Ok, here's my situation. I have 2 kids 5 and under and I am a child of the 70's. Basically, Atari blew my mind - throw in some asteroids, space invaders and a decade later - a little Wolfenstein 3d on my 486 computer and that's been pretty much it.

Starting a business 10 years ago and having kids the last 5 - I just never had the time before. TV sucks, so I want to play good video games on my big TV...even with my kids.

I have 0 Clue with the TV game systems. I have nothing. I want the best. Money is no object. I figure not having this $hit for the last 15 years had to have saved me some money, so what the hell.

Can someone please explain and/or recommend the best gaming system for my growing kids and certainly myself ? Bring me into the 21st century. Is Nintendo still around? Anyone remember Intelevision?

Help - I don't even know WTF an X box even is.

Thanks!

Interesing little history on Intellivision here.

Hunter, just say no. You'll end up with carpal tunnel and brain damage.....

PH

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Hunter, just say no. You'll end up with carpal tunnel and brain damage.....

All I've done the last few years is work on my computer - I'm ready to risk some brain damage for fun now.

Some of these games have to help skills and be educational too, I would hope? Unless you're playing breakout all day.

Nintendo Wii - more kiddie games (out next week, I think).

xBox 360 is good b/c it's available now. plus, lots & lots of software for it.

PlayStation 3 will be impossible to get your mitts on.

the latter two are geared toward teens & adults

hey Hunter, PM me your cell on WinoDepot and a quick chat will give you the run down

xbox 360 + special HD-DVD drive will play new high res DVD movies (assuming your tele is HD ready)

PS3 will do this out of the box. however, only plays Blu-ray, the competing format

either one of these will play regular DVDs (if you don't already have that covered)

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Originally posted by just a skosh:
Nintendo Wii - more kiddie games (out next week, I think).

xBox 360 is good b/c it's available now. plus, lots & lots of software for it.

PlayStation 3 will be impossible to get your mitts on.

the latter two are geared toward teens & adults

If money is truly no object then buy all three of these. If you're seriously into gaming, you'll eventually end up with all three plus some games for the PC as well.

Hunter,

You need Half Life 2. Pereferably on PC.

If you get an XBOX, do yourself a favor and get Ninja Gaiden.

I want to get a new PC so I can play FEAR, Half Life 2 Expansions, SWAT 4, Quake 4, Doom 3. Some oldies but goodies for me are Rainbow 6 (start with Raven Shield), Ghost Recon, Dues Ex, and Return to Castle Wolfenstein, Splinter Cell-Pandora Tommorow.

There may be others but I have not been paying as much attention lately.

quote:

Nintendo Wii - more kiddie games (out next week, I think).

xBox 360 is good b/c it's available now. plus, lots & lots of software for it.

PlayStation 3 will be impossible to get your mitts on.

the latter two are geared toward teens & adults

Playstation 3 is new I assume. Is it worth waiting for it the sales to dim down a little?

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hey Hunter, PM me your cell on WinoDepot and a quick chat will give you the run down

Kumazam, are you an insider? Thanks for the offer. If I can remember my log in, I'll do that tomorrow. No need to impose on you though. Just looking for a few ideas.

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Return to Castle Wolfenstein

I actually played a decent amount of that on my PC 2 years ago. Pretty cool game. The jump to map cheats made it even more fun, as it is impossible for me to get through all 25 levels, or whatever amount is on there without cheating a little.

Hunter,
Is this for you or you and the kids? I really don't know much about XBox and that stuff...but if you want to get a video game system for the kids...there is a Leap Frog video game system that is so kid/user friendly and they are really educational. I don't think they are expensive either.

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Originally posted by spo:
Hunter,

You need Half Life 2. Pereferably on PC.

If you get an XBOX, do yourself a favor and get Ninja Gaiden.

I want to get a new PC so I can play FEAR, Half Life 2 Expansions, SWAT 4, Quake 4, Doom 3. Some oldies but goodies for me are Rainbow 6 (start with Raven Shield), Ghost Recon, Dues Ex, and Return to Castle Wolfenstein, Splinter Cell-Pandora Tommorow.

There may be others but I have not been paying as much attention lately.

Now we're talkin', but not for your babies. For the PC: 'Fear', 'Half-Life 2', 'Prey', 'Chronicles of Riddick' to name a few. However, these are for you, not for your little ones...

My kids spend 90% of their time playing WOW and the reset playing XBOX 360 including Halo 2.

Hunter, sounds like we are in the same situation, except for the business part. I did however graduate to Intellivision after Atari, and it rocked...

Anyway, I'd say there are two things to think about: is this for you or the kids, and is your big TV hi-def, and if hi-def, does it do 1080x1920 (and preferrably 1080P - like a new high end large LCD from the last maybe 6 months) or is the TVs native res more like 768x1320 (50"-plus plasma; probably displaying either 720P or 1080I only).

Aside - an absolutely GREAT forum for reading about AV stuff is AVS Forum - but be careful, you might spend a first growth case (pre-'05) on a TV if you read too much...

If it's for you and if your tv is bleeding edge, spend lots of time and money getting one of the PS3s that will disappear about 10 minutes after they go on sale on Nov. 17. This may require sharp elbows, spiky hair and a heavily modified import/tuner car. You may also have to fake an id for under 25.

The graphics capes on this thing are unbelievable.

If it's still for you but less bleeding edge, and you want to be somewhat future-proof, an xbox360 is exceptionally good.

If it's truly for the kids, buy them a book on wine (kidding). To save money and effort here, last generation hardware (ps2, xbox) would be fine. Or Bella's solution; don't know it, but could be the kid solution you need.

Squirrel

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Playstation 3 is new I assume. Is it worth waiting for it the sales to dim down a little?

No. Would likely have to wait quite some time when there is plenty of cool stuff for the xBox 360.

quote:

Posted by spo:
I want to get a new PC so I can play FEAR, Half Life 2 Expansions, SWAT 4, Quake 4, Doom 3. Some oldies but goodies for me are Rainbow 6 (start with Raven Shield), Ghost Recon, Dues Ex, and Return to Castle Wolfenstein, Splinter Cell-Pandora Tommorow.

quote:

Posted by WIML:
If money is truly no object then buy all three of these. If you're seriously into gaming, you'll eventually end up with all three plus some games for the PC as well.

Joe

Spo & Joe are throwing out those red flags. Although I piped up earlier with my (husband's) two cents, don't do it!!! Any gaming system, that is.

Perhaps you think it will only be the cost of the "whatever" plus the games you buy. But, fast forward a bit. About every other year, your cherubs will be hounding you to buy a computer and/or graphics card fast enough to play the latest, greatest game available. This will cost you thousands in the long run.

If you are in the ranks of the super-wealthy, as opposed to merely wealthy, please feel free to ignore the above little rant.

I agree with the lovely just a skosh. Don't do it...

I don't know of anyone who has a gaming system and plays it occassionally. You will become addicted to it and be up until 6 am playing it. Then your wife will get mad at you and blah blah blah. Get the Leap Frog system

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Originally posted by Bella Donna:
I agree with the lovely just a skosh. Don't do it...

I don't know of anyone who has a gaming system and plays it occassionally. You will become addicted to it and be up until 6 am playing it. Then your wife will get mad at you and blah blah blah. Get the Leap Frog system

I have a gaming system (my PC ) and I play it occasionally. I'm assuming we're all adults, and I'm assuming that we can delay gratification. It's my time to exercise the other side of my brain. Don't let it scare you...

Kids have leap frog and kiddie laptops for teaching. We read to the kids a lot and they go to school. My kids, as most of the people on this board that have kids would agree, get a LOT more learning stimulation than we ever did. These kids learn to write their own name in pre-school now! My kids get all day kindergarten (I did not). I was also smearing finger paint in kindergarten and that was a big deal then. My parents basically sent me to school and let me terrorize the neighborhood till all hours of the night. So, my little guys deserve some high end high tech action.

My kids also watch TV obviously, so I'm hoping when they want to watch that wise-ass Spongebob - we can play some cool games on the TV instead.

So, I guess it is for me to get into and then eventually play with them. I'd like my son to learn how to play hockey with dad on the TV.

I was also just curious, as I have obviously heard of all of these game systems and just want to know more, so I can make an informed purchase. It's only a matter of time before the kids hit me up for it down the road anyway, so I might as well look into it.

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If money is truly no object then buy all three of these. If you're seriously into gaming, you'll eventually end up with all three plus some games for the PC as well.

See, THAT is what I don't understand.

Aren't these all the same, but are priced different and/or offer different software (games). I'm sure all 3 have a lot of the same stuff. I just want one system that will cover me best. I would assume most would feel that way. There are people that own 3 console game systems for their TV? Scratch that. I guess there are some people that do everything.

I also don't want my kids near my PC. Makes me nervous.

Nope, they're not all the same. Be lovely if they were, would save us big bucks. It's simply finding what you like, meaning graphics, interaction, sound, and the type of gaming you like. What you might like for yourself will be different than what you will deem appropriate for your little ones. There are many outlets (Best Buy, CompUSA, etc.) where you are able to test many of these systems. Have fun, and you'll find what you want.

I agree with Skosh. PS3 and Xbox are more teen and adult oriented, which may be a little too difficult for kids under 5. Consider the Nintendo Wii for the kids and plan on upgrading to a Playstation when they get a little older.

In the meantime, buy a faster computer for yourself and try some of the PC games. There is a new version of Wolfenstein.

If you are serious about a PC gaming system get a unit with a Intel Core 2 Extreme QX6700 Quad-Core processor. Also consider a NVIDIA nForce 590 SLI Video card and don’t chintz on memory. Get 4GB of Dual-Channel DDR2 SDRAM running at 667MHz. Since money is not an object, Dell has a system with these specs that runs north of $3,500. Vicious PC also sells a nice unit with an AMD Athlon 64 processor and four NVIDIA GeForce 7900 video cards. These units run about $4,000. I prefer the Intel Core 2 Extreme processors. Also get a BIG hard drive of at least 500 GB and 8 to 16 MB of cache on the hard drive.

Hunter,

i was just kidding, but feel free...

if you're buying these for your kids to play with you, get the Nintendo Wii... what's unique to the Wii & relatively new with console gaming are the controllers - they're interactive & motion sensitive with sensors to relay back to the console.. for example, imagine playing a tennis game and, while holding the controller (shaped more in a rectangle then a traditional controller), swinging in the motion as you would with a racket, instead of pressing buttons & what not. plus, as other people have posted, the games are more kid friendly and definitely aimed younger.

the XBox 360 & Playstation 3 are definitely geared towards teens & adults... get one for yourself, though i'd opt to wait for the PS3 when it becomes readily available... the graphics will be better along with game speed (the processor in the PS3 is 2x as fast as the XBox 360) and there will be eventually more games. these things are nothing like your Atari were, with removal & in some cases upgradable (PS3) Hard Drives, component video, HD DVD/Blu-ray players, etc... i dont know what the software is, but the PS3 will even allow you to browse & download off the internet, will be WiFi capable, and have Flash memory card slots so you can use the Hard Drive to store music & movies as well. other things are a little more gamer-centric, for example, the PS3 supports up to 7 wireless contollers (in the pase, consoles just supported 2 and you had to buy hardware to upgrade)... personally, i think it's Sony & Microsoft's invasion into the personal computer... in 20 years, there wont be gaming consoles, PC's, DVD players, stereo equipment, etc... you'll just have this pissed off little box that does all that & more

Thanks guys. Especially the last 4 replies. That really helps.

good luck, and have fun!

if you have any more specific questions, be sure and post. the best thing to do is go down to your local Electronics Boutique, Game Stop, Best Buy, Toys R' Us, etc... and play them. i dont know if the Wii is available yet, and the Play Station 3 comes out on the 17th, but you probably wont be able to buy one without issue or markup for at least another 2-4 months