PC, Xbox 360 or PS3?

[Flexor the Mighty!]

Going to buy a 360 today. There just isn't anything on the PS3 I want to play that much compared to the 360.

 

[GoodKingJayIII]

Going to buy a 360 today. There just isn't anything on the PS3 I want to play that much compared to the 360.

This is really what it comes down to. They're both good systems, but it all comes down to what you want to do with them. If I needed to play Ratchet and Clank, MGS4, FFXIII, or Warhawk I would've gotten the PS3. But in my case, I needed to play Halo 3 and Mass Effect. So the choice was simple for me.

As much as I love my 360, I am a little urked by it's underlying principle: here is the base system, everything else will cost you. Even simple things. Take for example my recent exploits. I returned my old 'box because, despite the fact that I bought it in November, the hardware was over a year old. So I returned it for a newer system, no questions asked. However, I was surprised to learn that the 360 wouldn't even recognize my flash drive, and that in order to transfer all of my saved files I had to go out and by a memory card. I suppose that's no different from any other game system, but being made by perhaps the largest software giant out there, I guess was expecting a little more compatibility with some of my computer stuff.

 

[Kid Charlemagne]

That's one of the nice things about the PS3. I can plug a USB anything into it, or a bluetooth keyboard, or an external HD (as long as its formatted in the right mode).

 

[Enforcer]

True, the Xbox 360's extra stuff is pretty pricey. I'm still miffed over the wireless networking adapter costing around $100... even if there's no way running a 50 ft. ethernet cable would've been okayed by my wife (or me for that matter). At least it works flawlessly.

$50 a year for Xbox Live, however, is a steal. That service rocks, and rocks hard.

 

[GoodKingJayIII]

That's one of the nice things about the PS3. I can plug a USB anything into it, or a bluetooth keyboard, or an external HD (as long as its formatted in the right mode).

Right. That's awesome, and I dearly wish Microsoft would do the same. But they don't really operate with an "openness" MO.

$50 a year for Xbox Live, however, is a steal. That service rocks, and rocks hard.

Really? I love XBL but I'm not sure I agree with that. Out of curiousity, why would you say it's a steal? There's definitely no other service quite like it out there, though as PSN grows and once Home is released XBL will have some serious competition.

 

[Enforcer]

The ease of finding other players in multiplayer right there is worth $50 a year. I can start shooting people in Team Fortress 2 within about 60 sec. from powering my system on. Built-in voice chat and the TrueSkill system (behind the scenes) just help to make it better. And since you're actually paying for the service, they (Microsoft) actually cares about making it good (like how we're all getting a free Arcade game due to the intermittent service outages over the holiday season, nevermind the fact that all I've been playing lately is Mass Effect and haven't needed Xbox Live).

 

[Arnwyn]

The ease of finding other players in multiplayer right there is worth $50 a year. I can start shooting people in Team Fortress 2 within about 60 sec. from powering my system on. Built-in voice chat

I'm still not sure I understand... don't all the other systems do this as well? The PS3 and PC both do, at least...

And since you're actually paying for the service, they (Microsoft) actually cares about making it good (like how we're all getting a free Arcade game due to the intermittent service outages over the holiday season

Ouch. There's some ugly irony, here. I like it when the service doesn't go out at all (again, like said other systems, which one gets for free to boot).

I'm still waiting to see what makes Live worth the money (I had online for all the systems, but dumped Live as it provided no value that the other systems already had for free) - no one has yet to be able to explain it, other than trying to justify to themselves the money they've spent...

 

[Enforcer]

My understanding is that it's easier to connect with other players on Live than on the PS3. It's certainly much easier than it was to play Counter-Strike on the PC, and the TrueSkill system makes it much less likely that I'll be put into a game with crazy-awesome experts who will do nothing but kick my ass all day, which happened all the time in Counter-Strike.

Perhaps someone who has played multiplayer on both Xbox 360 with Live and on the PS3 wants to chime in here?

As for reimbursing us for service outages, the outages occurred because everyone and their mother signed up for Live over the holidays. Giving some recompense is a great way to treat customers when you drop the ball. If it had happened to Sony they would have said what? Probably something along the lines of "well you don't pay for it, so suck it up and deal with the outage and just hope it doesn't happen again. It's free."

 

[Rackhir]

My understanding is that it's easier to connect with other players on Live than on the PS3. It's certainly much easier than it was to play Counter-Strike on the PC, and the TrueSkill system makes it much less likely that I'll be put into a game with crazy-awesome experts who will do nothing but kick my ass all day, which happened all the time in Counter-Strike.

Perhaps someone who has played multiplayer on both Xbox 360 with Live and on the PS3 wants to chime in here?

As for reimbursing us for service outages, the outages occurred because everyone and their mother signed up for Live over the holidays. Giving some recompense is a great way to treat customers when you drop the ball. If it had happened to Sony they would have said what? Probably something along the lines of "well you don't pay for it, so suck it up and deal with the outage and just hope it doesn't happen again. It's free."

While it is possible for the kind of scenario you describe to happen with the PS3 and you're likely accurate about Sony's attitude. I think most of Arnwyn's point was that unless, the internet goes down. You aren't likely to get a similar total outage with a PS3. You could get it for individual games, but not the whole system.

That is a good point about the Skill level matching, though there are some similar features for at least Warhawk from what I understand (no idea about TF2 or UT3).

 

[Arnwyn]

Perhaps someone who has played multiplayer on both Xbox 360 with Live and on the PS3 wants to chime in here?

That would be me, which is why I was curious.

The online PS3 games I play, including Warhawk, R:FoM, and Rock Band, among others, syncs up perfectly with my friends list. All have voice chat, etc. Since I've played both online, I've seen no evidence that the 360 is "easier" in any way - and certainly not $50 easier.

Not sure about the TrueSkill system, though - I played 360 games (such as Halo 3) online, and I never (overtly) noticed such a thing. Is it game specific (ie. Orange Box only), or a Live thing? If it's a Live thing, now we're (beginning to) talk about value-added stuff (though, indeed, as Rackhir noted, Warhawk does have a ranking system).



Rackhir re-iterated my point about reliability well enough (and I don't care about "if it happened", because it hasn't - which again, is part of my point). I know why it happened with Live, and I just have to shrug (and be amused). For a pay "service", that's pretty lax.