Engadget & Joystiq's live coverage of Microsoft's Xbox 360 E3 event
posted May 16th 2005 10:03PM
Hey everyone, we up in the Shrine Auditorium to give you complete live coverage of Microsoft's Xbox 360 E3 event. We know they formally announced the device last week on MTV, but hopefully we'll all get some of these burning questions answered this evening. Stay tuned: we're live!
While we're waiting to get this show on the road, here's a quick recap of what's gone down. Today's Sony PS3 unveiling has opened up a world of questions regarding how Microsoft expects to maintain a competitive edge against a system that will supposedly have more than double the raw processing power, a next-gen media drive (Blu-ray, in this case), two-generation backwards compatibility, and even support for 1080p hi-def. We also still don't know how much the Xbox 360 is going to cost, an exact release date, what kinds of configurations it will have, and, of course the big question: will it have backwards compatibility?
Ok, we're getting started. Let's roll!
Kim's here to "start us on a journey". Man, Microsoft, hyping this at all?
They're showing what appears to be a commercial for the device. A commercial eh? Feels a bit like that's what this
whole event happens to be.
We've got three execs up on stage, including Xbox posterboy J. Allard. They're calling this the "most powerful entertainment system in the world". Ok, we'll let them prove it to us then, yeah? They're talking up their successes with the original Xbox—"over 20m customers", and a $125 million in sales in one day with Halo 2. Yes, yes, we know. Now they're chatting up new Xbox 2005 titles. Can we hit the 360 yet, s.v.p.?
Two words: backwards compatability! That's right, everyone. It'll play Xbox games! (Well, some of them, anyway)
They still aren't giving up any specific date, but we can apparently expect the Xbox 360 to hit stores this year. The interesting part? It'll be a simultaneous launch for the US, Europe, and Asia—something we've never really seen anyone attempt (successfully) before.
They're showing off a rather long, elaborate demo of Dead or Alive 4 for the 360. Showing off cutscenes and video shots this way makes it hard to tell how much is prerendered—so we're assuming it all is. But if most of it isn't, well, we're more than a little impressed by these visuals.
J. Allard's back up. He's claiming that we can expect between 25 and 40 game titles for the 360 this year, and there are more than a hundred additional titles yet in development. He's talking up "the HD-era", and how they're going to "reach one billion people with our medium."
J's showing off the new dashboard system, and talking up Xbox Live Silver, their free level of out-of-box service. This will include the bread n' butter online gaming, as well as video messages, player matching, tourneys, music and photo sharing, the gamercard and gamer achievements, the Live marketplace, and more.
He's talking about Xbox Live Arcade, targeted at "non-gamers", which is a simplified "old school/retro" gaming experience. It appears to be free to Xbox 360 owners. Hmm, hardware margin.
They confirmed it! iPod and PSP integration! How much? We dunno, but we're definitely going to find out for you exactly what we can expect.
Uh, they're showing a total nonsequitur video of Gates and Ballmer hanging out in line in the Star Wars line to try and understand their demographic. Ballmer says, "HD! HD! HD!" Man, no one else here found that funny. But Allard got it right: "Billionaire software moguls attempting to be funny." Um, yeah.
Peter Moore comes on to yammer on about the zen of running. He wants to deliver "the Zen of gaming", and he's
introduced a demo vid of Lost Odyssey, Final Fantasy creator Hironobu Sakaguchi's latest masterpiece. Looks totally
hot, very classic Japanese RPG drama. They're also showing off in-game vids of Ghost Recon 3, which looks unbelievably
hot. They are also showing off NBA 2K6 and Kameo. Their Call of Duty 2 demo was a little choppy, which is a little
unexpected. Oblivion—the sequel to Morrowind—is being narrated by none other than Patric Stewart. Patric freaking
Stewart, dude. Now Gears of War, which will apparently "literally make you afraid to lift up the controller."
Don Mattrick, Pres of EA studios worldwide came onstage. He looks a lot like a (very) poor man's Tom Cruise—let's say
Risky Business era—and he also brought with him Oakland Raider Robert Gallery, who's only about 800 times larger than
both of them put together. He's claiming this is the largest EA dev commitment in their history with 25 titles in
development. At least 6 will be out this year, including Need For Speed: Most Wanted, The Godfather, Fifa 06, NBA Live
06, Tiger Woods PGA Tour 06, and, of course, Madden 06.
Microsoft brought out Yoichi Wada, President of Square Enix, to announce their partnership and in developing for the Xbox 360, specifically Final Fantasy XI with Xbox Live integration.
Well, that's it! They're wrapping up here, so be sure to get up early (if you're on the left coast, anyay) for our live coverage of what Nintendo's got up their sleeves. We out!
FYI indie rock nerds: they're outroing with the Kaiser Chiefs. FYI everyone else who was soo excited last week about the Killers playing music in promotion of the new Xbox 360. They're playing live here tonight, and yeah, we're gonna heckle them like bigs. "Play Worked Up So Sexual!" Ok, maybe not.
I heard that this thing is junk my friend Carsten Bogner says he owns one and he says the first xbox graphics are actually better than the graphics right now on the 360.
Actually this is a pretty good overall column about the strengths and weaknesses of both platforms. Very objective and I believe dead on.
http://www.macworld.com/news/2005/05/17/xbocps3/index.php?lsrc=mwrss
right now, i have no desire to own an xbox360.
i'll play my PS2, PSP and the HDR advances from valve until the PS3 is released.
What am i going to miss out on? ordering a t-shirt from velocitygirl?
Don't know what hte deal is I'm just getting all 3 no fuss no muss I only care about the best games.
#48
PS3 DOES NOT have 8 cores, it has 1, and 7 of something else (there's an interview on extremetech.com about it)
Xb360 will be easier to develop games faster, plus its coming out earlier... so, with all said, xb360 blows ps3 out of the water, and kicks it while its on the ground.
this is to Joe Dimashio i think u r full of shit when u say your friend has this machine already any proof of that the xbox360 is only running the alpha on games rite now wich uses max 40
% of power the games are not running on the real system power so if that is not even in develepment yet set some time in july to release final hardware how does your friend have one u r full of bs. i have your imaginary prove it bs.bs.bs.bs.bs.
Joe Dimashio no what u r talking about cause no one can get there hands on the real xbox360 till sometime in july and if your friend does have one then he must be running the one micrsoft showed on E3 think u r just nocking the xbox360 because the p23 is stronger but what if it wasnt stronger bet u wouldnt say the xbox360 is worse than the first xbox they are just starting out with this. Halo3 will kick major ass!
lol @ badtazz
im seeing comments on here from sony fans did you forget that it said xbox360 you guys have your likes about playstation we have ares about xbox one thing to keep in mind. Halo 2 genereated over 125 million copies in one day of sales and still rising sony has yet to release a game that does that much and the nre xbox comes with so many features other that a gaming console to keep us satisfyed over the playstation 2 or even the 3 when it comes out and last time i checked if you take any game that came out on both the playstaion and the xbox and put sided by side you would relize that graphic wise we kick sony ass and the dvd player is much better on the xbox thn the playstion so if you want to come onto the xbox side and start trashing it let me remind you tha the xbox ius by far surperior than the playstion and yes they may have sold more then the xbox but i own both systems and my playstation 2 just lacks the excitement and graphics of the xbox and they have nothing that can get you online playing friends and foes for hours and hours like halo 2 and just wait to see what halo will look like on the xbox360 you will soon also xbox customers.
Can anyone out there tell me where I can find the picture of J. Allard sitting on the angular platform all non-challant after the lights come back up from the XBOX press conference?
badtazz33 lol @ jason
For All Those Who Are Still In The Dark Come Into The LIGHT!!!
http://xbox360.ign.com/articles/617/617951p1.html
ps3 luvers im just as hyped as you but sum of u are being way to rash. ps3 is certainly not gonna be better than xbox 360 xbox beats it by a long shot(i did some research on peoples reactions and i looked at sum of the best announced games for both. suming them both together both will be kick-@&% systems but xbox 360 out weighs ps3 by a ton(mine and others oppinions dont get offensive...)
Well, from reading all this I conclude that we all should not buy xbox360 or Ps3 because it will divide the nation into World War 3. Overall, we should not buy any next-gen consoles because theyre all lies and peices of crap. Theyre just prettified versions of the crap we have out now. They are not "NEXT-GEN" because they're utilizing old hardwares and softwares and ideas that anyone could have come up with. Plus, we expect something new, just like how Super Nintendo went on to N64 and everyone was like "OMG WOW MOMMY I WANT ONE, ILL KILL FOR ONE!" and N64/psx generation to gamecube/xbox/ps2 generation where the graphics were more clear and lifelike and didn't hurt your eyes to look at and everyones like "NOW THAT'S WHAT I CALL LIFELIKE GAMES!" well now, what do we got? The same BULLCRAP! All they put in these new systems were faster processors and more memory storage just so the graphics can get a little more detailed. The makeup is still the same from the present generation of gaming graphics, just a few more pixels of detail and they call this "NEXT-GEN". When I hear next gen, I think of future things, like teleportations ,hovercars, nanotechnology and stuff,--- not the MONOTONOUS boring overused crap that we got out now. Shoot, I realized i just repeated myself 500 times but I can not do it enough to emphasize how frustrating this is. We can all go get alienware computers with all this money we are planning to spend on these "NEXT-GEN" consoles and get better games from it, and no "LOADING..." screens. Geez.
Sinse we don't have very many options and I appreciate creativity, let's all go out and buy a revolution. Don't shun it because 1:you think it's going to be a failure, 2: you think everyone else thinks it's going to be a failure, 3:You are oblivious to how much support this revolution is gaining.
So let's all prevent WW3 from happening, and let it happen in government and politics, not in the gaming world. So hows about we all stfu and be peaceful----BUY A REVOLUTION NOW!
Dude the only reson I'm with XBOX is they're doing what PS did last time. XBOX is comming out first and XBOX is going cheap!!! PS is puting themselves where XBOX was last time around. Think about it who has a Blue Ray disk reader? And if you do how much did it cost? This thing is gonna be freak'n expensive (PS3 I mean) Next to a DVD player that u can probly find online for $20-. However one thing hasen't changed, PS hard to program, XBOX easy to program. Besides XBOX is gonna make PS3 cry with Halo 3 on the exact same date!!!! Not quite enough for PS3 but plenty for the most highly antisipated console game on the market.
Dude the only reson I'm with XBOX is they're doing what PS did last time. XBOX is comming out first and XBOX is going cheap!!! PS is puting themselves where XBOX was last time around. Think about it who has a Blue Ray disk reader? And if you do how much did it cost? This thing is gonna be freak'n expensive (PS3 I mean) Next to a DVD player that u can probly find online for $20-. However one thing hasen't changed, PS hard to program, XBOX easy to program. Besides XBOX is gonna make PS3 cry with Halo 3 on the exact same date!!!! Not quite enough for PS3 but plenty for the most highly antisipated console game on the market.
xbox 360 is going to rock better than ps3 i do not think ps3 has that Graphics.people say good Graphics im like i dont know really everything is pg only video not real. they did that for sow long i spend a lot of money on my computer more than $7000 becauce alienwear alx area 51 all i got to say xbox 360 and ps3 may take out nintendo i hope please god when will nontendo die o and if sony a 100% i will be buying sony than.
Number 39 are you a figgin idiot or do you just eat all the fing bull they feed you zero load time will never be hear even flash has load time and what they'll do is have some mini animation for evertime the thing has to load so they can say it has no load time. And who cares what the system looks like it is all about proformence. and as for the processors #32 your on crak you can't run three processors simotaniously in that small a package and PS3 has a core system far more advanced than Xbox360, one PS3 has 8 cores and Xbox360 only has three, and two Xbox had specs that were supposed to be there but just wern't they were fake have you forgotten those yet.
"Number 39 are you a figgin idiot or do you just eat all the fing bull they feed you zero load time will never be hear even flash has load time and what they'll do is have some mini animation for evertime the thing has to load so they can say it has no load time. And who cares what the system looks like it is all about proformence. and as for the processors #32 your on crak you can't run three processors simotaniously in that small a package and PS3 has a core system far more advanced than Xbox360, one PS3 has 8 cores and Xbox360 only has three, and two Xbox had specs that were supposed to be there but just wern't they were fake have you forgotten those yet."
First off, you're making comments about two months too late. Second, you're saying that the Xbox 360 can't possibly run three processors at once, but the PS3 can run 8? Perhaps it is you who is smoking "crak".
the ps3 will totally demolish xbox because xbox r crap, ps3 rule and playstation will rule 4 eva...