Microsoft: Xbox 360 Made for Families, Not Gamers

[The_root_of_all_evil]

Really off topic, but I just watched your avatar for about 5 minutes. I have no idea why.

LMAO, I get those quotes every couple of days. Not mine originally, but I liked it so much I bought the company.

 

[ANImaniac89]

yeah I Xbox 360 doesn't lack long enough to be considered a gaming system.

and when I replaced my 360 with a PS3 it was the best decision ever.

 

[SonicWaffle]

Read a little harder plz. There was nothing that needed to be spell checked and any1 who IM's or has a cellphone could read it just fine

We can read it, it's just annoying being forced to, and many people will just skip your posts. That style of writing is a hangover from the days when text messages had low character limits, which don't really exist anymore, so there isn't really any reason for using it - especially in a forum where people are likely to value spelling and grammar, and you have no character restriction on your posts. Take a few extra seconds to type the words properly and you'd be amazed at how many more people will actually read what you gave to say.

And no my bro takes impeccable care of his systems.

I've had my 360 for three years now, and it's seen a lot of use. It's been carried around the country on trains and buses in my backpack, it's been set up in a variety of places, it's been knocked over, had things spilt on on and even been dropped. It's still working perfectly. Taking care of your system (which I do generally try to do, contrary to the impression I've probably just given) doesn't have much effect on the RRoD, as I understand it; the problem was shoddy manufacturing in the console's early days which has since largely been rectified.

1. virtually no backwards compatibility. tho i know why they do that. it is so to play all the old games you have to buy them again on xbox live and play them that way. If you do not still own an xbox. greedy buggers!

While it annoys me that, say, The Warriors is not backwards-compatible there are still a great many awesome games that are. On the other hand, my flatmate's PS3 isn't backwards compatible at all, and trying to run an older game on my PC is a crapshoot that nine times out of ten prevents me from playing what I want. The backwards-compatibility thing is an issue, but it's hardly one that is exclusive to the Xbox.

2. Red Ring of Death- nuff said on that

Still not something I've experienced, though the aforementioned flatmate claims to have something similar (the yellow light, or something?) happen with his PS3.

3. A worthless amount of hard drive space, compared to the obviously superior original Xbox

Well, that depends entirely on your needs, and those needs should dictate the model you buy. Personally I have about 60 albums, a ton of DLC and arcade games, a couple of bigger games saved onto my hard drive, and a fuckload of savefiles. I've still got about 15gig of space left, and my HD is the basic 60gig model. I'm not sure what you're doing that makes such an amount "worthless", but there are bigger drives out there to compensate.

 

[SonicWaffle]

I can almost guarantee that games with high levels of violence and gore are the majority when it comes to games available for the 360. You can take your family console pipe-dream and shove it -.-

I highly doubt that. Plenty of AAA titles, sure, and the ones we hear about from newssites, but there are still loads of games without a high level of violence or gore.

The list here breaks it down (if you look to the left of the screen); [link]http://marketplace.xbox.com/en-GB/Games/All?xr=shellnav[/link], and while there are more "action/adventure" (presumably the most likely to be violent and gorey, though I wouldn't say most of them would be to a "high level") titles than any other grouping, followed by shooter, the amounts from other genres add up pretty well too.

Adding together those genres that I'm pretty sure won't be hyper-violent (card & board, educational, family, music, platformer, puzzle & trivia, racing & flying, sports & recreation) this gives a fairly respectable score of 1187 games. The combined amount of action adventure games plus shooter games only comes to 1152, and I'm sure the majority of those aren't even the uberviolent titty-jiggling gorefests that would get media watchdogs in a tizzy.

In terms of the games the console has, it would appear that the 360 is already pretty family-friendly!

 

[The Unworthy Gentleman]

The worst part of this for me is that we can't get Hulu in the UK.

I don't mind it taking an entertainment system direction as long as it stays true to it's roots and keeps up with the good non-casual games.

 

[Macgyvercas]

Fuck you, Microsoft! Fuck you! How can you even dream that you could say that the Xbox 360 is not for gamers and not expect a negative response. I mean, good god, you have Halo, Gears of War and Dead Rising on the damn thing, so you have no fucking right to say that this console is "not for gamers"! Rot in hell!

/rant

 

[Spoon E11]

Clear sign that the console is just coming to the end of its lifespan.

Really? with xbox 360s and kinect I'd give it untill xmas 2013. before it's superseeded.

 

[Nick Holmgren]

Umm, I thought that was how sony moved consoles. sony: "look! it plays blu ray on the cheap, and that random game you might want to try but eh BLUE RAY!!!!!!" (and i own one of those) Microsoft: "LOOK! halo, gears, and xbl. oh and I guess HD-DVD is kinda there but whatever" Nintendo "Look! We have more money then we could ever spend! Screw multi-media!"
yeah...

 

[SmilingKitsune]

Microsoft are about five years too late to try jumping on the Wii bandwagon now.
Same goes for Sony.

 

[xXx5Niq3rzxXx]

Question: What is a Gamer?

 

[Tom Phoenix]

"Xbox isn't a gaming console. Xbox is a family entertainment center."

Sorry, Balmer, but the Xbox 360 wasn't originally designed with that role in mind. No matter how hard you try to disguise it, the Xbox is neither "family-friendly" nor an "entertainment center".

Besides, what is wrong with a device primarily specialised in a certain role? Heck, the "multimedia dream" is a fallacy many people have fallen for in the past. Both the Philips CD-i and the Apple Bandai Pippin were designed with that concept in mind...do you recall how well that went?

 

[Mr Pantomime]

I heard Bill Gates wants the XBOX to control yur entire house. Security, Lightswitches, Dishwashers, all that

 

[SaintWaldo]

Why this isn't reported as a major shift that should really give pause considering the 4 full years MS has been poo-pooing casual gamers and their systems escapists me.

 

[Sixties Spidey]

It's official. Balmer's a fucking idiot. Is it considered family oriented when most of the Xbox 360's line up is comprised of shooters and lest we forget, an exclusive, no less, about chainsawing aliens in half?

Yeah. I thought so.

 

[Anti Nudist Cupcake]

Now I REALLY won't buy one.

When I think of something that's "fun for whole family" I think this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_iYBmAVuBns

(click on the damn link! and watch the damn video! it will show you what the wii really is...
and it's funny)