Both the Wii and the PS3 launched with sold-out results. But the Wii sold out more, sold out faster, and keeps selling out. People are now trading in PS3's for Wii’s. Or in some cases, gamers have been passing up the PS3 until more shipments of the Wii arrive – something I witnessed first-hand with a group of college students at K-mart. The all but quiet group of young males planned to purchase some 360 games and a Wii. But they were willing to part ways with the merchant after finding out the store was sold out of Wii's, but still had a single PS3 SKU. Even though the PS3 is supposed to be harder to find than Osama Bin Laden, gamers would rather pass it up in search of a more powerful combination of hardware.
It's the new force that’s been building since its sly mentions after E3. Microsoft and Nintendo reps have been hinting at this duo with subliminal marketing tactics, and games that perfectly offset each other. Sons and Daddies get Gears of War, while Mothers and Daughters can play Wii Sports; who would have thought the Wii360 was so accommodating? What Bradgelina is to Hollywood, the Wii360 is to video games.
A marketing force of unmentionable potential, the Wii360 is already making gamers hate the name and it hasn’t even appeared in EGM yet. But what’s more, is that gamers have already adopted this trend well before the name came about. Polls from Gameindustry.biz, VGCore.com, and Gamepro, etc., have all hinted at what systems people would most likely purchase, if at all. And guess which two systems people preferably wanted paired together? Microsoft’s ingenious Xbox 360 Core system and Nintendo’s casually affordable Wii. And better yet, the Wii360 still equals less than the $600 PS3. While it may be more than the $499 PS3, a combination of two systems for the price of one...that’s what makes it look like such a good deal. Despite the amount of money gamers will have to dish out to play both.
Realistically, gamers will pay far more for both systems (i.e., including peripherals, controllers, software, etc.,) as opposed to buying either PS3 console. The Wii’s controllers alone (an extra Wii-mote plus a nunchuck is about $50) will put dents in the pricing gap that so many people are supposedly afraid of with the PS3. Can you imagine playing same-console four player games on the Wii and having to buy extra controllers? Talk about turning your wallet into ashes. That’s not to say that the PS3's peripherals aren’t expensive, only a Wii360 experience is going to loop the amount of money it would cost to buying extra controllers for a PS3. Considering that one extra Wii-mote and nunchuck and one extra Xbox 360 controller already puts the total amount close to $100.
While software may be equal for the Xbox 360 and PS3, and seemingly cheaper for the Wii, gamers still aught to be cautious of the “Wii360 is better than PS3" slogan some gamers have been tossing around. Even online play will get pretty costly with the Wii360; Xbox Live, microtransactions and Virtual Console titles could easily add up to unneeded expenses if left unchecked. Again, Sony still has microtransactions waiting in the wings like a thief in a New York City ally. But right now Sony’s free service looks a little less money hungry than Microsoft’s current beast, Xbox Live. But that’s not to say that gamers shouldn’t snatch up a Wii360 if they have the opportunity, and more importantly the cash. They just aught to count the cost before counting out the PS3.
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Im a proud owner of a launch day 360, and I would love to have a WII. I went shopping for one on the 26th, but of course everyone was sold out of them. I will get one though.
The Wii360 is a good deal, but u also don't get a blu-ray player. I am not a sony fanboy, I hate sony now b/c of their tactics, but I still think That PS3 is a good deal if u are looking for a blu-ray player.
The online version of PS3 pretty much sucks compared to xbox live or wii connect.
Anyway, I think that 360 will not be successful because it is not targeted to the youth in Japan. That is one thing both sony and nintendo have going for them, that is why the 360 is failing miserably in Japan.
You think that Nintendo and 360 will win the console war. maybe...but overall Sony will win.
Why? Think about Blu-Ray. Even if PS3 manages to sell just 10 million PS3 units by March 2008, that is 10 million blu-ray players. HD-DVD will fail. Sony will get royalties FOR EACH AND EVERY bluray product produced.
Who really wins? that question is simple. Sony could be winning the console war, but at the current rate, they will only establish that bluray is the next gen format.
and i suppose all the peripherals and games for the PS3 are free? is that why buying them for the wii or 360 is gonna break the bank more then a PS3? get real, even after you buy all the extra peripherals it's still cheaper to buy them for the wii and 360 then for the ps3
Well first, Sony is going to have to get those consoles sold. I went to three different stores today, all of which had numerous PS3's sitting there on the shelves and no Wii's anywhere to be found.
As for the PS3 as a blu-ray player, yeah it's pretty cheap but I picked up an HD-DVD player for $200 and it came with a free movie. Poo on you; the PS3 doesn't come with free anything. Besides HD-DVD and Blu-ray are only valuable when you have them hooked up to at least a 1080i capable TV and not a vast amount of people have those. As far as Blu-ray and HD-DVD's are concerned, HD-DVD's are cheaper to manufacture, cheaper in price for the consumer (at least where I'm at) the stand-alone players are cheaper, there are more HD-DVD movies (not by a whole lot though), there are better movies available for HD-DVD (I find at least), more and more movie studios are moving to release titles on HD-DVD, and the technology behind HD-DVD is better.
Sure BR-ROM discs can technically hold 50 gigs of data vs. 30 gigs for HD-DVD dics but the compression technology with Blu-ray is dated vs HD-DVD discs too (leaving you with less compressed data). Not only that but there haven't been any dual-layer BD-ROMs yet so we've only really seen 25 gig discs while there are 30 gig discs on the HD-DVD side. HD-DVD players come equiped with dual video decoders which allows the viewer of a movie to simultaneously play the movie while having a PIP of the directors commentary or the the making of or storyboards.
Blu-ray isn't all that impressive to me and the cost certainly doesn't justify wanting one to watch a whole 3 decent movie titles on it. The only thing that it has going for it is the extra 20 gigs which is negligible when you're talking about movies due to the data compression technology.
As far as BD-ROM PS3 games, well, the largest games in the world don't even top more then 6 gigs, give or take. The data on the discs for the PS3 are padded to make the discs look more full. It's dumb.
When Microsoft has 10 million 360's on the market and a readily available, extremely affordable HD-DVD player, those with HDTV's are going to lap it up. Those people are already, I haven't seen a single HD-DVD 360 drive since a few weeks before Christmas. My local Fry's had tons but they're all sold out now.
Suck it down Sony. Wii60 FOREVER! (or until the next generation... dun dun DUN!)
Jon, i think you need to get your facts straight. Blu-ray and HD-DVD both support the exact same video compression formats, and sound compression formats. The only difference in the technology behind the different formats is their interactive content formats, Blu-ray uses a version of Java whilst HD-DVD uses a Microsoft derived technology. It definately can't be said that the technology behind HD-DVD is superior.
Seeing as they use the same compression formats, the extra space on Blu-ray can't be brushed away as negligable, it makes a huge difference. Even if 30 Gb is used for the main feature, there is a lot more space for special features etc, or for just using a higher bit rate on the main feature. Oh, and Blu-ray also supports pop-up menues and PIP, amoungst other things.
As for the largest games in the world, many games already fill DVD-9 media, which is *surprise* bigger than 6Gb. And with many games it takes a great deal of compromise and compression to fit it on DVD media. Whilst some current games on the PS3 might be padded to make them look bigger, they would still be bigger than DVD-9 regardless. Blu-ray is a future format, and games definately will get bigger, so mentioning current games as the be all and end all is ignorant.
I'm not a sony fan, i think all the next generation consoles are impressive in their own way, it just annoys me when fan-boys start spounting nonsense just to make their chosen company or format look better. Either make useful, truthful comments, or keep your opinions to yourself and enjoy whatever console you chose to go with because afterall, they are ENTERTAINMENT devices.
Sorry Tris but your wrong. Blue Ray uses MPEG2 compression and the HD-DVD uses MPEG4 and VC-1 for compression last time I checked MPEG 4 is alot better compression then MPEG2. Also the depth of the information on the discs are different Blue Ray is very close to the surface which will cause problems with scratched discs alot easier I believe I remember the depth being like .01 and for HD-DVD it's .06 just like regular DVD's. Another plus for HD-DVD is the fact that alot of them come 2 sided with the second side being regular DVD so you can play them in either. Blue Ray doesn't have that feature.
TRIS, BLU RAY USES MPEG-2 COMPRESSION, THE SAME AS STANDARD DEF DVD, WHILE HD-DVD USES VC-1. I OWN BOTH A PS3 AND AN XBOX 360 WITH HD-DVD ADD ON AND I CAN TELL YOU THAT THE PICTURE QUALITY IS BETTER ON THE XBOX EVEN THOUGH THE PS3 IS USING HDMI AN THE 360 COMPONENT CABLES.
THE EXTRA BLU RAY SPACE MAY BE AN ADVANTAGE AS FAR AS COMPUTER/DATA STORAGE MEDIA, BUT WHEN IT COMES TO GAMES OR MOVIES I PREFER HD-DVD.
AS FOR THE Wii, ONCE THE NOVELTY OF THEIR GIMMICKY CONTROLER WEARS OF IT WILL FADE IN POPULARITY. IT'S A CONSOLE DESIGNED FOR YOUNG CHILDREN WITH STICK FIGURE GRAPHICS (SEE Wii SPORTS) LOTS OF SILLY KIDDY GAMES AND OVER RATED ZELDA.
THE NEXT GENERATION IS BETWEEN XBOX 360 AND PS3 AND RIGHT NOW THE XBOX HAS BETTER GAMES, FAR SUPERIOR ONLINE PLAY THAN PS3(NO VOICE CHAT? UNIFIED FRIENDS LIST? CAn'T PLAY WHILE DOWNLOADING!! ) OR Wii (NO ONLINE YET). AS THE SAYING GOES "YOU GET WHAT YOU PAY FOR" XBOX LIVE RULES. PLAYSTATION NETWORK IS FREE BUT IT'S ALSO CRAP.
AND IF YOU NEED ANY MORE PROOF WHY THE XBOX 360 IS BETTER, I'VE GOT TWO WORDS FOR YOU:
BlueRay and HD-DVD have the same specifications in terms of playback. It is just what format they choose to use and when they choose to use it.
Blue-Ray will playback VC1 just as HD-DVD will. There is just no benefit to compress your data MORE when you don't have to because of the space.
Mpeg 4 is not better than Mpeg2, they are just different. And VC1 has been shown to achieve the same video quality as Mpeg2 HD at under 19mb/s, but generally for high def you want as much as possible therefore the Mpeg2 should be superior.
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December 28th, 2006 at 11:12
Lol @ the guys turning down PS3. Im getting the premium 360 for keeping my wii company