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[MegaTen]

Just a little over a year since the Xbox 360 launched there have been a lot of great games exclusive to the system(so far). Just off the top of my head..

Ridge Racer 6
Gears of War
Chrome Hounds
Dead Rising
Bullet Witch
Lost Planet
Blue Dragon
Project Sylpheed
Earth Defence Forces 3
Viva Pinata

I think that's close to the amount of worthwhile games the original Xbox had in it's entire lifetime. Aside from Sega's games, I probably enjoyed a few others such as Phantom Dust, Pghantom Crash, and Ninja Gaiden... so I really wasn't expecting the Xbox 360 to have such a strong line up of games so soon.

I'm sure people have already realized this long ago, but it didn't hit me until now. Thinking about the great releases this last half of the year and in the coming months is what made me realize it. Sure the Japanese sales and support could be better, but with Blue Dragon's very recent release and Lost Planet coming soon, I have high hopes.

 

[Tieno]

I sold all my games, except for Oblivion, Gears of War and Viva Pinata. Nothing else worth keeping for me. Thank god for Oblivion or I wouldn't have been all that happy for most of 2006 (until GOW).

 

[ToxicAdam]

I'm sure people have already realized this long ago, but it didn't hit me until now. Thinking about the great releases this last half of the year and in the coming months is what made me realize it. Sure the Japanese sales and support could be better, but with Blue Dragon's very recent release and Lost Planet coming soon, I have high hopes.

What does Japanese sales have anything to do with your enjoyment of a console?

 

[open_mouth_]

1st to market + good dev tools + microsoft courting developers + great software sales = lots of great games, just like the PS2 before it

 

[raYne]

Too many shooters... (according to some dude).

 

[MegaTen]

What does Japanese sales have anything to do with your enjoyment of a console?

It'll increase developer support? And seeing as how the only games for the original Xbox I really enjoyed were from Japanese developers...

Did you read the entire post?

 

[jooey]

What does Japanese sales have anything to do with your enjoyment of a console?

ha ha ha, your rhetorical humor amuses me!

 

[Funky Papa]

Did I read Bullet Witch and Project Sylpheed? =/

The original Xbox had a lot of great games, it is a damn shame that most of them went unnoticed. Buffy, JSR, Orta, Gun Valkyrie and both Otogis were awesome.

 

[JB1981]

It's pretty frickin' great.

 

[pswii60]

Impressed that they took the strategy of getting rid of the 'halo-box' idea by delaying halo 3 until way after launch.

Impressed with GoW - could be another Halo-sized exclusive for MS, surprised they haven't swallowed up Epic yet.

Surprised with the interface - really is seamless, love the 'invite friend' feature and how almost every game supports online in one form or another. Also feel 'connected' at all times.

Impressed with 2007 line-up. "Wow" in the style of Wario64 sums it up.

Unimpressed with lack of variety. Outside of Viva and Kameo, there is little to suit my platforming / kiddy game cravings. MS need to address this in 2007 as quickly as possible.

 

[pCeSlAyEr]

What does Japanese sales have anything to do with your enjoyment of a console?

little japanese success means few good JRPG's in the future... probably..

 

[meltpotato]

not for one minute did i care about the xbox or feel i wanted one.
i am currently a 360 own and don't see myself needing anything else any time soon.

basically polar opposite platforms to me

 

[Dr. Kitty Muffins]

I bought mine for Oblivion, Culdcept Saga and the two Mistwalker JRPG's.........and the promise of more to come. I really hope they come through for me on the JRPG and japanese game front. Fortunately, I have a PS2 to keep me company on the JRPG side for awhile.

I would love to say that as a Rare fan I bought the system for Rare games but I didn't. I like Kameo (only got so far in), hate PDZ (yet love FPS games) and LOVE Viva Pinata.

I loved JSRF, Otogi 1 and 2, and Panzer Dragoon last gen. Hopefully more stuff comes out along those lines and not late in the consoles lifespan.

 

[jetjevons]

I sold all my games, except for Oblivion, Gears of War and Viva Pinata. Nothing else worth keeping for me. Thank god for Oblivion or I wouldn't have been all that happy for most of 2006 (until GOW).

I think:

Condemned
Call of Duty 2
PGR 3
GRAW

are worth keeping.

 

[EverSoTrendy]

I don't have asian fever so really the games on the original xbox were plentiful, X360 looks to be the same in the game department just a tad bit better. Which is a good thing.

 

[Tieno]

I think:

Condemned
Call of Duty 2
PGR 3
GRAW

are worth keeping.

I bought both COD2 and GRAW, but I asked myself if I ever wanted to play them again and said 'no'. Especially when I know they're almost like yearly franchises and they more or less play like seperated missions. (not that I'll buy the sequals)

 

[EverSoTrendy]

I bought both COD2 and GRAW, but I asked myself if I ever wanted to play them again and said 'no'. Especially when I know they're almost like yearly franchises and they more or less play like seperated missions. (not that I'll buy them)

Sounds like you wasted money on an Xbox360 for nothing...

 

[Mr Furious]

not for one minute did i care about the xbox or feel i wanted one.
i am currently a 360 own and don't see myself needing anything else any time soon.

basically polar opposite platforms to me

Same for me, but I did buy an Xbox (about a year before 360) just to play Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory, Spiderman 2, and a few other great titles.

 

[dark10x]

It still feels like XBOX to me. Not necessarily a bad thing, but there is a distinct difference between the XBOX consoles and what the other two companies are doing with their platforms. I've had a good time with the machine, though, and Gears of War was truly AAA, but it hasn't been overwhelming by any stretch.

2007 looks fantastic, though.

 

[jarrod]

It's still missing something to fill the Smilebit void... VF5 and AB Climax would do nicely tho.

 

[Jammy]

I'm also one of those gamers that didn't own an Xbox yet think a 360 is very appealing at the moment.

I'm definitely getting a 360 next year, most likely when a pricedrop occurs.

The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion
DOAX2
Gears of War
Call of Duty 3
Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six: Vegas

And by then, Halo 3, GTA IV, and others won't be that far off. I'm also looking forward to stuff like Fable 2, and especially Banjo-Threeie.

 

[Skilotonn]

Impressed greatly in the sense that they built up and expanded on everything I loved on the original, including genres and Live functionally...

Some very memorable games on the original Xbox, and even more are here/coming out soon on the 360, and it's only been a year, so things are going pretty damn well for me as an Xbox owner...

 

[ZeoVGM]

I thought Xbox was an exclusiveless piece of crap!

GC + PS2 FTW~




Now I ****ing LOVE 360 and it was hard for me to play PS3 because of its inferior online setup and general layout.

And 360 helped get me into shooters.

360 FTW.

 

[Tieno]

Sounds like you wasted money on an Xbox360 for nothing...

Almost feels like that, if it were not for GoW, Oblivion and Geometry Wars (and to a lesser extent Viva Pinata). So I probably would have bought a premium at 400$ euro anyway.
Not to say that I didn't enjoy COD2, it was an amazing experience first time through (not so much 2nd time), just didn't think I'd play it again in a couple of months. The 360 experience while playing games is very good (only downer is the loud noise).

 

[Musashi Wins!]

I'm not sure. I felt like the last real year of the Xbox had a lot of niche stuff to complement the blockbuster titles. I'm curious if this will have the same.

I'm impressed with Live.

I'm impressed with Gears.

I'm impressed that it's getting the Culdcept sequel. I'm impressed that Rare made Viva Pinata. I'm sort of impressed with Capcom.

I'm not overly impressed with the first year library. I'm not impressed with Xbox Live Arcade. I'm not impressed with the hardware reliability.

I think it's benefiting from it's launch head start big time right now, especially since the PS3 is so unimpressive. I think next year will be pretty damn good for the system.

 

[superNoid]

<3 360.

 

[Dr_Cogent]

This first year I would have to say seems better than the first year of the original Xbox. When I got my 360 (a surprise from my wife, I had every intention on waiting for better games) there wasn't much to play. After GRAW and Oblivion, things picked up and I've been loving the system ever since.

This coming year looks fab as well.

 

[OnWarmerMusic]

I never owned the original XBox, so I can't really place the two in comparison, but I will say that since my 360 purchase I've been very pleased. Of the games I picked up with the system, Dead Rising was a blast, and getting RR6 for only $20 was a complete steal. I haven't gotten GoW yet (I'm sorry! I ran out of money!) but I hope to rectify that in the next couple of weeks, and I'm looking forward to getting online with it.

One complaint I have is the occasional OS weirdness. Saving games and downloading stuff from XBL can be a bit clunky, and navigating the system menus in general can feel like a chore. I know those points have been beaten to death here, and will likely be addressed to a certain extent in Dashboard updates, so I won't dwell. And obviously, I spend more time actually playing games than navigating through menus, so the percentage of my time that's spend with those mild annoyances is pretty nominal.

All that said, with Blue Dragon, Lost Planet (holyshityes), and maybe Lost Odyssey in the next year, I'm a happy camper. More Japanese dev support would be great, so I'm hoping the Mistwalker titles sell well enough in Japan to encourage more of that.

 

[duk]

of course the 360 will be better than xbox, but yes MS has really done a good job overall (sans crappy launch)

 

[Odrion]

there is little to suit my kiddy cravings.

You goddamn pervert.

But yeah, really like the X-Box 360 so far. I'm rather oblivious to what we're getting for 2007 but it just means more surprises for me, whoo hoo!

 

[Ignatz Mouse]

I'm impressed but not surprised, if that makes sense.

I said a while ago that it looked like MS had "it"-- that whatever-it-is that the PS1 had that set it apart and attracted interesting games to it.

[That game list is more like 1.5 years, but that's nitpicking-- still impressive.]

 

[Dr_Cogent]

I'm impressed but not surprised, if that makes sense.

I said a while ago that it looked like MS had "it"-- that whatever-it-is that the PS1 had that set it apart and attracted interesting games to it.

[That game list is more like 1.5 years, but that's nitpicking-- still impressive.]

I thought you didn't own a 360 Ignatz. You do?

 

[Fantasmo]

Not surprised at all.

Bought Xbox for Ninja Gaiden. 480p widescreen, DD 5.1 STANDARD! Highest framerates, best standard controller, best ports.

Street Fighter 2/3 over Xbox Live, Ninja Gaiden, Riddick and Halo alone were worth the purchase.

Awesome versions of Burnout, GTA, Super Monkey Ball, Gun, Panzer Orta, Serious Sam, Silent Hill, Fatal Frame, plus about 20 others.

And modded you get XBMC and great emulators with tons of features? If you had the money for an Xbox and didn't pick one up, you're insane!

See that's the best part about Microsoft, they require you to do things and they've continued that and pushed for more this generation too!

Go Microsoft!

 

[jjasper]

I got a xbox when KOTOR came out and while I thought it was pretty good for a couple of games (KOTOR, Halo, R6:3) I wasn't really impressed by the system as a whole due to lack of diversity in the titles.

However my brother picked up a 360 about a month ago and so far I am pretty impressed I really only have Gears and Oblivion so I am starting with an rpg and shooter like I did for the xbox, but I am much more excited about upcoming games then I ever was for the original xbox (which was me waiting for halo 2, KOTOR2, and JE)

 

[plagiarize]

i'm not surprised, but what i will say has impressed me is the dashboard, and how pervasive they've made live this time. that all encompassing online vision really turned out. live was good on the xbox, but they improved it more than i was expecting this time around and it's certainly the one place they delivered.

now that i've built up a group of live friends who are fun to play with, i don't know that i'll bother trying to do the same on ps3 or wii, so for multiplatform online games, i think the 360 will be my system of choice, unless a lot of my friends get wiis or ps3s that is.

 

[GhaleonEB]

The games are great, as has been mentioned. I think it's the best year-one lineup since the Dreamcast, honestly. What really impresses me is Live and the Dashboard integration. Sony's solution seems to justify the notion that it's really, tough to nail, and MS has used their leadtime to really build an amazing system.

 

[Segata Sanshiro]

The Xbox 360's interface truly outclasses Nintendo and Sony's efforts in huge ways. For whatever other knocks I have on the system, they are really on the ball with their online integration. Making the other two look bad in this area, really.

 

[RumFore]

I'am loving the 360. I dont know if its the fact I have more money or what but I havent bought so many games in such a short time frame for a console since maybe the Dreamcast or of late the Nintendo DS. The PS2 had alot of great games but I kept putting one great game off for another until I totally forgot about the one I intended on getting and ended up getting nothing or one game every 3 months.

Playing the shit out of Gears of War, Tony Hawk P8, Rainbow Six Vegas and I got Viva coming this. Loving every minute of it and I'm reminded of the Dreamcast days and how much time I wasted on the system.

 

[Pimpbaa]

I was surprised that the 360 hardware ended up being more unrealiable than the original xbox with a thompson dvd drive. I really hope they are reworking more than just the CPU (the jump to 65nm) for the next hardware revision. I want one, but don't want to have to deal with getting a replacement (especially a refurbished replacement) or getting it fixed and having to pay for microsofts own mistakes a year or less down he road (considering I play games quite heavily).

 

[DarienA]

I can't remember when I bought an Xbox but I feel like it was fairly along the way...there wasn't much exclusive content I had interest in.

However here it is only slightly past a year in to the X360's life and I own one. I'm very happy with the racing games I've played on it and they'll probably continue to make up a majority of my 360 library.

 

[Speevy]

I think the Xbox 360 has better future prospects than the Xbox did, while the Xbox was more exciting right out of the gate.

Overall though, I'm impressed with the potential of the Xbox 360.

 

[jakershaker]

Microsoft are doing things right this time. Most of those titles listed are shit though ^^

Blue Dragon FTW

 

[Nozi]

The 360 feels more user friendly than the Xbox in every regard.

Going online with a games console has never felt so effortless and well designed. I love the Live Arcade, downloading demos and the friends list.

I never thought I'd like achievement points but after playing through Resistance I noticed I kept checking for them at the bottom of the screen.

 

[djtiesto]

Positives compared to the original Xbox:
-Much more RPGs, well quality Japanese games in general, are on 360
-Live implementation is even better
-The first year lineup is very impressive no matter what the system - RR6, Oblivion, Gears, Enchanted Arms, and of course Geometry Wars
-XBLA

Negatives compared to the original Xbox:
-No exclusive SEGA titles. This was the main reason I bought the original Xbox.
-Where are the fighting games??? UMK3 over Live is a joke compared to online KOF, CvS2, GGX2#R, and the amazingness that is Third Strike.
-No longer the clear winner in the graphics debate

Overall, I am very happy with my purchase, and I have a feeling I'm gonna end up liking the 360 a heckuva lot more than the Xbox. So far it's the best American console ever...

 

[dark10x]

I never thought I'd like achievement points but after playing through Resistance I noticed I kept checking for them at the bottom of the screen.

Funny you'd say that with Resistance, though, as that particular game includes its own brand of skill points. Insomniac has always done this.

I'm not a fan of the achievements, though, as the overall score is COMPLETELY worthless and the achievements between games are far too uneven.

 

[Timedog]

360 will be better than xbox just in it's first 2 years.

<3 360

 

[VALIS]

I'm not overly impressed with the first year library.

It rarely happens, but I have to disagree with you here, Musashi. I can't think of a console's first year that's even come close to having the range of great and varied games as in the 360's first year.

High quality shooters, of course: Gears, R6 Vegas, GRAW, FEAR, CoD2/3
Great driving games: PGR3, Test Drive Unlimited, Ridge 6, Moto GP, Burnout
RPG: Oblivion, Enchanted Arms
Sandbox/GTA style games: Saints Row, Dead Rising, Just Cause
Survival Horror: Condemned
RTS on a console!!: LOTR: BFME2
Sim/Management: Viva Pinata, Outpost Kaloki X
Platform: Kameo, Cloning Clyde
Sports novelty: Table Tennis, Amped 3, THPS8
Fighting: DOA4
Stealth: Splinter Cell, Hitman
Arcade: Geometry Wars, Lumines Live, Mutant Storm Reloaded, retro arcade games with leaderboards and online play

That's really hot for one year. And some of the areas they're lacking in, like J-RPGs or quirky J-games in general, are about to receive pretty big boosts to their numbers. The 360 has absolutely dominated my playing time in the last 12 months.

 

[lix2k3]

lovin my box. I have 9 games in my collection and I have the good problem of having too many great games to play and too little time.

 

[Mana Knight]

Well, I thought the original Xbox was better in its first year, with games like Gun Valkyrie, Blinx, JSRF, etc.

As of right now, I think the 360 is a huge disappointment, where there are only a few games I like (PGR3, RR6, Enchanted Arms, N3, and DoA4 to some extent), unlike the original Xbox. Only three of those games are truly exclusive, since my favorite game (RR6) has a sequel on PS3, and my 3rd favorite game is coming to PS3 (Enchanted Arms, with several additions, like cutscenes removed due to the limited DVD disc). Too many shooters (seriously, I just can't stand them), sports, racers (although I like a few). The 360 lacks platformers, RPGs (they'll eventually come, which is good, unlike the original Xbox), fighters, music/dance games, samurai type action games, etc.

Although PS3 hasn't been out long, I feel it's doing a way better job with game variety and I see it continuing to come (thanks to SCE) in the future.

2007 looks much better for the 360, but it also does for PS3, so we'll see (Still PS3 FTW for me. Screw online multi-player, gets too boring quickly).

 

[Vangellis]

I didnt care too much for the original xbox. This time around I think they got most of it right. Ive been rather impressed with live and its seemless intergration. The 360 interface is rather nice, clunky at times but i like it overall. Love the wireless gamepad, probably one of the nicest feeling pads in my hands. So i think im most impressed how well the os is shadowed and at anytime I can access friends, music etc. Oh and turning on and turning off the system from the gamepad is the best thing ever. I know all the systems do this know, but I first expereinced thi with my 360 and cant live without it.