Console Wars Thread! PS4 vs. Xbox One vs. Wii U Fight!

XBox is #1 on the system. That isn't news, but it isn't the only great game on the system. Halo 2 made Microsoft a real player in the video game market, while the PS was a hit the day it came out.

Fable isn't in the category of the other 2, but is on par with a lot of the PS series that you want to throw out there.

I got the original PS & PS2 as soon as I could. The same could not be said for the PS3, largely because they no longer had the same exclusives that I loved. That said, they do need new exclusives (like Titanfall) as FPS can get stale. The XB1 might as well be where Sony was with the PS2. The original Xbox just didn't have many quality games.

 

I'd have to look at the sales again, but I think the majority of people who had a XB1, 360, and XBO didn't play Halo. Or at least they didn't own the game.

It is a pretty powerful exclusive, though as I've said before, I wonder if it is losing popularity (as nearly every IP does over time, especially as the original creators quit working on it). Few IPs have the power of say Mario. Mario even has the ability to be leveraged in multiple games (platformers, racers, fighters, puzzle games, etc.). MS tried that a bit with Halo, but think it can only be sustained via a big FPS release every couple of years (supplemented with DLC and/or re-releases of old games).

I think this is one of those things that sounds fun, but in practice, people just end up preferring a button command for throwing grenades.

I'm sure stuff like this has been attempted, but it just ends up being a gimmick instead of something most people actually enjoy doing for their games.

 

Doesn't really discredit your main argument, but the PS1 did take a bit of time to take off. Part of this is they weren't confident enough to bring it outside of Japan until a year (or so) after they launched. But I think they only shipped ~4.3M units in its first 18 months or so (most of that near the end). They followed that up with ~9M units the next year, and then 3 straight years of nearly 20M a year.

The original Xbox sold 500K in its first week, and I think around 8M in its first year. I believe it was around 16M units before Halo 2 came out (it ended up around 24M overall). I think it actually did pretty well on day 1 (possibly due to Halo 1), though it never got into that next gear to hit 10M-20M units a year. The 360 did a better job of putting up "PS" type numbers (at least in the US).

 

Transistor launch trailer for those interested.

Trailer got me even more hyped for this game and looks like Watch Dogs will be on hold till I'm done with this beauty

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Only game I'm absolutely buying this month. Watch_dogs and Wolfenstein are maybes. No question on Transistor, it looks great and Bastion was awesome.

 

I hadn't heard of this one yet. It looks awesome. I was hoping it wasn't an XBox exclusive the whole preview. I'll definitely be giving it a try, it may just push my time on Black Flag back.

 

This one has been on my radar since last E3, very excited to finally get to play it in a few days.

I also preordered watch dogs and Mario kart 8. If the reviews for watch dogs are bad, I'm either going to pick up wolfenstein or maybe get some Vita games (helloooo god of war collection).

 

Does anyone have any idea why the exclusivity changed between Bastion and Transistor? It seems strange -- Bastion was on PC and Xbox 360, and now Transistor is on PC and PS4. Eh? Generally a company will either stick with a platform/company for exclusivity or just start releasing on all major platforms. I'd love to know if there's some reason for the flip-flop here.

 

I think a big part of it is that Sony has been much more welcoming of Indie games this generation and making it easier to publish their games.

With Microsoft's parity clause for games released on their system I'm not sure if Transistor will ever be released on the Xbone. But I'm sure Microsoft will backpedal on this like they have everything else once they start losing out on more big time Indies such as Transistor

 

My friend I've spent literally hours upon hours just doing ship battles. My Jackdaw is a hoss now, but I still can't hang with the Legendary Ships...yet

 

BTW, (1) that trailer for Transistor is awesome, I especially love the music and the art is wonderful too, and (2) does the combat remind anyone else of Valkyria Chronicles a bit? A lot of differences, obviously (especially the controlling of multiple characters bit), but I can't think of another game with combat even remotely similar, although I may be forgetting something. Either way, the combat looks great.

 

Yeah. I'm truly impressed by what they're doing at Super Giant games. One of the founders (he's also creative director / and wrote bastion, perhaps this as well) of the company was a reviewer for Gamespot. (Greg Kasavin) He always came off a bit arrogant in his reviews, but I can't deny the greatness of the games he's backing. I believe they only have 12 people working on Transistor.

I agree on the combat, that's what first struck me about it. I'm really impressed with the way they managed to mix real time and turn based. It may sound silly, but this is one of the reasons I got a PS4 over a Xbox One. I'm all about AAA games, but I feel people are truly missing out when they ignore Indies. Some indie games are among my favorite these past few years.

Bastion, Limbo, the Penny Arcade (episode 1-4?) games, Resogun, Scot Pilgrim vs the World, Guacamelee, Fez, Mark of the Ninja, Shadow Complex, Torchlight/Torchlight 2, and I'm definitely forgetting just as many.

Wouldn't shock me, losing out on Rime and Transistor was bad enough. There will be others.

 

Target is offering 300% trade in value this week.

Traded in 9 games and got $270 in credit. I had some games 2-3 years old and nearly got what I paid for it new. Sold the credit to my buddy for $240. Went to Best Buy to PM Frys $429 for Xbone and got Forza 5 for free. Spent a little over $200 for the console out of pocket after the trade ins. Wouldn't have picked up the Xbone if not for the Target trade in deal and Fry's sale on the Xbone.

Have all three last gen systems and now own all three next/current gen systems =/. Who else here can say that?

 

Have you played Dishwasher: Vampire Smile? It's on Windows and 360. Friggin' amazing game. Three years old now.

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Also, I love Greg Kasavin (he never came off as arrogant to me, just awkward in a geeky and endearing way). Gamespot is my favored reviews site. It sucked when they lost Kasavin, Gerstmann, and Navarro all in such a short period of time, but now Gerstmann and Navarro are sorta back since GiantBomb partnered with Gamespot. And they have some other good people -- I like Kevin VanOrd, Tom McShea, and Carolyn Petit especially. All they're missing Is Keza MacDonald, who's still the best game critic out there.

 

Where can I find info about that target deal?

 

http://www.targettradeinprogram.com/

 

Haven't heard of that game before, maybe it was just me on Kasavin. I trust Gamespot's reviews but I've also always felt they were heavy handed in their review scores. They just always seem to give lower scores just to say they have the lowest.

I preordered transistor through the phone app. Love that.

 

This game looks awesome. I'm surprised it didn't get more publicity/hype.

 

I discovered it when I was visiting my brother and browsing the games he had downloaded. Started playing it and was blown away at how good it was. Had never heard of it before that. And generally speaking, I don't know much about Microsoft-exclusive games, since 95% of my console gaming in the past five years has been on the PS3. My 360 mostly collects dust. But there are those few, and this was definitely one of them. Well worth a download.

 

Yeah, but I also think it's the case that most sites score things too high. The problem with a ten-point scale is that in our heads, it's connected to grades in school, so we assume that anything less than a 7.0 is crap. But if a 5.0 is "average," that just ain't the case.

I actually prefer 5-point scale... out of 5 stars, for instance. People understand that a 2-star movie can still be enjoyable. But if you tell them it's a 4/10, they assume it has no redeeming qualities.

Anyway, you get the idea.

BTW, this is kinda random, but Gamespot does this podcast I really like, and my favorite episode is one from last year in which Kasavin came on as a guest. You might want to give it a listen, lots of great game talk on it.

https://soundcloud.com/gamespot/gamespot-gameplay-episode-37