Having all 3 available, I play the XBOX much more than either PS2 or Gamecube.. Games released for all 3 systems are always better for XBOX (graphics, extras, load times.. gameplay is the same.. look at NHL2002 or Spiderman) Also, I'm looking forward more to the XBOX games coming out soon than for other consoles (Knights of the Old Republic, Dead to Rights, Ninja Gaiden, and Project Ego)

Source? Last time I saw, they were talking about $10/month.

I can see the problems building up right now. If you think it will be easy for developers to deal with Microsoft, you are wrong. And here is a question: Who is going to be paying for this optimized code? $50/year from 1 million (that is being realistic) users doesn't pay game developers to optimize code and run dedicated servers with support and backup.

I hope they are more reliable then the servers they distributing new software. Just remember, if the the identification servers go down, you aren't playing anything.

I don't have to buy a Hard Drive, but probably will. As for talking to my friends over my ADSL, I'll probably just use the free headset that comes with S.O.C.O.M. Or maybe I'll pick up one of those keyboards that isn't even offered for X-box.

Tony Hawk 3 has been online for months, and I have heard of no major problems (or any problems for that matter). I don't see why you think it would be a problem for other companies to follow suit.

'Twas announced at E3.

From the BBC:A number of sites have reported the same. AFAIK, it's $10 a month after the first year.

Don't forget that you can rip your own music onto the XBOX HD. You can play this music in games that support it.
Also, the PS2 has a bigger library of games because its been out longer than the XBOX. Most of those games are worthless anyway and who really wants to play PS1 games??? No thanks. There will be 200 games out by the holiday season for the XBOX so don't worry about not having any games.

At launch, U.S. consumers can purchase a starter kit for $49.95. For the estimated retail price of a single game, the consumer receives a year's subscription to Xbox Live, an Xbox Communicator that plugs into the Xbox controller and facilitates all voice communication with other players, and "ReVolt," a fun, online racing game from Acclaim Entertainment.

Source: http://www.xbox.com/e3-02/e3pressbriefingpr.htm

As for reliable servers, I'm sure MS will build plenty of redundancy into Xbox Live.

http://www.xbox.com/e3-02/e3pressbriefingpr.htm

Here is a snippet from the press release found at the bottom:
At launch, U.S. consumers can purchase a starter kit for $49.95. For the estimated retail price of a single game, the consumer receives a year's subscription to Xbox Live, an Xbox Communicator that plugs into the Xbox controller and facilitates all voice communication with other players, and "ReVolt," a fun, online racing game from Acclaim Entertainment. Pricing and specific offers in regions outside of North America will be announced locally at a later date.


My question is why wouldn’t the developers make optimized code? If the developers already optimized code for PS2 they could just ask Microsoft to run that code on Microsoft’s servers.


Yes I agree, but with three data centers that are capable of authorization the likely hood of them all going down is very small.


Yes you can do that but like you said you have DSL and voice is an option for you. Can you use voice over 56K? Also would you then play with the keyboard? I can't see somebody playing with a pad and then having to go type something on the keyboard. Personally I bought a console to play with a pad. I find it more effective and why play with a keyboard on you PS2 when you could use your PC?

Also with Xbox Live all games support the voice communicator so there isn’t the hassle of “oh let me hook up the keyboard for this game.” And the keyboard/headset for ps2 hooks up to the USB slots correct? Imagine the mess of wires to get that working properly. The communicator plugs into the controller on xbox and the only wire you have is the same only one you had all along for the controller.

I am not familiar with how THPS3 works. Can you give me the internet use model for this game and details on how it works? Is it peer to peer? How do you trash talk each other?

PS2 has more games because there have been more people developing for it. Most of the games are worthless, I admit, but the same is true for X-box. There are more AAA games on PS2 than on X-box. Playing PSX games is great, there are some games that are must play which aren't on the PS2. This holiday season, there will be more games out for the PS2 than the X-box. It is in general agreement that the PS2 has a better and larger library right now.

Also, as has been mentioned before, if you do have a problem with your console, Sony has been known to repair consoles after the warentee has expired, while Microsoft charges you over $100.

I'm pretty sure that's false, at least if you have the infamous problem everyone talks about.

Sega had more AAA games than PS2 last year, but you and many others chose to buy the PS2. Was that a dumb choice? No because lots of good games popped up the following year. The same will be true of the Xbox. Why can't you and all the other PS2 funboys get that into your head?

Well, I'm not entirely sure that's true. Sega never installed a big userbase, and never got much support from third parties.

I'm not sure how many of the titles fondly remembered by Dreamcast fans are really AAA games. Games like Jet Grind and Shenmue are a little too quirky to really sell any systems. For the XBox, the clear AAA title is Halo.

I'm skeptical of whether Halo 2 will really be much of a step forward. Halo was in development for over 3 years. The timeframe on Halo 2 is about a year. As for Counterstrike, if they rebuild the game, that will be cool, but if they just port it over, I don't really see anything exciting there.

I will say that shooters and such aren't really worth paying the XBox Live fee. I'm still not clear on whether massively multiplayer games will incur seperate charges or not. I'm pretty used to playing online for free, so I'm not that eager to pay for it.

As for Tony Hawk, I know there's no central server for it, so I assume a player's console acts as the server, which I think is the way it should be done for most games.

No, it's true.

The PS2 had more AAA games last year than anyone (including Sega) and will have more AAA games the rest of this year and into next year. I like the way IGN rates there reviews, so lets just use them as an example. Right now in there reviewed list, they have 33 PS2 games which score 9.0 or higher. Keep in mind this does not include any games which are 8.9 or 8.8. They currently have 10 X-box games which score 9.0 or higher. I would consider a game rated 9.0 or higher a AAA game. Over 3 times as many AAA games on PS2 than X-box, and the gap is only going to widen.

As for being a fan boy, I don't think so. A fanboy is someone who blindly follows a company. I don't blindly follow Sony, I look at the statistics. Over 30 million consoles sold. 33 AAA games. A sucessful console under their belt. If anything, you are a Microsoft Fanboy for trying to down play Sony's sucess.

They have 3 servers on the West Coast and 3 Servers on the East Coast to connect you with other users. Then one of the users host the game. I was just making the point that Online Gaming has been done sucessfully without the help of Sony.

Are you saying the PS2 had a better library at its launch than the DC?

Oh yeah, I said FUNBOY, not FANBOY. There is a difference.

I don't know, what did the DC have at launch?

Okay Webster, what's the difference?

There is one major flaw in this argument. Sony does have 3 times as many "AAA" games as Xbox but Sony has been out 3 times as long as Xbox. Noting this it would indicate that when Xbox is 18 moths old it should have about 30 "AAA" titles, the same as PS2 has after 18 months.

It is my opinion, to answer the original posters question. Xbox currently is the better buy. Think about it this way, a console is an investment in fun. With Xbox you pay $200 and you get a gaming platform that is capable of surviving for 3-4 more years. With PS2 you might have to buy a hard drive, network adapter, keyboard, etc. Witch would then defiantly cost you more than $200. With Xbox you are ready for whatever the PS2 can dish out in the future without needing to purchase anything in the future. Oh and no need for a memory card, save those $25 and buy a game or a DVD remote.

With the Xbox developers are free to make original games like Blinx that without a hard drive are impossible.

And any future games that appear on multiple consoles, if done by a reputable developer will take advantage of the advance features the Xbox has and will give you a more enjoyable and rewarding experience. Take Spider-Man for example. The graphics are better and the Xbox version even has additional levels.

Oh and like most people here I am really into DVD’s so I have a 5.1 theatre setup. This allows me to plug my Xbox into this setup and get a truly immersive experience that is not possible on PS2. DD5.1 goes along way to making transferring emotions and ambiance. Imagine being able to detect somebody is behind you to your right by hearing his or her footsteps!

P.S. With the hard drive you can use the Xbox as a jukebox. I copied all of my CD’s to hard drive and now I don’t need to mess with CD’s if I want to hear my favorite song.

Eh, I meant the DC's existing library when the PS2 launched. The DC blew it away.


Don't you watch The Simpons? Hey funboys, get a room!

Even if that happens, PS2 will still have more AAA titles at any given time.

Playstation2 will last 5 years (especially since X-box and GameCube don't threaten them). Infact, it will last atleast 10 years because PS3 has already been announced as being backwards capable to atleast PS2. And don't forget, Hard Drives have MTF while Memory Cards have no such assignment.

Yeah, because they haven't done any PS2 games in DD5.1*

*sarcasm

What does Sony's launch against DC's existing library have to do with AAA titles last year? It's 2002, meaning last year was 2001 and PS2 was released in 2000.

Must have missed that episode, why don't you just explain yourself instead of dancing around it?

I have both Xbox and PS2. Have had Xbox for 2-3 months, PS2 for a year. I haven't touched my PS2 in months though. These days all I play is Xbox. And I love it. That being said, if I had to choose between one or the other, I would still choose the PS2. I had A LOT of fun with the great PS2 games that came out last fall, and if you haven't played them yet somewhere, you have a lot of catching up to do. If you have played them, then it's probably better to get the Xbox. There are also more quality peripherals to buy - better joysticks, better steering wheels, etc - for the PS2.

If you check out IGN's editor's choice awards, the PS2 has a lot more in the list than the Xbox. Personally I can't see myself having only the PS2 or Xbox, but if I had to choose one, I'd choose the PS2 just because there are more quality games out for it.

Joshd do you just hate Microsoft? Because it seems that anything Microsoft does is bad to you. You don't even give them a fair chance. That's just my opinion.

Its going to depend on the games you like. I have all three and the PS2 was getting most of the usage until Resident Evil came out for Game Cube. Other than Halo (which I tired of and sold) and Spiderman I haven't used my Xbox much at all.

GTAIII alone is a reason to buy a PS2 and I would put the PS2 slighty ahead of the Game Cube and way ahead of the Xbox.

True but that is the benifit of coming out first, they point I was trying to make is that XBOX is just as capable of producing "AAA" titles as PS2.


True I will give you this, but like PC's I consider consoles to be disposable after 2-3 years.


Hmm, I belive that you are wrong here. PS2 hardware is not capable of DD5.1. If they do want DD5.1 they would have to do it in software and that would eat up CPU cycles from the AI, and graphics, ect.

There are games with both Dolby Digital (FFX, MGS2) and DTS (EA Sports games) on the PS2.

Ok, I guess I have to be very specific here. PS2 hardware is not capable of doing DD5.1 IN-GAME. PS2 can play DVD's and DVD's are required to support DD5.1, and that is exactly what PS2 does for those games. The sections that have DD5.1 are just movies. I know a friend of my purchased a DD reciever just for MGS2 and was very disappointed to find that it wa snot in game DD5.1.

And the EA games with DTS are being done in software like I stated before.

I hate Microsoft's tactics. I do, in fact, like the X-box. I think it was a great idea that came out against overwelming competition. As for this factor, I like decentralization. Microsoft is planning a centralized server for all X-box games, and I don't think it is a good idea at all. I believe that the companies should support their own servers. That is why I think Sony's online plans are better than Microsoft's.

I would buy an X-box if I didn't think my PS2 was superior to it. Only time will tell, but I think that the PS2 is the way to go, period.

The problem with this argument is, quite simply, if the XBox doesn't sell, it won't get the games. For whatever reason, the best games, with the exception of sports games, tend not to be multiplatform; they're exclusive to one console or another.

Agent Under Fire or Spider Man may look better on the XBox, but these weren't really great games to begin with.

To succeed, a console has to have exclusives. Microsoft has a lot of money, but Sony owns the audience. There are a lot more gamers with PS2 systems than XBoxes, so PS2 will get more exclusive games.

I think most of the best games will be on PS2, and maybe somewhere else a year later, like Metal Gear Solid. MGS: Substance looks cool, but it's nothing worth waiting an extra year for.

As for the hard drive, I think it's unecessary. It enables things like the semi-interesting conceit of Blinx, but it also anchors the console into your entertainment center by making it larger, heavier, and more fragile than the other consoles. You can throw Gamecube in a backpack and take it with you, and PS2 is a lot more portable than XBox. I kind of doubt that the PS2 hard drive will be released in the US, and if it is, I don't expect it to sell.

I mean, does anyone seriously want to argue that the "innovative" concept of Blinx excites them more than Mario Sunshine or Wario World?

I also don't expect the next generation of consoles to use hard drives. I think future consoles will look more like Gamecube and less like XBox.

Also, memory cards make your game data portable and transferrable, which is nice sometimes.