Oh while I'm posting.. highlights for me from the PS3 presentation today in order:

- Unreal 3 Engine technology support - this should give us better games, faster!
- A massively impressive game line up this early!
- Dual screen support! I'm still thinking about how best I can use this, but it's definitely in the nice to have basket. How about dual screen co op on the one console?
- 7 wireless controller support - time for a bomberman update?
- The look of the console. Nicer than the PS2 and probably on par with the 360 for me. Also based on the comparison shot appears to be compact!

Overall, definitely more positive on the ps3 than previously.

Never bought a PS2, so I'll probably buy an X-Box 360 and then the Revolution after the first round of price drops

If they were both being released around the same time the PS3 would find it's way into my home before the Xbox 360. No question about it.

Want to know why? Three words: Limited Backwards Compatability.

I'll end up getting all three, most likely at launch as well, even if I tell myself to wait. Frankly, nothing I've seen of either the 360 or PS3 has me excited yet, but I know there will eventually be games I want on each. 360 will be bought for Live support, PS3 for the wide support it gets, both for the exclusives, and the Revolution for Nintendo games and hopeful innovations (although my PS2 is easily the least played in my house currently, so I hope that changes with PS3 and more worthwhile titles).

That's how my post would read almost exactly.

I'll get all 3 also, but I'm disappointed to see the lack of originality in games shown on the PS3...was there even one game shown that wasn't a sequel? At least the 360 had some original games...

You need to check out Eyedentify:

http://ps3.ign.com/articles/614/614942p1.html

Doesn't get more original than that.

Ill definitely be getting the 360. With it coming out first I think this will cause alot of impatient people like myself to want the newest next gen ASAP. Ive also never owned a PS2. All of my friends had one but when they played my XBOX they bought one and never looked back. I am a big sports gamer and it looks like XBOX will be the way to go with the capabilites of XBOX Live. Only thing about the PS3 is that Im a graphics whore so I might end up getting one as well.

I'll probably get all three at some point as well. Microsoft blew it in my eyes with the limited backwards compatibility crap, only "popular" games which is funny because the games I'm sure are on that list will be the same games or very similar games on the new system. Original titles like Jet Set Radio and Panzer Dragoon will be shit on. Nintendo is the only one that has a chance of a launch buy, but I still need a good game to justify it.

Last generation I bought an Xbox first, then a Gamecube and finally a PS2. This time it looks like it may be Nintendo, PS3 and in a distant third, Xbox 360. Having nothing but contempt for Nintendo and Sony entering last generation Nintendo has really won all my childhood love for video games back and then some with their great little system and fantastic games and Sony finally got me to warm up to them seeing that with 30 games coming out each week for their system, there end up being some really cool gems hidden in the crap (not to mention great imports).

Neither. I'll be getting the Nintendo Revolution.

I'm getting the Xbox 360 and maybe the PS3 after it's been around a while. Backward comp. to me is no big deal, i've got about 5 component selector on my HDTV. I'll wait on the PS3, because of that boomerang controller is a killer. I sure some third party companies will bring out something better.

I'm no fan of Nintendo first party games and with them getting very little 3rd party support this generation (I don't see that changing). I won't be getting the Revolution.

That controller trips me up as well. Admittedly I haven't held it, but it looks terrible. My favorite this generation was easily GameCube with Xbox and PS2 taking a far and distance tie. I haven't liked what I saw with the 360 controller either so far, but it looks passable.

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/content_page.php?aid=8834

E3 Opinion: Xbox 360 is outgunned and outclassed by Sony's PS3
Rob Fahey 07:09 17/05/2005

With both Microsoft and Sony laying their cards on the table over the past week, the opening skirmish of the next-gen console war has tipped heavily in favour of the PlayStation 3 - but the war is only starting, says Rob Fahey.

There was a point, at Microsoft's pre-E3 conference four years ago, when a lot of people began to believe in Xbox. I can pinpoint the moment almost exactly - it was the point when the video of Dead or Alive 3 rolled, and the jaws of the audience slackened as the best in-game graphics they'd ever seen suddenly graced the screens ahead of them. Back when Halo was just another unproven first person shooter, a single swoop over Team Ninja's beautiful, sun-kissed beach was enough to convince many people that Xbox was worthy of attention. I know; I was one of those people.

Walking out of that conference, just a few miles from where I'm sitting now and just a few years back in time, I heard someone - an American journalist - say that Sony had been "totally, like, outclassed". He was right; the PlayStation 2 had just been given a technological kicking by its upstart rival. Not that this would stop Sony from coasting to a comfortable victory by the end of the hardware generation, of course, but the sheer graphical prowess of the Xbox really did give PS2 a bloody nose. Outclassed was the only word for it.

Today, Sony returned the favour. With interest.

Looking at the content of the two conferences today in Los Angeles - and the MTV special last week, in the case of Xbox 360 - "outclassed" is a word that comes to mind a lot. The bar which was set by Microsoft last week has not only been met, it has been vaulted over. PlayStation 3 is more powerful, more fully featured, more innovative and better supported than Xbox 360. When the Sony conference kicked off, we expected to see something "a bit better" than Xbox, technologically. We didn't expect to have our most fundamental beliefs about what next-generation games will be capable of changed. That, however, is exactly what happened.

I don't want to beat on Microsoft too hard, because ultimately there are still quite a few Xbox 360 games I'm looking forward to; but it's hard not to feel that suddenly, Microsoft's hip lingo and celebrity endorsements seem to ring very hollow. Where Microsoft gave us Elijah Wood babbling through a half hour marketing-led special on MTV, Sony had us watching Phil Harrison show off jaw-dropping interactive tech demos on stage. Harrison is about as far from being a hobbit as you can get - I'm not kidding, the man's a giant - and Ken Kutaragi is unlikely to ever have as many screaming fans as The Killers, but Sony seemed to feel that its new console spoke for itself. It didn't need celebrity endorsements, or senior executives trying to be "down with the kids" - thank god.

It's not that Sony would have problems rounding up some impressive celebs if they so desired. Sony Pictures, Sony Music and the PlayStation brand itself could have called out half of Hollywood today. Instead, we got to see a game console that feels genuinely next generation. We weren't told how "cool" a random American sports star thinks PlayStation 3 is, we were told how astonishingly powerful it is and how incredibly feature-packed it is. We're not just talking about a console that's twice as powerful as Xbox 360 in simple, logical terms (and bear in mind that that's a far, far greater gap in power than existed between PS2 and Xbox); we're talking about a console with more functionality, with fewer corners cut and with a genuinely more impressive line-up of software.

If the day could be summed up in a microcosm, it would be Square Enix' story that explained events best. Yoichi Wada, the firm's president, made two stops today. At the Sony conference, he was one of many developers presenting stunning tech demos - in his case, a truly stunning real-time recreation of the opening to Final Fantasy VII, using characters almost as high quality as those seen in the forthcoming Advent Children movie. Within a matter of hours, he had another stop to make - this time with a headline billing at the Microsoft conference, where he revealed that Square Enix will be supporting Xbox 360... With the release of a four year old massively multiplayer game that's already available on PS2 and PC.

Outclassed? Undoubtedly. Sony's hardware, its software, and even its simple display of confidence in its own product have completely outclassed Microsoft today - but while there can be little doubt about the outcome of this particular battle, it'd be a foolish man who assumed that the war was over yet. What Sony has done unto Microsoft today, Microsoft did unto Sony not so many years ago - and software giant is unlikely to take a defeat at E3 lying down. This tug of war has a long way to go yet.


For me not a problem. I will be buying all 3 next generation consoles, because the most important part is of course the games. Each system has their own exclusive titles and if they look interesting enough, I will buy all 3 systems.

Chris

That is one hell of a good article. Not because it slams the 360, but because it brings up a valid point. Microsoft has been pushing how this system is for "hardcore" gamers, but then puts it on MTV using celebs out the waazoo. Sony brought the system right to the gamers with no celebs - the the console itself to make an impression. Gamers don't need someone to tell them its cool, they know its cool by what they see. Its definitely two different approaches to marketing. Sony is "keeping it real" and doing the same thing they always do. Microsoft is trying to pick up new gamers by appealing to them through celebs and MTV. Sony's method works (for them). We'll have to see if MS has choosen wisely.

Xbox 360 backwards compatibility -

MS is announcing that it IS backwards compatible but there is a rather large caveat - sounds like they are doing it via software emulation, and have said that it will only work for certain "top-selling" games. So I hope you dont like any unusual or unpopular games. Sounds like they will have to tweak the software individually for each title they choose to guarantee functionality. Who knows at this point if it will be 1 game 5 games 20 games or every "platinum seller" ... but no there will not be anywhere near 100% backwards compatibility.

Since the PS3 will likely have PS2 guts inside of it you will have close to 100% backwards comp (a handful of games with quirky coding will probably just plain not work)

If I had to choose between 360 and PS3, I would get PS3. I am truly shocked at how well it was presented. I know much of it can't be delivered once it's released but so far it looks pretty sweet.

It's between the 360 and the Revolution for me. I'll probably wait until the second round of price drops, though.

That limited backward compatibility crap just dropped the X360 to a distant third. Sony is continuing a wonderful tradition, and Nintendo is finally spreading that thinking to their consoles (aside, I might have bought a DS by now if it was fully backwards compatible), and Microsoft comes out with this?
I live for quirky games, and have no doubt they will not be considered "popular" enough to program for.

Tech savvy people, answer me this: if some hacker in his mom's basement can get a PC to emulate games from NES, Genesis, SNES, etc, why the hell can't MS do the same for a system they own! Couldn't they just dump the Xbox 1 OS on the harddrive and run it off of that?

Not that simple. Xbox used a nVidia GPU. They had a falling out over prices and the relationship ended there. In order for the 360 to run Xbox games, it would need to emulate the GPU as well (since it is now ATI) which would cost Microsoft money. MS doesn't want to give any more money to nVidia, so they are trying to limit their costs. They must have a costing plan where nVidia will charge them for every game possibly played on 360. So MS sold X number of Halo 2, its going to cost the the royalty fee (R) times X or R*X. If they did that for all games, the price would be huge and include all those games Xbox owners want to forget. That is my guess anyway - that Microsoft is saving money by limiting the amount of games backwards capable.

going with 360 and then the ps3.

XBox used DirectX though. ATI supports DirectX, so unless I'm oversimplifying things, I don't think that should be a problem. Games shouldn't be interacting with the GPU directly, just through DirectX.

With the announcement of the limited backwards compatibility, I'm having to rethink this whole purchase.

The only system I know for sure I will buy at launch is Revolution.

You are oversimplifying things. And who cares, like I ever played ps1 on my ps2 more than 5 times EVER total in all these years.

x360 and ps3 of course. Who the hell wants to wait a year to play next gen on a ps3. No thanks. Big N's system I'll have to think about, I barely played the gamecube.

He's oversimplyfying and your generalizizing. :D

Who cares. I do to both.

On the first, I still play a lot of SNES games, much less last generation games. A lot of the new games don't do much for me. And I have a big back log of this gen games to catch up on, so being able to sell my current console and still catch up on them on the next gen system is a big deal.

And that ties into the second point, I have no problem waiting a year. Hell, I'm waiting 6 months to a year after the PS3 and Revolution launches to pick up anything both because I'll have plenty to play on the 3 consoles this gen still, and I want to see what each systems game libraries look like before buying.

So you should say "I don't care" rather than "who cares." :D

Interesting that 2 of the 3 future consoles will use chips based on the PowerPC architecture. I'm assuming Nintendo's will as well since the Gamecube does. So much for my iMac being the only PowerPC based product I own. ;)