September 26, 2005
Speaking in an interview with GameInformer at the recent Tokyo Game Show Dead or Alive 4 creator Tomonobu Itagaki said the Microsoft Xbox 360 was better than the PlayStation 3.
"I think Xbox 360 is the best game console on the earth. It's better than PlayStation 3." He went on to add that the "PS3 has too complicated architecture."
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September 19, 2005
At the Tokyo Game Show 2005 Microsoft confirmed that the Xbox 360 will be region locked for both games and DVD movie playback.
The Xbox 360 game console will be launched on November 22 in N. America, on December 2 in Europe and December 10 in Japan. The first version of the Xbox 360 will feature a 12x DVD-ROM drive (Toshiba), as well as a 20GB hard disk drive. The device will be able to playback DVD Video movies.
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September 18, 2005
After 3 days of touching at the 2005 Tokyo Game Show, the folks over at IGN are in love with the Xbox 360 controller.
The beauty of the 360 controller is that it is small and lightweight without feeling cheap. It also posses an excellent layout that puts every button within easy reach of your thumbs. When prompted to press the start button I found myself lifting my hand off of the controller out of instinct. This was unnecessary seeing as I could easily reach both of the buttons next to the central guide button with my thumbs. The guide button itself is an excellent addition that quickly brings up the Live menu. We entered the Live guide on numerous occasions out of curiosity and the irresistible urge to push a shiny sphere surrounded by glowing lights.
Next up for the hot couple -- marriage.
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September 15, 2005
Microsoft today announced that Xbox 360 will arrive on store shelves Tuesday, November 22 in North America, Friday, December 2 in Europe, and Saturday, December 10 in Japan. The announcement, made on the eve of Tokyo Game Show 2005, marked the first time that a game console will be launched in three territories in the same time frame. In preparation for what is expected to be massive worldwide demand for the new system, Microsoft also announced that Xbox 360 manufacturing is under way, with state-of-the-art facilities producing millions of units ultimately bound for frenzied gamers' homes from Osaka, Japan, to Oxford, England, and Orlando, Fla.
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September 12, 2005
Last week, I touched on a comment, made by Andre Vrignaud, Director of Technical Strategy for Xbox Live during the Xbox 360 presentation at the GDC Europe 2005 in London. Vrignaud basically said it will be hard to hack the Xbox 360. BBC Online has a piece, which spawned a piece on Joystiq on how Microsoft plans to make its next generation games console, the Xbox 360, as difficult as possible to hack.
I am going to assume that Vrignaud is challenging folks to try to hack the Xbox 360. That 'you can't' psychology."
Xbox engineer Chris Satchell, says the Xbox 360 will have security built directly into the hardware.
"One of the reasons we went with custom hardware design for all our silicon is that it allows us to build security at the silicon level," he told the BBC News website.
"There are going to be levels of security in this box that the hacker community has never seen before."
Part of the motivation behind this is to prevent people from using the 360 to watch pirated films or TV shows.
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September 10, 2005
Microsoft has confirmed the various pricing plans for the Xbox Live service on Xbox 360.
The basic pricing for Xbox Live Gold is $7.99 per month, with a three month subscription priced at $19.99 and twelve months at $49.99.
The Xbox Live Premium Gold Packs will be available in three-month and one-year variants, priced at $39.99 and $69.99 respectively. Both packs will include all of the Gold features, along with an Xbox Live headset and access to an Xbox Live Arcade game - Joust for three-month subscribers, and Bankshot Billiards for twelve month subscribers.
Three month subscribers will also receive a $10 mail-in rebate coupon for any Xbox 360 games, and 100 points to spend in the Xbox Live Marketplace, while twelve month subscribers get a $20 rebate and 200 marketplace points.
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Dissecting OrigenXbox360.org
The folks at teamxbox.com are all over Microsoft's OrigenXbox360.org. The site features a backward countdown, in addition to a tree, a green shape that looks like a rabbit and behind that shape a hidden item that looks like an Xbox 360 placed in its vertical position writes TeamXbox 360. What will happen once the countdown ends is still a mystery, but Xbox 360 fans are searching the tree at OrigenXbox360.org for clues.
So far the guys found a Latin line
"in hoc spatio arbor noster floruit, fecundus pomies Elysii ignoti, qui in loco ludent electi, ab Originis angelis circumdati."
Translated as (via Team Xbox):
"In this space our tree has flourished abundant with the unknown fruits of Elysium, who will play in the chosen place, surrounded by the angels of Origen.
That's deep
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September 4, 2005
According to the French website XboxLive.fr, Microsoft Xbox 360 owners will be able to choose from multiple Xbox Live packages.
For Pro-Gamers - Premium Gold Pack will be available for US$69.99. 12 month subscription to Live, an Xbox Live headset, $20 off an Xbox 360 game and 200 Xbox Live marketplace points.
A non-Premium Gold Card will be available for US$59.9. 12 months of Live subscription.
3 Month Premium Gold Pack will be available for US$39.99.
Standard 3 Month Gold subscription will be available US$19.99.
Standard 1 Month Gold Card, will be available US$7.99.
Microsoft has no comment on the speculation
Seen at palgn
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September 2, 2005
Gamasutra.com posted an in-depth article from the Xbox 360 presentation at the GDC Europe 2005 in London. One very sad/interesting bit from Andre Vrignaud, Director of Technical Strategy for Xbox Live.
More interestingly, a question from an audience member on the security for Xbox 360 in terms of 'mod chips' and other devices that modify for imported/illegal content prompted a reply that Microsoft took 2 and a half years on security this time round, whereas the Xbox only had around a year. Vrignaud prompted: "Never say never", but he thinks it's going to be a long time before the Xbox 360 gets modded.
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September 1, 2005
According to three US retailers, Microsoft plans to launch the Xbox 360 , Friday, November 25, the day after Thanksgiving, with software potentially hitting shelves earlier that week reports IGN.
The three retail chains reportedly received an email describing launch data late Monday.
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