Xbox celebrates one of gaming's best eras with a nod to the PS2, GameCube, and Dreamcast

[midian182]

What just happened? It’s not often that a gaming company will pay tribute to competitors’ products, but it seems Microsoft is happy to give credit where it’s due. On the 20th anniversary of Xbox, the brand shared a tweet containing an image of the four most iconic consoles ever made—the original Xbox, the PlayStation 2, the GameCube, and Sega Dreamcast—with the caption, “One of gaming’s best eras.”

The official Xbox Twitter account tweeted the message using the #Xbox20 hashtag. The four machines come from what is generally accepted to be the sixth generation of video game consoles, which as anyone who was around at the time can attest to, really was one of the greatest gaming eras.

One of gaming's best eras #Xbox20 pic.twitter.com/Czh5qvH8oq

— Xbox (@Xbox) November 17, 2021

Going by order of release date, the Sega Dreamcast was first to launch, arriving in Japan in 1998 and the rest of the world in 1999 (except India, which got it in December 2000). Despite being the worst-selling console of the four, those who owned one have fond memories of playing the likes of Shenmue, Jet Set Radio, and Crazy Taxi. Sadly, Sega discontinued the Dreamcast on March 31, 2001.

Next is the PlayStation 2. Released in the year 2000, Sony’s machine went on to become the most popular console of all time, selling 155 million units. More than 3,800 games were released for the PS2, with over 1.5 billion copies sold.

The GameCube also celebrated its 20th birthday this year. The Nintendo 64 successor may have sold 10 million fewer units (21 million in total) than its predecessor, but owners will still remember that fantastic controller and games such as Eternal Darkness, The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker, and Resident Evil 4.

Finally, there’s the Xbox. Microsoft’s first foray into this world of video game consoles—the first major one to be produced by an American company since the Atari Jaguar in 1993—was more powerful than its competitors and the first to feature a built-in hard disk. With a games list that included Halo: Combat Evolved, it had a massive launch in the US and went on to sell 24 million units worldwide; more than Sega’s and Nintendo’s machines, but it couldn’t compete with the PS2.

Congrats on the big day! 🎉

— PlayStation (@PlayStation) November 15, 2021

Xbox wasn’t the only one tipping its hat to rival products. PlayStation also congratulated the company on its anniversary.

Permalink to story.

https://www.techspot.com/news/92279-xbox-celebrates-one-gaming-best-eras-nod-ps2.html

 

[Yenega]

My last Xbox was the first Xbox.

 

[Wrinkle]

My last Xbox was the first Xbox.

I've owned them all except the One X. In fact I just bought a 2013 xbox 360 because my old Elite is dying. Only the original Xbox One series was disappointing due to lacklustre performance.

Series X on the other hand is probably one of the best consoles ever made. It's dead silent and outperforms my 9900k/2060 rig. Combined with a 4K high refresh rate OLED it's a wonderful experience.

 

[Yenega]

I've owned them all except the One X. In fact I just bought a 2013 xbox 360 because my old Elite is dying. Only the original Xbox One series was disappointing due to lacklustre performance.

Series X on the other hand is probably one of the best consoles ever made. It's dead silent and outperforms my 9900k/2060 rig. Combined with a 4K high refresh rate OLED it's a wonderful experience.

A console is usually about games, not hardware (in terms of sales) . That is the reason why even Switch outsold Xbox One and PS4 completely dominated Xbox One too. Xbox severely lacks good exlusives (the platform does not really have any, considering they all come to PC too)

Your GPU in your PC is outdated and was never considered high-end, thats the only reason - However with DLSS Quality enabled on that 2060 it will beat XSX in alot of games. 9900K easily beat the CPU inside XSX, a low clocked Zen2 would not even be close.

A lower end GPU like RTX 3060 beats the GPU inside Xbox Series X _and_ have option for DLSS for a 50-100% fps boost on top and don't forget that 3060 non-Ti is actually ALOT slower than 3060 Ti and 3070, 40/50% slower

Besides, XSX and PS5 don't use static 4K/UHD but dynamic res in pretty much every single "4K game" Some drops close to 1080p when system struggles. Go check out digital foundry for confirmation, it's a fact. Far from "native 4K".

PS5 and XSX are no beasts, it's mainstream hardware, which is typical for a console. They are not even beating mid-end PCs today, and they are in the beginning of the generation, meaning in a few years they will be far behind even mid-end PCs and in 3-4-5 years they won't even perform like a low-end PC. A console always struggle HARD with games at the end of a generation, 15-30 fps happen. Ever tried GTA 5 on PS3 and Xbox 360? Huge stutter and insane fps dips, feels like 5-10 fps at times


Nvidia 4000 series and AMD 7000 series looks to double performance by Q2 next year. That is the problem with consoles. They only get slower and slower because Dev's are pushing the limit every game and hardware stays the same. 30 fps is bound to happen, sadly.

There's already alot of games that only run at 30 fps on PS5 and XSX. I can't stand 30 fps, 60 fps is bare minimum but I prefer 100+ and both my 5900X/3080Ti and 9900KS/3070 allows me to do this in all games + mod support and full customization of games. Cheaper games too.

We will see PS5 Pro and beefed up Xbox for sure in 2 years tops. Halfway generational refresh because launch hardware is getting too slow.

I might pick up a PS5 when Slim comes out, no interrest in Xbox since all the games come to PC and will play better on PC.

All the consoles I buy usually end up collecting dust tho, most seem like a money sink (paid sub and overpriced games/dlc). On PC I can mod games to get endless content if I like the game. On console it's just done and I can't do anything fun with it. Empty feeling.

Game Pass is decent but the games included is usually the most drained version, that contains no extras and no DLC, meaning that fans will buy the dlc on top anyway. Microsoft makes sure to add alot of dlc packs to all games included for free in game pass; Forza is a DLC HELL for example. TONS of paid DLC.

I don't hope TES6 will be a DLC spam HELL to milk customers dry... I have mixed feelings with them buying Bestheda...

 

[elementalSG]

I still play Crazy Taxi on my original Sega Dreamcast and that game is still ridiculously fun, even today, as you try to drive paying customers all over the place like a chicken with your head cut off. Wish they would remake this one

 

[Wrinkle]

A console is usually about games, not hardware (in terms of sales) . That is the reason why even Switch outsold Xbox One and PS4 completely dominated Xbox One too. Xbox severely lacks good exlusives.

There are only so much exclusives I want to play, in fact I really don't care about Zelda, Mario or GoW.

Your GPU in your PC is outdated and was never considered high-end, thats the only reason - However with DLSS Quality enabled on that 2060 it will beat XSX in alot of games. 9900K easily beat the CPU inside XSX, a low clocked Zen2 would not even be close.

I know it's outdated. I'd even call the 2060 a bad product. However, in this day and age a good gpu costs considerably more than a console. The value proposition is really, really bad. Also a dedicated gpu is always going te be louder than Series X.

A lower end GPU like RTX 3060 beats the GPU inside Xbox Series X... _and_ has option for DLSS for 50-100% fps boost on top and don't forget that 3060 non-Ti is actually ALOT slower than 3060 Ti and 3070, 40-50% slower

You referenced DF below. In the pc <> xbox FH5 comparison they reasoned you'd need a 3070TI to match the Xbox performance mode. Both Xbox and PC use DRS in this game. DLSS is not a given on pc.

Besides, XSX and PS5 don't use static 4K/UHD but dynamic res in pretty much every single "4K game" Some drops close to 1080p when system struggles. Go check out digital foundry for confirmation, it's a fact. Far from "native 4K"

I'm aware of this and I really do not care. Mostly games seem to drop down to 1800p with a minimum of 1440p.

PS5 and XSX are no beasts. They are not even beating mid-end PCs today, and they are in the beginning of the generation, meaning in a few years they will be far behind even mid-end PCs and in 4-5 years they won't even perform like a low-end PC.

A low end pc will be utterly unable to play a Series X game at 4K60 in 5 years.

There's already alot of games that only run at 30 fps on PS5 and XSX. I can't stand 30 fps, 60 fps is bare minimum but I prefer 100+ and both my 5900X/3080Ti and 9900KS/3070 allows me to do this in all games + mod support and full customization of games. Cheaper games too.

It appears my €2500 pc appears to outperform your €500 dollar console mister Bond.

 

[Squid Surprise]

The only XBOX I've owned was a 360 I bought at auction for $1 - I wanted the Kinect (that came with it) to build an AR Sandbox and gave the XBOX to my niece...

The Gamecube and Dreamcast don't really belong in this group - yes, it's the same generation, but it was really the N64 / PS1 that heralded in this golden generation of games...

The Dreamcast and Gamecube were largely failures - while the most powerful, the Dreamcast's failure basically ended Sega's hardware business. Had it not been for the Wii, the Gamecube's failure probably would have ended Nintendo as well...

 

[Neatfeatguy]

Still have my PS2 boxed up and tucked away. Last time I played it was probably 10-11 years ago and went through some of Star Ocean: Till the End of Time (I really enjoyed this one) and played Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance 1 & 2. Once I was done, I boxed it back up and it hasn't come out of the box since.

Awesome system. I liked it more than the PS3, but then again by the time I got the PS3 my days of playing on consoles was diminishing and my time playing PC games was increasing.

Maybe I should blow the dust off the box and hook it back up and play some more Star Ocean.

 

[EdmondRC]

I would say that era of gaming is basically the same as modern gaming. There was online competitive games, MMOs, and just about every single/multi-player genre we have today. Things have improved greatly since due to technology moving forward, but gaming hasn't taken any giant leaps, at least not ones that have caught on across the industry. The PS1 and N64 on the other hand were transitional, but they were still pre-online and still much more technically limited. I remember being extremely impressed with PS2 graphics and games, even early on, it was an astounding leap. Yes I realize that online came later, it wasn't there at launch.

 

[Nintenboy01]

The SNES, N64 and GameCube are still the best Nintendo consoles for me. What I love best about the Cube era is when they resurrected and reinvented long-dormant or less popular series like Metroid and F-Zero.
The Switch is also great, especially after they started porting more Wii U games over

 

[Vanderlinde]

The PS2's succes was as well due to it's DVD player.

 

[Yenega]

There are only so much exclusives I want to play, in fact I really don't care about Zelda, Mario or GoW.



I know it's outdated. I'd even call the 2060 a bad product. However, in this day and age a good gpu costs considerably more than a console. The value proposition is really, really bad. Also a dedicated gpu is always going te be louder than Series X.



You referenced DF below. In the pc <> xbox FH5 comparison they reasoned you'd need a 3070TI to match the Xbox performance mode. Both Xbox and PC use DRS in this game. DLSS is not a given on pc.




I'm aware of this and I really do not care. Mostly games seem to drop down to 1800p with a minimum of 1440p.



A low end pc will be utterly unable to play a Series X game at 4K60 in 5 years.



It appears my €2500 pc appears to outperform your €500 dollar console mister Bond.

The GPU inside XSX is nothing like a 3070 Ti, more like a 5700XT/6600XT. Same TFLOPS.

XSX does not even do 4K60 today, since it's using dynamic res. In 5 years you will be looking at 15-30 fps. There's already tons of 30 fps games on both PS5 and XSX.

And who says your XSX will even last this long, warranty is only 1 year because of cheap components; Weak VRMs, cheap power supply etc. Most will replace their console 1-2 times during a generation as a result, especially if they use it alot.

Microsoft gives 1 year warrenty for a reason. Bare minimum. They know they won't really last well. They will rather sell you a new one in a few years. Xbox failure rate has been high on every gen, unless they were dustcollecters and not being used anyway.

Meanwhile my quality PC parts have 3 years minimum, mostly 5-10 years, or even lifetime (memory). Hence the price. Besides, I can do other stuff than playing games. A console is nothing but a locked down ecosystem meant to milk you dry. Sub required for online play etc.

 

[Neatfeatguy]

The PS2's succes was as well due to it's DVD player.

The PS2 was my primary DVD player when the wife and I moved into our first place. It served as the DVD player about 5 years or so (well past the time the PS3 launched), up until around the time Blu-Ray became the standard over HD DVD and I picked up a blu-ray DVD player.

 

[Ironmanajm]

So we gladly accept the curtosy to be repaid by all of these gaming organizations to acknowledge one of the best eras of gaming from Xbox at the moment for their super gamepass service ensuring that all day 1 exclusives are played for almost free on this service, thank you!!!!!!!!!!

 

[VaRmeNsI]

PS3/360 was the last console generation worth buying, now any half decent game is available on PC, the days of exclusivity are long gone.