Let me start by saying I don't consider myself a Microsoft Fanboy, despite owning every version of the Xbox that Microsoft has produced. My goal here is not to gush about the virtues of the Xbox One, while overlooking any shortcomings. Instead, I plan to give you a quick write-up of my first day of experience with the new Xbox offering. My motivation for purchasing the Xbox One was not a need or desire to be an early adopter. The deciding factor was significantly more mundane... my 360 stopped reading my disks, leaving me with the choice of buying a new 360, or upgrading to Xbox One. Since I'm writing a review on Xbox One, my choice should be obvious.
Let's start with the setup. It was straight forward, with no glitches or gotchas. There was an immediate software update required, which 500 meg, and took a bit to finish. In fact, the initial update doubled the time needed for the setup. The first boot-up, and the one immediately after the software upgrade seemed slow, when compared to the Xbox. After the updates, I migrated my settings, which was a snap. I simply had to enter the email address and password associated with my existing Xbox 360 account, and everything was transferred. This migration was something that Microsoft got 100% right! I do not know, however, if you can go back to the 360 after migrating to Xbox One. It does, however, look like you can sign on to a different Xbox (at a friend's house, for example) and access YOUR downloaded games, music and movies. (I haven't verified this firsthand though.)
Next, I spent some time playing with the Kinect and voice commands. I was very impressed with how well the Kinect recognized me as an individual. My wife walked in and out of the room several times, and each time, the Kinect recongized me. I was also impressed with the voice commands. I'm not going to say it was flawless, but I will say I suspect that errors were based on my misunderstanding of command synatax, rather than the Xbox failing to understand my speech.
After spending some time with Kinect, I downloaded Netflix, Hulu and Amazon. Once again I was impressed... Netflix and Hulu settings transferred with my profile. All I had to do for Amazon was enter the username and password. I was initially a bit concerned that these apps might not be ready on launch day, but was happily to see them. In fact, I'm pleased to see the wide array of available apps.
Finally, after a brief eternity, I got around to trying out the gaming, which in my case is Ryse. I didn't spend a lot of time playing the game... my goal was to have everthing up and running when the kids got home. But I will say this... I like how the controller feels. I like how the game looks and plays. I do not, once again, like how long the game took to install and load initially.
Overall, I'm very happy with the purchase. Setup was a breeze; all of my must-have apps were available, and gameplay looks to be very immersive. The only issues I have are with install/update speed.
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4 comments:
TY- Please keep us updated on how you like it as you actaully get to game. I wanted to get this for Paul for Christmas, but he wanted his tat and wanted to wait a couple of months to see how the reviews on it went. You know how it is the first few months after a new console comes out- sometimes they can be really buggy and all..... It helps to have someone we know "personally" to have one and give a review on it and not having to wonder if the review we're reading is from a real person or from a paid employeee whose job it is to write a few reviews every day to make it look good.We know that if you say something about a console or game- it's straight up what you REALLY mean.
It's a crying shame that traits such as Honesty andReliability are SOOOO hard to come by these days!!!
I'm a little hesitant to make the upgrade based on two factors important to me:don't have the scratch and the kavk of backward compatibility.
I just can't afford the initial price tag, and until it drops significantly I don't foresee getting one any time soon.
As far as my other qualm, we have a pretty extensive library and until I can play old and new on one console, again, I don't see myself opening one anytime soon.
My kids however don't seem to be that smart.
@Sunny... You know I'll keep you informed. I spent an hour playing Ryse last night, and I'm about 15% through the game. The eye candy is great, and I haven't seen any technical issues yet. I have no technical issues with the game or the console. My one issue with the game itself is that it's a bit repetitive... specifically, the story is a little thin and it's almost exclusively hack and slash. Additionally, it's not an open world game like GTA. It tends to funnel you where you should go, like Halo. If you're going to be funneled to a specific destination, I'd prefer better story development, or more problem solving. It's not a BAD game, just not quite what I expected.
BTW, a new feature of the Xbox One is that it has Skype built in. I don't do much Skyping, but I thought it'd be cool to test how well Skype works from Xbox to PC (or whatever other medium). You and Paul were the people who came to mind as testing partners. After all, we've never actually spoken or seen one another. If you're interested, send me a PM via Facebook.
@RayRay...I'm with you on the lack of backward compatibility. I came very close to not upgrading (or even switching to PlayStation) for that very reason. Eventually though, your existing library will go the way of the Atari 2600. This won't necessarily happen in the next year, but it will happen. Also, remember that my DVD drive broke on my Xbox 360, so I was kind of SOL on game play anyway, and I was going to spend some cash one way or another for a replacement.
ok, so, it's been a couple months.........how about an update?
( i'm seeing your always "online" when i log into xbox live)
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