“In the forest, there was a crooked tree and a straight tree. Every day, the straight tree would say to the crooked tree, “Look at me…I’m tall, and I’m straight, and I’m handsome. Look at you…you’re all crooked and bent over. No one wants to look at you.” And they grew up in that forest together. And then one day the loggers came, and they saw the crooked tree and the straight tree, and they said, “Just cut the straight trees and leave the rest.” So the loggers turned all the straight trees into lumber and toothpicks and paper. And the crooked tree is still there, growing stronger and stranger every day.” - Tom Waits (Wristcutters, A Love Story)

I felt it was related to the discussion. Your post had a crooked-tree-ness to it. Cheers.

EDIT: Cody might be the most crooked tree of all time. :P

We'll see what happens!

I got a Vita for my girlfriend for her birthday next month. This news makes me sway a little more towards the PS4 side. Though I'm sure I'll get an Xbox one eventually- I love my Halo, after all.

Yeah... I'm still going to get an XBO, but now I'm going to have to save up for two systems.

I dunno. The crux of this for me is going to be, what is it doing when the console's off? Microsoft has said that all it does is listen for the phrase "XBox - on." IF that turns out to be true, then I don't mind it. The thing about computers, and machines in general, is they do what they're programmed to do, and nothing else. If, in its low-power state, Kinect isn't capable of doing anything beyond listening for two words, then that's all it does. Kinect isn't going to randomly decide one day to post naked pictures of me to Twitter just because it decides it hates me. And frankly, if it does anything else when it's off, I'll figure out a way around it.

Actually, while your statement about computers doing only what they're programmed for is true, one has to take into consideration that firmware updates are commonplace even within the 360's environment. So there is always the potential for the XBO to do just what you described, even if it, originally, was only programmed to listen for "Xbox - on".

Although your game does sound kind of fun......

Eh, I don't think it's really very easy. If it was, the 360's original XBox support would have been good and I would be able to play RalliSport Challenge 2 right now. :( The sad face is to indicate that although I disagree, I am sympathetic. ;)

I never had any problems playing original Xbox games on my 360. Only the software update to allow it to play older games was a bummer.

Can't argue with the games thing. For me, getting Forza 5 is worth it, but YMMV, as they say. Also on the all-in-one thing. I'm getting an XBOne purely because of a game. I couldn't care less about the TV functionality, although I do like the multi-tasking idea a lot.

I'm a Forza junkie so that game is a definite buy, but like Destiny, it's not a console seller for me. Truthfully I spenf far more time watching film, television, and other videos on my 360 than playing video games. There are still tons of games I own that I've yet to play. Maybe it's just that I'm growing up or they were impulse buys that I have no real excitement for. So I guess the only selling point for the Xbox One is the media functionality. It looks fantastic. But I won't buy it just for that alone.

I don't see where Microsoft gets off on calling backwards compability "backwards"

I feel like you're taking that statement as an insult against your (and everyone else's) desire to have backwards compatibility. It isn't meant that way. It's a statement about whether that step would make sense from Microsoft's perspective. Unfortunately Mattrick didn't go into detail, but I assume he meant that because of the totally different architecture between 360 and XBOne that it would be a significant investment in engineering and support, and all they'd accomplish is emulation which has historically been crap. Think the 360's half-assed original XBox support, or the better-but-still-not-perfect PS2 support after they took the PS2 hardware out of the PS3. He was just trying to say that including backwards compatibility would drag the console down in other ways, and MS doesn't feel it's worth it.

When I hook up my Xbox One, I will still need to keep my 360 and PS3 at the ready. That's bullshit. Pardon my ignorance, but this functionality seems like easy work for an essential bulletpoint for consumers to appreciate.

Eh, I don't think it's really very easy. If it was, the 360's original XBox support would have been good and I would be able to play RalliSport Challenge 2 right now. :( The sad face is to indicate that although I disagree, I am sympathetic. ;)

So right now the PS4 is in my good graces. More worrisome than that are the games. I'm not going to buy either until I can buy enough great exclusive games that equal the amount I paid for the console itself. The Xbox 360 still has plenty of exciting games coming out. It has Netflix, YouTube, and Crunchyroll accessibility. I don't need another "all-in-one box."

Can't argue with the games thing. For me, getting Forza 5 is worth it, but YMMV, as they say. Also on the all-in-one thing. I'm getting an XBOne purely because of a game. I couldn't care less about the TV functionality, although I do like the multi-tasking idea a lot.

Destiny alone won't sell a console for me. All of my gamer friends are on Xbox Live and I don't expect them to buy Xbox One anytime soon. It'll be an Xbox 360 buy for me initially and I won't rule out buying it for PS4 or Xbox One later on.

Sounds reasonable to me.

Also, why does the new Kinect have to be so fucking creepy?

I dunno. The crux of this for me is going to be, what is it doing when the console's off? Microsoft has said that all it does is listen for the phrase "XBox - on." IF that turns out to be true, then I don't mind it. The thing about computers, and machines in general, is they do what they're programmed to do, and nothing else. If, in its low-power state, Kinect isn't capable of doing anything beyond listening for two words, then that's all it does. Kinect isn't going to randomly decide one day to post naked pictures of me to Twitter just because it decides it hates me. And frankly, if it does anything else when it's off, I'll figure out a way around it.

Pretty sure Pete's talking about this being a temporary thing for when you're not using it, by the way. Obviously, it may require being uncovered for the console to operate - a device which can 3D-map an entire room right down to the occupant's faces, limb positions, and heart rates, can surely tell that it has been placed right up against a flat surface. :)

Do you have much trouble switching back and forth?

I find that switching from one system to another matters very little. The general placement of things on a PS3 vs a 360 controller is close enough that it doesn't matter. Provided the button assignments were equivalent, I feel I could play a game on PS3, then switch to the same game on 360 and be fine.

What does get me sometimes is switching from one game to another, especially when they're the same genre (so general movement and actions are similar) but the button assignments are different. Whether it be from a 360 game to a PS3 game, or from one 360 game to another*, if I spend a lot of time on an FPS with one control scheme, and switch to another FPS where some of the actions are on different buttons, THAT is when I get confused. Thankfully, this is usually just for a few minutes.

Unfortunately for your old brain, this does mean that control confusion is probably inevitable. The good news, I suppose, is that it's not likely to be any better or worse if you have 2 consoles.

* Actually, I almost feel it would be LESS of a problem if the PS3 and 360 layouts were hugely different. I doubt I would get as confused, for instance, switching from a Nintendo 64 controller to a 360, simply because the layouts are so different - there's no way my brain could confuse the two.

Wait, what? The anti-console thing I get, although I don't agree with, but tell me I'm misinterpreting you. The way I'm reading this, you're complaining the game is tracking your information to provide ads. Where the heck did that come from? Again, correct me if I'm wrong; this seems out of nowhere. It's just, last time I played a game, I didn't get any commercials doing it. Heck, the extent of the data mining of the Dash is it gives me ads I actually care about. Well, about games I care about; I don't really ever click ads.

This is our new reality. We do not rely entirely on applications to filter, we learn to filter ourselves. When ads first started appearing they bugged the hell out of me because they kept grabbing my attention. Now, they're nothing but background noise. I have never clicked on an ad purposefully.

I've always hated this; You don't have to oppose something that is mildly annoying just because it could lead to something worse. Accepting something doesn't make you implicit in them taking it overboard. And what exactly are they doing that is overboard? Because I highly doubt they are tying your face to ads; if they are, I'd stand against that. But can we wait to actually hear some facts before arranging a boycott? There are certainly data mining and ad practices that are despicable, but just tailoring ads to what you've played is really not that big a deal. You should be able to disable that, but it isn't worth a boycott. Of course, I'm fairly certain you're looking for reasons to dislike this thing, but that's fine by me. Just to clarify, if they ARE doing despicable things, I'm out and consider this retracted. I just doubt they are because of how monumentally stupid it would be to do most of these things.

Manipulation of us is bad, but has been going on for a long time. TV is a horrible manipulator, but so are magazine advertisements and even signage coloring. Why is the M on a McDonald's yellowy-orange? Because that color makes humans think food. I find all of it a bit slimy, but it is our reality.

Safari. Safari Adblock. Block 3rd party cookies.

Yes, understood. But what percentage of the population is savvy enough to get this? I play my online presence close to the vest, but that ship has sailed for the vast majority of the population. Mom and Pop aren't going to be as savvy as you, and they vastly outnumber you.

It was already decided by a population far greater than us. I think we're fooling ourselves if we believe there was ever anything the gaming community could have done about it.

You don't need to DO anything about it. Either you play or don't. More than likely I won't, seeing as how there are other games / game systems and other activities that don't treat me like a product.

Understood, again. I agree with your principle. I'm saying that battle is already lost. They (they!) won't even notice you're missing.

Edited for grammar

I'm just really shaking my head at this whole thing. How did nobody in their marketing department not speak up and say that people are going to have a problem with this? Now, instead of going out and building more hype, they're having to go out and try to put out the fires they've started.

The biggest threat an always on spy camera in my living room poses to me is causing me to hit my bandwidth cap. I don't particularly want a Kinect. They didn't really prove that they could make it useful with the 360 and I'm somewhat doubtful that they can make it useful with the Xbone. I'd suffer without being able to talk to my console if they'd knock $50 - $100 off the price. But the privacy issues don't concern me. Microsoft isn't that stupid. And on the off chance they are some kid with a packet sniffer will call them on it one week into launch and it will be fixed.

Haha, the bandwidth issue is one I did not consider. But yeah I don't expect Microsoft to be stupid enough to break certain boundaries with privacy.

As far as them including Kinect with every XBO, I am pretty sure it's to try and get REAL developers to do something worthwhile with it. "Look it's connect to EVERY XBO! Now develop for it! Please?"

...but just to point out again, according to Microsoft the Kinect will be able to be turned off:

From the article:

"If you want privacy, we'll give you modes that ensure your privacy."

Modes? Like off I hope?

Microsoft's new Xbox meets the definition of a surveillance device under some Australian laws

Uh oh!

Berlin's federal data protection commissioner Peter Schaar has also expressed concerns, via the same piece. "The Xbox One continuously records all sorts of personal information about me. My reaction rates, my learning or emotional states. These are then processed on an external server, and possibly even passed on to third parties. The fact that Microsoft could potentially spy on my living room is merely a twisted nightmare.

Double oh oh!

"We aren't using Kinect to snoop on anybody at all. We listen for the word 'Xbox on' and then switch on the machine, but we don't transmit personal data in any way, shape or form…

Oh good!

…that could be personally identifiable to you, unless you explicitly opt into that."

Wait a minute!

:p

Really I'm just having fun with it.

The biggest threat an always on spy camera in my living room poses to me is causing me to hit my bandwidth cap.

Don't get me wrong. I don't particularly want a Kinect. They didn't really prove that they could make it useful with the 360 and I'm somewhat doubtful that they can make it useful with the Xbone. I'd suffer without being able to talk to my console if they'd knock $50 - $100 off the price. But the privacy issues don't concern me. Microsoft isn't that stupid. And on the off chance they are some kid with a packet sniffer will call them on it one week into launch and it will be fixed.