XBOX 360 RROD

The dreaded RROD (Red Ring of Death) has hit my XBOX 360 console. A few months back I experieced the disc unreadable error while playing Mass Effect. The error was quite annoying as it happened at key parts of the game where I didn’t have a checkpoint to revert to. However, I could take the disc out, restart the console and continue playing.

Since that time, I haven’t had the time for any gaming and with the release of Fable II I thought I’d spend some time with the X360 again, and now the disc unreadable error has progressed into it’s inevitable end resulting in the RROD.

Thankfully, with Microsoft’s new policy on the RROD, though my console is out of warranty, I have been setup with free repairs and will likely get a different console than the one here (hopefully a newer console. ). Unfortunately, the turn-around time for the repairs will run right into my vacation, so I will only be able to play Fable II and other games after I return in December. Shucks!

Cheers

The demo allows you to take control of the Apprentice through the Tie Fighter factory hunting for a Jedi master. You come pre-equipped with force push, lightening, grip and of course your trusty lightsaber. The game is set to be released in a couple of weeks, so a demo is appropriately timed to hype the game in addition to the plethora of videos readily available on any gaming website.

My initial impression of the game didn’t make me want to buy the game immediately, however, I’ve been a fan of anything and everything Star Wars and will likely buy this game and learn to enjoy it. The force powers are impressive in execution and implementation. The lightsaber skills are equally nice, however I felt the controls were a little imprecise. Virtually anything and everything in your environment can be manipulated with force powers to become a weapon and that being the case the targeting reticle constantly tracks the numerous crates and objects lying around as opposed to the Stormtrooper shooting at me.

Another aspect of the game that had me at a disadvantage was the need to use the force powers as much as possible to quickly eliminate your enemies. However, I found myself spending more time trying to dash over to each individual Stormtrooper rather than strategically having a crate drop on his head. Perhaps better use of the force powers will yield a more enjoyable experience.

Bottom line, having played through the demo a single time, it wasn’t as good as I expected but no where near as bad as I feared. I think with a few play-throughs and a better use of the force powers this game might turn out to be quite enjoyable. I guess we’ll find out on September 16th.

Check out the video of the entire demo level in Part One and Two.

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In the little gaming time that I get these days I’ve been slowly traversing the massive world of Mass Effect. Without giving any of the plot away, I’m on the planet of Noveria and have essentially been stuck at the pivotal part of the game for the past couple of months now. I’ve tried various tactics to get past this point and all of my efforts have been faced with the inevitable fade to black.

After reading other gamers posts about the path they chose, turns out that I might have made a mistake going to Noveria with a fairly low-level and skilled character. The easier choice, of course, is to reload a save game from before I arrived on this planet and trying one of other destinations, but then I felt that I hadn’t really built up the characters as well as I probably could’ve.

To that end, I’ve decided to call it a mulligan and restart the game with a new character and try a different approach to see if I can not only get farther in the game and finish it before Mass Effect 2 is released.

Do you ever find yourself thinking that your choices in a game weren’t particularly good and do you restart or just salvage what you can?

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All the recent buzz and a article on eWeek seem to declare the demise of HD-DVD and Blu-Ray the chosen format. I wonder what this means to the XBOX 360.

I guess in this case early adopters of HD-DVD are the ones that will pay dearly to not only abandon their current HD-DVD players but potentially pick up a Blu-Ray player or PS3?

Updated 02/23/08
Turns out that Toshiba decided to waive the white flag on HD DVD officially. All early Blu-Ray adopters now get to walk around with their nose held high and tongue sticking out at anyone who’d question their Next-gen HD choice. I guess Sony’s choice to bundle the Playstation 3 with Blu-Ray players was a smart idea after all.

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Sony has cut the price of the PlayStation 3 by $100, or 17 percent, in the United States, a move that should boost the video game console’s lackluster sales.

The PlayStation 3, which includes a 60-gigabyte hard drive and a Blu-ray high-definition DVD player, will now cost $500, or $20 more than the most expensive version of Microsoft’s Xbox 360. #

This is definitely a start and now if the game catalog were to get better perhaps Sony might have a chance after all, no?

Like a wonderful blast from the past Ubisoft is set to release this awesome classic on XBLA with updated graphics and probably a new story. I just can’t wait for this one!

Another classic find of mine recently was the open-source version of Star Control 2 called The Ur-Quan Masters. I have vivid memories of the countless hours my friends and I spent in melee with the variety of ships. I had never spent much time in the game itself, but having since found The Ur-Quan Masters, I’ve take the opportunity to check out the game as well and am really enjoying the quirky humor.

Unlike POP, this is a true to it’s origin port to make the original classic work on newer machines. The game runs under Windows, MacOS X, Linux and BSD. One of the best parts of this game was the awesome music for each race in the game. Listening to this music again just brings back a flood of wonderful memories.

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The basic summary of changes include a console in black, a HDMI port, 120 GB hard drive, but still no official word on the small 65nm processor which supposedly runs cooler. The only “upgrade” here that I would even remotely consider is replacing my stock 20 GB hard drive with the larger 120 GB variety.

I currently use the component cables to connect my X360 to my TV and optical audio cables to get the games surround sound. With an HDMI option I would just need to run a single cable to get everything. However, since I already have 2 HDMI devices plugged into my receiver I would need to invest in some sort of an HDMI switch to get this 3rd device going. In my book, that’s just not worth the extra money, not to mention that the XBOX 360 Elite already costs about $479 to start with.

Perusing a few of the gaming forums seem so to indicate that I’m actually in the minority of existing X360 owners who has no intentions to trade in their existing X360 at a loss and fork over lots more money to get the Elite version. Many of these people also don’t have a TV that have HDMI inputs, so this must be the true definition of a fanboy.

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I was glad to see that the controls are a whole lot easier. However, learning the tactics of a squad based game and directing your squad mates will take a little bit of time. I’m used to just running around shooting by myself. The game employs some fairly simplistic measures for directing the squad. Moving them from location to location is a simple as pointing to the desired destination and hitting the A button. Can’t get any more simple than that.

Taking cover is very important in this game as not doing so will get your killed very quickly, and thankfully taking cover can be accomplished by a quick pull of the left trigger. If, however, you do expose yourself and are taking shots, you will get a few indications of direction and the fact that you are taking a beating by the whole screen blurring. This is your indication that you should seek cover immediately, once under cover the blurring effect stops.

I didn’t get anywhere near finishing the mission of this demo as I was fumbling around with the controls, it was late in the night and I died too many times. I will continue to try to get better at this and perhaps pick up a used copy of the game when it gets released.

Cheers