• 20Oct 08

  RROD and Xbox Harddrives

  I just got my first good old RROD (luckily I only have the core console). Ah this is what I was kinda worried about, every single time I turned on my xbox. Although since my xbox is pretty old I was thinking of perhaps getting a new one (well if I can't find my receipt and get it fixed). After all my little xbox doesn't even have a harddrive, which as things are now isn't a very good place to be in.

  For those that don't know the newest xbox menu thing required a harddrive or at the very least more storage space then my memory card allows for. I found this to be pretty interesting since if the newest patch for the xbox is going to make your xbox hard drive required then why exactly is microsoft still selling core-systems? Probably because those core-systems have earned Microsoft the right to say that their console is the cheapest of the current-gen, of course this probably screws over a couple of consumers who don't realize that they'll have to buy themselves a harddrive come the newest firmware update.

  But somehow I don't see microsoft really caring all that much if they cheat a couple of thousand people this holiday season. As long as they get the sales numbers they were looking for and alls good right?

  Now let me be clear here, I might be slightly unhappy about the whole RROD thing but that doesn't quiet make me a xbox-hater quite yet. I'm sure that given the opportunity Sony and Nintendo would do the same thing. Ok perhaps not Nintendo since they've got enought money to buy a small african country but still Sony wouldn't mind screwing you or me over if they could gain a few spots in the current-gen race.

  But I must wonder if this strategy is really working for Microsoft (not the cheating consumers strategy but the price cutting one). After looking at the sales numbers its true that microsoft has sold a lot more consoles but how about profits? Didn't the overall console sales profits drop by 9% (or something like that, I'm probably not the best source to quote). Higher sales but lower profits isn't a very good business plan. The only real advantage this brings to microsoft is that if they can keep it up in 3-4 years they can enter the next-gen console wars as the previous gen's 2nd place winner.

  Oh well luckily they cut their prices, if I'm going to be buying myself a new xbox then it would really have been a pain to have payed full price.

  • Posted Oct 20, 2008 4:58 am PT
  • Category: Opinion
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• 3Oct 08

  Another lunch time...

  So I've just ordered by first batch of pre-owned games, at not to bad of a price. Although most people seems to have been doing this for a while now, the things is South Africa hasn't...

  But in other news I'm finally getting myself a broadband connection, yeah, although they're only installing it in two weeks (since they still need to install the line and everything and it is Telkom we're talking about), so nay. So I'm rather looking forward to actually being part of the larger gaming community, so far all I do is steal some bandwidth from the company I'm working at and check out a few sites but hopefully that will change.

  As far as the as the time that they're installing it goes, I guess I can't really complain too much, I'm still technically a student (busy with my internship) and I do have three projects due by the end of this month which I've barely started on, so all-nighters gaming my mind out will have to wait for a while...

  • Posted Oct 3, 2008 4:53 am PT
  • Category: General
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• 10Sep 08

  A little about nothing.

  Personally I was really planning on getting more Blogging done, although my lack of web 2.0 'motivation' (even though I am a web developer...) and the general lack of time has left me unable to put my poorly narrated thoughts on the web.

  But I guess in the world of gaming things have been interesting enough. Several game conventions have come and gone, all of which I could not attend because of my unfortunate geological placing (South Africa btw). But I have seen a bit of an odd trend with the game conventions, although my pov is that of someone surfing the net, that when you get to the third one there really isn't anything new which wasn't shown at the previous conventions. But I guess that there's still some hope that the Tokyo Game Show will offer something interesting, although the only games I'm really interested in are the titles that Square will be producing.

  On the topic of Square I personally would have liked the Tecmo buyout. Just to think that Ninja Guiden might have had a good story, or perhaps that DOA might become the first fighting game in history to have a actual narative or character development. But atleast I can dream can't I?

  And a final little note, I can't wait for Dead Space. Originally I didn't see what made the game good, saw a couple of trailers and it peeked by interest quiet a bit. And then the ban came, immediately putting this game on my must have list

  • Posted Sep 10, 2008 4:55 am PT
  • Category: General
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