Respect Sakura

I decided to pick up a few games for Xboxen over the past couple of weeks, so I thought I should offer some insight into how that went.

Before that, I’d just like to mention a few things about the system. The coolest thing is the whole interface, and community deal. Ultimately, the Xbox 360 is a system that’s designed for playing games and communicating with friends online. Yes, you’ll have your single player games and times where you’d rather play through the campaign, but even then.. communicating with friends is a button or two away. The Dashboard feels more like a gamers’ OS, rather than just a glorified savegame manager, and global options configurator. The ease of being able to switch between it and whatever game you’re playing is awesome. USB keyboard support for chatting is also awesome, as is the whole voice messaging deal. The fact that the dash remembers who you were recently playing against is pretty cool as well, in case you forget to add some guy to your friends list straight away, or want to file a complaint against some obnoxious faggot who screams into their mic.

Wireless controllers are also awesome, and Microsoft have very nearly done this right. The batteries tend to last a good while, and for many reasons, the whole wireless aspect just rocks. Being able to run into the kitchen to grab something, then run back all without taking your hands off the controller is a pretty cool thing, as is the lack of tangled cords, or having people trip and/or yank on the damn things. The downside is that it seems to turn off too quickly, and the manual doesn’t give any instructions as to what it means when the damn thing flashes every once in a while. Is the battery too low? Is there interference? Is it flashing because it wants to? What the hell’s going on? No explanation.

I could rattle on more about the media stuff, but you’ve no doubt heard that all before. Video playback from a computer only works with Media Center systems, and again, that only works in WMV format, regardless of whether your Directshow setup allows for custom formats when running MCE locally. It sucks, but I didn’t buy the thing to stream DivX’s to it, and our original Xbox does that well enough anyways. So.. that’s pretty much it for the system. What about these games I promised to talk about?

First of all, there’s Halo 2. If you like 1st person shooters, and can adjust to the controls, this is a required title. Yes, it’s an original Xbox title, and it looks dated compared to what’s out there today, but it’s all about the gameplay and the fact that there’s still a ton of people playing this. Futhermore, lag feels like it’s non-existant in every match I’ve played, which is an incredible achievement when compared to other games (and I’ll get to that in a bit).

It’s still fun, as well.. although if you’re new to console first person shooters, then I’d advise getting through the game first yourself, and submitting to the fact that you’ll just plain suck to begin with. Eventually, you’ll start to do well and actually win matches, by which time your rank will increase, and you’ll have plenty of hapless sucks accusing you of cheating. In any case, it’s required if you plan to play these games online, because even Quake 4’s controller setup is fairly similar to how Halo 2 works.

So.. that out of the way. What’s next? I haven’t picked up Battlefield 2: MC yet, despite enjoying the demo. I’ll most likely do so in a couple of weeks time. Hopefully the full game has more teamwork, and less TKing faggots who want the goddamn helicopter first. BF2: MC is a very different game to the PC version, the only real similarities are that it has Americans and Towelheads, just like the PC, but the levels are a lot different, the game mechanics are different, and things are a hell of a lot simpler. I find it a lot more fun than the PC, but that’s just me. At least when you change the graphic settings, it doesn’t spend years doing that shader shit again. The load times are a hell of a lot less obnoxious, and the game is actually stable.

There’s Quake 4.. and its lesser brother DOOM 3. I managed to pick up both of these, Quake 4 for the usual price, and DOOM 3 collector’s edition for only $30 - not bad, but also not terribly surprising. I haven’t played DOOM 3 online, but I’ve played a little Quake 4. Sure enough, it’s a console version of Quake 3 with Quake 4’s graphics, just like Quake 4 multi was just Quake 3 with Quake 4’s graphics. There’s also a shitton of lag. I’ve played maybe.. I dunno.. 12 matches? Half of those, were actually playable to some extent, but jesus fuck was the lag still present. I think I’ll stick with a few more matches against Australian players with Quake 4, but I won’t be playing it nearly as often as Halo 2 (which sucks, because Halo 2 won’t give me any gamerscore benefits). Graphics wise, and single player wise, I can’t find any difference between Quake 4 for the PC, and Quake 4 for the Xbox 360. It’s exactly the same game.

Finally, there’s Dead or Alive 4. There’s only one reason to buy this game, and that’s because it looks awesome. No other reason need apply. It’s not like the game has any kind of skillset involved, as it’s just pure button mashing and/or spamming the same faggoty move again and again until the Gods decide who wins. My sole goal in this game is to unlock the schoolgirl uniforms for as many female characters as the game allows. Why else would you play it? You wouldn’t play it online, because the lag present in Quake 4 seems to be a hundred times worse in DOA4, and in a game where timing your attacks is a pretty big deal, this makes the whole “leave it in the lap of the Gods” thing all the more evident, and it seems the Gods don’t approve of my lustful schoolgirl desires.

So.. that’s the games. There’s a few demos I’ve played here and there, and the arcade games are pretty cool. I’m really looking forward to Chromehounds next month, because I haven’t played a decent mech game since Heavy Gear 2, and Mechwarrior 2: Mercenaries. I also look forward to the formation of Günlanzers, and pledging my allegiance to them.

So all in all, it’s a pretty cool system. There’s not a lot of great games out there at the moment, as the one I’m enjoying the most is an original Xbox title anyways, so without Chromehounds, I’d find it hard pressed to recommend the system to other people. The new Live stuff is awesome, and if you’re like me and have a 24″ Dell, or some kind of amazing HDTV setup going, then it’s well worth looking into. Halo 2 looks a hell of a lot better on the 360 than it did on the original Xbox, and the online portion is great as well. All in all? If you’ve got a great speaker system and a great display waiting for it, then the 360 is a good buy. If you’ve got a pretty standard TV, and maybe a stereo speaker set to go with it, but don’t plan on playing online, or hooking it up to your PC in any way, then it’s probably not the console for you just yet. Ultimately, the games will decide, and there aren’t enough 360 native games out there to make that choice.

Once Chromehounds hits, though… every man, woman and child will want an Xbox 360.