Slashdot Mirror
2007's Ten Biggest Gaming Letdowns
Game|Life offers up an anti-top-ten list, noting the three blog authors' biggest disappointments from 2007. Chris Kohler's biggest letdown echoes my own feelings on this topic: "No LittleBigPlanet. PlayStation 3's software library got significantly better this holiday, but there's no killer app. I honestly don't know if LittleBigPlanet would have been one. But I think it's going to be mine. It's going to be the thing that glues me to PlayStation 3... when it ships. I was all ready to start building worlds and sharing them with my friends and generally start being a jackass by now, but it won't happen until next year -- late next year, if you believe the rumors. I hope they're not true. And I do hope LittleBigPlanet sets the planet on fire when it releases." Any gaming 'event' this year an epic fail for you?
Hands down, without a doubt, would have to be Two Worlds. I mean, the setup was genious. On paper, it appeared to be Oblivion on steroids...I mean come on, a massive, open-ended RPG that you make your own spells and can play co-op over system link on a couple of 360's? My buddy and I were waiting for this one with huge anticipation...only to feel like we had gotten a kick in the nuts. Horrendous menu systems, terrible gameplay, and textures so muddy you couldn't tell what was going on half the time (and this on an HDTV)
Without compare, the biggest gaming letdown of 2007.
Living With a Nerd
I couldn't get enough people to click myminicity links! What a dumb game.
Belief? Hope? Preference?The Existential Vortex
I still haven't managed to beat VI. You know, that console game where the object of the game is to edit a file and then quit? That's a really hard one, and I'm so disappointed that I got so close, but didn't finish it this year. Ah well, there's always 2008.
I'm waiting for a "-1 somepeoplejustshouldn'tgetmodprivileges" meta-moderation.
To begin, I'll echo the biggest disappointment as being the Wii's lack of anything good from companies not named Nintendo. A number of my friends are regretting the purchase of the Wii because of this reason, wishing they'd bought a 360 instead. Surely having both is best but I certainly haven't felt so much of the same sentiment from 360 owners I know.
Anyway, my disappointments:
1) Smash Bros Brawl being delayed until next year. Mr. Iwata personally told me that he was hoping to make this game a release title for the "Revolution" (this was in 2005). We're now more than a year overdue, and for something like Smash that really doesn't imply 6.5 solid years of development time. They were simply slow to start on it.
2) Lack of availability of the Wii. I'm not used to having to put so much work into acquiring a $250 piece of technology one year after its initial release; my mornings are usually quite busy. As a result I still don't have one.
3) FFXII: Revenant Wings (DS). I expected much better than what it turned out to be. Even looking at videos of the game on IGN didn't quite get across the abysmal pacing and unbelievable lack of variety in this game. Its supposed depth doesn't amount to anything in practice.
4) Mario 3v3 Hoops (DS). I think this came out in 2007. If not then nevermind. Anyway this game is a giant turd.
5) ArenaNet slowly turning Guild Wars into a grindfest. The one MMORPG that let me play PVE at my leisure and not "fall behind" decided that it's a much better idea to just go into WoW me-too mode rather than stick with the original tenet of skill over time played. The Eye of the North expansion released this year completed the transformation.
6) Bioware going to EA, Blizzard merging with Activision. Let's just say that these *cannot possibly be good things* considering Bioware and Blizzard haven't exactly been in need of an improvement in any way. (Well, Blizzard graphically perhaps but Activision doesn't help there.)
7) Forza Motorsport 2. Great racing engine, cool graphics, good customization, good online mode. But... what is with no music during races? Or having to play your ass off to unlock even the ability to *purchase* a lot of the cars? This isn't supposed to be a 100-hour RPG, it's a freaking racing game. Nobody wants to spend days driving cars they don't like to get at cars they do; there's no storyline or change in gameplay to keep you interested in the meantime. Seems the developers forgot they were making a *game* rather than a training sim for racing teams to study tracks.
I like basketball!!1!
...was that Duke Nukem Forever wasn't released in 2007. I was sure that this year was the year!
Does anyone know the specific incidents the article is talking about here? I found nothing on the wikipedia pages for her and Assassin's Creed, and I'm lazy...
@AlexSheive
Bethesda, an Xbox FPS company? WTF?
According to Wikipedia, out of the 68 games that Bethesda has played some part in developing, publishing, or producing, only 14 of them actually appeared on an Xbox console...those 14 games include BOTH Xbox AND Xbox 360...on top of that, on just a quick skim through the list, only a handful of those games are actually FPS (and no, Oblivion was NOT an FPS. If the previous Elder Scrolls games were not considered an FPS, neither was Oblivion)
What the hell are you talking about?
Living With a Nerd
Not at all, the Halo series has never really done much for me...people can rip on it all they like, I don't care...but if shills are posting on boards to try to get people to turn away from a competitor's products, they should be doing it by talking shit about a game that hasn't been out for a couple of months (nor should it be about a game that, as of right now, is sitting at the top of Live in terms of people that play it. In fact, Halo 3 pisses me off because of this...it's not that it's a shitty game, but it sucked away many people that were playing OTHER games on Live.)
Living With a Nerd
Boy is it pretty. And smooth. And climbing things is fun for the first half-hour or so.
... okay. Actually everyone's good except for Altair himself, but I have heard worse.
The voice acting is
But seriously, I was looking forward to being immersed in the role of an assassin stalking his target patiently, taking just the right moment to strike, then blazing a bloody trail out of town. But nope, I get to listen to "Thief! I'll have your hand for that!" over and over and over and over and over again until I get sick of it and decide to have my two-dozenth very high-profile swordfight in the middle of the street -- which the guards will mercifully forget all about when I walk away for a couple minutes to climb the next Generic View Point Tower.
Talk about a wasted opportunity.
Done with slashdot, done with nerds, getting a life.
Bethesda having the rights to Fallout can only be a good thing.
The only complaint I've ever had about them is that they beta test on paying customers. But it seems that everyone is doing that these days.
For what it's worth, I never really got into the fallout games. I loved the idea, but the gameplay just didn't do it for me.
Linux Zealots: Smarter than Mac Zealots, but still zealots.
I do not own Halo 3 and I have no intention of buying it or a 360 but I'm going to defend it anyway. The whole "640p" thing was because it renders to two 640 row framebuffers which are then composited and slightly scaled vertically to achieve some cool lighting effects. People were only able to notice the slight reduction in vertical resolution by counting pixels on framegrabs. Until I see a study showing that people are even capable of distinguishing 720p and 1080p video sources (not still images), I will continue to believe that all of this fretting over resolution is nothing but fanboy wankery.
That's a challenge to all of the resolution whores out there. I'm sure someone out there can put together a simple double-blind study to test this. Get some volunteers and set up a game to play a demo in 720p or 1080p. Don't let them pause the demo, or get close enough to count pixels, just have them sit an appropriate distance from the screen and ask them which sample was higher resolution. Call it a hunch, but I predict that less than 60% of the volunteers will get it right. If you somehow manage to test "640p" versus 720p I don't see how it could be significantly higher than 50% for a sufficiently large sample.
If you consider Bethesda Softworks an "XBox FPS developer" then you never had an idea of what a CRPG was to begin with. So don't worry, you won't notice a thing.
I like basketball!!1!
What about all the games SEGA churns out.
I didn't find it a letdown at all. Quite enjoyed it, actually.
At least, the parts we've seen so far. /sadface
Troika's dead, an Xbox FPS developer has the Fallout IP, and Bioware was eaten by EA before they could squeeze out an uncorrupted Dragon Age.
On the other hand, we have the Witcher, and NWN2: Mask of the Betrayer, which makes it one of the best CRPG years in a long time. Which brings us to my disappointment, mirrored nicely by this article: This was a great year for PC games, the best in a long time, but online media seems only to care about consoles.
Being bitter is drinking poison and hoping someone else will die
Talking shit about a game 4 months old? I've seen people on here who haven't RTFA, but you didn't even read the fucking title of the article - 2007's Ten Biggest Gaming Letdowns.
Prof. Farnsworth - "Oh a lesson in not changing history from Mr I'm-My-Own-Grandpa!"
But all in all, Pojut is 100% right. If you're going to bash a game for no reason, bash a game that isn't 4 months old. Hell, there are far more worthy targets out there if you're going to sit and unjustly bash old games. Bioshock (an excellent game, I might add) didn't live up to 1/4 of the hype heaped upon it (no game could have), so from a certain perspective, it's by far the most disappointing game of the year. Why don't you pick on that one while you're at it? I'll tell you why, because you're another idiotic anti-Halo fanboy. I've seen very reasonable arguments put forth as to why Halo isn't good, but yours isn't one of them.
"16MB (fuck off, MiB fascists)" - The Mighty Buzzard
Anyone that played Morrowind before and then Oblivion saw the huge difference.
Morrowind was a PC game that got ported to console. Oblivion was was a Console game ported to PC. A "port" as commonly known with PC players. And as most "Ports" it sucked in the same ways like them. The RPG part dumbed down overall with more emphasis on fights, made more lowest common denominator accessible for the "casual gamers", had simplified controls due to the lack of keyboard and mouse, horrible user interface, again due due bad res of the typical console "monitor" (NTSC TV) and controls.
It might have helped Bethesda's pocketbook (bigger market, easier to sell the bonus quests due to missing moddability on consoles, etc) but it made the game itself worse in the eyes of (PC)gamers and especially long time ElderScrolls players.
No it's not a full FPS (yet) but it certaily is a lot less of a RPG like it was.
Bungie could only manage to get Halo 3 to run at 640p resolution and not the minimum standard 720p for real next gen games.
Wait, what? How is that a "minimum standard" for "real next gen games"? You know that the Wii's maximum is 480p, right? If you consider Halo 3 to be even borderline "next gen," then you can't say Metroid Prime 3 isn't, as its single player mode blows Halo 3's away.
True, the interface was definately geared more towards consoles...but, with the help of the (excellent) oblivion modding community, the interface was helped out substantially. What you said about long time elder scrolls gamers is rather funny to me...I've been playing since the first one, and I personally thought Oblivion was the best one yet.
Living With a Nerd
And you apparently haven't read Slashdot since Halo 3 was announced...nearly the exact same cut and paste troll post has been posted in nearly every single story dealing with video games. Changing the first sentence so that it seems to be on-topic with the discussion doesn't make it any less of a shill/troll post.
And no, I won't block AC posts because sometimes ACs do in fact make insightful comments...when they aren't pasting in responses that were written months ago, that is.
Living With a Nerd
Are you in the same article that the rest of us are in? Or are you just a little too emotional about HALO for some reason?
Notice how most of the cut and paste post (which has appeared almost verbatim in nearly every video game story on Slashdot for the past 6 months, I might add) focuses mainly on the game, while devoting only a couple of sentences to the hype machine.
If it were purely about the hype machine, I would have modded it underrated (if it haden't been an AC, of course). But it was the same cut and paste crap that has been tossed at Slashdot readers for months, and as such, I posted a comment stating that it's pointless to continue posting that months after the release of it.
WTF, are people supporting shill/trolls on here now?
Living With a Nerd
I care. I bought a 1080p TV so i could play 720/1080 games.
640 is not HD, sorry.
All of the Halo games have had wicked awesome explosions, sure. But they also have a deeply engrossing storyline, fantastic multiplayer, good AI, and unsurpassed world physics. Halo 3 is the best game in the series and was my favorite shooter (and many other people's) of the year. By no stretch of the imagination was it a bad game. Star Wars is full of light sabers and lasers - but obviously, if you look at it more closely, there's an intricate storyline with fantastic characters (in Episodes 4-6).
Sure, BioShock and Portal are arguably better games than Halo 3 but they didn't sell nearly as well. The reason? Exposure. Most people haven't even heard of Portal. There certainly aren't Portal trading cards, helmets, action figures, and TV commercials.
For christ's sake, you can't even BUY Portal on a console -- at most, an hour long game -- without buying a $60 package that includes another game I've already beaten (Half Life 2) and two expansion packs I don't want. If Joey asks for Portal for Christmas, his mom won't be able to find it in a store.
Sales figures are a result of many other forces besides the quality of the game itself, and that's reality. Microsoft went to bat for Halo 3 with their pocketbook, executed very well, and they reaped the rewards from it. BioShock and Portal did not pony up, and since most people don't know what they are, they aren't purchased at nearly the same rate. It has nothing to do with the average American only liking "wicked awesome explosions."
rm -rf
The article's biggest letdown of 2007 was the poor third-party lineup for the Wii.
The Wii's the only next-gen console my wife and I own, and while we've played a lot of the tennis game, some Zelda, some of the first Rabbids game but no other titles have really grabbed our interest. I bought one of those 'maze in the air' games that came out early on, lent it to a friend and haven't cared to ask for it back.
The lineup (outside Nintendo) seems pretty weak, but I've not paid a lot of attention lately.
While we're conducting studies lets also grab a group of random individuals, show them a thirty second gameplay clip from Halo 2 and Halo 3, and see if they can't tell the difference in graphics and distinguish one game from the other. I'm no Halo fanboy, but I even take offense to the argument that people couldn't tell the difference between H2 and H3 screenshots. First, I believe that was an issue with the beta, not the final product. Second, a "screenshot" isn't exactly the best way to determine if a game has good graphics or not. Hell, you think a screenshot of Crysis is gonna do that game justice? I don't think so.
In the end, I can name 3 or 4 other games that I enjoyed more than Halo 3 this year, but Halo 3 is still a good game and isn't worthy of all this hateboy nit-picking.
So I won't get into the thick of the discussion. but "8ish" hours isn't incredible short, for a full blown game??? Man, what have marketing people done to us gamers that we accept a game that lasts only 8 hours! These are sad times indeed. I wouldn't expect even an episode or expansion to last that little. A good FPS for me should have some 40-30 hours of gameplay, period.
Where is that guy who'd die defending what I had to say when I need him?
I remember when Spore was the next huge thing to hit gaming, and every game show had breathless gamers watching previews. Then we waited. And waited. And waited.
Years passed.
Still no Spore! It's an ambitious game, yes, but once you hit the third or fourth year of development, it starts seeming like it'll never get here. Games with extremely long dev times have a history of disappointing. I reckon "No Spore This Year" should be on the list as a disappointment of 2007.
Wither Spore?
Nice strawman, though.
No one with a lick of sense gives a flying fuck. Unless you're counting the lines, rather than playing the game, you can't tell if there are 640 lines or 720. Give me a break.
Realistically, no, it doesn't matter much. At this point, graphics increases don't mean much, as we're well past the point where adding graphics power lets you create game play you couldn't do before. But the Xbox 360 and PS3 are sold on the premise of HD resolution graphics. To the people who bought the systems for that reason, anything less than 720p isn't what they were led to believe they would get.
It's hardly "incredibly short" (took me 8ish hours), and every game ever made (except some RPGs) is linear. You can hardly bash Halo 3 for being what 90% of games are, buddy.
Well, 90% of games (or anything) is crap. That doesn't mean we shouldn't bash a bad game. Obviously every game is linear at some level, but some a lot more so than others. Halo games are far over on the linear side of things. Whether that's a good thing or bad depends on your tastes, but singling out Halo 3 for it after Halo and Halo 2 set the bar for it is silly.
I think it's more likely that you bought an HDTV for the sake of being able to say you have an HDTV and so you fret over things like the resolution of games because admitting that it matters little threatens the rationalization of your purchase and makes you feel like a fool.
First, what study have you read indicating that Xboxs released in the past year still suffer the same number of hardware malfunctions as their predecessors? I play close attention to gaming news and I haven't seen a study like this anywhere. Please tell me where you get this information so that I can be as informed as you are.
Second, Bioware was bought out. It's not as though they "left". If fact, Bioware was never an exclusive developer, they simply made a few exclusive games, which I'm sure many developers have done at one time or another for one console or another. It's entirely possible that future games developed by Bioware could also be Xbox exclusive. Also, Bungie may be wholly independent now, but they've stated they have no intention of developing for other consoles. Your statements that developers "are in shambles" and have "turned their backs" on Microsoft seem to be considerably exaggerated. Let's not forget that 3rd party exclusiveness isn't exactly Nintendo's or Sony's strong points.
Third... graphical disasters? Really? Let's check some review quotes for Mass Effect, shall we.
Basically, I find it hard to believe that anyone could really claim that they were "graphical disasters". Even if you had said they were "graphically subpar", I would probably take issue. But "graphical disaster" makes it sound as though you have some kind of vendetta against these games? I'd call you a Nintendo or a Sony fanboy, but I'm not that petty (wait, maybe I just did).
It's a letdown in itself that 8 hours is now an acceptable single player campaign.
(I still haven't beaten Nightmare Xaero.)
09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0
45 5F E1 04 22 CA 29 C4 93 3F 95 05 2B 79 2A B2
I'd say you're both a little right. I bought an HDTV after seeing my friend play a game on his. The picture was so clear and nice I couldn't help but be impressed. So it's not entirely unreasonable that there IS a difference between HD and standard and that difference is noticeable. But on the other hand, we're talking about a difference between 80P of resolution. Honestly, while I can tell the difference between 420P and 720P fairly easily, I struggle sometimes to tell the difference between 720P and 1080P. So crying over 80P seems pretty dumb to me.
Wow, lots of points to make. I'm lazy so I'm not gonna quote or anything, but here goes.
The people who can't see the difference but still care are idiots. I know that's not the most logical response, but it's the only way I can seem to rationalize a stance like that. In my opinion, elitism like that is nauseating. As for the 5 or 6 people who CAN see the difference, good for you. That's quite an impressive skill. However, if a lapse of 80P is enough to ruin a game for you, maybe it's more of a curse than a skill. Or maybe you're just being ridiculous.
The Half-life episodes weren't 8 hours each. I don't know if you were drunk and thought you were playing when you were really watching Ben Hur, but I can assure you that I beat both episodes in under 6 hours. Episode 1 was 2 ½ hours, Episode 2 was 3 ½. They were great games, but they were short, plain and simple. If you add in Portal, the original single player content of the Orange Box added up to about 7 ½ hours of gameplay.
As for 50+ hours, show me a FPS game that's taken you fifty hours to beat. Hell, show me a "good" one that's taken you 20 hours to beat. I've played a lot of FPS games, and it's rare to find one that lasts more than 12 hours.
Yes, no dedicated servers and a 16 player limit is a bummer, which is simply a testament to how much fun the multiplayer portion of Halo is that it can be remarkably fun and exciting even without these features.
Lastly, I don't even know why I bothered replying to you, since I just read that you have never played Halo 3 and never will. You know, one time my brother and my brother-in-law were having a heated debate about a certain type of automobile. I know very little about automobiles and hadn't driven it. So you know what I did? I went and watched TV. Then next time you feel like participating in a discussion about a game you've never played and know very little about, go watch TV instead.
Fair enough, though opinions are not as valuable as facts. Over half of all 360 owners have and play Halo3. Sorry you don't like it, but the masses have voted with their wallets.
I must be lucky. I started the year loving Battlefield 2 and Call of Duty 2, and ended it loving Orange Box (once I got over hating the idea of re-buying), Bioshock, and now the topping on the cake - Call of Duty 4 demo runs great on my AGPed 3.2P4!!! Disappointments? None. Well... I remember being disappointed about how Bioshock's Securom made my AVG antivirus panic... but I got over it.
I'm going to agree with you on the 640p whatever comments. I really don't care that Halo did some weird resolution tricks - I saw the game for the first time this week and it looks pretty good for a next gen game. Not Crysis good, but better than say Resistance did on the PS3.
However, I don't agree with this comment:
but consoles aren't the place to be looking for good FPS multiplayer gaming anyways.
I think that Xbox Live really set the bar in this last gen and you can see games like Warhawk (split screen multiplayer on a dedicated server) set the bar this gen. Matchmaking and dedicated servers really are going to become a staple this time around, and I don't think that the PC can claim this as much anymore. Especially now that UT3 supports mouse and keyboard on PS3 and most likely will do so for 360 as well.
The original Halo really kind of pushed things ahead when it was originally released for multiplayer on a console. I expect that it should do so in this gen as well.
Oh, and I'm sick and tired of the 8 hour FPS games. I want 20 hours minimum. That's a game. 8 hours is too short for entertainment value.
640 Progressive scan doesn't exist? Wow, I'd better tell Win/Lin to stop having it as a resolution option...
It is pitch black. You are likely to be eaten by a grue.
fair enough, so don't market the game as HD. HD denotes a minimum resolution of 720, there is no disputing that.
I hate responding to trolls.... but.
They took a billion dollar hit to their bottom line to STOP the bleeding of consoles... they admitted (in no uncertain terms) that EVERY console they sold (up to that point) was potentially destined to fail... and fail for the SAME FLAW.
20% not high? 30%? How many consoles have to go back to Microsoft (and how many times), before you admit there's a flaw in the 360 that is VERY troubling and VERY problematic for their goodwill and future as a gaming company.
The failure rate of the PS3 is infinitesimal. Google is your friend. The Wii's also a solid performer. Compared to the 360 the PS2 launch console is more reliable.
You've been nursing Bill Gates' ballsack too long to notice the facts DO support his statement... and it's NOT fanboy rhetoric when the VERY company extends the warranty for a _SPECIFIC_ failure to 3 YEARS, for FREE. That had "class action dodge" written ALL over it, chum.
AC, indeed. Sometimes your asinine insinuations really get to me.
It's the Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man.
As for this first claim, I cannot back the new consoles vs. original design because Microsoft is _hiding_ that information. You can't even tell which ones on the shelf have the flaw and which do not without a pad and paper (where it was made, when, what "team" put it together....etc.) So we'll never get anywhere trying to decide if the flaw was fixed or not until this generation is over, I suspect (if ever.) And without a screwdriver or a flashlight, you can't tell if your console on the shelf is "flawed" or "fixed".... so that's moot, but a good point that it's probably anecdotal.
;) If you have a more specific quote, I'd appreciate the link...
;)
;) And a few additional factoids to make the process all the more complicated. :)
As for Bioware being bought, yes... they were a Microsoft "partner" (read: got big bags of money to make a few MS exclusive games)... but Bungie WAS microsoft's pride and joy and they LEFT. Bioshock and Mass Effect should be heading for the PS3 next year (I'd wager... and the Bioware PR guy basically hinted that the PS3 was getting Mass Effect in the next year). IIRC, Bungie has never publicly stated they were not going to develop for other consoles, and neither did they say they were... it's someone reading between the lines, I suspect... because their PR-like statement made it sound like all was wonderful in MS-land, and they hated to leave the big nest...
From someone who played Mass Effect, the slowdown and popup can be unbearably bad... particularly during the oft-overdone battle sequences. It is _NOT_ "cinema quality", unless you count the grain filter addition (which you can turn off) as an "aspect of compelling cinema"... When you're looking at stills and statics, the game is superb. It's when you move around too much or have too many things on the screen that we see the flaws. It was a good effort by Bioware, but I think it fell short... combat was too problematic, the rover was a pitiful thing to _attempt_ to drive... and the story was, in effect, a bit too linear to be such an "open" game. Some people liked it though.
Let's talk Halo 3. It's not even 720p. Good? Sure, but not great... certainly not the 2nd coming (as the article mentions). But why was it not up to the hype MS marketing had for it? I'd consider that little gem to be a bit of a PR disaster, rather than a graphics disaster (but when you couple that with the hyperbole from Redmond regarding their console, it really does seem like a gfx disaster.) Does it make for an un-fun game? I don't think so... but then again, I never liked Halo... Sure it sold millions... MS counted on that. But if it represents the epitome of "next gen" gaming... they should really stop and take a deep breath... and maybe play Bioshock or Gears of War... (the latter being not an FPS, but very graphically impressive, IMO.)
Third party exclusiveness isn't ANYONE's strong point this generation, if you hadn't noticed. And Sony still has a lock on MANY developers that won't do an XBox title... or if they do, it'll be long after the PS3 title has moved to the bargain bin... Nintendo never has had a lock on third party anything (that's for another post, though).... but this generation has seen the death knell of 'third party exclusives'. If you want to play a Sony game, you have to buy a Sony... if you want to play a MS game, you have to buy an Xbox, and so on... but for Namco, Capcom, Bioware, etc etc... you can pick any of the offerings.
As you may have guessed.. I own a 360 and a PS3. So, I'm neither one's fanboy... I just want to balance both ends of the anecdotal spectrum with a bit of my own.
It's the Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man.
A World in a Grain of Sand / Heaven in a Wild Flower,
Infinity in the Palm of your Hand / And Eternity in an Hour.
You're correct, it doesn't mean it must be wrong...but that doesn't mean it's right, either.
As far as "people with different opinions" go, reread the post a bit. The entire post is constructed in a way that smacks of paid badmouthing. If you think it is an opinion of some random person, you are far too trusting.
Living With a Nerd
Here's a link to a Gamespot news article.
http://www.gamespot.com/news/6183773.html?tag=result;title;1
Here's a quote from the article - "With Bungie no longer tied to Microsoft, many speculated on whether the developer would lend projects to consoles other than the Xbox 360. While the option remains, Bungie lead writer Frank O'Connor has said that the developer isn't going to make the move any time soon."
As for the rest of your comments, I might not agree with you 100% but I recognize that Halo, Mass Effect and Forza have their issues. I also recognize that Bungie not being owned outright by Microsoft is a bad thing for Microsoft. And losing any type of exclusivity is probably bad for the Xbox 360. I do not contest any of that. But the AC's tone was what I took issue with. He seems to think that the Xbox 360 is doomed, and that impressions of the system so far are overwhelmingly negative. This seems to be very opposite to the tone of the gaming industry as a whole, or at least what I have seen of it (which is a lot). Very few would argue that the 360 didn't have the best lineup of games for this holiday season. The Xbox Live system is often touted as the most robust online console service. And all three of those games he touted as "graphical disasters" have received very positive overall reviews (check metacritic) and have sold quite well. Terms like "shambles" and "graphical disasters" seem so ridiculous to me. I don't see any reason to believe, as the AC so elegantly put it, that the 360 turned out to be a "mess."
I also forgot to mention in my previous post that the AC's claim that the Xbox is only selling well in the U.S. is a flat out lie. In fact, the only market I know of where the Xbox is NOT doing well is the Asian market, primarily because of lackluster sales in Japan. But in Europe, Canada and Australia, the system is selling very well. I'm not gonna look up the stats to back this up cause I'm lazy, but I'm sure one wouldn't have too look far.
One last thing, you stated third party exclusivity hasn't been anyones strong point so far, but I disagree. The Orange Box (Valve), Bioshock (2k) and Mass Affect (Bioware) were all 3rd party exclusives to the Xbox during the holiday season, (yes, I know this will change but the damage has already been done). I believe last year that Oblivion was exclusive during the holiday season. The Xbox might not retain these exclusivities forever, but they know how to time it right.
I hate it when people dissect posts into quotes, but whatever, I'll respond.
Stating that the average player took 8 hours to beat each of the HL episodes to give the unfair impression that the Halo 3 campaign is as short as an episode of HL without actually having research to back it up is unfair. Maybe citing my own anecdotal evidence wasn't the best way to counter such an argument, so I'll use some real stats.
http://games.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/11/19/1739223
According to these stats, the average person took 5 hours to beat HL:E2. That's not quite 8. Unless you would like to claim that Portal runs an average over 4 hours (go on, I dare ya) that brings the grand total to 9 hours. Hardly a far cry from Halo's single player offerings.
As for the fact that the Orange Box contains an excellent multi player game to make up for its somewhat short single player experience, you're absolutely right. It does, which is why the Orange Box is a great purchase and is, in my humble opinion, the best game of the year.
But who are you to declare that Halo's multiplayer aspect doesn't do the same for Halo 3 when you haven't even played the game? I love that you simply can't imagine a world in which peer-to-peer and a 16 player limit can still produce a good (if not great) experience. Hell, compared to the Orange Box, Halo's multi-player is enormous, despite your uninformed opinion to the contrary, including 4 player online co-op in the campaign, about 2-3 times more maps than team fortress, an easy built in tool for map customization and a seemingly endless amount of game options. Halo 3's multiplayer, despite its shortcomings, is still good-to-great and more than supplies the 50+ hour quota you have placed on a game worthy of your almighty dollar.
And as for the whole consoles-controller-fps thing, that is such an old, tired argument. I'm really tempted to play the "idiot" card again, since I fail to see how anyone with opposable thumbs would find it so detrimental to play a fps on a console. I've been doing it since I was a child and it's never caused me any irrefutable harm. I know playing a FPS with a mouse and a keyboard is easier, but so is driving an automatic transmission. Doesn't mean I can't enjoy a race if I'm driving with a stick, does it?
Then again, it took you 8 hours to beat HL2:E2 with a mouse and a keyboard and it took me 3 1/2 with a controller. Maybe you really are thumbless.
Wii is last-gen graphics with next-gen gameplay. While I love my Wii, the graphics suck compared to the 1080p graphics coming from my PC. I also know what I paid for it and understand perfectly why Nintendo wouldn't make that the default. For now I'm happy they're reclaiming ground so there'll be a next generation, and I do expect it to be at least 720p (though since it's some years away I hope they go directly to 1080p). Maybe they should make two versions, since I'm sure we're talking a $100 price difference on the graphic chip.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
I suspect we'll see Bungie jumping onto either the Wii or the PS3 sooner rather than later... they can't let revenue slip away because of brand loyalty..... I'm just speculating. ;) It was still a bit vague, although more negative towards other consoles than some of the summaries I read.
;)
;) It's much better than the AC's painting of it, to be sure... and that we can agree on. I just don't have as positive a picture as some do... probably because I'm old. :)
While I agree the tone of the original response was a overtly harsh, and the person's obviously frustrated with the 360 (perhaps his/her unit died on them right at Christmas time).... I still think that MS is potentially losing future goodwill and mindshare with how the console has been even less reliable than their first attempt... (the only console I've had fail since my 2600 has been my first gen XBox... even my launch PS2 is still working, beating the odds there I suspect..) Still, their attempt to avoid a recall was at least a positive step (something Sony never did...) If their redesign helps, and their new 65nm systems come around to mass quantities, the goodwill lost might not be permanent... but I'm not sure how to know, without seeing the sales for the XBox 720..
Ace Combat 6 sold well in Japan... for a week... bringing up 360 system sales to a respectable level... but the next week, the blip was off... and I suspect that might've had something to do with the eventual PS3 port of the game coming next year... (That's Japan... Microsoft might as well abandon trying there... it's hopeless...) But with the exception of the US, the PS3 has seen much better overall sales in Europe and Japan, which is nice but still behind the 360 with its head of steam. We're seeing the Wii break all records, but not having the attach rate the 360/Ps3 has in terms of software sales (more important to Sony and MS who lose on the hardware, but still...) So I think the 360 will do fine, but it's not all rosy.
If you distill AC's focus down to the failure rate... I would agree that the 360's a mess because of it. (It creates bad press at the least, but pissed-off customers are harder to let slide into obscurity than an article decrying the QA at Redmond.) The billion dollar slice out of the pie for repairing a particular flaw is really cutting their overall success (since they've not really made a hefty Nintendo-esque profit on their VG venture since they started), but they have made up for it with at least great games (so far... albeit FPS heavy this generation for some reason...) I still suspect that things will be stinging over there for a while in the division that handles the 360.
The Orange Box did finally come out for Christmas on the PS3... but the sales lead for the 360 was substantial (not to mention Valve's asinine port handoff to some no-name company). I think the PS3 had a great lineup too... Folklore (a bit older, but a good game) Heavenly Sword (short, but VERY good), Ratchet & Clank (everyone owes it to themselves to try that one... superb), and Uncharted were all top notch releases the PS3 didn't have last year... and with a $400 console in the pipeline, we're finally going to see some decent competition for Microsoft's lead... (competition's great for the gamer...) Devil May Cry 4 is on the horizon... along with some other neat titles... should be a good year for both systems... (I don't own a Wii, so I cannot speculate on how the library stacks up...)
As for exclusivity... I think the AC was harsh about that, but considering everyone in the press and online gave Sony so much shit for not having any exclusives, or timed exclusives, saying they were doomed because of it has finally come back full circle to Microsoft... But the tune's not the same anymore for some reason. Losing some 3rd party supporter exclusivity (at least in the short term) will look bad more than actually _be_ bad, but if the games keep coming for both systems, we can see
It's the Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man.
I can totally tell it's at a lower resolution than other games. I think they're also not using the antialiasing in the same way as most games, or something else is amiss, because I can definitely see the hard edges of walls and doors and so on. Mind you I have a 1080p Full-HD television.
It's not like it's a big deal, they made their choice so they could run at framerate and get the lighting they wanted, but at least some of us could tell immediately. By the way, the reason they do this reduced framebuffer size (and it has to be horizontal as well as vertical) is so the whole thing fits in the GPU's embedded memory and they don't need to resolve to main memory during the rendering process.
Graham
Change is certain; progress is not obligatory.
Change is certain; progress is not obligatory.
I don't understand this logic.You're calling a '4 months old game' old? What the hell?
Change is certain; progress is not obligatory.
"Those cutscenes were worse than anything Pol Pot ever did and I demand that whoever suggested them be dragged to the Hague to be tried for crimes against humanity."
From the obligatory hivemind.
"The combined effect of slave labour, malnutrition, poor medical care and executions had an estimated death toll of 750,000 to 1.7 million."
Come on. A little perspective please. It's only a video game, for chrissakes.
In case my irony detector's broken, let me at least throw Ben Cresslaw's take on Assassin's Creed. Amusing.
I'd like to think the Internet isn't comprised almost entirely of 14-year-old misanthropes, but based on the unmentionable events surrounding that game, I could be wrong.
Actually, 480p is the minimum for HD. Because it's not massively different to 480i though, people usually mean 720p and up when they refer to HD resolutions. 640p is a lot closer than 480p to 720p anyway.
Ever play Halo 3 on your HDTV? Pixels are found at almost every edge in the game. I was very unimpressed last night when my friend brought it over to play on my 1080P set, yes it is the first time I've seen Halo 3. Bioshock, on the other hand, looked fantastic on the 360 and really blew Halo 3 out of the water as far as visuals go.
I'm not "crying over 80P" here, I'm pointing out the fact that Halo 3 looks a lot more like "Halo 2.5" and that other games on the same system look much nicer.
I went to eat some animal crackers and the box said, "Do not eat if seal is broken." I opened the box and sure enough..
In what way is Halo 3 far over on the linear side of things? What would be the vast swathe of FPSes that you would give as counter-examples? Are you talking about the way you work your way through a level?
I'm guessing you have lots of Microsoft stock, because the post was perfectly on topic. All of which tells me you have been slighted in some way and can't let it go. Might I suggest that you skip this topic as Halo 3 is a perfect legitimate target for criticism in the context of a "Year in Review", and you obviously can't handle this fact. Cut&Paste criticism or not.
Prof. Farnsworth - "Oh a lesson in not changing history from Mr I'm-My-Own-Grandpa!"
Nope, no Microsoft stock. You are right though, I can't let it go. Like I said, changing the first couple of sentences of a copy-paste troll post that people otherwise almost ALWAYS mod flamebait doesn't suddenly make it an insightful post...it makes it flamebait, same as it always is.
Ironically, I actually agree with a lot of what is in the post...I personally have never liked the Halo series, 3 included...just because I agree with an opinion doesn't mean I have to agree with its origin.
This is insane...it's like a serial killer taping a printed out picture of someone else over his face, and suddenly no one sees the knife in his hand.
Living With a Nerd
My biggest disappointment was how much of a graphics hog bioshock is. Can't run it on my PC whereas Orange Box runs fine. Plus Bioshock isn't out for Wii as far as I know, so no Bioshock for me until I fork out for a new graphics card, or break down and buy an Xbox. *cry*
Actually, Uncharted: Drakes Fortune was developed by Naughty Dog, which is a first party developer owned by Sony, so that doesn't really fall under the category of third-party exclusivity. Also, Insomniac Games (Ratchet and Clank, Resistance: Fall of man), while technically an independent developer, has been developing solely for Sony since 1996 and all of their games have been published by Sony. So its no surprise that they continue to do so.
Still, all that is beside the point and I've steered this thread a little off-topic. I guess if I had to sum up my position, I'd simply state that, perhaps, if one wanted to be cruel, I could abide them to refer to certain aspects of the 360 as "a mess" (such as hardware reliability), but referring to the entire console as "a mess" is just fanboy flamebait. But don't misunderstand my intentions. If anyone was to call the PS3 or the Wii a mess in the same tone as the AC, I'd be defending them just as vigorously. Competition IS good, that I agree with, and I think the market today is finally able to truly support three independent consoles as well as a move toward 3rd party development dominance, both good things.
Don't get me wrong, I see your point. It's just that it does not apply in a "Year in review" thread where Halo 3 is more than fair game.
Prof. Farnsworth - "Oh a lesson in not changing history from Mr I'm-My-Own-Grandpa!"
i think sega was smart in not tacking on motion controls that _have_ to be used. i see no reason for motion controls for this game. Right now it is rare, especially for a third party developer, not to force players to use some sort of motion control that ruins the game.
I'm not sure how this game can really be a disappointment for most people. the two-player game is fun, if short. the graphics do seem to be some of the best i've seen on wii. the controls are obvious and simple. ( i would recommend using a classic control if you have one.)
i would love to play the original, which was revolutionary when it came out (from what i understand), but I can't. at least, i can't easily play it (i'd need to buy a saturn, the special controller, and the game... which would be spendy according to my last check on ebay.)
I think NiGHTS Journey of Dreams is a good reintroduction to (what I hope) is a continuing franchise. it's not perfect, but it's an excellent game and a great (re)entry into a new world.
read my comics, please, at http://www.funfactorycomic.com
I think the entire article, and perhaps the motivation behind it, is misplaced.
For those who are not snobs, more-hardcore-than-thou, fanboys, bitter, or bilious, 2007 has been one of the best years for video gaming - ever. I say this as someone who's been gaming since Pong.
Why raise your blood pressure gnashing your teeth over the things that were less than perfect or less than promised, when there is so much out there to enjoy?
Let's take one example: the Halo 3 complaint. Was the disappointment that Halo 3 was buggy, or unfun, or far less than promised? No. It was the snobbish whine that other people bought it instead of Earnest's more highbrow favorites; and then they had the effrontery to actually enjoy it. Clearly they are the unwashed masses who prefer wicked awesome explosions to the refined pleasures of agonizing moral choices and black humor. And that disappoints him.
Not that I haven't played Earnest's favorites, and enjoyed them immensely (multiple playthroughs of BioShock, and Portal was amazing); but I also enjoyed Halo 3 as a polished gameplay experience with a solid sci-fi plot riffing on myth and legend. At least there weren't any Ewoks.
I could produce a long list of games released in 2007, which, if you ignore the hype, were quite enjoyable. And I think it's possibly the longest list in the history of video gaming. But I think I've made my point.
Hans
Change is certain; progress is not obligatory.
I can and most people I know can see the difference. I bought a cheap 32" HD LCD for my PS3, excusing 1080p and 1080i you can see the difference in games as you increased the resolution. If you take Motorstorm, Orange box, Resistance FOM and start on a 576p resolution, move up to 720 and then lastly to 1080i/p you'll notice the text becoming crisper the model edges becoming smoother, and increase an graphical detail (Motorstorm really suffers at low resolutions.)
Every game I own (except Pirates of the Carribean) looks far better on a 1080p tv then on a 720/576p tv. If you don't believe me, next time your in a store goto into display settings and reset the PS3's resolution then play the game and then run it at a higher resolution, ask a friend to judge if you believe its psychosematic.
I can't see the difference between a standard PAL DVD and a Blu-Ray film (and I've really tried to find some.) But when it comes to games there is a noticable difference.
I love Yahtzee, he's hilarious. But truthfully, reviewing Halo 3 and stating "I don't care about multiplayer" is like reviewing Bioshock and saying "I only care about the hacking mini-game." Okay, maybe it's not quite that bad, but it's still pretty bad.
Good point.... I really didn't want to imply that I was thinking the OP was correct in his assumptions, just that tempered with a bit of pragmatism, we're seeing less of a "doom and gloom" scenario than we saw for any console at any point in its lifecycle (Dreamcast included). We're both on the same page, and I've enjoyed the discussion...
;) Insomniac I would assume had the same arrangement (for longer) that we saw with Bioware (if I had to guess.)
;)
;) heh. Or maybe Folklore. ;)
:-)
Yeah, I forgot N.D. was a Sony owned developer... explains why the game is fairly flawless... it's their own house.
What MS and Sony need to do is court more situations like Insomniac and the pre-Christmas Bioware so that they can gain an edge... but I'm no mogul.
I really should be playing the new DLC for Bioshock...
It was a great Christmas..
It's the Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man.
I would just like to point out that the 20 percent number is a guess. It originated from a website that ran a poll and they came up with that number after they received the results. It wasn't scientific, and it wasn't based on anything like retail reports. Some people were given a chance to bitch and they did. The warranty is definitely compelling and definitely says there is a problem, but it is also worth noting that Sony has been deluged with so much bad press that it is not surprising they are trying to nip it as quickly as possible. The internet has gotten very noisy in the last couple of years, especially with regards to Sony. All bad news about any system has to be taken with a grain of salt. It is possible that is an admission of a nasty defect, but it is also possible it is MS making a PR move that helps deal with the noisy backlash and makes them look more customer friendly than Sony. Neither you nor I know. There are a lot of people with a chip on their shoulder out there, just waiting to strike. You should keep that in mind when you're presented with a sensationalist number like that.
As for the AC posting, do you really blame the guy for posting anonymously and going against popular opinion? Slashdot's moderation system is not friendly towards those with a different view.
"Derp de derp."
Great Christmas nothin'. It was a great YEAR! It started for me with God of War 2, ended for me with Assassin's Creed, and had a whole crapload of great in between. Hard to imagine what it would have been like if Smash Bros. and GTA4 hadn't been delayed, along with a few others. Incidentitally, I'd name the BioShock DLC amongst my disappointments of the year. Great game, but the DLC was kinda weak. The patch that fixed the widescreen issue was cool, but in all fairness it should have been like that to begin with. Go with Folklore.
Oblivion, and I am speaking as a PC gamer here, was far superior to Morrowind. Yeah, things were less customizable in the sense that you couldn't do little tricks to make yourself completely invincible by using alchemy and spell casting. I think it was less about being dumbed down and more about having more control on what a player was able to do so that they couldn't get stupidly powerful. But Oblivion was just much more fun to play and much more engrossing in its quests. I couldn't play through all of Morrowind because it just got boring after awhile...while Oblivion I played all the way through and had over 100 hours of game play. I didn't have a problem with the interface...but that's a good thing about being a PC gamer. There are plenty of people out there who were like you and made mods to make oblivion more morrowindy.
Support a great indie game: http://www.abaddon360.com
Really, it depends on your style of playing. I've just started playing OB of Xbox360 and it takes me about 5 hours to clear a level. Of course I like to stop to look at textures and architecture and find secrets and not just run from start to finish. How does EP1 and Ep2 compare to an average HL2 episode, like Waterhazard or Highway 17? Valve says Ep1-3 are about the same size as a full HL game.
US-UK-Israel: The real Axis of Evil
Why not actually finish making the game before releasing it? It's a mess.
Agreed. I had one launched full force into a concrete wall. The battery cover popped off and the batteries scattered. Still no issues. :)
Think that's bad? Imagine that with no multiplayer and little to no replayability, and you have Heavenly Sword. Seriously, the game is fine as a rental, but getting to King Rohan takes about 5 hours and then can take Maaaaaaaaybe an hour or 2 to beat him all 3 times, and end the game.
Halo having a short/ lackluster single player campaign isn't all that unexpected. When was the last time you heard someone complain about the Single player campaign in Mario Kart? People have been buying it for the multiplayer and the rest is gravy.
Halo 3 has that, it's just not limited to the single player campaign.AC... you're all the same to me. You underestimate the flaw as much as most people overestimate it. Fanboy? No, but if it walks like a duck....
My 360 is fine. It's not a launch system, but it still works. Sounds like _you_ need to lighten up.
Only a fanboy would defend the flaw of a system as not as bad as it was, when the warranty _for_ the specific flaw cost MS $1 billion. Quite a big hit for a "small" flaw....
Post with your real name if you're so certain of your opinion... if not... blather on... no one's listening.
It's the Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man.
You've got a point (actual values are a mystery...)
;)
;)
I don't think MS would have taken the hit and extended the warranty for the flaw in the 360 if it were _only_ 5%. Sony never acknowledged the flaw in the PS2 launch unit's laser, yet they fixed them within a normal warranty (and charged for outside of it)... and I'd say that was a good % of units (my launch unit was unaffected.) Microsoft (in spite of being a publicly held company) does not disclose their failure rate, so we're all left to speculate the number of units. But when it's on television, not to mention newspapers... it's not a bunch of vocal bloggers and people on enthusiast websites making the news. I've always said it was to avoid a full-scale recall of the affected systems.... but only Bill Gates knows for sure.
I've been moderated harshly for having contrary opinions, but mostly I get a load of morons replying to my posts with mostly nonsense.
Additionally, while I take most failure issues with a grain of salt, including the PS2's laser issue, the fact that Microsoft is extending the warranty for a specific failure in the 360 lends credence to the fact that this flaw isn't simply something we take with a healthy dose of skepticism. (A little is good.. considering the actual % of failures... but the issue still exists..)
I try to avoid the fanboys (on both sides).... I still enjoy my 360... no dispute there... so it's not like I have a personal vendetta against the system.... I just feel MS is misleading the public to prevent slumps in sales (it appears to be working... well, with the game stable they have these days, it's hard to avoid it.)
It's the Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man.
woohoo... glad you could spend some maturity points, AC. I really don't know why I'm still responding... but here goes.. ;0
$1 billion hit was to prevent a class-action recall... simple as that. They're not benevolent. Maybe in your world... but not the real one.
You admitted it was pretty darned high... that's all I asked. It's not a small problem, an "isolated" problem, nor is it a problem that will go away if you post enough AC fanboyisms to stem the tide of reality. It's as simple as that.
I don't know the actual percentage (thanks for harping on that like some OCD sufferer), but anything over 5% is a systemic flaw that can lead to a recall... simply put, if you've got 10% of the cars shorting out on the freeway from a particular line or manufacturer, there's a substantial recall process that they go through to fix the _DESIGN_ flaw (that's key here... it's not misuse, it's not humidity, gremlins, or the Pope). If Microsoft made cars, we'd have already seen a recall and replacement/fix for each and every console they sold up to the point that they updated their heatsinks. Does it fix the problem? Who knows?)
So, my friend, you can spend your mommy's college fund arguing nebulous percentages (and whether or not I'm psychic and guessed the right one)... If you recall, I asked you how high was too high? (I didn't quote 30% as gospel... I was asking rhetorically, since you're some AC nut, if it would take 20% or 30% to make it seem like a really big deal... in so many words...) If it came from Sony's PR firm, I don't give two monkeys... the facts remain... Microsoft has a flawed console... they take a hit to extend EVERYONE's warranty _for a particular flaw_ to 3 years... they have massive PR flak for not admitting the flaw or even admitting it (even if you think it was a gesture of good faith or actively fixing a problem... more like to me actively covering their asses), with the exception of the now-probably-fired employee who mentioned 100% of the consoles in the wild _at that time_ suffered from the particular weakness and will most likely fail. They _have_ updated the console's GPU heatsink... and they are actively reducing the mfgr. size of the chips to avoid heat related issues in the future... (and to bring costs down... but you get the idea...)
Grow up? Wise words you could possibly heed yourself.... Do have a pleasant day, though....
You're worth a giggle or two... but that's about it. Back to mom's basement you go! I kid... I kid... lighten up AC... this is the internet... no one's civil here.
Surprise! I have a 360 Elite. Got it in August... sold my original Premium... and I have a PS3... that must make me schizophrenic! Or a fanboy torn between two loyalties! It'd make for a good Lifetime movie, though....
It's the Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man.
Yeah, an isometric beat-'em-up
A beat em up? Yeah, you've obviously tried the game...
and an expansion pack...
But WHAT an expansion!
I'd try to convince you to try them, but you are obviously satisfied with being a prejudiced, bitter and disappointed gamer, so I doubt anything I'd say would change it.
Being bitter is drinking poison and hoping someone else will die
While I agree (even if you did call me a dipshit... even though if you'll take your own advice and read the thread, I didn't claim any percentage, but hey... what's facts these days? I asked specificially "what is a big deal? 20% not high? 30%? Where exactly did I say "published reports have the failure rate a x%" I used the original AC's number as a jumping off point to question the hyperbole of "high" in terms of failure. Because I got the impression that you were intent on minimizing the issue with the 3RR. If we are on the same page (and for the most part, I think we are), I apologize for misconstruing your post as a defense of the Big Redmond Monster. I did not, will not, and do not, take that percentage as gospel. Since MS is the only one who knows for sure, no one has a % handy.) So, I put this up at the top so your ADHD doesn't miss it. *grin*
;) We can agree on one thing (or more, if you squint a little)... there are FAR too many fanboys this generation. WAY more vocal than before... attesting to the democratization of the internet and the proliferation of cheap access for morons who can't spell. :)
;)
I do agree that certain causes of the 360's problems can be attributed to misuse (and misuse could get the 3 RRoD)... the fact that you seem to keep ignoring is the "PR" (or because as you so eloquently put it "monkey see monkey do") stunt that cost MS $1 billion in warranty work stems from the thing I've said it was (and I'm not the only one) all along. a _design_ flaw, or a flaw introduced to cut corners. It's a flaw. It affects 100% of the consoles designed before the heatsink change (that we know of... because we don't know if the redesigned heatsink will fix the problem), and it will not go away this generation, even if they _do_ fix it, because there are so many out there produced in the first two years of the console's life that are just waiting to fail on them. Sorry, Indiana Jones warehouse or not, the consoles are not all fixed by any means... that'd be TONS of sold worldwide... after two years, how many had they sold? And I can safely say that March-April 2006 was the first time anyone had seen any design changes to the heatsinks. So up to that point, there were _quite_ a few flawed ones still on the shelf. Any specific number is all speculation. I might be missing where you're going with your argument. I do say this is FAR more damaging a flaw than some idiot who tosses his Wiimote at the TV. That is user idiocy, coupled with a strap that didn't plan for the morons using the console. Applying the reasonable man test exonerates the Nintendo people, and any suits brought are just silly. The PS2's problem, which had a PR meltdown (but didn't affect sales of the PS2 for some reason, overall) because it refused to admit there's a problem. Guess what? Microsoft has _never_ admitted officially that there's a problem. They won't confirm or deny a flaw exists, nor will they commit to how many have been fixed under warranty for the 3 Red rings, and they will not tell you which ones have the "new" solution to the problem that they refuse to admit exists. It's all very secret hush-hush with them, because of what I stated in a previous post w/r/t recalls.
So, in terms of PR... simply throwing money out the window is the same as Sony... the only difference is, there are far too many people who don't pay attention (not as astute as you or I) sending their Xboxes back in a vacuum. Because like the PS2 flaw, many people will deny it existed because their console's fine. And as many 360 owners unwrapped their bundle of off-white joy recently will attest... theirs is fine too... So in come the deny-o-trons, scoping out threads like this and crapping them with their anecdotal "MS rulez" nonsense, and we're back at the original PS2 issue... with a bit more press.
Ah, you have a good one too... I'm going to enjoy New Year's.
It's the Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man.
I really didn't clarify that percentage statement well... I should've left off the percentages and asked what would be considered high... which is what drove my original reply... (I misconstrued all around, of course.)
:-) Your point about parts and pieces is very insightful... and with the "dead" console threads floating around the net, you'd think the root cause was the same. I have no way of knowing that. (And by the way, the only console in the last 3 generations that have failed on me was my original XBox... not the hard drive, but the DRE issue that caused it to stop reading anything, including movies and CDs.) That doesn't make me hate MS any more, and I don't want others to consider that a thorn in my side that I'm trying to lash out in forums to alleviate. (I hate them for their OS more than their games... and I used to love their original Natural Keyboards...)
;) Until I get too old and feeble to use the controllers (when the dualshock 3 gets over here, I might have to stick with the Sixaxis.... heheh.)
:)
;)
You have made some excellent points... don't worry about "dickhead" mode... we're all guilty of that from time to time.
I did a recent scan of youtube, and there's a bunch of clips on how to fix a magnetic piece that flies off the DVD drive on the 360... Another third party item that had a bad batch, I assume. (the infamous "scratched disc" threads... at least those who didn't turn or nudge their xboxes while running)
I think after two tries MS is learning. They will not stop trying, of course (even in Japan)... and I think Sony's fumbles early on have caught them off guard (not really feeling the original XBox a threat) and they are learning too. Next gen ought to be fun to watch... in spite of Sony's "10 year plan" for their PS3... (the Ps2 is still around, so I tend to believe them...)
I really love the new consoles (I can't say about the Wii, since I've never seen a box for sale around here since launch) and I hope they both succeed... that means more games for me.
I tend to use defect and flaw interchangeably. I really should just pick one.... "design flaw" in the heat sinks is what I think the biggest weakness (and the only thing I have any empirical evidence of with the redesigned heatsinks). I don't think it's the cause of all the warranty repairs... just a larger than normal percentage. (There are some real idiots fiddling with electronics these days). I really shouldn't imply that is the only reason for warranty work. That's my fault... The "defect rate" as it specifically relates to the consoles sent to McAllen TX, is something we'll probably never get a handle on... unless it hits the courts for some reason (there are a couple of class-action suits in California, iirc, flowing through the system... dunno their outcomes or progress... I hate class-action suits personally... they only make lawyers rich.)
Thanks for clarifying... and now we're on the same page (relatively speaking... miniscule details aside)... it's good to end 2007 officially with a great exchange. Thanks for the point of view. It is worth all the chest-thumping sometimes...
Now if only the fanboys could learn that....
It's the Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man.