Xbox 2

[vsp]

Originally Posted by crossfire

I understood most of what you said, but in answer to your question about the games, are we forgetting Halo, Ninja Gaiden, KOTOR, Halo 2, Doom 3, and others. Well, to each his own.

Halo = an above-average FPS, currently available on PC if I really want to play it that badly.
Ninja Gaiden = a hard-as-hell action game. Not my favorite genre, and one well represented on PS2 (the Jak games, the Sly games, Prince of Persia, Ape Escape 2, many more), but if they ported to PS2 I might rent it.
KOTOR = a Star Wars RPG. I would rather eat a broom than play a Star Wars RPG.
Halo 2 = NOT OUT YET ON XBOX. Thus, it is quite difficult to determine how good the finished product will be, how it will compare to the original, or if it'll be visibly banging its head against the hardware limitations of the Xbox. Twenty-five years of gaming experience have taught me never to write off a game as a buy-the-system-for-this masterpiece before it ships; I still hear echoes of my Atari 2600-owning friends in my heads, mocking me for owning an Intellivision in 1981 because "Atari's getting PAC-MAN and you're not and it's going to be AWESOME!"
Doom 3 = SEE ABOVE, and playable on PC (as soon as I break down and get Windows XP, anyway).

I'm looking at the Xbox's Release Dates page on IGN right now, and here's what catches my eye at all between now and the end of the year:

* The Bard's Tale - also on PS2, I'll get it there.
* OutRun 2 - vague curiosity, saw it in a shore arcade. A rental.
* Pinball Hall of Fame - also on PS2, I'll get it there.
* Doom 3 - I own a PC, I'd get it there.
* KOTOR 2 - Bleah.
* Prince of Persia 2 - also on PS2, haven't played the first one yet.

Which means I'm balancing OutRun 2 against GTA: San Andreas, a handful of promising RPGs, Gran Turismo 4 if I get in a driving-game mood, and oddballs like Rumble Roses. ADVANTAGE: PS2. And the NEXT Xbox game that looks interesting (Jade Empire) isn't out until March, is more of a "hey, that's a great concept" thing than a sure-fire success, and release dates that far in advance are always overoptimistic.

I'm not saying that the Xbox is an oversized lump of green-and-black shit with nothing going for it; there are some games for it that are interesting. I'm saying that as a PS2 and PC owner, there were no visible reasons at launch for me to buy an Xbox -- and here, a couple of years later, there STILL aren't. Only the N64 is lower on my contemporary-consoles-to-buy list.