Preferred game console?

[Otherguy Overby]

I searched for this first, btw.

Which game console has the most, best features?

XBox 360, Playstation 3, or Nintendo Wii?

I've heard the XBox has some reliability problems, should I take it off the list?

[Nick1911]

My fiancee was given a Wii.  I don't play it much, but she seems to enjoy it.  No reliability problems thus far.

[grislyatoms]

I'm on my second 360. Microsoft replaced it, no questions asked, when it experienced the "Red ring of Death" error. Apparently, the hardware failures are caused by inadequate heat sinks.

I like the game library for the 360 much better than the others, though I cannot comment on their reliability, not having owned them.

[Werewolf]

Stick with a PC...

I've had playstation 1, 2 and Xbox along with all the Atari's, Nintendo's etc over the years bought for my kids.

Waste of space, electricity and money IMO. Games are all twitch fests and good for ought else. Maybe the latest games for Xbox are different (I hear good things about Mass Effect and Bioware has made some excellent stuff for the PC) so maybe consoles are changing.

It'll take a lot more than just one game though to convince me.

Stick with a PC...

[Jamisjockey]

PC.

[mfree]

I like my 360; it's a first run, still the same unit. Personally i think the key to the heat issues is just to have it out in the open and don't run it on it's side, run it flat... no weight/torque on hot components.

GTA:IV will be out in April, so they say. I'm waiting with bated breath.

As far as the Wii goes, I think it'd be a hell of a lot of fun...

[Nightfall]

The 360 gets my vote. The Elite version has different innards, wouldn't be surprised if it's less prone to over heating. That said, if you a) don't stick some third-party "cooling" device on it and b) give it plenty of room to dissipate heat into, you should be fine. Only seen one die personally, and it was due to above mentioned third-party cooler. It has the best library of games by far, the best online experience by far. New ones have HDMI, if you get the standard or Elite version.

The Wii is an easier experience for the "non-gamer" to pick up and play. Only place to get those Nintendo classics like Mario and Zelda. Does have the advantage of built in WiFi for going online too. Least expensive of the three, also the hardest to find.

The PS3 has... well, it has a Blu-Ray player built in. It has the biggest price tag. Personally, I think it has the worst library and online experience as well. Shouldn't have any trouble at all finding one though, they seem to be moving very slowly.

[Evil Monkey]

I knew of the 360's problems and I still bought it. I had red lights of death after about 10 months but they replaced it promptly. I bought the Xbox 360 because of anticipating Halo 3 and because it seemed that most FPS games were coming out for the 360. Shooting games are pretty much the only games I play. Plus, it was alot cheaper than the PS3. It was a win-win situation. It was more affordable and had the games I like.

[zahc]

Probably the best console ever is the PS1. PS2 is really good too...just think of the game library. Buy a backwards-compatible PS3 and give up nothing. Anything else is just a second choice, how could you give up that kind of game availability? It's like buying a PS1, PS2, and PS3 all in one. You can instantly go over to the bargain bin and pick up half a dozen indispensible PS2 games for ten dollars a piece. And blurays.

[Otherguy Overby]

Thanks for all the replies, so far.  I find them both interesting and informative.  Thanks especially for the PS3 comments, cuz I saw them yesterday at Walmart; 40Gig for 399 and 80 Gig for 499.

Please keep the comments coming.

[Manedwolf]

For people who enjoy playing with a group of friends, Wii. Just watch the furniture, and try not to punch each other in the face by accident, or throw the remotes.  Wii + beers = lots of noise and laughter. There's lots more party and group games that are hilarious and fun.

For people who will spend 6-8hrs gaming alone on the kind of games that take 50+ hours to finish, 360 or PS3 has more of that style of game...the FPS and turn-based RPG sorts.

I prefer the Wii, as I can't sit still that long, I get bored too quickly.

As regards "original" titles, curiously, it seems the Wii is going to get a pretty interesting adults-only one, "No More Heroes". It's like a Japanese-vision-of-American-punk-culture GTA, animated in the style of A Scanner Darkly. It's got a sort of Tarantino-esque feel to it, too, at least in the trailer, which reminds me a lot of the Kill Bill movies.

http://www.gametrailers.com/player/28459.html

The PS3, what I've mostly seen are overhyped launch titles that were not good, and halfassed studio property tie-in light and noise shows I have no interest in at all.

[mfree]

Be careful with the cheap PS3's, I've been following along and the cheaper "new" PS3s are the European (PAL, then NTSC) electronics without the compatibility chips.

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/content_page.php?aid=29764

[wooderson]

360 - I've had mine since the first month they came out, still running strong. But I'm more a casual gamer ('realistic' FPS and sports games when they don't suck), so I'm not exactly pushing it to the limit or anything.

Won a PS3 in a raffle, but I basically just use it to play Blu-Ray movies. The console itself doesn't offer me anything over the 360 and I haven't encountered any games that would only run on the Sony.

[bunni]

I game on my PC - but if I had to choose a gaming console it would be a 360 because of Xbox Live and its media pc features. For me the only reason to go with a Playstation in the past were its exclusive titles, the console itself has always had fewer features than its competitors, Grand Theft Auto and Grand Turismo. GTA IV will be available on both machines and Forza 2 is a great racing simulation. I don't see any reason you'd choose a PS3 over a 360, and on top of it the 360 is cheaper.

[atomd]

The problem with using a PC is if you want to run the latest games in a high resolution (or now HD) so it's similar to the graphics on the ps3, etc, you need the latest hardware which is super expensive. Most high end video cards cost as much or more than the most expensive consoles...and that's not even taking into account the other hardware needed to go along with it. For example, the PS2 came out in 2000. It's over 7 years old and they are STILL releasing new games for it. My PC is less than 7 years old and it's not powerful enough to run the newer games anywhere near their full potential. The games being released now for the PC have higher system requirements than I have. I understand the newer PC games have much better graphics and require more power, but my system is still very outdated for a gaming system. You will typically get at least 5 good years of gaming out of a console which isn't bad at all. The PC is still better for certain types of games though. Of course now you can get keyboards and mice for consoles too so that somewhat evens the score I guess.

I think the 360 has the best games out there right now. Most of the big titles are for the 360 and xbox live has tons of players. The Wii is great too (I got my wife one for Christmas this year). The ps3 was sort of a flop initially and doesn't have many good games at the moment, but they are coming out with some better games shortly. If you are really into the latest and greatest, the 360 has it. If you just want plain, simple fun and don't care as much about graphics, the Wii is the way to go.

[GeoJAP]

Answer for me: The PC.  Gaming on the PC is hands down better than any console. 

I am using a 2.5 year old AMD FX-57 CPU, 2 Gigs of RAM and a Nvidia 7950GTX graphics card.  I can still play most any game that is on the market today.  And I have a 24" Dell LCD that has 1920x1200 resolution. 

Consoles have more limited controllers and they also have worse graphics.  The most involved and complex games are always on PC as well.  Programs that gamers need like Ventrilo and Teamspeak, as well as checking DKP on a website are programs that are only on computers.  PC gaming opens up much more intensive and involving gaming to the gamer.

[K Frame]

Early generations of the 360 did have some serious problems, affectionately known as the "3 segment red ring of death," which designated a critical, and fatal, system error.

XBox was having so many problems with it that they finally extended the warranty to 3 years to cover that specific problem.

Mine died over the summer - XBox replaced it with an entirely new deck.

I chose the XBox mainly because a group of good friends were already online playing with it, and they wanted me to join in the games. We have had some incredibly fun times.

I'd game more on PC, but in order to run a lot of the games that are out these days it takes systems that are thousands of dollars to put together. No thanks.

[Manedwolf]

I'd game more on PC, but in order to run a lot of the games that are out these days it takes systems that are thousands of dollars to put together. No thanks.

Plus unless you're a hardcore geek, Windows gaming is a joy of "Why did it quit? It just quits!" and "driver issues".

[mfree]

Manedwolf +1, this is why I stopped doing it and got an Xbox 360

btw, I also run a TVersity server on my PC and I use my 360 as my "music box" since it's hooked to the big stereo in the living room. It's *very* good at this job...

[Matthew Carberry]

You can't play Mass Effect with a 2 year old machine, and that is soon to be the minimum requirement.

X-Play did the math and a PC with the RAM, CPU's, video card and cooling to play the latest games is approaching $2K baseline.

Answer for me: The PC.  Gaming on the PC is hands down better than any console. 

I am using a 2.5 year old AMD FX-57 CPU, 2 Gigs of RAM and a Nvidia 7950GTX graphics card.  I can still play most any game that is on the market today.  And I have a 24" Dell LCD that has 1920x1200 resolution. 

Consoles have more limited controllers and they also have worse graphics.  The most involved and complex games are always on PC as well.  Programs that gamers need like Ventrilo and Teamspeak, as well as checking DKP on a website are programs that are only on computers.  PC gaming opens up much more intensive and involving gaming to the gamer.

[SteveS]

I liked the 360.  It had a great library and a nice controller, but then the drive stopped working.  I sent it back and got a new one, which had a similar drive failure after 8 or 9 months.  I sent it back, got a refund, and got a PS3.  I know they aren't perfectly reliable, but my PS2 is still running fine and I had trouble with my old Xbox, so maybe MS was just not meant for me. 

I had a subscription to Xbox Live, but I'll admit that most online games weren't all that fun.  There seemed to be a high number of squeaky, foul-mouthed 12 year olds. 

Most of the good games that are out are on the PS3 and the 360, like COD 4, Uncharted, and Assassin's Creed.  The same is true for stuff that is coming out.  There doesn't seem to be many exclusive titles, though I am looking forward to God of War 3.

I don't know anything about the Wii.  Personally, it doesn't really have much that I want to play.

[Firethorn]

The problem with using a PC is if you want to run the latest games in a high resolution (or now HD) so it's similar to the graphics on the ps3, etc, you need the latest hardware which is super expensive.

I'll have to disagree here.  Yes, computer hardware will be more expensive, but it currently will beat console graphics, as long as you have a good enough monitor (a yum-cha 17" LCD monitor is no longer enough).

I just built a new gaming computer last month for $1200 - Consider that a PS3 is ~$500, and Xbox 360 seems to run around the same.  This is discounting that HDTVs are generally expensive enough to make up the difference, even adding a good monitor to the computer.

Meanwhile, I can run office sofware, have a 500GB harddrive(no wimpy 20GB), run all sorts of software, etc...

Most high end video cards cost as much or more than the most expensive consoles...and that's not even taking into account the other hardware needed to go along with it.

Top end, I'd say.  My graphic card cost half of what a console would, and I'd call it 'second best'.  I buy cutting edge, not bleeding edge.  Of course, the top is out of sight - It would have been easy to spend $5k for my computer for ~2X the performance.

I understand the newer PC games have much better graphics and require more power, but my system is still very outdated for a gaming system. You will typically get at least 5 good years of gaming out of a console which isn't bad at all. The PC is still better for certain types of games though. Of course now you can get keyboards and mice for consoles too so that somewhat evens the score I guess.

They are merging, I'll admit.  With HDTV you have more than enough resolution for running office apps if you want.

[Manedwolf]

I just built a new gaming computer last month for $1200

And in five years, it'll be Salvation Army donation value.

That's one of the biggest problems I have with gaming PCs. They depreciate like a dropped rock, and turn into worthless junk that can't even fulfill their original purpose after a short period of time. It'd be like if you dropped $1200 on an audio system, and in five years, it stopped sounding good and couldn't play new music. Would you want to keep doing that? It's not the case, there...even an extremely old audio system, if it's quality, can sound as good as any new one. PC? No such luck. If it's old, it's junk where games are concerned.

If you can deduct it as a work expense and get far more money out of it as a useful asset, I can see it, but for games? I'd rather invest the money...or buy something that appreciates, like firearms. 

One of the reasons I like Macs is that they stay useful and hold their value for far longer. Even an ancient 1998 G4 still goes for $300 and up on eBay! How much is a 1998 PC, any PC worth?

[grislyatoms]

I too got sick of chasing the technology to play games on a pc. Ditto the depreciation. If they would hold ANY kind of reasonable value, I would probably change my tune.

At times, I see console games becoming more cerebral, and at others I see them becoming more inane. Hard to judge where the trends will ultimately lead.

BTW, Mass Effect is fairly good. I won't say excellent, though, it could have been excellent but missed that mark. I'd rate it about an 8 out of 10.

[K Frame]

No one has mentioned the other problem with PC gaming as opposed to console gaming...

PCs evolve almost daily, meaning that the software/hardware baseline needed to run games is constantly moving forward at a VERY rapid pace.

What will run Mass Effect without a problem now very well might have problems running Mass Effect II a year from now.

With consoles the hardware/software baseline is pretty much static, and that gives latency to the system. Yes, the video and other aspects will lag behind the cutting edge in the PC market, but you don't go insane trying to keep up.

I have a friend who is a HARD CORE PC gamer. Since the middle 1990s he estimates that he's spent over $40,000 on new computers, upgrades to existing computers, all to keep chasing a baseline that's impossible to catch.