launched with a pile of shit games, and only recently got a "killer game" by way of GTA3.
Sony seems to think the xbox is going to force them to abandon PS2 sooner than they anticipated....and roll out the PS3...check it out here.
Full Story
--GuntherAEPi
"
Can somebody please make an unbiased review. How can you expect a good review of anything when the first paragraph attacks Microsoft...
Yeah, but it's a PC with a fixed set of hardware.
Boy I pitty the PC game developers having to make sure their games work on all the different video cards out there, having to pick a common feature set or having the game not look too good on the older cards. With the Xbox they can milk the display for all it's worth. (Wonder what chipset MS chose for this and how good it is). Ditto for the sound system.
Okay, my bad. Must have been mis-informed about the network adapter. Silly donut.
I hope to die peacefully in my sleep like grandpa, not screaming like his passengers.
From the Salon article: It's already drawn the interest of PC gamers, who often dismiss console games as brainless kiddy fodder.
Maybe the reason it drew interest from us PC gamers was that Halo was announced ages ago as a PC/Mac game, a situation which changed dramatically when MS bought out Bungie?
I'm not alone in being extremely disappointed in Bungie over this. I remember desperately looking forward to Halo a year ago, but now I probably won't even buy it. (And not out of spite; by the time the PC version is out, I'm sure there'll be much more attractive games available. That's if the PC version ever gets done at all.)
-- If no truths are spoken then no lies can hide --
The stop button on MS's version of IE is exactly like the X Box logo. They must have the same designers.
I noticed the other day that http://www.futureshop.ca [Lazy Link] has had their site taken over by MS for the XBox. Now I dont mind advertising, but, having something pushed in my face like that when I could be shopping for something like the GC kinda upsets me. I know major retail stores do tend to play favorites with certain companies but this is over the edge I think. So, do you think stores should be monopolised (heh) like this?
An optimist believes we live in the best world possible; a pessimist fears this is true.
Why do you really care what country certain
industries are based? It's quite possible to
make games for it regardless of where the hardware
is made. There's no good reason that you should
choose to identify more with an american company
than a japanese one -- they're all just people.
For every problem, there is at least one solution that is simple, neat, and wrong.
you claim things are good (such as having a PC in the living room or having an ethernet or a harddrive on a console) but you don't explain why these things are good.
i'll tell you my take; both of those things are not good in and of themselves.
i don't have my PC in my living room, it's in my bedroom. the console is in the living room with the TV. i play different games on them, completely different (RTS, RPG on the computer, Gran Turismo, Mario, Zelda, Final Fantasy (which are not RPG IMHO) on the console.)
an ethernet connection on a console isn't some gaming messiah. there are currently no games which i could see benefitting from this on any console, nor any in the future. same with having a hard drive. great, it'd lead to faster and more saved games. dandy. personally i don't run out of space on my memory cards, but that's me. this by itself is not a reason to buy a console.
as this salon article says (and i hate salon), it's the games, stupid. great games sell consoles, mediocre games sell a few as will the flood of adverts that MS has put out.
but in the end, there are no interesting games for the console, thus it is uninteresting and will ultimately fail.
personally, i'm spending $700 on a new computer which has more than twice the power (and 5 times the storage space, and that's nothing) of the X-box. there are actually interesting games for this computer i'm buying; civ3, dark ages of camelot, max payne (which i still haven't played), et cetera.
anyway, this is a dead horse i'll stop beating it.
...dave
Think different? I'd be happy if most people would just think...
They are really cheap on on eBay.
"My mother never saw the irony in calling me a son-of-a-bitch." - Jack Nicholson
And where can I get them?
Why do some of you want to help Bill Brother to be the master of all the technology oriented markets ?
I personaly think it's better to have the right to choose, and always investing in the same company ( the same that want to be present everywhere ) will not help at all.
I know the concurents are also big ones ( which prove we can them ), but I don't want to accept M$ on this market, especially because they nothing better to provide than the others.
It might not mean a linux port worthy of writing games for, but it would be a linux port. After all, the dreamcast port doesn't support GLX, as far as I know.
Besides, as has been said many times: X isn't linux :)
Well, that's good for the small percentage of the population that wants to play against other people, and the ever smaller percentage that has high-speed connections at home. For the rest of us who just like good games, it's a big "so what?" Not everything needs to be networked just for the sake of networking.
The Gamecube can also take advantage of HDTV's (progressive mode).
I was scanning posts to see somebody hadn't beat me to it - think of a relatively nice PC with superb graphics and a lot of other bells and whistles - all at $300. If you could buy these in bulk and turn them into a nice internet appliance with all sorts of multimedia features, that be a truly ironic kick in the pants to MS.
It be great if half the people who bought them didn't buy a single game.
And when MS starts complaining, all I can ask is why they didn't see it coming. Of course, the XBOX will probably come with some shrink wrap agreement saying you can't do jack to it, so we'll all somehow be violating the DMCA if we try to hack it - no hack websites, because the government flunkies will bow to the will of MS (just like they did with the RIAA and MPAA).
Oh well, you can't keep a good hack down for long. I may actually put off buying a second "real" PC until we see what we can do with one of these.
Stupid sexy Flanders.
I haven't seen the XBOX itself yet, but I can here at least one of my roommates downstairs, howling periodically at it, probably playing DOA3. He's also blocked out the next 5 or so days for playing new games and nothing else. yikes.
gigantino.tv - Heavy but weighs nothing.
being a big cross-breed between RTS and FPS.. but MS required bungie to orient it more toward the X-Box.
i mean, how would an RTS really play on a console? those that have been ported over have been very poor echoes of their PC versions.
oh well
...dave
Think different? I'd be happy if most people would just think...
NYtimes article.. For MusiciansX box is no jackpot.
I guess they didn't get to be rich by writing a lot of checks.... (thanks homer)..
Forgetting the fanboy comments for a minute, I'm really curious as to what the Xbox launch was like in places around the country. Here in Atlanta, it was pretty embarrassing. I hit a couple of Best Buys and WalMarts to see if the crowds were as crazy as the PS2 release. At 2 stores there were a handful of people and at 3 others there WASN'T ONE PERSON IN LINE! This is after 11pm too, so I must say I was surprised. I think the folkes at Best Buy were a little confused as well.
So what was it like everywhere else?
(Please mod up so we can get some kind of useful thread going on this story)
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe that you get that message when you try to put a non-X Box CD in the system. So its not really an error because of the X-Box, just a really horrible way for MS to have worded and displayed the message.
forma3
I, for one, would be pissed off to find out that Bad Religion got no money love out of Crazy Taxi. Music can make a game, it shouldn't be given to a megacorporation without compensation.
-sk
Typically games on console platforms are better or look just as good as PC games despite the hardware on the PC is superior. This happens because game developers can optimize code for the specific platform. Will developers for the Xbox do this as well? Or will they still want to release PC versions down the road that will cause them to write for the lowest common denomenator. Thus causing the software to suffer. It seems that if Halo was targetted to be released on the XBox from the start and not for the PC would it have looked better?
Yes but every time I try to see it your way, I get a headache.
One wonders if J. Allard even knows that "Run Lola Run" was actually brought to us by Sony.
Unless Sony is suddenly a German company, this guy needs to get his facts straight. The only part Sony has in this movie was buying the distribution rights a couple years after it was released.
Hammer of Truth
www.xbox.com isn't responding !! HTTP Error 500-13 - Server too busy
Internet Information Services
My copy of Zelda: OOT has never caused my N64 to crash. I wonder if you could be a bit more specific. I'd like to see this crash bug for myself.
"You spoony bard!" -Tellah
When linux has been successfully ported to these machines, I will buy one.
microsoftword.mp3 - it doesn't care that they're not words...
you can build a better PC for the cost you're talking about. bigger harddrive will be $100, so for $400 you can build a better machine than the X-Box.
...dave
Think different? I'd be happy if most people would just think...
Bill would enjoy knowing it ran Linux.
Right, because he likes innovation- in fact he recently claimed to have been personally responsible for the rise of open source because of the way dos/windows commoditized hardware. Innovation warms his heart, just like heartburn.
microsoftword.mp3 - it doesn't care that they're not words...
I am giving the domain xboxlinux.com to the first person to successfully port/install Linux to the X-Box. No cost, no strings except you must be willing to continue work on it and release it to the public in some form.
Hammer of Truth
NOT!
Slashdot editors are really scraping the bottom of the barrel in their overt attempts to bash Microsoft. They do so at any cost, and by that I mean regardless if it makes them look like biased buffoons or not.
Salon is the last place I go for anything remotely to unbiased reporting. Seems Slashdot wants to follow suit.
The X-Box should be judged for what it is, and that is an attempt to offer flexibility to developers to make the games they could only wish to create for the PC. Microsoft or not, I would love to see some real creativity in the market that didn't involve a regular game company.
Can Ms provide that? I don't know, but I won't slight them based upon a Salon review, in fact if Salon bashes them at all I see it as more of a reason to look at the product.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
Stop thinking of the XBox as a game console and think of it as a subsidized Linux workstation. It would be the ultimate irony that the only people to buy the XBox are Linux supporters.
-- Linux Consultant
Salon is overlooking something very critical. They run down the list of X-Box titles and call them boring and pedestrian, then detail FUTURE Sony titles that will be innovative...
But they don't mention any future X-Box titles which will innovate, other than a dismissive mention of the 2002 lineup which claims to have 'nothing ambitious'.
Are they forgetting that Sega has close ties with Microsoft? Jet Set Radio Future, the first franchise to effectively work cel shading into the game's stylistic approach, is due out for X-Box. In addition, Shenmue, the series which redefined how adventure games and peristent worlds work on Dreamcast, will be an X-box franchise from now on. US gamers will be getting Shenmue 2 on X-box alone.
If you're going to hold one console above another, at least consider all aspects of both, rather than forgetting a key area. That's just good journalism, whatever your preference for gaming platforms or your like/dislike of Microsoft may be.
Yeah, good thinking, Michael. Yesterday in New York would have been the perfect time to assault Bill Gates with an unknown white substance.
Honestly, while I support the right to protest and yell as much as you want, I'm baffled by how everyone seems to think hitting someone with a pie is cute and harmless, and not an assault on someone's person. I suppose that's because it's limited to leftish causes -- I suspect if anti-abortionists went around throwing pies at feminists the response would be different.
As loathsome as I find Willie Brown (why can't someone that brilliant use his skills to improve government instead of just manipulating it?) I give him credit for being the one recipient to insist that the attack on him be taken seriously. Second place goes to the elderly UK politician who decked the 20-something guy who pied him. (Said guy than had the nerve to whine about it.)
Now if I were Bill Gates, I'd have offered $10,000 to the first person to pie the guy who nailed him, offer to be repeated on each of the next 60 days. What's the point of being a billionaire if you can't do something like that?
When is someone going to come out with Linux for XBox. Seriously, the equivalent PC to an XBox costs oh so much more. If I could get Linux on there I've got cheap cheap servers. Tribes 2, Counterstrike, and Apache ahoy!
The GeekNights podcast is going strong. Listen!
Nomatter how good or bad, it will still be a great alternative for parents with no technical expertise to give to their children come X-mas.
After all, who didn't get their first kick on computers on a VIC-20 or simular boxes...
A couple auctions of interest. This one sold a link to where you can preorder the Xbox for a final bid of $407. Funny, considering the link is in the description and the seller says "If you decide to place a bid, then I will only resend you this website. So if you bid, you will not receive the xbox system, just a link to where you can purchase a x-box".
The other auction of note is here, where the winner gets the box that the Xbox came in. The seller is very clear about the person only getting the box that it came in, yet the winning bid was still $366.
Was a crime committed here? Nope. They were just helping the fool part from his money sooner.
I was walking in downtown Montreal last Friday night and as I passed by the Paramount movie theatre, I saw three guys standing on the sidewalk wearing strange uniforms and a backpack upon which was attached a long pipe that mounted an flat-panel screen that was showing X-Box demos. It was freezing cold that night too.
Also, as I walked by the local Blockbuster, I noticed there were TWO ENTIRE empty rows with shelves reserved for X-Box games. M$ must be paying Blockbuster a lot of money to promote an unproven product.
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oh, yes... Microsoft makes operating systems. did it ever occur to you that they would want their devlopers to succeed? successful devopers make good games, which sells their OS, not to mention that consumers get good products, so everyone wins.
Microsoft is in this to make money. They will. Patience... The grim reaper will visit...
Truthfully I just bought a PS2 and I'm pretty happy with it. To me the biggest drag for the Xbox will be the lack of cool Japanese style games. This might change in the future, but whether or not the X-box will penetrate very far into Japan and sign on Japanese game makers has yet to be seen. And am I the only one that isn't so hot on net access for a console? To me, if I can't type at other people an online game doesn't have much of a point to it.
:)
from Cnet:
"ndustry analysts have been estimating that Microsoft will have to absorb losses of $1 billion to $2 billion related to its effort to subsidize for the manufacturing of Xbox."
Nice to see MS take in the rear for once
I went to the XP launch (I know, I know... work made me) where Seamus Blackwell(I think) the Project Manager for the xBox did an hour+ demo. He was *definitely* not the standard MS type. He showed up in a black shirt, jeans, and cowboy boots when everyone else was wearing their MS uniform. He said he had worked as a designer for PS1, PS2, Genesis, NeoGeo, and several other gaming consoles. There were multiple references to how much better xBox (and gaming in general) was better than be addicted to coke, crack or your other hard drug of choice... It's nice to see that MS went for a platform designed by people that care about gaming, and not about the bottom line. It was also nice to see that MS was smart enough to hire the type of freaks they did to get it done right...
Xbox has a green interface, thus has a green screen of death.
:)
How can you do Ctrl-Alt-Del with a Xbox's controller?
Metroid was released in one of the last years of SNES supermacy. Hardly a 'launch' title.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
Maybe the moderators should actually click the link before declaring this "informative".
Troll? Maybe.
funny? Maybe.
Informative? heck no.
Bad Religion did provide some of the music for Crazy Taxi. When I play on the Dreamcast, it's usually the second song, after the first one by The Offspring. From the game's web site: "Rockin' soundtrack by hit bands Offspring and Bad Religion."
it's called themable crash screens. they got the idea from Mandrake's themable linux installer.
Got friends?
Ok then...if crashes exist....what about Ctrl Alt Del? You mean....you haven't found them yet?! They ARE there...
When eveything is outlawed, outlaws will have everything. - Xaxor -
Tricky move by MS. All the time I was predicting that people were going to get all excited about the Xbox and then they would be greeted with the blue screen of death, but MS fooled us all, it's now green! Haha!
I beleive an "I told you so" is called for here.
~ now you know
Ok, this entire review is a giant contradiction of ideals. First, the guy seems to rank of Microsoft for trying to control everything everywhere with its operating system. "Internet Explorer of the Game world". IMMEDIATLY after that, he ranks on the fact that Microsoft has secured no incredible new games, and are simply presenting the same lackluster games that everyone else has..
So answer me this. Why is that their job?? They provide the platform, and for ONCE in their lives actually try to provide developers, in this case, GAME developers, a platform they can flurish on without locking shackles on them, and they get yelled at for NOT doing EXACTLY WHAT EVERYONE COMPLAINS ABOUT??
Talk about your catch22 no win situations..
Hands down, the XBox has more capabilities then the PS2 does. You simply cant argue with the numbers. Does the PS2 have a better developer following, which hence, utilize the hardware better? Hands down, yes. But for crying out loud, that doesnt mean that the entire platform is a peice of crap.
I bet some of these guys saying how crappy of a platform it is are the SAME ones drooling over the GeForce 3 cards, that actually have LESS capabilities then this beast does..
-- I'm the root of all that's evil, but you can call me cookie..
Umm, it's the ramifications that bother people. No one really cares too much about the sub standard, non standard, hardware.
Fireplace > Radio > TV > M$ borg box. It's not evolution. I don't plan this or any other game console as the "center" of my family space. Technology should be unobtrusive and helpful. The X-Box is just another game, with M$ spy hooks. No thanks. I'm going to do better with systems with voice recognition, message relaying from internet so I can talk to my mom in another town, and basic home automation with security. M$ has not and will not deliver.
DMCA, Hollings, Palladium. What might have sounded like paranoia is now common sense.
I'm buying the purple Gamecube, myself. Its such a nicer colour than green. Sony's idea of limited-edition differenty coloured PS2s sounds cool as well.
(insert obligatory Drazi joke here).
"I Know You Are But What Am I?"
This Xbox soundtrack will havave you playing for hours. :P
Remember that like most game systems, the console is sold at a loss, which the manufacturer recoups via game licensing fees. Microsoft loses at least $100 for every XBox they sell, with the red ink expected to approach $1 billion over the next 3 years.
So, all the M$ haters here have a simple choice -- buy an XBox. Buy several. Turn it into a PVR / mp3 Jukebox / file server. At $299 it's a nice piece of hardware.
This is simply an error message, and the problem is clearly handled. Would it be better if they did not inform the user that something is wrong at all and have it actually crash because of a bad executable?
They're on the back molded into the controller itself so you have to look for them. And even when you find them, you must buy an upgrade to use them. :)
When eveything is outlawed, outlaws will have everything. - Xaxor -
Wow, those are some future thinking statements.
I would love to have a hard drive if that meant I could store lots of game save data without having to spend lots extra on solid state storage devices that just can't hack it.
Why would I not want to have caching of data on a hard drive rather than have to constantly hit the cd rom drive? Geez.. caching would be fantastic and most games would benifit from this.
Ethernet would be great for anyone that has a broadband connection. I would love to play GT3 with people on the internet. Would I want to play Halo on the internet with lots of people? hell yah.
geez man.. Maybe xbox doesn't fit your personal needs but your arguments are pretty pathetic.
Microsoft just isn't capable of anything original, are they. I was reading about the pathetic Steve Ballmer X-Box monkeyboy spectacular when I realized that all this showmanship is just another cheap attempt to rip-off Apple.
First the Graphical Interface (yes, I know Apple ripped if off from Xerox, so that isn't quite as evil), but then they see OS X come out so Microsoft shovels out a steaming load of Windows XP a year later. Now, after seeing Steve Job's charismatic presentations of new Apple technology stimulating interest in their products, Ballmer pathetically tries to replicate it by dancing around frenetically on a stage ordering developers to new heights of "creativity". That company is a leech, and the scariest kind: one that has grown bigger than the body it leeches from.
I got my copy of Metal Gear Solid 2 yesterday(odd how it was released right before the Xbox and GameCube launch), and it kicks some major ass. I have yet to see any X-Box game from the demos in stores, or movies released to the web that is as good looking as MGS2.
And I can shoot seagulls's with the PSG1! It's surprisingly satisfying.
Back on the subject, other than what MS bought, I barely see any developer support for them at all. And to make matters worse, the X-Box is HUGE. And if I understand correctly, in Japan, small is good cause apartments tend to be on the small side, but maybe the Japanese version folds out to become a coffee table that keeps your drinks warm as it overheats?
If I want to play Halo, I'll get it for the PC or Mac.
Now if I could figure out how to get into Shell 2 without dying....
-Henry
"Useless organic meatbag" -HK-47
Now Gate's will finally understand failure!!!!
>Oh, that's not fair. He understands it, alright. >I've got one word for you: "Bob".
Or wince.
Such is the infinite Grace of Popeye.
I saw an X-Box demo machine at Wal-Mart the other day with Munch's odysee on it (The Oddworld series was one of my favorites on the PS1). Believe it or not (I think you will), the machine was totally locked up....My PS1 and PS2 have *never* locked up on me before....
I picked up my Xbox this morning from the local Babbages and played it for about 2 hours so far. I will only comment on Halo (thats all I have played so far). All I can say is wow. This is the most impressive game I have seen come out in a very long time. Visually the game is stunning. Absolutely gorgeous. The music is kinda creepy but really sucked me in. Its almost like Virtual Reality. I was totally immersed in the Halo world. Before I knew it my alarm rang and I had to go to work. I can't wait play it again tonight.
So far so good. No crashes, and it loaded really quick as well.
Well of course the Xbox is a PC in dressup! That is what will be so great about it. Writing a game for a PC that has fixed hardware allows for so much more latitude than what is available today.
All these people bashing Xbox simply because it is MS might be in for a big surprise. If I remeber correctly, at launch, the PS2 was nothing but hype. The games didn't even look as good as Dreamcast. But things change as a platform matures. I'll reserve judgement until then...
Chris
If you have a wife, I would think twice before buying it... that, or get yourself a good counsellor.
Here's a few links to other and may be more objective reviews
Zdnet
Gamespy
Gamespot
FiringSquad
TeamXBox
Yahoo 2 3
--
"Can I run a linux cluster of those?"
!
^_^
Part of the problem is that both the dissers and the pro-XBox people miss the point - the subject of my message. Dreamcast had great hardware - where is it now? The *vast* majority of end users of these products care not a whit about specs - they just want games on it that they enjoy playing. Only time will tell if Gates et al get that point and manage to attract designers of the same magnitude as Nintendo does. The fact that MS seemed to focus more on hardware than software doesn't bode well for them, since they're the new kid on the block. However, as much as I'm not a big MS fan, they're not entirely stupid - I'm sure that now the hardware footprint has been established they're focusing on attracting those developers.
DThorne
i'm buying; civ3, dark ages of camelot, max payne (which i still haven't played),
Max Payne is on the X-Box
Here's the Max Payne trailer (Windows Media Player required).
Can you run linux on it?
This may be a stupid question, but how does it play DVD movies? I mean, obviously it has a DVD-ROM, but where does the software to play it come from? Do you need a boot CD to load up the OS/player, then you swap in the DVD? Or is there a small Windows OS on the hard disk itself that contains a player? If there's a Windows OS on the HD, what's stopping the natural corruption of some DLL's and the player breaking?
I wonder how many M$ salespersons would commit suicide if someone infected the X-Box with Linux http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/4/22770.html Of course, Bill is right in a way. He just lied 75% of the time. If he had said that Linux came about beause he and other thought the standard should be a buggy / crashable / needs-to-be-updated-constantly OS, it would work. Would we need Linux if M$ actually worked harder and was careful in their coding? Probably not. But ehy didn't, so here we are.
When eveything is outlawed, outlaws will have everything. - Xaxor -
If Microsoft or a third party develops a Tetris game for the system and some decent RPG is also developed.
I have always liked the editors at Salon and this time is no exception.
What Xbox has going for it...
1 - PS2 is known as a more adult gaming platform. I just bought a PS2 and finding games for my 9 year old daughter is interesting. Maby MS can capitalize it if they are smart.
2 - Should be easy to port PC games to it. Something lacking in PS2/Nintindo worlds.
What Xbox has going against it....
1 - Sony rules the console market right now. Hands down. Nintendo has some a good new platform and more kiddy friendly games. Xbox has to compete with this
2 - Microsoft is used to being able to do what they want because they have a Monopoly. How will management react to situations when they are the small guy. It's like General Moters starting to offer blenders. They are not experts and the people the people who have been making them know a lot more about it and actually listen to there customers.
3 - Lack of vision. Ties into #2. Where's the killer app? Do you really think Gates and Balmer can envision great new games.
4 - Game makers won't produce for a console that hasn't got a proven track record. Why spend millions developing a game for a potential 50 people when I can do it for tens of millions across the world (PS2).
5 - Blue/Green screen of death will put off gamers. I bought a PS2 so I could get away from computer gaming and costant error messages and rebooting. When has anyone ever seen an error message on a Playstation or a Nintendo? I want drop in a game and play it never seeing an error message. PC users are use to getting them and can live with it. Console games don't and won't tolerate it. I gave up PC gaming because I got sick of upgrading video cards, getting more hard drive space, better processors. I just want to drop that disc in and play the game.
6 - The goofy Balmer/Monkey/music crap that the Salon article talked about. If you have to dance around on stage and talk like a motivational speaker your not selling stuff in the console market. When Grand Theft III is released or the next version of Final Fantasy they don't even need to air a commercial. They could send it to the stores and put it on the shelf without a word and it will sell out. Microsoft ain't cool. Sony is, Nintendo is some what.
I could go on and on. I can't see Xbox being anything but a niche market. Microsoft bit off more than they can chew with this one.
Have you witnessed Metal Gear Solid 2? Absolutely one of the most riveting games, ever. My wife (who normally detests any videogame other than Bejeweled) is now addicted to watching me play! It's that engrossing...
Devil May Cry is also the game that every 3D version of Castlevania has ever tried to be. Give it a play and tell me you're not impressed and I'll kindly give you a whap with the closest handy LARP.
Gran Turismo 3 not impressive? Guess that depends on if you like driving games or not.
How about Tony Hawk 3? Great game. Splashdown? No? How about SSX Tricky, the first game to ship with in-game DTS 5.1 support?
Methinks you need to expand your horizons a bit.
I wish I had a kryptonite cross, because then you could keep Dracula and Superman away.
Also part of that investor group was Wasserstein Perella Group, Inc., which has done M&A transactions for AOL (http://www.wassersteinperella.com/about/transacti ons.htm).
It's a stretch, but not a BIG stretch. AND this is off 10 minutes of research.
sarchasm: The gulf between the author of sarcastic wit and the person who doesn't get it.
The author first blames XBox for not having enough good titles at it's release as he would like. Then he goes on telling how wonderfull the GameCube is and talking about a strategy game for the console.
I went out to get myself an Xbox but they were all sold out but I'll get one sooner or later. I'm sure that Dead or Alive 3, Halo, Madden 2002 and Munch's Oddysse are all great games. That's enough to occupy me for a very long time.
As for the article, it's plain FUD. The guy is probably paid by Sony.
bliss, you must learn to become one with your manhood. Truly great rewards await you at the palace of snafu.
Eat plenty of beefy noodles and your manhood will grow big and strong. All the ladies will gaze upon it with mighty envy. You will be the man.
In the sky, there is no room for the nonsense of crack whores. Your mission is to plug up any holes in these whores you may find with your sizable pecker. Remember to use the fun coffee filters to mop up any leaky stuff from the lovely holes.
All is happy to be here in Slashdot for your learning of how to be a pimp daddy. Having the fun!
Has anybody else noticed that the "Green Screen of Death" has a caption with XDK at the top? As in, Xbox Development Kit? Okay, so maybe the XDK crashed, but we don't know whether that was an MS error or one caused by a programer's error while somebody was using the XDK for development. This does not show that the Xbox itself crashed; it merely shows that the XDK development environment can crash. Are there any crash-proof development environments out there for any platforms? Doubtful.
As to whether the Xbox is good or not, that remains to be seen, but let's stick to factual arguments and not spread the FUD that Slashdot is so quick to point out when it relates to Linux.
XBox runs off a Pentium III, right? Why?!?!
The last thing we need is segmented
architechture in video game consoles. I guess
Microsoft is planning to make Windows run on it
or something. Or maybe Minesweeper.
could you imagine having been one of the people that worked on that? what would you tell your friends? did they realize they were working on the hokiest program ever? how could you tell someone with a straight face "yeah, i work on microsoft BOB"? that's definitely something you leave out of your resume :)
Every once in a while I like to masturbate a new word into my vocabulary, even if I don't know what it means.
All I could think when I say the Gotham Racing commercial was "Need For Speed 2/3" with Voodoo2 acceleration.
That is my observation/summation/knee jerk reaction.
Innovation, hardly.
Revolutionary..murrmph..snort..hahahaha.
Interesting...ok, I'll admit I'm intrigued.
Must have? Have not bought a console since the original Nintendo/discovering PC's...not going to start again unless I see a 50$ console and 5$ games.
My Opinion, no more no less.
If it is not on fire, it is a software problem.
The only times I can remember Nintendo NES's crashing was when they fell on the floor after people tripped over your controller cord or after you got excited and yanked on the controller, pulling the NES off it's shelf. This was quite annoying because it usually happened when you were very far along in the game, but all you had to do was to reset the system, possibly eject and reinsert the cartridge, and start over. An Xbox, with it's DVD/whatever drive and internal hard drive, would probably be much worse off after an encounter with the floor... But from what I've heard it's so heavy that your controller would probably get unplugged before the system took a dive.
PS2 is already dead, graphically its not even in the same league as Xbox or Gamecube, and Square and all their third parties are running to Gamecube and Xbox, PS2 is in the same situation as Dreamcast was in when PS2 Launched.
Xbox, is very powerful, however Microsoft has done a very bad job in Marketing, and the games suck, not really a single good Xbox game except Halo and Xbox games look worse than Gamecube and some even on the Dreamcast/PS2 level.
Gamecube seems to be the only System with revolutionary games, Good graphics, Great marketing, and Great price.
Gamecube has the best graphics mainly because Nintendo was smart, they knew having 100 million polygons is useless if the polygons have ugly textures, so what they did is settled for maybe 12 million polygons with high quality textures and tons of special effects.
So while Gamecube may not be able to render the polygons of Xbox or even PS2, the games look better because it can do more special effects, and the textures are such higher quality that Gamecube games look either like Cartoons, or they look so realistic that you'd think it was fully rendered on a super computer.
Xbox is a very good machine hardware wise, but they need to take advantage of the power of Xbox in a way which matters, I dont want to see Xbox games with jaggies looking like a PS2 game, If Xbox has power, it should make games which simply cannot be done on any other system, Like Multiplayer RPGs, Games which let you completely edit them, Games which use the harddrive to store textures, sound, etc.
Right now they are just using the DVD, and pixel for pixel, Gamecube absolutely destroys the Xbox in quality, what Xbox must do is use quantity, use more textures than gamecube, make big huge games which cant fit on a gamecube disk, take advantage of the ethernet for online gaming, and most importantly, use the pentium CPU for software based special effects than gamecube simply can never do.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
1. Condemn anything created by Micro$oft (wasn't the $ catchy?)
2. Pine over whether Linux will run on the hardware.
3. Whine that Linux could have done it better.
4. Quote a highly biased article from a rag of an online magazine. (the same magazine that recieved flak for it's poor content meer weeks ago)
5. Put synth-blood in the water to whip up the zealots into a frenzy.
Did I forget anything?
...when it comes to error messages. That green-on-black look alone is "hip" and "trendy," but the attention to detail shows that Microsoft has put a lot of effort into making the user's error message experience an enjoyable one. In the future, I'm sure we can look forward to more "dynamic" and "interactive" error message paradigms from this "innovative" company.
Not happy with MS? Stick with your OS X and leave us, the majority, alone. I don't see how the XBox interface can look like OS X.
Yes Apple ripped their GUI from Xerox and they ripped their code from BSD. Makes you wonder what their developers are doing.
I would love to have a hard drive if that meant I could store lots of game save data without having to spend lots extra on solid state storage devices that just can't hack it.
Psx had a tiny hard drive that plugged into the port in the back, providing a ton of extra storage space. I think the ports were removed in the "new" psxs. I haven't seen one for any system since, though.
I alternate between posting +5 and -1 Comments. Karma: +53 -47 = 6
I think this line from the article says it best:
So for the first time, I actually dared to entertain warm thoughts toward Microsoft.
Yeah, no kidding that he doesn't normally like Microsoft. I would never have guessed it from the consistently cynical tone of his article.
I'm no big fan of MS either, but jeez. Would a little unbiased journalistic integrity be appropriate? Hmm.
As it is, I don't think that I know anything more about how good the XBox is after reading the article than I did beforehand -- because I don't even begin to trust the opinions of the journalist with his obvious baggage of preconceptions.
Why are you letting these clowns ruin our country?
Admittedly, I am biased against Microsoft. I want them to fail. So what? Objectivity is impossible for anyone, and at least I'm honest about my bias.
But all that doesn't matter. (Mostly.) The XBOX gets so much criticism, not because it's Microsoft, but because it really does suck. There's nothing it has that a stale PC from a year or more ago doesn't, or couldn't with a little money. The games are mediocre at best, the hardware is crap, and thus few console gamers show interest. The fact it's Microsoft is just the cherry on the icing of this fruitcake.
Don't think of it as a flame---it's more like an argument that does 3d6 fire damage
Couldn't the same be said about Sony with the Playstation
No. The ps1 was not gigantic, and it was not widely hated. That's what the poster was saying, that the Xbox was hated and ridiculed. People were obsessing over the PS1 for a long time before it came out.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
some of us have put our hearts and souls into this thing
So you work for MS?
the ps2 is a mess. it is a ridiculous and stupidly designed POS from the dev standpoint
The games look damn fine to me and work very well. Incredible graphics. Why don't you elaberate. Or can you?
The selection of ps2 games is comlpete crap
Many thousands of game titles for both I and II don't meet your expectations. And how many does Xbox have, or Nintendo for that matter. Do you actually get and venture into a store that sells games?
I can't believe people are just going to absorb this thoughtless withering criticism from a pinch lipped bitty like michael who probably doesn't even play games
As apposed to a foul mouthed bitter looser such as yourself. Get real....
Otherwise, some good points but there are some holes. Dreamcast was much the same, although a slower computer a few years back. And they didn't do anything with that advantage.
Bleh!
i believe the founders of valve (half-life) were on the BOB team
GSOD (G'S'O'D)
GSOD: A acronym for defining the Green Screen Of Death. Invented by Microsoft Corp, in 2001.
This is what is displayed when the XBox(R) crashes, and fails to load media. Mostly requiring a power cycle.
Also See Evil Empire
--------------------------
Is this a sig?
--------------------------
I bought one of these last night because I wanted to. I made my decision off of the good reviews and the bad reviews but mainly because I wanted to.
/first/ games released for the Xbox". The platform has been stable so far *no crashes or anything like that* so I`m hopeful. To be honest I think I would have enjoyed a PS2 just as much, but the built in hard drive, and the ethernet jack is what sold me after it was all said and done. The DVD option is $30 extra so I`ll probably wait a bit for that since I have a quality DVD player anyway, but like I said, I think time will tell. If nothing else you know at least every M$ game released will be available. heh.
For a company who has never been in the game console industry I have to say I`ve been impressed so far with the few hours I`ve had to play on it at home. I bought Halo, as well as Madden 2002. Like someone said above, I`ve also noticed the few little paused in Halo while it loads the new screen, but by no means did it take away the feel of the game which even after playing many FPS's I genuinely liked. I didn`t know what to expect playing a FPS on a game controller but they did a really good job with the conversion and the pinpoint control you have with a mouse is even there. Madden 2002 is taking some getting used to but I really think they made a really good migration compared to the PS2. There are a few things I wasn`t too impressed with price wise but I suppose that's to be expected. Thinking to myself "These are the
I agree. I think that's on a development box, probably a few months ago, caused by bad code of course - obviously fixed before release.
You people must realize - consoles DO NOT crash. They don't release games or hardware that crash!
Can't believe the FUD...
This looked really cool, Now you can play all those old crapy games on your xbox. Sweet now I can thow away all my other consoles.
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It seems like the Xbox is gearing up to be "the" gift this holiday season. This brings back memories of seasons past where companies or individuals would give a PS2 (or something) to a local radio station, which would auction it off for charity - all the while plugging away for the donor company. I remember one major Boston radio station literally begging for a PS2 last year, literally saying "if you can get us one to auction off, we will plug your company in a major way".
Microsoft should consider cutting out the middleman and give a certain number of Xboxes to radio stations to auction off to charity. The cost to Microsoft would probably be a fraction of what they'd bring on a radio auction at a decent sized station, It would give them lots of favorable free press. It would build momentum for the Xbox. And both the radio stations and the local charities would benefit.
"Can't you see that everyone is buying station wagons?"
I tried to play Halo on my new X-Box but when it boots up it ask me for a 25 digit activation code.
A bit off the topic but still video games... A sequence in Metal Gear Solid 2 requires you to upload pictures onto a computer. Well, when the computer is booting it loads Linux. The bootup process is an exact replica. Pretty cool I thought.
While we're at it, it would be nice if it would let me browse the web, or perhaps run some online games that are playable at some distance from a relatively large, low-resolution (640x480) screen (though I have an HD-ready high-resolution set, most don't). And you know, all these entertainment devices with their complex controls, some of which have a video output for interactive menus are getting a pain to control. Why can't they provide a web server interface to a device with a browser and appropriate plugins, and just be hubbed into the local room 'net?
The ability to run local entertainment software (i.e. games), networked or not, is a feature that comes for free if we're going to have enough "oomph" to do MPEG2 decoding. While you might want to use it for non-entertainment duties (i.e. checking one's bank acount, or ordering a pizza on-line), work isn't it's primary purpose.
THAT is what the XBox could be. Architecture should be open, so third parties can develop apps/add on hardware for it. Still, it should be useful enough on it's own to justify it's price. Whether the hard disk (if present) and or CD/DVD-ROM is integrated, or outboard (firewire?) is more of a stylistic issue -- today we have A/V receivers as well as separates.
In my search I have come across some neat tech by Sigma Designs (http://www.sigmadesigns.com, http://www.sigmadesigns.com/products/netstream_con sole.htm (watch the damn inserted space), and particularly the iDVD3036). So decent convergence products are coming (say 2002).
But, if PC history tells us anything, the ones that succeed will be more open than the one's that don't. Unless Microsoft opens the XBox up architecturally and makes it easy for third party hacker developers, they will be among the convergence also-rans.
You could've hired me.
i've always known most slashdotters are somewhat if not full blown anti MS... but i've always thought of them as quite intelligent people.. and now many of them are making uneducated and outright wrong statements... simply put.. the xbox has a super fast bus... you could spend 5000 dollars on a computer and it couldn't compete... true you wont have a high resolution screen right there in front of your face... but it isn't needed.. because you aren't a foot away from the television... your probably around 7 feet away.. and the screen is atleast 3 times bigger than your monitor so it'll look great... as for the games not making leaps and bounds in technology and inovation... give it time... its a great toy... its not the anti christ... i enjoy playing games on my computer... but im also quite interested in seeing what the xbox has to offer... great graphics have always been a major factor in getting my attention... and the x box has some nice capabilities... now its up to the developers to use those capabilites
I've had mine for weeks.
e m& item=1296487556
e m& item=1293591459
Two actually, I got them off of ebay, here are the links to the auctions:
http://cgi.ebay.com/aw-cgi/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewIt
http://cgi.ebay.com/aw-cgi/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewIt
Sorry, but it sounds a little like you're a typical PS2 owner who fell for the hype, spent way too much money for the biggest let down in consoles ever, and isn't dealing too well with the fact that he/she now has the worst console available aside from the psone.
The thing is, your statements could almost apply just as well to the PS2 as the XBox. Sure, with the PS2 you have to obtain a seperate solution for ethernet or a HD (which is not totally nessicary as you could consider the memory card enough storage to make things interesting).
However, you also have to consider that MS had said repeatedly they are NOT making a home PC, they are making a pure game console. To help drive that point home they have made the USB ports non-standard.
If you look at it from a point of connectivity, the XBox has ethernet but as far as the larger device market goes nothing else. The PS2 has both standard Firewire and USB ports, and also a SUPPORTED version of Linux (and Java in the works). You can use USB keyboards and mice you have sittig around from computers, or go to lots of stores and have keyboards to choose from as well as being able to hook up digital cameras with included cables.
Which one sounds more like a home PC hub to you? Remember, just because it doesn't have an Intel processor does not mean it can't be a computing device...
One last point - though I have a cable modem and DSL line (not for long though - thanks a lot Sprint!), people are still going to be using modems for a long time. Sony has realized this and is including a modem with thier ethernet/HD extension. MS has only ethernet which is great for some but not all users. I can't remember exactly what Nintendo was planning, but I think they had a combo modem/ethernet solution as well.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
All of life is a cycle, now chant with me the XBox mantra "Ooh. Aah. Doh! Ooh. Aah. Doh!"
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
Maybe once upon a time I'd have given them credit for being so, albeit obviously liberal-leaning, but as times have moved on and VC has dried up, the quality and quantity of writing that they put out has dropped, and a fair number of their staff writers have adopted the Linux/open-source-pandering inflammatory article "writing" that another high-profile site who shall remain nameless is so well-known for doing.
Let's not forget that Salon.com is the site that less than a week ago broke the SHOCKING news that there's rampant drug use at LAN parties!, an article so obviously rife with unsubstantiated anecdotes and biased information that a high school paper's editor would have to laughingly decline it.
Not saying they're wrong, saying take it with a pinch of salt.
Easy does it!
This comment has been submitted already, 276865 hours , 59 minutes ago. No need to try again.
Of the x-box luanch games I have played, only one has impressed me, DOA 3, and even then largely because of its graphical enhancements as opposed to gameplay enhancements. Overall, X-box is clearly capable of quality graphics, perhaps the most stunning yet on a console, however I hasten to remind people that gameplay will win out over graphics in the long run. My real question is, why isnt there a truly innovative title in the lineup for X-box? Why isn't there a Pikmin, or another "quirky" game? Old games with fresh graphics do not a system make.
"Smokey, this isn't Nam, there are rules." -Walter
I'm delaying my X-Box purchase until the first service pack gets put out, Gartner told me so.
Not only that, but whoever hacks the X-Box risks the legal wrath of Microsoft. Now what could be more exciting?
/. for the hell of it.
For the record, I won't even be buying an X-Box. This could change if someone ports linux to it though.
Or maybe I should just redirect the domain to
Hammer of Truth
You laugh, but Freecell is the only reason my wife lets me have a computer at home.
I hope that XBox is hacked soon, as I think it has the possibility to really democratize computing (without really enriching MS, they'll take the shaft on producing hardware).
I want to see a cheap keyboard and printer peripheral. And a cheap word processor (OS is irrelevant, as each disc ships with it). These could be great things. These might even prove effective office machines (new meaning to commodity hardware).
Let's not stir that bag of worms...
Microsoft sells these boxes for whatever price they need to sell them for. We have to be careful not to increase demand too much.
However, Microsoft is investing all this money into the xbox in order to sell software, licenses or future xbox extensions. The money is not in selling the boxes at all!
If they have a big pile of unsold xboxen, they can dump the prices even farther. They are willing to lose a LOT of cash in order to take over the gaming console market. In the end, when they are the defacto standard, they can start raising prices again.
If a large section of the boxes sold are used for totally different purposes, they will truly bleed. They sell all these boxes for a loss, hoping to get that investment back later - but we just install linux on em instead.
That is completely demoralizing to Microsft. Hopefully, a linux hack will keep them in line since people sick of upgrading their gaming consoles will just install linux and use their box for online gaming, gimping and whatever else can be fun to do with a console.
Agreed?
Stop the brainwash
Has anybody figured out how to open an Xbox without damaging it?
Twoflower
--
Twoflower
One thing that's always bugged me about a Hard Drvie on a game system. What happens when you need to defrag the Hard Drive? They're using the thing as a swap disk, so it's gotta be ripping data on and off the thing often. I wonder how long before the HD fails and you lose all your game saves? No doubt there will be a patented Microsoft replacement drive.
InstantCool
Dear slasdotters, please help!
I just got myself an X-Box, it's nice. I played Halo and Project Gotham (which sucks so far). Overall Halo is pretty cool, sound is amazing, but yes, it is just another first shooter and I have not yet got out of the bunkers to the outside.
Anyways, I have trouble setting high resolution on my TV.
I bought HD AV pack, put in 3 color wires into TV and can play it, but when I try to run the game even with 480p, it does not display. I have Sony Wega 36''. Please help who can!!!
http://dtum.livejournal.com
That's true. Also keep in mind the first generation of PS1's had heat problems from the internal transformer. Some would get hot and lock..and the first generation of PS2's (which I was unfortunate enough to purchase) also had heat and DVD issues. Nothing's perfect.
I'm not a huge microsoft fan, but that salon article was just one big ad hominem with very little concrete to say against the xbox save "this is microsoft's first console," which is really irrelevant. Does anyone remember what happened with nintendo's first console?
What really peeved me was that the author had good things to say about games he has never played because they were nintendo titles, while he put down titles just because they were the first crop of titles for the xbox and weren't all 100% ground breaking AAA titles... No console has ever launched with a complete assortment of hits. Usually there's one if you're lucky.
I can understand peoples' desire to speculate, but this article wasn't speculation it was favoratism and name calling.
Ex Nihilo
This is one development which I think could be seriously interesting. We know Linux has been ported to the PS2, and we know that the Xbox uses a standard PIII and NVIDIA Gforce chipset. Given GL support and reasonable performance under both graphics chipsets imagine porting FlightGear to the PS2 (it's a given that it should work almost unchanged on the XBox) and providing ISO images for folks to download and burn. This would be a great way to get desirable free software out to the masses. It might even spark greater interest in Linux to boot!
:)
FlightGear is an impressive flight simulator with a huge amount of scenery data taken from satellite images. Unlike Ace Combat 4, FlightGear actually flies like a real airplane. It's got some networking support and a userbase of real pilots working to make the simulator as real as possible. It's one of the only simulators out there which strives to make star field, moon, and sun locations as real as possible.
Of course there are other potential targets for GL games ported through Linux, and Linux would provide an ideal quick cross platform development platform for both systems. End users don't need to know that Linux happens to be driving the game (or program) underneath, and it would cost nothing to distribute. I love the idea that free software developers could distribute software for free to both PS2 and Xbox users -- something which I think would surprise quite a few console gamers. Heh.
Cheers,
--Maynard
X-Box could be the new Commodore 64, just needs:
1. Linu-X-box with a simple word processor and spreadsheet. Should require no setup, and should sell at Walwart cheap.
2. Printer/keyboard/mouse adapters - again they should be cheap.
At some point, the upgrade cycle for PC's just isn't paying off for home users - this may be the next big thing.
And who cares if MS is the one taking the shaft on the hardware?
Let's not stir that bag of worms...
This is the most informative post I've seen yet, yet it's only a '3'.
/. are fucking pathetic.
You moderators on
I do not respond to cowards. Especially anonymous ones.
Personally I'm wondering how long it will take before someone writes and emu for this thing. PCs will have the power very soon, if they don't already, and its basicly DirectX and Windows, shouldn't be too hard to crack. Also going the other way shouldn't be too tough either: turn your $400 XBox into a normal PC to play with and compile linux kernels.
"A coward dies a thousand deaths, the brave but one."
I am very anit microsoft but that doesn't mean my arguments are invalid. I still think Xbox has a long hard uphill battle.
It's a different business for MS. There not use to it. Sony and Nintendo are veterans and know how to compete in the console business. The Xbox may be a nice peice of hardware but that doesn't always sell. MS lovers have been harping Linux lovers about that for years.
If MS wants to get a peice of this market they are best to highlight the disadvantages of Playstation and Nintendo. Playstation has a lot of adult games. I would put out the message that PS2 has too many kid unfriendly games. Buy Xbox for more kid friendly games. That's how nintendo competes. Shutting of the DVD player unless you buy the remote is not good for Xbox. Pack more value for you dollar, especially in the economic downturn. I don't see Xbox doing this.
I would only buy an X-Box if
1. I can install Linux on it
2. Microsoft loses more money on the sale than I would be spending on the purchase.
3. The hardware doesn't start fires
Have fun watching low-rez PS2 games on your hi-rez HD-TV. All it does is change the aspect ratio. The PS2 can't afford to sacrifice performace for higher resolution. Shit... Even many Dreamcast games offer the 16:9 aspect ratio. PS2 doesn't evenhave real VGA compatibility. What a nice console. It does have some interesting games though (finally), and that's what matters, right?
Did you miss the fact that the X-Box is buggy and the games aren't any fun and all you'll see is the green screen of death and it the graphics are grainy and Halo pauses every time you step and the games aren't original and it is logically impossible that they would be because MS would suck the creativity out of developers just by looking at them and a game like Halo could only be creative if it was ported to the PS2 where the control pad isn't unusable and the heat doesn't burn down your house and the xbox is too big?
That's it! You must be some sort of MS mole!
Let's not stir that bag of worms...
Targets (Midwest equivalent of Wal-Mart)
There are targets and Wal-Mart's all over the nation. Target has been advertising on MTV of late, and are trying to reinvent themselves as the 'classy' low-price department store, rather then competing with Wal-Mart on price. The target where I live has a much nicer appearance, etc.
There was chick on Conan O'Brian a long time ago raving about target and how she shopped in the target in Manhattan because they were the only place that sold the perfume she used.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
How can you possibly say this? Surely you can't think that the ability to connect machines together is useless? Surely? Please? Obviously the millions who play games on the Internet aren't having any fun.
"an ethernet connection on a console isn't some gaming messiah. there are currently no games which i could see benefitting from this on any console, nor any in the future.
Let's not stir that bag of worms...
That is completely false. Game consoles DO crash. You just don't realize it beacue it doesn't usually give you a verbose error. Fortunately, most games go through QA testing. Sometimes, they get hung up on crash bugs that they can't easily reproduce. This slows down publication of the game severely.
Vintage computer games and RPG books available. Email me if you're interested.
If you want GTA3 on Xbox, be ready to wait. It'll be next year.
Men believe what they want. - Caesar
Only 5 things in this world can be perfect:
A)Heineken
B)Sega Dreamcast
C)Linux/Unix/BSD
D)pr0n
E)AMD
That isn't in any particular order, either. Pizza comes close, but isn't always perfect.
You are obviously mislead by your choice in beer.
Not Heineken if perfect, Grolsch is! (That is the 'other' beer from the Netherlands)
Gr.
Hertog
-=- I heard rumours about an OS called "Social Life", heard of it? Is it stable? -=-
As an IS professional charged with the support of applications and databases running on NT and Windows2k I find it distressing that a company that has for the past few years devoted themselves to taking over the mid-range server OS market has invested this much time and energy into a video game box.
If that money slated for the Xbox had been put to work on XP maybe the general reception to XP would not have been as cool. And companies are left with OS's that are rapidly becoming obsolete because efforts to maintain a consistent OS were subjegated by the quest for the "perfect" game box.
Be realistic, in any corporation there are huge tradeoffs for funding of projects. Regardless if the Xbox is a success, the damage to MS's already shaky IS relationship has been magnified in my view.
This only feeds the perception that many IS people feel, that Microsoft is only really good at making a platform for games and not a serious platform for business. In the end the Xbox might be seen as the best thing to happen to Linux.
One thing the article mentions is that the XBox gets a bit of a head start over Sony, which has yet to release the ethernet/HD expansion pack.
On the other hand, how many people do you think will be interested in online Halo play, vs...
Online Star Wars?
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
to collect my money from you.
yes i have and they are complete and utter junk.
...dave
Think different? I'd be happy if most people would just think...
XBox simply proves that, just like what Windows fans have said since the beginning days of the Macintosh - The Mac is a toy. No... wait a minute...
Steve
--- What?
It's not that Microsoft will go bankrupt in the near future. It's keeping the stock price up that's hard.
They've basically reached market saturation. Everybody with disposable income who wants one already has a PC. Businesses have about one PC per employee. Most new sales are replacements. And there's really no pressing reason for most people to upgrade.
That's usually the situation in which margins go down. That's already happened in PC hardware. It ought to happen in software. Microsoft is frantically trying new business strategies (raising the price for Windows XP, technical tie-ins, a subscription model) to avoid becoming a "mature business".
But there's no "killer app" in sight to force the next generation of technology.
I can't stress how hilarious it is to see Slashdotters, many of whom take pride in the amount of MP3s they've downloaded for CDs they've never bought, self-righteously coming to the defense of the artists that they've been ripping off. Let's note the difference, shall we? While you're more than happy to give a big "Fuck you!" to any band that asks that you quit pirating their music, Microsoft actually asked for and received the bands' permission. Beautiful.
but i personally feel no need to find opponents on the internet. more importantly though, currently no games take advantage of this.
GT4 is supposedly going to include an online world where people can participate in real scheduled events, etc. that will be neat. but right now it doesn't matter at all, was my point.
...dave
Think different? I'd be happy if most people would just think...
as did a bunch of other people who replied to me.
an ethernet connection can be a useful thing, but currently there are ZERO GAMES which are announced to use such a thing on the consoles.
in case you missed the clueboat, PSX2's are already linkable to each other.
there are ways that it COULD be used, but it is not being used. personally, i don't think they're such a boon to console games that i'm angry it's not there.
...dave
Think different? I'd be happy if most people would just think...
I had a look at the Xbox at a Future Shop. They are charging $600Cdn($377US). One of the store clerks was trying to set up a demo machine but it was too big to fit in the kiosk case they had for it. I asked him about playing DVDs on it and he said you could but you had to spend another $50 for the DVD controler and $25 for the cable to connect it to the TV. It comes with one game controler and to add extras would be another $50 each. So now I'm looking at shelling out $825 + $120 in taxes. I said no thanks and walked on which is what I suspect is most Canadians will say.
Today's vices may be tomorrow's virtues.
And what mess would that be? Are you saying we should always use 'The most ethically correct tool for the job'? Whos ethics are we to follow? Yours? Mine? Who knows. I see nothing wrong etically with buying an XBox. Bring it up to an ethical issue is silly. Is Sony of all people 'more ethically sound' then Microsoft? Cripes no. Is Sega? Nope. Does Greenpeace make a gaming console? Please, explain further..
-- I'm the root of all that's evil, but you can call me cookie..
And history repeats, but usually not so quickly. Everywhere I read that Microsoft is new to the game, unexperience, etc. These make me laugh. Its clear that there's more animosity towards MS than the X-Box itself (though it may well deserve animosity on its own).
Ever heard of the MSX(or for the matter of experience, MS Flight Sim)? While MS wasn't really involved with the hardware production, neither can they be said to have been very involved with their latest exploit. The MSX was a PC version of Pinoccio, the console that wanted to be a PC. To a large extent it is. Soviets used it quite a bit in education. Microsoft's involvement was MS BASIC as an operating system. MS now denies that the MS in MSX means Microsoft, but the OS was originally called MicroSoft eXtended BASIC. Go figure.
Interestingly, there was more than crap edutainment games made for it. Ever hear of Metal Gear? Both MG 1 and 2 were made for the MSX. Looks way better than the NES version too. Crazyness, I tell you!
And when did this whole MSX thing happen? "back when [you were] 13, playing Zelda or Sonic!"
I Browse at +4 Flamebait
Open Source Sysadmin
The writer seems that he can barely conceal his disgust of all things American/Western and plays to typical racist stereotypes of Westerners/Americans. It's typical of what is increasingly seen throughout Asia.
The Western/American stereotype is as he describes Microsoft's Steve Balmer: arrogant, obnoxious, fat ("big-thigh bravado"), dirty ("soaked armpits") loud (he "roars" and "screeches"), unintelligent, lazy, slovenly, and worships money.
The Japanese on the other hand are industrious, creative, intelligent, hardworking, modest, artistic, but you get the picture. Check out the description of Asians: "unflappable Sony Entertainment CEO Ken Kutaragi or revered Nintendo developer Shigero Miyamoto elegantly groomed, unassuming men who modestly offer their wares with only a hint of boyish twinkle, as if they were toymakers to the emperor's children.
You missed the point of the comment: they stole the "showmanship", not the "X-Box interface". I don't believe I even mentioned anything about the X-Box gui in the entire message.
Uh, who's the big mascot for the PS2? A snowboarding guy? The fact is that single-character branding only works on Japanese kids nowadays. Even Nintendo has figured that out, and isn't pushing Mario on us anymore.
Bullshit. There's more than a dozen games on that list, each one of them better than anything PS2 had at premiere. Remember the crap that PS2 had on shelves for its launch? If you could even find a game.
This sense is validated by a recent survey of consumers in the market this Christmas for a console; overwhelmingly (as in 62 percent) they preferred the Playstation 2, and primarily on the strength of its brand and wide variety of games.
Again, bullshit. Although the 62% figure is correct, with XBox and Gamecube basically tied, the reasons for choosing PS2 had more to do with "brand leadership" and Sony-ness than games. Games were listed as third in the list of reasons. Even then, it had to do with variety, not quality.
I could go on, but you get the point. That article was crap. Not a review, more of an editorial. The author was so afraid of adding publicity to the XBox machine that he hardly mentioned the console at all, instead focusing on why he thought PS2 and G^3 were so much better.
If you fall off a building, go real limp, because maybe you'll look like a dummy and people will be like hey, free dummy
SOME games used the SuperH Dreamcast WinCE. Most of them were the shitty games, too. The best games used the SEGA Dreamcast OS instead.
How many more times do we need to tell you guys this? The damn console is 3 years old now.
I wouldn't consider a sequel important in the grand scheme of things.
Then why, just two sentences later did you say, "GT3, GTA3 and MGS2 are going to be like that ['important'] for the PS2?" Maybe they're just there for decoration, but I was under the impression that those little numbers after the acronyms indicated that they're sequels. Which of course, to you, are unimportant. Unless they're on the system you're pimping for, I guess.
Obviously from someone who never ever played PSO... After racking up several hundred hours on PSO using my DC ethernet card (through my linux router) I said to myself - I can't imagine why a console *wouldn't* have one of these.
Grolsch is great too.
Whoops. Suppose MS prevent Xbox hacking by smearing chocolate sauce over the chips. Someone who doesn't know this speculates that chocolate smeared over the chips would have prevented hacking, and then someone else says it could be wiped off. It looks like the latter person is trying to circumvent protection on the real thing rather than as part of a thought experiment.
I don't want anyone to get in trouble with DMCA or anything like that, so please be careful.
Well, one of the advantages of the nVidia chips is that one driver runs all of them, as long as the XBox chip is not radically different the current ones, the binary driver will probably still work anyway.
Pure conjecture of course.
In the spoon, there is no Soviet Russia!
Well, they better be aiming for the 14-30 yo age range, cause my 10yo son tells me everyone is down on the xBox, even the ones who demo'd it at Pacific Place and other spots.
But the Gamecube definitely has the mind share there.
--- Will in Seattle - What are you doing to fight the War?
because no DC games (including PSO) interested me.
i'm glad you found it fun, but you have to realize that you are in the minority. in order for a feature like that to be included on consoles enough people have to want it to be profitable, and it's not.
...dave
Think different? I'd be happy if most people would just think...
Gee Fiz, a bone-a-fido headset? Like the ones people have been plugging into the back of their home computers since i486? So why is this just "in the works"? I'm not sure my mom want's to play half life, but I am sure I don't want a head set. M$ is never going to get there.
The privacy invasion design, if it's anything like their other OS, is ready to go!
Where did you want to go yesterday? Don't bother to answer, we already know.
DMCA, Hollings, Palladium. What might have sounded like paranoia is now common sense.
"Learn to think for yourselves and don't judge every product by simply looking at the brand name"
So give some logical arguments why Xbox is better and will get market share. Look at the arguments against it and come up with reasons to counter them. Your post doesn't have a wiff of inteligence in it.
Would it be possible to buy 1 console and be able to play games from a 2nd console? Since the XBox has a harddrive and an obvious OS, could it be possible to modify the code so that it could play PS2(PSone as well) games, among other consoles. Then that way, I could have an easier time to justify the cost.
I drive WAY too fast to worry about cholesterol!
on a PC placed in your living room, if you really wanted to. there are *gasp* TV-out cards, you know.
the only thing you couldn't do is play good console games, which you can't on the X-Box anyway.
sorry guy, but you're just blowing smoke.
...dave
Think different? I'd be happy if most people would just think...
In reference to the "green screen of death" linked to in the article, since *when* is a simple error message the same as the machine dieing?
./file.jpg
Here, try this: place a single jpeg file in your home directory. Do `chmod +x file.jpg` Now do
Doesn't work? Oh, too bad. Well guess what? It's the *SAME THING HERE*.
Get a clue, Michael. Just because someone doesn't use plain text on a console terminal to show error messages doesn't mean that the machine has crashed.
You should never take life too seriously - You'll never get out of it alive.
Microsoft loses at least $100 for every XBox they sell
True, but you're not looking at the Big Picture.
For every unit that MS produces and sells, they lose $100.
For every unit they produce that they don't sell, they lose $500.
For every unit that MS sells, they add that to the total, and tell developers "look how many potential customers you're losing"
I can hurt them more by NOT buying one.
I hope you meant that as a joke/troll... I've crashed console games before, just by giving them bizarre input. (IE no patchers or odd hardware). Being a console or a console game doesn't make something immune to bugs. Come on now. =)
you miss my point.
a) more storange is not necessarily a bad thing, but it's not a reason to buy a console. the games are. one memory card is enough for probably all the games you could be playing at one time (unless you're like one of my friends who makes save games in final fantasy every 5 minutes.) of course a bit of caching would be nice too, but it's not a reason to buy a console.. actuall most games on the PSX2 don't have *that* awful of load times.
b) ethernet WOULD be nice if some games would use it but none are! (not literally, but none of the big games.)
you need to stop and think about things a bit before you go off on me again.
...dave
Think different? I'd be happy if most people would just think...
Two thoughts:
Of the following systems I own, guess which have a tendancy to overheat and lock up:
- Atari 2600
- Nindendo Entertainment System
- Nintendo Gameboy
- Nintendo SNES
- Sega Genesis
- Sega CD
- Sega 32x
- Sega Saturn
- Sony Playstation
- Nintendo N64
- Sega Dreamcast
- Nintendo Gameboy Color
- Bandai WonderSwan
- Sony PS2
- Nintendo Gameboy Advance
Yep. The Sega CD, the Playstation, and especially the Saturn. All the optical drive systems, with the exception of the very recent ones: the Dreamcast and the PS2.Hopefully, Nintendo has picked up on the design lessons it took Sony and Sega one or two tries to learn. Having hot running chips in a console is only a small problem. While given a long enough play time cartridge-based systems can overheat and lock, it's fairly rare, and most non-game-all-day-straight players won't experience it. However, moving to optical disks, and adding a warm electric motor can lead to lockups real quick if you don't design carefully. Witness Sega's first two tries.
I'm rooting for, and planning to buy, the GameCube, not the XBox, but we're seeing each company's first attempt to pack hot chips and a hot motor in a small package. Without even getting into possible firmware and software issues, I'm not counting out lockups with either device.
"Be Happy or Die." -- AoN
but it will look better and play better (IMHO, mouse and keyboard vs. controller.. and don't give me that you can have a mouse and keyboard for your console, like i wanna bend over to use those on my coffee table) on the PC.
...dave
Think different? I'd be happy if most people would just think...
Sounds like "Bill the Borg" is trying to make their brand's personality a Borg. Whould this be considered plagerism?
If "disco" means "I learn" in Latin, does "discothèque" mean "I learn technology"?
"The CPU is from intel, the GPU from nVidia, and the console from Microsoft. Support the U.S.!"
The Intel CPU is manufactured in Asia, the console was farmed to Flextronics and is being built in Mexico.
And to add another argument, is it really patriotic to buy poorly made products in your own country so you can reward people who can't do the job as well as people in other countries? The argument didn't wash with cars in the 80's.
you even quoted the part where i explain what i meant.
read it again.
in plain terms : ethernet now == not useful.
ethernet in the future == probably useful.
but the console developers need to start putting it to use, and if you look at all the upcoming big titles, they aren't. please do a little thought before you knee-jerk back your drivel in my direction.
...dave
Think different? I'd be happy if most people would just think...
I want one so I can compile Linux x-apps/games. The really good games, "GTA2/MGS2," are all on the PS2 so this is just a cheap PC to me.
In fact the controller cord is DESIGNED to unplug before the system plunges to the floor. (It has some sort of special clip or something...)
I tried those games on the N64 and I found all FPS games except Goldeneye to be virtually unplayable. I simply could not get the thing to respond quickly enough. Doom would've played nice since there's no need for a Z-axis there, but come on already. Goldeneye handled this by controlling the Z-axis for you; the others didn't. Wasn't really that great though. Want to jump off a catwalk in Goldeneye to surprise someone? Forget it, use the ramp. It just couldn't handle it.
GoldenEye was a good game, to a point. After killing about 900 anonymous soldiers though, it got a bit tedious and started to become a huge pain in the ass.
Multiplayer was better, but I never figured out why Nintendo didn't hack in a simple Appletalk-like protocol with USB ports or something so you could network the boxes. Put some of those together with some smallish TV sets, and multiplayer would have been a whole lot better. I'm not a big believer in the multiplayer+single screen thing anymore; unless you're talking about Tetris or Mario Party or something like that.
Also, Goldeneye made me motion sick far quicker than any FPS I played before or since, and I won't touch it anymore.
In short, the best games we played on the N64 have been Tetris (my wife's preference), Zelda64 (with the walkthrough of course, and I won't touch Majora's Mask as I'm afraid of the time suckage), and Diddy Kong.
FWIW though, I did like the N64 controller. It was especially natural to use during Mario64 and Diddy Kong.
Please mod this post only if you think others should/n't read this. I have enough ego^H^H^Hkarma. Thanks!
little boy, my car probably costs more than you've earned in your entire life.
...dave
Think different? I'd be happy if most people would just think...
Well, after the last two weeks of hovering and roaming around the local Toy's R Us playing with the various games, I now own an Xbox. I can't say that I like Microsoft for the various OS stumbles or their constant legal battles, but as a console, and for what you get with it, it's pretty damn fun.
:-)
Nuff talking... back to Halo.
The hell it didn't. That was the only thing that saved the car industry in the 80's their made in america campaign. They obviously couldn't win with their products so they started trying to get better but in the mean time they got a lot of extra sales from patriotic americans.
So you are saying products produced in North America don't have the same quality as those produced in Asia and elsewhere? I would beg to differ. The fact of the matter is the Xbox helps our economy much more than it helps Japan's. That is a huge change.
it's not like any of the consoles are quiet.
you can build a pc to be quiet, it just takes a little effort because there's not much demand for it.
...dave
Think different? I'd be happy if most people would just think...
Actually, Netscape 6 for OS X is so great, that I'm actually making the switch.
IT IS FAST!!!
On my iMac 233 here at work with IE 5, loading this story took five minutes, and pretty much froze my computer while it was doing it.
On my G4 867 at home, it would probably take 45 seconds to a minute in IE. I'm not exactly sure though, because I use Netscape for OS X there, and it loads in about THREE TO FOUR SECONDS. That is raw and uncut, nested.
So, Netscape isn't dead yet. (At least on the Mac)
the blind and the dumb amuse me... :-)
"So you are saying products produced in North America don't have the same quality as those produced in Asia and elsewhere? I would beg to differ. The fact of the matter is the Xbox helps our economy much more than it helps Japan's. That is a huge change"
I think quality is independent of the region. Any region can produce crap and/or quality. But the money from Xbox is not going to the states. Since MS is producing it at a loss the money is actually going to Asia and Mexico where it's being manufactured.
And currently US car makers are in hot financial water. The 80's saw huge inroads to companies like Honda. But that's another topic.
Anyone want to take odds on how long this will last?
It seems to me that Xbox (hard drive, ethernet) + broadband == hardware p2p client. Anyone want to take a wager on how long it takes for Gnutella and Audio Galaxy clients to start showing up?
Too bad it doesn't have video capture . . .
Regards,
-l
Hmmm....FYI, I ran out during lunch and stopped by both Gamestop and MediaPlay (here in the Rochester, NY AKA Hell on Earth area) Gamestop was only selling them to preorders and they didn't have the DVD controllers in yet, MediaPlay offered to sell me one, but it was in the form an atrocious bundle (I had a preorder w/ EB that I canceled because I decided against a bundle) that consisted of 3 games, a memory card (please tell me what the point is...it's got a hard drive!) and an additional controller. Anyone else have any availability stories?
Yeah...and we all play games cause we are zombies. and they have a monopoly, because they secretly own Sony, and those two companies have pretty much split the US videogame market. YOu are trying to be cool by being anti-anti-ms. get a life. Be real. See that this company is evil. Watch dancemonkeyboy, and try not to get scared. This company is planning on rolling over Nintendo and Sony and making the videogame market another MS monopoly. I don't like the sound of that. anyways, read the salon article, before you post, and then think about it. peace.
Who is this Anonymous Coward character, how does he post so much, and why is he always such a whore?
The XBox is from Microsoft. MS isn't all bad, but I BET there will be show-stopping bugs found in the OS. And how are you going to update the OS? Is it on the HD, or is it loaded from ROM?
"Companies dont create a product to lose money. In time Xbox will likely bring MS a lot of revenue"
I agree, if MicroSoft manages to keep a market share in this they will in time make money. But I don't buy the bull argument of "Buy an XBox, support America" crap. For the next year or two that cash will go to Asia and Mexico.
but ethernet support has been a known standard feature of the x-box yet few games are coming out with support for it..
IMHO, the types of games that work well on consoles do not lend themselves to WAN play. you already have LAN capability on the PSX2, and that works great (playing Gran Turismo 3 on two or more TVs, etc.)
being able to put your console on the internet is not a reason to buy it, IMHO. i'm also not interested in loading mediocre media onto it to get mediocre playback. i have a top-of-the-line DVD player for a reason.
...dave
Think different? I'd be happy if most people would just think...
This could change if someone ports linux to it though.
That's why I bought a Dreamcast.
the good ground has been paved over by suicidal maniacs
Rather than point to FUD just as you did, go on google and do a search for fun things like Pentium 3 700MHz benchmarks versus the Gecko that the gamecube has. then, check out the GeForce 2 (MX?) in the xbox, and the RAM, versus Gamecube's. Then, just to make it all worthwhile, check out real performance. To show that pure "power" doesn't matter, and it's the programming and just general design, compare games, side by side. Gamecube to Xbox to PS2. Then, think about the games taht are coming out, later..um..xbox gets halo. After that, i hear it is nothing (gamespot, among others). PS2 will rock, undoubtedly, and i predict the Gamecube will sell the most systems because of it's price and kiddie factor this Christmas.
It's the games. Games are from developers.
Who is this Anonymous Coward character, how does he post so much, and why is he always such a whore?
I agree completely with your M$ v. NS assessment. However, I don't think it is a slam dunk that XB2 > PS3. Sony doesn't suffer from the same problems that Netscape did (they have other problems, but who doesn't?):
They understand the importance of...
--sound architecture
--standards
...and they have set standards successfully and over the long haul.
Twelve-and-three-quarter inches. Unyielding. This wand belonged to Bellatrix Lestrange.
Putting the game genie in and pushing it in hard (not necessarily entering any codes) *always* made trouble games work for me. I never understood why the game genie worked without being pressed down like regular games, but shoving a game in w/o the game genie never worked...
"Also there are other U.S. companies involved, nVidia and Intel. "
Intel will funnel the money to Asia as that's where it's manufactured (The CPU and dozens of supporting chips). I am not sure what nVidia does, but Flextronics who's building the Xbox is in Mexico. The cash goes from your pocket to Microsoft who pays Intel and Flextronics billions, who inturn pay the Mexicans and Asians employee's.
I not saying all the money will leave the country, but the "Buy America, Buy Xbox" does not pass the litmus test. About 90% of that money will leave the country.
$5 / month hosted VPS on linux = awesome!
an ethernet connection on a console isn't some gaming messiah. there are currently no games which i could see benefitting from this on any console, nor any in the future. same with having a hard drive.
Holy cow... There is one very powerful incentive to include these features on a console. MMORPGs are very popular, and have turned out to produce quite a bit of revenue. I haven't played it, but apparently Phantasy Star Online is very popular. The first company to bring a real MMORPG to a wide user base is going to win BIG!
Consoles have a far larger market penetration than PCs when talking about the gaming market. There's a huge untapped potential here for revenue. And frankly, I think MMORPG will be the killer app for online console gaming.
Regards,
Spooticus
It's only an advantage to them if you buy the games. The just the parts in these puppies are worth far more than $300, albeit not in large quantity purchases, but either way M$ still loses with every hardware sale. Do I smell another "NetPliance Iopener" on the horizon? Except this one has a guaranteed supply due to the strength of its backer! So what we need is for someone to hack the Xbox sufficiently to make it easy to load Linux. Then someone needs to reverse engineer the NVidia chipset to gain access to 2D, 3D, and any video / mpeg2 related functionality.
Well, I can design, build, and ship a PC (w/o monitor), for about $400. That includes Athlon 1.2C, 30 gig hard drive, 300W PS, good case, keyboard and mouse by Logitech. All from Newegg.com. A superior site, in my opinion. And with that system, i'm sure I could compete with your GF3 enough with my GF2-GTS enough where the gameplay and graphics would be about the same.
No, the beauty of consoles is their ease of use, price, game libraries (no myamoto, ever, for pc, unless you ROM it), portability (except the XBOX), pop-in-a-game-and-play, multiplayer (on one tv), and again, price...no expensive monitor...
Who is this Anonymous Coward character, how does he post so much, and why is he always such a whore?
True enough that MS currently dominates, but I think that everyone can agree that that was due to illegal practices on Microsoft's part.
Not really. In fact the whole Netscape thing seems to be
one of the few cases where MS fought fairly.
MS beat Netscape because Netscape allowed their browser to stagnate, while MS made huge leaps on theirs.
Netscape got complacent, and lost the market because of it.
It wasn't the bundling of IE that killed NS, it's because NS's browser sucked in comparison with IE.
C-X C-S
i don't think these types of games work that well on consoles, i think they're quite a bit better on PCs. most of the market for this type of game are geeks too (at least the ones i met in my brief stint with EverQuest.)
i'd be interested to see the size of the user base for POS vs. EverQuest/Asheron's Call/etc.
we'll see though.
...dave
Think different? I'd be happy if most people would just think...
this is the last time i'm replying to this thread..
first off see my reply to a guy higher up in this thread about MMORPGs on consoles. MS has one already it's called Asheron's Call
as i've said (also in other places in this thread), i do not think most games that are good on WANs (ie the INTARWEB) work well on consoles.
these being FPS and MMORPGs and games like diablo, the console versions of these games are always far inferior to their PC siblings.
...dave
Think different? I'd be happy if most people would just think...
Here is something I said earlier, but it deserves repeating:
"my favorite quote from the [salon] article is this: 'The company is taking a substantial loss on every Xbox sale.' Music to my ears. I might buy one, and HALO, and then Linux it into a super nintendo-playing emulator (laughter, more laughter)...hmm...anyone up for some madden '94? Legend of Zelda? I love ROMS. ohh...ohh, Final Fantasies! playstation emulation! CHRONO TRIGGER ON XBOX! It's a beautiful thing...I love how its a pc...hmmm...ohh....ohh...i'm just rolling in laugher. ha. Not to mention the viruses..."
By viruses I was referring to a comment I had made, that since the xbox has permanent storage, is built by MS, and has Internet (and thus probably email by microsoft) functionality, it will probably be the first console in history to get viruses. Just a funny thought.
peace.
Who is this Anonymous Coward character, how does he post so much, and why is he always such a whore?
For those that are interested, check out the demo.
here
You could've hired me.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
The issue is optimizing the X driver for GL performance on the PS2, which is hardware dependent no matter what GPU you're coding for. I imagine it's likely that performance may not be as good on the PS2 as writing hand assembly. That said, I'm sure it would be good enough considering that FlightGear runs perfectly fine on my Dual PPRO 200 with a PCI Voodoo 3 video card.
Honestly, the idea of providing a cross platform development and gaming environment between the PS2 and Xbox is pretty cool. FlighGear would be an excellent way to show off Linux and it's wide range of hardware support.
i just stumbled across this article on nytimes.com - sorry if it's already been posted.
... sounds like bullying, at least to me.
P L.html
the article mentions how microsoft picked up some small bands and used their music on the games without paying the bands or the labels. microsoft explains that the promotional exposure that the bands will get from the games is reparation enough. however, the games fail to mention the names of the bands and the titles of the songs that are in the games! so how do you know who these artists are??
article also mentions how some fear that the xbox (with it's hard drive and internet capabilities) could become a major haven for pirated videos and music, although they also note that this data could NOT be burned onto cds (so i guess that makes it ok?)
it's an interesting read. check it out: http://www.nytimes.com/2001/11/15/arts/music/15PO
Satanists get good grades too...suspiciously good grades
never fear folks,
the xbox technology is nothing more than a nextgen graphics processor and high paid game companies.
so, instead of NVIDIA releasing their nextgen graphics card to the gaming market, they signed a deal with microsoft to keep it 'under wraps'. next, microsoft pays big dollar to game companies to develop exclusively for the nextgen graphics processor. so, now you have a game console with technology that no one has....yet.
i'm sure the deal NVIDIA signed with microsoft won't keep their nextgen stuff proprietary for long. there's probably some clause that says that after 6 months NVIDIA will be allowed to deliver this new technology to the market.
so, microsoft has a fantastic console, not because of microsoft. it's because they sabotaged the computer game market. whoop de doo.
That is kind of peculiar. The local Software Etc. has their PS2 demo machines turned off also.
It could very well be Microsoft demanding this. But perhaps store owners are just trying to get people to concentrate on X-Box products for the moment.
For starters, how about "Twisted Metal Black"?
To this game's credit, you really can drive your car around anywhere on the "playing field". When you're stopped from driving any further, it's because there's a real barrier there, such as a chain-link fence or a building. None of that "Star Wars" game concept of "pan a little bit to the left or to the right, but we'll stop you here because we didn't want to develop more scenery past this point".
Also, you seem to completely discount all of the sports titles for PS2, which are probably among the most played games on consoles, period. Many a console (of all types) has been purchased mainly so people can compete in a round of NHL Hockey or Football.
Really, I think the overall complaint that "everything seems like you're watching scenery scroll towards you" can be argued equally for PC games. How many Doom/Quake/UT remakes do we need on the PC anyway?
When you compromise by only providing a joystick type controller and not a full-blown keyboard, you automatically limit the genres of games suitable for the system. I think the PS2 and all other consoles serve their intended purpose very well. Considering a low-res TV set is the primary display device, you can't cram lots of text on the screen anyway. What other types of games do you have in mind to put on one?
So, if you modify an X-Box so it is no longer operationally equivalent, but runs Linux instead, does it become an Ex-X-box?
And if you install a GUI on your Linuxified X-Box, does it become an X-Ex-X-Box?
And if you then use your GUIified Linuxified X-Box for surfing adult web sites, does it become an XXX-X-Ex-X-Box?
KMSMA (WWBD?)
I would argue on Pope Slackman's behalf that Microsoft _did_ play fairly on this issue.
I think the whole bundling argument is just so much horse hocky. Does Ford compete unfairly against Blaupunkt because their cars and trucks come with stereos installed? I have never heard an argument that draws any real distinction between this example and Microsoft bundling useful tools with their OS. Why didn't people complain about WordPad, or Minesweeper, or edlin?! After Dark managed to overcome the fact that Windows 3 came with built in screensavers because they offered something more. It's not Microsoft's fault that they wrote a better browser. (Of course, it is their fault when they strong-armed OEMs into not letting _them_ bundle Netscape, but let's face it, if Netscape was good enough, they would have figured out a way to overcome customers' reluctance to switch from the default.)
In any event, this was clearly a case of Netscape not being able to cut it technically and being a cry-baby because there was already a groundswell over the fact that Microsoft has done many other unfair things. Of course, anyone with brains realized this around 1990, but by the time it reached the courts it really didn't matter anymore.
You are in a maze of twisty little passages, all alike.
So, is anyone working on making it possible to run Xbox games on a regular computer? If they're sharing a lot of technology with Windows, hopefully it should just be a matter of getting appropriate joystick hardware and having compatible video and sound cards. (And how long before we can run Xbox games under WINE on Linux?) I don't consider it worth my while to buy an Xbox just to play Oddworld, but I might as well make sure my next computer purchase is capable of running the games in some boot configuration.
"Before enlightenment: sharpen claws, catch mice. After enlightenment: sharpen claws, catch mice."
I knew it was going to happen when i read this:
Unbelieveable quote:
"We want to first succeed in the United States and then ride the wave of popularity into the Japanese market,"
It is obvious that microsoft is completely oblivious to how the gaming market works.
Got Freedom?
Thinking?
Here's a review I wrote on the thing when I messed with it at E3, and then added onto once I played with it again at the Tokyo Game Show, and screwed with it when I could find a working kiosk.
XBox Review
Scroll to the bottom of the review for all the new info.
Here's a first look review of Dead or Alive 3, as well.
DOA3 Preview
Netjak.com independent reviews of domestic & import video ga
The Salon article wasn't a review of the Xbox, it was essentially a review of the launch titles. I agree that there aren't any truly ground-breaking titles, but they will come. Gotta say, I want to play Cel Damage, though.
The article almost entirely ignored the fact that developers have been quite positive about their Xbox experiences. Contrast this to what many developers are saying about the PS2's arcane internal structure.
Remember the original Playstation? It took off because Sony provided developers with an excellent platform. Also, the games improved over time. Compare the quality of the PS1 launch titles with the most recent PS1 games - big difference!
If developers fall in love with the Xbox, then eventually they will create great, innovative games for it. It's a nice piece of hardware, with huge potential. The fact that the launch didn't live up to all the marketing hype shouldn't surprise anyone.
Shinyfish Software
In spite of the fact that I already think that people are incredibly stupid, and in spite of seeing decades of evidence of the incredible stupidity of people on probably at least a weekly basis, stories like this (these eBay auctions) still somehow manage to boggle my mind and make me shake my head in wonder and disbelief. I find myself searching for possible rational explanations. So far the only explanation I can come up with that makes sense to me is that perhaps the bidders on these auctions were mostly foreigners with very poor English skills (possibly having recently moved e.g. to the US), who would not only easily have misunderstood the descriptions (understanding probably mostly just the main keywords), but would themselves (in a sort of naive trusting of people, and in good faith) never have believed or even considered that anyone would attempt such ridiculous auctions. If that was the case, I wonder if there would be any legal implications. Probably not, but still, if somebody deliberately and knowingly conned a naive immigrant with poor English skills, it seems a bit on the shady side.
GT3; Grand Turisimo 3 masterpiece in racing simulation (even if you can't put a scratch in the purty cars)
GTA4; Grand Theft Auto 3 super violent thug simulator also very fun for that reptile part of your brain. and worth the price of the PS2
I used to have a cool sig, back when I cared
That's excatly the reason they will not be sold in China/Hong Kong. Look at This TheRegister Story from today. Quote Microsoft's Xbox gaming console will not be sold in Hong Kong or China for the foreseeable future due to the rampant piracy problem in the region. The company is selling the actual hardware at a loss - as much as $125 per box, according to Merrill Lynch - and plans to recoup profits on its software titles, much like the razor blade or printer cartridge industry. UNquote
Help fight continental drift.
*sniffle*
Maximum resolution (cinematics)
X-box: 1920x1080
PS2: 1280X1024
Maximum resolution with 2 x 32bpp frame buffers + Z buffer (gameplay)
X-box: 1920x1080
PS2: 640x480
First, its not a review at all! It hardly talks abou the XBox. I thought that the Game Cube comments were unfair as well and that the author was very unreasonably biased towareds the Playstation 2. He only mentioned 3 or so Game Cube titles in the whole thing.
Most people would die sooner than think; in fact, they do.
According to this, MS has stated that it is NOT progressive-scan DVD, just for the games:
7 0, 2824108,00.html
http://gamespot.com/gamespot/stories/news/0,108
This article was supposed to be about the X Box? It was supposed to be a review?
I'd say 1/6 of it was X-Box related and it certainly wasn't a review because the so called reviewer hadn't played any of the games! It was also primarily speculation and time spent talking about games that are coming up in comparison to other games coming up for other types of consoles. It should have been accurately labeled as a discussion of upcoming consoles and their games.
Most people would die sooner than think; in fact, they do.
You should fire it up and run SETI@home on it...
You know, someone I worked with at my last job out on the far end of tech support hell did something like this. He actually had _two_ subnets on his home LAN to accomodate both Ethernet and Token Ring. Why token ring? Because he had some old piece of shit MCA box and only had a Token Ring card for it.
And why was it running at all? To complete SETI work units. No other use. Bah. Waste of time.
--saint
Americans and Europeans tend to be very laisez faire (sp), but an unbelievable number of superior Western products fail in Japan because of one reason: NATIONALISM.
"Microsoft CURES AIDS AND CANCER"
Yeah, that would be great. I'm sure everyone with either disease would love to have re-purchase the cure every year or have Microsoft employees come out and re-infect them.
Yes, this is a poke at Microsoft and their ridiculous love of licensing. Why? I just got my MCP "Welcome" info packet yesterday, and the certificate was in an envelope with what was essentially a EULA sticker sealing it shut. I have to agree to some contract to read a piece of paper or hang it on my wall? Pfft!
I can't wait to see how Microsoft deals with people who beat or become bored with X-Box games and try to resell them on eBay or at Funcoland.
~Philly
I don't get this - I have an xbox sitting right here - and on the back left of the unit (as your looking it it) is a 10/100 ethernet jack...
Could I plug an xbox with the hdtv adapter on a rear projection HDTV?
I have heard it could damage the the tv?
They keep mentioning it's the first console to support hdtv but most set are rear projection...
If so I'm bound to buy a xbr....damn.
I lost all interest in the conclusions of this article once I saw the author. Check out this previous article of his, on the game "Black & White".
Salon review of Black & White
There was a lot of pure hype "reviews" of this game that had nothing to do with the reality, but this is the worst one I ever read.
Here's some quotes to give you the tone:
Tell me, those of you unfortunate enough to have purchased this game, are these fair comments? I know hardly anyone who even bothered to finish it, it was so annoying, repetitive, and simple-minded. And that's not even considering the massive bugs that made it damn near impossible to play for the first six months of its release. Not that any of these things stopped Wagner James Au from transcribing his fantasies.
I imagine his review of the X-Box has about the same level of insight and realism.
The main reason Gamecube will be better then X-box is not because of OpenGL but the fun factor of the games that Nintendo is producing for it. It seems that Microsoft has gone to the "graphics are better then gameplay" tatic and as we see this in other computer games, we all know that this doesnt work while the gamecube it focus more on the fact that the games they are making for it are fun. Graphics can only please you so many times
"Eat right, Exercise daily, Die anyways."
http://www.10angrygamers.com Where purple monkeys attack!!
I can't tell if you're trolling, or simply haven't played many video games. Let me assure you that console systems do crash, there is no guarantee that code is perfect. Obviously there is more effort to reduce bugs in a fixed enviroment, but it is impossible to have perfect code all of the time.
FuzzyWhe the PS2 was released, people were auctioning them on Ebay for $1500 USd (highest price I saw with a bid). I just did a quick search for the X-Box, and guess what? Quite a few people are getting less than $299 for them, and the ones that are, aren't getting much more than $300 (unbundled) for them.
Learn to think for yourselves and don't judge every product by simply looking at the brand name. How shallow is that?
... ) What i can see of most north american customers these days is a lack of criticism and a faithful fanatism towards big marketing campaigns and brands.
Excuse me ? The only persons who seem unable to evaluate the quality of a product currently are the ones buying M$ products out of marketing hypes. Meaning you. I'm pretty sure you never look at the quality of their product before buying them.
You see Microsoft on the box, then you say:
" Well! Since everybody uses it, it must be good."
I don't mean to be rude ( In fact yes i do ), but when is the last time you really checked the full specs and reviews of a product before buying it. (10 years, 20
Do us a favor, why don't you go talk your opinion where it matters, meaning somewhere else
This is the lamest comment i've read today. ( Yes i am pissed, and yes this is a flame. )
From an article at Cnet.com about techie Christmas gifts and who wants what:
"Executives
Weellll . .
We're not surprised, are we?
None of that "Star Wars" game concept of "pan a little bit to the left or to the right, but we'll stop you here because we didn't want to develop more scenery past this point".
Amen from the highest fucking rooftops. I wish Lucasarts would make another genuine flight simulator like XWA, rather than Yet Another Shitty Arcade Game like Rogue Squadron and Rogue Leader.
Oh, silly me. Crappy arcade games take less time and less people to develop. Cheaper to make equals higher profit margin if successful and lower losses if it bombs. What could I have been thinking?
I have to say that I'm a pc gamer. I like some console games but there aren't many that make me drool like they do on the pc. sure I might be tied to Windows for games at this time but i just prefer playing games ont he pc. the other thing is that the only game thats on the xbox that i want to play is Halo. that might come to the pc/mac eventually and I'll play it then . if it doesn't then oh well. I'm not shelling that much cash for a system that has one game that I might play. Halo might be cool but its no FF7 or Tekken thsoe are the games that got me to buy a PSone.
-
i was staring at nude pictures of the xbox over at www.firesquad.com , and i thought to myself how can they call this thing a console! it a god dang computer. there's the fancy geforce 3 sticking out of the "gasp" motherboard of the xbox. a nice circular heatsink over the pentium III cpu. and a bunch of slots that look like pci slots and dimm slots for ram. i would of thought they would have put more time in to the xbox like the ps2. they could of intergrated some parts to reduce the fucking size of the xbox. have you seen one and hold on! it bigger then my vcr and vcd machine combined. while microsoft is trying to sell this thing as a console but to me it is a very inexpensive computer! i not so excited by the games that will be produced for the xbox but for the thought of some day may be not today maybe not tomorrow but some day (better make it soon!) some ingenius hackers out there to turn the xbox in to something usefull. like the the dreamcast linux boxes that i saw on /. the xbox is 100x more power full then the dreamcast {R.I.P} some good shit can be made of the box. here are some ideas.
1. all the talk about bewoulf clusters and supercomputing. i don't xbox super computers?
2. the nice and fancy geforce 3(?) cards in side the xbox. buy the box and turn them in to graphic farms. i know that sony are using the ps2 in boxes to do parallel graphics processing in future digital movies.
3. at 733 mhz and a 8 gig hd and a sweat ass graphix card all for the low low price of 300 dollars somebody out there better make some kind of hack so i can install so kind of operating system on the xbox maybe win xp or red hat.
my two cents about the xbox.
i have seen halo can't wait for it to come out for my good old computer.
Me and lunchbox here are going to kick your ass.
The problem is, company profiteering notwithstanding, they're making it obvious that's all they're interested in. "Oh look! The gaming industry has lots of money! We can get some of that!"
There's a term for this sort of behavior. You might want to write this down for future reference, so I'll wait for you to get a pencil. Ready? Good. The term is:
Microsoft is expanding into a new market to try to increase profits? Say it ain't so! What, exactly, do you think is the purpose of a company? I realize that we're dealing with Microsoft, and therefore required to hate them, but seriously--companies exist to make money. You want to see expansion into a new market? Look at Sony--I have a 25 year old Sony TV. That's long before the PlayStation was a gleam in some engineer's eye. At some point after my TV was made, Sony decided to get into the game console market. Have you noticed that they now have a music division, and movie division (Sony Pictures Studios), and several other divisions not related to their previous business of building non-interactive entertainment hardware (stereos, TV's, etc.)?
If Microsoft wants to diverisfy its business, let them. If you think about it for a bit, you'll realize that it's almost certain to be a good thing. Look at the options:
In any event, the introduction of a new system will create competition, driving down prices and spurring innovation. End result: consumer wins. Leave the Xbox alone, and let the market decide.
"Make it ten--I am only a poor corrupt official."
--Captain Louis Renault (Claude Rains), Casablanca
The green screen of Error that was posted with this is from an old version of XDR. It's not fair attributing errors from prerelease versions to the final product
"Not knowing when the dawn will come, I open every door." - Emily Dickinson
To paraphrase, the problem with pr0n is that it isn't perfect. But it certainly helps.
Do a google search before posting.
Come on. The comment was a joke.
Here...I'll explain it for you though. Every Windows owner has probably seen the BSoD. Windows is made by a little company called Microsoft. Microsoft has also started selling home game consoles. Therefore, it would be a good joke to relate the BSoD from Windows to this new console. That might be funny, huh? Don't just rant about this joke being MS-bashing. Laugh a little.
We are here to think how we want, there are plenty of people neutral on MS here, plenty who pick on them for fun, and plenty who hate them with burning passion. It isn't groupthink, stop trying to get noticedby being anti-anti-MS. Yes, i know i'm replying to a troll, but someone had to do it.
Who is this Anonymous Coward character, how does he post so much, and why is he always such a whore?
most importantly, sony has too much money for MS to go head to head wit them by selling an 'equivilent' product at a loss.
netscape OTOH just didn't have enough money to compete against MS when MS started screwing them by giving MS away for free.
If I had enough money to build and give away cars for free, I would eventually dominate the market. Then I could charge usage fees.
Of course If I did that I would be shut down for unfair trade, and illegal use of an monopoly.
But rules like that din't apply to software companies when the bush family is in office.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
i heard a wild rumor (mostly i made it up) that if you plug a x-box by a ps2 the x-box will slowly drain the power from the ps2 till the ps2 fails to function and dies. leaving the xbox the only console playable!
Me and lunchbox here are going to kick your ass.
Ok. I get a little zealous sometimes, apologies.
I recommend anyone check out the games for the systems, and do a comparison on the software, not the hardware.
Who is this Anonymous Coward character, how does he post so much, and why is he always such a whore?
Apparently, the guy who wrote this doesn't remember the PS2 launch. Other than SSX and Madden, there weren't any incredible games either. In fact, for the first few months I had mine, I kept wondering when the good games were going to show up. Of course, now they are showing up -- GTA3, TH3, Half-Life, MSG2 -- and more, but it took a year. I think it would be better to look a year from now and see what kind of games are around for both consoles, and then judge.
-- Hobbits suck!
no...let them rot on the shelf till obsolete (say, 6 mos.) *that* will hurt ms.
Treatment, not tyranny. End the drug war and free our American POWs.
See my user info for links.
I work at a Best Buy, and our Xbox display unit freezes at least once every two hours, and we have to reset it. ( I usually leave it froze until a customer asks me to reset it, so more people can see that this thing freezes, heh heh). So far our gamecube has not froze once, we can leave it on all day with no problems. The only difference between the display units and the consumer ones is the demo units don't have the hard drive.
NerdShoe says its the "Cock Box"...
Console War
=D
There are a lot of filesystems that rarely need to be defragged. Most high performance filesystems don't really need it at all. When was the last time you defragmented a NTFS drive, or an ext2 drive? (Which is not to say it's never done, but I've never had to do it.)
J
No hardware fails if you can run Linux on it. Does anybody besides me think it would be terribly humorous to buy an xbox, rip out Bill's software, and run Linux instead?
-russ
Don't piss off The Angry Economist
The revenue still goes to the states .
/dev/null
Don't you mean the revenue still goes to Gates??
Which, for now, is, $ >
It's already been done... http://www.otakunozoku.com/xbox/
LEGAL - DMCA
There have been a few comments here that seem to seriously misconstrue what the DMCA is capable of, so let's review that then take a look at reverse-engineering case history.
"Ella the Cat" fished for ideas on what the Microsoft team might have done to keep unauthorized software off their box, then worried about DMCA implications. "Chakat" suggested that circumventing MS's only-signed-discs-may-apply code could be a DMCA violation.
I won't quote it all, but here's chapter 12 of the US Code. 1201(b) is what Dmitry's been charged under. It only prohibits devices that circumvent methods that "effectively protects a right of a copyright owner."
In this case, Microsoft can claim copyright on the BIOS in the Xbox. Suppose that we remove the MS-BIOS and replace it with one that'll boot anything (L-BIOS). We've circumvented a measure that prevented running unauthorized games, but that authorization or lack of has no legal weight behind it. Microsoft must enforce it themselves by creating strong measures.
We have to be careful that L-BIOS doesn't allow booting copies of games or we will run afoul of the DMCA.
LEGAL - Reverse Engineering
The Emulation FAQ AppendixB Appendix C provides a good background. Also see CASE SUMMARIES OF COMPUTER COPYRIGHT CASES and Overreaching Provisions in Software License Agreements by Michael Liberman.
The two cases that I think are most apropos are Sega v. Accolade and Sony v. Connectix. Accolade tried to create Genesis-compatible games. Connectix tried to emulate the Playstation. Both cases were about copyrights on games that were disassembled in order to figure out how the game machine worked. The odd thing to me is that disassembling the code and creating a work that used the ideas contained therin was no problem. What Sony & Sega attacked on was making a copy of the ROM into a computer's memory to do the disassembling. The courts found (post-DMCA in the Sony case) that the copying was fair use to gain access to the ideas. Copyright only applies to the expression of those ideas in the object code of the ROM.
Disassembling MS-BIOS to figure out how to talk to the memory, USB and hard disk controllers and create L-BIOS is perfectly legal. It's important to avoid copying MS-BIOS code directly and a clean room would be a good idea (the disassemblers send specs to the L-BIOS authors who never see the actual code), but it seems that Connectix did not employ clean room techniques and got away with it.
TECHNICAL
The Xbox System Software Overview says in part:
The ROM [...] will provide the following [...] services: FAT32 file system, UDFS file system, Copy-protection support, Certificate/signature validation
Supported media are CD, DVD, CD-RW, or DVD-R. There is no CD-R support.
Power Up- When the user turns on the console, the system software is decompressed out of read-only memory (ROM) into random access memory (RAM). Once in RAM, the system software initializes the hardware[....]
Media Detection- Upon power up [...] If it determines that the media [in the DVD drive] is a game, it loads the game into RAM, checks the signature of the game to verify that it is an authentic copy, then starts playing the game.
-
So it appears that MS-BIOS will only boot signed (presumably using strong encryption) DVDs. There are, of course, two answers to this:
1) Replace the MS-BIOS with a more pleasant L-BIOS that'll boot anything and perhaps boot off the hard drive instead of the DVD. Loading "real" games sounds pretty hairy and I'd rather not figure out how to do that, so you won't be able to play them anymore. I'm envisioning replacing the Flash ROM (I have access to a nice Nikon binocular microscope and a Metcal soldering iron for working on surface mount parts), but there are a couple of alternatives: a) piggy-back on a 2nd ROM containing L-BIOS except for chip-select which is hooked to a switch or b) use the JTAG port to reprogram the part in-circuit (only possible with some mfg.'s parts).
2) Figure out how to sign our own discs. This is a good excuse for me to get a DVD recorder. I'm concerned that this method is fewer steps away from a "mod chip" that plays duplicated games.
-
Well, that's what I've found out. I'm interested because it sounds like it'll be sort of hard. If we need to hook up a logic analyzer & watch MS's code do its thing I can handle that. I think getting Linux up & running, talking to keyboards & mice over USB & doing TCP/IP over the ethernet port shouldn't be too bad. Getting basic graphics (VGA emulation) up shouldn't be bad, but I make no promises that we'll be able to use the nVidia 3d. I'm thinking a server is a lot more likely than a nuevo-Indrema/TuxBox.
Worst case scenario is that the chipset itself has encryption hardware built-in and it must be unlocked by the CPU before it will enable access to RAM or peripherals. I doubt they had enough time to do something that clever.
By the way, you can reach me at morganw@yahoo.com (posting preferences not workin' for me)
Microsoft has been pulling the licensing trick since Windows 3.1.1 and maybe even before that - there once were other DOS's, not just MS-DOS. Microsoft used bundling tactics not only to make their version of DOS dominant, but also destroy all other OS's on the PC platform. I remember when manufacturers got a huge price break for only selling Windows and no other OS's. Tack on Office and you got another huge break. Microsoft was forced to stop this practice as part of an antitrust filed in the mid '90s, but no one seems to remember that (I think it was settled out of court, but those were my college years - a bit hazy :).
But back to the original example - if Ford, offered Blaupunkt stereos it might be different, but Microsoft would build their own and only offer their factory models. They then tack the fee for the stereo onto the price of the vehicle. The Ford costs more (look at how the price went up from Win95SE to Win98) but you get a "free" factory stereo with it. To be even more realistic, Ford would then wire the stereo directly to the electrical system so it can't easily be replaced or removed without breaking the entire vehicle.
Most of the time, though, Microsoft just starves out the competition by bundling the feature and tacking the development cost onto Windows (or server machines in the case of IIS). Netscape, Novell Netware, DR-DOS, and many others with little or no other revenue stream can't last long against the sort of "competition."
In writing this, I realized why Microsoft hates Open Source so much - it's not that the Open Source community is a threat, it's that if the Open Source community ever becomes a threat, there's no easy way to destroy them (bundling doesn't work when the competition works for free).
The specs for the PS2 list the screen resolution as variable from 256x244 to 1280x1024. A far cry from being limited to 480i.
It is very clear in this article that these analysts do not know what they are talking about. Afer today there is no question in my mind that Xbox will be a success. Has Microsoft ever lost at anything they put their full weight into? Not likely. People will be converging from the high cost of computer gaming and move to the Xbox as a cheaper, beter alternative. The analysts mention in the Salon article are traditionalists, following whats tried and true not whats state-of-the-art and new.
LOL - www.xbox.com is DOWN :-)
Well, at least at 6:12PM EST
Regarding the symbols on the buttons...
This makes sense to me, from an internationalization point of view. Not everyone is going to be able to recognize "A" - especially if your native written language doesn't use letters.
However, even a 3 year old will know what a circle, square, triangle, and cross are - even if they use different words for them.
as you peer in, one of those facehuggers leaps out and deposits an alien hatchling that has to burrow its way out of your chest.
As for Xbox game resolution goes, it still is all up to the developer to support higher resolution graphics modes. Progressive scan will give a Lot more pixels to draw per second, and I wonder if users will accept lower res/lower poly models as a trade of for higher resolutions. Since the Xbox does not support VGA output, progressive scan support will stay a niche market for quite some time, and I fail to see why a developer would put much extra effort in this option.
Nice for spec sheets, but the extra resolution is not without some major drawbacks.
Sentry23
-no brain, no pain
The problem with the Gran Turismo series is that it is *not* a driving simulator. It is merely an arcade racer with some realistic elements in it. Even the designer Kazunori Yamauchi says that.
Dont get me wrong I love playing the game but it is so different from a real-life experience it is untrue. Things like damage represenatation (apart from the token gesture of tyres), unrealistic driving lines, and being able to "catch-up" after crashes is pure fantasy. Hurtle into a corner at full speed and "bounce" of the car holding the proper line is a favourite trick I observe.
For myself and a lot of true gamers, the best simulation will always be Sega's Ferrari 355 Challenge. This game was not too popular in the arcades as it was *too* difficult, ie. realistic. Having only one car that modelled so accurately turned off a lot of people, have a minor scrape and you were lucky to finish anywhere decent. Crash and you were nearly guaranteed last place. I have a friend who races Ferraris in Macau and he says that the feel was perfect.
Regards,
Po
I would love to use NS 6 on Mac OS X, but everytime I try to use it, it locks up, and I can't make it do anything, so I have to force quit it every time. If you know why this is happening, let me know, and I'll use NS 6 again.
Powerbook G4/1.5GHz 12", Toshiba Satellite 1135-S1554
You call this a "Review of the XBox." This is by no means a review of anything, other than the author's opinion about Steve Ballmer and his impact on the abilities of MS developers to develop. He says nothing about how good or bad the XBox games actually are, just that he hasn't heard anything about them and hasn't seen them (some reviewer...), but he does mention (extensively) what the PS2 has, had, and will soon have (hopefully). This is not a review of the XBox, but a shameless ad for the PlayStation. Or, more accurately, an anti-XBox opinion based in no particular facts.
Lack of eloquence does not denote lack of intelligence, though they often coincide.
that screen you link to is not a green screen of death at all! It's an error message, which you would probably get if you tried to load a game without the disk in. Oh my god! I'm sure we'd all rather they didn't give you an error and let you try to figure it out yourself... like most home users will of course know how to do...
Of course, it wouldn't have this problem of not being able to load, it would just boot linux off the drive!!!
Bear in mind, of course, that the box is designed for games, not linux. Put the damn disk in!
Lack of eloquence does not denote lack of intelligence, though they often coincide.
GTA3 is THE BEST driving SIMULATOR EVER!
So who's gonna be the first to put Linux on it? It's pretty much a stripped down PC right(or not)?
/. and it got /.'d.
You never know though. MS could put some funky coding and design in there. Just look at Windows?
I put my sig on
I always wondered why people on this sound board were so hard on MS; but I think I figured it out; 1. You have no life outside of finding weaknesses in it's OS; 2. You have no thought process outside of the fact that one needs a Masters degree to figure out something different that ALL people can work with; 3. There are WAY too many acronyms in the PC world (I think you develope them DAILY); 4. And finally, you spend WAY too much time on the internet discussing these things. IMO, people stick with what works and with what they know; so who is anyone else to criticize? Thank God this is America; who else would you have to bitch to?
[SIG] Remember Mattel handheld games?
I was intrigued at the thought of seeing internal pictures of the xbox, but when I went to www.firesquad.com, it says the domain is "parked".
Where/how do I find these pix?
(I did a few google searches to no avail, I'll keep trying...)
Then it is remarkable that he managed to be completely correct, isn't it?
- An XBox developer
now if you could only get yourself a broadband adapter for less than you payed for the system itself. +)
my sig's at the bottom of the page.
Well, it came. I compared and not impressed at all. I didn't see much difference between the quality of the three units side by side, MS, Nintendo and Sony all looked good. However, when I looked at the new available titles for the PS2, I could not resist spending money on more games for the PS2 rather than investing in a additional system. As they used to print in all the computer magazines - when choosing an operatings system - it all boils down to the apllications and that is where Sony really shines.
Microsoft does have the monopoly power to force stores to keep empty shelf space for all the vaporware, and that lack of space does hurt the smaller developers for Sony or Nitendo. People usually buy what they can easily see, not what is hidden in some drawer.Many smaller companies with less than great games will be forced to write for Microsoft just to get a place on the shelf, as the competition for shelf space under the Sony PS2 and Nitendo name will be tough and only the best games will survive. Under the Microsoft umbrella anything will make the shelf, regardless of quality - yeah, that is when the blue screen of death will become a regular site. Not really the Microsoft hardware's fault, the imfamous "good enough for Microsoft hardware" curse will set in.
BTW:Picked up Metal Gear Solid 2 and it is pretty good.... just wished we would have gotten there sooner, before they ran out of free MGS2 t-shirts, guess you gotta line up before the store opens, much like they did to get the PS2.
>>>please remove "nospam" from email address
will it make a file server /home? for my home network
or a game server for my son's tfc server
a dvd player for the living room
how do you load linux onto it and whats taking the guru's so long and thankyou bill for selling it so cheap..........
Personally, I'm pretty sick of all of these dumb box geometries. Why not just standardize on the 19" rack, maybe 4 feet high and woodgrained. Then make the boxes conform to 19" rack standards. Couldn't we just do that?
No, or course not. I have to find floor space for a stupid fake-heat-sink-finned cube or cabinet space for a sideways sitting parallelepiped. I just want to have components again. Is that too much to ask?
My friends crashed a demo of San Francisco Rush 2049 for Dreamcast once. It complained it didn't have enough streak polys and said to call Steve. We took pictures, but I lost them when my computer got stolen. Alas.
Remember...
Game Designers/Developers asked Microsoft for a Hard Disk, and Ethernet. Maybe we should all think ahead a bit, and we should be creative to think about the possiblities this brings to the table for consoles...COME ON!!! If you can't think of anything that these features would be useful for then keep playing your old consoles (which of course is still fun).
Cool features of the Xbox so far...
1) Multiplayer to the max - Did you know that right now you can have 16 people play Halo simultaneously (4 Xboxs via an ethernet HUB x 4 people each). Hmmm (something we can't do now with a console).
2) You can rip your Cd's with it, store it on the Xbox, and substitute your soundtrack for the game's soundtrack. That's cool (something we can't do now).
3) Other things that may be useful in the future...a system clock...Think of a game that changes the time of day in accordance with your ACTUAL time of day! I think that'd be cool.
Come on folks...PS2 is sweet, GameCube is sweet, my Intelivision is the bomb...and I think we need to give some credit the the xbox.
Jeff -- skibum, among other things
No kidding. I can almost buy two machines for the price of what some people want for broadband adapters.
the good ground has been paved over by suicidal maniacs
Isn't strange how fucking stupid the slashdot crowd is sometimes, especially something involving Microsoft. One genius posed the question "Do you think Gates and Balmer can envision great games?" Do you REALLY FUCKING THINK BILL GATES DESIGNS GAMES FOR THE XBOX? Other quite intelligent people are telling everyone they ought to buy XBoxes because Microsoft HAS to be losing money on each one you buy. The factories spitting out the XBox make just about every component in the console with most components being contained on a single board. It is very cheap to manufacture SBCs. The 300$ price tag doesn't leave much room for profit but they aren't losing anym oney on the damn boxes. Stop using pricewatch.com to find the prices of computer hardware and then trying to extrapolate the price of a console system. Others claim the XBox is little more than commodity PC hardware in a little black box. The memory subsystem isn't exactly an i815 chipset or something. Buy one if you want or don't buy one if you don't want to play the games. I'm waiting for Sunday to pick up a Gamecube. I can get a console and a couple games for the price of a PS2 or XBox console. Plus I get something for my GBA to talk to.
I'm a loner Dottie, a Rebel.
Please do the maths.
MS produces 100 Xbox, each priced one dollar, real cost was 2 dollars, Linux zealots buy them (lets say they buy them all), so OK MS sells no software, but at least recovers some money from the boxes sold. They invested 200, got back 100, net loss: 100.
Second scenario: the only Xbox is bought by Gates. They don't recoup any money at all. They invested 200, they got 1 back, net loss 199.
One does not need to be too clever to know which scenario hurts MS the most, do the same with any numbers you wish and assume for demonstration purposes that the same numbers of units either go unsold or are bought by Linux zealots. Every time the pinch hurts the most when the boxes are unsold.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
MS haters should not buy the thing. Period.
Honest people, did you ever study basic arithmetic?
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
There is not a god given right for every Xbox to be bought.
That other person that is going to buy it, would have bought it any way. It is you we are talinkg about, no the hypotethical other buyer....
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
In any case, 3 years is mighty small in terms of games development. Remember the tricks they pulled on the last generation of SNES, Genesis, PlayStation, and N64 games? With the PS2, developers will just come to terms with what they can do on the system until it comes time to move onto the PS3.
All that taken into consideration, why should gamers be expected to buy a new system every 3 years? This means that the improvement a new console will bring will only be slightly incremental. I have a PC to upgrade too, by the way. I'm pretty pissed off, because I bought a Dreamcast, PS2, and plan on buying the Gamecube, just so I could avoid the dilemma of being limited to exclusive games. (I'm still not buying an X-Box).
The PS2's hardware can't be that bad... can it? They stuck it out with the PSX and came out on top of Nintendo, even graphically. If the Saturn would have stuck around, even its inferior technology would have been able to produce amazing things (did you catch the video of Shenmue for Saturn?)
Disappointment.
.sig: Open Source, Open Mind
all right, i know there are a lot of great games out there. but truthfully, the only games i care to play these days are konami's bemani series.
dance dance revolution 5th mix ownz. i play it until my vision blurs and i fall over, and then i rest for a few minutes and play some more. it's addictive. so's beatmania. so's guitar freaks. all of these are creative, challenging, exciting. . . and only for playstation series (except for very minor inroads on the dreamcast.) allowing for age, i can't think of a single bad game out of the 20+ that have come out of the bemani series.
if ddr comes out, with pads, for the xbox, i'll acknowldege it has at least one innovative game. if beatmania 2dx comes out for it, i might even have to buy one. ^_~
and at least, when playing ddr on a dance pad, i wouldn't have to use that idiot bloated controller.
(and, by the way, most of these games are for the original playstation. graphical power means nothing in the face of great gameplay.)
well i hope this isn't too redundant, but i've got both games, and GTA (grand theft auto 3) is the REAL killer app. out for the PS2.
Gran Turismo looks tight, but, as someone else has said: it leavs me cold. It's boring since the computer offers no AI competition whatsoever; the other cars don't even react to you in the slightest.
Grand Theft Auto 3, though: wow. murder, drugs, and prostitution combine with (much more importantly), a vast, lifelike city environment (you just gotta experience it), interesting, numerous, and varied missions, and lastly, sweet music (even this is presented creatively: your car radio).
you even quoted the part where i explain what i meant.
Was that the part where you said
there are currently no games which i could see benefitting from this on any console, nor any in the future.
Your subtlety amazes me. I guess by saying "nor any in the future," you meant "lots of games in the future." It's clear that I'm dealing with a superior thinker here, so I'll try my best to stay on your good side.
Geez, no!
First of all, I wouldn't want to use an XBox controller -- I'd use a standard remote or airmouse to navigate throught a browser-like interface on the TV or monitor screen.
Second, the problem is that I have a number of devices (well, just three, right now, but it will grow) that all want to provide a menu system on the TV screen: i.e. the TV itself, the Satellite receiver, and the VCR. The TV will pop up it's menu over whatever program is displayed, and the other equipment displays it on a chained RF output and individual component and svideo outputs going to different inputs on the TV.
The implication of all this mess is that I can't control one device while watching another (i.e. program the VCR while watching a movie); the TV menu and other menus can pop up tother (what a mess), and I have no control over how the satellite receiver program guide is displayed).
It strikes me that it would be far more convenient if I had a multi-window browser displayed on the TV where I could select and control sources. Naturally, the current streamed video would usually take up the background and there would not be a foreground browser displayed.
IOW, if I wanted to receive a satellite program, I'd click on the satellite hyperlink and get a window of satellite video and a control panel for the satellite. Same for VCR. Same for sreamed video from some web site... Browsing slashdot would be trivial. Now, there might be a limit to the number of video feeds I could select simultaneously (because of overlay window hardware limits), but a background and a movable foreground window should be adequate.
When hubbing in new equipment, it could "register" with the "master" display contoller, and could update it's top level menu accordingly. Other hyperlinks could be added manually via keyboard and a bit of cgi. If you're gonna have a keyboard, you could use it for email, and interactive forms, but I see the use of a keyboard more for configuration than anything else.
Basically, think of the TV/receiver as a computer with browser, and all other equipment as web servers.
The Web-based UI works for so many disparate sites, that I can't see it failing here. The only enhancement I could conceive is a "universal" remote which causes certain "hot" buttons to match similarly tagged hyperlinks on the page displayed, so FWD, REV, VOL+, VOL-, CH+, CH-, etc. do what you'd expect. Anything "fancy" would require manually mousing and clicking on the appropriate link.
You could've hired me.
I got my ps2 the day it came out, not any problems with heat and dvd playback.
My brother got one about a month later, it wont even read any disks anymore, and sony wants him to pay 120 bucks to fix it..
Gotta love it!
They are both damn good beers =)
Only if Heineken had a cool top like Grolsh does then it might be better..
And btw, I have a Heineken bottle that has a stamp on it that says "For military use only". My grandfather got it when he was in the Korean War.. I think my little brother recently opened it and drank it though, probably pretty nasty
i'm sorry to all you console geeks out there, but i can't respect any machine made by our friend borgey. hell, i read the processor was a pentium. what the hell is bill smoking these days? i played one at wal-mart and i got all pissed off becuase the controller is asstastic. 8=D---microsoft fans. anyway, i fucking hate peacocks. oh yeah, http://www.8th-wonder.net. -has a nice program. "phasma 2.0 enterprise" check it out.
Microsoft admitted to losing $125 on each unit sold, but other companies are saying that they are flaming lyers, which is most likely the case. Most believe they are losing much more than that. There's no doubt someone is going to exploit the hardware of the xbox.
I was able to get Netscape in that period for $17 on CD in that period. I think the annual subscription was another $17 or so. NS problems were not brought on by bandwidth or MS, but management that was more interested in deals and stock options than driving the boat.
Most memory read/writes in games are random except those for textures and 3d models. And for textures, it's better to have a separate bus with its own caching (as it is the case with GC). Let me put it another way. Unified memory for game consoles is *BAD*, because the memory has to support two completly different kinds of accesses: streamed, high-bandwidth (textures, models), and random, low-latency (the rest).
n /a pple_bandai_pippin.html
While I don't have the numbers near me, the RAM used for "main" memory (not texture memory) has lower latency in the GC, while the texture memory on the GC has a higher bandwidth (yet higher latency) because it is embedded on the 3d chip, and I/O can be done (from disk to texture cache) without the need to go through the "main" bus, the "main" memory or worse, the CPU. I'd drool to have that on my PC (or the X-Box).
Overall, memory speed is equivalent on both GC and X-Box, but there is less need for code optimizations on the GC, because the caching systems takes care of all that for you. So, for the GC, slightly lower performance, WAY lower cost, and easier to code for.
So, this is why I'm slightly "against" the X-Box: it's architecture is a step *backwards* in hardware design.
Hint:
http://assembler.roarvgm.com/Apple_Bandai_pippi
It kicked PlayStation's a** (performance-wise), but guess what? Felt too much like a computer (worse, a Mac).
- Benad
http://assembler.roarvgm.com/Apple_Bandai_pippin/a pple_bandai_pippin.html
- Benad
Just remove the space in the link. Damn word wrap.
- Benad
I would lik to share my a few of my opinions about the X-Box....
1. memory bandwidth
The whole buzz is around the graphics controller, which is probably similar to GeForce 3 running @ 250MHz, with a system architeture similar to the nForce chipset.
The nForce sounds great, consider that the GPU is basically a GeForce 2 MX, but can TwinBank w/ DDR RAM keep up with a GeForce 3? TwinBank is nothing more than a fancy version of a UMA architeture. The GPU on the X-Box doesn't have dedicated V-RAM, it shares the same DDR memory with the CPU. That sounds like a serious bandwidth issue.
It sounds like the SNES all over agin: a great GPU being limited by the system architeture.
for the record, PS2 uses RDAM and GameCube uese 1T-SRAM.
2. Hard drive
Is a hard drive really desirable on a console? It adds complexity to the system: File management, software installation, physical failures, etc. A console should do nothing bu play games and should do so simply and reliably.
3. CPU
Is a 733 MHz P-III enough? Consider x86's lackluster FPU performance, can it really compete with the MIPS core of PS2 or the PowerPC core of GameCube?
4. The platform
Of course one might argue that having a HD creates new possibility beyond games, and that's what MS is betting on. Whether the X-Box is successful or not, it really is just a launch platform for future MS digital home entertainment strategy. The digital hub is what MS trying to conquer.
5. Future price cuts:
Consider the fact that it uses standard PC parts, and how fast the prices of these parts fall, I'd imagine MS would be able to cut the system price rather aggressively in the near future, something Sony can't really do with the PS2.
Personally I find GameCube a better system: Respectable specs, and it does nothing beside playing games. It amazes me to see how clean the GameCube's sytem board design looks. While it's uncertain how powerful it's GPU really is, if u consider all the problem developers have with the PS2's vector units and the possible system bottlenecks of the X-Box, the GameCube should remain rather competitive.
Realisiticly though, the PS2 would probably continue to take the lead in sales and public mindshare.
I have heard that the XBOX has network capability. I am wondering what is the extent of that capability. Is it just being able to play with multiple users online?