Xbox One or not to Xbox One?

[pseudophyte]

Finally deciding whether or not to buy an Xbox One S (or PS4) and would like to get some opinions from the community.  I can guess the answer (given this particular crowd), but I'd love some honest opinions about whether or not I should sink a few hundred dollars into the current generation of gaming systems.  So here's my predicament:

 

• I currently own an Xbox 360, a PS3, and a Wii U (plus, a decent PC w/ 150+ titles on Steam).
• I currently have a huge back-log of games to play.
• I currently DO NOT have a massive amount of time to play between work, kids, exercise, and life-in-general.
• I'm pushing 40-years-old and I can't stay up into the wee hours like I used to (read: limited gaming time).
• My kids are hogging all my electronic devices!
• My better-half is pretty particular about having too many large electronic devices (small ones are okay *snicker*), so we'll be fighting over the living room TV.

 

All that said, I've truly been struggling with making a decision for weeks/months now.  I keep thinking, "Wow, such-and-such title looks really cool and I think I'd love to play that!"  But then, "Hmmmmm... I'm only half-way through the Mass Effect series and I still have Skyrim, Fallout 4, Bioshock(s), not to mention Divinity titles, ARK, Overwatch, etc... that I already own if only I could wrench my computer away from my kid and get some gaming time of my own but my wife finally put the baby to bed and I should probably spend a little time with her watching some Netflix or something cuz God knows I only get a couple hours with my family in the evening because I'm going to work for friggin' 10 hours a day and I hardly get to spend any time with them but I reeeeeeeaaaaallly want to play some games but I cannot in good consciousness play a Witcher game in front of my 6 year olds arrrrrgggghhhhhhhhh!"

 

To make matters worse, I recently had an opportunity to purchase a system, plus 3 extra controllers on sale, which I did.  So, $240 for a 500GB XBox One S Minecraft bundle, plus 3 Xbox One S controllers at $40 a piece ($120), for a grand total of $360 plus tax for the whole kit-and-kaboodle.  My struggle now is whether or not to keep everything or to return it all.

 

HELP!  I don't want to waste money buying a system that is already several years old that I might never play.  A lot of folks have commented on how great this system is as a media center, but I also hear that the Xbox One system is a minefield of advertisements and uncontrollable updates.  I know there are a lot of neat apps that you can download, like Netflix, Hulu, and YouTube, but I hate losing control of my ad blockers to proprietary apps.  Any thoughts fellow Nerds?!

[Grandkai_NL]

Wow a lot of stuff. I am as a single person living alone so i am going to try and give a answer that will help in your situation:

On ‎10‎-‎3‎-‎2017 at 8:04 PM, pseudophyte said:

I'm pushing 40-years-old and I can't stay up into the wee hours like I used to (read: limited gaming time).

Try to play what you can, if you have a bit of time to play an hour try to play an hour. Something is better than nothing.

 

On ‎10‎-‎3‎-‎2017 at 8:04 PM, pseudophyte said:

My better-half is pretty particular about having too many large electronic devices (small ones are okay *snicker*), so we'll be fighting over the living room TV.

Maybe try to get a cheap small tv you can use for your gaming time. That way less hogging for the tv.

 

On ‎10‎-‎3‎-‎2017 at 8:04 PM, pseudophyte said:

I'm only half-way through the Mass Effect series and I still have Skyrim, Fallout 4, Bioshock(s), not to mention Divinity titles, ARK, Overwatch, etc...

Every gamer has this problem. Try to put all your focus on the game that you are playing. If you are constantly thinking about another game you wont enjoy it and thus stop faster with playing it.

 

On ‎10‎-‎3‎-‎2017 at 8:04 PM, pseudophyte said:

Xbox One system is a minefield of advertisements and uncontrollable updates.  I know there are a lot of neat apps that you can download, like Netflix, Hulu, and YouTube, but I hate losing control of my ad blockers to proprietary apps.  Any thoughts fellow Nerds?!

I have my Xbox One on sleep mode so it updates when i am at work and not when i turn it on. So for me no problems with updates (except if its for a game i havent played for a while). I have never seen a advertisement when using my xbox one so i dont know where they came up with that. I use netflix, crunchyroll as media and i have never had any problems with ads.

 

On ‎10‎-‎3‎-‎2017 at 8:04 PM, pseudophyte said:

I currently own an Xbox 360, a PS3, and a Wii U

Perhaps you can play co-op games with your kids that way you will go through the games and have some time with your kids (if they are kid age approved).

 

Hopefully this helps a bit and keep us fellow Nerds up to date.

[pseudophyte]

Thanks Grandkai_NL for your opinions and input.  I appreciate that you took time to reply to my questions.  I agree with most of your replies (some really great advice there!), but there's one point where I should elaborate (advertisements).

 

On 3/21/2017 at 3:32 PM, Grandkai_NL said:

I have never seen a advertisement when using my xbox one so i dont know where they came up with that. I use netflix, crunchyroll as media and i have never had any problems with ads.

 

On the homescreen/dashboard, there's a large rectangle that shows the last place/game/movie/etc... that you had playing.  Under that, is your history of apps/games/etc.., then your pins at the very bottom.  Along the right hand side of this, there's your "Apps and Games" or what-not, then four or five tiles worth of advertisements; things like "free weekend" or "Get with Gold now" or "these new movies are available"... it's all advertising and you can't get rid of it.

 

And sometimes it's downright tricky; this weekend I experienced a new tactic: The new WWF/E '17 wrestling game suddenly appeared in my games list.  I didn't buy it, I never would, but there it was.  When I clicked on it, I was redirected to the store and was asked if I'd like to buy it... WTF... A shortcut link to the store, placed in my purchased games list?!  Shame on you Microsoft.

 

Then there's the in-app advertising: I'm assuming that YouTube still forces you to watch 30 second ads every once in a while, right?  And the Facebook app still makes suggestions and links out to multiple articles/interests/etc. in the sidebar and within your feed, right?  On my PC, I can block most of that because I access those sites via my web browser, but it's not so easy with dedicated apps.  You are correct that Netflix doesn't run ads, not so sure about Crunchyroll, but maybe that's ad-free as well.

[pseudophyte]

So, real quickly, I finally decided to open the Xbox One S that I purchased a couple months ago.  I recently celebrated my birthday and one of the cards that I received from my kids read, "You have our permission to spend some money on yourself every once in a while.  Mom says to open the stupid Xbox already!"  I've been playing for a couple weeks now and I definitely have an opinion on its usability and UI.  I do think that it's a bit confusing at times to find games/content and there are a few ways that it could be improved.

 

My little rant on dashboard design:  I use my Xbox One S as, primarily, a gaming device.  I know there are a lot of cool apps and features that make this a great all-around media center, but (again, for me) I really don't have much use for all that other stuff.  I just want to play games, maybe watch Netflix or similar, and I don't want to go hunting for everything when I do.  Here are a few suggestions that would make the experience better for me:

• Giant "recently used" rectangle on the homescreen is ridiculous.  Maybe it should preview whatever disc you have in your Xbox at the moment, but really isn't useful for me to see a box that takes up 75% of my screen stating that I was just in the Settings.
• Putting my pins at the bottom of the homescreen is stupid.  Put my custom links right at the top of the screen where they're useful.  Or at least give me the option of moving things around where I'd like them.
• Since we're on the subject, from what I've read the Xbox One is now running Windows 10; so, give us some customization options!  Let there be a default option for folks that just want the base experience, but give the rest of us options for moving things around and picking what tabs are visible.  I know Microsoft wants to limit this because of the revenue that it makes by placing ads on the homescreen, but honestly...
• Add "physical disc check" once a month, then let games be played without the hassle of putting the disc in all the time.  I mean, I already installed 40GB to the HDD.  There isn't any other reason for the disc after that.  Keeping a "disc check" feature in there would guarantee folks aren't buying, installing, then returning/selling the media.
• Along those sames lines, when I create a "pin", a tile/shortcut is added so that I can quickly launch content from the homescreen; however, unless that content exists permanently on my Xbox (e.g. digital purchased game), that shortcut/tile launches the Store and asks me to buy the content.  For example: I own a physical copy of The Division.  I installed the content, did the updates, and pinned the game to my pins list.  Now, if I click the shortcut while the disc is in the drive, no worries.  But, if I click on the link without the game in the drive, I'm redirected to the store and asked to purchase the game.  I feel like there should be some feature where you can tell the Xbox that you already own the disc, then instead of directing you to the store, you get a message that reads, "Please insert disc".  I feel like the "pin" feature works really well if you digitally purchase all your content AND you're playing on your home Xbox system.
• Bring back the "auto play" feature where powering-up your Xbox starts whatever disc is in the machine.  Right now, there's an auto play that works when you insert the disc; however, I miss the auto play feature that the 360 had.  If there's no disc, then start into the homescreen/dashboard.

I'm sure some of what I've posted isn't going to be an issue for most folks, but a few of these things really bug me about the new Xbox One dashboard.  A couple of these might even be deal-breakers for me.  If anyone has a work around or more information regarding the items that I've listed, please reply with your experience!

 

[Grandkai_NL]

45 minutes ago, pseudophyte said:

And sometimes it's downright tricky; this weekend I experienced a new tactic: The new WWF/E '17 wrestling game suddenly appeared in my games list.  I didn't buy it, I never would, but there it was.  When I clicked on it, I was redirected to the store and was asked if I'd like to buy it... WTF... A shortcut link to the store, placed in my purchased games list?!  Shame on you Microsoft.

Oh yeah that part, i dont pay attention to it. And it sits there but when the weekend is over it disappears from your "to-download" list. Its the 48h free game. Just something that you can download and play with and if you dont like it it disappears after the 48 hours. If you dont want to play it, dont download it. 

 

35 minutes ago, pseudophyte said:

Giant "recently used" rectangle on the homescreen is ridiculous.  Maybe it should preview whatever disc you have in your Xbox at the moment, but really isn't useful for me to see a box that takes up 75% of my screen stating that I was just in the Settings.

Latest update changed that to only small squares.

 

Sad to hear you have some issues with the console's interface. I hope you will be able to live with it. 

[pseudophyte]

On 4/3/2017 at 11:41 AM, Grandkai_NL said:

Latest update changed that to only small squares.

 

HA! I had been putting off the update thinking that things were going to get worse!  Eventually forced into updating ("Only if you want to keep playing online!") and I'm happy to report that this most recent change is a welcome update (in my opinion).  I still have to play around with the settings some more and see if I can get everything tweaked and adjusted and colored "just right", but I like this most recent update.