Dear Jane Letter Part 2

It’s hard to judge someone when you know them, but we all do it. And often times it’s really hard to say “I told you so” to someone you like as a person and you want to continue a dialogue with, but...

Dear Jane: I told you so!

Last July, Jane Wells of CNBC’s Funny Business posted something on her blog about how the PS3 will win the console because her son wanted one and traded in his Xbox 360. Link. I went off on her. Link. I then had her on Geezer Radio and apologized for my rude comments. Link. Well, perhaps the final chapter in this interesting saga has finished. Link.

She made some interesting points and I’d like to talk about them. In her lessons learned section, she said:
1-the gaming experience is more than a few games and cool graphics.
I can agree with this completely. Let me list every game that I have purchased this year. Rainbow Six Vegas 1 & 2, Guitar Hero 2 & 3, GTA IV, Viva Pinata: TiP, and will be getting Left 4 Dead, Gears of War 2, and Fable 2. What do these titles all have in common? Multiplayer (mp). Not one of them is solely a single player game. The one game that I considered to purchase that didn’t have mp was Star Wars: The Force Unleashed, but as the game came nearer to release, it was discovered that it just had too many bugs and it wasn’t worth putting up with since you couldn’t play with friends.
I really think that the one thing that has completely changed my perception of gaming are my friends on Xbox Live (XBL). If I had to choose between a sole single player game with AWESOME graphics, and a multiplayer game with decent graphics, I would choose the mp game in a heartbeat just in case my friends get the same game and I can play with them. Great graphics pale in comparison.
Something else in that sentence: few games. The reason the PS3 is not the console of hard-core gamers is because of the lack of games. The PS3 has some cool games coming down the pipe, but they are 3 to 4 years in development and the ones announced in 2005 have still yet to come out. The reason for this is the processor that can create those cool graphics, takes forever to create code for. It’s just BAD.

2-repeatedly doing trade-ins at Game Stop is a money losing proposition.
Sad and Bad. A sad fact that is GameStop. And a bad lesson to learn by doing something like this.

3-PC games like World of Warcraft can actually MAKE you money.
Are you sure? How many months was he spending $15 to $20 to keep the account going?

4-don't talk to your mother about these things.
Being 30-years-old, that’s something I don’t do.

In closing, let me ask you this, Jane. Now who’s going to win the console war? I couldn’t find the answer in your article. Does your son switching back mean the 360 is going win the console war? Is this “ultimate proof”? Did you know that the 360 outsold the PS3 in August by 10,000 units? Did you know that Microsoft (so take this for what it is) is reporting that 360’s are “FLYING” off the shelves? Anyway, it looks like the console war not over yet.