First and foremost, I do have an issue with the Microsoft company directly, but more due to their handling of the computer/PC side of the business more-so than the console-side. I'll get to the console-side momentarily, but thought it pertinent to point out my "history" of view on Microsoft to paint a clearer picture.
For the record, I'm no stranger to technology or video games; I originally started on a ColecoVision (then later a ColecoVision Adam) when I was 5 years old, as well as a PC-based 80286 using the original Dos when I was right around the same age, (I think it was even later after that getting Dos 2.1 which I needed to run certain PC games, some with the use of "SetVer"). Anyways, over the years, I was there to see the original release of such innovations as Monochrome going to CGA, to later go to EGA, then to VGA, and finally Super-VGA; I was there publicly to actually watch the unveiling of the first VGA hardware and saw it used without any pixelation on the screen. I was there to see the very first unveilings of the mouse interface for the personal computer (which I'll admit, took me some time to get used to... even today, if I can bring up a command-line interface and type the commands rather than point-and-click, I opt for that instead). I was also there to see the growth of several computer-based game and software companies, anywhere from the original Sierra On-Line to Origin Games (Ultima/Wing Commander/etc), Accolade, LucasFilm Games, ID Games, Apogee, Epic, etc... all the way to Corel, even Microsoft. I was one of the first users to test out the original DosShell, and later was one of the first to fire up and run the original Windows.
At first, I thought the graphical-user interface, at least starting with Windows was pretty neat (as DosShell left a bit to be desired). However, I noticed over the years, that as bugs would crop up, rather than fix the code, Microsoft would simply patch/pave over the fix piling more code on top of old code, which doesn't completely fix the problem, just makes a larger jumble to be processed and suck system-resources dry, and at times still leaves certain weaknesses (sort of like how they patch potholes in the street... they put a different coating of tar in the hole which eventually wears away). They continued to dump more and more money into the "next version", and would go on to pump out Windows 3.1, Windows NT, Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows Millenium, Windows 2000, Windows XP, Windows Vista, and now Windows 7, and soon Windows 8. It was, in fact, the original Windows coding that brought around the birth of the original "winnuke" as it stemmed from an exploitation of the protocol port 139 being open by default. In their years of operating-system releases, more and more weaknesses would pile up, more error scenarios would get added to the pile, and more security issues would crop to the surface. Anybody whose ever dealt in TechNet CDs knows EXACTLY what I'm talking about!! Having worked in IT, in a computer-based market that's pretty much dominated by Microsoft, I've seen many; which makes it annoying for those of us "in the know", because you're able to fix everybody else's problems, and when a Windows error crops up on your own machine, typically, it's one you've either never dealt with before, or is outside your scope of experience and makes it that much more stressful to fix, or is worst-case scenario non-fixable.
Now, I have nothing against a company "dominating" the market, but when they pretty much run and control the market, that's where I have an issue. I'm not going to praise Apple up and down like some do; yes, I like the company, and I have nothing against them, but attempting to keep this as objective as possible. I believe Macintosh is a sturdy system, I believe that had Macintosh actually had the freedom to flourish and bloom at their own pace they could have been a big giant in the computer-industry; however, for any that know the history of the original Macintosh and the instrumental part that Bill Gates played in where Windows stemmed from, you know that Macintosh had been pretty much held under Bill Gates thumb since day one. Another major reason I don't have much respect for Bill Gates. Now, to go along with that, the over commercialism and massively increasing prices of Windows has forced certain distributions of Linux, over the years, to have to go commercial/retail in order to stay afloat; which is a bit of a culture-shock for those of us who are used to getting most Linux flavors as freeware/open-source; though, there are still some distros that are free, the "better" ones now have to make money in order to stay afloat and compete, which is understandable, they deserve their royalties for their invested time/resources.
Now, I have nothing against a company "dominating" the market, but when they pretty much run and control the market, that's where I have an issue. I'm not going to praise Apple up and down like some do; yes, I like the company, and I have nothing against them, but attempting to keep this as objective as possible. I believe Macintosh is a sturdy system, I believe that had Macintosh actually had the freedom to flourish and bloom at their own pace they could have been a big giant in the computer-industry; however, for any that know the history of the original Macintosh and the instrumental part that Bill Gates played in where Windows stemmed from, you know that Macintosh had been pretty much held under Bill Gates thumb since day one. Another major reason I don't have much respect for Bill Gates. Now, to go along with that, the over commercialism and massively increasing prices of Windows has forced certain distributions of Linux, over the years, to have to go commercial/retail in order to stay afloat; which is a bit of a culture-shock for those of us who are used to getting most Linux flavors as freeware/open-source; though, there are still some distros that are free, the "better" ones now have to make money in order to stay afloat and compete, which is understandable, they deserve their royalties for their invested time/resources.
I just have to wonder, rather than dumping millions into the "next version" of Windows all the time, why not dump just as much money, or even half of that, into actually fixing it truly and completely without all the bugs? In essence, Windows since its original inception, even up until now, has been pretty much running as a beta if compared to the standards of other software with ongoing fixes. Now, to take another look at the Macintosh; it's hard enough finding PC-based software in stores these days, or at least a decent selection... how often can you say you see true Macintosh-based versions of software? It's been many moons since I've seen any. This is the part where many would point out, "oh, but there's Parallels" or some other Windows emulator for Macintosh; but there's two problems with that. One, there's still royalties going to Microsoft, and two, which is a problem also seen emulating Windows in Linux, when you emulate Windows, you're also emulating all the bugs/weaknesses that come with it. Even with that aside, to use cars as a visual, that'd be like saying, you like to drive a Hyundai or Chevy, but hypothetically we'll say Toyota ends up dominating the market, you can have the shell of the car you want, maybe even the engine, but everything else will be Toyota, royalties going to Toyota, and any and all safety-issues, quirks, bugs, problems that anybody who has a full-fledged Toyota has to deal with, you'll have to deal with as well. Disclaimer, I don't have anything against Toyota, but they have had a really long history with safety-issues that can't be denied.
Okay, now, that was long-winded, and I apologize for that, moving right along to the console side of things. I won't lie, I'm a bigger fan of the Playstation, and will come right out with it, but I have played several games on an X-Box 360 as well. I believe the 360 is a good/decent system, but for my preferences and what I'm looking for, it just doesn't "fit me" as well as a Playstation does. One major factor is the exclusive games on the PS3 more fit my tastes than the 360-exclusive games. In fact, I can honestly say that to date, there's only 3 or 4 real 360 exclusive games that have ever really caught my eye that much, and that'd be Fable, the original Saints Row 1 (where you can get 2 & 3 on PS3), Mass Effect 1 (where you can get 2 & 3 on PS3), and some Ninja Blade game I played a demo of off the marketplace; other than that, can't think of too many others that really fit the type of games I'm looking for. But that's just preference on my part, that's nothing against the 360 itself. Also, as far as my preferences go, I feel the PS3 has some better options straight out of the box than 360; and again, this is preference, not saying it's solid fact, and I'm not saying, "360 sucks".
Perhaps I was wrong, maybe BSoDs aren't so bad! ;)
Okay, now, that was long-winded, and I apologize for that, moving right along to the console side of things. I won't lie, I'm a bigger fan of the Playstation, and will come right out with it, but I have played several games on an X-Box 360 as well. I believe the 360 is a good/decent system, but for my preferences and what I'm looking for, it just doesn't "fit me" as well as a Playstation does. One major factor is the exclusive games on the PS3 more fit my tastes than the 360-exclusive games. In fact, I can honestly say that to date, there's only 3 or 4 real 360 exclusive games that have ever really caught my eye that much, and that'd be Fable, the original Saints Row 1 (where you can get 2 & 3 on PS3), Mass Effect 1 (where you can get 2 & 3 on PS3), and some Ninja Blade game I played a demo of off the marketplace; other than that, can't think of too many others that really fit the type of games I'm looking for. But that's just preference on my part, that's nothing against the 360 itself. Also, as far as my preferences go, I feel the PS3 has some better options straight out of the box than 360; and again, this is preference, not saying it's solid fact, and I'm not saying, "360 sucks".
What I am saying, is if I cleared my head completely, stepped back out of the gaming industry, and approached it like somebody who has never touched a game controller before, and compared what I got from the 360 and PS3 side-by-side straight out of the box, I'd probably be more inclined to go with the PS3. Here's why, the PS3 straight out of the box plays Blu-Ray discs, has a built-in media-library, has free web access (*with your own ISP account), game demos you can download and play, the ability to message other users on the PlayStation Network, the ability to play against other players on the PlayStation Network free of charge when I get other games, has Playstation Home that has mini-games and which now has quests you can do, has a built-in browser so I can browse the web from my living-room, or if I happen to not have a computer, as well as a marketplace that allows me to purchase things for straight price without having to use points that never work out even. The 360 by itself straight out of the box, has a built-in media-library, has the ability to make a silver XBL account, a marketplace you can browse, demos you can download and play, and the ability to message other XBL users (I think, not sure if you can do that with a silver account, I never tried on mine). Now to expand from there, if you wanted to do more online with X-Box Live, you'd have to pay more money for a gold account, to be able to play with other players, play games multiplayer (which I usually tend to prefer single-player myself anyways), etc, but still have no way/browser to truly browse the interwebs. Also the XBL Marketplace "Points" get annoying when you can never get just the exact amount you need and are forced to pay more than what you should be for extra points that are useless unless you buy more points to use them up and then again have a points remainder, because you can only buy in "Points Packages". (Please note, I'm being as fair as I can be, if I forgot anything I sincerely apologize, I'm not out to make either look better, doing a true objective comparison).
Now, again, that's my personal preference... I'm not saying it's fact or how everybody should view it. I know there are some that could care less about messaging users, or care less about using PS Home, or give two turds less about free internet access (*with your own ISP account), or even playing Blu-Ray discs. That's another thing I should point out though; last I checked, a Blu-Ray disc can store something like 25gb, whereas a HD DVD (which is what 360 uses) can store something like 8-10gb I believe it is (may be more now??). There's also talks of a dual-layer Blu-Ray disc on the horizon (if it hasn't come to market already?) that will be able to store even more. What that says to me right away, is any game that spans multiple discs will need less discs for a PS3, and thus less disc-changing, which is kind of nice so your gaming isn't interrupted/paused as often. Which again, is a minor thing, if 360 fit my preferences, I'd have no issue with having an extra disc or two to swap out; the other bonus is, should a PS3 version of a game need as many discs as say a 360 version, with the extra space on the disc they usually tend to put in extra goodies. Like I think the PS3 version of Battlefield was supposed to be packed with one of the classic Battlefield games or something along those lines... don't follow shooters much, but there are other games that do the same, why waste the extra storage.
I'm not going to take the time to compare hardware to hardware; not because "I'm afraid the 360 will look better", because there are some specs of the 360 that are actually a bit better than the PS3, just as there's some PS3 specs that are better than the 360. The reason why is in the long-run I feel they're both about equivalent to each other, each has their pros and cons which somewhat equal out, and therefore I don't truly feel that either system is "truly superior", not to mention there's already been hundreds if not thousands of those comparisons done, which can readily be found by means of Google or YouTube.
As far as game-selection goes, again, most big-name games are available on both systems, and I'm not going to say, "PS3 graphics look better than 360", because I truly believe that depends more on the coding of the game itself, as I'll admit I've seen some games look better on PS3, but I've seen just as many look better on 360 as well. Just as some games run smoother/faster on PS3, and just as many run smoother/faster on 360; all depends how they're coded and what they're coded for. Now when it comes to console-exclusives, my preference will lean more towards PS3, simply because I'm more of an open-world, adventure, platforming, single-player, role-playing kind of person; as I stated, Fable on the 360 is fun, but on the PS3 there's Uncharted, Infamous, Little Big Planet, etc, etc. But again, that's my preference, that's not to say the selection is better, as it depends on what you're looking for.
Also, we have to look at motion-control; I know many could care less about it, but where the Nintendo Wii is another competing console that relies on motion-controls, it makes sense. Having used both the Kinect and the Move, from my own preferences, I have to give more props to the PS3 Move. Simply because with the Kinect, you can only flail your arms in so many ways and lean your body in so many ways; where with the Move, it not only reads body movements, but has small hand-held controls for toggles, control buttons, etc. I know the whole hype for Kinect is no controls, but one thing the game industry should have taught us, is depth requires some sort of interface, unless they can invent a device that actually reads your thoughts. Even PC games showed us that; for any old-school computer game player, compare the simplified text commands to the newer point-click interfacing, and how much more depth and options it brings. I mean, I'm not even the largest shooter fan, but I had a blast playing Socom 4 with the PS3 Move using the SharpShooter gun-device; again, not to knock the 360, but I truly feel the depth control can't be replicated by Kinect, and even if so, you'd have to either lean forward or march in place to be able to move forward I'd think.
Now, the big clincher. Before I get into the "networking", I'll go ahead and say for the record, yes, Sony got hacked, and yes as some have said, they took something like 7-10 days to come forward to the public about it, etc. I'm not here to make excuses, but what I can say from my own professional experience in the IT/network-security business, is when something happens of a large-scale, you isolate the issue, figure out what's going on and how to fix it, before you come running out and causing a panic. A fireman, when he shows up to a fire, doesn't start talking to the news reporter while it burns, he puts out the fire. When you're talking technology, it can tend to take a week or so to isolate the problems, secure everything, and take damage-control. Sony however, did come out with everything, even admitting they realized they had a weakened security that they had to fix and update, every detail (even though there were a couple details I'll honestly admit seemed to change as time went on, but they were still pretty close to the truth, may have been a perspective issue), they even pointed out that yes credit card numbers were stolen, but the security codes for those cards were on a separate secure server that wasn't breached, and yes they were down for over a month. I'm not going to fault Sony for that, because in hacking, you have the attacker and you have a victim; Sony was the victim, regardless of whether or not their security was completely up to snuff... (if a wreckless driver slams into my car that's really old and doesn't have all the modern air-bags etc, am I at fault because they slammed in to me?).
Now X-box Live on the other hand, I will admit hasn't had their servers hacked directly, but for almost a year now, several X-Box Live users have been falling victim to hackers. Which again, I won't fault Microsoft for the actions of the hackers, what I do fault is how they handle it. For *several* months, Microsoft first were trying to dodge the subject and brush it under the rug, then once it became big enough of an issue that they couldn't ignore it, they tried pointing the finger at the VICTIMS; the actual USERS and CUSTOMERS of the X-Box Live service. If you use XBL, if you've been hacked, Microsoft was trying to pretty much say it was "user stupidity", if you haven't been hacked yet, there's still a chance it might happen, at which time you become "user stupid" by Microsoft's terms, or at least would have. Finally after almost a year, Microsoft is finally owning up to the fact that yes, users are being hacked and NOT always phished (as I'll admit, there's always going to be a certain percentage of victims who are phished, it happens). Problem is, I've been following this for quite sometime, and even back then, there were obvious signs/proof that certain users weren't phished and still being disregarded as "sucker enough to be phished".
Which brings us to the next issue. I'll honestly admit, there are a decent number of users that had their accounts resolved and returned within the 21 day period, with refunds made for lost money. However, there's also been a decent amount of horror stories ranging anywhere from how the users were treated/handled, how much money they lost, etc. A fellow Raptr user and friend of mine lost several hundred dollars that they needed to care for their one year-old disabled son; problem is, Microsoft had informed them the account would be locked down during investigation, yet the hackers went on to use the attached PayPal to continue to spend money, while Microsoft never notified the user. The user actually had to call into Microsoft to find out that Microsoft was unable to lock their account; decent security would have been to notify the user right away. The user followed the trail of their account, and finally found out their account eventually got sold to somebody else by means of an online service similar to Ebay. There was another article about a gentleman that reported his XBL account hacked, who ended up getting banned because they tracked his account back to an OLD 360 he didn't even have anymore that was being used by a hacker to steal accounts; turns out his old system had a Red Ring of Death (RRoD), he sent it to Microsoft, they refurbished it, sent it or sold it or whatever out to somebody else, that somebody else was using it to attempt to hack people. The guy had been on his new 360 for how long and they still couldn't trace back to THAT system and NOT the old one? Wow. Then I read about another one today, where one gentleman waited 28 days (a whole week more than they said he'd have to wait), called up Microsoft, they told him his claim had been closed because they didn't have the info they needed, etc. He asked why they didn't contact him, they said they didn't have the information, which he said he specifically gave them a different email address to contact him with. He had to wait another 21 days, in which time his friends told him they saw his account online playing games, then finally gets his account back, to find out it'd been being used the whole time to buy games and other items; he calls for a refund, he gets a "manager" who treats him like a tool that pretty much says, "look, sorry for this that and the other thing, you can't escalate this any higher to my manager, there's not a whole lot we can do", etc, etc. Finally however, they agree to refund him credits, a couple months go by, nothing, so he calls them up, and again they say they're going to give him credits, and if I'm correct he's still holding his breath waiting to see anything. There's also been dozens of other horror stories of people having to wait 2 to 3 or more months while this is all dragged out and they're treated like morons by customer support, who don't even have the decency to contact them when there's an issue, like the Raptr user when they were "unable to lock her account". I've even talked to a gentleman that works for Microsoft support, whose own support co-worker at Microsoft got hacked as well!
Now, let's compare the Sony hack and the XBL hack side by side. Again, the hacking itself isn't to blame on either company as they can't control whether or not somebody decides to attack them. But overall view here, Sony was down for over a month fixing the problem, came out and explained it all out for everybody to see, etc. I won't say that none of the PSN users lost any money in the Sony hack, I can't say I've ever seen anybody say they have, but that's not to say nobody did, and for those that may have, that's horrible and it shouldn't happen. I have however seen numerous posts from users who use both XBL and PSN, who have said, and I quote, "during the whole Sony hack I never lost a dime, now my XBL account has been hacked, and I've lost hundreds". Microsoft has been very hush-hush with any information; even now that they're finally admitting to users being hacked, they're still trying to defend that there's no weaknesses at all in their network (from an IT perspective, there's ALWAYS a weakness in ANY system). I mean, it's taken them THIS long to admit that users are being hacked; how much longer is it going to be before they finally come out and say, "oh yeah, oops, it was a weakness in our system"??
Now, let's compare the Sony hack and the XBL hack side by side. Again, the hacking itself isn't to blame on either company as they can't control whether or not somebody decides to attack them. But overall view here, Sony was down for over a month fixing the problem, came out and explained it all out for everybody to see, etc. I won't say that none of the PSN users lost any money in the Sony hack, I can't say I've ever seen anybody say they have, but that's not to say nobody did, and for those that may have, that's horrible and it shouldn't happen. I have however seen numerous posts from users who use both XBL and PSN, who have said, and I quote, "during the whole Sony hack I never lost a dime, now my XBL account has been hacked, and I've lost hundreds". Microsoft has been very hush-hush with any information; even now that they're finally admitting to users being hacked, they're still trying to defend that there's no weaknesses at all in their network (from an IT perspective, there's ALWAYS a weakness in ANY system). I mean, it's taken them THIS long to admit that users are being hacked; how much longer is it going to be before they finally come out and say, "oh yeah, oops, it was a weakness in our system"??
Now let's look at the downtime; the whole of PSN was down for over a month, while yet, if you're hacked on XBL, you're off that account for 3 weeks at MINIMUM, many going much beyond a month, even beyond 2 months. On PSN, as long as you've never entered any credit-card info, you have nothing to fear (same as XBL to be honest with a silver account); but again, multiplayer, can play multiplayer free on PSN, want to do that on XBL, you HAVE to purchase gold and enter a credit-card or payment method, and if you get hacked, your info is up for grabs with shopping sprees on your credit-card/PayPal.
I also can't say I know for certain how users were treated when the Sony hack happened, but I still have never seen a horror story where they're given the run around, their account is left in the wind as free prey, or where the customer support treats them like garbage, and then smiles at them in the press conference and says, "you're our loyal customer, please keep giving us your money". Whereas with Sony, after the PlayStation Network was back online, as long as you were just a basic user, they were giving away TONS of free stuff to show how much they cared about you; from what I have read, the customer service during the hacking was actually really good too. I mean, for the record, I haven't dumped a dime into Sony for quite awhile; not because I don't like them, just happened I didn't really dive into many direct Sony items. Perhaps they got some royalties from a PS3 game, but I think the last I dumped money into Sony directly is either when I was paying to play EverQuest 2 many moons ago, or when I bought my PSP several moons ago as well. Even after not having invested much of a dime into Sony, they had 2 free PS3 games for me, 2 free PSP games, free premium services, one year of free account-security protection, etc.
I also can't say I know for certain how users were treated when the Sony hack happened, but I still have never seen a horror story where they're given the run around, their account is left in the wind as free prey, or where the customer support treats them like garbage, and then smiles at them in the press conference and says, "you're our loyal customer, please keep giving us your money". Whereas with Sony, after the PlayStation Network was back online, as long as you were just a basic user, they were giving away TONS of free stuff to show how much they cared about you; from what I have read, the customer service during the hacking was actually really good too. I mean, for the record, I haven't dumped a dime into Sony for quite awhile; not because I don't like them, just happened I didn't really dive into many direct Sony items. Perhaps they got some royalties from a PS3 game, but I think the last I dumped money into Sony directly is either when I was paying to play EverQuest 2 many moons ago, or when I bought my PSP several moons ago as well. Even after not having invested much of a dime into Sony, they had 2 free PS3 games for me, 2 free PSP games, free premium services, one year of free account-security protection, etc.
Again, trying to be as objective as possible, looking at the customer service from Sony side-by-side with the horror stories and at times shabbiness of Xbox Live, I'd have to honestly and fairly give this one to Sony. Also for the record, Sony fixed their problem, and even though there was another attempted large-scale hack against them not too long ago, and yes a small number of accounts were compromised (which even one single one counts, not saying it doesn't), they still remain fairly rock-solid; whereas again, XBL for almost a year has been having accounts hacked, money stolen, with it either brushed under the rug, or MS beating around the bush trying to blame its customers/clients that pay their salaries, to finally admit hacking while still trying to say, "our systems are secure, YOU are hacked, not US, we're still PERFECT", but still not really diving in head-first to tackle whatever the hell is going on.
So there you have it, quite long-winded, but my take on why it seems as though I'm railing on Microsoft/X360. I'll honestly admit, if it wasn't for all this XBL nonsense, or how fellow gamers are being treated (victimized by MS Customer-Support after being victimized by the hackers), I'd probably still regard a 360 as just as decent a system as the other consoles on the market. It's not the console itself I have anything against, and I'm not attempting to fan-boy the PS3 (at least not completely... again, preference); it's the treating of the customers... which you can't honestly say isn't your driving reason at times for shopping at say Target or Old Navy instead of Walmart. Q;-)
So there you have it, quite long-winded, but my take on why it seems as though I'm railing on Microsoft/X360. I'll honestly admit, if it wasn't for all this XBL nonsense, or how fellow gamers are being treated (victimized by MS Customer-Support after being victimized by the hackers), I'd probably still regard a 360 as just as decent a system as the other consoles on the market. It's not the console itself I have anything against, and I'm not attempting to fan-boy the PS3 (at least not completely... again, preference); it's the treating of the customers... which you can't honestly say isn't your driving reason at times for shopping at say Target or Old Navy instead of Walmart. Q;-)
