Microsoft isn't so bad once you get to know them

[buffgod]

Microsoft has the ability and money to produce some of the best video games around, why does evyone dislike them so? I mean they did create many things that we use today and yet many people still hate them. Why?

[ElVaquero]

Because it's trendy.

[DARK OSAMU]

Because they are whores. I hate them mostly because of the X-Box. I'll not get into it but it is a BIG list of reasons.

[Schultz]

Originally posted by buffgod
Microsoft has the ability and money to produce some of the best video games around, why does evyone dislike them so? I mean they did create many things that we use today and yet many people still hate them. Why?

I would like to see what titles you say microsoft makes the best..
Halo.. produced by a company that microsoft bought out to have it Xbox Only for its release.. and basically screwed us Computer gamers out of a great game for like 2 years..

2nd i would like to point out that Microsoft has axed there Sports games on the Xbox.. they won't be making anymore.. because they didn't do as good as they wanted and so they are not going to bother with making the next lineup of them..

and from what i have seen most great games are not made my Microsoft themselves.. they have a sub company produce them for them.. and they just stick there name on them...

[buffgod]

What about the idea that The xbox has greater power on all levels interms of the video game console platform. Has nice highly unused Hard drive and is now 149$. Developers like the infrastructure of the xbox etc. I mean they did put out a nice product comparitavely. Don't you think if reseident evil and final fantasy and other greats came out on the xbox it would be the prefered system to have. I feel that comsumers are being short changed because of hard ware short coming of ps2 and game cube.

[Prophet Hero]

Originally posted by buffgod
What about the idea that The xbox has greater power on all levels interms of the video game console platform. Has nice highly unused Hard drive and is now 149$. Developers like the infrastructure of the xbox etc. I mean they did put out a nice product comparitavely. Don't you think if reseident evil and final fantasy and other greats came out on the xbox it would be the prefered system to have. I feel that comsumers are being short changed because of hard ware short coming of ps2 and game cube.

Surely you don't believe 'power=best' regardless? Power is great, but think how many Xbox developers actually use it. At the moment Tecmo is the only developer that's really pushing the Xbox. In fact you even mentioned that the Xbox has a "highly unused Hard drive (sic)".

I believe that it's the games that are important and not the machine itself regardles if it's from Microsoft, Nintendo or Sony.

If Resident Evil and Final Fantasy did switch to Xbox then sales would increase because those are two very popular franchises. People would buy an addtional console or migrate from other platforms because of the games.

I completely disagree with your last point. I think consumers are short-changed when they're offered tired gameplay, sloppy programming and poor controls - hardware has nothing to do with it and certainly not the "short coming of the ps2 and game cube (sic)"

Plus, if anyone is being short-changed at the moment it's Xbox owners in particular. It's the Xbox that doesn't get many games that exploit it's potential. It's the Xbox that gets lazy conversions. Therefore, you should be pointing the finger of blame at developers rather than the PS2 and Cube.

If the PS2 or Cube version of multi-format title is weak, perhaps because of hardware shortcomings you say they have, then it's up to the Xbox arm of the developing studio to produce a conversion that fully realises the Microsoft machine's power, right? Or would it be easier and just to port over the PS2 version, spending less money and making a bigger profit? You simply cannot blame the weaknesses of the PS2 and Cube in this instance.

Namco has provided the best example of how to approach multi-format titles with Soul Calibur II. It can be said that the PS2 is the weakest (graphically) of the three and that the Xbox is visually superior to the Cube, but has the consumer been short-changed? I don't think so. Every SC fan gets an excellent version of the game regardless of what console they own and if you own all three machines you get to choose what bonus character you prefer.

I think a more fair comment is that all console owners are short-changed when developers don't strive to get the best out of each of the three consoles. Like the Xbox, the full power of the PS2 and the Cube is rarely exploited - it's only when you get real experts behind titles (usually first party and second party developers with the exception of Hideo Kojima and Capcom's RE4 team) that you see the power of these consoles and the results are stunning, e.g. MGS3, RE4.

[buffgod]

It's all about the games. The game dictate the death or the continuation of a videogame console. It's kind of scary if you think about it. You could have the most amzing hardware out but no one willing to create for it and the lame hard ware with the games winns the the best hard ware dies in obscurity. It sound like a tough business.

[Schultz]

Originally posted by buffgod
What about the idea that The xbox has greater power on all levels interms of the video game console platform. Has nice highly unused Hard drive and is now 149$. Developers like the infrastructure of the xbox etc. I mean they did put out a nice product comparitavely. Don't you think if reseident evil and final fantasy and other greats came out on the xbox it would be the prefered system to have. I feel that comsumers are being short changed because of hard ware short coming of ps2 and game cube.

Well for one you are wrong.. the Xbox don't have greater power on all levels.. Each system is built with its own design and intention.. The ps2 has an actual True 128bit processer which can be split into two 64bit processors.. and also more units it can use.. the PS2 is very hard to develop for.. because it is done totally different then a normal computer is.. Look at it this way.. People are trying to build a PS2 Emulator but even a 3ghz+ computer can only get a few fps outta it.. because its such a hard arch to work with.. but we now have a Xbox Emulator running a game at full speed on the same.. why because an Xbox is exactly like a Cpu in ALL ways.. with a NVidia graphics card..

Also the Gamecube can do lighting effects way better then the Xbox or PS2 can because it has extensions built into the cpu and gpu which make it easy for developers to work when it comes to lighting..

also the fact that all 3 units are based on different types of CPU you can't compare them just with there MHZ.. just because i have a
3ghz decalpha chip.. doesn't mean it can beat a 2ghz x86 cpu.. because the x86 can actually process more with the lower ghz because of different chip structures..

But i will agree fully with Prophet Hero.. its not about the systems anymore.. because i belive that the nextgen consoles it won't be about the graphics.. because they have hit there plateu.. it won't get that much better it will be about how well the game makers actually make the games and how bad or well they do ports of them to other consoles.. My perfect example of this is Bloodreign for Gamecube. it was a direct Port of the Ps2 and they didn't even bother changing allowing you to select stuff with the menus with the analog stick.. you had to use the small D pad on the GC controllers to do it.. which got annoying.. 1 simple thing they could of changed that would of made things alot better for the port..

[ElVaquero]

If the console fight is about games then the Dreamcast wins.

[Schultz]

Originally posted by ElVaquero
If the console fight is about games then the Dreamcast wins.

Yea it sucks teh Dreamcast did have some awesome games.. Especially for RPG lovers..

[buffgod]

I often reflect how the cool the dream cast was then I saw Ps2 and was not amazed, then I saw the Xbox that was the next exciting thing in video games in terms of graphics. Dreamcast started the video game movement, it's to bad that id died due to ps2 favortism.

[Prophet Hero]

Yep, the Dreamcast is a fine machine. As well as RPGs it's home to some glorious 2D beat-em-ups (I still prefer these over the 3D titles) and because of this it's the only console for which I've bought an Arcade stick.

Originally posted by buffgod
Dreamcast started the video game movement, it's to bad that id died due to ps2 favortism.

Although it's not the sole reason I like to blame EA's decision not to support the Dreamcast as a significant factor in the machine's eventual demise.

True, without EA the Dreamcast wasn't plagued by FIFA updates and other mainstream titles and so became very much a 'gamer's console'. However, given the choice between wading through crappy titles and the Dreamcast flourishing...

[morgorath]

Example time... ANybody remeber the 3DO. It was beyond it's time when it hit the market. A game like FF7 on the 3DO would have set a level that we might still be trying to reach today. BUt then we fall back into what is the norm of the gaming world. We don't care about the specs ( some of us do but for other reasons) we care about content. Now the 3DO had some killer thing going for it but since it was first off way too pricy and second no real third party support it failed.

On the other hand look at the GBA this has been a system that has had so many short comings that the Big N didn't even care to fix and it still did well. What Shortcomings you ask? First generation GB was a sucubis to battery life. GBC could have flopped until N dropped the price. GBA a great design that was backwards capable, but the lack of backlighting caused a lot of gamers to wait and the N answered with the GBA:SP which has a short coming of it's own you can't listen to headphones with out adaptor (ok minor) but you can't charge the system and play FF:CC at the same time either (that blows)
But it still beat everything that came out to compete with it. Hell Wonder Swan won't even come to the states becuase it is afraid of going under. And why because GBA has the games and a price that we all find nice...

[buffgod]

You make a good point morgorath!

[Zagatto]

Umm.... Morgorath... did you ever actually play a 3DO for any amount of time? Sure it was one of the first game systems to use disc technology for games and had some impressive numbers behind it but the games all SUCKED HARD.

The controls were slow and jerky.
The graphics were slow and jerky (although they were pretty).
There wasn't any depth to anything that was developed for it.

The 3DO was blown away by the Sega CD which came out just one year later and was considerably cheaper.

The best thing that happened to 3DO was them shutting down the hardware division of the company and focusing on software (a tactic later taken by Atari and Sega).