The Xbox 360 Thread Elite Edition

[mikeszekely]

Good luck with Cleveland, we'll have to hang out or something. You can give them my address in Cleveland if you want to send it in before your move, they can send me your refurb and I'll get it to you. I'm not moving for at least two more years.

Trade in values suck at Gamestop. They were going to give me $20 for my original Xbox. I think they said it was about $90 for a core 360 when I asked when the Elites first came out.

Where in the greater Cleveland area are you at? The company I'm trying to get into has an office on E 9th St, so I've been looking at apartments around Avon (near Elyria), since it's a pretty straight shot on 90. Might consider Westlake, but Avon seems more conveniently located.

[Apollo Leader]

Good luck with Cleveland, we'll have to hang out or something. You can give them my address in Cleveland if you want to send it in before your move, they can send me your refurb and I'll get it to you. I'm not moving for at least two more years.

Trade in values suck at Gamestop. They were going to give me $20 for my original Xbox. I think they said it was about $90 for a core 360 when I asked when the Elites first came out.

Besides Gamestop, is there any local gaming shops in your area? For example, a few days ago I called in to the Gamestop I usually go and got the trade in value of a few PS2 and original Xbox games I was wanting to get rid of. The next day I stopped at one of the local Gamers stores to see what kind of trade in values I could get. In the case of some of the games where I was offered like $3-$5 at Gamestop, I was typically offered $10-$15 for the same exact games. Of the games I was going to get rid of at Gamestop to help pay for my Legendary edition of Halo 3, I only traded in one Xbox game and a few movies. The rest I traded off at Gamers to apply towards some upcoming games I have on preorder throught them.

The bottom line is to shop around with your trade ins when you can.

[Chowser]

I'm on the west side of Cleveland off Clifton Blvd. next to Lakewood, my wife works at the Federal Building on E. 9th Street. It's a 10 minute ride in to work for her.

Avon is pretty nice, Westlake is one of the premier west side suburbs (pay $$$$). If we ever win this residency ruling, I'll probably move to Westlake. Any further and it's going to be too long to drive to work. My brother works at the Federal Building too and he is looking for apartments downtown so he can walk, but the cheapest he's found is $950/month.

With Avon, even Westlake (and especially Elyria), you have to factor in rush hour if you work the normal 8-4 shift. It takes about 30 minutes to get downtown from Westlake and that's not during rush hour. There's not much chance to exceed the speed limit because you have Rocky River and Lakewood PD who patrol 90, and once you get into Cleveland, during the warmer months, they have motorcycle cops out there with a guy standing on a bridge shooting laser. Rocky River cops are real pr1cks when it comes to traffic. I can't count how many times they've pulled me over for stupid stuff (not speed either). Coming from Elyria/Lorain is even worse because of the bottleneck once you hit Cuyahoga County. Parking downtown is uberexpensive. My wife parks at the muni-lot which is $3/day and about 15 minutes walk. Places closer to 9th street will run $8 and up per day. Where on E.9th is the company? South end? North End? Parking will be cheaper towards the south end. If I have a court case downtown (felonies/juvies), I usually take the bus downtown which is 10 minutes for me, but I don't know what it costs because cops ride buses for free. I think it's $1.50.

I just traded in some games to pay towards Halo 3 and I got an extra 20% for trading games in. It still sucks with the value, I got $26 for some PS2 games: Xenosaga I and II, Gundam Encounters in Space, some old fighting game, and some other racing game. That sucks, but it's $26 off Halo 3 LE. They gave me $6 for Gundam and they put it back on the shelf for $19.99. What a load of crap. They won't take PS1 games so I'll have to hock those on ebay or something. They laughed when I tried to trade in my import IQ and IQ Final.

We've got Gamestop and EB Games like everywhere. I could probably find a CD Game Exchange or something, but it's not worth the gas cost. I go to the Gamestop in the next city over from my job while on my lunch break. I'll be there at midnight on Sept. 25th to get my Halo 3. I get my game first and they get free security. Which is good because when WoW expansion came out, there were some disgruntled people that didn't get theirs.

I ended up selling my Xbox and some games for $100. Beats the $47 I was going to get at Gamestop. I guess I can pay off Halo 3 now. I'm still debating preordering Ace Combat 6 and the flight sticks.

[mikeszekely]

I have a friend in Sheffield Village, at the Waterford Circle apartments. Waterford is just of Detroit Rd, and you can see the on-ramp to 90 when you get to Detroit Rd. He works 8-5, and he says it takes him 25-35 minutes, depending on traffic. When I interviewed there and went to his place after, it only took me about 25 minutes. Most of the traffic thins out once you get past Westlake.

The thing about me is right now, I live in Greensburg, PA. From where I'm at, I'm used to the convenience of having a Target, a Wal-Mart, two parks, a Best Buy, and a mall all within 5 minutes. I'm also maybe 15 minutes to the PA Turnpike. Meanwhile, the closest real city to me is Pittsburgh... and that's a good 45 minutes to an hour from here to downtown... which I avoid anyway.

I'm kind of contradictory. I don't like cities, but I like convenience. That's why I'm eying Avon... it's a lot like Greensburg. Westlake reminds me of Monroeville, which I've never really liked. Elyria is a little too far west and a little run down. Avon, though... right off 90 (and 90 dumps me out right onto E 9th), it's close to that one mall, Best Buy, Avon Commons, Wal-Mart, Giant Eagle, and Sheffield Village. The lake is a short run down Abbe Rd. And it's maybe 20 minutes to the Westlake Mall or Crocker Park. The apartments around Avon vary wildly... I'm looking at two places, both owned by the same people, right by Lorrain County Community College, and it's about $525 for two bedrooms (yeah, I know I'll have to deal with a lot of the college kids, but I already have Pitt Greensburg and Seton Hill University students for my neighbors, so biggie). But there's lots of places labeled "resort-style living" that are closer to $1000.

The building is the Penton Media Building. If you turn left onto St. Clair, and then right onto 6th, the building has it's own parking garage. Parking was a little pricey when I went, but it looks like employees get a pass. What's the line between the north end and the south end? I'd guess the PMB is closer to the north end... I mean, it didn't seem to take me long at all to get there when I got off 77 (coming from Pittsburgh that time, 77 to 14th, then Prospect to 9th). Actually, I think the PMB is really close to the Federal Building.

[Keith]

Ouch, $20 for an xbox? I got $40 when trading in my DS to get my girlfriend a DS light, they must be doing atari math.

[CoryHolmes]

Doh I got my cables confused with the system settings. I was thinking of the audio control pannel setting, was it set to Digital or Analog?

There are only three options for the 360. "Dolby Stereo" "Dolby Digital 5.1" and "Dolby Digital 5.1 with WMA". I had it on the middle one, the 5.1 option.

[mikeszekely]

Ouch, $20 for an xbox? I got $40 when trading in my DS to get my girlfriend a DS light, they must be doing atari math.

People actually want a DS, even the non-lite ones. Nobody wants an old Xbox. Law of supply and demand would figure that the DS is worth more.

[yellowlightman]

Not exactly 360 related, but it is Xbox related and I didn't feel like starting a new thread.

I picked up a brand new copy of Steel Battalion today. I was out with friends and as we drove by a Gamestop one of them casually mentioned he'd bought his used copy of Steel Battalion there and last he knew they had a new one sitting in the back. They did, and it was only $99 so I picked it up. Box is a little beat up from shuffling around in the store room for a few years, but otherwise looks to be in great condition. Haven't bothered to set it up yet, as I have no idea where I'm going to put it.

The guy waiting behind me in line as I was buying it told me he owns 4 (!!!) copies, for LAN play.

[JsARCLIGHT]

There are only three options for the 360. "Dolby Stereo" "Dolby Digital 5.1" and "Dolby Digital 5.1 with WMA". I had it on the middle one, the 5.1 option.

To my knowledge, or at least to my memory, that third option was grayed out on my system. With an optical cable attached my Onkyo receiver it read the first option (Dolby Stereo) as an analog source and the second (Dolby Digital) as a digital source. I also heard from a guy in my office who knows more about Xboxes than I do that those options go out the window when playing back a DVD... according to him the Xbox 360's audio system will be instantly overridden by whatever output the DVD is using up to it's max of DD5.1. He has told me that even if you have your system set to DD5.1 if you put in a DVD that is set to DA2.1 it will play back in analog two channel.

[Ladic]

is steel battalion and its controller xbox360 compatible? or only worki on regular xbox?

[Apollo Leader]

is steel battalion and its controller xbox360 compatible? or only worki on regular xbox?

The only ports the 360 has are USB so unless you can find some sort of an adaptor, you're probably out of luck.

[eugimon]

I thought the 360 specifically didn't accept xbox controllers. I think I remember some gripping specifically about the steel batallion controlers.

[GreenGuy42]

Played Bioshock yet?

The game's wonderfully twisted and the Unreal Engine makes for some fun, creative ways to kill people. I walked into Blockbuster yesterday to return a game, and they were putting it out. I'd suggest renting it, if you can.

[JsARCLIGHT]

I picked up Bioshock on my way home last night and was only able to play it for a little bit last night. The real game is a lot harder than the demo seemed to be. I made it into the medical area before giving up for the night.

[JB0]

I thought the 360 specifically didn't accept xbox controllers. I think I remember some gripping specifically about the steel batallion controlers.

You recall correctly.

There's no XBox ports on the 360. And even if you buy/make a XBox->USB adapter(the XBox actually uses USB, so it's just a matter of wiring the plugs), they STILL won't work because 360 game controllers have to use a proprietary encryption scheme, and XBox 1 controllers don't. Odds are that the 360's emulator will never contain a Steel Battalion profile for this reason.

You'll be able to play Steel Batalion on a PC before the 360.

I gather the controller issue would also cause a problem with any game that required pressure-sensitive buttons, too. Which I think consists of Metal Gear Solid 2 and... MGS2.

Other games CAN use the pressure-sensitive buttons, so it limits your control config choices on those titles. But I think only MGS2 REQUIRES them.

It would ALSO cause a problem with House of the Dead 3, if you wanted to use a lightgun. But then again, I don't think anyone made a decent lightgun for the 360.

[yellowlightman]

There actually is an adaptor for using original Xbox games on the 360, but it costs about $80 and requires a wired 360 controller to be be plugged into it in order to spoof the encryption.

[David Hingtgen]

Another game that requires the hard drive:

http://www.1up.com/do/newsStory?cId=3162176

I personally think it's a good thing. The more that require it, the more that games will start to take advantage of it, caching stuff, etc. And it also helps against the "360 versions of the same game are downgraded from the PS3 versions because the 360 can't be assured of having a hard drive" argument/possibility etc.

[GreenGuy42]

Have you picked up the Plasmid "Inferno?" It makes the game a lot easier, I think... torch 'em and hide.

Also, if you can, equip the cloaking plasmid. When you're still, no one sees you, and it helps with those annoying drones when/if you set off an alarm. don't recall what it was called. I finished the game today (was sick, so I had nothing better to to the last two days) and enjoyed the hell out of it.

[Apollo Leader]

The guy waiting behind me in line as I was buying it told me he owns 4 (!!!) copies, for LAN play.

Didn't Steel Batallion retail for $200 with the controller originally? The price some of us will pay for our hobbies!

[yellowlightman]

Didn't Steel Batallion retail for $200 with the controller originally? The price some of us will pay for our hobbies!

Yeah, it originally retailed for $200. Gamestop's current price for it is only $100, so if you manage to find a Gamestop with one it won't be too expensive. Used ones can go for as low as $60. Expensive, but not ridiculous. I'm wondering how many other Gamestops have the big green box in the back store room, because unless you ask for it you'd never know.

[Fort Max]

My copy of Bioshock was posted yesterday and I have all next week of work to play it.

I can't wait to re-enter Rapture.

[JsARCLIGHT]

Have you picked up the Plasmid "Inferno?" It makes the game a lot easier, I think... torch 'em and hide.

I have not been using the plasmids that much. Telekenisis yes, it's about the only one I've found to be useful to my play style. Outside of using the electricity one to shock multiple targets in water or shock a gun turret or robot so I can run up and hack them or using the fire one to get into the blocked areas I've mostly been relying on my firearms to get me by.

My tactics are to go slow and careful, usually using the pistol as my primary weapon. I go slow so I can listen for sounds of the baddies... on my stereo system this game is really good at letting you pinpoint the locations of baddies before you even see them if you have keen ears. It makes planning my attacks a lot easier. I usually have one good headshot on a target before it even knows I'm there. I also generally hack everything I come across no matter what it is to get the health bonus from the hacker add on thing. That actually saved my ass in the Big Daddy fight as he walked right in front of one of the gun turrets I hacked and it lit him up, he turned to beat on it and that gave me a nice open spot to spray him with my Thompson right in his back.

Playing as slow and deliberate as I do I finally got to and beat the first "boss" and the first Big Daddy last night and I made it to Neptune's Bounty before stopping for the night.

And is it just me or is this game a little fast and loose with the achievements? I've barely made it to stage three (or at least I think it's stage three) and I've already chalked up like ten achievements.

[mikeszekely]

Yeah, it originally retailed for $200. Gamestop's current price for it is only $100, so if you manage to find a Gamestop with one it won't be too expensive. Used ones can go for as low as $60. Expensive, but not ridiculous. I'm wondering how many other Gamestops have the big green box in the back store room, because unless you ask for it you'd never know.

You know what's funny is, at the time, $200 seemed ridiculous for it. But now I can't wait to pay that much for Rock Band. Go figure.

Meanwhile, I'm wondering if the following news will do anything to win over traditionally PlayStation gamers in America... or to win over anybody at all in Japan...

Nippon Ichi Software to develop for Xbox 360.

[GreenGuy42]

I have not been using the plasmids that much. Telekenisis yes, it's about the only one I've found to be useful to my play style. Outside of using the electricity one to shock multiple targets in water or shock a gun turret or robot so I can run up and hack them or using the fire one to get into the blocked areas I've mostly been relying on my firearms to get me by.

My tactics are to go slow and careful, usually using the pistol as my primary weapon. I go slow so I can listen for sounds of the baddies... on my stereo system this game is really good at letting you pinpoint the locations of baddies before you even see them if you have keen ears. It makes planning my attacks a lot easier. I usually have one good headshot on a target before it even knows I'm there. I also generally hack everything I come across no matter what it is to get the health bonus from the hacker add on thing. That actually saved my ass in the Big Daddy fight as he walked right in front of one of the gun turrets I hacked and it lit him up, he turned to beat on it and that gave me a nice open spot to spray him with my Thompson right in his back.

Playing as slow and deliberate as I do I finally got to and beat the first "boss" and the first Big Daddy last night and I made it to Neptune's Bounty before stopping for the night.

And is it just me or is this game a little fast and loose with the achievements? I've barely made it to stage three (or at least I think it's stage three) and I've already chalked up like ten achievements.

Yeah, and the "hard" setting's a bit easy. I haven't had much use for the telekinesis power, but I'm playing with it now. Alas, my sound system doesn't really give me much to play with when it comes to finding the location of a splicer... need to remedy that.

[JsARCLIGHT]

With a good surround system you can hear them walking, mumbling to themselves, and you can pinpoint close to where they are pretty easy. The things that are hard to pinpoint are the Big Daddies, because their whale-like bellowing echoes around the levels. As it gets louder you know they are closer, but you don't know which direction they are coming from until you hear the clomp clomp of their big metal feet. Also a pain in the ass are your hacked allied helicopter robots... they just make so much darn noise that you can't hear much of anything else except for their buzzing, sputtering and clunking.

As for plasmid use I mostly use telekinesis to catch grenades, rockets and proximity bombs and throw them back at people. My other new favorite plasmid is the "Turn Big Daddy" one. The second I got that I started using it in Neptune's Bounty. I got it so I had a "Rosie" Big Daddy following me around the whole level and I had him dispatch most of the small fry for me and I even had him duke it out with another Big Daddy while I hid out of the way.

I'm playing on Normal to start and I've really only died about three or four times, every time when I bit off waaaay more than I could chew, usually tussling with a Big Daddy. I'm not sure what the game developers were talking about when they were saying stuff like "ammo will be scarce"... it's all over the place. Since I mostly use the pistol as my default weapon I wound up having full Thompson and shotgun ammo and I had to switch over and use those for a while just because there seemed to be so much extra ammo for them laying around.

I also think this game is too generous with it's achievements... every night I play I get like four or five new achievements. My gamerscore has gone up almost 200 points in two days from just this game.

[Apollo Leader]

Halo 3 is just a month away!

EGM and 1up have a three week blow out of articles and pictures:

http://www.1up.com/do/minisite?cId=3161338

Interesting thing is the gatling gun and the 3rd person perspective were in the original Mac version of the original Halo all the way back in 1999!

http://www.1up.com/do/minisite?cId=3161338

http://halo.bungie.org/screenshots/index.html?page=12

[Apollo Leader]

Finally last night I sat down and seriously started playing Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter nearly a year-and-a-half after I originally got it. I wish I had sunk my teeth into this game alot sooner. I like how the game focuses on using cover just like Gears of War. Go out running and gunning and your dead!

Better late then never, huh?

[Dante74]

Finally last night I sat down and seriously started playing Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter nearly a year-and-a-half after I originally got it. I wish I had sunk my teeth into this game alot sooner. I like how the game focuses on using cover just like Gears of War. Go out running and gunning and your dead!

Better late then never, huh?

You should try GRAW2. It's everything you love about GRAW but just a little better. Sadly it's also a little short just like the first GRAW.

[Mechafan]

Finally last night I sat down and seriously started playing Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter nearly a year-and-a-half after I originally got it. I wish I had sunk my teeth into this game alot sooner.

The first GRAW was fun and I still have it.

[yellowlightman]

I really witht he next gen Ghost Recon games had stayed closer to the style of GR2 and GR: Summit Strike. GRAW's awful cover system and retarded drone BS kept me from getting into it.

[Macross73]

just got Bioshock tonight couldn't wait to get the 360 back from the repair shop so I went to my Bro-in-law house

He likes it a lot he just kept beating everything up in sight. the game looks great and i like the story.

now i just need to sit down and play it for myself. LoL and definately not a game for small kids its truly violent.

[yellowlightman]

We've talked about Mobile Ops before, the Battlefield-style Gundam game. There hasn't been much said about it in the past year, but I did come across this bit of information from a few months ago:

t E3 ’06, Mobile Ops: The One Year War was around to tryout, but not this year. In last year's demo you could run around on foot, enter vehicles and hijack other mobile suits. The good news is Mobile Ops: The One Year War is still in development, but it won’t be coming out in North America this year.

http://www.siliconera.com/2007/07/16/missi...-and-one-piece/

Not great news, but at least there's still a chance we'll see it some day.

[mikeszekely]

We've talked about Mobile Ops before, the Battlefield-style Gundam game. There hasn't been much said about it in the past year, but I did come across this bit of information from a few months ago:

http://www.siliconera.com/2007/07/16/missi...-and-one-piece/

Not great news, but at least there's still a chance we'll see it some day.

If it doesn't suck. Gundam doesn't have the most consistent track record. AEUG vs. Titans, Battle Royale, and Climax UC were all great games. Zeonic Front, Crossfire, and Journey To Jaburo, not so hot.

Edited August 27, 2007 by mikeszekely

[yellowlightman]

Yeah, the demo they were showing off in '06 was decent... but very limited. As cool of an idea as it is, I have my doubts on Bandai being able to turn out a high quality game, considering how ambitious it is.

[JsARCLIGHT]

I finally beat Bioshock for the first time last night... without spoiling anything for those still playing the game the ending was, well, kind of a letdown. I enjoyed the story and for some reason it just sort of became quite derivative after the ultimate "confrontation" with Ryan and ceased being interesting and fresh and wandered into the realm of "seen it before". For some reason I was expecting, well, more. This game was so well put together that to get "that" as an ending, while expected, was pretty short and... well... lame. I'm going to replay it on hard and this time through I'm going to be the evil sonovabitch rather than goody two shoes like I was this time. I also know that I missed a few things my first time through (missed a weapon upgrade machine and a few tape recordings) so this second time will be a more thorough trip through the game. Now that I know "what to expect" I can plan a little better.

I also hope that the hard setting is actually hard... playing through on normal was a complete cake walk. I never once ran out of ammo, eve or medkits... in fact I usually found myself maxed out and had to pass up several ammo and health pickups along the way. I suppose if you played this game like a mouth breather and just ran headlong into every gun turret and stood still and let every splicer have his way with you then you'd start running low on supplies and heath. Before it came out I was reading about this game online and everyone was talking it up as being so difficult with limited resources and "hard decisions to make" but I found it on normal to be far too easy.

Plus, as I've said before in this thread, this game was far too generous with the achievement points. I played through the game once, only once, and have over half the 1,000 total points already. These are the most points I've ever earned from one single game. I don't consider myself an "achievement points whore" like a lot of folks I've see around... I generally just "play" the games without concern for the points. But this game just showers you with them for doing regular in-game activities, most of which you have to do just to progress in the game.