X05 Reveals Many 360 Details

StocDred writes "GamesIndustry.biz has an interview with Microsoft's Robbie Bach stating that Halo 3 may not be out in time to smackdown the PS3 after all, despite what Bill Gates said to Time Magazine in May." He also had things to say about the Live marketplace and MMO plug-ins and their hopes for Japanese success. From the Gamasutra article: "Finally, Bach gave details on anticipated MMORPGs for the Xbox 360. The already-announced Final Fantasy XI will have a large beta test, such that any Xbox 360 owner with the necessary hard drive will possibly be able to participate. Apart from that, Bach said there would be no new MMORPG in the launch window due to the logistics of setting up a new service, but there would be a new entry in the genre two to three years after launch." Several MMOs are planned, though, such as the MMOFPS Huxley.

Comments

WHY are they talking about FFXI at all?

[Anonymous Coward]

Final Fantasy XI is going to be four years old at the XBox launch (according to the Wikipedia). So, what they're saying, is that the XBox will be receiving a four-year old port of an MMORPG, and then nothing else for another two to three years after that. Um, yay?

Not to mention that it's a PORT from a console that's popular in Japan (the PS2) to a new one, from a company that failed to gain any real popularity in Japan. According to some earlier Slashdot article, FFXI will be a flat port to the XBox 360 and not an upgrade. So, essentially, you'll be left with a choice: pay $250 for a PS2 + HDD, or pay $400 for a new XBox 360 with an HDD. (Or something like that, I don't know the actual Japanese prices.) I can't see this being that big a deal.

This is almost as underwhelming as it would be if Sony announced that the PS3 was going to be receiving a port of FFXI to it, without any enhancements, shortly after launch. So what? It's a last-generation game, without enhancements.

Maybe Microsoft is hoping that old PS2s will start dieing, and seeing as the new slim PS2 doesn't support the old PS2 HDDs, they'll get people migrating to the XBox 360 for their MMORPG fix. :-)

It just seems really silly to mention FFXI as a launch game. The only real message here is that game companies no longer HAVE to use Live, instead they can use their own service. It just doesn't seem like it's a compelling feature at all.

Um, WHERE'S THE BEEF?

[larsoncc]

Hey, where is my backwards compatibility announcement? If it was GOOD news, don't you think they'd be announcing it during the keynote?

What are they waiting for?

How about reports from real gamers about Perfect Dark Zero?

IGN says they HOPE the framerate will get all the way up to a whopping 30 FPS?

WHAT?