Xbox has ruined gaming

[jfrost]

I've read that the PS2 is actually difficult to develop for, but good marketing and mass adoption made up for it (Guerrilla, developer of Killzone 2, said so, IIRC).

Yeah, I remember when the PS2 first came out I saw a list of advantages between the Dreamcast and PlayStation 2. The fact that it was harder to develop for the PS2 was listed.

The sheer amount of titles available for the system makes it seem that the PS2 is a developer-friendly platform. Rather, it looks like it was mass adoption that made it worth it for the companies to bet on the PS2.

[Niode]

Well, I'll say that the PS3 was a better choice FOR ME PERSONALLY. That's really all it comes down to - what do YOU want?

I wanted free online gaming. Before you give me the whole "Oh, but PSN isn't as good as XBL!", I'll say bullshit. In all the time I've been playing BlazBlue, Unreal Tournament III, Resistance 1 & 2, Warhawk, Metal Gear Online, Burnout Paradise and Lord knows what else, I haven't had a single problem. As far as I'm concerned, it does what it is supposed to.

Plus, the whole "It's more expensive" deal goes out the window when you factor in the fact that online gaming is a must for me. If I wanted wanna use XBLA, I'd need to spend at least $300 to get a unit with a hard-drive, and if I plan to play my X360 for more than 2 years, I've already spent more on the X360 than I would for the PS3. I dunno about you, but I plan to play my next-gen systems for a lot longer than 2 years.

Even if you only go for the $200 model, then you'll only be gaming online for 4 years before you've spent as much on a 360 as on a PS3. That's not even taking into consideration the price of a X360 Wireless Network Adapter ($99) for those who have routers far from their gaming rooms, a X360-branded 120 GB hard-drive ($159) for when you quickly run out of space for those XBLA games and optional installs, and god knows what else.

All of this, of course, is conditional. If you don't care to download Castle Crashers and Rez HD, if you do have your router near your TV, if you don't care about spending more money over time for online gaming or flat-out don't care about online gaming at all, then maybe the X360 is right for you. It just wasn't right for me.

My argument wasn't aimed at you personally I don't recall ever mentioning your name at all. My argument was aimed at the general gamer who wants the most value from their gaming money. The PS3 just isn't good value even with all the extras you get with it. Especially when the games aren't as numerous as they are on the 360.

Whoever asked for specific exclusives for the 360.

Crackdown
Forza 2
Amped 3
Viva Pinata
Viva Pinata 2
N3
Saints row
Kameo
GRAW 1
Gears of War
Gears of War 2
Mass Effect
PGR 3
PGR 4
Dead Rising
Halo 3
Lost Odyssey
Kingdom Under Fire
Banjo Kazooie


Those are just the titles I consider worth having that are exclusive from my personal collection. There's probably more that I've overlooked.

I don't know what it is about my PS3 that just makes me pass it up every time I sit down to play something. There's lots of little things that annoy me about it, like how if you have a GH controller plugged into the USB slot it assigns that to controller 1 instead of the controller you switch the system on with. The 360 assigns whichever controller you turn the system on with as controller 1, why doesn't the PS3?

Mandatory updates that take a fucking age to install. Why are all the updates to games usually over 100MB and take at least 20 minutes to download and install? Don't even get me started on the hour long installs of system updates.
The 360 has an update, it asks you to confirm, a progress bar zips across the screen within 10 seconds and you're in the game. Why doesn't the PS3?

The 360 has demos for nearly every retail release and demos for every XBLA title. Why doesn't the PS3?

Those things are just little things but there's just something about the PS3 that makes me think. I'd probably be having more fun playing my 360. Maybe it's a subconscious thing, maybe I think I'm not getting my £300 worth out of this machine so I actually don't want to play it because it just depresses me that this is what £300 of gaming gets you these days. Overhyped and under performing middle of the road machine that costs far more than it's worth.

[the7k]

I didn't say that you aimed it at me personally. I just said that the decision depends on the person. You're making it sound as if the 360 is superior to the 360 in every possible way, as if ANYONE will have OH SO MUCH MORE FUN with a 360 than a PS3.

If I had to choose between X360 or waiting a little longer for a PS3, I'd wait a little longer for a PS3. That list of exclusives you just threw up? The only ones that do appeal to me even a little bit are Left 4 Dead and Mass Effect. You know what those two titles have in common? If it is "They are exclusive to the Xbox 360", you'd be wrong.

The whole "Here's a list of games you should like" thing will only get you so far. Different people, Different tastes. A lot of people don't like ten tons of FPS games and racers. YMMV.

[RadarScope1]

My, what a tiresome thread.

[GSZX1337]

The reason a lot of people think retro-gaming is better is because nostalgia has blinded them.

I don't think retro gaming is better than modern gaming, but I prefer it because when I walk into a GameStop/GameCrazy to buy a new PS3 game I see:
Shitty Generic FPS
FPS that has a better version available on the PC
License tie-ins
Multi-platform games that I'd prefer to play on another console
the few good PS3 games (ie. Little Big Planet, inFamous, etc.) that I don't have that are also still $50-$60

I know that gaming has pretty much always like this, but at least back then, I cared about the exclusives for the older systems.

[the7k]

Well, working at a GameStop, I can tell you that you are only going to see the games that people sell back. I'm still waiting on someone to trade in a copy of Eternal Sonata for the PS3, but it just ain't happening.

I think another reason people think retro-gaming is better is because they are looking back at it retroactively. We already know the good stuff, even the good obscure stuff, and so we can hop straight to it.

I remember ignoring the Power Rangers Fighting Game for the SNES because I just assumed, it being a licensed game, it would suck. Now I know it's actually worth getting. By that token, there are probably some good games already out that I'm ignoring because of the assumption that it sucks, even though it might not be so bad.

[Arbitern1]

I would argue that the wii has ruined gaming. Nintendo has always been a family friendly developer,but come on it is insane. It is sad considering that i used to be a nintendo lover and they have deeply dissapointed me. I like the 360 better than the PS3 because they have a rather similar library and BOTH of the exclusives are good. I like my 360 better though becuase i have had it since release day with no problems and my PS3 has broken down totally and had to be replaced twice.

I know i am in the minority here ,but my 360 has been more reliable. I just think that for 100 dollars less at the moment the 360 is a better option in my opinion. Honestly, it is hard to believe that the PS3 is being beat by a console with like a 95% failure rate. It is just a testament to how poorly sony has handled the PS3. No matter which console to favour you can not say that sony has done a good management job of the PS#

[Arbitern1]

I think the general course of Capitalism has contributed more than anything to the gradual erradication of what gamers like ourselves expected for video games to become in earlier years. See, with all due respect to Adam Smith (author of "The Wealth of Nations", which basically constructed the outline for Capitalism), Capitalism, while a spectacular system to create a well-sustained, profitable nation, sort of kills art on any large-scale. Let's take a step back, shall we? We'll look at the industry starting with its "reboot" in 1985.

The NES revives video gaming and brings forward such exciting and innovative classics as "Super Mario Bros.", "The Legend of Zelda", and "Metroid"; each of these games popularized or re-invented new concepts in gameplay and story-telling, yet were simple and accessible enough to become world-wide hits; Nintendo marketed its new product as a toy predominantly for children. Sega came into its own half a decade later with the Genesis, which pushed video games towards a slightly more mature adolescent market; sometimes cheaply in the case of "Mortal Kombat" with blood, and sometimes in a more sophisticated manner in the case of "Phantasy Star II". The Sony PlayStation materialized some years later and captured the attention of young adults; meaning more intricate and mature topics being explored in the form of RPGs such as "Final Fantasy VII" and "Xenogears", as well as narrative-driven action titles such as "Metal Gear Solid".

So now you see how video games "grew up", but notice our chronology - it goes Nintendo, Sega, then Sony. One of these is not like the other: Sony. See, while the Sony PlayStation was a tremendous triumph for gaming, Sony, unlike Sega and Nintendo, did not making its name as a video game company. They are a massive multi-faceted electronics corporation with no passion in particular; they make televisions, stereos, VCR's, DVD players, laptops, own a record label, and as you all know, video game systems. Needless to say, they have a ton of money. So, do you think that a company so hell-bent on making as much money as possible cares about innovation and art simply for the sake of innovation and art? Of course not. They will pander to the most profitable group readily available. See, the PlayStation wasn't popular because Sony created a bunch of great games for it; it was popular because it was the most accessible platform to develop for in the mid-1990's, thus third-parties flocked to it to make their high-end, sophisticated video games. Experienced gamers liked the console because it had SquareSoft and Konami's best work of the era; new gamers liked the console because it had Crash Bandicoot and Spyro the Dragon.

So now Sony (or more accurately, the third-party developers who have created games for the PlayStation) has created a massive audience for video games, and one that has become loyal to the PlayStation name-brand, no less. This means that big-name developers have access to tap a massive market, so for the sake of securing large sums of money for themselves, the big-name developers create games that, instead of targeting experienced gamers who thirst for more thought-provoking and truly innovative gaming experiences, target ordinary "Joe I-Gots-A-PlayStation". These broad titles are so meant to target a massive audience that they become less personal in two ways - they have less personal impact on each individual player, and they contain less personality of the development team.

The last attempt to really go back to that "personal" gaming experience was the Sega Dreamcast, in which Sega broke up its development teams into a dozen smaller ones and basically said, "Make whatever kind of game you want, and we'll market them to their demographics accordingly". This meant very personal gaming experiences; if "Crazy Taxi", "Samba De Amigo", "Space Channel 5", and "Virtua Tennis" weren't your thing, "Shenmue", "Skies of Arcadia", "Phantasy Star Online", and "Ecco the Dolphin: DOTF" might have been. Or maybe you were eclectic in your gaming tastes. It didn't matter, because every season yielded a host of great new games, and one was bound to be tailor-made to your specific gaming desires. But of course, they got crushed, so nowadays it's "Either you buy one of these three games, or it's uninspired shovelware for you".

So saying that Sony ruined gaming is a more valid response than saying Microsoft did. Microsoft simply copied what Sony did; offer a high-end box for developers to create games for, and provide marketing when they see fit. But that's not really the case either; see, Capitalism is all about supply and demand; to blame supply (Sony and Microsoft) is only half-correct. The market expanded, and thus demand changed accordingly. Video game production is no longer intimate to enthusiasts; it's to anyone who might pass up an Xbox 360 in the local Wal-Mart. Nintendo is just as guilty by literally marketing towards non-gamers, creating an absolutely HUGE market. The gaming industry has always suffered from high development costs, but you used to be able to create a "hardcore" game and be assured sales so long as it was good (being as your audience specialized in the field of art they were "demanding" in) despite the cost development. But nowadays the stakes are even higher with exponentially increased development costs and projected audiences. So if you want to make money off of your costly endeavor, you damn better market it towards "casual gamers" who really don't pine for artistic innovation in their video games, because the "hardcore" market is too small.

*EDIT* Sorry for all the edits, guys. To those who have stumbled upon this post and seen the "Edited 13 Times" denotation, I haven't changed anything substantial. I've only edited for clarity. I'm quite the type-A when it comes to writing. I've even edited this edit, hahaha.

Sorry for the double post ,but this is a monumentual reply. It is so very well thought out and i agree 100% with your post . YAYYYY DREAMCAST and Sega in general.

[Arbitern1]

sorry a really bad lag on my comp cause me to post previous message twice-_-

[GSZX1337]

Well, working at a GameStop, I can tell you that you are only going to see the games that people sell back. I'm still waiting on someone to trade in a copy of Eternal Sonata for the PS3, but it just ain't happening.

I was looking at the new section.