So I was in the preview of the new dashboard update which was working fine until the release candidate. After the reboot when the download finished; I started getting weird lines on the screen, like the Xbox was about to die...

You guessed it. One week later, RROD from the update. Not happy M$... you need to fix this asap :evil:

So I emptied out the wallet a few months back. I think it's finally recovered after the glut of games. I'm plowing through the purchase's. 14 in total. I still have Dead Space, Far Cry 2 & Fall Out 3 to finish. So I'm doing Ok.

Just managed to get the Gamerscore through the 68,000 barrier. So the target is to get to the 100,000 mark by years end. Bring on the score whoring...

My God... So much money is draining from wallet with all of these top notch games coming out, I think my wallet is sad!

That's OK, I'm in sensory overload right now... :P

I see the bank account is going to get a little thinner later this year.

More games to add to the collection in no particular order:

1. Battlefield: Bad Company
2. Far Cry 2
3. Dead Space
4. Fallout 3
5. Ghostbusters
6. Left 4 Dead
7. Mirrors Edge
8. Brothers In Arm: Hells Highway
9. Guitar Hero: World Tour
10. Crash Bandicoot: Mind Over Mutant
11. Geometry Wars 2
12. James Bond: Quantum of Solace

So we're coming up to E3 yet again & you know there's going to be tons of games coming out. Time to put finger to keyboard for this years to buy list:

In no particular order...

1. Star Wars: The Force Unleashed
2. Fable 2
3. Gears Of War 2
4. Tomb Raider: Underworld
5. Lego Batman
6. Lego Indiana Jones
7. Race Driver: GRID
8. Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts

More to come..

Ah Crap! there goes another grand.

Well it's definitely the hot topic this week. CNET's decision to terminate Jeff Gertsmann is probably the biggest gaming story of the year. This would be an understatement of epic proportions. It's a sad time when someone can't express an opinion because of the sensitive nature of the party receiving the attention. I was quite surprised myself to see Kane & Lynch only receive the 6.0 rating but then again I was even more surprised that Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess only received an 8.8 rating.

The one thing I liked about Jeff is that he's truthful about the product he is reviewing. I read the the amended review that Gamespot posted the other day and it still doesn't flatter Kane & Lynch in the slightest. What I did take from the review, was that Jeff was either tired & couldn't be arsed giving the review the full treatment it deserved or it was as many people are reporting that the game is just plain awful. If you look at the comparison scores that are posted alongside Gamespots score, any half decent review site didn't give the game anymore than a 7.0 rating. So in my opinion, where does CNET get off firing Jeff Gerstmann because a publisher has invested advertising dollars? I know it's business, but you have to draw the line somewhere.

I had read somewhere that Jeff's dismissal was due to a culmination of bad reviews. I looked at Jeff's reviews and all of the decent games got 9.0 ratings or better. I think the exception was Guitar Hero 3 which rated 8.0. Hardly a game killer. Crap games got crap ratings, no problem here. If CNET thought it was over the top and Jeff didn't want to budge on his position, it was hardly grounds to get canned. Jeff should have got a written warning & CNET refunded Eidos' money. Eidos got free publicity, it's a win win situation. Good & bad publicity is OK, contrary to some opinions. Gamers would have made up their own minds whether Kane & Lynch was good or bad. Most people that have played it say bad. All Eidos & CNET have done is make the game look worse than it is because of the situation at hand. Now, most gamers won't even look at the game out of respect for Jeff. A martyr is born.

If Jeff was sloppy in his presentation then he deserved to get the boot. I don't think this is the case. It's another sad reflection of what this industry and the world in general has come to symbolise, corporate greed. The official news release I have read on Jeff's departure is nothing more than pre-fabricated spin to cover CNET's arse. No one believes them. CNET & unfortunately Gamespot have lost all credibility. Ryan MacDonald's comments sound nothing more than an employee with a gun to his head.

With the loss of Greg Kasavan, Rich Gallup and now Jeff Gerstmann in a year, I can't really see how Gamespot will recover from this. These were the three guys that made me want to join Gamespot in the first place. They made it fun & interesting which this place is now sadly lacking. The other crew are good at what they do but they all seem to be doing the wrong jobs just to get things done. Only time will tell if the ship can right it's self. Gamespot is currently leaking like the Titanic and may find itself on the ocean floor alongside Bioshock's 'Rapture'...

After 5 months of the 'Metal Slime' dungeon or better known as the level 20 glitch, I finally levelled up to level 21 today. For some it went quicker but I'm not that hardcore. At least I got there in the end.

I think there's another glitch around level 64 that takes ages to get through. I'd say it's going to take me a while before I see that one... :)

Originally posted at Gamespot: http://au.gamespot.com/news/show_blog_entry.php?topic_id=25577844&sid=6169500&tag=latestnews;title;2

This is is an interesting article from Llamma.com. http://www.llamma.com/xbox360/news/inside_the_xbox_360_elite.htm which leaves a lot of questions unanswered.

Did Microsoft finally put the new 65nm chips into their new machines & why the hell didn't they put the new quieter BenQ drives into the Elite that are already available for the current 360?

Only time will tell I guess. I personally can't wait for the new 120Gb drives to come out in Australia. The price hasn't won't be cheap, I'm guessing A$220+. With all of the new content coming out like the Shivering Isles expansion pack (996mb) & the Halo 3 beta, we're gonna need all the space we can get...

;)

After playing around for another week now with the console and talking about the features so much, I think I can draw better conclusions about the xbox360 & PS3. If you're looking for an all round HD entertainment package then I would give it slightly to the PS3. If it's pure gaming you're after then it's 360 hands down.

Given the fact that M$ has just announced the Elite Pack, this will address the HD issues found with the original 360. The larger HDD is something they should have included from Day 1, but hey, at least they got there. I don't think upgrading right now would be a good idea. I think most people who early adopted will wait for the new 65nm chips to be installed before changing again. I thought they would have done that with this iteration of the console but why do that when you can bring out another version and make more money on a corporate level...And so the wheels turn. ;)

In a word...BAD. We've had them at work for about 2 weeks & I'm not overly impressed. I know I'm a 360 fanboy at heart but deep down I'm a gamer first. I was on the original table tops back in the late 70's. Yes I know, I'm old 8) I try to take things on their own merits but I can't get excited about the PS3.

I looked at Resistance: Fall of man yesterday and the graphics look very PS2. There are so many jaggies that it's just sad. Draw distance is very poor. This is supposed to be the premium title for the launch. I played a few levels and unlike Gears Of War it is very linear. You must follow this path to proceed. This sort of programming went out in the 90's. One would hope that it gets better further in.

Virtua fighter 5 looks sweet colour wise. It's very vibrant but there seems to be a lot of dodgy voice over work. Even more so than DOA 4. Jaggies abound every where.

Motorstorm was good visually and played quite well with the 6 axis controller. Although the controller felt like a cheap piece of crap without the rumble feature. Said controller doesn't have a battery that you can replace. So when the recharge dies in about 12 months time it will cost $80 for a new controller as to $17.95 for an xbox360 battery. The 1 metre charge cable doesn't help much either (Duh!)

NFS: Carbon we all know already looks better on the 360. HDR lighting on PS3 is bad in comparison right now. Maybe developers will fix this in the next Gen. of games.

Fight Night 3 likewise. Better character models on PS3 but bad HDR lighting. Same gameplay.

I could go on about all of the games like this. I think xbox360 was a far stronger launch. Most of the launch titles on PS 3 have been out for 3 - 6 months on 360 and have been done better in my opinion.

The one thing I can't fathom, Sony have left online multiplayer up to the developers to implement. Online is not primary for Sony it seems. Virtua Fighter 5 with leader boards and no online is just plain stupid. Again this may change down the track.

Online account sign up was a bit of a mess. It took me so long to set up with the pre-emptive text keyboard. You can do letters individually but it takes too long. The first time I tried to set up it would not connect me to the servers and bounced me back to the start again. You guessed it, it didn't retain the information and I had to type it all over again. The sign up process is best described as painful.

The console interface is very slick. The same cross media bar as the PSP. Easy access to all of the functions as you expect. The friend adding function on the face of it didn't look quite right. I'm not 100 % sure but I think you will need to remember the gamers name to add them to your friends list. There is no suggestion that you will be able to add them from in game as with the 360. I maybe wrong about this as there was no one on the network I could add in game as yet??

Although this sounds very 360 fanboy, I was really finding it hard to find some positives to take from the launch. Yes, movies look good in BluRay and when games done right look very nice running through HDMI but there wasn't much else to excite me. The console won't look much better than most 360 consoles running on Standard Definition Plasma or CRT. I suppose if you can afford $1000 for your next gaming console then Bravia 'X' doesn't look that expensive to get the benefits the console has to offer. The one thing Sony did get right is the 60GB hard drive.

Right now I won't look at the PS 3. Everything that I want is coming to xbox360 & is being done better on that platform. Especially online game play. I hope for all gamers sake that Sony & it's developers lift it's game and push the envelope to make games better on all platforms.