Devs still bitter about non-HDD Xbox 360 Arcade
by Dustin Burg 
{ Mar 4th 2008 at 1:30PM }
In a recent chat with CVG, Bourne Conspiracy lead designer Rory McGuire flat out said that Microsoft made a "mistake" with their decision to not make a hard drive mandatory in all Xbox 360 models. McGuire told CVG that "in retrospect I wish Microsoft had made the choice to have [mandatory] hard drives like Sony did with the PS3." McGuire further went on to explain the development advantages of having a HDD saying that "if you have a hard drive, the whole game loads faster. Obviously you'll be facing a short install time, but the developer benefits from it and you definitely benefit from it as a player." Take that Microsoft!
On second analysis, it's entirely possible that Microsoft could make HDDs mandatory in all Xbox 360 consoles by axing the Arcade and taking out another $1.9 billion hit to ship 20GB HDDs to Core and Arcade owners. Makes sense to us.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Hexx @ Mar 4th 2008 1:41PM
Short install time? SHORT? How about Zero install time that's short. I want the pick up and play... it's interesting to see games on the PC are even trying this like Halo 2 pc or steam where the install is so seamless that you don't even realize it.
Urza @ Mar 4th 2008 1:43PM
Simple fact is the PS3 needs to install games just to load as fast as 360. While both systems have the same about of ram, 360's can be used anyway developers like, while PS3's ram is physically divided between the CPU and the GPU, with some reserved on both sides for it's bloated OS.
Anyone with a 360 knows the hdd is there for DLC and video downloads. Show me an example of a game performing better off PS3's harddrive.
Rory McGuire needs to go back to making his game and stop trying to sound relevant.
Sacredleader @ Mar 4th 2008 1:48PM
Am I crazy for saying that making the hard drive mandatory for games that need it is the solution? If you really want to play a game that requires it, then go get a hard drive then. Chances are your not playing anything that will require it if you don't need it now.
xFenixKnightx @ Mar 4th 2008 1:51PM
I thought this was Xbox 360 Fanboy??? WTF?!!
mike @ Mar 4th 2008 1:54PM
Hello,
I told Microsoft via email, way back in 2006 that they should have added a 10gig or even a 8 gig HDD for the Core and Arcade versions (obviously before Arcade came out) of the Xbox 360.
I did get a response from microsoft, they just said, "I will forward this email to the appropriate department. Thank you for contacting microsoft" Along those lines.
Well obviously the guy didn't get my email... I wish I had power, then it would have happened.
Ejab @ Mar 4th 2008 1:55PM
Lmao Urza you own!!
Josh @ Mar 4th 2008 1:59PM
While I agree that not including a hard drive in all 360's was a big mistake by Microsoft, I agree with Microsoft in not putting a hard drive in the arcade model. The damage is already done so putting one in the arcade model still doesn't do anything for the core users. All I gotta say is that Microsoft had better learn from the mistakes they made this generation.
Jeramy @ Mar 4th 2008 2:01PM
yeah, i'm sure it would cost them about $200 to ship hdds to all core owners. i mean, it's not like 20gb hdds actually cost $100. or they could drastically drop the prices on the hdd retail packages, which would make them more enticing to core owners (though it wouldn't really stop people from not having one, which is the issue here).
Matt @ Mar 4th 2008 2:03PM
maybe they shouldn't have even made this shitty system to begin with
Tony @ Mar 4th 2008 2:03PM
Why can't they just set up a hook that will install a portion of the game on a 360 with a hard drive? Hell, even the PS2 did that a few times.
andyg8180 @ Mar 4th 2008 2:09PM
short install time? Has anyone seen the DMC on the PS3 install? How about demos? gheeyyy... its takes about 5-10 minutes to install the Rachet and Clank demo after the stupid DL... on the 360, you can play right off the bat...
I think Microsoft made a great decision
h0mi @ Mar 4th 2008 2:21PM
How about not charging $100 for a 20gb hard drive in the first place, and offering 360 owners different HD sizes for less than 2 arms, a foot and some fingers?
IncredibleBulk92 @ Mar 4th 2008 2:24PM
@4 Yes its a blog that reports on news related to xbox 360. Its not an xbox 360 fanboy like you find on the playstation boards blindly bashing other systems and praising the xbox 360.
What the hell happened to the reply system btw? It was flawed but better than nothing
TheHostileDwarf @ Mar 4th 2008 2:27PM
What good are your fingers if you already have lost both your arms?
mattclarkie @ Mar 4th 2008 3:00PM
While they are at it, make it easier to transfer stuff from one HDD to another. I got an Elite yesterday, but I am still using the 20gb from my RRoD Premium because I don't want to wipe the HDD to transfer it to the 120gb, and I don't want to buy a memory card and do it manually which would take ages, and some saves wont even allow trasfer.
Pro-Truth League @ Mar 4th 2008 3:39PM
Even without installing, an HDD helps a whole hell of a lot, and MS is stupid to not make it mandatory. How can people defend this? Are some people honestly that blindly loyal?
Ciaran Gallagher @ Mar 4th 2008 3:10PM
Install times no way! I'm not wasting my tiny 20gb hard-drive on installation files!
Sky Shark X2 @ Mar 4th 2008 3:36PM
Sounds like Sony might be paying devs to try and make hard drive installs sound good....or they're getting lazy and don't feel like taking the time and effort to make the game load up quickly without the hard drive. Its funny because no one complained about it untill just recently when certian PS3 games started forcing the issue. Though I might like to see all the 360 SKUs to have a HDD , if this is what will happen if they did then I say screw mandatory hard drives. I believe it was said that in the development phase to hit their target price they could either have 512mb RAM or a hard drive in every box with 256.....if that was true, I wonder which was the better choice....not that hard of one.(for those of you who aren't techincly inclined but have a 360 the better choice was the 512MB RAM, it allows for more detailed textures and data to be loaded into the 360's ram at a time which means prettier better games at a resonable speed)
Urza @ Mar 4th 2008 3:44PM
@ Sky Shark X2:
If the ram setup on the PS3 wasn't crap and the blue ray drive wasn't so slow, they wouldn't need to install anything. 512mb of RAM the devs could use any way they like would have reduced any need for harddrive caching.. PS3 divided up it's memory between the CPU and GPU.
That's is why the 360 doesn't need a harddrive and a PS3 does, the 360 always has extra RAM, the PS3 doesn't.
James @ Mar 4th 2008 3:55PM
$100 for a 20 gig drive? Pricewatch says $35 shipped, and that's not even wholesale. MS should be able to put out a 20 gig drive for 50 bucks, though frankly I'd rather be able to get ~120 gigs for $100 (which is easily doable as well).
George Arauz @ Mar 4th 2008 6:28PM
I dont know anyone WITHOUT an HDD
nick @ Mar 4th 2008 4:32PM
I have long held the belief that Microsoft made a mistake with the low end system by NOT including a hard drive. And I was surprised the Arcade did remedy this situation.
That certain games requires a hard drive and XBLA releases are limited because of the memory unit, is a problem.
Now I wouldn't go back and give everyone a hard drive that didn't have one. That's a done deal and you can obtain one on your own. I would however drop the current Arcade configuration for a new low end system that did include at least a 20GB hard drive for all future purchasers.
nick @ Mar 5th 2008 4:13PM
I have long held the belief that Microsoft made a mistake with the low end system by NOT including a hard drive. And I was surprised the Arcade did remedy this situation.
That certain games requires a hard drive and XBLA releases are limited because of the memory unit, is a problem.
Now I wouldn't go back and give everyone a hard drive that didn't have one. That's a done deal and you can obtain one on your own. I would however drop the current Arcade configuration for a new low end system that did include at least a 20GB hard drive for all future purchasers.
Teabag @ Mar 4th 2008 6:34PM
"On second analysis, it's entirely possible that Microsoft could make HDDs mandatory in all Xbox 360 consoles by axing the Arcade and taking out another $1.9 billion hit to ship 20GB HDDs to Core and Arcade owners. Makes sense to us."
Hhahaa, i hope you were joking, Dustin. Don't say this any of MS top officials, they give you a give across and maybe kick in the sack.
Also, the devs of Bourne Conspiracy is complaining for the lack of HDD? Bourne Conspiracy? A movie-to-game adaptation? Ha! I bet my sack the game is gonna suck. If the game is good, it is only THEN his comments are justified.
Teabag @ Mar 4th 2008 6:36PM
No edit button? Crap.
Fixed version below:
"On second analysis, it's entirely possible that Microsoft could make HDDs mandatory in all Xbox 360 consoles by axing the Arcade and taking out another $1.9 billion hit to ship 20GB HDDs to Core and Arcade owners. Makes sense to us."
Hhahaa, i hope you were joking, Dustin. Don't say this to any of the top MS officials, they might give you a five across and maybe kick in the sack.
Also, the devs of Bourne Conspiracy is complaining for the lack of HDD? Bourne Conspiracy? A movie-to-game adaptation? Ha! I bet my sack the game is gonna suck. If the game is good, it is only THEN his comments are justified.
Evan @ Mar 4th 2008 6:37PM
I did not buy a console to install a game!
I'm quite happy i get to use that space for whatever I want. I could see a 20 GB HDD filling up rather fast if everyone had an install file on their game.
I can't accept the Bourne game anyway, that doesn't look like Matt Damon!
anton @ Mar 4th 2008 8:21PM
I just bought a PS3, and a few games to go with it, mostly to round out the set (360, Wii, DS, PSP).
If the games are anything to go on, I don't know how PS3 owners put up with it. Let's take Heavenly Sword as an example, it's an A grade game of sorts. Placing the disc in, I'm prompted that I MUST upgrade to the latest version, so it installs, and updates, and I'm left waiting 15 minutes for the game to copy itself to my hard-drive.
Urgh - this is WHY I bought a console in the first place, so I could pop on a game like a DVD and just relax.
The game ended up pissing me off with it's stupid 'guide the projectiles with the motion sensitive controller' sections, so I probably spent more time installing the game than playing it.
Oh, and... for a system that is so PROUD of being HD, it only shipped with a composite video cable.
wickedpheonix @ Mar 4th 2008 8:25PM
"ship 20GB HDDs to Core and Arcade owners."
Or they could just, you know, offer hard drives for how much they cost. Because the actual casing is only like, $5 worth of plastic at the most? And 40GB hard drives are like $40 not in bulk?
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822140118
which means that they should be able to offer a 40GB hard drive for like $40, right? If you need any more room then you need to start getting your video purchases on your PC.
anton @ Mar 4th 2008 8:31PM
as an addendum, I'm actually glad there is a hard drive free version, as I'd pretty much filled my 20gb HDD, I upgraded to the 120gb, and now I've been able to donate the old 20gb to the office 360 :)
Wolfster @ Mar 4th 2008 8:59PM
Should make it mandatory so we can get better updates/downloads on the games we have and bigger arcade games from live.
Many people shouldn't have to suffer from the very few that use their small memory cards as a hard drive.
Al @ Mar 4th 2008 9:25PM
My 360 keeps giving me the "this disc is unreadable" error message on all of my games. just wondering if anyone has gone through this ordeal and can tell me the hell im gonna go through b/c microsoft makes cheap s***.
ZeroCorpse @ Mar 5th 2008 12:24PM
The consensus seems to be that the Arcade being shipped without a hard drive wouldn't be a problem if Microsoft didn't hobble owners by SERIOUSLY overcharging for their proprietary hard drives. The price of the 360's hard drives, wireless controllers, and WiFi adapter are oppressive and imbalanced.
The 360's USB WiFi adapter can be no more technical than a Belkin device of the same kind, but costs more than twice as much. The hard drives are also priced more than twice the fair value of them when you look at the components. Microsoft is charging us extra for their name on the package, and ensuring it HAS to have their name on the package by making their console REQUIRE their slightly-tweaked versions of common devices.
They would sell a TON of hard drives and WiFi adapters if they dropped the price by 30% and they would sell a lot more wireless controllers if they were somewhere around the $35 range instead of costing us $60 a pop.
These sorts of disgusting markups and proprietary requirements are the only things I dislike about my XBox 360. I hate that I can't just pop in my own hard drive, or that if I want a WiFi adapter, I need to spend 1/3 the price of the Arcade console itself.
I can deal with console prices being what they are. I cannot logically allow myself to shell out $180 for a 120GB hard drive, or $80 for a USB WiFi adapter with limited function (only works for 360). That's why my system is using wired ethernet, and will continue to do so until MS drops their prices.
That's also why I'm using an TV for my television and movie downloads, instead of using my XBox 360. By the time you add up the cost of throwing a 120GB hard drive and WiFi to my 360, it costs WAY MORE than a 160GB TV. Consider the whole "MS Points" thing, and you end up with a system that has higher operating costs than a dedicated one like TV.
I still LOVE my 360 for gaming, but I'm not going to bother doing anything to fill the hard drive-- Not when prices are so steep.