Tag: xbox

E3 – Xbox Presentation

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– An open world Metal Gear Solid with graphics I thought were from a cut scene but were actually game play…freaking sweet

– No word on exclusivity or exclusive content. Probably not.

– 13 next gen titles exclusive to Xbox One…nice

– Weird: starting with some Xbox 360 games that are coming. Xbox 360 redesigned and available today. Cool. Two free games per month for Gold members. That’s nice. This month includes Assassin’s Creed 2 and Halo 3. Some great games.

– World of Tanks for Xbox 360…that`s pretty awesome

– Max seems a pretty standard platformer for the 360 with nice graphics. Not too compelling for me

– Dark Souls II for 360 looks pretty awesome

– Ryse: Son of Rome seems awesome. Like Call of Duty set in Roman times. Cool.

– Killer Instinct fighter looks awesome as an exclusive

– Sunset Overdrive stylized open world shooter. It looks spectacular and fresh. Very exciting.

– Forza 5: yeah we all knew that was coming.Yeah it looks amazing. Graphics are awesomely sweet looking. Driveatar is a good idea.

– Minecraft: better be crazy spectacular to excite me more than the original. Nothing said. Bigger maps. Woohoo. Not too exciting.

– Quantum Break: so far all cut scene. Need to see gameplay. No gameplay. How do i know if it will be any good?

– D4 looks like an awesome cell-shaded game. Not much to tell what it will be like.

– Project Spark: Looks SUPREMELY awesome as a custom game development system. Wow. Uses Kinect and Smart Glass. This looks like a standout game for sure. Very excited for this one.

– Smart Glass integration: Who needs a separate handheld device when you have this updated Smart Glass. Pretty cool. Easy recording to Twitch for broadcasting gameplay and game videos. Nice.

– Losing MS Points for real $$$ is a GOOD idea. Thanks.

– Unlimited friends instead of 100

– Crimson Dragon: a flying dragon game. Meh. Seems cool. Not sure. Graphics seem average.

– Dead Rising 3 looks spectacular. Open world zombies. No load times? We’ll see. Whole lotta zombies going on…customize weopons, that’s cool. Driving too…sweet. Man this game looks like too much fun. Ok – you can call in artillery support via Smart Glass. C’mon how cool is this?

– Witcher 3. Completely free-roaming and open world. Nice. Spell-casting via Kinect is a great idea. Graphics look freaking awesome. Wow. Getting close to Skyrim.

– Battlefield 4: Actual gameplay. Ack. First glitch…frozen. Re-start. Graphics are UNBELIEVABLE. Battling on ship – that is cool. Battling IN ship – even cooler. The sound is very good as well. Ok – now some sweet battling from smaller gun boats.

– Below: It looks exceptionally creative but the small trailer really told me nothing. Cannot tell if it will be good or not.

– Black Tusk Studios: Looks good but no details at all.

– The first Halo trailer looked awesome but no game details. 60 fps. Nice.

– Overall an impressive line up. Launching in November at $499. Too much in my mind repeating mistake of the PS3 at launch.

– Final Exclusive is a very cool mech FPS called Titanfall. Looks great.

As cool as this Xbox is I will likely not be lined up on launch day for the first time ever. We shall see what PS4 brings.

Gaming: Xbox One or Playstation 4

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Notice I didn’t mention Wii U? That’s because there is no need to as their strategy to innovate essentially innovated them right out of the market with a strange, radically under-powered console that relied solely on gimmicks to succeed.

At hand are the launches of Xbox One and Playstation 4 and with them two very different strategies. With Xbox we have an emerging all-in-one system that tries to put everyone in the living room first and may, in the end, fail to put anyone first at all. With Playstation you have a system that proclaims to put gamers first but is clocking in as only modestly more powerful than the Xbox and without a large number of quality exclusives this strategy could fail too.

The tech and gaming media are uncertain but equally critical of any move that suggests gaming may take second place to other areas of entertainment.

As a life-long gamer I have a message for the gaming media – putting gamers first in this next generation of consoles could be a sure way of killing the console. With an increasing interest in entertainment technology in the living room a focus on the gaming segment of the market is a focus on a much smaller and increasingly competitive piece of the pie.

New PC technologies such as the Steam platform and forthcoming Steam Box are VERY compelling gaming devices that could cripple a console with a gaming-only focus.

With these things in mind I think the Xbox One strategy is broader and could likely see longer term survival/success as it exploits other market segments should gaming be as competitive as I think it will be.

Some wildcards that could play out include the possibility of Nintendo exclusively unlocking a couple of its super franchises like Mario and Zelda and striking exclusive arrangements with Playstation or Xbox. Given that Sony is a much larger competitor to Nintendo in Japan and the handheld gaming market it would make sense for them to partner with Microsoft in this area.

Another possible partnership would be for either Playstation or Microsoft to give up on their proprietary gaming content delivery system and adopt the Steam platform…unfortunately this seems like a fairly far-fetched option at this point with both Sony and Microsoft clearly having invested a lot in online infrastructure for the next gen.

Price is going to be a significant factor in choice (at least for me) in this next gen…as much as I appreciate the bells and whistles of Microsoft’s next offering if all things are equal it will come down to game offers and price for me.

I want something in the $400 range. Anything significantly higher could see me investigating the Steam Box as an option. If there is too much disparity between the two in terms of price my allegiance to Microsoft could crack. Both consoles have some expensive tech in them – Microsoft has decided to bundle Kinect while Sony has opted to incorporate GDDR5 memory – both costly inclusions that could drive the price of the console too high. Here’s hoping they remember that consoles should be loss leaders to drive an install base for the sale of games and other high margin content.

So what am I saying? At this point I am leaning toward Microsoft but not as heavily as I have in the past. The gaming market is at a very interesting point right now and substantial portions of Sony, Nintendo and Microsoft’s install base could feasibly shift in another direction and they could do it quickly with little warning.

We’ll see.