Looking at buying a XBOX 360 or PS3. Could use some help.

So, I've been debating buying a new game console. Last year, I picked up a PS2 (for $18) and a ton of games.

That said, I feel slightly overburdened by money, and I'm thinking of picking up one of these in Nov (with the new launches, I figure I can get either for cheap). Therefore, I look to you dudes for advice again.

The stipulations:

I have a PC, so FPS isn't going to dictate much on my choice. I'm not a big Halo person, not a Gears of War fan.

I'm looking to play some of the console exclusives that never made it to pc. Ex: Bayonetta, maybe Dragon's Crown, MvC3, persona 4 arena, etc.

I'm also aiming to play all numbered Final Fantasy games, so this does mean 13, 13-2, 13-3 Return of the King blah blah (yes, I know there's a lot of opinions on this one, but I must for my life goal).

I'm a big third person action/rpg fan, but I know each console has bad some ups and downs. So, any info would be awesome. You dusters have steered me right before, so I'm hoping for another slam dunk here.

Thanks All!

Madman.

Buy a PS3.

It won't break/Blu-ray player.

Last of us.

Gta 5.

Ico/Shadow of the collosus.

Uncharted 2.

Journey.

Tokyo Jungle.

Demon´s Souls.

Yakuza series.

that's it.

P.S. you should have bought one years ago.

@thatdutchguy: yea, I'm commonly late to the party, but I'm an old-schooler.

I prefer the 360 over the PS3, but if I was starting from scratch, I would go for the PS3 just because of the few exclusives I cared about and the fact that it is a BR player.

Definitely go with a PS3... especially since you don't want Halo, Gears of War or FPS's in general.

Yep, PS3 for sure will fit the bill for you.

I'm a nearly PC-exclusive gamer who finally got an Xbox 360 last year when I returned to the states. I did it largely because of console exclusives that I'd likely never see on the PC. (Red Dead Redemption, Catherine, and so on...) The reason I went 360 instead of PS3 is because I prefer the controller and the exclusivity of the XBLA titles at the time. (Fez, Shadow Complex, etc.) Since then, most of these XBLA titles have come to the PC. So, if I were buying a 7th gen console right now, it would probably be a PS3.

PS3 has some amazing exclusive games, such as inFamous, Uncharted, Last of Us, and Demon's Souls. It's also apparently a bitch to program for, which is why they're dropping the cell structure for next gen and it took so long for it to get off the ground. Right now that only really affects games that you can get on the PC anyway, like Skyrim, so that shouldn't be a worry. The only features the 360 really has on it, in my opinion, are a more comfortable controller, better online support, and a few good but not mandatory games like Shadow Complex and Gears of War.

PS3 has significantly more interesting exclusives.

I recently picked up a ps3 after having a 360 for many years, and have certainly been enjoying the platform specific back catalog available to me. A couple of suggestions, which I'm surprised haven't come up already:

If you get a PS3, sign up for PS+; they have at least one freebie game each month, and are reasonably good about putting things on sale for download.

Don't skimp on the hard drive, if you're planning to download, or get most things from the online store.

I started a thread about two weeks ago here, asking for back catalog suggestions, and had several good ones. I've also never really been into Halo or Gears, so maybe some of the suggestions there would be helpful. I can say that so far I had fun playing the first Uncharted, which I was able to find on Amazon for about 8.00 including shipping.

Have to go with PS3 given your above points.

PS3 gives a somewhat wider game selection - many of the Xbox 360s platform exclusives happened earlier in the console generation, and Microsoft didn't really pursue them once Call of Duty kinda shot their console sales through the roof.

The 360 is the king of the FPS, but as you say, you'd prefer to play them on PC. (I tend to agree!)

You mention a ton or JRPGs and other japanese developed titles. PS3 tends to get more japanese games, largely because it's the big HD console in japan, while 360 versions need to be ported.

PS3 can play every numbered Final Fantasy except III, which is on PSP and DS.

For multiplatform releases, you'll find that many will be considered "better" on one platform or another, but the side by side differences are often insignificant to all but the most discerning videophile.

One note about PS3: Hard drive space. You will need a ton of it. Thankfully, the PS3 supports laptop sized internal drives, so you have a fair selection. There is also new cheaper PS3 ultra slim coming that doesn't have a HDD to speak of - this is perfect if you want more than the 500GB drive present in most of the bundles.

I have found 500GB to be more than adequate, though I don't store any music or video on my console, only games. Many games have a required install, if you have a lot of them you may find yourself removing these to make space.

If all numbered Final Fantasy games is something you're after, then you're... well, for one, you're crazy, but for two, the PS3 will be the way to go since you can conceivably play nearly all of them on it, though I would suggest playing the GBA version of VI on an emulator - it has a better translation and no loading times. Seriously, the Playstation version of VI has to slowly load every battle.

Since you're also not interested in Halo or Gears, then I'd really push strongly toward the PS3.

Well there's your answer. PS3.

Sounds like PS3! Thanks for the info all, and that backlog link looks good. Thanks for posting that!

@believer258: I am crazy. I have all but 13, and 13-2, and I'm getting those next. Also, played 6 on GBA, and have it for SNES.

Thanks for the advice all!

Well, of the games you mentioned, Bayoneta runs like shit on the PS3, but the cutscenes in FF13 look a lot less compressed on the PS3 (and it's not on several discs). If you're looking into some early gen multiplatform games (anything prior to about '09), chances are it will perform better on the 360.

As far as exclusives go, the PS3 wins in a landslide. It's got games like The Last of Us, the Uncharted series, Infamous 1 and 2, Demon's Souls, Valkyria Chronicles, MGS4, God of War 3, Journey, and many more fantastic games. On the 360, there is less quality and quantity of exclusives, and honestly the best games on that system (Gears and Halo) you have already expressed a lack of interest in. There are games like Fable 2 and Lost Odyssey that you might enjoy, but that's not enough reason to buy an entire console.

Go with the PS3.

Not to be a dick, but almost everyone saying PS3 hasn't read your post of wishes.

First, most of the games you listed run better on 360. Bayonetta in particular runs like crap on PS3. Second, not one single game you mentioned is exclusive to either platform, so advicing PS3 for the 'better exclusives' is not relevant considering your wishes and remains opinion at that point. Lastly, 360 is more friendly in use, especially this long into the generation. I bet you're installing updates for your system, games and PSN for an hour before you even get to play a game. PS3 has a lot of issues with downloading updates. They take insanely long compared to 360 download times. Since you are picking a console up this late, every single game you will play will have multiple updates in queue to be installed, and 360 will handle that a lot better.

Also, it is probably a lot overlooked, but the newest PS3 version still has overheating issues. I'm sure you are familiar with the 360 breakage as that was all over the place, but ever since the S model (the ones currently being sold) it's actually had an insane drop of issues. I have no numbers to back anything up, but I'm betting it performs better than PS3 at this point. This is purely speculation on my part though, let that be clear. My friend's PS3 locks up all the time (she prefers PS3 so plays there a bunch), mine overheats every now and again. Not a big issue, but it gets obvious when you play a lot like we do.

To finalize, the 360 controller is a lot more comfortable. Opinion, sure. But most people seem to prefer it. The DualShock's triggers are bad on their own and when compared to the 360's smooth ones, they just seem terrible. So much so, that shooter devs have actually mapped the fire button back to R1 instead of R2, because no one likes using it.

I also like to mention that XBLA has a lot of great indie titles. It's true that PS3 has some cool ones too, but Super Meat Boy, Dust, State of Decay, Fez and more all started out on 360. You can get most of them on PS3 too nowadays though, as those deals only lasted for a few months. But some of them are still just released on 360. I actually think if you counted, PS3 would have more of them today. But as I had both machines when things were unraveling like this, it was apparent that a lot of them started on 360, so that's where I have the biggest library (not counting PC).

Also, you said you liked action/RPG's, but do you prefer to play on PC or console? Because I could recommend a bunch of games of this generation, but a lot of them are also available on PC and I'm not sure if you've already played them or not.

Not to be a dick, but almost everyone saying PS3 hasn't read your post of wishes.

First, most of the games you listed run better on 360. Bayonetta in particular runs like crap on PS3. Second, not one single game you mentioned is exclusive to either platform, so advicing PS3 for the 'better exclusives' is not relevant considering your wishes and remains opinion at that point. Lastly, 360 is more friendly in use, especially this long into the generation. I bet you're installing updates for your system, games and PSN for an hour before you even get to play a game. PS3 has a lot of issues with downloading updates. They take insanely long compared to 360 download times. Since you are picking a console up this late, every single game you will play will have multiple updates in queue to be installed, and 360 will handle that a lot better.

Also, it is probably a lot overlooked, but the newest PS3 version still has overheating issues. I'm sure you are familiar with the 360 breakage as that was all over the place, but ever since the S model (the ones currently being sold) it's actually had an insane drop of issues. I have no numbers to back anything up, but I'm betting it performs better than PS3 at this point. This is purely speculation on my part though, let that be clear. My friend's PS3 locks up all the time (she prefers PS3 so plays there a bunch), mine overheats every now and again. Not a big issue, but it gets obvious when you play a lot like we do.

To finalize, the 360 controller is a lot more comfortable. Opinion, sure. But most people seem to prefer it. The DualShock's triggers are bad on their own and when compared to the 360's smooth ones, they just seem terrible. So much so, that shooter devs have actually mapped the fire button back to R1 instead of R2, because no one likes using it.

I also like to mention that XBLA has a lot of great indie titles. It's true that PS3 has some cool ones too, but Super Meat Boy, Dust, State of Decay, Fez and more all started out on 360. You can get most of them on PS3 too nowadays though, as those deals only lasted for a few months. But some of them are still just released on 360. I actually think if you counted, PS3 would have more of them today. But as I had both machines when things were unraveling like this, it was apparent that a lot of them started on 360, so that's where I have the biggest library (not counting PC).

Also, you said you liked action/RPG's, but do you prefer to play on PC or console? Because I could recommend a bunch of games of this generation, but a lot of them are also available on PC and I'm not sure if you've already played them or not.

@zevvion:

I'll try to go down the line.

First off, most of the indie titles are already on pc, which I prefer. The console is for those that don't port to PC.

2)I know of the triggers, but since I play pc shooters, this is of no consequence. I do not play console pc shooters (newfangled thumbsticks confound me)

3) updates - I play on PC, updating clients all the time. Again, this is one of those things that doesn't bear much either way.

That said, I appreciate the caveat on the overheating risk. It is something I have to watch across the board.

I own a PC, a 360, PS3 and Wii. The 360 hasn't been played for over a year and is in a drawer somewhere. It's basically a Dead Rising 1 emulator at this point.

I have to mention that the 360 is notorious for having soldering cracked due to rapid heating and cooling.(MS didn't really think the whole airflow-system through) Although it's much lower than the initial 30-50% failure rate of the older models now.

I'd get a PS3 if I were you, Bayonetta has been fixed by patches and is nearly identical to the 360 version at this point. Red Dead Redemption is running at a slightly lower framerate.

See if you can find the normal Slim version new. As mentioned above the new slim might have some problems(which I personally have never heard of)

Ended up getting a PS3. I also picked the brain of a friend of mine who runs a game store, and a lot of what he said matched GB.

Infamous, Heavy Rain, Bayonetta, FF13/13-2, Ni No Kuni, and P4 Arena. Also plunked down for Kingdom Hearts 1.5 since I can get the limited edition on Amazon.

Thanks all for the advice!

I own both, but I personally feel Ps3 has the best exclusives overall.

no, get an OUYA, I promise you'll love it.

yo dawg, Nobody else got Towerfall.

I would trend toward PS3. You will tend to get better audio quality out of it, and it is much more functional if you are not planning to subscribe to XBLA (in addition to having blu-ray, which is nice for otherwise multi-disc games).

Bayonetta and XCOM (if you wanted to play on a console for some reason) would both be really rough on PS3; a lot of the initial games had issues. But if you already have a PC the PS3 opens up a lot more genres instead of mostly increasing your man-shooter options.

I would trend toward PS3. You will tend to get better audio quality out of it, and it is much more functional if you are not planning to subscribe to XBLA (in addition to having blu-ray, which is nice for otherwise multi-disc games).

Bayonetta and XCOM (if you wanted to play on a console for some reason) would both be really rough on PS3; a lot of the initial games had issues. But if you already have a PC the PS3 opens up a lot more genres instead of mostly increasing your man-shooter options.

The PS3 is the best fit concerning what you said.

I have a PC, so FPS isn't going to dictate much on my choice. I'm not a big Halo person, not a Gears of War fan.

I'm looking to play some of the console exclusives that never made it to pc.

Halo and Gears of War are a sbustancial part of the Xbox 360 exclusives, the rest of the boxed exclusive properties are Fable, Alan Wake and Forza.

I'm looking to play some of the console exclusives that never made it to pc.

(...)

I'm a big third person action/rpg fan, but I know each console has bad some ups and downs.

On the PS3, you have the franchises:

• Uncharted
• inFamous
• Last of Us
• Disgaea
• Atelier
• Hyperdimension Neptunia

Plus the exclusive titles:

• Valkyria Chronicles
• Tales of Xillia
• Final Fantasy X/X-2 HD Remaster (coming out soon)
• Kingdom Hearts HD 1.5 Remix
• Ar tonelico Qoga: Knell of Ar Ciel
• Demon Souls
• Record of Agarest War 2
• Tales of Grace F
• Star Ocean: The Last Hope International
• Persona 3 FES (downloadable)
• Final Fantasy Tactics (downloadable)

Plus the third party games:

• Resident Evil Revelations
• Nier
• Deadly Premonition
• Final Fantasy XIII, XIII-2 and XIII-3 (coming out soon too)
• Dragon Crown
• Persona 4 Arena
• Ultimate Marvel VS Capcom 3

Given the catalogue I say it's a no brainer.

As others have suggested, don't forget to pick up PS+, as it is definitely worth it, and it sounds like you are looking for older games that you may be able to snag for free in the future.