Slashdot Mirror
More on Future X-Box Capabilities
rtphokie writes "The oft - rumored expansion of Microsoft's Xbox from a gaming console to a more full featured entertainment hub is taking a little more shape. A C|Net article tells of a HomeStation device which is claimed to be slated for a fall release. In addition to Xbox game compatibility and DVD functionality, it is reported to have TiVo/UltimateTV like PVR functionality as well as WebTV like email and web surfing capabilities.
This "report" comes on the heels of the announcement of the Moxi Digital set-top MoxiMedia Center which was named "Best of Show" at the recent Consumer Electronics Show."
This was first brought up several months ago in an article on The Register, but everyone widely dismissed it as a hoax.
PC Format also covered it a few weeks ago, and people still dismissed it as a hoax.
Now its on C|Net, is it still consired a hoax??? Or is it now a definite sign of things to come?
Microsoft Germany spokesman Boris Schneider-Johne has denied (apologies for the german link) to Heise that Microsoft is working on such a thing.
michael at slashdot.org: The real answer is that a couple of the slashdot authors are sick.
However, [a portable system] isn't competition for home systems.
If you only have one TV and multiple children, it is. The kids will fight over who gets to play on the TV and who has to sit out and play on the GBA.
I won't grant that the Gamecube controller is a rip-off of the Playstation's controller. To me it is a natural evolution.
Granted.
with the added bonus of the D-pad and Analog both being usable with an easy switch.
This is going to make Tetris Worlds hellish. It'll be quite difficult to make the pieces do what you want because the digital pad is so far away from the palm of the hand that the thumb must be twisted from the normal 45-degree orientation to reach the pad. You may get similar problems to what happens when trying to play Tetris with a SideWinder USB joypad (SWPNP or SW GamePad Pro), such that it's next to impossible to push straight down without also pushing to the side.
The button layout on the right is the SNES layout reoriented around the reality of a primary button (A), secondary button (B) and optional extra buttons (X, Y).
Two problems: 1. It's confusing for Super NES veterans, who associate the primary button with the letter B and the upward direction with the letter X and see the Cube's buttons as rotated 90 degrees clockwise, and 2. it's nearly impossible to press B and Y with one thumb on the Cube's controller.
The SNES had four equal buttons
According to nintendo developer guidelines (which have been partially leaked over the years), the Super NES had two main buttons (A B) and two secondary buttons (Y X).
However, the hardware interface treated B and Y as primary and A and X as secondary. The interface was based on the NES Four Score interface, which concatenated the data of players 1 and 3 (each in A B Sel St Up Dn Lt Rt order) onto player 1's port and players 2 and 4 onto player 2's port. Super NES, on the other hand, uses B Y Sel St Up Dn Lt Rt A X L R 0 0 0 0 order, where the 0's apparently have something to do with mouse quadrature (the mouse buttons are sent on A and X; try plugging a mouse into port 2 and using the pad test in kirby's avalanche).
but they were rarely uses as such.
Several Super NES games used the buttons as a second directional pad, such as Smash TV, where B fired south, A+X fired northeast, etc. Many PlayStation games (such as Forsaken) also came configured this way. This was made explicit in the design of the Virtual Boy and Nintendo 64 controllers.
The C-buttons had the advantage of letting the N64 ACT like a 6-button controller
And the Wishtech Adaptoid (an N64 to USB/HID adapter) even returns button information to Windows as if it were a 6-button.
(for things like Street Fighter).
Or in real-time tactical sims such as Starcraft 64.
Will I retire or break 10K?
They released a mediocre PC masquerading as a game console with mediocre games.
How many God damn idiots are there in the world? For probably the 2 billionth time for those jackasses who haven't heard it.....THE XBOX IS NOT A PC.
If it was a PC, how come no one has figured out how to do ANYTHING more that change the damn IDE cable in it?? If you call the Xbox a PC, I hope you consider ALL consoles PCs because they all have processors, motherboards, GPUs, RAM, etc. The fact is that they aren't PCs and they never will be. They are gaming machines for one purpose: to play games. That article is a fine piece of rumor-mongering for all the drooling idiots who want Microsoft to die.
As for these "mediocre" games...I wonder how many of them that upstanding member of the anti-Microsoft mafia he has played? Probably none, or else he plays in secret, in fear that his fellow Linuxheads will find out. All consoles have good and bad games, its all a matter of personal taste, but this guy probably hasn't even played any.