XBox One: Game Console Review
The xBox (or comparable Playstation 4, Switch Game PC) is a whole lotta ways to open up some amazing and more importantly – interactive – sci fi activity (if you have time).
The only problem with gaming is it takes time and effort to get to the good stuff and you have a learning path to go through before you can be skilled enough to get there.
Having said that, once you play a game that you like it’s almost (some would argue definitely) addictive. In fact, so much so that you may not realise, but the production costs of some sci fi games eclipse that of the many popular TV shows and movies and the sound and graphics quality in today’s gaming universe is very live like and realistic.
For many of you this is, of course, really obvious, but if you haven’t considered gaming as part of your daily/weekly sci fi fix, you should and the Xbox is an excellent entry level into the heady world of sci fi gaming.
An Xbox is a computer specifically designed of game playing (although you can also watch blue ray movies and DVD’s on it to and do some tricky and complex web surfing). You buy the console and plug it into your TV and then you buy your games and plug those into the console. Fairly straightforward. The Xbox will cost you between £/$/E200 and 400 (depending on currency and where you buy it and games can be as much as £/$/E50 or even more!
Most fantasy and sci fi games are Epic in nature and they tell a story which drives you to take quests to gear/level up. The better your gear and level, the more complex and challenging (and fun) the game-play.
Xbox have a huge number of games to chose from and they all play really effortlessly. Graphics are lifelike and smooth and the sound is exceptional – considerably better than you are likely to get in a movie theatre (especially with headphones).
Ok, so enough intro. For those of you that want technical specs and a better technical review. There is a great review at Toms Guide:
You can even buy grease proof accessories! (- I so want (need) one)
“When the first Xbox One launched, it had pretty similar specs to the Sony PlayStation 4, including an x86-64 AMD “Jaguar” CPU, 8GB of RAM, an AMD Radeon GPU and a 500GB hard drive. But Microsoft managed to eke out a bit more performance with a faster, 1.7-GHz clock speed compared to the PS4’s 1.6 GHz. However, the Xbox One came equipped with 8GB of DDR5 RAM, which isn’t really optimised for use with graphics cards like GDDR5 RAM.
The One S kept most of its predecessors’ internals but bumped up the GPU’s clock speed from 853 to 914 Megahertz, which helps the system deal with the rigors of High Dynamic Range (HDR). The One S also shipped with a previously unheard of 2TB of storage.”
They have (of course) brought out an even faster, higher spec machine, but personally, I think that is mainly for the more hardcore gamers and not the likes of us SadGeezers and Lady SadGeezers.
So what are we playing? What works well?
Well pretty much everything that you want to lay on the Xbox will run seamlessly and smoothly. My favourite game is (by a very very long way) Diablo III which is great if you have a few friends over (and pizza and wine) – nothing more friendly and fun that going into a dungeon together and bashing the hell out of a bunch’o monsters.
I also play elite Dangerous on the Xbox (and PC). Elite is a space simulation trading game (exploring, combat, politics alien insertion – jeez, it sometimes puts Babylon 5 to shame!) and a lot of fun (and time-consuming – checkout the video. – But remember, this is all actual game-play, no part of the video is movie CGI)
Newkate really likes playing Witcher III and (in complete contrast) Stardew Valley. We both also like playing Final Fantasy XVI.
So, if you aren’t gaming, you are probably missing out! Xbox is great but frankly, so is the Playstation and the terrific Nintendo Switch (which we also have for when the better half is playing on the Xbox).
By the way – the way we have set up reviews doesn’t lend itself to reviewing tech so I just gave everything a 9 – pretty awesome and we have reaped our initial investment many times over – great value for money in the long run.