Well no, not that. Rather some more unresearched, ill advised Microsoft motivated mental meanderings. Because they are evil, aren't they? I was reading these comments just now and enjoying the complaints of Playstation 3 owners regarding the lack of DLC on their big games (GTA4, Fallout 3, Gears of.... no, they don't have that one. Um... Hal... no, nor that one. How about Mass Eff.. no. Crackdown, then - they must have Crackdown, surely? Or Dead Rising. What?).
First thing to cross my mind (other than the Valeria Bruni Tedeschi film I watched last night) was that Sony fanboys can surely come up with something better to hate Microsoft for? Sony are easy pickings these days - Lik-Sang, being happy to offend Christians but not Muslims, The Dreamcast lies, the PSP - I could go on, and probably might at some point. Nintendo were the big bad of the Eighties and early Nineties, bullies and monopolists and so on - my love for Nintendo really blossomed with the Gamecube and has wilted with the Gamecube 2: Sore Arm Edition and the reprehensible shovelware, fucked online system, storage drought, Stars theft and ludicrously overpriced Virtual Console faffery I've been mug enough to invest heavily in, believing that one day I'll suddenly become overwhelmed with happiness. Because Nintendo love me. Microsoft though... well, what are their sins?
Red ring of Death? I'll grant you, they rushed the console out, they cut corners - and they've done the decent thing and are making good on their mistakes in an efficient and honest manner so far as I can tell. Had they not been first out of the gate, they'd have been buried by PS3 and Wii despite the cumulative console experience being pound-for-pound better than the two alternatives. I'm willing to forgive them the almost inevitable RRoD my machine will one day suffer, because the two weeks I'll be waiting to get my machine back is still less time than I'd spend on mandatory hard-drive installs through the life of the alternative console.
People recently criticised Live Gold carrying a fee on the forums I frequent - but look at what you are paying for - the worlds' most reliable and popular online walled garden in which to play for 12p a day (I'd gladly pay that for the same on my Wii or PC, or DS for that matter. In fact no, I'd pay a pound a day to get rid of friend codes on my Wii). So that one doesn't wash with me either. I'm stumped here - the cash-for-DLC-exclusives deals are no worse than the HD disc format wars where Sony were more than happy to hold onto their exclusives. It won them the war and what's good for the goose...
I doubt the likes of Fallout 3 would have been quite the title we ended up with were it not for Redmond chucking a million or so at Bethesda while they were still spending on development. I cannot see how this is a valid reason for Microsoft or specifically XBox to be evil, so I'm throwing it open - surely there must be something, surely there must? The last time I had the hump with them it was for acquiring Rare, but would Perfect Dark Zero, Viva Pinata or Banjo Nuts & Bolts have been any better on Wii? Would Perfect Dark Zero have been good at all? Help me out here - give me your best shots at dissing the Beast of Redmond - because this is the games industry we're talking about here and I refuse to believe that everything is fine and dandy.
Of course we might have moved beyond this good/evil debate in the more sensible corners of the web. This isn't one of them though, so flame away.
First thing to cross my mind (other than the Valeria Bruni Tedeschi film I watched last night) was that Sony fanboys can surely come up with something better to hate Microsoft for? Sony are easy pickings these days - Lik-Sang, being happy to offend Christians but not Muslims, The Dreamcast lies, the PSP - I could go on, and probably might at some point. Nintendo were the big bad of the Eighties and early Nineties, bullies and monopolists and so on - my love for Nintendo really blossomed with the Gamecube and has wilted with the Gamecube 2: Sore Arm Edition and the reprehensible shovelware, fucked online system, storage drought, Stars theft and ludicrously overpriced Virtual Console faffery I've been mug enough to invest heavily in, believing that one day I'll suddenly become overwhelmed with happiness. Because Nintendo love me. Microsoft though... well, what are their sins?
Red ring of Death? I'll grant you, they rushed the console out, they cut corners - and they've done the decent thing and are making good on their mistakes in an efficient and honest manner so far as I can tell. Had they not been first out of the gate, they'd have been buried by PS3 and Wii despite the cumulative console experience being pound-for-pound better than the two alternatives. I'm willing to forgive them the almost inevitable RRoD my machine will one day suffer, because the two weeks I'll be waiting to get my machine back is still less time than I'd spend on mandatory hard-drive installs through the life of the alternative console.
People recently criticised Live Gold carrying a fee on the forums I frequent - but look at what you are paying for - the worlds' most reliable and popular online walled garden in which to play for 12p a day (I'd gladly pay that for the same on my Wii or PC, or DS for that matter. In fact no, I'd pay a pound a day to get rid of friend codes on my Wii). So that one doesn't wash with me either. I'm stumped here - the cash-for-DLC-exclusives deals are no worse than the HD disc format wars where Sony were more than happy to hold onto their exclusives. It won them the war and what's good for the goose...
I doubt the likes of Fallout 3 would have been quite the title we ended up with were it not for Redmond chucking a million or so at Bethesda while they were still spending on development. I cannot see how this is a valid reason for Microsoft or specifically XBox to be evil, so I'm throwing it open - surely there must be something, surely there must? The last time I had the hump with them it was for acquiring Rare, but would Perfect Dark Zero, Viva Pinata or Banjo Nuts & Bolts have been any better on Wii? Would Perfect Dark Zero have been good at all? Help me out here - give me your best shots at dissing the Beast of Redmond - because this is the games industry we're talking about here and I refuse to believe that everything is fine and dandy.
Of course we might have moved beyond this good/evil debate in the more sensible corners of the web. This isn't one of them though, so flame away.
Posts
3 comments:
Shameful though it may be to comment on one's own blog when no bugger else does, I just clicked onto this and it made me weep with laughter:
http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/sony-us-slags-off-rival-consoles
Microsoft are bastards because I don't have an XBox 360 yet, and they won't give me one for free.
Um...
Steve Ballmer obviously has this site as his no.1 RSS feed, so you never know!
Also, owners of older XBoxen can make their own 360 by turning their original model off, then using a little red paint and a three-quarter-circle stencil on the front right of the machine. Presto! (In fact send it back to M$ and you might get a functioning 360 in return, if they are't paying attenton!)
Post a Comment