The Console Wars: Games/Software (The Wii edition)

To being, I would like to say, I love the Wii. I thought it was a great idea and they did a wonderful job with being innovative and thinking outside the box. That's the thing with the Nintendo franchise. It is perfect for testing things and seeing how they work. The NES and SNES were some of the first to use a d-pad and 4 button controllers effectively. The N64 helped usher in the analog sticks and now the Wii has gotten us one step closer to interactive rooms and virtual fighting. This is also a reason why the gamecube wasn't really that good, it didn't do anything new.

While the actual console for Nintendo has always been ahead of its time, the games are always the same. You never really get any original games for a nintendo console, you get remakes where they do things better. But the best games on the Nintendo are on the SNES and the N64. The Wii games are all copies.

• Super Mario Galaxy: Best - 10/10 (Edge); Worst - 9.5/10 (Gamespot)
• Super Smash Brothers Brawl: Best - 10/10 (Nintendo Power); Worst - 9/10 (Eurogamer)
• Mario Kart Wii: Best - 37/40 (Famitsu); Worst - 6/10 (Edge)
• Wii Fit: Best - 91% (Official Nintendo Magazine); Worst - 6.8/10 (Computer and Video Games
• Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess: Best - 10/10 (Game Informer); Worst 8.8/10 (Gamespot)
• Wii Sports: Best - 8/10 (Eurogamer); Worst - 6.5/10 (Game Informer)
• Super Paper Mario: Best - 9.5/10 (Game Informer); Worst - 7/10 (Edge)

This will likely be brought up in the comments, but Nintendo has always had it's own developers for its consoles. This means that there really aren't too many poorly made games because they are designed specifically for the Wii. Just like Final Fantasy games work best on the Playstations.

The Console Wars: Games/Software (XBOX 360 edition)

Ok, I know these have been incredibly lame and I apologize for that. I've been extremely busy with school starting up again and haven't been able to play any new games to review. Money after the holidays has been tight as well, my 360 went kaput so I had to spend Xmas money on that and now I ended up having to cancel my WAR account. That's ok. WAR is a great game and had more potential than WoW did when I first started playing it. Unfortunately, WoW has a huge fanboy following, almost to the point of Mac and Sony, which takes away from WAR's playerbase. But I digress.

The 360 had a very successful year in 2008. They put out some good games and maybe a few great ones. These include in no particular order:

• Ninja Gaiden 2: Best - 9/10 (Team Xbox); Worst - 7/10 (Eurogamer)
• Too Human: Best - 4/5 (Gamepro); Worst - 6/10 (Eurogamer)
• Fable 2: Best - 10/10 (Eurogamer); Worst - 8.5/10(Gamespot)
• Gears of War 2: Best - 5/5 (Gamepro); Worst - 9/10 (Eurogamer)
• Left 4 Dead: Best - 5/5 (X-play); Worst - 8.5/10 (Gamespot)
• Mass Effect: Best - 10/10 (Official Xbox Magazine); Worst - 7/10 (Edge)
• Bioshock: Best - 10/10 (Any Review Magazine); Worst - 9/10 (GameSpot)
• Army of Two: Best - 9/10 (Gamer TV UK); Worst - 4/10 (Edge)
• Halo 3: Best - 10/10 (Any Review Magazine); Worst - 9.5/10 (GameSpot)

I'm sure there are more that came out, I just can't think of any at the moment. Any help in the comments would be much appreciated. Now, the biggest thing I've noticed from this list vs. the PS3 list is that a lot of the PS3 list has games where it includes user content. Which is a great thing in it's own right, but if you want solid games that were made by companies than choose this console. If you want to build your own levels, the 360 is not for you.

Any suggestions for games for the list above... please put into the comments. This was mostly 2008 exclusive, but I will put other games in there.



***************************************Edit***********************************************

Thank to Toby for the suggestion of Bioshock, Army of Two, and Halo 3.

The Console Wars: Games/Software

Another week, another dollar as they say in China.

We'll go this week based on the difference between the games by the consoles. I'm sure there are other games out there but these are the games that defined the console, especially for the year of 2008. This was the year of the PS3 where they were supposed to jump ahead of the 360. The reason for this was because the PS3 was such a pain to try and code your game for. 2008 was supposed to get past that point.

We'll begin with the PS3. These are the PS3 specific titles that were released in 2008:

• Metal Gear Solid 4: Best-(9.8/10, IGN); Worst-(8.5/10, GameSpot)
  
• LittleBigPlanet: Best-(10/10, Edge); Worst-(9.2, IGN(Aus))
  
• Resistance 2: Best-(5/5, Xplay); Worst-(4/5, Gamepro)
  
• Haze: Best-(7/10, Gamesradar); Worst-(2/5, Gamespy)
  
• Disgaea 3: One Review-(8.25/10, Eurogamer)
  
• SOCOM: Confrontation: Best-(8.5/10, Playstation Universe); Worst-(2/5, Xplay)
  
• MotorStorm 2: Best-(4.5/5, Gamepro); Worst-(3/5, Playstation Magazine)
  
• Buzz Quiz TV: Best-(8.9, IGN(US)); Worst-(7/10, Edge)
  
• Time Crisis 4: Best-(8.0/10, IGN); Worst-(5.5/10, GameSpot)
• Gran Turismo 5: Prologue: Best-(8.5/10, IGN); Worst(7/10, Playstation Magazine (UK))
  

I'll have to do the other consoles next week since I have run out of time. I have reviews of 2 games that are on here. You can check the blog for them. The other ones I haven't heard of for the most part. I am sure there are more games out there for the PS3 so if you have any suggestions please let me know.

It does amuse me thought that the PS3 controller is supposed to be the best for an RPG style game and there are no RPG's on here. In fact, most of the games that came out seem to be FPS. These were essentially the best games coming out for the PS3 this past year.

None of them really made me turn my eye at all, then again I haven't played all of them either...

~j

The Console Wars

Alright, we all knew this day was coming. I wanted to ignore it because so many people are so fanatical about which console everyone else should be getting. Let me preface this by saying that I don't care which one you like better. All I ask is that you don't put your inhibitions on me. I'm gonna go by the three main ones now. Yes, the PS2 was one of the best consoles ever put out. But it's so old that I've seen one selling for $20.

Hardware:

Xbox 360 - The 360 came out a year before the Wii and the PS3. When the 360 came out though, it had the option of getting an HD DVD player. You could buy a wireless antenna and as such play online. It had one of the best graphics cards ever. All in all, for when the 360 came out. It was top of the line and definitely ready for anything games on the market. Those are the some of the pros for the 360.

Cons - The RROD. For those of you who don't know what that is. It is when there is a cooling failure in the workings of the 360 and it completely freezes up the entire console and you have to send your 360 back in to Microsoft. It ends up being more of a minor convenience because they have changed the warranty for that particular problem to 3 years instead of the one year warranty. Another hardware con is the whole disc drive thing. Apparently when Microsoft was making 360's they decided to skimp a little bit on the disc drive. They left out a small rubber piece that the Wii and the PS3 have in them. This piece costs about $.50 to put in. Now they have several class action lawsuits against them.

PS3:
Pros- The best processor to date. Honestly, nothing can hold up a stick to this consoles sheer power. It's like 50 computers in a computerized room doing computer stuff. It's incredible. The blue ray player is a huge huge HUGE benefit as well. While you can't necessarily tell when it comes to movies, the ability to put a potential 6 game disc onto 1 disc is definitely good news for the developers.

Cons- With so much power, the expense hits the buyer. No game has even approached the opportunity the ps3 has and therefore they all look about the same as the 360. The processor, while extremely powerful is about the same thing as one of those old supercomputers. You know the things. They took up a whole room, they were powerful and way ahead of their time, but they were only good for doing computations. The PS3 is only good for computing. It's funny because usually the mac users are the ones that proclaim that the PS3 is so superior, while the PS3, out of all the consoles, resembles a PC the most.

Wii - I'll just get this out of the way. Nintendo is wonderful at coming up with new designs. The N64 was way ahead of its time in regards to controllers and ingenuity. The same can be said about the Wii but on a hardware level, it's vastly inferior to the previous two.

That's about all I have time for at the moment. I will get other things in the following weeks.

~j