Xbox vs. 360: Do you really need HD?

I think this whole fanboy shit is annoying. People are so stubborn that they will not give any other console a chance. I think this whole console war is dumb, the PS3 can't even compare to the top-of-the-line pcs out there. Monitors in my opinion have better picture quality than any HDTV. Don't get me wrong, 360 and PS3 both look amazing, and I will probably buy both. But in the end, PC will always be more powerful than consoles.

xeper

Dont call Grrrrrrrrrrr ignorant.

I completely agree with him. You guys are making a HUGE deal over shinier textures. It really isnt that HUGE a difference. Certainly not like ps1 to ps2.. or super nes to n64. And I HAVE seen the two side by side on sdtv and hdtv... everything is just shinier and smoother. It isnt like oh my lord this is heaven in a box. I'm sorry. Personally I'm waiting for Revolution that sh!t is gonna Hammer fools.

I, for one, would love for games to look as realistic as any show on SDTV cable. Imagine playing a game that looks like From Dusk Till Dawn.

That is what next-gen is all about. I don't care if it's 480i or 720p. If it can look as real as a movie, then that is next-gen.

With that said, the 360 does not look next gen. It's just current gen at higher res. Blah blah blah.

First, these pictures are of games currently on the XBox and on the 360 -- of course there isn't going to be any originality or that much improvement -- the survey selects these by design!

Second, you're comparing the best of the last-gen to the first of the next-gen. Compare Halo 1 and Halo 2. If they look even this good now, then imagine how good they'll look a year from now when developers start getting the hang of the equipment.

Third, of course XBox to 360 isn't that huge a leap compared to SNES to N64. But was N64 to GameCube that big a jump? And the difference between late PS1 and early PS2 is over-rated.

andrew.. perhaps you should go play your PS1 and N64 again. you might be surprised.

the leap from late N64 and PS1 to current Gamecube and PS2 is phenomenal.

prince of persia, resident evil 4.. nuff said.

Rare Hare, perhaps then we should wait until 360 has been on the market a few years before judging how much of a jump it actually is over the original Xbox. I mean since you are comparing PS1 and N64 to Resident Evil 4 which is by far the best looking game in the Cube library.

It's amazing to me how many simple minded posts there are on these threads. What's the point really. If you don't like the 360 or don't find that it worth the upgrade to you, don't buy it. Why try to convince everyone else that they shouldn't want it either. Everyone make up there own mind and fanboys, please stay away from threads. Every damn thread whether it's 360, PS3 or Rev has someone spouted a bunch of crap. Same crap over and over again.

Geez, people around here tend to take this stuff a little too seriously.

The article was asking the question of whether games look different from regular TV to HDTV. Of course HDTV is gonna win, because for the most part there are more pixels on the screen that allow for better output. It's like going from 800x600 to 1280x1024. Large difference there...

When it comes to the games being shown in the pic here, it's showing off multiplatform games that for the most part, the DEVELOPERS did nothing to make their game look better on the more powerful system.

Stop crying about it already, because it's getting annoying. Time will tell which - IF ANY - of the next gen consoles will fail, so unless you can predict the future accurately, STFU about it and let those who enjoy their gaming system do so.

Geez, people around here tend to take this stuff a little too seriously.

The article was asking the question of whether games look different from regular TV to HDTV. Of course HDTV is gonna win, because for the most part there are more pixels on the screen that allow for better output. It's like going from 800x600 to 1280x1024. Large difference there...

When it comes to the games being shown in the pic here, it's showing off multiplatform games that for the most part, the DEVELOPERS did nothing to make their game look better on the more powerful system.

Stop crying about it already, because it's getting annoying. Time will tell which - IF ANY - of the next gen consoles will fail, so unless you can predict the future accurately, STFU about it and let those who enjoy their gaming system do so.

Fong, You're forgetting that Halo was a launch title. It looked pretty sweet for "next-gen". None of these launch titles are anywhere near as a technological leap compared to Halo.

I'm extremely dissappointed with the 360. I hope that Nintendo and Sony blow the socks off of the PS2 and the Gamecube because Microsoft sure didn't with the 360.

Since many consoles are sold on sports titles, i don't think there is a problem with comparing the xbox and 360 versions the way gamespot has done so.

I checked out some brochures for plasma and LCD TV's yesterday, here in Australia, a 'standard definition 32"' set is around $2,500, while the 'high def', same size same brand is around $4000!

When you cats are talking about having HDTV, are you saying that you've all got a fancy, expensive thing like that? I can't afford to buy something like that just to play games on...

Xbox 360 doesn't come out here til March, if there are any spare, so i'm sure we'll have a better selection of games for our launch than you guys have had for yours.

From Reed Business Consulting:

"At the end of 2004, there were 11 million HD households, each owning an average of 1.2 HD sets,” Kagan Research associate Patrick Johnson said in a prepared statement. ”We project that the average price of an HD set will decline some 38% by 2010, reducing the average price to $1,139. Rapid price declines, coupled with increasing levels of HD programming, will drive the number of HD households to nearly 97 million in 2010, penetrating more than 82% of total TV households.”

Just some info about how many houses had HDTV by the end of last year and projections...

LOLZ...PDZ is the techno leap that Halo was...put PDZ next to Halo 2 and Halo looks like an NES game.

I think the people speaking the loudest here about their dissapointment are not objective and haven't had any real experience with a 360.

Talk about bad pictures. The Xbox games look like they were shot off a Genesis.

Shagi - I think you've got it right on the money.

Screw what all these negative people say - there's no way i can rightfully play my Xbox games thinking that they're the cream of the crop anymore, because between PDZ, PGR3, COD2 and a BUNCH of the other launch games, there's NO room for comparison to the current gen.

Anyone that's disappointed is only fronting for either one of a handful of things:

1) Hate for Microsoft
2) Love for PlayStation/Nintendo
3) Anger for not getting an Xbox 360

If you're a tech-head or a gamer in general, enjoy the GAMES and respect the fact that they're doing more than they did with the current gen. Otherwise, you're a POSER.

Stop POSING and start having FUN.

-Deejay Knight

After playing the 360 on my crap 20 inch tv and then playing the 360 on a friends HD TV. It is highly recommended to buy an HD TV.If you don't play the 360 on a HD TV or monitor the games look like ps2 and xbox.IT MAKES A HUGE DIFFERENCE.

I dont have an hdtv but i do have the 360. this is my honest sum up of the games.
all the EA games for the 360 launch minus need for speed look crappy. pgr 3 looks amazing and can in no way on any television be compared to pgr 2 or GT 4.
perfect dark would be the killer app if the story wasnt so stupid. the game play is solid and the detail in the environment, weapons , and character models is crazy. the jungle level kinda disappoints though. its pretty, but compared to the visuals in other levels it looks rushed. nba 2k6 looks great too but feels rushed. the court and player models scream next gen, but the coach and audio feels like the xbox verison without the jaggies. another thing i notices was how shitty the 24/7 mode looks. the street courts look better than current gen , but fall short of next gen quality. the people watching the game hardly move and the cars on the stree seem to be of hi res ps2 quality. i really dont under stand how the crowds in pgr3 are so life like in every way and these people just stand there. in pgr 3 they cheer, jump up and down and react to the race as if they were the main focus of the game.
the up converted halo 2 on the 360 looks twice as good as the xbox version. the jaggies are gone, the picture is crisp, and the colors are vibrant. it still doesnt look any where near next gen but there is a very noticeable difference. thats about it. if stay away from EA's half ass next gen games you will be blown away by the crisp, fluid visuals.
p.s. BACK OFF KUTERAGI'S NUTS. how can you look at a few screen shots, that are probably the least visually impressive ones they could find, and judge the consoles abilities. seriously to look at the visuals of the 360 and call them crappy is childish. just a couple of months ago the "crappy" pgr pics had sony fans screaming photoshop and its gotta be fake. take a look for yourself it was on joystiq. http://www.joystiq.com/entry/1234000107070601/

You don't need an HDTV!!!

They sell a VGA HD adapter that will let you play your Xbox 360 games in 720p on your computer monitor. Judging from this forum, I'm guessing EVERYBODY HERE has a computer monitor!!!

And those screenshots are sort of bogus. I've seen these games running, and they look a LOT better than what GameSpot is showing you.

Of course, it's no secret that GameSpot skews toward Sony fanboyism in many articles. They'll give the PS2 version of a game better reviews than the identical Xbox version. While we're at it, lets see what Nintendo Power has to say about the 360, too!

IGN has been a lot more balanced in their 360 coverage. While it's not all positive news, at least IGN isn't making up articles designed JUST to libel the name of the 360 with poor-quality photos and skewed text.

What a debate we have here :) I love reading what you all post here..

Anyhow, I am not here to argue or take sides, only to give my opinion. I own a PS2 and recently acquired and XBOX. I work at Best Buy and could have easily scored a 360 without waiting on a line and all of that. That is not a slam to all you dudes who waited it out for a 360, I give you TONS of credit as you show true gamerness to get your game on :) As it stands for me right now, I don't feel the 360 came out at the right time nor do I wish to buy it just yet, but Microsoft felt it was ready so they could capitolize on $$money$$ and the holiday rush. All the really impressive graphically games I've seen such as Gears of War, have been slated for 06' releases which is understandable and I'd rather game developers take their time to make a game really shine if it takes longer. That's not to say that PGR3 is an awesome looking game. But some of the titles such as GUN, TONY HAWK AW, and PDzero look alittle better on the 360 than what we could see on the XBOX. Maybe if these developers took more time to fine tune them they could have looked even better. But all is said and done, the games are out and they are what they are. As for future games, sucha as Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter, thats stuff I am talking about, that game was originally a LAUNCH TITLE but Ubisoft decided to push it back to Q1 06' so they could make the game better and I am glad they did because that's when I will purchase an 360. I also wish that they would have addressed the backwards compatablity issue better as I am dying to play Splinter Cell Chaos Theory on it!! The PS3 is shaping up to be an awesome machine, but the 360 I feel is on par with it as well as a powerhouse performer. To me it's up to the game developers to push their games to the system's limits. As for the whole HD thing, I wish Microsoft would have went with a 1080p output since everyone is talking about "NEXT GENERATION" graphics, HD, etc. I own a Westinghouse 37" LCD which has 1080p, I can't fully use it yet for 1080Pness but when PS3 comes out, most likely game makers will let their games be shown in true 1920x1080p as well as other resolutions. At the DigitalLifeExpo in NYC this past fall, I asked Peter Moore as well as a few Microsoft guys as to why the XBOX did not have an HDMI/DVI port nor have the capability to show games in 1080p. 1080i is garbage cause it is not a progressive signal no matter how better the picture looks bigger, but thats another issue for another day. So yeah, I asked about the 1080p as well as a few other valid points and it all boiled down to the hard earned dollar and getting it out first.

In my opinion, I see it's going to be history repeating itself but in different hands. Sony dropped the PS2 first, did what it could with it. A year later, XBOX came along, improved on what PS2 could do and here we are today. I feel that Sony with the timeframe of now to when they release are gonna pull an XBOX on the PS2, but I could be wrong. Only time will tell. Again, I dig the 360, I just feel the games I am seeing right now aren't worth the price of admission. And Sony needs to get their own form of LIVE cracking already!!!

So all you 360 dudes, cya in feb (for my bday =)) and for PS3 dudes, cya in October 2006? hehe one can hope

~ zenigata

Bender: I paid $800 USD for my 27" LCD HDTV, but you can get a 27" CRT HDTV starting at around $500 USD these days.

Zenigata8o8: You couldn't have easily snared a 360 without waiting in line at Best Buy. Corporate policy was that the company would NOT allow stores to allocate or hold systems for employees. Best Buy employees- even those of us who actually work in the Media department selling video games- were told we had to wait in line with customers to avoid the appearance of favoritism from the company. Even the Media supervisors and GM had to wait in line.

If your store did any less, then somebody didn't get the memo, and there should probably be some discipline handed out.

And anybody who understands HD knows that HDMI and DVI won't make a very big (if any) difference on video games unless you're running them on a 40" or bigger HDTV. Since most of us won't be getting one that big, and the difference is negligible, it made little sense to support it for the 360. Use VGA or component and it looks just as good.

Unless you're one of those freaky videophiles who can see the teeny, tiny difference between component and DVI.

ZeroCorpse, lol i totally feel ya bro, but do you honestly think "corporate policy" goes on in every store?! lol this is the real world, where people do as they feel, in my store, some units were held for employees, i could have easily aced one, my supervisor even called me the night before and said i am going to hold you one, but as you see from my post and to be fair to dudes who waited on lines - i don't want one right now. there was a memo, and people read it but didn't choose to obide by it. thats just the way life goes, lol although i must say i didn't wait in no line for a PSP and i worked that morning haha and i still got one, but PSP did not have a turn out the way 360 did.

ZeroCorpse,

How old are you? I'm guessing around 37. Old enough at least to know the difference between hardcore gamers and the more casual mainstream gamers. The casual gamers are the vast majority of the gaming population. The hardcore gamers are the ones more likely to be posting here at Joystiq.

The casual gamers are more into the PS2 which is one of the reasons why the PS2 has been so successful. The hardcore gamers are more into the 360 mainly because they see it as the newest thing to get, the "cool" technology to have.

It takes a hardcore (or rich) gamer to spend $500 for a premium 360 system. It's $500 after you add sales tax and only one game. Plus you have to pay more if you want Xbox Live and still MORE for all the bullshit micro-transactions and other things that Microsoft does in their attempts to bleed gamers dry.

It's simply not worth it. Not for a system that truly is NOT leaps and bounds better than the first Xbox. PLUS, you need to have a HDTV just to get the most out of the 360. What percentage of homes have a HDTV? Is it even 20% yet?

I'm looking forward to see what the PS3 and Revolution have to offer. Till then, I will continue to enjoy my PS2, Xbox, and DS. Maybe I'll even get a 360, when there are actually some quality games worth buying.

ZeroCorpse,

One last thing on a totally different subject. Regarding the game review websites. I prefer Gamespot much more than IGN. From what I've seen, IGN tends to rate games too high, while Gamespot seems to be stricter with the scores they give. Also, you said that Gamespot tends to rate PS2 games higher than Xbox games but I haven't found that to be true at all.

Holy Sony fanboy. You DO know that Sony IS a little nervous. Analysts are already predicting the 360 will win this round. I hope they are right, Sony doesn't deserve it anymore.

People may think Microsoft is "evil" per say (I somewhat agree), but I think Sony is MUCH worse. Microsoft shows more customer support effort than Sony ever will.

Yes, I will buy a PS3. Again, I'm just interested in exclusive titles, so they won't see launch day money from me.

The main problem with the Xbox vs the PS2 is that many gamers already had a PS2 (because it came out first), and didn't want to buy another console. That will probably be reversed this time around.

I didn't care for the Xbox for a long time, until I lived with guys that had them. It only took a few weeks to change my mind, and the PS2 has been essentially useless since. Sure there are tons of games for the PS2, but many of them are boring. Try comparing Shinobi or Nightshade to Ninja Gaiden Black.

Online gaming, although not as popular, is more important to me than HDTV. I have both, so I've got no complaints, other than Sony is a failure with anything online. I bought a network adapter for my PS2, but other than adding a hard drive it's been worthless.

By equipping both versions of the 360 with cables that can be connected to standard definition resolution sets, MS is acknowledging that the majority of the total gaming public (not just hard core gamers) does not have HDTV nor are most gamers going to up and buy an HDTV strictly so they can play the 360 at it's maximum graphical potential.

While the visuals are obviously going to be sharper on an HDTV, does seeing ice spray from skates actually add any real signficant $ value to the gaming experience?

My guess is that as programers become more familiar with the system the graphics on even SDTV sets are going to be far removed from what the Xbox is capable of putting out now.

Ultimately, the system isn't going to succeed (much less be competitive with PS3) if it only offers a superior gaming experience to the minority of gamers who can afford HDTV and surround sound entertainment systems.

I may not have be able to get an HDTV for gaming purposes for a good year or so. But, I preordered the system anyway strictly because the "gameplay" potential for the future releases is what has me excited.

Re: my comment 73

"...MS is acknowledging that the majority of the total gaming public (not just hard core gamers) does not have HDTV..."

should really read as....

MS is acknowledging that, outside of hard core gamers, the majority of the gaming public does not have HDTV...

HDTV is the next step after colour tv. sure not everyone has them now, but the revolution has started. i believe its at %3o ppl picking up HDTVs. They're going down i nprice ALOT, my entire neighbourhood has been picking up HDTVs for the holidays, its ashame Nintendo doesnt see that for the Revolution. Guys, those ppl that say Xbox 1.5 dunt own the console-its that simple. I enjoy a nice Sony 60" LCD while playing Perfect Dark and it looks outstanding. I cudnt believe wut i was seeing for a launch title. I have high hopes for the the Xbox's future graphical capabilities

Ben (#55):

i wasn't comparing the leap from the PS1-PS2/N64-GameCube to the leap from the Xbox to the Xbox 360 (at least potentially). i was simply correcting andrews underestimations of the differences between the consoles.

PERHAPS, you should think and at least try to undrstand a post before you comment on it and refer to it as simple minded.

After reading these everyone here is missing the point, even arguing the point and not realizing it.

The point is that it is the HD that are making the games look good, not the graphics. Several of you are arguing against yourself by saying "Show me the comparison of xbox on 480i vs. 360 1080i!!) Your making the point right there that it is the HD output capabilities not the graphics capabilites of the conoles that make it look better. On a pure Graphics standpoint we are not seeing the imrpovement we were promised. The HD is giving us a sort of optical illusion to better graphics.