Archive for January, 2006
I’m sure all of us remember seeing the madden footage on MTV or ESPN back in late April 2005. The press was buzzing, and future Xbox360 owners were salivating ! Fast forward a few months, and Madden 2006 is in our hands, and my reaction is very mixed.
The good: Graphics are top notch, stadiums look great, and the game controls feel solid.
The bad: Features are weak. There is no owner’s mode or training camp, no spring training details, no goals, no team management , etc. The mini-camp is gone, although EA promises that it will return in ‘07.
The ugly: Jaggies, vysnc/video tearing problems, and slow downs ! I’m running with HD component cables ( plan to try VGA soon ), and I get jaggies, some video tears, and some slow downs at the end of plays ( obviosuly cables are not at fault here ). For a top game game like this, I would expect perfection.
Conclusion: If you must have a football game, go pick this up, since it’s the only game in town. For anyone else, this game was rushed out, so skip it this year, and plan on getting the 2007 version.
Technorati Tags: madden06, xbox360
January 28th, 2006
Mega publisher EA Games has cut the prices for games by $10 to $20, according to a report issued Thursday by Banc of America analyst Gary Cooper. Games that have been cut from $49.99 to $39.99 include Burnout Revenge, NBA Live 06, NASCAR 06, Tiger Woods 06, The Sims 2: Nightlife, and the PSP’s Need for Speed Underground Rivals.
“At EA, we make pricing decisions on a title-by-title, market-by-market basis,” said spokesman Jeff Brown to Reuters. “As we’ve said in our quarterly reports, this point in the console transition is historically marked by softness in pricing.”
On thestreet.com, they did some quick research and noted:
The cuts apparently don’t affect games made for the latest-generation Xbox 360. Indeed, while GameStop’s Web site and Amazon.com, for example, are charging just $29.99 and $26.95, respectively, for Madden for the PlayStation 2, they’re both still asking $59.99 for the Xbox 360 version of the game.
So no discounts yet for us Xbox360 owners. Might want to try renting a game or download a demo before dropping $60 for a single title.
January 23rd, 2006
If you have Xbox Live, walk — no run, and download the demo !
Fight Night 3 on an HD setup is simply an incredible looking game. Definitely one of the first truly ‘Next Gen’ games we have seen.
Release date is scheduled for late February, but you can play the demo now or check out these amazing screenshots:
Technorati Tags: Xbox360, Fight Night 3
January 18th, 2006
We posted earlier about our game rental research, and how we selected GameFly. Now for an update.
Two games shipped on Jan 3rd, 2006. They both arrived on Tues Jan 10th. Given that it was shipped in CA, and I live in NYC, I was expecting it to take about a week, and was not surprised that it arrived on the 10th.
The games arrived in nice red envelopes with GameFly branding. I didn’t have a chance to open them up when they first arrived, and when I returned home later that day I could not find them ! Turns out my wife mistook the envelopes for AOL CD junk mail and tossed them ! I was quickly able to retrieve them from the top of the kitchen garbage, but a warning to all of you out there, they do look very much like promotional / junk mail :) I also was concerned that since they were marked as coming from GameFly that they would be targets for mail theft.
Inside the envelopes were pre paid envelopes for shipping it back. No instructions are included for the game, but they do post all the info on the GameFly site (ex: PGR3 ) — which is a nice touch. I now also have the option to purchase the game for $44.95, which if I choose to do, GameFly will send me the original case and manual.
I’ll post another update once I get a few rounds in of returning and requesting other games.
January 13th, 2006
According to the the theinquirer.net, HD porn is on it’s way to the Xbox360.
A production company, High Def Home Entertainment (HDHE), in conjunction with Arrow Productions, is set to release “Deep Throat” in 720p HD. They will ship 2 DVDs, one standard low-rez and the other encoded with Windows Media (WMV) 720p files.
As we all know, the Xbox360 is the only mainstream home electronics device capable of playing windows WMV files.
The inquirer story recounts that:
Arrow was in the middle of cleaning it up when they found the original masters, so they threw out what they had done and used the clean copy. They ended up with the first new copy of the movie in decades, all in glorious HD. For the XBox360. Only for the XBox360.
There is also another story here discussing plans by another company, Lurid, to also provide porn in HD. They were showing off their latest setup at the AVN show this year:
Lurid was giving away an XBox360 on their stand because it is one of the only consumer devices out there that can do HD movies at the consumer level. In the above picture, they are streaming smut from a MCE05 PC to an 360, and as you can clearly see from the pictures, the quality is great. You can see every little [not a chance that this will make it in, so I will censor it myself], and the donkey too. Without Microsoft and the XBox360 team, we would not have true high quality filth, thanks guys.
Porn has been the killer app for film, vhs, dvds, and broadband internet access. Will it be the same for the Xbox 360 ?
Technorati Tags: xbox360, hd-dvd, hd porn, Deep Throat, Lurid, High Def Home Entertainment warning: some technorati links may not be work-safe
January 13th, 2006
As we discussed the HD-DVD add-on the other day, we had no idea that Blu-Ray was even a posibility.
But Peter Moore, Microsoft’s dean of all things Xbox, made some shocking statements to a Japaneese site called ITmedia. Moore was quoted as saying that Microsoft would offer their external DVD player in Blu-Ray format if somehow the standard war settled on Blu-Ray.
Microsoft reps were quick to go in to damage control saying:
“Microsoft firmly stands behind the HD-DVD format as the best choice for our consumers, the question of whether the Xbox 360 has the flexibility to adapt to consumers’ needs is a different issue entirely.”
The statment also mentioned that the Xbox 360 is:
“a future-proofed system–one that allows us to add features as consumers demand them.”
This next gen DVD format war will be interesting to watch - that’s for sure !
Technorati Tags: xbox360, hd-dvd, blu-ray, hdtv
January 12th, 2006
Peter Moore — Microsoft’s head of Interactive Entertainment — made some very bold statements at CES this year. Along with the HD-DVD announcement, Moore made the claim that 90% of Xbox 360 owners either have an HDTV or are planning on buying one within 6 months. His exact quote was:
“In fact, Xbox 360 is the killer app for HDTV adoption. It’s driving HDTV monitor sales. A recent study concluded that 9 out of 10 Xbox 360 owners have either purchased or intend to purchase an HDTV in the next six months. And 90 percent of them say that it was Xbox 360 that is the primary reason for making that purchase, 90 percent of them say it’s about Xbox 360.”
GamesDaily Biz and Ars Technia made mention of it as well. While all of us here have embraced the next gen console, and feel that getting an HDTV is a must, we do wonder if that 90% is accurate.
Technorati Tags: xbox 360, hdtv, hd-dvd
January 9th, 2006
Microsoft announced that it will offer an external HD-DVD drive to Xbox 360 owners. After much speculation and publicly battling Sony backed Blu-Ray DVD format, the news was received with a mixed response.
On the one hand, many analysts voiced concerns that a next generation console should support next generation media formats — something the Xbox 360 did not at launch. But adding an external device puts it in competition for those who may opt to use a standalone DVD drive, let alone from a competing format of Blu-Ray (which appears to have stronger hollywood support).
Statement by Bill Gates that “this will be the last format war” suggested to some that perhaps Microsoft would push for delivery based video content via their Xbox Live service. Gates told the Daily Princetonian:
For us it’s not the physical format. Understand that this is the last physical format there will ever be. Everything’s going to be streamed directly or on a hard disk. So, in this way, it’s even unclear how much this one counts.
And finally, over at the sportsgamer blog, they echo what many recent purchasers of the Xbox 360 must feel right now:
Just out of curiousity, how many of you that dropped $1,000 on an Xbox 360 bundle are going to drop another $1,000 on an HD DVD external drive for your Xbox360? I think I’ll pass, and it’s pretty stupid, even if it has Final Fantasy 23HD on it.
We’ll have to wait and see how this turns out :)
Technorati Tags: xbox360, hd-dvd, xbox live, blu-ray
January 8th, 2006
Great article in the WSJ the other day titled “A New Reason to Buy a High-Definition TV” ( article may require paid registration )
The writer, Nick Wingfield, makes a strong argument that xbox 360 and the future PS3 will help push sales of HDTVs.
As we’ve seen during this week’s CES, HDTV is front and center, and Nick mentions the Bill Gates keynote:
In a sign of how intertwined the next generation of game consoles is becoming with HDTVs, Microsoft executives — including Chairman Bill Gates in tonight’s keynote — at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas plan to disclose data showing that the company’s Xbox 360 system is helping HDTV set sales.
Retailers are confirming this trend of HD + Xbox360:
Retailers say the growing library of games in high-definition will help improve the selection of content available to HDTV owners, even as television programmers gradually improve their HD offerings. “People are starved for high-def content,” says Mike Vitelli, senior vice president of merchandising of Best Buy Co. of Richfield, Minn. “There’s no question [high-definition games are] filling a void.”
Overall great news for owners of HDTV and Xbox 360s. You can read the full story here
Technorati Tags: ces, xbox360, ps3, wsj, best buy, bill gates
January 6th, 2006
With games near $60 a pop, and a solid number of launch titles now available, I explored the option of renting games.
Doing some research, I looked at the new services that have popped up which essentially mirror what NetFlix has accomplished — the removal of ‘late fees’ with the adoption of a subscription service.
I looked at the following: Gamerang, GameFly, and GameLender.
Gamerang Pros: 4 shipping centers; California, New Jersey, Oklahoma and Minnesota. $9.95 trial month is a nice touch. Site is useful with features such as reviews & ratings, and an easy to use search
Gamerang Cons: I was all set to signup until I checked the game availabilities. Without exception every game I wanted had a wait time — meaning it would not ship out immediately. I was surprised to see this, and hope they can get their inventory up to a better level.
GameFly Pros: Easy to use site. Trial offer for $14.95 is a good thing. All the games I was looking for were in stock and ready to ship. Prices to purchase/keep the games are competively priced ( FIFA 2006 for $44.95 and PGR3 for $38.99 — keep in mind these are pre-owned)
GameFly Cons: Only west coast location, so shipping to the east coast could take an extra day or two. Not the cheapest of the services I looked at.
GameLender Pros: Strong reviews online from fellow gamers, good selection, competitive pricing
GameLender Cons: Web site appears to be a bit out of date ( copyright still has 2004 ), shipping from the west coast, and no clear pricing that I could see if you wanted to keep the game.
In the end I chose GameFly. Two games are being shipped as we speak, so I’ll post a review of the overall experience once I’m a few cycles into this subscription.
Agree or diagree ? Got a service that’s even better ? Please let me know in the comments field below.
xbox360, gamerang, gamefly, gamelender, video game rental
January 3rd, 2006
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