The Next-Gen Odd Couple

1up.com is running a lengthy piece talking to Microsoft VP J. Allard and Sony Computers of America President Kaz Hirai about what exactly the 'next generation' of consoles are about. The article is informative and varied, with talk about Xbox Live, the launch of the Xbox and PSX, and what past efforts from Sony and Microsoft will mean as the newest front in the console war heats up. From the article: "OPM: What are the benefits of being first to market, much like the Dreamcast was? What are the pitfalls? JA: Good question. I'd say one of the pitfalls from a competitive point of view is that you don't know what the other guys are doing, and to be frank, the guys over at Sony have been very good at not telling anyone what they're doing. It's tough to tell where they're going with the PS3. The other tough thing is that you're under the microscope [when you're first]. [Sony] shows two movies and a product that you can't touch behind a piece of glass, and that's what you get to write about on them."

Re:"Next Gen" is a buzzword

[cyberbob2010]

Saturn was not "next generation". They intended the machine to be a 2d powerhouse with CD media. They didn't even integrate 3d features until they saw what they were up against with Sony and even then they just threw some stuff on the original 2d board. Ever open up a Saturn? Uuuuuuuuuuuuuuugly.

Question about xbox live

[Yahweh Doesn't Exist]

is a live subscription a broadband service, or do you need a broadband connection in the first place?

just interested, either way I'm getting the Revolution. I don't buy MS or Sony products, partly because I hate those two companies' practices but mainly because they just don't make products that I'm at all interested in. the Revolution is the only console that offers something genuinely new, plus I like Nintendo games.

plus it's the cheapest and my gamecube games and controllers will still work (for "conventional" games). I don't know how the internet connection will compare but that isn't important to me since I don't think my home connection would be up to standards.

Pah, the article is crap right at the start

[SmallFurryCreature]

on the other, you have a U.S.-based company whose fortune was made off operating systems for the PC and whose number of years in the videogame industry can be counted on a single hand.

I am sorry? Exactly when was did MS get involved with flight simulator (first a non-ms game but now firmly owned by ms) vs Sony involvement with games? I spot it as MS being almost a full decade earlier. In 1982 MS licensed the program from sublogic to be released on the IBM-PC (before it had been on all the other platforms of the day but NOT that new fangled thingy). The playstation doesn't make an entry until 1994. (Oh and it even seems that MS flight simulator as it would become known was no fluke but actually commisioned by Bill Gates himself wich would explain why such an odd product would keep being developed)

Or do PC games not count as video games? When an article doesn't even do basic research how worthy can the rest of it be?

So for your info. MS has for a very long time had a game division for its operating platform and continues to do so. Sony wich became a game player much later in live also has a big PC division, almost all of its MMO titles for one. MS of course already had experience with the ancestor of live, MSN chat and similar software. Sony of course did not. MS was late to the internet and the whole online idea but not as late as sony so it is no wonder that the x-box was the first console to have a large online component.

Argh I am bored with this. Game journalists should be shot.

The Dreamcast was a good system

[WickedClean]

There was nothing wrong with the Dreamcast system! Of many of the same games made for it and the PS1 were better on the Dreamcast. For example: The Gauntlet Legacy game. The DC had nice controllers and a wide selection of games, including Shenmue. It just got swamped by the competition, which had more money to play with and could afford to lose more.

If you poke around online, it is not hard to find emulator programs for the Dreamcast so that you could play Genesis or even SNES games on it. How cool is that?

Next Gen is about lock-in

[Generic Guy]

I was just reading a blurb in Game Informer magazine, about some 'patented' process Sony is working on with PS3 to undercut the used game market. Something to do with tying your game disc to your specific console. This and the reported Blu-Ray DRM which can disable your machine makes the Sony rootkit fiasco look tame by comparison.

Microsoft has been moving full steam ahead with Xbox Live, offering downloads for sale right into your 360's hard drive. I think it is both interesting and embarassing for MS that one of the most engaging Xbox 360 titles is a $5 download called Geometry Wars. But again, this is about locking in your customers, so you can nickel and dime them to death. I find it ironic that Microsoft touts media freedom with the 360, but you need a pricey MCE2005 PC setup to use it and it still doesn't support xvid nor divx MP4 videos.

If this is what they are offering customers this time around, I'm much more interested in seeing what Nintendo has to offer.

Re:Just make good gaming rigs

[JPriest]

Yes but they have to spend all that cash on powerful hardware, high capacity disk readers, and network capibility anyway just so people can play games. Not to mention Hi-Def etc. If they have to build in 98% of what is required for an "all in one" device they might as well throw in the software to be able to do things like watch movies on it since they are 99% of the way there anyway.

IIRC many people I knew that purchased the PS2 didn't own DVD players at the time. The inital cost seemed expensive but if you subtract the cost of a new DVD player it no longer seemed quite so expensive. This may again prove to be the case with Sony and HD-DVD.

Re:revolution in gaming

[CastrTroy]

In case you didn't realize, Nintendo did this for a reason. At the time, optical media was deathly slow. N64 chose to stick with cartidges so that they wouldn't have loading times. I applaud them for this. Loading times on the PS1 were terrible. Same goes for the GameCube. It has much better load times (most of the time not even having load times), which is greate compared to the XBox and PS2. I'm not sure if it has anything to do with the disc. Also, Nintendo games don't cost any more than PS2 or XBox, so the fact that they control the manufacturing means nothing. I applaud Nintendo for keeping loading times out of games, where everyone else has failed.

Re:what?

[hollismb]

The XBOX 360, while mative 720p, will also convert the video signal to 1080i, so even those with tvs that don't support 720p can still play in High Definition. FYI.