 | | These sure are exciting (and expensive) times. A good year into the latest generation, just where the hell do we stand? |
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Next-gen systems. Been out a while now, haven't they? All three machines are on store shelves, more or less readily available, and each has at least a handful o' big games to its name at this point too.
Ish.
With launch hysteria died down and much dust settled across all three fronts though, things have been a wee bit quiet for the past couple of months. Bioshock aside, it's been a pretty friggin' humungous dry spell actually. Ironic, set against our depressingly
wet British summer.
As we finally hit that turning point though, and shit starts heating up towards the end of year holiday season (that which promises, I'd argue, the greatest gaming line-up in history), now feels like a good time to sit back, survey the situation, and assess the war thus far. Who's winning? Who's losing? Who's flat-out dead? Take it away Microsoft...
Xbox 360
What I Said At Launch
"...Microsoft have certainly kicked off the next-gen war in style. In fact, I'd argue that their true must-own "title" right now is Xbox Live itself...As far as games go though, while the 360 has a pretty good launch line-up, it ain't quite perfect...The original Xbox had Halo, the Nintendo 64 had Mario, and so on. The Xbox 360 doesn't really have anything on that level though - one single all encompassing classic that the system will be remembered for decades down the line." [More]
What I Say Now
 | | I just started playing this again recently |
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In terms of games, I'd say the 360 has not only a huge selection of solid titles at this point, but a whole
heap of the afore-lacking knock-out classics too.
Gears of War, Bioshock,
Oblivion and this month's Halo 3 spring to mind personally, but others'll similarly claim
Crackdown, Viva Piñata and most bizarrely of all
Earth Defense Force as the ones to buy the system for (don't believe me?
Read). The important point being, there's a variety and a breadth of titles available for everyone at this point.
It also somewhat crucially boasts the superior versions of pretty much all cross-platform games too, with the various incarnations of Rainbow Six and
Ghost Recon throttling their respective PC and PS3 counterparts for example. With the impending "death of the exclusive", and the inevitable future of 99% cross-platform developed games, this is just about as important a point as any.
 | | 4-player Vegas co-op is a riot over Live. Especially with hilariously ugly scanned faces ala Tom |
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Accompanied by the upcoming fall release line-up that pretty much stretches killer titles across all genres and styles you could ever possibly want or imagine - from Mass Effect to PGR4 to Eternal Sonata and beyond - and the 360, quite clearly, has a games line-up to be proud of. The best of the lot, in fact.
Then there's the online side of things. Good old Xbox Live. Fab 'init? Well...yes and no. Things get a little more murky for me here, as to be blunt, Live could use some revamps. What was stunning back in 2005, and so far ahead of the curve, has grown a wee bit stagnant in my opinion.
Sure, nothing beats a night on Live with a group of pals. You know the drill; headsets in tow, hopping from game to game, while the gang gets progressively more inebriated, skills go out the window, and eventually the Live
Vision cameras come out to play (errr, or maybe that's just us). I'd simply argue that as much fun as such worryingly homoerotic shenanigans are, Microsoft have been sitting on their online laurels to a certain extent this past year, wasting time and effort on useless pap like MSN integration and cross-platform Shadowrun play, when the
real stuff we want - nay,
need - namely group chat and dedicated servers, remain but a pipe-dream. That sir, ain't cool.
 | | Live Arcade is another major selling point for the 360, with more fab stuff in the works, that (one hopes) is coming soon |
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More importantly, why am I still paying a monthly fee for this service, when no other system on the market deems it necessary? And while we're at it, where the heck are all those Live Arcade games we've been promised for years? I want my Sensible Soccer, dag namnit. Not to mention Castle Crashers. And Every Extend. And a zillion others. This past month things have improved a fair bit on this front, with Space Giraffe and Puzzle Fighter providing light amusement on a rainy day (which is
every day, right now), but hopefully there's a lot more to come. And soon.
Don't get me wrong. In spite of the troubling cobwebs, playing on Live still proves just about as fun as ever, with the 360 boasting my fave online gaming environment going right now. PC included. In fact, I'd still recommend the 360 to anyone in the market for a new console over all else for that alone, never mind the top notch gaming line-up. But there's room for improvement, Bill. Hear our cries.
 | | She's almost here, peeps. And you know what happens when she arrives? ALL FUCKING HELL BREAKS LOOSE, ARGHHHH!! |
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With the system's frightening failure rates sorta side-stepped at this point, and upgraded Elite models now "hitting the channel" as they say, Microsoft seem to be in a good place in spite of all my bitching then. With the Wii recently over-taking the 360 in accumulative sales, I guess technically Microsoft's position as #1 in the console race is a thing of the past...but ask any hardcore gamer what they think, and I'm pretty sure they'd take issue with such a statement.
I for one continue to enjoy my 360 daily - both on and offline - and can't see that changing any time soon.
Coolest Moment So Far
Halo 3
beta test shenanigans. I'm playing with Jam. He has no clue what he's doing. He sees a fully-armed deployed landmine. Through the headset, his unmistakable northern tones ponder excitedly, "Oooh, what's this do!" as he anxiously runs over to "pick it up". Kaboom! The Jam goes flying. Save film to hard drive. Re-watch every day since. Laugh ad nauseam. It never gets old. Everything that's great about online gaming, friendship and Jam's, ahem, "gaming skills" all rolled into one. Good times.
Lamest Moment So Far
Red ring o' death. And I sure ain't alone.
Games of Note
Gears of War - Epic do the impossible by essentially crafting the next Halo
Oblivion - Best RPG ever? Nah, that'll be Deus Ex. But Oblivion's dang close
Rainbow Six: Vegas - Definitive version of the current king of online shooters
Dead Or Alive 4 - Under-rated jiggle fighter with ace online modes
Crackdown - Cyber-punk tinged free-roaming co-op craziness
Test Drive Unlimited - Not for me, but the rest of the world swears by it
Geometry Wars - Many called it
the 360 launch game. Not bad for £3, then
Playstation 3
What I Said At Launch
"...the online service practically struggles out the door like Stephen Hawking trying to walk...The good news of course, is that they'll continue to add and enrich this experience over time...the online stuff fails to match up to the competition then, but - and this may well see me hung from the nearest tree - Sony make up for it in other areas. One specific area, actually...the PS3's boasting prettier graphics than the 360 was so early on in its life. I think that speaks for itself...when its true killer titles start showing up over the next 12 months, it should make for quite the interesting battle" [More]
What I Say Now
 | | What looked to be an incredible end of year line-up for the PS3 rapidly nose-dived recently. Ratchet still looks hot as hell, mind |
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Yes, while the PS3's operating system and online abilities seriously lacked at launch, to toot my own fortune telling horn a little, I was pretty darn right on that whole firmware upgrade thing. The PS3's seen some stunningly impressive updates already, such as upscaled PS2 games in HD, networked media sharing with PCs, cancer curing screensavers, and 720p DVD playback to name but a few (the last of which, some argue, betters even the most high-end stand-alone DVD players on the market).
In fact, rumour has it the next such update will supposedly add the ability to call up the system's "Cross Media Bar" mid-game, and with this, one presumes, will come real-time messaging, and instant friend invites ala Xbox Live. Coupled with the fact I'm paying no monthly fee for such a service,
and getting dedicated servers to play on to boot...well, Microsoft may well need to start rethinking a few strategies if it all turns out true.
 | | VF5. Quite the exclusive for the PS3. 'Til it went cross-platform and got an online mode for the 360. That's gotta sting, Sony |
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Sony's announcement of its Home interface - and the crazy online communities that promises - not to mention LittleBigPlanet, and the demented co-op shenanigans possible there too, further hint at such coolness heading our way on the online front. And, again, I have to emphasize,
without a monthly fee.
The downside of course, is that this is all still "down the road" type stuff. Distant promises, remaining unfulfilled. There's no denying that right here, right now, the system still lacks important functionality and, more specifically, games. In fact, the PS3 suffered a truly dire shit spell of nothingness pretty much from Virtua Fighter 5's release onwards, with only downloadable toys like
Flow and
Super Stardust giving us even the slightest
flicker of a reason to turn the damn thing on in months.
 | | I'll stick to my guns on my previous graphical comments. No two-ways about it, this is the best looking game ever. For now |
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Ninja Gaiden Sigma, and more recently Warhawk, hint at improvements on the release front, but with heavily hyped titles like Lair and now Heavenly Sword receiving mixed reviews, it may well be a while longer 'til the true greats start showing their face to patient PS3 owners. As incredible as they look, Ratchet and Uncharted just won't be strong enough to withstand the Halo 3/Mass Effect juggernaut this holiday season, while both Metal Gear and Killzone 2 - as gorgeously sex-tinged as they come off - will be lucky to see release within the next six months. Oh dear.
So there's good and there's bad on the PS3 front all in all. I can't wait to check out the fall line-up, in particular some of the download-only stuff, but ultimately it's still just way too early to tell what the heck's going on with the PS3. All a bit weird, no?
Coolest Moment So Far
My jaw dropping to the floor on firing up MotorStorm for the first time. Dear god.
Lamest Moment So Far
Turning on my imported launch model to the sound of a grinding, grunting, squeal, its Blu-Ray drive dead on arrival. Sony's new format was off to a bad start with me. And it stayed that way 'til I saw Casino Royal in 1080i and promptly squirted pants glue.
Games of Note
Ninja Gaiden Sigma - The greatest fighter of them all gets a next-gen spit 'n' polish
Resistance: Fall of Man - Deathly dull opening hour aside, utterly brill
MotorStorm - The ultimate high def show-off game
Super Stardust HD - The crown jewel of the Playstation Network
Virtua Fighter 5 - Coming to 360 soon, but PS3 fans had a good 6 month head-start
Warhawk - Conclusive proof Sony can certainly deliver the online goods when needed
Wii
What I Said At Launch
"...the first year line-up doesn't particularly excite, and visually it can't hold a candle next to the competition either. The biggest compliment you can give the Wii though, is that it's so much damn fun to play, the majority of the time you can safely ignore these technical shortcomings and concentrate on the good stuff." [More]
What I Say Now
 | | I was psyched for this game. A year ago. Couldn't give a shit about it now |
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I'd agree with past-tense Diggler, but with a far, far bleaker outlook towards the future of the Wii. Iffy graphics, I can live with. What I can't though, is having
no games whatsoever to play on the damn thing. It's sad, but there's literally been nothing of note released...pretty much since I wrote that original article. Well, other than Resident Evil 4. Yep. A Gamecube port.
Rubbing lemon juice in the wound, is the depressing fact that over on the other side of the pond, Americans haven't really had this problem. At least, not to the extent we have. They had their Trauma Center on launch day, a game we only received
last month. Then they had their Super Paper Mario seeing 'em through that slow, summer of Hoth-like coldness...a game we're still yet to see here. And now the slimy ingrates have Metroid Prime 3 kicking all sorts of arse on the FPS tip. Fuck
knows where our copy of that is.
 | | Metroid looks to be the first genuinely shit hot FPS for the Wii. And yanks are playing it right now |
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Hey, at least we got Mario Strikers before 'em. Oh yes. The excitement that is mascot-repackaged sports games with added Wii-mote waggle. Dunno about you, but as a European Wii owner, my balls feel much like those on the receiving end of that game's patented Mega-Strike.
And yet, in spite of nothing new or interesting of note happening all year long in Wii land, the system continues to fly off store shelves. Youngsters, oldsters and entire families alike, all transfixed by its empty mirage. It's a truly odd phenomenon, and as one forum poster put it, surely the "highest-selling-to-shitly-reviewed-games-system" of all time.
 | Umbrella Chronicles. One of the few (only?) mature, adult Wii games due any damn time soon
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Yet as much resentment and - to be frank - hatred I often direct towards my Wii for continuing to show me no love whatsoever...it takes just one mere go on Resi 4 to make me see green again. Jesus H Christ. It's
oh so good. An upgraded port it may be - much like Zelda - but it does draw one interesting point to light regarding the Wii as a system. Cross-platform ports aren't so bad, in hands such as these, as the Wii's mental control scheme has the potential to alter such games so damn drastically, as to reinvent them in a whole new way.
RE4 for instance, went from merely ace game on the Gamecube, to one of my flat-out faves of the year, while Zelda, in all honesty, probably wouldn't have stolen 35 hours of my life without the supreme awesomeness of Wii-mote sword swiping keeping me transfixed that entire time. I doubt I would even have bothered with that game on the 'Cube in fact.
 | | Wii Sports. The brain-washing money spewer that has defined the Wii, and essentially, gaming as a whole. For better or worse |
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And it's at times like these where I totally buy into the Nintendo philosophy and love that vibrator-mote with a passion. You might even catch me sneaking it under the covers with me at bed time. A solid Wii release like Resi 4'll steal my heart 100%, and I'll be right there waggling it up a storm alongside the masses like a good little bandwagon jumping sheep. Soccer mums, family gatherings, Big Brain Age Degree Training Academy...I want it all! Nintendo are teh phuture!!11 Can I get an A-men!
But the love never lasts. The store shelves remain awash with blandness. Their lack of thrilling titles taunting me day in, day out, driving away the love, replacing it instead with taint. Nintendo continually piss all over that big old smiling face of mine, like R Kelly wielding a video camera, and it's all so depressing really. The most blatant example in all my years of how a system is only ever as good as the games available to play on it.
Plus, dude, ain't those graphics getting worse by the day? Cripes. The Wii's fast becoming the one and only system I play with my glasses off.
Coolest Moment So Far
Watching my video game-hating older brother bowl a perfect strike in Wii Bowling on Christmas day, huge grin plastered across his face the entire time. Bravo, Nintendo. You did it.
Lamest Moment So Far
Each and every day of dust-gathering since.
Games of Note
Wii Sports - This right here, has sold millions upon millions of systems alone
Resident Evil 4 - Own a Wii? You need this game
Zelda: Twilight Princess - Ace control scheme in tow, it's right up there among Link's finest
Wario Ware - I gave it a shit
score, but for those scarce few hours it actually lasts? Fun stuff
Metroid Prime: Corruption - A good month away here, but early word of mouth is insanely positive
PC
With all this console chit-chat, it feels only right to touch upon the faithful PC while we're at it. How does he fit into all the next-gen hoopla? The PC typically suffers a bit of a slump whenever new consoles come out actually. With sparkling new machines boasting superior visuals at a tenth of the price, it's no wonder really. As a former exclusive PC nut-job who despised consoles in all their forms, this phenomenon made even me regularly question my own faith back in my darker days. Until one year I finally cracked, saw the light, and went multi-platform. It's the only way to live, man.
 | | It's a sad day when the long-awaited, much-delayed follow-up to the most quintessential online PC game not called Counter-Strike is coming out on both 360 and PS3 |
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Within six months of a major console launch though, the PC has typically clawed its way back to the top of the gaming food-chain, and more often than not, far surpassed its console brethren once again. We see this over and over, each and every generation. You just can't keep the old dog down.
Yet, um, it doesn't really seem to be happening this time.
Oh sure, Crysis is gorgeous, and one hopes DX10's destined to show us even more fab, fun stuff down the line too. In practice though? I'm still seeing far more impressive visuals and just experiences in general over in console land right now.
What the heck's going on in PC-ville? Where are the cutting edge new titles driving the industry forward? Where are those exclusives we used to gawp at, that just weren't even vaguely possible on a console box? Why are companies like iD Software and Valve bringing all their amazing new projects to the consoles, not dedicating them solely to the PC where they belong? Hmmm. Somewhere along the line it all went horribly wrong.
 | The £3000
game? |
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It may well be the World of Warcraft phenomenon at work, as more and more devs concede to Blizzard's "air superiority" of PC gaming, and thus set sail for console waters. After all, that's the only place to make money these days, now that everyone's too busy playing WoW to buy proper games.
As much as I love a good opportunity to squirt diarrhea in Warcraft's general direction though, I also wonder if it's perhaps a sign we're starting to hit a brick wall in terms of graphics as well. I mean, that's really been the PC's strong suit since the dawn of time, no? How stunningly glorious the latest games look, powered by their overclocked quad SLI-rigged mother-brain atom fusion reactor core CPU boards? Yet with the advent of HD gaming on consoles, that graphics crutch has all but snapped. The difference really isn't that big. If at all.
As a result, there just ain't the incentive to splash out £3000 on a top of the line PC these days. Not when I can grab a console at a fraction of the price, have it look every bit as good, and hell, enjoy ten times the number of new games every year on top.
Still, I hate to turn this into another trademark Diggler PC-bash. I hope for better days, I really do. If one looks past the Wii-caliber lack of exclusives, and the unstoppable black hole of WoW sucking in all that was once good about PC gaming, we do at least have the likes of Valve and Microsoft trying to push the platform forward in mildly interesting ways. Online ways, at that.
The former's
Steam Community has proven impressive thus far for instance - with a fab beta on the go right now that all should be trying - while the latter's "Live For Windows" initiative has thus far let us down something depressingly fierce - but at least the big guns refuse to let the PC go down without a fight. God bless 'em.
A good thing too, the amount of cash I spent on this bloody machine...
Conclusion
360's where it's at, peeps. Buy one. Now.
