Well, the time appears to have finally come. With my kids starting to cross over the 10 threshold I am on the verge of caving in on the gaming console issue. As a kid who wanted an Atari 2600 but got a TI-99/4a it took me a while to realize that gaming consoles are now pretty much part of the background recreation matrix/social experience of kids and not an extravagant extra. Anyway, they get good grades and I wound up working for a while as a game programmer and it did not kill me.
So parenting aside, I was wondering if anyone could suggest some good sources of information on the three major platforms (XBox, GameCube, PS2). The kids told me that their friends mostly have PS2s and that they like the GameCube, but I just want to make sure that, say, in February the next generation of platform hardware won't come out and they stop production of titles for what we get. FWIW their tastes are Backyard sports games, Civilization 3, and Hobbit/Harry Potter type games -- but they remind me that playing those and Zaxxon on the family PC do not a gaming system make. Oh, and there any must-have accessories that we should take care of up front? Cheers.
posted by cgk
on Dec 6, 2004 -
26 answers
