Wanna play a 360?

[Knightshade Dragon]

http://www.risingconcepts.com/frapper/xbox360kiosks

Its like Google Maps, get in there befoe the morons ruin it.

[Calvin]

That is freaking awesome KD. I still havent had time to check local Wal Marts.

[stiffler]

Played one today.  I absolutely hate Wal-Mart but I needed some stuff that I can only find there.  Went back to the game cave and saw the white controller sitting there all lonely.  Nobody around so I calmly walked up, hit start, and began playing the Kameo demo.

Maybe it's just the nice LCD screen or the progressive scan, but the thing looked wonderful.  I only played a little bit, controlling various forms, and feeling out the controller.  I like the way it feels and can certainly see myself caressing the wireless version.  The extra shoulder buttons seemed to be placed in a bit of an awkward spot, making me hold the controller different ways depending on the buttons I wanted access to.  Meaning it wasn't "natural" to use the bottom triggers and shoulder buttons at the same time.  To make it better I kinda lost control of the face buttons.  Perhaps it will become easier with more use and when it isn't bolted to the display stand.

But the game looked nice from what I saw.  I wish I had time to play with the other demos, but since I heard Kameo was a looker I wanted to check it out.  It didn't necessarily look better than some current-gen games but it was definately smoother.  720p/LCD at work perhaps.

And yes, I am thrilled that the era when everything is 720p is finally upon us.  Even if the graphics capabilities weren't improved upon in this generation 720p would make you think so.

One thing I did was hit the lighted "X" button.  It seemlessly brought the blades up on the left of the screen.  Definately a nice touch to have everything at your fingertips.

Now I actually want to go back to the cursed Wal-Mart and check out the other titles on the demo disc!

[The_Man]

Played one today.  I absolutely hate Wal-Mart but I needed some stuff that I can only find there.  Went back to the game cave and saw the white controller sitting there all lonely.  Nobody around so I calmly walked up, hit start, and began playing the Kameo demo.

Maybe it's just the nice LCD screen or the progressive scan, but the thing looked wonderful.  I only played a little bit, controlling various forms, and feeling out the controller.  I like the way it feels and can certainly see myself caressing the wireless version.  The extra shoulder buttons seemed to be placed in a bit of an awkward spot, making me hold the controller different ways depending on the buttons I wanted access to.  Meaning it wasn't "natural" to use the bottom triggers and shoulder buttons at the same time.  To make it better I kinda lost control of the face buttons.  Perhaps it will become easier with more use and when it isn't bolted to the display stand.

But the game looked nice from what I saw.  I wish I had time to play with the other demos, but since I heard Kameo was a looker I wanted to check it out.  It didn't necessarily look better than some current-gen games but it was definately smoother.  720p/LCD at work perhaps.

And yes, I am thrilled that the era when everything is 720p is finally upon us.  Even if the graphics capabilities weren't improved upon in this generation 720p would make you think so.

One thing I did was hit the lighted "X" button.  It seemlessly brought the blades up on the left of the screen.  Definately a nice touch to have everything at your fingertips.

Now I actually want to go back to the cursed Wal-Mart and check out the other titles on the demo disc!

You owe it to yourself to check out Call of Duty.  It's definitely the best looking of the three playables.

[Destructor]

Reports state that this device was leaked early and also has major configuration issues at some locations. Anybody can get into the config menus and totally screw things up, so if the games look like shit, that's why.

[Calvin]

Whoa, great impressions Stiffy. I am a little bummed where you say "doesn't really look much better than some current gen stuff". I watched like a 30 minute gameplay vid of Kameo, and it looked better than anything I have seen lately you know!!

[Mustang66]

I played around with the 360 at the Walmart in Addison, IL today.  It didn't look like it was setup correctly.  The monitor was widescreen but the demos and videos weren't filling the screen, they were letterboxed and looked stretched.  Call of Duty didn't jump out at me as looking any better than the demo did on my PC (6800GT) and playing it with a gamepad confirmed that I'll be getting it for the PC.  Kameo looked nice but didn't scream next-gen either.  I'm still IN however as I know it's capabilities will be more pronounced when properly setup on my 55" widescreen HDTV.

[depward]

Went to the Wal-Mart at Moscow, Idaho.  It was there alright.  But if wasn't turned on.  Argh, that sucked.  Though, I did hold the controller in my hand, closed my eyes, and imagined I was playing Kameo.

[Crawley]

There was a kiosk at Woodfield Mall, IL Electonic Boutique that had Call of Duty 2 running. I watched it for awhile. It looked just as good as the computer version. Nothing amazing but it was certainly smooth and the graphics were crisp.

[Zarkon]

Rumors are that some Wal-Mart have gotten their systems set up wrong by the MS reps.  I.E. non-780p and 4:3 instead of 16:9

[Destructor]

Rumors are that some Wal-Mart have gotten their systems set up wrong by the MS reps.  I.E. non-780p and 4:3 instead of 16:9

As I said a few posts back.

Wait for your local EB or Gamestop to get them in in about a week or so (according to the one near me, anyway). That way they'll be connected properly, and no kids can just go in and change the settings.

[Destructor]

I hate replying to myself, but here's two interesting links I found:

Xbox 360 to use giant brick power supply via Joystiq originally (picture included), and the wireless functions of the Xbox 360 controller (or something related to the hardware) is causing tons of problems with Walmart hardware.

Yet another reason to wait for your local EB or Gamestop to get a console in before you judge it.

[happydog]

That power supply doesn't look any bigger than my laptop's. And I have to lug this one around, that one can sit on the floor.

[Andrew Mallon]

I finally was able to try out the 360 kiosk at my local Walmart and I have to say I was impressed with everything overall. The graphics for King Kong and CoD2 were very impressive compared to the XBox (although I can see how PC gamers would be disappointed) and the dashboard is awesome.

THe only negative for me is that the controller just sucks. The thing is way too small for adult-sized hands and I hate the placement of the triggers. I don't suppose they're going to make a 360 version of the original XBox controller, are they?

[happydog]

Just played at a nearby Wally-World.

First I have to say, freaking' way too small of a screen to showcase this thing on. It looked to be 17 or 19 inch. Second I have to say, COD2 looked just slightly worse than on my XPS2 laptop (GO 6800 Ultra). What happened to full screen 4x anti-aliasing? The jaggies were pretty bad. I did play Kameo and it looked pretty good (still jagged though). Some of the surface effects looked good (reflection and bump-mapping). The game play was kind of fun even though I only played for about 3 minutes.

The controller wasn't nearly as bad as I was expecting. You see, I am one of the fools who loves the original massive controller for the Xbox. The s-type makes my hands cramp. So I figured the 360 controller would do the same. But from the short time that I played I just didn't feel that I was going to get the same cramping.

And now the sad part. I wasn't going to get one this year, but my wife recently has been pushing me to get it soon. No, that's not sad. So today the dentist tells me I need (another!) root canal. So there goes about 500 bucks. Stupid teeth.

Oh, and one other thing. The employees at Wall-Mart didn't know much about the 360. They were trying to tell someone that if you got the "better" system (i.e. with the hard drive), that all the original games would play on the 360. I had to correct them on that one. After the other customers walked away one of the employees was asking me questions about it.

[Thin_J]

happy:

Most of the wally world stores don't have their displays setup correctly.

I've been to two, and both have been setup to display the 360's picture in 480i resolution, which is.. you know.. not good.

[mytocles]

My local EB has one now... Hadley, MA

I was zooming in to get Ratchet: Deadlocked, so the only thing I saw was one helluva great looking dinosaur...  I don't think it was Call of Duty.  

[coopasonic]

played a bit of Kameo at Walmart, it was very pretty, but the setup they had was awful and my neck still hurts.. controller at waist level directly under monitor mounted on top of 6.5 foot hight display case.

Controller felt perfect to my normal adult sized hands. You guys with the big hands will just have to deal, you have other advantages... ya know... big gloves. Actually I have one whine about the controller... the triggers are perfectly placed for index fingers, so what do I hit the shoulder buttons with? my nose?

[stiffler]

played a bit of Kameo at Walmart, it was very pretty, but the setup they had was awful and my neck still hurts.. controller at waist level directly under monitor mounted on top of 6.5 foot hight display case.

Controller felt perfect to my normal adult sized hands. You guys with the big hands will just have to deal, you have other advantages... ya know... big gloves. Actually I have one whine about the controller... the triggers are perfectly placed for index fingers, so what do I hit the shoulder buttons with? my nose?

That was exactly what I was talking about!  I am glad to see the black/white buttons gone, but damn if the new ones don't just fall a bit out of reach for my mitts.

And I certainly agree with your assessment of the display.  It is nice if you are watching from afar, but not directly underneath the damned thing!

Hey, at least I can now tell all my students I've actually played one!  That and I gave out some handouts to keep them busy so I could read a copy of the newest OXM I borrowed from one of the kids :twisted:

I really want to find an excuse to go try out some of the other games.  Mine store appeared to have the machine setup correctly.  Either that or I am going to drop dead when I see it "for real."

[Ralph-Wiggum]

I played one last night in my dream. I wasn't very impressed.  :wink:

The sad thing is that I really did dream about playing it at Wal-Mart. And I wasn't impressed.

[Destructor]

The sad thing is that I really did dream about playing it at Wal-Mart. And I wasn't impressed.

That's just really, really scary. Or it shows how much you want to play the Xbox 360. I'm not sure which.