liveinabin

Having only picked up a 360 a couple of days ago, I was sceptical about the criticisms of the D-pad. I was then astonished to see how right they were. On an otherwise amazing controller, MS stuffed up what must be the simplest thing to get right. It's truly dire, not just for games, but for the most basic text entry.

Heh. That's pretty extreme. I had a bit of a scare yesterday when my Xbox, added to all the other AV stuff running, overloaded it all and everything went dead. Luckily the Xbox's power breaker took the brunt, and the console was fine - it even picked up it's downloads where it left off. Smart. To add some balance, I should add that my PS3 originally had a dead blu-ray drive.

I'm getting used to the fan whine now. It's not amazingly loud, it's just at a noticeable pitch. Aside from the relative volume, though, it's great. I was rather harsh calling it 'cruddy'. Sorry Been playing pretty much nothing but Mass Effect:). Had a quick go at Geometry Wars 2. Not sure what all the fuss is about there, surely that's just a less focussed Robotron. Suffice to say, I'll be buying Robotron

Yay! My Elite arrived today! After some fiddling with cables, I've been at Mass Effect all evening. Absolutely astonishing game. So happy. As for the console itself, the software/firmware side of it is great. The Xbox dash has a lot of character and the free demos of pretty much everything are nice. The hardware is pretty cruddy though, if I'm honest. Glad I installed Mass Effect to the hard drive, then I can play it with only the annoying pulsating whine of the fans rather than the insane row of the disc spinning. Pretty though, and the controller is nice (apart from the D-pad obviously). Haven't even broken the shrink wrap on Bayonetta yet.

Wow. Did you even sleep at all?

Looking at your list of games, I'd say your tastes are pretty similar to mine. I got a PS3 first for Ridge Racer and the PSN games. However, I had an HD TV and Blu-Ray was also a factor in my decision. Given you're still standard def., I'd have to recommend the 360 instead. You get to play Mass Effect (the reason I just bought one). You really MUST add Fallout 3 to your want list too. While the basic premise of it sounds dull (post apocalyptic wasteland - yawn), I have to concede that it's probably the best RPG of all time. That said, it's on both systems so that shouldn't color your judgement. As for which models: PS3 - doesn't matter. I like the original design but both are quiet and reliable. 360 - you must buy a new machine. The 360 has been, I think it's fair to say, the least reliable console ever made. New models are pretty well put together. Arcade and Elite models are AFAIK, inwardly exactly the same.

Yeah, I love demos, that's why I got an Elite - that 120Gb is going down in a hail of free sh*t! As for other games, I'm really fussy about what I play. See, I loathe cliché and can spot it a mile off, which is an issue, given that games - perhaps even more so than movies - tend to be fairly unadventurous, style and content wise. If I've seen it before, chances are I don't wanna play it. Given this - that rules out probably 99% of the 360s library straight away. Still, if there are even three games that I really click with, I'll consider the console a worthy purchase.

I've held out this long in buying a 360 of precisely the same reason. However, I'm pretty satisfied with the measures taken with the current issue of 360s. I'm pretty sure these will live. That said, I'll post here right away if mine is DOA

Cool. Imagine how a dose of Rickets can add extra realism to that WW2 shooter. Throw in some buzz-bombs and some powdered egg and you're almost there!

Good. Hopefully, Apples' continuing decision to ignore Flash will stop website creators from using it. While I have nothing against interactive, animated webpages (my own site was exclusively Flash), I can't believe that even a simple Flash movie needs upwards of 70% of the CPU to run. It's a resource drain, a battery killer and has no place in modern computing. Adobe should spend less time bitching and more time making Flash actually work properly. Seems to me, Adobe are as complacent as Quark used to be (and, incredibly, still are) - "We're the industry standard and we can do no wrong". Their products grow ever more irrelevant as time goes on. Don't get me wrong, Apple aren't the eternal good guys, but at least continue to deliver solid product despite their success.

I thought this looked kinda fun. Is it easy enough to play with no (useful) command of Japanese?

Can't wait to play it. I've ordered a 360 and Mass Effect 1 and I'm going to be doing some mad catching up over the next few weeks. I'm still unsure as to what gender my Shepard should be! I normally play males in RPGs because I am one, but the female voice acting in this seems so much better (Jennifer Hale is superb). Xbox arrives in 2 days (from Amazon) so I gotta decide quick!

Does Bayonetta count? There's a lot of acrobatics with the hacking and slashing, but there's some hilarious finishing moves as well.

Thought I'd give you chaps the heads up - Telltale are selling the entire season 1 of their awesome Sam & Max adventures for $4.95 this weekend. So for the price of a cruddy Starbucks, you can have 6 of the best point and click adventures ever made. LINK to their page

Will do. Thanks

Ooh, just looked at the Xbox Live Marketplace - I didn't realise how much good stuff was there! - Rez, Ikaruga, Robotron 2084, Mr Driller... Yay!

I thought it was a bit much that the Elite now only comes with a composite cable. Nothing very elite about that, is there?

Thanks Albert. Browsing AA on my iPhone is a joy.

No, there are some bundles going around with Forza, Pure and Lego Batman for slightly more than retail, but none of those games really interests me. Amazon UK had a deal on, the Elite and 2 games from a short list (I got Bayonetta and ME1) for £199. Can't wait to get stuck into Mass Effect.

UPDATE: Just caved and ordered an Elite from Amazon - with Bayonetta and the first Mass Effect. How terribly exciting. Hope it doesn't die. Separately ordered one of those Play and Charge things and a component lead (have no HMDi sockets left and my amp can convert component to HDMi anyway). Is that all I need? Sorry, I'm all a bit new to this Oh yeah, one more little question - is the Xbox Live online store thingy updated every week? If so, what day? Mrs Liveinabin and myself already enjoy, what we've come to know as, Free Sh*t Thursday on PSN. Another would be cool.

I think it's a strong product. For what most people use a computer for, this is infinitely better than a netbook. Now what we have to realise is, we're not 'most people'. This is for the majority of people who would be buying a laptop, but not using most of the extra functionalty of a laptop. It's just a great coffee table browser, and an unparalleled eBook reader. Intersting to see an Apple-made processor. That was a surprise. Great battery life too - 10 hours with a standby time of a month!

That's fair enough then Who am I kidding? I've already started thinking about my Commander Shepard. Going to break tradition and go with a female as Jennifer Hale does the voice work for that, and she's excellent.

I said I didn't like FPSs Oh, I am sorely tempted to get one, Mass Effect 2 looks astonishing (even with the FPS battle system). One other thing, what the hell happened to the middle of the range 360 (the pro?). I can barely justify an Elite and the Arcade is (surely?) a pointless machine, being sans hard drive.

Gah. Stop it I must not buy another console for one game. I MUST not....

I'm thinking of finally getting a 360. I say thinking, it's rather more finding an excuse. See, I've already got a PS3 and that gets a lot of attention, but I REALLY want to play Mass Effect (and the forthcoming sequel). So, you reckon it might be worth a punt? Of course, I'm assuming Mass Effect is great. I love epic western RPGs (and Bioware's work, particularly Knights of the Old Republic) and I'm just about done wibbling about in Fallout 3 (after 200 hours!) so I'm looking for something new. I'm really on the fence here. I'm sure I can find other stuff to play on it (the slightly superior version of Bayonetta springs to mind) but not a lot, and I'm no fan of online gaming or first-person shooters, which seem to be the 360's bread and butter. Help!