Xbox 360, Dignity or Line-Ups?

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I hope I've given everyone a fair approximation of what the Xbox 360 experience is all about and which games are worth considering (or not) before you leave to camp out a Wal-Mart. The final question is pretty simple, is the 360 and the launch line-up strong enough to compel an otherwise reasonable man to squat in a parking lot for hours, hoping to get one of the precious few systems available? The answer is a resounding NO. Stuff those desires back into the depths of your mind and think about Baseball, this is not worth spending the next 24 hours of your life trying to get a system. Do NOT spend $500+ dollars to get it on Ebay either.

The Xbox 360 is an excellent console and I think it has a bright future, but right now the games just aren't worth the extra time and expense. Think about it, there is ONE whole game slated for a December release (Dead or Alive 4) and only TWO for January, both of which are sports games. The current line-up has some solid titles to be sure, but only one or two are worth the full launch price they'll be asking you to pay right now. If you wait until February the systems will be readily available, the kinks will be worked out, the current games will be cheaper and most importantly, there will be more games worth playing.

Despite everything I've said I know many of you will go out and try to get one anyways. I wish you the best of luck in securing a system and hope you have a great time with it. There are plenty of excellent experiences to be had, just don't go killing little Billy to get one.

Xbox 360 Game Impressions

Xbox 360 Unit Impressions

Comments

TheGameguru wrote:
Thin_J wrote:

Yep. This is easily an even worse launch than the PS2. Way to go Microsoft.

How they can handle so many other things right and then totally screw one of the most important parts.. I suppose we'll never know.

Your totally wrong.. from a marketing and Microsoft perspective this launch was a HUGE success... its created a strong buzz and even people who were normally on the fence are now scrambling and desperate to buy one before Christmas at any cost..

But does this risk creating a negative "feeling" about the product in the future. I know when I think of the crazy Christmas product shortages in the past I just laugh.. Furby, Tickle me Elmo, etc. You feel like you are being burned as a consumer when you go into the store in the 2nd week of January and see piles of these things the size of the great Pyramids. Do they risk alienating the 2nd tiers once they realize that after Christmas they will be begging for you to buy one?

Do they risk alienating the 2nd tiers once they realize that after Christmas they will be begging for you to buy one?

No, because consumers have really short attention spans.

from a marketing and Microsoft perspective this launch was a HUGE success

I agree completely with GG. It has created such a buzz that even non-gamers are talking about it. A lady in my office asked me about it this morning. This has only increased the excitement for the 360 which helps to fuel demand.

PyromanFO wrote:
Do they risk alienating the 2nd tiers once they realize that after Christmas they will be begging for you to buy one?

No, because consumers have really short attention spans.

You are definitely right about tha ... Ooooh! Shiny!

oldmanscene24 wrote:
from a marketing and Microsoft perspective this launch was a HUGE success

I agree completely with GG. It has created such a buzz that even non-gamers are talking about it. A lady in my office asked me about it this morning. This has only increased the excitement for the 360 which helps to fuel demand.

Agreed. My father, who wouldn't know Mario from Lara Croft, sent me a link to an XBox 360 news story this morning, asking me what I thought about it. This is going to be the Furby of 2005, I think.

Pyro is right. Also, the people waiting outside - who got one - won't make up a significant number of people to be scared of, should they be pissed off.

I really hate the shortage situation and could care less if it was intentional or not. I remember as a kid I wanted nothing more than a Nintendo entertainment system and I could not find one anywhere. I had saved up for such a long time to get the system too, I was really dissapointed. My mom said not to worry and that eventually there would be more, but it didn't help I was not very happy. As it so happens we were wondering around the store a bit more and I saw a Cd player. They had just come out recently at an affordable price, and I got really excited and bought that instead. I never bought a NES, and I still have and use the CD player I bought that day.

My family has never had much money, and there are a lot of people families out there who are also in the same situation. They want to get thier kids something for christmas and if they can't get them the new system they may just find something else to give thier kids, and hope that they are just as happy with that present. (unless you are the parent of that chocolate milk devil child, than there is not hope.)

Wineglass wrote:

Thank you, Arrogant Bastard!

Amen, brother. I am fortunate enough to live in San Diego, where we can get that sweet nectar on draft at most of the local watering holes. The hops compel me!

Some of my notes regarding this launch:

-I stopped by Fry's last night and saw a line of > 30 people at 8 pm. The store didn't start selling them until 8am this morning. Sure, they had tables set up and were playing D&D (or whatever the kids play nowadays), but that's just freaking unbelievable.

-A friend's girlfriend pre-ordered for him from EB. He got a call 2 days ago: "We're sorry, but you won't be getting one from the first shipment, but we're reasonably certain you'll have one before Christmas. Probably." He was so freaking pissed. I would be too. I felt for his girlfriend who really went out of the way to do something special for her guy, only to have this happen. Regardless of the success of the launch, they should have been able to fill the pre-orders.

- I instructed the wife not to try to get one for me. I've got enough of a backlog of games on the xbox/pc/ds, that I can wait out until supply is better. I also have a pretty crappy 27" non-hd tv. Not sure I'd see much benefit from the next-gen console anyway:)

- I'm hoping that MS will go the PS route and release a smaller, cheaper xbox next year. I'm getting "dirty disk" errors often because of the crap dvd drive that is in my year-after-launch xbox.

-Fan

My wife works at a local Sears and told me they had people lining up before she left. But get this they only had 8 systems to sell and for some reason the manager told her they were not allowed to tell the people in line this information...

- I'm hoping that MS will go the PS route and release a smaller, cheaper xbox next year. I'm getting "dirty disk" errors often because of the crap dvd drive that is in my year-after-launch xbox.

This has been a rumor for a while... and honestly its just not going to happen.. given the need for the Nvidia chipset and a HD its simply not cost effective for Microsoft to continue to sell the original Xbox much past mid 2006 let alone completely redesign it.

Also, do I need to remind everyone about Fantavision? Nobody wants to drag that horrid game out of the history books.

...You've got to be kidding. Fantavision must be one of the absolute best multiplayer games ever created when entertaining a crowd of wasted friends. I must've spent sixty or seventy hours playing that game in vs mode while under the influence.

Good times, I say!

Those of you who didn't get one should bless your lucky stars because according to Slashdot they're incredibly unstable, crash all the time, and cause herpes. I'm so lucky that I appear to have one of the 1% that work wonderfully.

ColdForged wrote:

Those of you who didn't get one should bless your lucky stars because according to Slashdot they're incredibly unstable, crash all the time, and cause herpes. I'm so lucky that I appear to have one of the 1% that work wonderfully.

yes because of the million or so sold this week the fact that there are several posts on an internet forum speaks volumes!!

lol.. aint the internet grand... theres already an 8 page thread on EA on how unstable ALL Xbox 360's are and your basically damn lucky if your house isnt burnt down merely by powering on your 360.

TheGameguru wrote:
ColdForged wrote:

Those of you who didn't get one should bless your lucky stars because according to Slashdot they're incredibly unstable, crash all the time, and cause herpes. I'm so lucky that I appear to have one of the 1% that work wonderfully.

yes because of the million or so sold this week the fact that there are several posts on an internet forum speaks volumes!!

lol.. aint the internet grand... theres already an 8 page thread on EA on how unstable ALL Xbox 360's are and your basically damn lucky if your house isnt burnt down merely by powering on your 360.

Dude, an X-Box 360 killed my father in front of my eyes when I was a child. I have sworn vengence.

Well the good thing is that Microsoft will exchange all the damaged systems for free in 4-6 weeks!

DrunkenSleipnir wrote:
TheGameguru wrote:
ColdForged wrote:

Those of you who didn't get one should bless your lucky stars because according to Slashdot they're incredibly unstable, crash all the time, and cause herpes. I'm so lucky that I appear to have one of the 1% that work wonderfully.

yes because of the million or so sold this week the fact that there are several posts on an internet forum speaks volumes!!

lol.. aint the internet grand... theres already an 8 page thread on EA on how unstable ALL Xbox 360's are and your basically damn lucky if your house isnt burnt down merely by powering on your 360.

Dude, an X-Box 360 killed my father in front of my eyes when I was a child. I have sworn vengence.

Oh yeah? Well an Xbox360 killed my wife. And it only had one arm!

I had to work so I couldn't get one. I thought l would get one eventually somewhere, but I didn't ccount on how rabid everyone seems to have gotten about it. I actuaally don't mind not getting one, cause none of the games really excited me. I was purely buying it for whenever oblivion comes out.

The only thing that upset me about the whole experience was the geeky kid at gamestop. When I asked about the 360 he with a smug grin replied "Sowwy! Guess next time you'll preorder huh?" I so wanted to jump that counter and just see red.

On the other hand the walmart kid made me laugh when I asked about the 360. He just shook his head in a daze and mumbled "No, and I'm glad they're gone.."

So I hope to get one before my birthday in dec. I got a fat wad of cash waitin to be spent. I've been tempted to buy other stuff with it already i.e. paintball gun, used car, new pc. Hopefully I get one soon.

The X360 killed my father... and sorry, rape jokes don't tend to be funny. - Certis

I've heard that if a 360 pees on your hand it will give you warts. Not sure if this can be confirmed because no one I know has ever seen one.

Staats wrote:

The X360 killed my father... and sorry, rape jokes don't tend to be funny. - Certis

Family Guy reference! Sorry if anyone was offended.

First off I'd like to say that I'm a newb to this forum. It's nice to see it's not populated by fanboys and whiny children -- definately a welcome change.

I'm too lazy and tired to read through all of the previous comments, so I'll just go ahead and post my initial impressions of the xbox360.

Being a fortunate employee of the local EB Games and the second preorder on the list, I received my xbox 360 with no problems on launch day. I also got my hands on an extra wireless controller, 2 play and charge kits, and a handful of games including PDZ, COD2, Madden, and Condemned.

Considering the history of console launches, this one was better than most. There is a solid foundation of games available, the premium package is full of necessary accessories, and the migration of my xbox live account was virtually seemless.

As far as funtionality goes, load times are fast, menus are easily to navigate, and the fact that I can access my media playlists at the touch of a button and rock out to Welcome to the Jungle while I'm sniping from the belltower in COD2 is pretty damn cool.

Launch games are never as impressive as expected. The final dev kits were released, what, two months ago? And the game development cycle for these games have spanned less than a year. That's hardly enough time to even scratch the potential of brand new never-been-seen before architecture of a next-gen system. I think there is, however, enough solid lunch titles to tide over games until spring when games like Gears of War and Morrowind Oblivion start appearing on shelves.

Overall I think the launch went better than I expected, and I can't wait to see what developers have in store for this system.

Edit -- Completely off-topic, STRIC9!, the Chiefs will own the Chargers on the 24th. Thanks for listening.

Nice first post Rath, welcome!

Some of the more dubious online retailers (not ebay) are taking pre-orders for the next 360 shipment at $900 for the Premium System..

Now thats good old American price gouging at its finest.

And its looking like the Dec. 12th-13th timeline is correct... I've been told this second shipment is approx 1.2-1.5 million consoles.. .I'm unsure the ratio between Premium and Core.

I would say that what we now know is that Microsoft could have sold just as many consoles if they had ALL had hard drives, and then they wouldn't have cursed this entire generation of their hardware with the 2 config issue. Perhaps in 5-6 years the Xbox 1024 will once again sport a unified feature set.

Not hatin', just thinkin'.

Fedaykin98 wrote:

I would say that what we now know is that Microsoft could have sold just as many consoles if they had ALL had hard drives, and then they wouldn't have cursed this entire generation of their hardware with the 2 config issue. Perhaps in 5-6 years the Xbox 1024 will once again sport a unified feature set.

Not hatin', just thinkin'.

Ultimately its going to be a complete non-issue. In terms of design decisions.. I suspect the lack of an HD Optical Storage will have far more (if any) impact on the 360 that the 2SKU decision.

Over the life the of the console there will probably be a large enough amount of both units sold to support whatever decision a potential developer has when developing a game.

Neither the lack of an HD drive nor the lack of a hard drive feel like swift decisions, but I imagine they did both to keep the cost of the machine within semi-sane levels.