John Griffin is just another media junkie
From Xbox.com about the spring update,
- Added H.264 video support: Up to 10 Mbps peak, Baseline, Main, and High profiles with 2 channel AAC LC.
- Added MPEG-4 Part 2 video support: Up to 5 Mbps peak, Simple Profile with 2 channel AAC LC.
Potential for x264 and Xvid compatibility me thinks! Hells yes!
While playing the new Lumines Live add-on packs last night I thought to myself “Why can’t I earn achievements on additional content?”. A few hours later and thankfully my questions were answered over at Gamerscore Blog. Looks like future downloadables will be dishing out achievements as well with 250 extra points for retail games and 50 for live arcade titles. Unfortunately it only applies to games released from now on so no points for completing Lumines VS CPU mode but good news none the less.
Ok now this is funny. My 360 has it’s own blog! Get yours here.
By now you have all heard the rumours that Microsoft are going to drop the Xbox 360 Version 2 bomb sometime this week. The leaked pics show a clearly visible HDMI port below the the regular video out connection. Also rumoured are an increased hard drive (120gb) and all sorts of new TV based services such as VOD and IPTV.
This is good stuff especially if they are serious about expanding the box to have more TV features. HDMI is only important if you have 1080p and even then you can use a VGA cable. I see the inclusion of HDMI as more of a tick on the back of the box and a counter to Sony rather than a vital need for the system.
All this is also rumoured to coincide with the new CPU chip which should run cooler but no faster. While some people have reported over heating I have never had this problem. What I would like to see is a far quieter DVD drive and that’s a fairly basic component to change compared to a new chip.
However you look at this it’s only a very minor change and the games will still all play the same, it would seem MS are trying to expand the capabilities of the box while not breaking compatibility with v1 systems. If the IPTV is any good (ie available in the UK with UK content) then it will be a simple HDD upgrade to make the jump for existing users.
These are my Top 5 games on any platform this year. Being a transition year between console generations has been tougher than I expected on the release cycle. Early 2006 and summer 2006 were particularly sparse for releases, leading to a high number of titles launching in the Christmas season.
On a personal note 2006 was a year where I played very little between the months of January and May. Finishing up that degree seems so long ago but it involved going cold turkey for several months to get it done. With new releases on the level I mentioned this resulted in only needing to catch up on a small number of titles luckily enough.
This list is composed of games released in 2006 which I played, so anything which I didn’t spend time with is not included. I don’t see this as a problem as games which I don’t choose to play wouldn’t have made this by their very nature anyway. Argue all you like by the lack of Zelda Twilight Princess but it simply didn’t move the genre forward and ultimately was the reason for me not getting a Wii.
The two games perched far and away at the top of this list did move their respective genres forward. Both Gears of War and Oblivion are huge technical and creative achievements that have set the bar obscenely high for what games can do. If you play any two games this year it must be these.
1. Gears of War
I have been milking Gears of War all weekend. Got through the entire campaign in several long sittings and enjoyed every second of it (apart from the odd Berserker encounter ;-)). Strangely for me as soon as I was done I jumped right back into it, upped the difficulty and joined a co-op as Dom. The fact that I wanted to play this again straight away unlike anything else should speak for itself.
Oh and by the way if your going to play single player you may as well do so by just starting a new co-op game. This way as you are going through the game other players can jump in and help you out. You retain the saved progress and it might help you in some of the tougher fights.
Finally took the plunge and bought an Xbox 360 this week. I was toing and froing about it but it basically came down to the fact that Gears of War is out this week and now I can afford to run the console.
Had a good weekend of play on PGR3 which came bundled and as I’m sure all 360 owners will agree Xbox Live is by far the highlight of the system. It’s the simplicity of playing quick games, joining up with your friends and chatting to them through the headset that makes all the difference.
If you want to add me to your friends list my tag is j0hn00 or just send me yours in the comments or by email and we will hook up online. On Friday I will be able to chainsaw you in the face :-).
It’s awesome. Great graphics, cool gameplay and one hell of a kick ass chainsaw. Only had time to squeeze in 15 minutes on a 4 vs 4 team deathmatch but I got a really good idea of how it feels and plays. It’s very polished all round and is definitely looking like the kind of system seller Microsoft were after this Christmas.
Not sure if I will have time tonight but I am gonna try and get back down to the bullring later and put some more time in. I would have really liked to try out single player but the deathmatch will have to do for now - in all its fantastic bloody glory.
Anyone in Birmingham tomorrow or this weekend be sure to check out the Xbox 360 demos happening at the bullring. I’m definitely going to check it out tomorrow, can’t wait to play some Gears of War in my lunch break!
It doesn’t matter how powerful your PC is, Just Cause will never look as good as it does on the Xbox 360. Just take a look at the video I posted to YouTube below:
It’s almost as if all the shadows and HDR effects have been ripped out of the game. Why short change PC players like this? The option to enable the features should at least be available to those will powerful enough hardware. Added to this the lack of native widescreen support makes this look more and more like a direct port on the Xbox (not 360) version. Bad move Eidos, haven’t you ever heard of XNA?
My Amazon.com wishlist was created on Friday, March 2
Xbox Live 2100 Pts card
Supreme Commander: Forged Alliance (PC DVD)
Apple Mini-DVI to DVI Adaptor
This Gaming Life: Travels in Three Cities
Futurama - Bender's Big Score (with Limited Edition Lenticular Sleeve)![Futurama - The Beast with a Billion Backs [2008]](http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/511PW90lDhL._SL75_.jpg "Futurama - The Beast with a Billion Backs [2008]")
Futurama - The Beast with a Billion Backs [2008]
Nyko Xbox360 Charge Base (Xbox 360)
Recent Comments