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The State of the Game Console Wars
An anonymous reader writes "Two years after the next-gen game consoles hit the market, the verdict is in. What does the future hold for each of the Big Three? Here is a thoughtful but crude summary of the X-Box vs. GC vs. PS2 ordeal."
It was 03:00. The moonless night engulfed three individuals in complete darkness. Three individuals who moved, with surprising grace, toward a single destination. Three individuals on a campaign; a mission. A campaign to rid Slashdot of lame trolls. A mission to ultimately destroy Slashdot forever.
A low candle flame, flickering slightly in the crisp Autumn night breeze, lit the storm sewer corridors and access tubes with a deep yellow pallor. Faint whisperings, little more than leaves brushing against ancient cement walls to the rest of the world, could be heard.
"Where is Alan? I thought I saw him approaching a moment ago," Trollaxor hissed. Standing a full 6 foot, with slicked-back black hair and a few day's worth of stubble, Trollaxor looked every bit the revolutionary in his black leather biking jacket. His green eyes pierced the dimly lit darkness, awaiting a response.
"I believe he tripped on his beard," Linus stated matter-of-factly, with just a hint of impatience. Linus Torvalds, Open Source hero and maintainer of Linux, stood taut as coiled snakes as he realized the gravity of the situation.
"Contact him. We have already overstayed our time in this place, even as we arrive." Trollaxor pushed.
"Fine," Linus Torvalds threw back the hood that concealed his Finnish visage, which was painted with tightly closed eyes and a look of grim concentration. He rubbed his temples lightly as sweat began to bead upon his high Finnish forehead.
Mumbling rapidly in Finnish, Linus turned to the East, now raising one hand above his head, palm extended to the direction of the sun's somnal abode.
"I can't seem-- to contact him--" Linus grunted in broken English. "I will try another method!"
Now a tributary of Old Swedish poured from the well of Linus's foreign maw. Trollaxor started, "Linus, if he is lost to us, there is nothing you can do, not even a fossil language can bring him to us now!"
Linus broke his linguistic trance and turned to Trollaxor. "In the name of all discontinued Japanese Transformers! The enemy must have captured him! Damn him and his filth-ridden beard! Now you know why I hate working with dirty GNU hippies!"
The enemy, as both Trollaxor and Linus knew too well, were the nefarious Slashdot Moderators, a group of numb-minded, brainwashed denizens of their strange, dark world that patrolled in hopes of "disabling" those who rebelled against their beloved Commander's will. "As dirty as he was, he was a valuable ally that you and I and the rest of the free world needed," Trollaxor dryly pointed out. "If the Mods got him, we must forego tonight's plans and rescue him immediately!"
Grunting again, this time out of frustration and anger, Linus whispered sharply thru clenched teeth in a heavy accent, thick with Finnish and Old Gutnish phonemic forms. "In the name of unmade Beast Wars toys, how are you and I to do a thing if the Mods patrol tonight?"
Trollaxor, ever the rebel to thrive against challenge, grew a vicious smile as he turned to Linus again. "The harder they patrol, the harder we troll, my friend." Linus remained nonplussed. As Trollaxor tightened the belts on his black leather biking jacket and made sure all miscelanaous zippers were sealed, his face brightened even more. "We've faced worse setbacks. Remember the Fallen Trolls. And remember moreso those Trolls who have gone over to the other side."
As Trollaxor's voice trailed off, Linus hung his head and exhaled slowly. Thoughts of the fallen whipped thru Linus's Finnish brain like TCP packets to Linux's bit bucket. "No, how can I not remember. Troll Mastah, Signal 11, travesty... They tried to break us!"
"Looks like they'll try again!" Trollaxor replied, smiling, completing a verse from "Wild Boys", the infamous Duran Duran track that Trollaxor and his camp had taken up as their anthem. "Now come on. We have some Mods that need bitchslapped tonight!"
Sony looks alright but Microsft needs to sue whoever did that boob job. And what's with Microsoft going the grope? I'm not even going to mention what's up with Microsoft's swimsuit.
"She's a West Texas girl, just like me" - G.W Bush Iraqis
worst. article. ever.
PC vs Console is a more interesting debate since PC's have such a large installed base now. If PC game makers had their shit together there would be no need for consoles.
Those screenshots of the babes fighting, what game are they from??? *drool*
...those of us who have all the consoles anyway...
An edited version without the graphic illustrations can be found here.
Notice how they didn't have a "What went wrong?" for the Xbox? Like say, actually having more than a single game worth buying? Sheesh.
Sorry for the following rant, but I've been in this industry long enough to know how it works.
First of all, saying the Xbox is the future is just fanboyism as the article totally lacks the journalism and the facts to support it.
In fact, even saying the Xbox is #2 is really the typical short-sighted american view of the market. The videogame industry is worldwide, and as such, you really need to view the market in total console and software sales. Xbox and GCN are actually exchanging #2 and #3 in total sales worldwide several times each quarter. But this is not actually the point, the point is that even if they were a solid #2, they are still a failure in terms of their own expectations.
Microsoft has made a lot of artificial gimmicks to support the Xbox in the market, and the lack of profits on the Xbox division should be enough for anybody to see that. They expected to be able to snatch most of the PS2 market within one generation and there is simply no sign of them being able to do that, even when spending billions in marketing and development, severely undercutting the price of the Xbox (losing upwards more than $150 per machine), sacrificing royalties and/or explicitely giving money to developers for exclusive games and features, or outright buying them.
I'm not saying which of the Xbox, GCN or PS2 are the most powerful, or has the best games, or yadda yadda. Pure and simple facts, see the Microsoft press releases regarding the Xbox before entering the market. You'll see that they completely ignore Nintendo, and regard Sony as their target and sole rival. The sad truth is, they are way far behind their own forecasts and they haven't captured but a tiny fraction of the supposedly huge market they would conquer in this generation. They are struggling with millions in revenue, but not a penny of profit, fighting for #2 with a company they chose to ignore.
And no, forecasts were not optimistic some long ago. It's annoying how anybody with Internet access can't even make a simple article without checking the facts.
This and this are some of the first news regarding Xbox, check that PS2 is the console mentioned as its target and Gamecube is quite simply ignored.
I ask... Is Xbox really "teh fu7ur3"? Seriously, had not Microsoft budgeted such a huge amount of money for this venture, the Xbox would never survive. And it's quite a waste of money not to be in #1 after all.
- Otaku no naka no otaku, otaking da!!!
that article was funny as hell man i donno wtf is your problem.
i do not know what was funny about that article and i do not know why i should care about other peoples penis size.
this article finally proves it. thanks micheal.
When there was Sega and Nintendo nun of this big wars. nobody really played all that much is when the games were good IMO. I think the games are just 90% of the time going downhill beacuse there is no such thing as gamers that are respectful of others. so you may as well play single player. I play all kinds of multiplayer games and it just seems that either there needs to be one of these things. #1 PAYbyPLAY meaning you pay for how much time you spend online #2 Monthly pay X$ per month to play #3 Strict moderation by master servers. meaning if you are convicted of TKing on a consistant basis = killing all the time for shits and grins then be not allowed to play online simple as that. It makes the entire gameing experinces terrible but who cares about that aye mate? guess i will get a offtopic post but ohh well either that or troll sumfin i try to make good posts and i just get shit mod so do it again WOOT!
Sorry was in bad mood when made account
The article is only funny to people who find this funny.
The PC will always be the premier gaming platform
The PC isn't going anywhere and it will always have higher specs than any console.
Game Over