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XBox (Games)

Where is MS Taking the 360? 48

Posted by Zonk from the someplace-shiny dept.
The Inquirer has an article up asking the question where is Microsoft taking the 360? The author had a chance to sit down with UK Xbox head man Stephen McGill to get a sense of what they want to do. From the article: "You gotta love the PR hype and mud slinging that goes on during the run up to a really, really major competitive product launch. Sony and Microsoft are at loggerheads over their upcoming next-generation releases, and while we have all the tech specs (relatively) nailed and the hype about what will make each console Gods Gift to 14 Year Olds, what about the actual direction in which the two companies are pulling their franchises?"
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Where is MS Taking the 360? More

Where is MS Taking the 360?

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  • Where is MS Taking the 360? (Score:5, Funny)

    by acxr is wasted ( 653126 ) * on Friday July 22, 2005 @10:39PM (#13141636)
    Around in circles!

    jerk

  • V-chips (Score:4, Insightful)

    by warmgun ( 669556 ) on Friday July 22, 2005 @10:44PM (#13141654)
    Five will get you twenty that now they're considering putting in a V-chip style device. What better feature to advertise to parents than the ability to lock out Mature or Adults Only games in light of the recent ridiculousness?
    • I'm offering 1 : 10 odds on the kids figuring out their way around V-chip type mechanisms within a month of launch.
      • As long as the parents don't know about it (the ones who have NOT bought the 360), it doesn't matter.

        V-chip is just a marketing scheme. Its intention may have been something else, but the end product is just for marketing.

        I have methods on my TV and cable box to block adult content, but I have no idea how to use them. My fear is that I will set them up to block the kids out, but then I'll never figure out how to watch the late-night sex shows on HBO.

        God forbid I miss those...

    • Re:V-chips (Score:4, Informative)

      by Suddenly_Dead ( 656421 ) on Friday July 22, 2005 @11:07PM (#13141793)
      Eh, the Xbox had a parental lock as well. You could set maximum game ratings (ESRB) and movie ratings, protected by a password.

      I'm not sure, but I wouldn't doubt that the PS2 had the feature as well.
      • I had remembered that shortly after I made the post. But how much you want to bet that the feature will be getting more adspace and promotion for the new system?

        • Re:V-chips (Score:3, Informative)

          by Suddenly_Dead ( 656421 )
          Actually, I Googled it, and this does sort of add something new. Apparently, when you set up a profile for the system (it supports multiple user accounts, sort of like a PC, for storing seperated save games and settings in a house with multiple gamers), you can set the person's age. If the parent wishes, they can instruct the Xbox 360 to automatically restrict games based on the age.

          It's not really any different functionally from the old way, it must makes it easier and doesn't require knowledge of the ESR
          • You mean you used to play games that would have gotten a T rating when you were younger than 13 and have grown up fine, right? IIRC, the ESRB has only been around since 1994. Had you been 12 then, you'd be around 23 now. The game companies would still usually have some lower limit on player age printed on the box, but it was a statement rather than a box containing a big letter. You had to read the box to see it. Same here, but I did most of my young gaming with friends whose parents also played video games
      • The PS2 does indeed have this feature.
  • Franchises? You mean the console? From what I can tell, the Xbox 360 is going to be a media box that happens to play games. It does TV, DVDs, streams movies and music, lets you buy music, wire into a PC, and all this other stuff that could pretty much remove every other piece of media hardware in your basement. Well, it probably could. Oh, did I mention it plays games too? That's pretty neat. Sony appears to be taking the same route, being a media company at heart anyway. And as for Nintendo, they d

  • Wired Mag has Great X-Box Article (Score:4, Interesting)

    by DavidD_CA ( 750156 ) on Friday July 22, 2005 @11:09PM (#13141806) Homepage
    This article from Wired really gave a good perspective of where Microsoft is taking the X-Box:

    http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/13.06/xbox.html [wired.com]

    From that article:

    For Allard, Xbox 360 is all about gaming. For Microsoft, it's about gaming - and a whole lot more. The big picture isn't 10 million hardcore gamers trash-talking one another over a massively multiplayer version of Halo 3. It's 100 million Middle Americans using Xbox 360 as the linchpin of their Windows-powered digital home.
    • I am thrilled about the expansion of the Xbox 360. I'll be buying one no matter what...but the idea that I can stream my pictures and music to my Xbox from my PC sounds great. I am planning on buying a new speaker system just for the music that is streamed over. My wife doesn't like the idea yet, but she is going away to visit some friends next weekend, and that is a good time to add some in-wall speakers....

      I know there are methods to stream the content now- but I am not going to put any effort into my

  • Real 360 Devkits Slower Than G5s (Score:1, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward
    http://xbox360.ign.com/articles/636/636018p1.html [ign.com]

    Ouch!

    Maybe this is why we aren't seeing anything from the 360? Sounds like the real 360 hardware is giving sub-E3 type performance.

    Sounds like developers are having a real hard time with the 360 hardware. Only a few months away from shipping, this doesn't sound good for launch titles.

    • The article actually mentions again and again that the Beta devkits (incidentally the Alphas running G5s were "real devkits" too) have better performance (though still not up to the final level) than the last ones. Apparently these kits were actually supposed to hit pre-E3, which is one of the reasons things were a little more underwhelming than they should have been.

      It's an interesting article to read, but I am not sure what the anonymous parent is referring to.
    • Did you even bother to read the article you referenced?

      * What gamers want to know, however, is will the games look better than the early versions at E3? Will they run with fast framerates and look spectacular? All of the developers' indirect answers leaned to "Yes." How will that happen? The Beta Kits are simply more powerful than the Alpha Kits. They're a better, closer representation to the final console's power.

      * "They're better than the Alpha Kits," said one local developer. "They're still not quite a
    • That article seems like an attempt to put problems in a positive light, without outright lying.

      The games are harder to make, but that's a good thing. For some ill-definted reason. Same for price! Yeah! More artists. That's good, or something. I guess.

  • huh? (Score:2, Informative)

    by AaronBrethorst ( 860210 )
    The author of the FA refers to an XML development standard that will ease writing software for the XBox 360. I'm guessing he's actually referring to XNA and XNA Studio [microsoft.com].

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