The Xbox 360 Unveiled

You may or may not have caught the Xbox 360 unveiling on MTV Thursday night, but the internet will provide. A plethora of sites have photos, videos, commentary, specifications, and interviews about the new system. Your fellow readers have pulled together to provide links to: 1up.com, Joystiq, Gamespot, The BBC, CNN, NYT, Gamespy, Team Xbox, Voodoo Extreme, Anandtech, and eToyChest. The official Xbox 360 site opened last night as well for word straight from the source. For more official images Ourcolony.net has been 'solved', and now features an OurColony specific video preview. Finally, for commentary on the event, the Video Game Ombudsman provides an alternative to the press releases. From the post: "Kyle Orland (9:28:42 PM): The future of gaming is a girl in a blue dress? Dan Dormer (9:28:47 PM): The future of gaming is a girl with a bag? Kyle Orland (9:28:57 PM): She's the Xbox! OMG!"

Sweet!

[republican gourd]

Nothing like 6 months to a year of lead-time to make yourself the next Dreamcast.

Why this strategy from MS?

[Anonymous Coward]

The specs look amazing but I have to ask:

Why is Microsoft making it difficult to write games that run on both PC (Windows XP) and XBox 360?

One of the primary reasons I use Windows is for games. If game developers stop writing for Windows because they move to XBox 360, then it'll make it even easier for me to go all FreeBSD or Linux or Mac OSX.

Wouldn't it have been easier for XBox 360 to have a Windows XP or Windows Mobile 2005 foundation with just a custom explorer interface to make it look less-PC?

Does it run old X-Box games?

[DrXym]

It had better, or it's going to have serious problems convincing people to use it.

Aside from that, if the BBC site is correct, it seems that device is not a digital media hub at all. It seems rather stupid (to say the least) that they didn't think to make the thing a PVR. The last generation of boxes had the excuse, but a PVR / media station is almost an expectation of something which expects to occupy a permenant space by the TV.

Still, it'll be interesting to see what Sony produce. If they have sense, they will make it a PVR, and a media jukebox, and a kickass console with backwards compatibility. If it can do all those things when the XBox can't then I don't see they have much to worry about. Better yet if they make it hackable - not so hackable that people can easily pirate games but just enough that people can play around with the box and produce cool things for it.

Re:30 minutes? Actually its an infomercial.

[Anonymous Coward]

The entire premise of MTV is to show informercials (aka music videos).

And the winner is...

[MosesJones]

Well lets face it IBM. If XBox 360 wins (anyone noticed that you do 360 to end up back in the same place?) then its IBM processors at the core. If its PS3, then its... IBM processors at the core.

All those box numbers, all that volume, all those cheap servers.

XBox or PS3, doesn't matter as Intel lose.

(But please let it be PS3 that wins as its actually innovative rather than a re-hash of off the shelf stuff and (as ever with MS) no R&D).

Re:Backward compat

[UnknowingFool]

Microsoft is not guaranteeing backwards compatibility so that nobody can hold them to that promise. If they happen to get it to work, they can trumpet it. If they can't, no one can say that they promised it.

Re:Why this strategy from MS?

[Anonymous Coward]

I think you have missed a few presentations where Microsoft has said they are building their tool sets to make it EASIER to build games on both platforms.

Re:boy did it suck!

[wvitXpert]

As you get closer and closer to photo-realism the size of the leaps gets smaller. Think about the amount of time game developers would have to spend just to take full advantage of the graphics (forgetting about gameplay). It could take years to develop games that fully show off the graphics power of the next-gen consoles. All we saw on MTV were early renders of alpha games. I expect them to look a bit better on release, but still you can only get so realistic.

Re:PowerPC CPU?

[Breakfast Pants]

Microsoft can garuntee that it will buy x amount of these processors for this thing over the course of its life. Apple can garuntee that it can buy y amount of these processors and constantly stop buying as much as they move up to higher and higher specs as time passes. Now the kicker, Microsoft's x is bigger than Apple's y. Much bigger.

Re:PowerPC CPU?

[Astatine]

That would still be a lot of heat to dissipate from such a small box if the Xbox360's CPU really was equivalent to three G5s as seen in the high end Power Macs. Remember, liquid cooling isn't a "magic wand", connecting a radiator with an 80mm fan (say) to a liquid cooling circuit with the CPU on doesn't give you any benefit if you can attach the same size radiator directly to the CPU, the benefit comes from taking the heat away from the CPU and dissipating it through a much bigger radiator elsewhere (of which there is no sign on the Xbox360 enclosure).

No, these are stripped-down CPU cores.

Re:Does it run old X-Box games?

[jason_hutchens]

Backwards compatibility just ain't worth the trouble. I mean, seriously, what percentage of people playes PS1 games on their PS2? If you upgrade from your existing console, why not keep your old console around? And if you're new to the console, why would you buy old games? Playing PS1 games on a PS2 is a gimmick. Nothing more.

And the reason the 360 doesn't function as a PVR is that there's no way to make money from it. Sure, you sell another 360, but you're probably losing money on that in the first place. Instead, Gates will announce a video-on-demand service at E3, you mark my words. Steal Jobs' thunder AND one-up Sony in one fell move.

Microsoft need one more big announcement to trump Sony at E3. They can't have revealed their hand yet. Likewise, Sony need to out-do Microsoft. And what do they have? Seriously, it feels that Microsoft might win this one.

Of course, Apple and Sony could band together. Jobs could announce video-on-demand for the iTMS (which is widely predicted) and Sony could announce that PS3 will be able to access the iTMS. Furthermore, Apple could license iPod production to Sony, so they can get out of that market as it plateaus to focus on turning iTMS into their primary revenue stream.

Idle speculation, nothing more.

Re:PowerPC CPU?

[John Harrison]

I think that your prediction about the system being quikcly outstipped by new PC games might be inaccurate. Remember that the great advantage of a console is that it gives developers a single, stable target. They can write engines that utilize its full potential. Even so, it will take some time before anybody puts together AI and physics systems complex enough to really tax this thing.

PC games on the other hand, have to target a wider audience. It will probably be some time before PC games are designed with a multi-proc/core system in mind

Taking Advantage

[Tony]

Think about the amount of time game developers would have to spend just to take full advantage of the graphics (forgetting about gameplay).

No kiddin'. It was years before PS1 games were taking full advantage of the hardware. Same with PS2 games; compare R&C Up Your Aresenal to Rayman or any of the other early PS2 games, or event the first R&C. Big, big difference. The good thing is, it keeps the console fresh.

The XBox wasn't that big of deal because it was essentially a PC. The difference between Halo and Halo 2 wasn't really that great. With the XBox 360 being a different beast, there might be a huge difference between the first run games and the later games, as people learn to take advantage of the hardware.

Maybe.

Re:Does it run old X-Box games?

[DrXym]

Ask Sony if backwards compatibility is worth the trouble. It's not important how many people play PS1 games now but how many played them around launch time when there is a dearth of titles for the new box but plenty for the old one. It's about continuity - reassuring Mum & Dad that the new console doesn't render Johnny's old games obsolete.

It's interesting that you mention iTMS. Imagine that Apple produced iPod2 which dumped AAC for something else which is supposedly superior. Would that be a dumb thing or a smart thing to do considering how much people had invested already in AAC?

As for the PVR, yes there is a way to make money from it. A shitload of money. You sell listings. You bundle them with your XBox Live Platinum subscriptions and make even more money. You sell video & music on demand. You bundle everything into an MSN sub and make even more money.

Re:Backward compat

[ffejie]

Also, even if they know it's not backwards compatible, they don't want to announce it now. That would hurt current sales of games for the current XBox, because a lot of people see them as an investment. By keeping quiet on it, they can announce no backwards compatibility when it comes out so as to not hurt sales of old games.

Re:Backward compat

[Troed]

Software emulation for compatibility has never been attempted professionally in the console arena

Nintendo has NES, SNES and N64 emulators written and used as bonuses in Gamecube games.

$500?

[Johnny Mnemonic]

How in the hell is this box supposed to sell for less than $500, even after Microsoft's subsidy? I mean, holy crap. I think either of these things is going on:

• Those aren't your father's IBM 970s. How much they bear in relation to the 64bit PPCs shipping in Macs I think remains to be seen.
• Microsoft is going to untold lengths to subsidize these boxes, in the expectation that they'll make it up with Live subscriptions and game licensing. Like cellphone providers.
• Microsoft could have seriously missed the market. I'm sure they've done extensive market research; they're known for that. Even so, I have hard time believing that anyone is going to pay >$500 for a console. Maybe they know that the the Sony PS3 is going to be $500 too, so they feel safe in developing this kinda thing? Anyways, if it it's more than $150 more than the PS3, I think we can kiss it goodbye, no matter how much it rules.

If this ships with three real CPUs that are mostly similar to the ones that Apple uses, for less than $500, lots of Apple fanbois, myself included, are going to wonder wtf is up with that, and why Apple can't do the same. I think there is still a lot that remains to be seen.

Nvidia is the problem...

[CalTrumpet]

XBox games don't use a full 3D abstraction layer, like many DirectX or OpenGL games do. They are directly targeted (and optimized) for the Nvidia GPU, and the firmware and GPU compiler technology for the first XBox's graphics system probably belongs to Nvidia.

After such a big embarassing loss to ATI on the X360, it is highly unlikely that Nvidia would agree to license their technology for inclusion in a software emulator on the new platform.

Interestingly enough, MSFT has made some acquisitions over the last couple of years that point to building such emulation (VirtualPC, JIT scode conversion technologies), but it might be for naught if there is a legal barrier on the graphics chip.

I know, sucks.

Re:Introducing a joke you will get sick of quickly

[Anonymous Cow herd]

I disagree... GTA:SA is the perfect example of a game that's too ambitious for it's hardware; it would have been much better suited to a next-gen console. The graphics were grainy (although the textures were OK), jaggies all over the place, and you get some serious performance issues in key parts of the game. Don't get me wrong, the game itself is pretty good and a blast, but the lackluster hardware performance (especially texture load time! Driving over not-yet-rendered bridges is weird) seriously hampered my enjoyment of the game.

Re:Backward compat

[angrist]

If they get it to work, they can slap it on a disk and charge $50 for the "enhancement." Just like they did for DVD playback on the original.

Re:Introducing a joke you will get sick of quickly

[tomstdenis]

What? ok... we obviously play games for different reasons.

BTW the exact reason for the "not yet rendered" [it is actually rendering btw] is CD load time. The model for the city is in memory but not the textures [they're rotated out LRU style]. So if you drive super fast you're going faster than the CD can access/load the data [seems odd]. Thus the game engine just renders transparent surfaces.

If you drive fast enough you can occasionally see the green backing of the interstate signs blank and just have the white wireframe text up... it's funny.

Anyways, I find the game a sufficiently pleasant waste of time even with that shortcomming.

When I look at games like the old Splinter cells [chaos theory is good imo] they're nice looking games that are way too hard to play. I don't play for work ... I play to waste time.

In GTA I can hop on a quadbike and go on a murder spree. That's not only fun but it's educational in case I have todo it in real life.

Tom

Re:But.

[scottme]

Nah. It's only got a 20GB hard drive, which is either a case of cost engineering or someone's idea of a joke.

Re:PowerPC CPU?

[aero6dof]

The really funny part is that the XBox PowerPC buy goes to further the research and manufacturing of the core chip technology driving Apple Hardware.

Re:It's a nice thought

[WNight]

That was true, but now the time to optimize a big game enough to matter through all the machine-specific tricks often isn't available. There are a lot of tricks that depend on having fixed specs - only have one resolution of textures, etc, but the specific register, tweaking code order optimizations just can't be done in a practical time and they are what used to make consoles so amazing. If it can't be done in the API, game developers aren't going to do it. In the days of the NES it was more practical - much of the code would be hand-tweaked ASM anyways.

Re:Sweet!

[aftk2]

Or the next PS2.

...not Intel

[tgibbs]

It is interesting, isn't it, that nobody is now using Intel who is not locked into it by a commitment to legacy code? All 3 new game machines are using PowerPC processors.

And I wouldn't be surprised if the OS of XBox360 is based on Windows. Perhaps Microsoft will follow Apple's example with the 68K to PowerPC transition and release a PowerPC based Windows PC that runs old applications in emulation.

After all, they already own VirtualPC...

Re:PowerPC CPU?

[Anonymous Coward]

The really funny part is that the XBox PowerPC buy goes to further the research and manufacturing of the core chip technology driving Apple Hardware.

Or from a different viewpoint, Apple paid for all the research the led up to the current Xbox chip.

Re:But.

[Anonymous Coward]

20 GB is plenty of room for all of your saved games, sound files, etc. With plenty of space left over to cache an entire DVD.

You'll note that it's too small to store a large quantity of ripped dvd images to play with a mod chip. That's not an accident.