360 Has Best Launch Lineup Ever?

J. Allard had a chat with Edge magazine about the launch lineup of the Xbox 360, and makes the claim that they have the best launch lineup ever associated with a console. He also talks about the overall vision they had for the launch, and how well their expectations are being met. From the article: "I think it's pretty much spot on. I spoke with someone who was very involved in the planning about three years ago - he came over for about five minutes to drop something off and ended up spending three hours looking at all the capabilities of the machine, and he said, 'Son of a gun, if you guys didn't do 95 per cent of the original vision of the machine!' And I looked at him and said, 'Well, what was the other five per cent, what did we drop?' and he said, 'I don't know. I couldn't find it!'"

Comments

not saying much

[ThePepe]

Well that certainly doesnt say much for the previous consoles' release lineups.

"Launch Lineup" includes titles not available

[Sancho]

at launch. That's the only reason they can make this claim without being laughed out of the universe.

Some story awhile back detailed this and made the example of "Oblivion" as a launch title, even though it won't be available until 2006.

Spin, spin, spin....

And yet, no blockbuster games for 2005

[Torgo's Pizza]

At least, that's what I read just a few stories down. Best launch lineup ever or the one of the worst years for games. Time to curl up into a little ball and wait it out until 2006.

No.

[vertinox]

We'll reserve the best launch linup for NES "Duckhunt/Mario" combo catridge.

Remember the times when consoles would come with a game that was good enough to play for very very long time before buying a new game?

Wow

[nocent]

News flash! Microsoft executive claims Microsoft product has best launch ever!

Still no Ultramix DDR support!

[tepp]

Yawn. Wake me up when there is a single game a female gamer would like to play. Then MAYBE I'll consider buying one.

I'm still furious that it isn't even backwards compatable with Ultramix 2 or Ultramix 3 which just came out!

How hard is it to be backwards compatable with a simple dancing game?

At least when I buy the PS3 I can play all my DDR games on it the first day!

This won't go over well on slashdot

[the computer guy nex]

..but this is spot on.

Most of the release titles were sequels of solid games (COD, Perfect Dark, EA sports games). These are phenominal launch titles because they are easier to create and already have a fan base.

Case in point: The best release title is Kameo. It is the best adventure game ever to be released with a console spare Mario 64. It doesn't get the press it deserves because it isn't a sequel.

My local Best Buy had every 360 claimed by 6PM on Saturday night (40 people in line), when there wasn't even 40 in line on the launch day.

Re:This won't go over well on slashdot

[badasscat]

Most of the release titles were sequels of solid games (COD, Perfect Dark, EA sports games). These are phenominal launch titles because they are easier to create and already have a fan base.

So what you're saying is that this launch features a bunch of generic, lowest-common-demoninator sequels that appeal to people who have already played the previous versions.

This is a good launch lineup? At best, it will appeal to some of those who already own Xboxes. It will not initiate any interest in anyone beyond that. This is the problem when you have a launch lineup that's mainly a bunch of sports games and sequels.

Good launches always have at least one "must-have" game that shows off what the new system is capable of and/or offers a new gameplay experience. They also have to have most of the popular genres represented. The Xbox 360 has most genres represented (though it's missing a few important ones, like fighting games and RPG's), but it has no must-haves whatsoever. There is nothing in the 360's launch lineup that makes me go "wow! I've never seen anything that cool before, and I have to have it." There's no equivalent to Super Mario or Soul Calibur or even the original Ridge Racer in there (no, RR6 just doesn't carry the same cachet). MS obviously thinks there is in PD0 and CoD2, but these are sequels - they are basically graphical upgrades to previous games that a lot of people have already played. They may have a few gameplay tweaks but the core gameplay is nothing we haven't seen before.

I'd say the 360 launch lineup is middling. It's not the worst ever (go look up something like the Intellivision launch lineup), but there have been better ones, including the PS2, PS1, Coleco Vision, NES, SNES, Game Boy, N64, and Dreamcast. Not all of these systems had the same quantity as the Xbox 360 but they all had at least one game that everybody just had to play, and in some cases they had several.

I don't think the 360 launch lineup will hurt or help the console; I think it will mainly be forgotten about once the next round of games comes out.

Re:This won't go over well on slashdot

[steveo777]

Yeah, a bit offtopic, but playing Halo doesn't make you a 'gamer' any more than eating a taco makes you a mexican.

I beg to differ - Dreamcast

[dgrgich]

Dreamcast's launch lineup was much better. Virtua Fighter 3? Check. Soul Caliber? Check. A Sonic game? Check. Furthermore, games like Soul Caliber exercised the power of its hardware. A fair number - Gun, Tony Hawk:AW, others - of the launch titles of the 360 are just retextured ports.

I'll post a witty response...

[Progman3K]

As soon as I figure out what a "Linup" is...

The Xbox 360 philosophy?

[rohlfinator]

"Sitting down with Xbox's J Allard six months ago, at the 360's unveiling, two things became very quickly apparent. The first was that this was a machine built around a philosophy, not a set of tech specs."

It's this idea that makes me far more interested in the Xbox 360 than the PS3. Sony is clearly chasing the "set of tech specs" model of console design. At least Microsoft has a game plan, even if they don't follow through on it completely.

It's hard to tell if the 360 will ever live up to this philosophy. Xbox Live and the 360 Marketplace seem to be a big focal point, and I love what they're doing with retro downloadable games (although Nintendo will undoubtedly do it better).

But while Allard's "grand vision" of the Xbox 360 sounds amazing, it's hard for me to imagine Microsoft actually pulling it off. He claims that they're going to attract casual gamers, yet the launch lineup was aimed squarely at the same audience that bought the Xbox 1. He says that Microsoft can change their reputation through their actions, but their actions are only giving us PGR3, Halo 3, PDZ, and Kameo.

Nintendo was able to shift the DS's audience a bit by promoting first-party games like Nintendogs, Brain Training, and Electroplankton, which should open the door to third-party "non-games". But I really can't see Microsoft doing something like that. If Microsoft made a puppy simulator, their core fanbase would go nuts. The only non-games I can imagine MS promoting would be puzzle games and card games, both of which are readily available on the PC. The 360's price point isn't very non-gamer oriented, either. Microsoft can't win over non-gamers by considering them an afterthought.

Microsoft has good intentions, but it they're trying to cover two completely different markets in an attempt to compete with both Sony and Nintendo. Problem is, they can't do it all. One of those markets is being completely ignored, and the 360 will likely end up with the same core audience as the Xbox.

Re:The Xbox 360 philosophy?

[DarKnyht]

"Sitting down with Xbox's J Allard six months ago, at the 360's unveiling, two things became very quickly apparent. The first was that this was a machine built around a philosophy, not a set of tech specs."

Hmm... odd I seem to remember Microsoft and Sony getting into a peeing contest over their specs, and Nintendo being the only one to state that specs didn't matter three months ago.

Re:Sometimes It Is Better Just To...

[Irish_Samurai]

No shit.

Over the past week all I have seen is this bald douchebag telling me how games are going to take a "new direction" and microsoft is going to be there for it. The ONLY thing xbox has going for it is xbox live, and that's not all that great.

PLaying a puzzle game to make food for your Halo army? WTF? Does this guy not understand that these types of forced roles have been attempted before? I am not playing ANY game where I might have to handle some remedial task over and over again so my team can win. I'm not talking holding a position that no one comes to for a little while, or distributing healthpacks during a clash - I'm talking Halo: Pizza Puzzle Online. Yeah, that's neato.

Hearing him talk about multi access portals is even worse. Mr. J - have you even thought of the technical requirements for playing in the same game world from a phone, PC, and console? It's called lowest common denominator and it will sink that dream like a stone. You could have multiple different games in the same world on different platforms but that would be the same thing we have today. Way to blow smoke dumb ass.

I have yet to hear a Japanese Third party developer gush over your machine. Mostly I hear corp speak from a rep, not a developer. Not good dude.

You say you're a fan of persistent worlds? Then why did you guys purchase Bungie and change their dream of what HALO was supposed to be, a persistent online fragfest warzone, into a mediocre FPS with no tactical elements to it. Oh, probably because you don't know what your talking about.

This guy even has a writeup in POPSCI magazine about how innovative his console is. Yeah, no hard drive, selective backwards compatability, a release lineup where all the games aren't available yet, and a flawed DESIGN resulting in overheating - innovative in that maybe no one has tried to screw themselves over this hard with a new console release since the Jaguar.

You're publicist called, she says you sound like a moron.