I would laugh if this was only available via a DLC code which came with a new copy of the game.
HDDs cost money just to be built. The size isn't really much of an extra expense -- its the basic parts that cost. The 250GB drive in the new 360 probably costs about $3 more than the 120GB drive in the older elites did.
Mass-produced 160GB drives cost less than 80GB drives these days, simply because they are mass produced, and 80GBs are not any longer. Sony won't make a "cheap" model that costs more to make. That'd be silly.
I prefer to pay for something of value, with real games, rather than for something I won't use, due to lack of serious game support.
Honestly, I think you'd have to draw up a pretty odd situation for Kinect to "cost less", especially after you consider that Kinect games are being priced at $60, while Move games are $40.
Basically you have to have exactly two players, who want to play exactly one game (the bundled one), in order for Kinect to...
The extra cost in the EU is due to VAT, which is basically the huge sales tax of the EU -- which doesn't have things like income tax, as I recall. Unlike the US, where the sales tax varies widely from state to state, and even city to city, the VAT is universal, and is thus included in the price.
It'll cost $149.99 in the US... then there will be like 9-10% sales tax, and before you earn that ~$165 you'll have paid about 15% in federal income tax on it, meaning it...
Still trying to decide if Alpha Protocol is worth it...
And dangit, I have RDR, SC:C, AC2, and Metro 2033 already.
My gaming PC is from about 2005 -- a 3.2 GHz hyperthreaded P4 with a 256MB 8X AGP nVidia 6800 GT. How about some screens showing that compared with my PS3?
I have never understood the point of these "compare the PS3 you do have to the ultimate gaming rig you don't have" comparisons. Who, who buys a gaming rig, doesn't know the obvious, and didn't buy their rig for that purpose? Why bother comparing, other than for fanboy "look how much faster 201...
@Frag:
Yes, webcams can do facial tracking well. Consider the distance you are from your webcam for a moment, and then think about the distance a Kinect user needs to be from their TV. Remember Kinect video rez is only 640x480.
Also, ponder the fact that webcams tend to update at 60 Hz, and use a significant amount of the horsepower of a PC CPU when doing face tracking. Kinect updates at 30 Hz, but also need to analyze skeletal info and a depth image, and ...
The article author is wondering why platformers aren't coming to the 360 -- he's just using Mario as an example, for people who don't know what a "platformer" is.
Sony gets them (see: Ratchet&Clank series, Trine, Sly Cooper collection, etc.), and obviously the Wii gets them, but the 360 really has to dig into the XBLA pile to find any good ones outside of HD remakes like Banjo Kazooie, or PoP classic... at least ones suited for everyone (I would use ...
I'm not so sure that Kinect can detect the direction you are, for example, looking in. Remember it cannot pick up fingers reliably, so eyes seems like it might be a chore as well -- possibly complicated by users wearing glasses or not, etc.
Besides, if you look away from the screen... doesn't that kind of defeat the purpose of having control tied to your looking? Kinect might add arm gestures to shooters, but I think that'd be about it -- and it would require th...
Well.. technically you can be a FPS, merely by shooting and being in first-person.
Kinect could have rails FPS games, where you don't do any moving directly... and maybe you could aim with your arm, if the targets were big enough. And... uh... nod your head to shoot, or say "die, alien scum!" or something?
...yeah. Doesn't sound too fun to me, either.
Man I hope they don't do that. Ubisoft actually makes games I might like to buy new, rather than boycott for 12 months and buy used.
To quote the article:
"If a game sells 1.7 million copies, do you know that’s over $100 million in profits for the for its developer/publisher already?"
1.7M times $35 (which is the about the price of a $60 MSRP game to a retail chain) is $59.5M, and its not "profit" until the dev and marketing costs are paid in full, and of course each copy of the game costs about $7 to make and distribute as well (thats $11.9 million to make 1.7M physical copies ...
What I find funny about this article is that arstechnica is a site primarily read by territories where the 360 outnumbers the PS3 -- hence the disparity between Move and Kinect. They even have a special "Microsoft" section on their site.
Given the relative proximity of the survey numbers, and the Ars reader's likely bias toward the 360 (I said READER bias, not writer), I'd say that the Move is actually the more popular device, as far as attach goes, for gen...
The USB cables only supply power. Both the 360 and PS3 controllers still communicate wirelessly when plugged in, to my recollection.
Remember console OSes are meant to be as simple as possible, to save memory. They do things ONE way, and avoid having lots of extra paths for doing things, when the one supported way works just fine. Supporting USB communication for 360 controllers would just be more code and interface support that just isn't needed when you're trying...
You realize that "Creative Director" manages stuff like cutscenes and story in a game, whereas the actual gameplay mechanics are led by a game's lead designer, right?
Creative Directors are usually the "bosses" of lead designers, but they, like all administrative personnel, primarily play a support role, and do their best work when they free their team's hands to be creative, rather than being directly creative themselves.
Stuart B...
The 360 will continue to outsell the PS3 as long as there are $150 and $250 360s available new, at retail. It'll be about another month.
The sad thing is that, even with the 360 yard sale that's going on right now, MS *still* is going to take a good 2 months to clear their summer inventory (lesser than other seasons) from the shelves.
I know a lot of MS fans think this Americas 360 surge is a great thing... but its very foretelling of some serious up...
The Cell is the closest thing the world will ever see to a CPU-GPU unified arhcitecture. It may be "hard" to write good code for, but it the design is still unsurpassed.
I sincerely hope Sony goes with another Cell design for the next PlayStation -- it'll save devs a TON of money in engine development if its similar to the PS3 Cell (only larger scale), and it just cannot be beaten, when the time is taken to make it work well.
Development houses...
Another knucklehead who bought a PSP Go without realizing what it was for.
I love my Go. I knew what I was buying.
VGChartz numbers are decent. Its the articles that are hard to trust.
Since the site maintainers are sales-oriented, they tend to favor the Wii as being "the platform", and somehow extend that into the hardcore realm when they write articles about upcoming software, etc. They just ignore the 3rd party publishers when they state "Wii sucks for profits", and pretend like HW sales, and *overall* SW sales (which is good for Nintendo, but split up amongst too...
@Dlacy13g
...I'm comparing economics in the EU with the US. EU citizens pay taxes in a very different manner from US citizens. Income tax is hefty in the US -- its not a factor in the EU, so even though the US price *seems* cheaper, its not, relative to income.
The world doesn't all work like the US, you know. People are complaining that the EU price is "high" I am merely providing a reference for how US economics works, for a better per...