Conversations on the Xbox 360 and its library.

[casterofdreams]

I am a bit late to the thread here so I will answer the questions asked and then give my take on the 360.

1) What's your all time favorite 360 game and why?

I can't pin point one game but I can pin point one series and that is the Mass Effect Series. From the Xbox 360 exclusive Mass Effect (exclusive at the time), I was immediately hook. I love the wonder of discovery and was a big fan of the Codex. Mass Effect 2 improved the controls considerably and has my vote as the strongest in the series. Darker in tone than the first and Renegade Shepard was more bad ass! The last entry despite the ending was still strong. The one aspect I didn't like was adding a very important piece to the story as DLC and a throwaway multiplayer mode. Also the war assets system was garbage. Still played well.

2) What's the best open world game on the 360?

Easily the best for me was Red Dead Redemption. I love the Western setting, the random events, and the kooky characters. It also had the best DLC that I have ever played. They did zombies right.

3) What's the best driving/racing game on the 360?

The best racing game is the Forza series. In my opinion it's a significantly better series than Gran Turismo. The cars look better and everything runs at 60 FPS. Customizing the car with decals and tuning it is a real treat if you know what you're doing. Forza Horizon which is the spin off from the main series was very enjoyable as well. I highly recommend the whole series. Also the first game in the series is playable on the 360.

4) What was your favorite non-shmup shooting game (be it third person / first person / cover)?

The first two Bioshock games. Everything about it from atmosphere, story, characters, and the antagonists ideology was top notch. Rapture in some ways is a character as well. While the second was more linear revisiting Rapture a second time in a worse State than the previous game as a big daddy was fun. Minerva's Den, which was the DLC for the game was excellent and well worth the money.

5) What's the goriest FPS on 360?

I don't really know to be honest. I haven't really played any that was that gory.

6) What 360 game do you think had the very best graphics?

Grand Theft Auto V was in my opinion the best looking game on the console. It was impressive how how it looked with a massive map, all the cars, and people all around the city. It also has the best flip flop detailing in all of the industry. Look up on YouTube GTA V flip flops.

7) What popular 360 game do you think was just pure crap?

Modern Warfare 2 was crap even though I played dozens upon dozens of hours of multiplayer. The whole Spirit of multiplayer was lost from cod4 to this game. From glitches to exploit and hacking in between it wasn't that fun. I don't know why it went back and played it. Maybe I just like the punishment.

For me the strongest feature of the Xbox 360 was XBLA. Tons of downloadable games from Castle Crashers to Shadow complex it was a great service and ushered in the Indie scene.

[Xeogred]

I own copies of Heavy Rain and Beyond Two Souls. I bought them because they are exclusive showboats for the PS3. I figured if nothing else, the graphics/tech would be worth seeing.

Yep.

I remember Heavy Rain's competition was Alan Wake which none of my friends and I were really interested in at the time, boy were we wrong. I'd say I like Alan Wake a lot more. But they're about as different as it gets in the end. Alan Wake has some nice tech, but Heavy Rain definitely beats it with the character models and animations.

[Sarge]

Yeah, no question Alan Wake facial animations in particular are very PS2-era. It's still a fantastic game, it just takes some adjustment if you're coming in from other 360/PS3 stuff.

[PartridgeSenpai]

Even if you didn't like Indigo Prophecy, I'd still recommend Heavy Rain. Still probably one of my favorite PS3 games because I really got into the mystery, the plot really grabbed me, and the way the action uses 6-axis worked exactly as it should've for getting me into the quicker action based scenes (to describe those as non-spoilery as possible).

I'm not sure about that...

Heavy Rain is a great party game, but my friends and I would always crack up a ton whenever someone had to pull off the 6-axis moves.

Apparently there's a PS4 version now I think, I don't think the DS4 supports that so they must have thrown in more QTE's or something, which isn't really a bad thing.

Clearly my opinion isn't the universal one, but I really liked the six-axis fights. I wasn't really sold on the game until I came to the first one, personally. I also had a great time playing through it with my best friend at the time. Her and I would switch off every perspective change, and we both had a blast getting super into the story.

A funny (and VERY spoiler-tastic) piece of trivia on how Heavy Rain's plot could've been a bit more crazy like Indigo's:

You may remember that Ethan has a propensity for blacking out and waking up in weird places next to oragami. This is never explained in the narrative at all. This is because these scenes are leftovers from an ultimately unused plot-line where Ethan had a psychic link with the oragami killer, and would sleep-walk to places important to him and fold oragami. I'm really glad they left this out. It would've really distracted from what was otherwise a murder mystery fairly grounded in reality.

Also, as a side note, I'm fairly sure Beyond Two Souls isn't an exclusive title to the PS3. Though I think the remake might only be on PS4.

[Exhuminator]

a lot of great answers

That was a great read! Thanks for taking the time to keep this thread going as intended.

Also, as a side note, I'm fairly sure Beyond Two Souls isn't an exclusive title to the PS3. Though I think the remake might only be on PS4.

Yeah back in November of 2015 it got a PS4 port. But for a few years it was a PS3 exclusive at least. And at any rate, seeing what BTS does with the PS3 is more impressive than seeing the game run on PS4 at least. From a technology perspective I mean.

Yeah, no question Alan Wake facial animations in particular are very PS2-era. It's still a fantastic game, it just takes some adjustment if you're coming in from other 360/PS3 stuff.

Tell you what man, I've been really impressed with L.A. Noire in this regard. The technology they used to map the faces is so good, that even the lips match the words being said. Pretty sure someone could lip-read half the dialogue in the cutscenes. Now you know I'm not a graphics whore, but when the technology is making the game more immersive and believable, even I have to acknowledge it's pretty bad ass. Especially for 2011.

[Sarge]

Oh, yeah, whatever they were using in L.A. Noire is amazing. Absolutely fantastic job with facial expressions.

[mas]

On xbox live they are having really great deals. I want to purchase the mortal kombat games and mortal kombat vs dc but right now I kind of spend my funding on a couple locking pins for my bowflex. Staying in shape is a little better than mortal kombat.
Other than that the games that are on sale I kind of feel if your patient enough you can find them cheaper weather thru gamestop or ebay or yard sales or flea markets

[TEKTORO]

Picked up Tales of Vesperia $3.47 & Black Knight Sword $2.49. I'm guessing there are some games on sale that aren't advertised as I saw Black Knight Sword and Mars for $2.49 wonder what else is buried?

[casterofdreams]

Oh, yeah, whatever they were using in L.A. Noire is amazing. Absolutely fantastic job with facial expressions.

Everyone should search out the bloopers for that game. I saw it a couple of years ago and it was hysterical. The cameras were rolling as they captured weird facial movements.

[Xeogred]

Man, does anyone else still not really care for digital sales on Xbox/PSN? I know it's silly but with consoles I still want to be 99% physical.

I really need to swap out my PS3 HDD too sometime soon, pretty sick of deleting things for space. I imagine the 500GB I have for my slim 360 won't be filled up, so that's what I'll upgrade to for my PS3.

The PS4/XO definitely needed more than 500GB out the door though.