Still don't buy an Xbox One

This is old news, but in case you haven't heard, Microsoft did an Xbox One Eighty with their DRM policies, meaning that used games will be fully supported, sharing games will be possible, and disks will work like they do now. All because when they announced their plans, we said no. There was so much protesting, and we did it. If you posted anything saying what madness their proposed policies were, you did it too. Be proud, because the voice of the people made a difference. That may sound a little cheesy, but it's true. I don't know if you like Doctor Who or not, but if you do, you may remember a scene where the Daleks are threatening to exterminate people if the ninth Doctor doesn't comply, and he just keeps saying no to them. Basically, Microsoft is the Daleks and get excited, since that makes us the Doctor. Anyway, I'm happy about this victory, but Microsoft has shown that they are clearly unhappy about this and only doing it so people will at least consider buying their console and stop hating on it. So because of this, they've decided to be petty about it and take away family sharing, which was one of the few kinda decent things they had announced before. It's petty and contemptible, but I have to admit that it's smart. Now all the people who were looking forward to having family sharing are turning against us, the people who fought for their freedom from oppressive DRM. I'm not sure if they planned that to happen or were just trying to punish us for wanting to own the games that we pay them money for (since last time I checked, that's how a transaction works. If they want us to have no choice but to basically rent games, they had better be a lot cheaper than the price to buy them). If they did plan to turn gamers against each other though, I'll admit that's pretty good as far as corporate evil schemes go. I don't like it, but I do respect it. That's allowed, right? Doctor Doom sincerely respects both Mister Fantastic and Iron Man. Now that I think about it, I think villains are usually the ones who both hate and respect their enemies. Especially Kraven the Hunter with his philosophy about every man having his "spider." But this isn't really a you're-my-spider kind of thing as much as an I-don't-like-what-you-did-but-I'll-admit-it-was-smart kind of thing. Besides lacking my and many other people's respect and not deserving our money, there are still other reasons not to buy an Xbox One. It costs One hundred dollars more, and relies a lot on voice commands, which you can't expect to always work. You just can't. And the most important reason is still the fact that it's not truly about games anymore. Honestly, if you want a new console, buy a PS4, if you have some money you want to blow after buying one and like Nintendo, buy a Wii U, and if you still have $500 you want to spend on something, buy those gold pills I mentioned in my last post , and I honestly could not care less what you do with the remaining $75. I'll take it if you don't want it.

Next Gen Consoles

As a console gamer, the announcement of the next generation of game consoles was a pretty big deal for me. The PS4 is the console that all the news is about, and that doesn't really apply to me since I play Xbox and don't plan on switching and I'm too cheap to buy both, but I assume the next Xbox will be very similar. Some of the features they announced sound pretty nice, like a considerably bigger hard drive, a light bar on the controllers which are charged while the machine sleeps if they're connected, and the ability to record and share game footage for every title, but there are some things I'm less than thrilled about. There's nothing that I think will make it worse, but games will cost more, plus the console itself will be far from cheap, and I don't like being forced to pay for things that I don't necessarily need. For example, the console comes with a headset, which I would probably buy anyway, but I would prefer to choose one that, at risk of sounding like a cheesy commercial, is right for me. There's a fair amount of variety in headsets and I want to choose one without also being forced to buy the one that comes with the console. Especially since I don't play a ton online, and when I do, there always seems to be some kid who sounds way too young to be playing whatever game it is, and who doesn't know how or when to shut up. I pretty much never play Call of Duty, so I avoid the worst of it, but it's still a problem. Also, the graphics on these new consoles are going to be a lot better, which is good, but I don't know if I care enough for it to be worth the extra money for every game. Unless a game's graphics are extremely bad (and I mean extremely), I don't really care that much about them. I play and rate games based on fun gameplay, good story, creativity, originality, music, voice acting, how well it keeps with the series if applicable, loyalty if it's based on something else, THEN graphics. I've always thought that playing a game just for the graphics is like reading a book for the font it's written in. No matter what people try to convince you, video games aren't about looking good. They're about feeling good. Sorry, I kind of went into a rant there. I hate raging and swearing 9 year olds on Xbox Live, and I hate when people think graphics are the most important characteristic of a game, but I think the next consoles will be pretty cool! I said I'm not thrilled about some things, but that wasn't an understatement in order to express unhappiness. I meant that I'm literally not thrilled. I'm happy though. I'll probably wait a while before buying one, and an even longer time before I stop playing 360 if they're not backwards compatible (which they had better be or Imma shank someone), but I have high hopes for next gen consoles.
Until next post!