New Xbox 360 console next autumn? Comments by Robert Purchese

Suddenly all of the "it's reached it's full potential" comments make sense . . .

But will it have teh blue ray?

This sounds featsible but I hope it's not true. I don't want a 'new' generation for a few years yet, and a new 360 - even if it's not really 'new' - will mean Sony will also have to act (unless PS3 Slim would do the trick). I suppose Wii HD might well be available by then, too.

Bad move if you ask me. 360 still has a few years left in it I reckon. Natal did not impress me but what do I know, it could turn out to be awesome for all I know.

Hasn't this been discussed in the forums on the Internet all weekend?
I thought the conclusion was that the new console rumour is BS.

Yep, it's just a new form factor 360 with the Natal pack-in. Not a new console according to those in the know...

If there is a new Xbox due next year then I'd hope that Microsoft have learnt their lesson with the Xbox 360 and make the new machine more reliable, i.e. they actually test it *thoroughly*!!! ;)

Personally I'd love it to be true because I feel the Xbox 360 is looking a little dated technically these days; it clearly never was that "720p + 2X AA minimum for all games" platform that Microsoft promised back at E3 2005. A revamped console with a more powerful graphics card (capable of at least 720p + 4X AA for *ALL* games as standard), quad-core CPU, 4 GB of unified RAM, a 500 GB HDD and a Blu-ray drive would a nice upgrade IMO. All for £299.

Hope it's true.

It will be the 360Slim with Natal included and some small modifications.

BTW they will never put in a Bluray drive. Optical media for consoles will probably be gone by next gen.

But I will add that this rumor is probably 99.9% fake. The specs are the giveaway.

Darren, you are such a graphics whore! ;)

Wastelander is right, the in depth article I read was that they wanted to follow Nintendo's lead with the Wii, which is arguably a re-packaged Gamecube with a new controller, or the DSI, or the PSP GO for a Sony example.

In other words rather than have 1 big console launch every 6 years with all the others scrambling to get one out as well, just incrimentally update the hardware every few years and re-brand it, so it becomes like PC gaming rather than huge leaps in power.

IF its true (and by next autum they mean 2010?) I would hope for a much better form factor, the 360 is like having a gaming PC it's so big and loud, the Wii / Gamecube is about how big a console should be.

I really hope that this is not true. I bought my 360 a year ago and i would hate seeing it going obsolete so soon!

Off topic: Yesterday i finished Gears 2 ! i know that this might not interest you guys, but my friends are mostly PS3 only users so i have to share my excitement with you!

I'll cry if they start making games exclusively for it.

I think we'll see Sony doing the same with a PS3 Slim/motion control pack-in 'relaunch'

Eraysor - "I'll cry if they start making games exclusively for it."

They will do, for Natal. But don't worry, because they'll be shit anyway. ;)

Also, if this does turn out to be true then it's no surprise that Bungie are getting Halo: Reach knocked up so quickly - would probably be a launch title.

Not true.

However, I'm wondering whether the grunt inside Natal itself will be able to be utilised alongside the 360's own power for non-camera games, maybe giving a "higher settings" option akin to PC games for new releases...

I doubt it, not over USB 2.0 anyway.

"Darren, you are such a graphics whore! ;) "

+1

Its ridiculous imo. Graphics isnt even close to being the most important factor in games.
I enjoy good looking games. But i personally love the graphics and scale in Halo 3. On the other hand the supposedly fantastic looking KZ2 didnt do it for me even though i could see it was technically impressive.

Well as long as it doesnt blow up like my Elite just has then I don't mind. However, it gave me chance to play on my PS3! Then after an hour, I saw sense and went and bought an arcade and shoved my 120gb HDD on it. Job done.

1UP rumour being reported on as fact lol.

I just await the MS "no, that's not happening, don't be silly" reply to all this.

If true - im buying one on release day. ;-). I doubt it will be an all new platform though. A little early for that isnt it?

The Natal announcement specifically said that it world work with all existing Xbox 360 consoles.

If there is to be a new, natal-specific console with more processing power, then perhaps Natal for the original model will require an external processing box or something.

I don't think Microsoft are about to split their audience in a Megadrive 32x sort of way, they're not that stupid.

Lol@sanctusmortis
I'd read this as a rumor a couple of days ago -I wondered how it had become fact :)

There were rumours a year back that MS were briefing developers on putting code into their games to enable a higher fidelity graphics mode that would activate when the code detected it was running on next Xbox hardware. This was ostensibly so that the next Xbox would have full backwards compatibility and could render the games with better graphics out of the box with no need for emulation.

Of course in order for this to work the new Xbox would have to natively support Xbox 360 binaries, and that would infer that the next system would be like the GameCube => Wii with the new system having chips that were a superset of the originals.

So if MS were to release an overclocked 360 it wouldn't surprise me, we're already seeing this happen with the iPhone 3G S and the DSi... I think the only vital factor is that MS be absolutely dogged in ensuring developers do not start releasing games that run poorly on old 360s. That said, the Xenon is already clocked at 3.2GHz and all the chip manufacturers have been struggling with voltage and heat at any speeds over 4GHz so it's hard to see IBM being able to squeeze out a CPU much faster than the original for MS.

@ Bealsy...

Good Man..!

Nah, don't think this is true; a 360 Natal bundle is a cert, and I can feasibly see a 360 slim design, but a console with better specs? Meaning they'll be making games exclusively for it? Nope. In fact, at E3 MS said straight up that Natal would be a 360 add-on rather than a new console. Can't see them trying to segment the market.

I imagine they'll sell Natal at a big loss to try to get the "casuals" to hop onboard.

There was a story like this last E3 and that turned out to be NXE.

This simply isn't true - MS only need to look at Sega's history to see this would be a suicidal move. In any case it's not needed given the 360 has more than held it's own against the PS3.

@Dizzy - I think you're a bit off with your prediction that optical media will be done by the next generation. Maybe the generation after the next one... at a push... but certainly not the upcoming one.

There's absolutely no way that this country (UK) will be download only within the next five years, which is the period over which I predict the next-gen platforms will arrive. Both Microsoft and Sony are keen to sell their machines as home entertainment hubs which means that an optical drive is a must for at least the next two generations IMO unless they really think no-one will want to play their collection of DVD and higher quality BD movies on them. A lot of people use their consoles in preference to standalone players.

Anyway, Sony will continue to support Blu-ray (BD) because figures show that while DVD sales are dropping, BD sales are on the increase so there is clearly a market for them. BD players and discs are dropping in price all the time thus becoming increasingly appealing to the growing number of people with HDTVs.

As the consoles get more powerful so too do the sizes of the games. Several PS3 games are over 20 GB in size already, personally I wouldn't like to have to download them even on a 24 Mbps connection, especially as a lot of UK homes have usage limits in place. And then what about storage space? What happens if your HDD fails, do you really want to have to redownload everything? Me? No, thanks. A disc is convenient plus it has resale value and there's no need to backup if you look after them either.

I'm pretty sure the disc is here to stay myself, at least for the next 10 to 15 years, and I'd be very surprised if Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo don't include an optical drive in their next machines. DVD won't be sufficient so it would make sense for them all to move to BD for storage.

"There's absolutely no way that this country (UK) will be download only within the next five years"

It will be a combination of downloads and solid state media. Seriously.. optical media is really holding back next consoles both in noise, size and speed.

You gotta stop eating everything they feed you ppl.. Specially roumors lol. Its been officially stated ONLY as a peripheral so dont worry about it for now. Wii HD is also roumors so you need to relax a bit more on this one as well. Easily manipulated lil fuckers :)
XD

It does make me laugh when people say the 360 is looking dated, when it produces as good and most of the time better graphics than the PS3. The simple fact is the two consoles are almost the same in terms of tech and I own both consoles, so no fanboy here.

To be honest Darren almost all your arguments disappear IF you don't live in the UK. Where I live we have fast connections and NO limits (nationwide across all ISPs). :)

but but but...
Dam my launch machine just stopped reading discs so I decided it is the perfect time to upgrade to an elite...should I have just fixed my drive and waited?

@photoboy

I think the new Xbox will more likely featire more cores rather than increased clock speeds for the CPU.

Negotiator - "It does make me laugh when people say the 360 is looking dated, when it produces as good and most of the time better graphics than the PS3. The simple fact is the two consoles are almost the same in terms of tech and I own both consoles, so no fanboy here."

It's irrelevant which console we're referring to; both are still able to impress visually, but like you say, graphics aren't the most important thing anyway.

If Crytek can really get CryEngine 3 running on the PS360 as shown in the opening video, then it's clear the consoles have a fair bit of grunt left in them yet. Look at Uncharted 2, Forza 3 or Killzone 2 and tell me they're not incredible visuals.

no chance of a new 360 in the next 2/3 years.easy.this would be comercial suicide on microsofts part leaving a sour taste in the current userbase.plus why would they? they have to make up for the original xbox,the 360 is doing very well and only just starting to be profitable and the economy is in a mess.the vast majority of experts think this gen is only in its infancy esp with the levelling of graphical improvements and firmware updates ect..

The "new xbox" system spawns every now and then, lol. Put "new xbox" on google, you have all sorts of crazy versions. We were supposed to have one with hd-dvd; one with blu-ray; there was even a very strange one that was supposed to be made by other manufacters rather than MS.

Darren wrote: "Several PS3 games are over 20 GB in size already."

Funny, because I installed a couple games on my x360's hard drive and did you know that far cry 2 weighs only 4.7GB, while Xbox Original Psychonauts is 5.3GB?

My vote is new form factor plus Natal bundled.

It's the only plan that makes business sense, why make another console with unprofitable hardware that would split the market when you can have a console with profitable hardware and sell Natal to existing customers too?

@lambtron - The UK is still a big market for Microsoft though so they cannot ignore the broadband issues here. Even the Marketplace on my 360 is a right royal pain to navigate since NXE, taking typically a minute before I can even click anything to download! I know other people have the same problems too. I'm currently on a 8 Mbps connection that works perfectly with my PC, PS3 and Wii by the way and am moving up to a 24 Mbps from Wednesday but I suspect I'll still have the same issues with the 360.

But even with a stable, fast internet connection you still have the issue of download sizes and storage space to contend with, something you don't really have to worry about if you play from discs (well, OK, 60 GB HDD PS3 owners might!!!)? Do people really want to download 20 - 50 GB games for inflated prices which have absolutely no resale value? You only have to look at Steam to see how things could go if they're download only.

If it comes to it, I'd rather have a choice between a disc or download not be forced onto download only.

@ Darren: why 360 is looking, to you, dated and PS3 isn't ? (unbiasly)

I have no issue with download only BUT it would mean that if I was going to buy a new machine, I'd want it to have bluray in it otherwise I'd have to buy a bluray player to go with the machine.

I don't think there will be a new uprated Xbox, but I hope the next iteration does offer BR.

@ParanoidZombie - That's because the PS3 has an install limit of 5 GB (for obvious reasons) which means developers cache often read data to the HDD for speed of access but still leave less essential data such as videos and audio on the disc itself. Metal Gear Solid 4 is 33 GB in size for example yet installs its data as smaller chapters. Even so there's still data being read from the disc too.

The additional space on the Blu-ray disc means that many PS3 games have better quality audio than 360 games too, usually DTS or even uncompressed audio, which sounds absolutely meaty and awesome on my surround sound system. Download only means everything will suffer in quality IMO because it'll be heavily compressed to reduce file sizes.

*EDIT - Incorrectly referenced StooMonster in error. Oops!

Is this the future? Incremental upgrades to consoles that can be bought seperately?

Next they'll be attaching new motherboards...

@ Dareen: "many PS3 games have better quality audio than 360 games", like? Can you give one or two examples ?

@miiiguel - This is an article about the Xbox 360's successor and as far as I can see I haven't said anything about the PS3 not being dated. :?

But since you're asking, the PS3 is also dated. It has future-proof BD for games, true, and a powerful Cell CPU (reputedly) but it's graphics chip is old and underpowered, and it has very poor anti-aliasing capabilities IMO. It also suffers from a lack of memory. It's hardly cutting edge compared with the ever evolving PC and its that platform which dates the consoles.

To be honest Darren almost all your arguments disappear IF you don't live in the UK.

Broadband infrastructure is even worse in the US than the UK, so you'd have to ignore that market too. Which doesn't seem like a smart idea for MS ;)

If there was a new console next year, it would be madness to make it download only unless you only want to sell to the Far East and Scandinavia.

@ Darren: that's an oldfashioned concept (to me) of the industry. Here I am thinking that what we cared most was the games and the experieces they give us, by, you know..., actually playing them, but no the old idea that the hw is what matters still exists.

"many PS3 games have better quality audio than 360 games", like? Can you give one or two examples ?

Mirrors Edge has a DTS track and Motor Storm: PR sounds absolutely bone crushingly immense with the LPCM channel.

"Mirrors Edge has a DTS track"
Can I say "lol" ?

@miiiguel - What is this... 20 questions?

There are a lot of PS3 games that use DTS audio such as inFamous, Uncharted and Metal Gear Solid 4. Sometimes they offer a number of formats to choose between in the in-game options, including DD 5.1 too, such as Uncharted for example. The Xbox 360 has no support for DTS in games for some reason, possibly because it uses more disc space, something that isn't exactly abundant on the DVD format.

DTS audio sounds louder and clearer than DD5.1 on my surround sound system. Dead Space for example has DTS audio and it's better and more immersive than the 360's DD5.1 mix. At the end of the day it's purely subjective but like my DVDs and BDs, I find DTS audio richer and more enjoyable than DD5.1.

This doesn't sound likely to me... the Xbox360 is still going very strong so there is no reason for them to prepare a new console just yet. They've not even launched Project Natal and the Games downloading service. I think I'll believe this one when I see it. New bundle perhaps, but no ta new console.