Gaming by GlossGreen

Two days ago I finally bought an Xbox 360. I had been thinking about picking one up for quite a while, but like many, I had my reservations. Obviously, I don't have any reservations now and I bought an Elite on Monday. I went to the store by myself, chose the game I wanted, paid for it and went home. After I got home I let my daughter see what I bought thinking that she'd be excited to have a new system in the house. Boy was I wrong. Before I even had a chance to open the box my sweet, innocent, and carefree daughter was criticizing my decision to pick one up. OK, I've dealt with fanboys on the internet before. I usually respond by spouting logic and then ignoring them, kinda hard to do in this case.

See, here's the thing. I think this is all my fault. No, I'm not a Sony fanboy myself, although for the past several years the only systems I've owned have been of the Sony variety. In 2002 I bought a PS2 for myself. At the same time I bought a Game Boy Advance for my daughter. She was 5 or 6 at the time and not really into videogames as much as she is now. She would watch me play and pick up a controller every once in a while herself, but she didn't really have the skills to have fun gaming. A few years back all that changed.

Starting in 2006 things became different. My daughter was getting more and more active in playing games and more demanding to have more time to play. It got to be so bad that she would try to take the controller out of my hands, not that that actually worked. I finally gave in and sent my PS2 to the dark and dangerous region of the house known as "her room". After that, my daughter's interest in gaming went through the roof. She, like me, would spend hours playing games. She would play games like, Spyro, The Sims, and Kingdom Hearts all day and love it. Last year she kept bugging me to get games like Okami and Psychonauts for her, she knows creativity and quality in games when she sees it. And that trend continued up to a few months ago when I got my PS3.

Now, my daughter hasn't had the interest for the PS3 as much as she has for the old system (which miraculously still works after 6 years). Sure, she enjoys games like Uncharted, but of course, the PS3 resides in the living room and under my control, unlike her PS2. How is this teaching her bias against other systems? Remember, I said I bought her a Game Boy Advance right? Well, she never had any interest in that. We never had an Xbox (until now) or any Nintendo systems in the house during her lifetime. Sega systems are just as unknown to her. So she is biased on the basis of not having experienced anything else.

I don't have anything against Microsoft. Really, I don't. I just never thought too much of the original Xbox. And with the RRoD crisis I really didn't think too highly of the 360 either. This never stopped me from believing that both systems had great games though, the hardware just never impressed me. I think it was this attitude that my daughter has latched on to and adopted as her own. This attitude was laid bare when my wife asked me why I had to own all the systems in the current generation and how the 360 was different from the PS3. Before I had a chance to answer my daughter blurts out that the PS3 is better then the 360 in every way. She went on to criticize the game box saying that she couldn't even stand to look at the color. At that point I managed to get a word in edgewise and try to air my opinion of the 360. I explained to my wife that the games are different. Each system has exclusive games that I can't get for the other and that is why I had to buy both. This seemed to satisfy my wife, but I don't know if my daughter understood.

See, I have to teach her the way of the true gamer. It's not about the hardware and it never should have been. It's all about the games. The hardware is just a means to play great software, and the software is what it's all about. Next month or so (after my funds are replenished) I may pick up a game or two for the 360 that'll interest her. Maybe Halo would be a good choice. After all, blowing something up on the PS3 is just like blowing something up on the 360, it's all fun.

Shane Kim is confident and not afraid to speak his mind. We all know this because the guy loves to talk about the 360 and Microsoft Games Studio. He also tends to give out great quotes and sound bites. Reading an interview with Mr. Kim recently one of these quotes caught my eye and I just had to throw my 2 cents in about it.

"In no way would I say that Halo, or what we know of Halo today, is the peak of what’s possible. Far from it. It’s another benchmark, another milestone to exceed in the future.”

There's no doubt that Mr. Kim has a lot of confidence in his company and developers. It is also no secret that Microsoft has quite a few excellent game studios under it's umbrella. What is missing though, is just how Microsoft can top the biggest franchise - and the reason they're in the black - it's had? Ever.

“But if you look at the initial success of Grand Theft Auto IV on Xbox 360, that’s been super, and we have exclusive [DLC] content coming too. Gears of War 2 is going to be huge, Fable 2 is going to be huge."

I have no doubt that GTA IV and all the other games coming out in the next few months will be impressive for the 360, where my doubts lie is in the success of these titles compared to Halo 3. Collectively, the Halo franchise has sold more than 20 million copies and counting. Looking at the upcoming line-up, I don't see the possibility of any of those titles achieving that kind of success.

I know I'm just the average gamer, but I don't see the possibility of sales number like those seen for the Halo titles ever happening for the 360 again. I know that Gears Of War 2 and Too Human will be big titles as well as the eventual Mass Effect 2, but there's nothing coming that has the immediate pull of a Halo title. Even with Halo Wars coming out sometime in the future, I don't think the old Halo magic will be there. Mr. Kim says it himself here:

“So I don’t know. I believe that we’re going to have just as big of a year in terms of content on Xbox 360. Maybe we don’t have a particular exclusive that’s as big as Halo 3, but I do think that Gears 2 and Fable 2 will be really big hits.”

Big hits? Sure. Bigger than Halo? Not a chance. I think what I'm getting around to here is that the possibility exists that the 360 has already peaked. Hardware sales are slowing in North America and virtually nonexistent in Japan. Rumor is now that the Xbox has another price cut coming or the possible announcement of a new hardware configuration out of E3. Either way, expect sales to increase in the short term. Long term, though? The Wii will own hardware sales, and with Sony bringing out it's big guns in late 08 and early 09 expect to see the 360's attach rate drop from that magic 7.7 number that they are touting today.

This is by no means the end of the 360. There are still several years to go in the life cycle for this Microsoft console. Just don't expect it to last in the marketplace as long as Sony's machine. On the good side, the 360 will definitely outlive the Wii.