You can still send your Wii in after the warranty expires, you just don't get the repairs for free. Just because you were too lazy to do it properly doesn't mean the system is faulty. Lazy? I had to do a lot of leg work to find a EB with a wii to exchange. A new wii vs a repaired wii is always better. A repair often gives you a refurbished replacement for the part that is broken and they ship it both ways. The defect on my wii was a broken optical drive that failed to read the dist about 60% of the time. Statistically a repaired electronic device has a drastically increased failure rate. A refurbed optical drive brings the expected lifespan of the wii down greatly as well. My wii was in my possession for less then a two days before the return. Why on earth would I send it for repair, ensuring a shorter lifespan and a much greater chance of head aches later? You may send it to nintendo for repair after the warranty expires as well but by the time a non-defective wii dies after the warranty it will likely be more cost effective to buy a new one versus sending an old one for repair.
So in the long run buying anything on the wii virtual console ensure extra costs in the future. Either you flush all your purchases down the drain by getting a replacement or you pay to have it repaired wasting that money.
Or just download them in the external sd card. that is what i did when i broke up with my previous gf and she decided to keep the console, so i transfered the games to an sd card and bought a new one... now i still can play my virtualconsole games. Really. how? i do have a back up of my virtual console games but it refuses to allow them to be copied.
I have a DS lite and really enjoy it. I also have a GB and a GBA SP. I was never tempted by the PSP until recently with the slew of games I really wish I had. Sales figures for Japan shows they are moving very briskly there. I haven't seen any stats on it for N.A. but I assume it's now a comfortable #2 as opposed to being #3 behind a 5 year old system like in years past.
Graphics wise the PS3 is the intermediate step between the Wii and the 360. Although it's really 720p, Ratchet and Clank will change your opinion of where the graphics on the PS3 sit. The problem thus far is that developers are still getting familiar with the PS3. So the first crop of 360 games looked like Xbox + more polies the first crop of PS3 games looks like 360 -frame rate. I think thats starting to change.
I will say, though, that I buy/rent games on my PS3 rather than my 360 if given the choice now because my 360 is acting weird sometimes (graphical corruption that goes away when it's turned off and back on) and I don't want to have to wait 6 weeks until I can play it again. It's easier to just get them for the PS3 and not have to worry about it. A few friends of mine have picked up PS3's to avoid Xbox live. They got tired of paying for live. So any good multi-platform games they buy the PS3 version id possible to play online for free. I swore off the Wii virtual console shop due to the lack of transferability of the games. They die with your wii as Nintendo has a strict policy about those games and transferring and I ran into it when my new Wii was defective and I opted to exchange instead of sending it off to be refurbished. It made me realize anything I spent there is wasted when my wii dies after the warranty period. I also swore off Xbox live because of the inane credit card retention policy. They make it extremely hard to remove a CC after you use it and there really isn't any good reason for it. PSN or the wii Shopping channel don't demand your card stay persistent with your machine. So I'm on the PSN only for that sort of shopping. They allow you to redownload even off another machine and they allow me to remove my card off my machine if I wish.
Not just short but artificially shortened. Microsoft basically pulled the plug on the XBox as soon as the 360 appeared. The PS2 is clearly last gen, but Sony are still producing new versions of it even now. The major difference was that the PS2 was profitable per unit (ignore r&d) soon after launch while the Xbox was never profitable per unit up until it's demise. Mostly due to the sourced parts and IP Microsoft had to deal with. Sony's costs on the PS2 diminished continually while Microsoft's weren't as much under their control. A key part of that was the inclusion of the hard drive, HD's decrease in price per GB but generally not very much per unit. Contributing to their decision to partially ditch it in the 360.
Even if one concedes the Cell processor is difficult to program for, its clearly not impossible to do so. If vendors continue producing games for the PS3 (and if we're having a realistic argument, its safe to say they will do so, even if not exclusively), they will become more and more familiar with the nuances of programming over time. As this happens, the greater resources on the PS3 will shine through more and more. After four or five years, its entirely possible we could see significant differences in game-play and graphics on PS3 games, opposed to 360 games. I think with Ratchet and clank the difference is starting to surface. The game looked good but the real distinction is the number of objects on screen were sometimes staggering without slowing the machine down. The number of fully animated object like passing traffic, animal life, distant objects etc... made it a more immersive and believable world.
What actually have we seen from Google that is commercially successful apart from search? For their monolithic size and supposedly cool creative environment, we haven't had much to show for it. Vast majority of their services are still in Beta! Outside of their core business of search and serving adverts, Google are doing nothing particularly special. Ye gods, they had to *buy* Youtube because Google Video was so poor! Google analytics is putting the screws to a lot of analytics companies. They now either have to find something critical and new to offer, reduce their price, or increase their support. Analytics is as good enough for a lot of organizations.(click view source scroll to the bottom)
Google Maps grabbed a sizable amount of the market share of the online maps/directions market.
Google news is one of the best news aggregators on the net.
Google custom search put many smaller search tools for single site searches to shame.
None of them are stand alone or profit making products but they all give Google more information which helps their core compitence and they all help build the brand and mind share. Both of these pump their stock price which provides more money to expand. The longer you spend within Google's domain the more ads they can show you, the more money they make.
Spore (and a couple of other actually good games, depending on who you ask) has to come from somewhere. A game that might be fun, might be innovative, and might be released sometime in the next year or ten is hardly a reason for anything. So far I'd say some people really got into the hype but I thought it was conceptually poor from the start.
Hasn't the PS3 had lackluster sales for its entire lifespan? A serious question, rather than a disagreement with parent or an attempt to troll. In the US it is lack luster. World wide it's picked up a lot. Media creates data for the 22-28th of October shows the PS3 1:1.4 to the wii and 5:1 with the 360. Couldn't find data for the US. Apparently world wide it's shows a more 1:1 with the 360 and a 2:1 with the wii.
Small bands sign with a label not just to get a loan, but also to get promotion services. Aside from giving you a loan and pressing your CD's, the company might:
- contact all the radio stations where your music would fit and try to hype you up to get airplay
- arrange for you to open for bigger touring bands also on the label
- send out your CD to get reviewed by various magazines etc
- use their network and connections to spread your name around
You could do this all by yourself, but it's actually a lot of work, and many bands prefer to "focus on the music" (meaning they're not interested in the business aspects, just the music aspects of being a band... sadly it's the business aspects that make money - playing beautiful music on the street won't make money without the business aspect of putting down a hat for donations). You forgot to mention most successful bands did all of that for the first portion of their career. They needed to create enough buzz or enough of an impression on a agent to get signed. For the majority of bands the first album is usually the best as it's a collation of years of work and of balancing the tasks mentioned above and music making. After they get signed the sophomore tends to suck due to "lots of time focusing on music". A lot of time it's the pressure of doing all of it that encourages creativity.
Personally, I still think what new bands sacrifice for their record deals is by far not worth it, compared to just doing all that stuff themselves, especially early on in a band's career. Personally I don't. As I've seen more sharks eat my friends bands then symbiotic parasites getting rich together with them. So for the list of sharks vs beneficial parasites is 5:0.
My band had a record distributed through V2 records and I believe our tiny label was *supposed* to get paid about $2 per record. Despite selling a few thousand records, we never got paid a dime because they claimed they didn't recoup the cost of their sales department selling our record to Target, Best Buy, etc. I wish I had mod points. I know a few bands with similar stories. A large swath of the industry works for free trying to "make it" and actually get paid. The labels profit off of this lottery mentality and on the gullibility of young bands. Radiohead making 6 mil off online sales makes a mockery out of the business model. And rightly so.
drudgereport.com is a right-leaning website frequented by media execs
you see the very first story linked as:
"Most Fans Paid $0 for Radiohead Album..."
(breitbart is a right-leaning media outlet as well) The things is % of paid down loaders fails to account for paying customers who downloaded more then once. I certainly did. I paid 10 pounds for the record then download it 4 times as it was convenient.
One thing this didn't account for was advertising. A band that big probably had a huge advertising budget in their past that they no longer had to worry about because being the first ones out of the block, they caught a bit more press on the Internet. There were probably a number of new radiohead fans that were made because of this that will come back and buy future CDs. They might have taken a hit financially, but I think the payoff is going to be bigger in the long run. I think Radiohead got a considerable amount of free advertising. Due entirely to the novelty of the endeavor. I didn't see any adds for it and on the radio head site itself it's a bit hard to find. But there was a lot of online buzz from various unpaid sources. Unless it was a very clever viral marketing scheme I think they didn't really advertise much.
Some facts : - NPD numbers DO NOT include Wii Sports, but strangely enough, they include bundles for other consoles - The Wii has the lead in worldwide sales, yes, it has passed the XBox 360 lead in less than a year, despite the 1 year lead - The Wii has at least 2 M less sales than XBox 360 in the USA, which is far from being negligeable. The XB360 still has the most marketshare in the USA, and it better, as it is it's sole good market, with the UK The wii sports eclusion would likely be due to the non-optional nature of the bundle where as the Motorstorm bundle PS3 is not the only version available. They do include wiiplay despite most buying it for the controller bundled rather then the game. The attach rate is per unit so a 2m lead wouldn't skew that. The 360 doesn't do well outside of the US. it's got sub PS2 sales figures in japan and is outsold 6:1 there by the PS3 and 10:1 by the wii. Even in Canada it appears neck and neck with the ps3. Halo 3 might have changed that.
See, I guessed right. These are the worst set for viewing SD content. SD content have more natural, movie like image, while LCD display are very sharp and unnatural image, which some people prefer, but still, it's different from movie feel and general SD content. The Sony plasma is an old display with very bad logic unit (at most HD Ready to boot, as IIRC they don't do plasma anymore), and it's strange for your Sony RP, as if it's 1080i, that means it's analog (ad not a full HD set either), so it shouldn't have any special treatment to do, and should look better than on a SDTV. Again, even the current best LCD still have the numerous flaws going with the technology, that even the 120 Hz sets can't remove, while inducing others. And seeing a pixel mess is not subjective at all: if you see it, I guess it's there. It shouldn't happen, HD displays with good logic units and well calibrated should look better than a SDTV. I've heard a lot of these horror stories, especially related to the Wii, but the fact is that it never happened at my home. Every SD content just looks better than on my old SDTV. The problem is the LCD HDTV's are the most popular on the market. The Sharp Aqous was one of the best when I bought mine. Not sure of any brands that are better.
I meant that you know about console games, HD, SD,... I'm talking about people that just don't know even which console is what. For these people, a game like Mario Party 8 actually looks better than Heavenly Sword. And no, their jaw doesn't drop when seeing it. Mine neither BTW. Fortunately, I didn't buy the PS3 for the graphics (or I wouldn't play mostly PS2 games on it for now). Try Ratchet and Clank. It's pretty and insanely fun. Probably the only must get Ps3 title so far.
Preorders are obsolete. Supply is at the point where they are not needed.The big box electronics stores have more than enough copies. It's simply a vendor lock in tool. You go to GS to grab game and they ask you to pre-order. Lather, rinse, repent. Sure, for something like Halo 3. But what about an obscure title like Odins sphere or Etrian Odyssey? If your tastes runs into niche products then the big box stores will leave you wanting. Although I have never pre-ordered and have never been pestered to pre-order by the EB I frequent or actually by any EB in town. However it may just be that Canada is different.
I'll go to a local comic shop that has them or Best Buy, Target, Wal-Mart who is always cheaper. Over here, EB is the same price on all games but has a greater variety on the shelves as well as having much older games for sale used. Best buy, Target, and wal-mart always stock the AAA and a variety of easy to find titles but if I want a copy of a Atlus game or any other obscure niche title I normally can find it at EB. My last resort is online.
Finally, I hope the 360 sells more software than the Wii in the USA, given that it was released 1 year earlier and has a huge lead in market share there. The 1 year lead is fair comment but the market share is neck and neck, if you take the entire market as a whole. They are also NPD number which include wii play and I think wii sports. Not 100% sure.
Definitely depends on the set. The only games where I notice some hints of aliasing on my HDTV set are PS2 games like FFXII (even through the PS3 upscaling and antialiasing). Not one of my Gamecube game looks aliased on my set, from Skies of Arcadia to Metroid Prime to Tales of Symphonia. Again, the worst HDTV sets regarding aliasing SD content are LCD. And I guessed well that the problem was aliasing. Sharp Aquos LC-42D62U 42" LCD HDTV, PS3 look great(HDMI). 360 looks great(HDMI). Ps2 and GC is jagged but acceptable(Component/Composite). Wii(Component) is better then the PS2 and GC but not by that much. I am aware LCD's often dither but the Aquos is the subjectively the best of the bunch. On the Sony rear projection 50" (1080i) I have upstairs it's the exact same. A friends Sony Plasma 50" is the same as well. I don't think it's the LCD. This is subjective off course.
You complained, but I was talking of people without an agenda, normal people, causals if you like. I'd be interested to know what you think my agenda is? I think I have replied reasonably without acting either as a fanboy of another system or as a unfair critic.
Gamestop is one of the few stores I've ever been to where it appears their policy is to treat the customer like shit. [ Reply to This ] Depends on the store. In my town there are only EB's. I've been to about half the ones in my city and everybody has treated me well and gone that extra step to make me happy. But I live in Canada so it might be more common for younger people here to respect you. One of the stores knows me by name, and gives me a very wide berth in enforcements of store policy (on returns and such).
Guides can be worth the purchase for the convenience (if it's well-laid-out and thorough), the aesthetics of the design of the book, and the art inside it. The Final Fantasy XII guide is fantastic, IMO, in every respect, and I was very glad I purchased the collector's edition with the included Concept Art Book.
I also have this hardcover, gold-border Twilight Princess strategy guide but it's more of a "thing to have and admire" for its design because it's the opposite of useful when it comes to actually being used as a guide. Waaay too thorough or something. Hard to read through. But attractive. The downside is strategy guides are often wrong, using info from a beta version or a pre-release version. It's only important if your a pedant, power leveller, completist or a obsessive item collector. But some Guides have so many glaring errors that it's often better to take a trip to gamefaqs then buying a guide.
I mean sure it might be a good article, but if the messenger is wearing nipple clamps and a strap on vibrating horse penis you might just want to side step it all together. The page itself was Safe for Work. Not a vicious man eating nipple in sight. Playboy is just a touch bluer then Maxim and honestly can many men say they've never peaked at a playboy/porn rag before they were 18?
I just don't get developers sometimes. Somehow, some way, franchises stricken with Stupid Sequelitis like Madden, Need for Speed, Halo, Jak, Ratchet and Clank, and Splinter Cell receive installment after marginal installment, even though many (I won't say most) gamers that I know or talk to agree that these are just rehashes of more of the same, and the quality invariably declines with each iteration. Yet they keep coming, because some marketroid decided that there's still milk in that franchise cash cow despite the fact that to the nearest decimal point, nobody cares. (Though halo 3 was an exception to this, as plenty of people did care, and still do.) The reason sequels are so popular is because people but them. The truth is "innovative" doesn't imply "good". For each crappy sequel there is a crappy original title. They are just not as well publicized as the crappy sequel. When a Major franchise falls short of the mark it's news. When a new game falls short of the mark it's not news. If you really look at the number of game that come out each year you'll find sequel to original ratios have gone up since the Atari days but not that much since the SNES days. Some sequels are very good. Ratchet and Clank are always fun and the latest iteration is both gorgeous and insanely addictive. Halo is good but not great. But it's a very fun multi-player experience. Splinter cell is generally good as well.
As well, people like familiar things. You find a game you really like and you want to play games like that. A sequel is the easiest way to fulfill that need. Some studios make very good sequels. The MGS have always been fun for me, Xmen legends/Ultimate alliance have a addictive formula that fits me, Zelda is usually a highlight of Nintendo's' console, the FF series always gets my $60, etc. It might get tiresome for you but those franchises I listed are fun games. In the end of the day they are competing to entertain me not cure cancer. If X-men legends 32 entertains me so be it they get my $50.
Exactly, and it sells like hotcakes. So this argument is stupid at best, and only shows fear and insecurity from those spouting it. The wii has the lowest attach rate of the three systems. Generally it's hardware is moving like hot cakes but it's software is languishing on shelves. Everything except a few first party gems. All multi-platform games sell better in absolute numbers on the 360 in the US.
The Wii actually looks amazing and far better on the HDTV. Definitely depends on the game. I prefer RE4 on the SD TV for the free anti-aliasing.
I've yet to see someone complain on any Wii game (480p, so through component) I put on my HD (1080p) display. Didn't I just complain about it? Using the component cables at 480p Zelda and RE4 are ugly pixelated messes. After playing RE4 for 30 min the three people in the room with me and i were physically ill. My complaints aren't uncommon.
The wii isn't the be all and end all. It does somethings well (great party machine) does other poorly (solo gaming a bit spotty). With good art direction it can look good (Mario Party) but it has it's limits. The Virtual console is especially galling since it's machine specific, what ever you spend on it dies with the machine. There have been a lot more wii fanboys now and I was actually much more into them before I got one. After playing it for some time the novelty wore off for me.
Slashdot Mirror
So in the long run buying anything on the wii virtual console ensure extra costs in the future. Either you flush all your purchases down the drain by getting a replacement or you pay to have it repaired wasting that money.
I have a DS lite and really enjoy it. I also have a GB and a GBA SP. I was never tempted by the PSP until recently with the slew of games I really wish I had. Sales figures for Japan shows they are moving very briskly there. I haven't seen any stats on it for N.A. but I assume it's now a comfortable #2 as opposed to being #3 behind a 5 year old system like in years past.
Google Maps grabbed a sizable amount of the market share of the online maps/directions market.
Google news is one of the best news aggregators on the net.
Google custom search put many smaller search tools for single site searches to shame.
None of them are stand alone or profit making products but they all give Google more information which helps their core compitence and they all help build the brand and mind share. Both of these pump their stock price which provides more money to expand. The longer you spend within Google's domain the more ads they can show you, the more money they make.
Media create is Japan only. My point was outside the US the Ps3 is doing okay.
Japanese Source
- contact all the radio stations where your music would fit and try to hype you up to get airplay
- arrange for you to open for bigger touring bands also on the label
- send out your CD to get reviewed by various magazines etc
- use their network and connections to spread your name around
You could do this all by yourself, but it's actually a lot of work, and many bands prefer to "focus on the music" (meaning they're not interested in the business aspects, just the music aspects of being a band... sadly it's the business aspects that make money - playing beautiful music on the street won't make money without the business aspect of putting down a hat for donations). You forgot to mention most successful bands did all of that for the first portion of their career. They needed to create enough buzz or enough of an impression on a agent to get signed. For the majority of bands the first album is usually the best as it's a collation of years of work and of balancing the tasks mentioned above and music making. After they get signed the sophomore tends to suck due to "lots of time focusing on music". A lot of time it's the pressure of doing all of it that encourages creativity. Personally, I still think what new bands sacrifice for their record deals is by far not worth it, compared to just doing all that stuff themselves, especially early on in a band's career. Personally I don't. As I've seen more sharks eat my friends bands then symbiotic parasites getting rich together with them. So for the list of sharks vs beneficial parasites is 5:0.
you see the very first story linked as:
"Most Fans Paid $0 for Radiohead Album..."
(breitbart is a right-leaning media outlet as well) The things is % of paid down loaders fails to account for paying customers who downloaded more then once. I certainly did. I paid 10 pounds for the record then download it 4 times as it was convenient.
- NPD numbers DO NOT include Wii Sports, but strangely enough, they include bundles for other consoles
- The Wii has the lead in worldwide sales, yes, it has passed the XBox 360 lead in less than a year, despite the 1 year lead
- The Wii has at least 2 M less sales than XBox 360 in the USA, which is far from being negligeable. The XB360 still has the most marketshare in the USA, and it better, as it is it's sole good market, with the UK The wii sports eclusion would likely be due to the non-optional nature of the bundle where as the Motorstorm bundle PS3 is not the only version available. They do include wiiplay despite most buying it for the controller bundled rather then the game. The attach rate is per unit so a 2m lead wouldn't skew that. The 360 doesn't do well outside of the US. it's got sub PS2 sales figures in japan and is outsold 6:1 there by the PS3 and 10:1 by the wii. Even in Canada it appears neck and neck with the ps3. Halo 3 might have changed that. See, I guessed right. These are the worst set for viewing SD content. SD content have more natural, movie like image, while LCD display are very sharp and unnatural image, which some people prefer, but still, it's different from movie feel and general SD content.
The Sony plasma is an old display with very bad logic unit (at most HD Ready to boot, as IIRC they don't do plasma anymore), and it's strange for your Sony RP, as if it's 1080i, that means it's analog (ad not a full HD set either), so it shouldn't have any special treatment to do, and should look better than on a SDTV.
Again, even the current best LCD still have the numerous flaws going with the technology, that even the 120 Hz sets can't remove, while inducing others.
And seeing a pixel mess is not subjective at all: if you see it, I guess it's there. It shouldn't happen, HD displays with good logic units and well calibrated should look better than a SDTV.
I've heard a lot of these horror stories, especially related to the Wii, but the fact is that it never happened at my home. Every SD content just looks better than on my old SDTV. The problem is the LCD HDTV's are the most popular on the market. The Sharp Aqous was one of the best when I bought mine. Not sure of any brands that are better. I meant that you know about console games, HD, SD,
And no, their jaw doesn't drop when seeing it. Mine neither BTW.
Fortunately, I didn't buy the PS3 for the graphics (or I wouldn't play mostly PS2 games on it for now). Try Ratchet and Clank. It's pretty and insanely fun. Probably the only must get Ps3 title so far.
PS3 look great(HDMI). 360 looks great(HDMI). Ps2 and GC is jagged but acceptable(Component/Composite). Wii(Component) is better then the PS2 and GC but not by that much. I am aware LCD's often dither but the Aquos is the subjectively the best of the bunch. On the Sony rear projection 50" (1080i) I have upstairs it's the exact same. A friends Sony Plasma 50" is the same as well. I don't think it's the LCD. This is subjective off course. You complained, but I was talking of people without an agenda, normal people, causals if you like. I'd be interested to know what you think my agenda is? I think I have replied reasonably without acting either as a fanboy of another system or as a unfair critic.
[ Reply to This ] Depends on the store. In my town there are only EB's. I've been to about half the ones in my city and everybody has treated me well and gone that extra step to make me happy. But I live in Canada so it might be more common for younger people here to respect you. One of the stores knows me by name, and gives me a very wide berth in enforcements of store policy (on returns and such).
I also have this hardcover, gold-border Twilight Princess strategy guide but it's more of a "thing to have and admire" for its design because it's the opposite of useful when it comes to actually being used as a guide. Waaay too thorough or something. Hard to read through. But attractive. The downside is strategy guides are often wrong, using info from a beta version or a pre-release version. It's only important if your a pedant, power leveller, completist or a obsessive item collector. But some Guides have so many glaring errors that it's often better to take a trip to gamefaqs then buying a guide.
As well, people like familiar things. You find a game you really like and you want to play games like that. A sequel is the easiest way to fulfill that need. Some studios make very good sequels. The MGS have always been fun for me, Xmen legends/Ultimate alliance have a addictive formula that fits me, Zelda is usually a highlight of Nintendo's' console, the FF series always gets my $60, etc. It might get tiresome for you but those franchises I listed are fun games. In the end of the day they are competing to entertain me not cure cancer. If X-men legends 32 entertains me so be it they get my $50.
The wii isn't the be all and end all. It does somethings well (great party machine) does other poorly (solo gaming a bit spotty). With good art direction it can look good (Mario Party) but it has it's limits. The Virtual console is especially galling since it's machine specific, what ever you spend on it dies with the machine. There have been a lot more wii fanboys now and I was actually much more into them before I got one. After playing it for some time the novelty wore off for me.