Hairy Jew

Yes, I agree. How dare they try something different and innovate. I will deride them for that in an inarticulate manner, replete with incomprehensible 1337 spelling and references to my pelvic region!

Just make another GTA, morons! There's still so much to be explored in the free-roaming action genre. I mean, GTA - Anchorage would rock. You could be Nootaikok, an Inuit just released from prison for a sled-by shooting. Just make sure that it has some juvenile PG-13 sex game imbedded in it so that politicians, media hacks, and shyster lawyers can have their 15 minutes. That or another FPS. At least now I'll have spare cash for Madden Roster Update 2007.

FFX I just don't understand. I like RPGs - I like them a lot. But FFX was so damned linear and predictable. Where were all of the open-ended environments? Where was the option to spend hours or days wandering around and powering up your characters? Where was the option of wandering into a zone that I was way too weak to be in and inadvertently getting my ass kicked? No, it was more if a "follow the path the game has set out for you and maybe kill some things along the way" type of RPG. I can't say that I hated it, but it was one of a very few games that I put down prior to finishing. It simply seems to be more about bringing the FF franchise to thee PS2 and show off some nifty graphic. And don't get me started on MGS2.

And in response to Arch, my guess is that Yoshi, like me, takes no issue with the location of the pause, play and stop buttons. It's that we would like a few options for controlling our content above and beyond those available on a circa-1985 Betamax.

I have to agree with Yoshi. The fact that MS crippled the 360 in the way that they did is shameful. Don't get me wrong, I'm not so naive as to not understand their motives, but understanding and condoning are two different things. The requirement of having XP Media Center to access video functionality is just plain wrong. The machine has the technical capacity to stream video out of the box. You' pay what comes out to well over $500 for a machine that is promised to function as a digital media hub only to find that full functionality, my friends, requires an operating system that is not even available to the retail public. Not for technical reasons, but so MS can turn yet another buck. It deceptive and insluting.

Hurray for DivX support. BFD. The fact of the matter is that my modded XBOX with XBMC is a far better hub than my 360 – a fact confirmed by my 360 sitting right next to the XBOX it was meant to replace. And why is it so much better? Why? Because it allows me to make decisions about how and where I watch my legally obtained video content rather than to make those decisions for me. I know… I can't be trusted. Thank you, Mr. Gates, for making sure I walk the straight and narrow path.