21 replies to this topic

[Bernie]

No, not me, silly! (Well, me too. But that is another story)

I finally got my Internet connection to work. I had ordered a self-install kit and connected it to the coax cable coming from the street to my new residence. Except that cable was dead. There were more cables coming to the building but just on my neighbors side. (I share a wall with each neighbor.) One of those cables was unused. I tried it and got a signal. Yippee!

Since I have a Mac, I miss the opportunity to play a lot of great games. I will not enter the Dark Side (aka, Windows) just to play games. So, I'm thinking about getting either a PS3 or an Xbox 360. The PS3 would be nice because it is also a Blu-ray player but it doesn't play Halo — I haven't even play the original Halo — but Sony is an ass of a corporation that has screwed its customers so much that I really don't want to buy its products. What are your gaming console suggestions?

[the Battle Cat]

Yay!  Welcome back Bernie.  Here, I've been saving this for you.  ::Amid a cloud of flies tBC rolls up a wheelbarrow full of rotting bacon and flat moldy mugs of root beer::

[Frost]

BERNIEEEE!

My recommendation is a PS3, but that said I have both, so whichever you go for be sure and send me a friend request! Probably the biggest factor is what type of games do you want to play. If mostly shooters, 360 is probably the way to go. I mostly only play Halo and Gears of War on mine these days, but those two games provide endless fun. For literally everything else, from RPGs to racing games to sims to platformers and what have you (and it does have some great shooters too) I'd go PS3.

Microsoft also double-charges you to use your own internet connection to play peer-to-peer online, while Sony does not, so if money is a factor, there is that. I've got Live Gold now, but only because I split a $100/year family pack with three other guys so we're paying $25/year instead of $60, which is a lot more reasonable.

If an ass of a corporation that screws its customers is enough of an issue to prevent purchase... well, don't forget the alternative you're talking about is Microsoft of all things. Better buy a Wii.

[Bernie]

the Battle Cat, on 07 January 2012 - 10:52 AM, said:

Yay!  Welcome back Bernie.  Here, I've been saving this for you.  ::Amid a cloud of flies tBC rolls up a wheelbarrow full of rotting bacon and flat moldy mugs of root beer::

Ah, you are too kind, kind sir. Can you leave the wheelbarrow? I'm in pass-thru mode right now and it it would be very useful to have.

Frost, on 07 January 2012 - 04:42 PM, said:

BERNIEEEE!

My recommendation is a PS3, but that said I have both, so whichever you go for be sure and send me a friend request! Probably the biggest factor is what type of games do you want to play. If mostly shooters, 360 is probably the way to go. I mostly only play Halo and Gears of War on mine these days, but those two games provide endless fun. For literally everything else, from RPGs to racing games to sims to platformers and what have you (and it does have some great shooters too) I'd go PS3.

Microsoft also double-charges you to use your own internet connection to play peer-to-peer online, while Sony does not, so if money is a factor, there is that. I've got Live Gold now, but only because I split a $100/year family pack with three other guys so we're paying $25/year instead of $60, which is a lot more reasonable.

If an ass of a corporation that screws its customers is enough of an issue to prevent purchase... well, don't forget the alternative you're talking about is Microsoft of all things. Better buy a Wii.

My desire to play Halo is high, perhaps so high that it is clouding my judgement. Are the sequels fun too?

I'm also interested in Skyrim. Sounds like you recommend the PS3 for Skyrim.

Is the PS3 a decent Blu-ray player? Do you need to have an active Internet connection for it to play Blu-ray discs? Would I be better of getting a stand-alone Blu-ray player?

I do keep forgetting that the Xbox 360 is a MS product. Does Halo come on a disc with a rootkit?

[the Battle Cat]

Bernie, on 08 January 2012 - 10:00 AM, said:

Ah, you are too kind, kind sir. Can you leave the wheelbarrow? I'm in pass-thru mode right now and it it would be very useful to have.

Keep the wheelbarrow.  And here, you can have this too.  ::tBC drops a dead mouse at Bernie's feet::

[Frost]

Bernie, on 08 January 2012 - 10:00 AM, said:

My desire to play Halo is high, perhaps so high that it is clouding my judgement. Are the sequels fun too?

I'm also interested in Skyrim. Sounds like you recommend the PS3 for Skyrim.

Is the PS3 a decent Blu-ray player? Do you need to have an active Internet connection for it to play Blu-ray discs? Would I be better of getting a stand-alone Blu-ray player?

I think it's pretty well known Halo 1 ranks among my favorite games ever. I love that game to absolute death, and they just did a HD reskin of it a la Aleph One with HD textures in November, which was GREAT to play with.

Halo 2... ehhhhhh. They went from the strongest game in the series to the weakest. Story went from awesome to WTF. I did not like it much. Worth a playthrough, but I could leave it. Halo 3 was a definite improvement, and enjoyable. Also had all kinds of great environments, but on the story and gameplay front Halo 1 was still much more enjoyable to me. I wasn't overly impressed with 3 either.

The series started picking back up with Halo 3: ODST, which finally had a coherent and interesting story and brought back fun gameplay, and then Halo: Reach clambered back up to 90% of the fun that I had with Halo 1 (although competitive multi is only about 70% of Halo 1's fun. They never recaptured that absolutely awesome feel, sadly), making it a blast and something I still play regularly. ODST and Reach are doubly fun for including Firefight mode, where you team up with buddies to fight off waves of enemies. It can be annoying sometimes with randoms, but you get a good group of guys together who understand teamwork and it kicks ass.

Skyrim, can't say, as I'm not enough of an Elder Scrolls kinda guy and I'm aware from playing the newer Fallouts what kind of time I'd be investing, but I do have and love Fallout 3 & Fallout New Vegas, as well as Mass Effect 2 on my PS3. PS3 also has some exclusives that are really worth checking out. If you like the action/adventure shooter type of game, the Uncharted series is absolutely TOP notch. Killzone 2 and 3 were fantastic shooters, and if you like realistic racing, I'm sorry but while Forza has come a long way, it just cannot compare to Gran Turismo 5 which dials the realism all the way up.

Far as a Blu-ray player, the PS3 does everything just as well as the best standalone players, all the way up to and including 3D. You don't need an active internet connection to play Blu-ray discs, but having one does let you load up content from discs that are enabled with online extras. The PS3 having bluetooth standard also means bluetooth enabled BD discs can interface seamlessly with iOS devices for extra content there too. For example I was watching something, I forget what, a couple weeks ago and while it was playing in the PS3 I could check out extra goodies via the pocket BLU app on my iPod Touch, and can even use the iPod as a remote. Not a selling feature obviously, but something neat nonetheless if you have a iPod/iPhone/iPad.

Long story short I think you'd be happy with either probably, but aside from not having Halo, the PS3 gives you better bang for your buck and is more versatile.

Speaking of which, I dunno if you would want to load music/movies from your Mac onto your console or not, but I do that rather frequently and I must say it's easy and intuitive on the PS3, while doing it on the 360 has always been headache and I still haven't figured out how to move my stuff over and play it as of the new interface update a couple months ago. It unfortunately has all the intuitive design of a Microsoft OS. PS3 also has a web browser incase you want to show someone something on a huge screen... with that, you can do it, and the whole GameOS (PS3 OS) has full plug and play keyboard and mouse support.

Bernie, on 08 January 2012 - 10:00 AM, said:

I do keep forgetting that the Xbox 360 is a MS product. Does Halo come on a disc with a rootkit?

No, but if you liked the original Xbox 360 OS more than the ugly new one they came up with a couple years ago, it does come with something to force you onto the NXE without asking you. Guess how I found out.

[Sneaky Snake]

I'll throw in a vote for the PS3. I used to own a 360, but traded it about 2 years ago for a PS3 and never looked back.

The PS3 just has wayyyyy more in terms of games. The 360 gives you halo, which is awesome. But the PS3 exclusives are simply amazing. You have the Uncharted Series, Metal Gear Solid 4, Little Big Planet, and many more. Uncharted 2 and 3 are my favourite games that have come out in the shooter genre since Halo 1. (aside, you can get Halo 1 for your Mac off of eBay or something).

I think the 360 will give you a slightly better online experience, but the PS3 gives you a much better gaming experience.

[Bernie]

This is going to be a tough decision. If I was able to play often and was looking forward to getting many games, then I'd go with the PS3. But I'm not going to be getting many games. I know a different question to ask. Which console is faster to boot & faster game loading so that I can maximize by game playing time?

[Frost]

Bernie, on 09 January 2012 - 06:52 PM, said:

This is going to be a tough decision. If I was able to play often and was looking forward to getting many games, then I'd go with the PS3. But I'm not going to be getting many games. I know a different question to ask. Which console is faster to boot & faster game loading so that I can maximize by game playing time?

Quickest to boot up from "off" to waiting for you to use its OS, the PS3, but only by a hair.

Quickest to boot into a game... it's so close that the margin of error will tip it either way depending on which game you're playing. Realistically, you're talking about saving or losing a half second here or there; it's not an issue. Overall you'll probably see a bit faster loading from games that are on both consoles and make use of the hard drive as the PS3's 2.5" HDD is a 5400 rpm (and can be upgraded to 7200 rpm as well as higher capacities by the user) whereas the 360's is only a 4200 rpm and is stuck at pre-packaged capacities at very high prices. The newer 360 Slims (I upgraded to one after my 360 Elite died out of warranty AGAIN) DO have a 4GB flash memory chip built in that you can use to load stuff from your favorite games to keep it from being painfully slow, but it tends to fill up fast. I have my Halo and Gears stuff loaded on mine and it's already about full, with no room left for anything else.

[Sneaky Snake]

Quickest console would be the PS3 with a solid state drive installed, that's a costly venture though.

[Bernie]

I think the winner is the PS3. The recommendations plus the ability to do Blu-ray has beat out Halo on the Xbox 360.

[Frost]

If your primary interest is Halo 1, remember you can play that (and have a much better experience) on your Mac. No Xbox necessary, and you get way higher resolution and mouse & keyboard support to boot.

[Sneaky Snake]

Frost, on 11 January 2012 - 08:16 AM, said:

If your primary interest is Halo 1, remember you can play that (and have a much better experience) on your Mac. No Xbox necessary, and you get way higher resolution and mouse & keyboard support to boot.

What he said.

I recommend you pickup the Uncharted series as soon as you get your PS3. Start with the first one, as there's a continueing storyline. The first one is good fun, the 2nd and 3rd are exceptional though. In Canada, you can purchase for $60 the "Uncharted Pack", which comes with a blue dualshock 3 controller, as well as Uncharted 1 and 2. Fantastic value. I'd pick that up if I was you.

[AussieMacGamer]

Sneaky Snake, on 11 January 2012 - 10:09 AM, said:

What he said.

I recommend you pickup the Uncharted series as soon as you get your PS3. Start with the first one, as there's a continueing storyline. The first one is good fun, the 2nd and 3rd are exceptional though. In Canada, you can purchase for $60 the "Uncharted Pack", which comes with a blue dualshock 3 controller, as well as Uncharted 1 and 2. Fantastic value. I'd pick that up if I was you.

Thirded. I was an Xbox man, but i ended up with a PS3 because it was free. I love it, some of the exclusives have been my favourite games of the generation (Uncharted 2 is absolutely incredible) The swappable HD is great ontop of it's ease of use as a multimedia player, it's relatively quiet and the online is free.

I only wish more friends had a PS3 as it can make me a little bit of a lonely gamer but in the end they all play bloody CoD, so what loss is it eitherway.

And Snake my PSN is GoliathAMG. I don't have a mic so don't expect any interesting banter out of me  

[Bernie]

AussieMacGamer, on 12 January 2012 - 07:51 PM, said:

Thirded. I was an Xbox man, but i ended up with a PS3 because it was free. I love it, some of the exclusives have been my favourite games of the generation (Uncharted 2 is absolutely incredible) The swappable HD is great ontop of it's ease of use as a multimedia player, it's relatively quiet and the online is free.

I only wish more friends had a PS3 as it can make me a little bit of a lonely gamer but in the end they all play bloody CoD, so what loss is it eitherway.

And Snake my PSN is GoliathAMG. I don't have a mic so don't expect any interesting banter out of me  

Thank you for the additional feedback.

[Ichigo27]

Maybe a little too late, but I use to game on the xbox 360 , but when I bought a playstation 3 I got pretty carried away with it's first party titles. 360 now at days seems to be filled with multiplatform games then exclusives. LBP2 is a lot better then the first BTW.

[Tetsuya]

depending on your finances, there's no reason not to eventually do both.

The hardware that lived at my house (was storing hardware for a friend's business who rents equipment to conventions and the like) finally went to a proper home so i had to get my own systems.  

Got a Microsoft Refurbed Xbox 360S (the new slim one) with the HD in it for 229, and got a used, backwards compatible factory refurb fatty PS3 (only 20GB but if it becomes an issue / we start to use it for more than a Blu-Ray and Lego Star Wars (for our son) machine, ill just replace the HD) for 219.

The refurbed Xbox in particular was nice - it was all sealed up like it was brand new.

Im a sucker for sci-fi shooters, and i cant recommend the valiant-stand story of Halo: Reach enough.

[Frost]

^ This. If I had to choose between the two it'd be PS3 obviously, but... the manly philosophy of "X or Y? Get Both" is the best answer.

[Bernie]

Still alive, but the bronchitis and pneumonia sucked. Pneumonia is gone, but the cough continues.

Turns out that I've got a lot to occupy my time with right now. (The TV hasn't been on in weeks.) Putting together a new resume and going job hunting.

When it comes time, I think I'll start with the PS3 but eventually get the Xbox 360 too.

BTW: I've lost 11 pounds pounds since Jan 13. Need to loose at least 44 more.

[the Battle Cat]

This is just plain uncanny.  Every time I wonder what the hell is up with you lately, you pop up in email or on the forum.  I didn't realize that on top of everything else that you lost that screwy job you hated so much.  Condolences/congratulations.  Look for a job that has bulletproof cubicles, put that part in your resume or cover letter.  

In other news, man the world is just crapping all over you!  You don't deserve this but apparently you can endure it, and that's the important thing.  Eat right, get regular hours of sleep, exercise, keep your mind right.  You'll be fine.  All this will pass.