"Have a holly jolly Christmas..."

We do the gift thing on Christmas morning in my family, and by the end of it this year, I thought I'd done pretty well. In terms of video games, I got Bully, Guitar Hero II with the guitar controller, We ♥ Katamari, and Resident Evil 4 (PS2). After spending the rest of the morning playing through the first nine songs of Guitar Hero II co-operatively with my older brother (way too much fun), we all headed off to his place for Christmas dinner. When we got there, he had something in the middle of his living room floor covered with a towel; I asked him about it, and he said it was my Christmas present. It turned-out to be an XBOX 360 Pro Console, Wireless Racing Wheel, Gears Of War Limited Collector's Edition, Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter, Project Gotham Racing 3, and XBOX Live Arcade Unplugged. He had the winning bid on it at a charity auction. He was outbid on the PS3 package. Yeah. Holy shit.

Playing these games in 1080i (the highest my TV supports) is a thing of beauty, and the 360's presentation as a whole is quite impressive. Everything from the composite/component combo cable to the various software update methods just make sense and made the experience a notably smooth one. I like the idea of user profiles, I appreciate the wireless controller setup, and being able to update my console without connecting to XBOX Live (download the updates on my PC, burn them to a disc) is just a smart move. The backwards compatibility is pretty nice, and seems to run quite well for the most part. I did notice a few issues though, like the choppy movies in Conker: Live & Reloaded, and the apparent inability to save your progress in Soul Calibur II. Most disappointing, however, is the fact that I can't play my original XBOX copies of Burnout Revenge, Crazy Taxi 3, ESPN NFL 2K5, Gunvalkyrie, Jet Set Radio Future, Metal Gear Solid 2, Midnight Club 2 and 3, NBA Street 2, NHL 2K7, Oddworld: Stranger's Wrath, Otogi 1 and 2, OutRun 2, Panzer Dragoon Orta, Project Gotham Racing 1 and 2, ToeJam & Earl III, Top Spin, and The Warriors. That means that my original XBOX is still hooked-up alongside the 360, but now using only standard composite cables because my TV only has two component inputs; one set for my DVD+/-RW/VHS box , and one for my 360. I guess I could use the 360 as my new DVD player though, and use it as the optical device for my 5.1 decoder in the process (also currently hoooked-up to my DVD/VHS combo box)... We'll see what I get around to doing.

Anyway, so now I plan to pick-up a WiFi adapter, another wireless controller, Dead Or Alive 4, Dead Rising, and I'm considering Kameo, Perfect Dark Zero, Table Tennis, Test Drive Unlimited, and Viva Pinata :)