Console Wars VI

[DrSpike]

It usually depends on what games you are after. The newest release titles you will wait a while for in the equivalent services here. Delviery times have been excellent though in my experience.

[Alinestra Covelia]

Gamefly has some sort of "fast return" thing where some of the US post offices will track the arrival of your game at the post office and that will count as a return, freeing up a rental slot. This is in contrast to Netflix, which requires your DVD to get all the way back to a Netflix facility before it'll count as a return. It shaves a day or two off the whole process.

[snoopy369]

Yeah, I noticed that... not bad. OTOH it takes a day or two longer than NetFlix to arrive (NF is nearly always next day for me) apparently.

Sure enough, neither sports game (NHL nor FIFA) is on its way... Mirror's Edge and, oddly enough, one of my lowest ranked games, Soulcalibur 4. Ah well. The latter will probably be two days and gone, knowing me.

[El_Cid]

I found a bit more detail regaurding the xbox live 'boot out'/dos/hack thing:

http://blog.spywareguide.com/2009/02/hackers-use-diy-botnets-to-ddo.html

it's a new thing and apart from asher who else uses live for mp and have you come across it? Halo3 seems to be a popular target for this trick.

I'm also interested in the wider aspect of this kind of thing becoming a 'normal' vunerability of on-line mp based console gaming, no matter the platform. I guess you could start to see this kind of thing happen on Wii and PS3 as well, although they are not as PC based as an xbox, i'm sure the same trick could work on those platforms also?

And yes it wont ever effect me, but i'm interested in the details.

[Felch]

I use Live occasionally, for CoD, but I haven't seen it.

To be fair, Asher, DoS is generally considered hacking by the media.

[Asher]

I found a bit more detail regaurding the xbox live 'boot out'/dos/hack thing:

http://blog.spywareguide.com/2009/02/hackers-use-diy-botnets-to-ddo.html

it's a new thing and apart from asher who else uses live for mp and have you come across it? Halo3 seems to be a popular target for this trick.

I'm also interested in the wider aspect of this kind of thing becoming a 'normal' vunerability of on-line mp based console gaming, no matter the platform. I guess you could start to see this kind of thing happen on Wii and PS3 as well, although they are not as PC based as an xbox, i'm sure the same trick could work on those platforms also?

And yes it wont ever effect me, but i'm interested in the details.

Oh, give it a rest.

This trick is as old as the internet. I remember people being DoSed playing Trade Wars in 1994. It was common as hell back in the Diablo days as well -- people would either packetbomb (DoS) someone or they would WinNuke -- a bug in early versions of windows 95/98 that means someone could plug in your IP and hit NUKE and it'd bluescreen you.

This **** is old, and it has absolutely nothing to do with Xbox Live. It's also not at all common, it's far easier to do on the PC and to do it on Xbox Live requires a lot of work and know-how, or using a paid service (which is beyond pathetic).

It's a non news story to anyone who knows anything. It is certainly NOT new. All these people are doing is sniffing the IPs of people you are playing with -- if you're on a network, this is impossible to avoid! Then they're bombing it with data to slow their network down.

And what in the flying **** are you talking about with the Xbox being "more PC based"? That makes no sense in any kind of circumstances. Holy ****.

[DrSpike]

Sure enough, neither sports game (NHL nor FIFA) is on its way... Mirror's Edge and, oddly enough, one of my lowest ranked games, Soulcalibur 4. Ah well. The latter will probably be two days and gone, knowing me.

Yeah the chance factor is one of the things that puts me off. Also looking at those games, with sports games I prefer to dip in and out rather than play in a short time, which doesn't lend itself to rentals. Mirror's Edge didn't sell well here and you can already bargain bin it for £15 or so. SC as an older game you can get on fleabay for about £10. Any game you complete fast can be fleabayed for what you paid for it, minus postage maybe.

I don't see myself entering this market. It seems to be pretty popular though.

[DrSpike]

On the hack stuff no it's not new - but it is quite unusual on consoles, and with lack of cheating/hacking touted as a console feature this is a perfectly valid topic to discuss. If anyone wishes to sit out of said discussion they of course can.

[Asher]

On the hack stuff no it's not new - but it is quite unusual on consoles, and with lack of cheating/hacking touted as a console feature this is a perfectly valid topic to discuss. If anyone wishes to sit out of said discussion they of course can.

There's nothing to be discussed. If you're on the internet, you are susceptible to DoS attacks. This should be common sense. This is not an application-domain (console vs PC, xbox live vs PS3) issue. It's an internet issue.

Drop in a couple gems like the "xbox 360 being more PC-like" and you've got yourself a prime candidate for most retarded discussion on this site in months.

If you'd like to discuss internet topology, which is what this discussion is REALLY about, then start up a thread in the Technical forum where I can manhandle you two there. This issue really has nothing to do with consoles, let alone Other Games.

[DrSpike]

There's nothing to be discussed. If you're on the internet, you are susceptible to DoS attacks. This should be common sense. This is not an application-domain (console vs PC, xbox live vs PS3) issue. It's an internet issue.

Agreed.

If you'd like to discuss internet topology, which is what this discussion is REALLY about, then start up a thread in the Technical forum

No desire to do either thanks.

You are letting your dislike for El Cid and your knee jerk reaction to defend any perceived slight to consoles to blind you to the clear fact that this issue is relevant to the usual PC v console discussions that happen here.

It's not really technical possibilities that interest most posters - more practical implications across consoles, if there are any.

[snoopy369]

Got home sort of late last night, but there were GameFly wrappers in my post Also a few games inside of course.

Mirror's Edge is a ***** ... I think I like the game, but it's VERY difficult for me. I'm on the second real level, the one where you

Spoiler:

Overhear the wrestler and then have to run out of his office

and I can't

Spoiler:

figure out how to get out of the office

... I have a feeling it's some move I just don't do well (possibly wall crawling, I am horrible at that) but I spent half an hour on it (admittedly late) last night and got nowhere. Lots of dying...

[Alinestra Covelia]

My friend (a real life parkour student) got the game and I watched him play it. It's pretty cool - I like the fact that the emphasis is on mobility first and combat only as a distant second. But, the game appears to be pretty linear, and there are several combat-heavy situations where you will get killed several times before succeeding.

So a good game but with a few stylistic and design flaws that turned me away.

[El_Cid]

http://www.reuters.com/article/technologyNews/idUSTRE51N4GY20090224

so the xbox is the only console good for your health?

[Alinestra Covelia]

Well, I'd imagine you wouldn't have those problems with the Wii controller either.

[snoopy369]

My friend (a real life parkour student) got the game and I watched him play it. It's pretty cool - I like the fact that the emphasis is on mobility first and combat only as a distant second. But, the game appears to be pretty linear, and there are several combat-heavy situations where you will get killed several times before succeeding.

So a good game but with a few stylistic and design flaws that turned me away.

Yeah, I can see that. I'm getting slightly better at the game mobility-wise, and generally once I can see the solution to the puzzles I can solve them (though wall running is still a ****). I'm currently dealing with having to disarm three guys with machine guns (I can either do that or disarm one and shoot the others, but I'm a former Thief player so I prefer to go without guns; might as well try for that achievement anyway, I'm certainly not getting the 30 bags achievement as I've found maybe 2.)