For the second straight week Ruprick and I are gaming away on an Xbox here at the Café. Trying to stay inspired to report a few tidbits of Box delights for all of you. Actually, as I speak, the two of us are playing MechAssault on Live, and as usual, this is looking pretty ugly...
“Ok, enough, enough, break-time Ru. Let these guys beef up their statistics on two other lackeys.”
Mmm…More Mech Assault
You know one of the great things about Mech Assault for Xbox Live is the split screen option. Ru and I were just playing together on the same account off of one machine. This is especially useful for us, since that cheap bastard Sonny only bought us one console for the Café.
“I agree Ru, that classy Euro gesture of yours sums it up for me too, regarding our frugal GWX president, that is.”
So if you have one Xbox, or several, one account or several, Mech Assault has always been a good Live option – fast paced, robotic destruction? Smells like teenage boys.
But regardless of whether you’re a FASA purist and disappointed by this simplified take on the Battletech universe, MA is a very solid title, which also happens to feature the most downloadable content of any Live game to date. But as the oldest title on the mighty Xbox, why all the jibber jabber from me, you ask? Well of course, we just got news that MechAssault 2 is in development.
MA2 is being made by developers Day 1 again, which is good news, because they really did a good job on Live’s flagship online title. Apparently new features will include the ability to pilot non-mech type vehicles as well as hijacking enemy mechs. This should be good stuff, let’s just hope they take their time and make a well-produced sequel.
Full Spectrum Glitches
Last time we talked a little about the ultra-real military shooter, Full Spectrum Warrior. Apparently this much anticipated title is now being delayed. Should we be upset?
“Wrong answer, Ru!”
The correct answer is NO. Because it is my honest opinion, when developers delay these games, they do so for good reason. It is much better for these games to be fully developed and “glitch-free” than premature, no matter how badly we want them.
Case in point, ESPN College Basketball. This is a title with enough merit and class to have me wholly addicted. I have played through almost six seasons and am far from tired of it. I am fully convinced that college hoop is the greatest American sport right now, and Sega’s game sims it best.
“American sports, Ru, A-M-E-R-I-C-A-N. You know I love soccer too, man. Shut up and make me an espresso. Eurotrash…”
Anyway, the point I’m trying to make is that ESPN CB is a great game, but it is tarnished by an unbelievable amount of little niggling glitches. Trying to take players off of Redshirt freezes the game, sometimes duplicate players end up on your roster, sometimes the game freezes during recruiting etc. None of these little glitches ruin the game (at least if you save your game) but are all clearly little bugs not worked out in the testing phase.
So the bottom line is that ESPN CB is a fantastic and addictive title full of these little clitches. If the devs had taken the time to work out all of the bugs, then this really good game would have gone down as a classic (Which its NBA counterpart, ESPN NBA Basketball is. Check my review here to find out just what a masterpiece than game really is.)
Developers, please, take the extra month or two, fix all the bugs. We’ll wait, and be much happier for it.
Xbox Next
Well, lastly, I guess we need to address the 300 Lbs. Gorilla menacing the Xbox Café right now – yes, we are finally starting to get more and more information about the next generation Xbox console.
“Ruprick, Ru, what are you looking around for? Gorilla? Dude, it’s a figure of speech…it means…oh never mind…”
I mentioned last time that looking at the market race, Microsoft would probably be the first of the three big console makers to introduce a next generation unit. Considering the preliminary specs we are receiving from MS three things really stand out: firstly, the uber-advanced chip this machine will boast is the same 64-bit microprocessor currently being used in the Apple G5 series. Anyone see the irony?
Secondly, it is still up in the air about backward compatability with the current Xbox due to “licensing and technological” issues. This would really be a drag – especially since there is NO way we’re getting two Xbox Nexts out of Sonny.
Lastly, and most significantly, is the lack of MS’s commitment to a HDD this time. As I have harped over and over, in various columns, MS loses anywhere from $100-190 each time it sells an Xbox. The HDD is a big part of this expense (and MASS!) so an HDD is not a foregone conclusion for Xbox Next. This is too bad, because the HDD is one of the more attractive features of the Xbox.
I guess even Microsoft cannot continue to lose money on every console sold.
Go Live and Blow Us Up
Well, this is just our second week hacking away at Xbox Live. But if any of y’all wanna play sometime, look for our gamertag “paulinho.” (Ru, of course, will be “paulinho guest”. But, please friends, be gentle!
“Alright, hey Ru – let’s get back on! Sure, take an Atlas. Doesn’t matter brother, big mech, medium mech, light mech. It’s just gonna be a pile of flaming junk soon enough.”
