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PS3 and Wii — Head To Head
Posted by
Zonk
on Tue Nov 14, 2006 01:56 PM
from the ready-fight dept.
from the ready-fight dept.
1up has a piece looking at the Wii vs. the PS3, running down the particulars on graphical power, online capabilities, launch titles, and control scheme. For the most part, they're siding with the PS3: "Traditionally, Nintendo's never been much for online gaming (the GameCube had two online games&ever), but Wii appears poised to finally bring Mario and Co. into the multiplayer arena. Wii will use a modified version of the DS' Wi-Fi Connection software to facilitate online matchmaking. (Most likely, you'll only be able to play against players who give you 'friend codes' first, just like with the DS.) Like the PS3, the Wii will offer online gaming free of charge."
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Proofreading? (Score:5, Funny)
Here's the kicker:
Um, ok.
* On my part, anyway
** The amperstand after "games" is really there. It's not an HTML glitch.
Re:Proofreading? (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
Re:Proofreading? (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re:Proofreading and one sided article (Score:5, Insightful)
Am I the only one that feels this article is too biased or unfair to the Wii?
Parent
Re:Proofreading and one sided article (Score:5, Insightful)
Nope. All it really says is: "We (the author(s)) are REALLY, REALLY, REALLY excited about the PS3. Here's some boilerplate stuff about the Wii. See how the PS3 is cool?"
I'm glad they're excited, but they should probably be more upfront about it rather than pretending to have journalistic objectivity. A better solution might be to pit a couple different authors (with two different opinions) against each other. It would make for a more interesting read, at least.
Parent
Re:Proofreading and one sided article (Score:5, Insightful)
I agree with you. However, this day an age, journalism, with the advent of the online medium, is shifting towards opinion pieces than objective journalism. One only has to look to traditional media to see biased reporting, on many levels.
I personally attribute this to the fact that I think people are drawn to news of scandal and such in much the same say they're drawn to 'negative' news. It's more enjoyable to talk about. Afterall, why else would 'reality TV' be popular, rarely see 'good news', the explosion of online journals (blogs), etc. Women have always known this. They've been watching Soap operas forever. =P It's all about the water cooler gossip. It's not fun to debate something if everyone agrees!
Cheers,
Fozzy
Parent
Or... (Score:4, Funny)
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Re:Proofreading and one sided article (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
Technically, PS3 wins - Heart, Wii wins (Score:4, Insightful)
It's the games.
Re:Technically, PS3 wins - Heart, Wii wins (Score:4, Funny)
Parent
Re:Technically, PS3 wins - Heart, Wii wins (Score:5, Insightful)
I freely admit that the PS3 is more powerful with better hardware. But... how does eye candy make a game more fun? If your character in a FPS now had individually-rendered arm hair, does that make the game somehow better? Would Daikatana be any better with greatly improved graphics? I think that we are approaching the point of diminishing returns in graphics.
The key here, though, is price. By definition, half of the US population makes average income or below. Those are the sorts of people who are MUCH more likely to pick up a Wii than a PS3. Sony has effectively alienated a full half of the population from purchasing their product. Nintendo, on the other hand, is the best bet for those whose pockets do not run over, and they are also cheap enough to be picked up as a 2nd system for people who have deep enough pockets to get a 360 or a PS3.
Overall winner: Nintendo.
Parent
Re:Technically, PS3 wins - Heart, Wii wins (Score:5, Informative)
By definition half the US population makes median income or below.
More than half of the US population makes below average income because of the Bill Gates and other outliers that drag the average up.
Sorry, just a pedantic pet peeve.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
The median is an average, but whenever "average" is used as a specific measurement (rather than the class of measures of central tendency), it means "arithmetic mean".
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Take a VERY fun game, and slash the polygon count in half. Is the game less fun? The answer is probably something like "a little bit less fun, but still pretty darned good." So, double the graphics horsepower does NOT double the fun. This is what I mean about the graphics power. A good game depends more on story line, controls, and the general game design. The eye candy certainly helps, but it takes a big difference in order to make or break a game.
And if I had to choose
I hope they trade their 360s in.. (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
Re:I hope they trade their 360s in.. (Score:5, Funny)
This is exactly why I will not buy any of these new consoles. I can get called a "flaming cocktard" for free on Slashdot.
Parent
Re:I hope they trade their 360s in.. (Score:5, Funny)
P.S. Cocktard is not covered by the FF spell checker.
Parent
Re:I hope they trade their 360s in.. (Score:4, Funny)
Well, if you say it in a different way: "cocktard flambe'" it sounds like a french chicken dish.
Parent
Re:I hope they trade their 360s in.. (Score:4, Informative)
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Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:I hope they trade their 360s in.. (Score:4, Interesting)
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Re:Technically, PS3 wins - Heart, Wii wins (Score:5, Interesting)
I present to you:
* Nintendo DS vs. PSP - PSP processor is faster, the screen is a higher resolution, it has more function, yet bombed compared to the DS.
* Original Xbox/GC vs. PS2 - Both the original Xbox and gamecube had better graphical power than the PS2 and yet the PS2 sold a ton more units and games.
* N64 vs. PS - Granted what made the PS the winner in this case was using an optical drive for media, but the power of the N64 was higher than the PS1.
* Nintendo Gameboy vs. Sega Gamegear - I remember having a Gamegear. It was in color and had better graphics than the gameboy of the time. Yet it still died and the gameboy lived on.
It really is the games. For what I've been seeing on the PS3, everything looks done. Either I could get it on the PC/360 or it looks remarkably similar to a dozen other games I've played in the past. It's difficult to find something really exciting about the system, but the Wii seems to have that excitement. It may not look as good, but as Gabe on penny-arcade spoke about Zelda: "You'll never even think about the graphics while you're playing it".
That's what I'm hoping Nintendo can pull off with the Wii.
Parent
Let the customers decide (Score:5, Informative)
Sometime in January, we'll see sales results and then someone can declare a "winner". Even that seems silly, since the two systems seem to cater to different audiences.
Heh. (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Most Promising Software Lineup (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Who writes this shit? (Score:5, Informative)
I don't have a single friend code in my DS and still can play online against other people. You don't see their codes, but you don't need them to play online. They're only useful if you want to play against specific people.
Maybe the author should do some research instead of pulling "facts" out of thin air.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
So I'm assuming we can all blame Dan Hsu.
Biased much? (Score:5, Informative)
And I especially like how he says Nintendo is entering the world of multiplayer gaming. First, they've had the WiFi Connection running for more than a year. Second, just because they haven't participated much in online multiplayer gaming, he ignores all of their other great multiplayer and party games. The way I see it, online games are second fiddle to offline multiplayer. I'd rather be together with my friends, but if that can't happen, we resort to using the internet to play together.
Wii Numbers (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Biased much? (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
The problem is that not all of us are kids (Score:3, Insightful)
As we all know, though, that opens up a huge can of worms: griefers, immaturity, and predators. Obviously it's not an easy thing to solve. But I wouldn't say Friend Codes solves it either, since it basically eliminates the features many people want. It's like cutting off a finger, whe
Canned chat is not good enough for many people (Score:3, Insightful)
I think you're confused. This is what I said: They want a true matchmaking experiencing, without canned chat
I know you can still do random/skill-based matchmaking. But missing the actual communication functionality is crucial to a lot of people
Re:Biased much? (Score:5, Funny)
I don't think kids should be knowing each other physically.
Parent
Multiplayer != online play (Score:5, Insightful)
That's strange, I remember playing Mario Kart in multiplayer mode, with friends, in the same living room. Oh, and I had Super-Smash-Brothers Melee too, multiplayer, same living room.
Heck, Nintendo has been making multiplayer games decades ago with Mario Bros.
Funny... that's not what I heard... [slashdot.org]Pointless Comparison (Score:2)
Re:Pointless Comparison (Score:5, Funny)
Oranges: Tart, high acidity, the skin is relatively non-edible, the #1 fruit for breakfast juice.
WINNER: Apples - Great in pie!
OOPS... did I forget to proofread?
Parent
Ho hum. (Score:4, Funny)
there are plenty of wii games (Score:5, Informative)
They only listed seven Wii games, while Nintendo's website has a list of 30 that will be available within 5 weeks of launch. That's a pretty damn impressive lineup, especially compared to what we're used to from Nintendo.
This is kind of a stupid article. (Score:5, Insightful)
The PS3 takes the cake with graphics because that was their goal. The best graphics hardware was not Nintendo's goal.
The Wii takes the cake with controls because that's what Nintendo's goal was... Sony instead chose to remain somewhat conservative by continuing to use its tried-and-true PSX controller layout.
So of course each one is going to win in each of its given categories, because it's the opposite of what the other company wanted to do with their respective console.
NEWS FLASH: The Wii is capable of playing games from NES, SNES, N64, GameCube, TurboGrafix, Genesis, and probably more...
And the PS3 can play Blu-Ray movies? Woop-dee freakin' doo. I don't know about everybody else, but I'm going to buy a gaming console to play games. If I want to watch movies, I'll buy a movie player.
Re:This is kind of a stupid article. (Score:4, Insightful)
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Many times, having multiple tools to do the job of one tool is more efficient and more useful.
PS3 vs. Xbox 360 vs. Wii (Score:5, Insightful)
First, the people who buy a PS3 before Christmas are going to be hardcore Playstation fans. The PS3 is in such short supply and costs so much, it will not be a casual purchase. Even if you're rich, you will have to track one down or pre-order it. The Wii is half the price of the PS3 and there will be an ample supply of them because Nintendo doesn't have production problems.
A price sensitive gamer will ignore the PS3. The Xbox 360 will become more affordable once Microsoft cuts it's price. Even with a price cut, the Xbox 360 will be more expensive than the Wii. But it won't be twice the price. Meaning that someone who is willing to pay for a Wii doesn't have to pay that much more for an Xbox 360. It comes down to consumer choice.
A gamer looking for high definition graphics will be comparing the PS3 and the Xbox 360. The Wii is limited to 480p, so someone who wants HD will ignore it. A gamer must decide whether they want to pay $100 to $200 extra for the PS3. There are certainly Xbox 360 games with high quality graphics. We will have to wait and see how PS3 games look.
I think that Xbox 360 demand is pretty high in the US. I only say this because there are deals being offered in Canada that are not being offered in the US. Maybe Americans tend to spend more on Christmas than Canadians.
Why the illusion of a controversy? (Score:5, Insightful)
The PS3 and Wii are aimed at two different markets - the PS3 is definitely not aimed at the cost-conscious gamer (why buy an HD-ready system if you can't afford HDTV) and the Wii is never going to please the people who want high-end, graphic intensive games, so comparing them feature-for-feature is useless. People who can't afford a PS3 won't get one. People who aren't interested in a Nintendo won't get one. People who can afford a PS3 may also get a Wii. For most people, it isn't a binary decision, so why the illusion of controversy?
1Up Is Awful (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Power Glove? (Score:4, Insightful)
The Wiimote is built into the console and is the foundation of Wii gameplay, is cheaper if you want extras, and is matched to a system capable of doing something useful with the nuanced input it is getting. I completely agree that it's appropriate to wait and see how it feels after using it a while before passing judgement good or bad. I just disagree that history gives me reason to doubt.
P.S. speaking of failed Nintendo add-on controllers, I don't hear many people mention whatever the hell they called that ridiculous light-bazooka for the SNES. Seriously, it was the size of a small shoulder-fired rocket launcher and was intended to be held the same way. I don't know what the hell that was about. A relative accidentally bought me a game that needed it, so I never played it, making it only a slightly better gift than Donkey Kong 3 was.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Mattel & Nintendo made a big deal about how you could actually turn the steering wheel in Rad Racer, or punch in Punch Out. While I never tried Punch Out, the former wasn't actually true. The Power Glove had a "center" that you calibrated for. Any time you moved your hand away from the virtual center, your character/car moved. To run/jump/accelerate you flexed your fingers inste
It's NOT the *Nintendo* Power Glove (Score:4, Informative)
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Re:Wii and PS3 aren't competitors (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm getting sick of this "kid friendly" thing. Sure, there are some Nintendo games that are going to be for kids, as there will be on the 360, and PS3. There will also be some "hardcore" gorefest games on the Wii, though in a lower proportion than to the other consoles (RE4 on GC?). But then again the only games that make the PS2 worthwhile to me happen to be the more kid friendly ones, like katamari, where the emphasis is more on fun than how many polys you can render gibs in. Most violent games are not actually for adults, they are for the 16-30 crowd, mature players realize that they were drawn to gaming for fun, pure and simple, and not pure violence.
Parent