… and I feel sorry for them. Today I was spurred to make a really harsh comment on Digg. I got fed up with seeing the familiar comment “Yea well in a year PS3 will win!”. Sorry for the insult but seriously — it’s not awesome right now? I hope you didn’t buy it yet if you really have to wait for a year (or even a week!) to have fun with this thing. Why are these people so in love with Sony? Haven’t they played a 360 yet or heard friends raving about it yet? GameSpot.com tells me that there is nothing really good for it right now, the only game that has a +9 score I beat a year ago on my 360 (p.s. I don’t even think Oblivion is worth playing /w out achievements!).
I’d like to think I’m pretty indifferent towards MS yet I’m really into my 360. What about those guys that HATE Microsoft, yet LOVE the 360? I wonder what % of the 360 user base fall under that category. These people love the 360 because its fun — I bet they wouldn’t hesitate to raise hell if that ever changed.
So lets do add this up, The 360 is doing well with very little M$ love while the PS3 seems to be running on borrowed love from previous glory. What if every PS3 “fan boy” switched their stance tomorrow and said “this is complete crap, come talk to me when you’ve got some games to show” — could Sony continue to execute their current plan? I doubt it, the corporate big shots and stock holders would get very nervous and things would start changing. You guys *need* that change — you need to send a message to Sony that they need to smarten up!
So please — stop being brand cheerleaders! Do you root for your breakfast cereal? Don’t cut Sony any slack - you’re the customer, you deserve something awesome for all that money you spent RIGHT NOW! These big companies deserve no defence from you — a released console is only as good as what you can do with it RIGHT NOW. If you even had to wait another 3 months for the thing to “win” then the damn thing shouldn’t even be for sale right now!
/rant 
Next up.. I want to bust Subaru’s balls about this new disgrace of an Impreza.
Brandon
April 5th, 2007
I’m a MS lover. I always have been. However, with the recent announcement of the Xbox 360 Elite, I’m more pissed off than ever.
My TV supports 1080p over HDMI only. I want 1080p… like… in a bad way. I’ve wanted it ever since I saw a bluray/sony setup at The Brick a few months ago.
When I first bought my 360, Microsoft had promised HDMI support in the future. Well, recently we found out it’s not coming.
So I started thinking “I’ll sell my 360 at a good deal just to get rid of it … and get an elite…”. I’m going to keep all the existing components, so just the box and hard drive will be sold. Right now, Futureshop is selling new 360 premiums with COD3 for $500. I’m not giving up my controller or my COD3… and my system is used (been sent out for repair, they gave me back one where the cdrom acts funky from time to time, too). I was thinking of selling in the range of 200-300, depending on the person.
Then I’ll go out and buy the elite for $550+tax ($627) and get the HD-DVD player ($228). After all is said and done, I’m down 550-650 bucks. OR I should shell out $800 and use that just to watch my movies, and keep my 360 for playing (lower) HD games. For the $150 difference, shouldn’t I take a gamble on something that could possibly be better next year?
AND DON’T GET ME STARTED ON THE VIDEO MARKETPLACE. If that were out in Canada, I wouldn’t be bitching right now, I’d be standing in line waiting for the 360 Elite. I can’t believe they havent released it yet!
Okay… I got distracted by other stuff and I lost my sense of anger, so I’m just going to wrap it up now…
BPAndrew
April 5th, 2007
lol a little off topic but yea I can see why you’ve got some grief:P
Yea I wish we had the video marketplace too - I bet were not getting it because of that bullshit CRTC law about the 10% of the content has to be Canadian.
Who knows, anyway yea man sucks about the 1080p, can’t you do VGA?
Brandon
April 5th, 2007
Yeah, it was off topic… but I’m frustrated because of the situation I’m in.
10% of the content has to be canadian? I thought that was just for live television. Surely downloads cannot fall into that category… what next? internet traffic?
Currently, Microsoft has stated they have no timeline for getting it to Canada…
for some strange reason, my tv displays 1366×768 via vga … so its a really tiny letterbox on my native 1080 tv… Why is it so stupid? It’s a Sony…
Brandon
April 5th, 2007
Okay its time for me to post something somewhat related.
I’m sick of all these copycat games. When will something new and original come out? Every game is just a shooter with slightly better graphics or a sports game with updated rosters (2K series :@).
Then theres the big push for MMORPGs. They’re going to suck if you have to pay a monthly fee. That’ll kill it. Besides, every MMORPG has been an iteration of their competitors basically. The much-anticipated Huxley… What will that be like? A World of Warcraft ripoff with a Halo twist?
Will anything unique be released? I can understand why they don’t take chances as often… due to the rising dev costs… But is that also destorying console exclusives? Does that mean the 360/PS3 arguments are getting more and more pointless? Does it matter which console “wins” if all the games are the same?
BPAndrew
April 6th, 2007
That sucks about the TV - is it a plasma/projection lcd? I got the cheapest no-name LCD tv from futureshop for $550 and it kicks ass!
About the generic games, I see your point. I guess thats the point of this XNA stuff, build the “youtube” of games /w a very easy SDK so you can get some innovation.
At the same time, I’ve been very happy /w the games latley for the 360. Crackdown, Guitar Hero, GRAW2. Also soon to be released Forza 2 and Mass Effect are both a sure thing. Sure they are iterations of previous styles of games but they are still fun to me!
Read Think and Grow rich, the majority of ideas we see are synthetic - purely orginial ideas only come around once and a while. I’m sure the same will hold true for our video games
Matt Brett
April 6th, 2007
That’s a false statement. Up until the announcement of the Xbox 360 Elite, Microsoft has always made the claim that HDMI simply wasn’t necessary. They were content with using VGA for 1080p content. In either episode 186 or episode 198 of Major Nelson’s podcast (I can’t recall which, they were months ago), you’ll hear Albert explain why they opted against HDMI.
*raises hand* I’m definitely one of those guys, but that’s no secret. As much as I’d love to hate the Xbox 360 simply because a company that I despise created it, I can’t. It’s the superior platform on every field. I’ve never regretted a single cent I’ve spent on my Xbox 360. In fact, I’d call it the best gaming hardware I’ve ever invested in, hands down.
In any case, I fully agree with most of which you’ve said Andrew. It’s pretty ridiculous that people are holding their breath for something great, in the mean time bashing the one platform that’s continued to produce incredible games for months on end.
Nintendo is in the same boat as Sony, IMO. Actually, they’re worse off. There’s quite literally, 2 or 3 games actually worth spending money on for the Wii. And that’s if you’re “lucky” enough to have one. I am, I’ve had it for less than 2 months and it goes days without seeing any action. Where as, my Xbox 360 is used multiple times every single day.
I’m not going to touch the video marketplace topic. It infuriates me through-and-through. Apple is also dragging their ass with getting content into Canada for iTunes. It’s so frustrating that they’ll sell the hardware (AppleTV) here, but the service is nowhere to be found. You could say the same about the Elite, as aside from those that want 1080p via HDMI or simply prefer a black console over white (this guy right here!), there’s really no need to upgrade as there’s no content to fill that harddrive.