ldopa.net

Dear ldopa,
my wife wants me to get a video game console from the
Annual Gift Man. Problem is that the Gift Man doesn’t know which
system to get and, even worse, I do not know either. Should I
go for the 360? Or should I wait for the new offerings from
Sony and Nintendo? Or how about one of the portable systems?

…your wife wants you to buy her a videogame console for Christmas? Every man should have your problem:

• The Xbox 360 ($400) has mighty pretty graphics, but currently zero (0) games that your wife will want to play. Also, unless you make “good friends” with a blue-polo-sportin’ Best Buy employee right now, there’s virtually no chance of you finding a unit for purchase before Annual Gift Man Day. This isn’t because they are so popular, this is because Microsoft apparently made about twenty of them for the entire continental United States. Also, the consensus on the Xbox 360 is that while it looks incredible on an HDTV, on a regular TV resolution, there’s nothing so jaw-droppingly amazing about it. Bottom line: unless she’s a nut for online gaming, which is pretty polished on the Xbox 360, I’d hold off for right now. The older model Xbox is a scary, noisy, obsolete doorstop which only exists to reject my fresh and newly bought games as “dirty or damaged” — stay away from the older Xbox entirely.
• The Playstation 2 can be picked up for a song ($150) and has many inexpensive and used games, but at this point the graphics are a little behind the curve. The new Playstation 3 will be very technologically advanced, but expensive Ken Kutaragi, the president of Sony Computer Entertainment Japan, keeps making ominous public statements as to how expensive the Playstation 3 will be — statements such as “Ninety-two weeks of salary is not too much to ask for a technological marvel such as the Playstation 3″ and “I hope you haven’t become too attached to your youngest child, because soon you will gladly trade them for a Playstation 3″ and “Hey — I couldn’t help noticing your child looks succulent and delicious” and “I really look forward to eating your child”. What PR purpose Kutaragi hopes to accomplish with these statements is unclear, but what is clear is that the Playstation 3 will probably be expensive and won’t be out until around March of next year. It’s probably worth waiting for the new model rather than picking up an older one, but start saving your pennies, and children, now.
• As you may know, I have an unhealthy and forbidden love for all things Nintendo. I have the world’s largest collection of GameCube ($100) games, in fact, I just yesterday moved the entire collection to the other bedroom, and while I was moving it, I put the collection in order from “girlfriend-friendly” to “not-so-girlfriend-friendly”. I was impressed by the number of “girlfriend-friendly” GameCube games I own; I define “girlfriend-friendly” game as a game I would offer to play with my girlfriend, like “Super Monkey Ball”, and not a game I would hide away like underage-snuff-porn, like “Resident Evil 4″. Recently, Josh, Carrie and I have been having a lot of fun playing Monkey Boxing and WarioWare. Also, I love the wireless controllers Nintendo offers, they are cheap and comfortable and run forever on two AA batteries. And additionally I point out: it’s the cheapest of all your options at $100. However, the same caveat applies to buying a GameCube that would apply to buying a Playstation 2; next year there will be something much, much more advanced, so at this point it might be better to adopt a wait-’n-see attitude.
• Finally: I am an fool, soon parted from my money and so I own both a Sony PSP ($250) and the Nintendo DS ($130). I would wholeheartedly recommend the Nintendo DS; I’ve found lots of games I have enjoyed playing on the DS, while almost a year after purchase, the Sony PSP sits gameless. If your lovely wife would have any inclination for gaming-on-the-go (or gaming while lying around languidly in bed, another big plus for portable gaming) then I say pick one up. The downside is that two-person gaming becomes an expensive and extravagant affair — you’d have to pick up two — but two Nintendo DS’s cost about the same as one Sony PSP, and is still cheaper than one Xbox 360.

Hope this long, rambling polemic helped!

~jeff