Just Bought a 360

[Ex-Cyber]

ils down to personal preference

Bullshit. My favorite console is awesome and the other ones suck, and you're an idiot if you can't see that.

Seriously, though, doesn't this generation suck a bit in general? It seems like there's a chasm between total junk and million-dollar sequels/movie licenses, and sometimes the latter come off feeling a bit like shovelware too (oh look, a gratuitous SIXAXIS minigame! that makes it PS3-special! ). Or maybe I'm just getting cynical in my old age.

[JuddWack]

It's nice to have the wifi in the PS3 I guess but I'd rather not be paying for it since I just don't trust a wireless connection. Also I think those rechargeable battery packs are rip offs.
Get one of these:
http://www.amazon.com/Crosse-Technology ... 83&sr=8-11
And some of these:
http://www.amazon.com/SANYO-eneloop-Pre ... 283&sr=8-2
It really makes sense when you think about all the other things around the house that use AA and AAA batteries. I also got a large box of cheapo recharable batteries that I use for remote controls and stuff.

[Skynet]

It's funny, because the way you guys feel about the Wii is the way I feel about the 360. With the 360, it's either you are on Live, or you might as well not own the system. Out of my three game consoles, I play the 360 the least. There are a ton of great Wii games that are catered to single player. With the 360, many, many of the games I hear are great are only great over Live.

The Live thing especially holds true in the fact that you can't even watch DivX or XviD without being connected to the net. When I moved house and was waiting for the net to be connected so many times I wanted watch stuff on my 360 but I couldn't because I wasn't online. Not to mention downloadable content not working unless you're not connected to Live is one of the biggest annoyances I have with the console. I wanted to play some Rock Band with friends over while my net wasn't connected and I couldn't play any of my downloaded songs.

Having said that, my order of preference is 360 > Wii > PS3. I play my 360 most days of the week, my Wii at least once a week (especially now that USB Loader is out) and I never use my PS3 (it's a BR player for me).

[Specially Cork]

I've always enjoyed games with great single-player campaigns, and with that in mind, for me, the 360 doesn't rank any higher than the PS3 in terms of great exclusives. In fact, the Wii has far more exclusives that meet that criteria than either of the others. Looking at multiformat titles though...I think the 360/PS3 both share a lot of great stuff.

[cube_b3]

ils down to personal preference

Bullshit. My favorite console is awesome and the other ones suck, and you're an idiot if you can't see that.

Seriously, though, doesn't this generation suck a bit in general? It seems like there's a chasm between total junk and million-dollar sequels/movie licenses, and sometimes the latter come off feeling a bit like shovelware too (oh look, a gratuitous SIXAXIS minigame! that makes it PS3-special! ). Or maybe I'm just getting cynical in my old age.

Yes this generation sucks and it is quite depressing general with the advancement in Computer Technology games aren't even developed to take advantage of a consoles unique hardware Capcom confirmed that Resident Evil 5 was designed on the PC and ported to 360 & PS3.

It is really quite depressing, the next step in proper video game development has been initiated may have been taken by the wii but it ended up beeing a money making gimmick which is rereleasing Gamecube games and... all that crap.

Had the Wii had been on Par with 360 & PS3, in terms of Graphics and everything, this generation may have been diffirent.

[Code-Red]

The problem is however, releasing future-proof hardware years in advance at a competitive price point.

While I'd like to see virtual reality or stereoscopic LCD inclusions on the next generation, that's been an expectation for years of consoles, and honestly, every attempt has been small and worthless. I mean, sure, you can project a 3d image from a 120hz LCD, but who is going to go out and buy one just for that purpose? And in the same respect, how much is VR going to cost?

In my opinion, we are about to hit the pinnacle on the graphics front. After all, realism comes at a price, not only development time but raw power are no longer going to be exponentially ahead of the curve as they used to. I think it's going to be harder and harder to push graphics without wearing on the systems, and we are seeing that now with the 360 (mind you, build quality has a large part to play as well).

Personally, I think this is one of the best generations of consoles.

[melancholy]

Honestly, I think the next generation of game systems is going to change a focus from graphical update to hardware abilities. Instead of pouring resources into an even prettier visual experience, they will start to focus more on physic engines, more realistic AI, and basically all the CPU intensive things that we are starting to see now but not quite there yet.

I also would not be surprised if the next generation of consoles required an internet connection. Not just for downloading of games like we have now, but anti-piracy disc verification and such.

Finally, I would imagine console makers are going to create development tools that are way easier to work with. I think Sony especially is realizing that a system is useless if nobody wants to work with the tools.

[Ex-Cyber]

Honestly, I think the next generation of game systems is going to change a focus from graphical update to hardware abilities. Instead of pouring resources into an even prettier visual experience, they will start to focus more on physic engines, more realistic AI, and basically all the CPU intensive things that we are starting to see now but not quite there yet.

I think the way to look at it is that software complexity is increasingly becoming the bottleneck in games. Having a GPU hand-crafted by God won't do you any good if you don't have the data to feed to it. Animation quality becomes more and more important as the level of detail increases. How many PC games are as detailed as Crysis? How many PS3 games are as detailed as Killzone 2? How many 360 games are as detailed as Gears of War 2? Aside from that, it's unlikely that many people will have a TV bigger than 1920x1200 for a long time, and you can only fit so much detail into that.

I also would not be surprised if the next generation of consoles required an internet connection. Not just for downloading of games like we have now, but anti-piracy disc verification and such.

If they want to move in the direction of requiring an Internet connection, I wouldn't be surprised if they try to do away with the idea of buying discs altogether and just move everything to a PSN/XBLA/WiiWare type of system with a huge hard drive. 1TB drives retail for under $100 right now, and the current gen is widely expected to last another 5 years or so. Broadband penetration and the prevalence of usage caps would probably stop them, though. The big upside for the game companies is that this kills the rental and used markets, which some of them pretty much consider to be on par with warez (remember, these are the kind of people who think DRM is a great idea).

Finally, I would imagine console makers are going to create development tools that are way easier to work with. I think Sony especially is realizing that a system is useless if nobody wants to work with the tools.

This goes hand-in-hand with the software complexity issue. It's not just a matter of Sony's or Microsoft's SDK, but that increasingly developers will be using a lot of middleware instead of trying to code everything for any console directly.

In all honesty, I don't know if I even really want another generation of "consoles" as we currently understand the business model. DRM has been getting more and more invasive and obnoxious, and it doesn't look like the love affair is going to end soon despite the fact that the whole idea of DRM is fundamentally flawed. I'm probably an outlier in this regard, but I'd much rather buy into an open standard based on something like OMAP4 than a PS4 or an Xbox 3. Hell, I'd even take a PC-based console at this point as long as it's not built around the idea of a closed, DRM-laden platform (or if the DRM is at least optional).

[Specially Cork]

I think the industry needs to move away from these huge big-budget epic games and toward a model with more final products and less financial risk. The situation we're in now, where (successful) companies are having to spend years and millions of dollars on a single videogame that will leave them on the verge of bankruptcy if it flops is kinda scary. It's all very well saying that's just what it takes to make a videogame these days, but then...what is it going to take in a decade's time if we still go down this road?

[Zealous zerotype]

All new consoles suck now, every single one of them 360 just blows, ps3 is shit and the wii managed to fuck up smash bros, wtf. I lost a big part of my intrest in video games before these consoles really came out, but after they did I just kinda went :/. Most of my most recent good gaming has been on the DS/psx. I'd count gamecube if I played more than meele.

[Polymira]

I didn't go for a PS3 because I am waiting for a model which will be PS2 compatible, I am confident they will make one sooner or later.

Heh, and that would be the launch model.

[Lartrak]

If they want to move in the direction of requiring an Internet connection, I wouldn't be surprised if they try to do away with the idea of buying discs altogether and just move everything to a PSN/XBLA/WiiWare type of system with a huge hard drive. 1TB drives retail for under $100 right now, and the current gen is widely expected to last another 5 years or so. Broadband penetration and the prevalence of usage caps would probably stop them, though. The big upside for the game companies is that this kills the rental and used markets, which some of them pretty much consider to be on par with warez (remember, these are the kind of people who think DRM is a great idea).

I'd say it is pretty unlikely Nintendo would go down that route, at least not on the next generation. Any console that goes that way, I will never buy it. I have moved my consoles many times, and a number of times no internet access is available - not to mention I refuse to buy games that aren't future proof. Nintendo has so many casual users who want to be able to just stick games in and have them work that there's no way they'd alienate them with downloadables and internet verifications.

[melancholy]

Honestly, I think the next generation of game systems is going to change a focus from graphical update to hardware abilities. Instead of pouring resources into an even prettier visual experience, they will start to focus more on physic engines, more realistic AI, and basically all the CPU intensive things that we are starting to see now but not quite there yet.

I think the way to look at it is that software complexity is increasingly becoming the bottleneck in games. Having a GPU hand-crafted by God won't do you any good if you don't have the data to feed to it. Animation quality becomes more and more important as the level of detail increases. How many PC games are as detailed as Crysis? How many PS3 games are as detailed as Killzone 2? How many 360 games are as detailed as Gears of War 2? Aside from that, it's unlikely that many people will have a TV bigger than 1920x1200 for a long time, and you can only fit so much detail into that.

That's what I mean, the graphics aren't likely to get all that much more impressive. There's going to be standout games, sure, but what I meant is the next generation isn't going to be another graphic update. I think they are going to focus hardcore on things like physics engines and stuff. The things they tried to accomplish in The Force Unleashed, with smart AI, object physics...all that stuff they poured into the game. I believe that is going to be the focus of the next generation, making advanced processes like that more commonplace. The Havoc engine is already widely used right now, and hell, even home developers are doing some awesome stuff with physic engines. I just think the next consoles are going to greatly expand on that instead of just another graphic update.

[cube_b3]

DRM?