PTE72: Year One Seventh Gen

[gambit6613]

Xbox 360 for me, one big reason is Oblivion. Still to this day is a great game and i still love to explore the vast map. Also remember being blown away with Project Gotham 3, loved the walking around of the car garages.

[Neon Ignition]

Stuff like Oblivion and CoD4 were cut from the lists because they were out at the same time on other formats. I've applied the same rule to all the polls, in full there's an immense amount out in each first year that is missing due to being available on other formats. The same rule is why Twilight Princess didn't make the cut.

I'll have a look at how it would work with lifetime exclusives though as a follow up, might be too messy for older gens as they were much more common then

[QualityChimp]

Easy 360 win for me.

I was sold on images of Frank West atop a truck, surrounded by zombies, but even a delay of Dead Rising didn't dampen an excellent launch.

Condemned - one of the scariest games I've ever played (the mall mannequins, man! Argh!)
PGR 3 - Proper "next gen" graphics. I used to wander about my Lambo and Ferrari garages or stop a race in London and look for landmarks "Ooh, that's where I saw The Reduced Shakespeare Company!"
Call of Duty 2 - It's easy to dismiss the series these days from over-saturation, but I was enthralled by the exciting events and my friends and I loved the multiplayer and making our own modes up ("hide and seek", "Take the Watertower")
Perfect Dark Zero - I don't know why people loath this game so much, it was a fun experience with great co-op and multiplayer. The capture the flag mode was heart-pounding as we teamed up with hovercrafts to carry the flag-bearer.

Wireless pads, headsets and online gaming had been done before, but never together and as effortless as the 360 made it.
I loved how J Allard was passionate about gaming and making the 360 the best experience gamers could get. It had nothing to do with TeeVee, TeeVee, Water Cooler, TeeVee, sports, TeeVee.

Wii felt like a gimmick for kids and old people, the PS3 was expensive and too late to the party, so they can 0121 do one.

[Asura]

Stuff like Oblivion and CoD4 were cut from the lists because they were out at the same time on other formats. I've applied the same rule to all the polls, in full there's an immense amount out in each first year that is missing due to being available on other formats. The same rule is why Twilight Princess didn't make the cut.

It's difficult to get this kind of thing right; we all appreciate your effort.

Oblivion is a great example, in this case. It was year-1 for both machines, but it was released in March 2006 on 360/PC and March 2007 on PS3. Additionally, the PS3 version was slated as the worst of the three versions; it was a major source of criticism and controversy at the time.

It's interesting to see how this stuff gets more and more complex, up until the recent 2014 "exclusive-sorta-kinda-maybe-DLC" E3 that we've just had.

[Brad]

Stuff like Oblivion and CoD4 were cut from the lists because they were out at the same time on other formats. I've applied the same rule to all the polls, in full there's an immense amount out in each first year that is missing due to being available on other formats. The same rule is why Twilight Princess didn't make the cut.

I'll have a look at how it would work with lifetime exclusives though as a follow up, might be too messy for older gens as they were much more common then

Totally understandable. It does mean that the PS3 list is "PS3 first year exclusives", which is obviously more restrictive as it means the 360 list has high rating multi-platform titles that the PS3 isn't allowed to have in its list. Also massive games like COD4 aren't in any list at all.

An interesting exercise nonetheless and some good discussion from it. Cheers.

[dataDave]

I don't know how Super Mario Galaxy or Metroid Prime 3 can feel like gimmicks for old people and kids. One is one of the best games ever made and the other is the perfect culmination to one of the finest trilogies in gaming.

Besides that the only way Perfect Dark Zero could be considered good is if it was the first FPS you'd ever played. It was a really bad game in terms of standards, requirements, expectations, mechanics, presentation and form. The only thing good about it was the advertising and around half of the tracks off of the soundtrack.

[wakka]

Perfect Dark Zero was awful. But then so were a lot of the games in the first year on the Wii, including those released by Nintendo.

[speedlolita]

Ridge Racer 7 is the only game on these lists that I really care about. Exclusives wise at least. Many of the 360 list have superior PC versions.

[Mr Ono]

Based purely on that list - I went for the Wii.

I also remember that the Wii and its use of the Wiimote for Wii Sports was terrific fun in the first instance.

[QualityChimp]

I don't know how Super Mario Galaxy or Metroid Prime 3 can feel like gimmicks for old people and kids. One is one of the best games ever made and the other is the perfect culmination to one of the finest trilogies in gaming.

I was half joking about the Wii and the clich? that Nintendo is for kids and old folks homes, but the system didn't interest me and SMG came out a long time after launch and I was much more impressed with the 360 by then.

Remember, our experiences are all subjective dD, and I know SMG is revered, but it still felt like more jumping on turtles like Mario 64 on an awkward controller. Am I jumping by holding it like a NES pad or pointing at the screen?

Besides that the only way Perfect Dark Zero could be considered good is if it was the first FPS you'd ever played. It was a really bad game in terms of standards, requirements, expectations, mechanics, presentation and form. The only thing good about it was the advertising and around half of the tracks off of the soundtrack.

I'd played a fair few PC FPS games of the time (Half-Life, Unreal Tournament, Quake 3, NOLF, AvP), but only really played Half-Life in multiplayer and that was in a LAN with mates. Perfect Dark was simple to set up and within minutes, I was playing lag-free with people from all over the world.

You might not have enjoyed it, but it doesn't change the fact that I had a lot of fun with it and played it the most out of the launch games. It was a brilliant combination of the 360's strong points (excellent online experience), fun game modes and inventive weapon selections. The bots were pretty good too.

[nakamura]

I can't believe people thought PGR3 was 'next gen'. If next gen was a picture book frame rate and scruffy visuals. Still maintain the original looks better. Good game though no doubt. Same with NFS Carbon on PS3.

[speedlolita]

PGR3 looked raw. Loved the amount of aliasing!

[Neon Ignition]

I tell you what, looking back at the 360's early life reminds me of how great it was. The two to three years it became my absolute go to machine, saddening that I found MS started to get weaker as time went on. PS3 was really poor on launch but you can trace an upward aggressive recovery over its life which makes the PS4's success seem like common sense culmination whereas the 360 tailed off through what I assumed was MS apathy but the XBO reveal showed to be corporate incompetence

[Brad]

I think I'd agree with that summary ^^^

[wakka]

I do agree with you QC regarding the 360's online play. It was so effortless and so cool - I didn't have much experience of online gaming at the time, and Ridge 6 on headsets with forum peeps was blinding!

I love the Wii (my US launch system is still hooked up to my TV and has had thousands of hours of play) but its first year felt lacklustre. Galaxy just squeaked out 6 days before the console's first anniversary, so it didn't really feel like a 'year 1' experience. Wii Sports to me was disappointing. The motion tracking was inaccurate and the games felt pretty boring. The most fun was to be had with non-gaming relatives at Xmas, and that was more of a one-off thing anyway.

So many of the Wii's early titles were disappointing too, as I've said. Prime 3 wasn't a bad game but I wasn't massively engaged by it. Other stuff like WarioWare and Pok?mon was just dross. The Wii became great but the most fun I had in year 1 (prior to Galaxy) was probably ExciteTruck. A simple but awesome game and very underrated. I should mention I never played FE: Radiant Dawn.

As QC says, it's all highly subjective. We're all going to be very influenced by what we had the most fun with at the time