‘Videogame’ Is One Word

So, finally – and some might fairly say “inevitably” – after almost 2 years of near-faultless videogaming on a first generation Xbox 360, those dreaded three lights have appeared.  And this time they won’t go away again.

I had my first encounter with Microsoft’s infernal “red ring” about 6 weeks ago, in the middle of playing then-recently-purchased Burnout Paradise.  It’s quite a weird thing when it happens, driving around one moment before the 360 lets out a screech of pain as everything comes to a sudden, flickering stop.  (Interesting faux moire effect from the crashed graphics buffer, too.)

So you get up, switch the machine off and switch it back on again, praying it was just a software glitch.  But, after a moment’s normal boot process, there they flash.  Like tiny crimson prophets of videogaming doom.  You hastily switch the machine off again, give a it few minutes to calm down and try again.  And on that occasion, it did come back to life for me.

I phoned Microsoft immediately anyway, just to report it.  They advised me to try the cache clearing trick, which seemed to drag a few more weeks’ sporadic use out of the machine.  But it finally crapped out again for good on Friday night, when I’d invited a friend over especially for some gaming.  Fortunately, my Dreamcast has never had any such issues, so Under Defeat, Virtua Fighter 3tb and Soul Calibur all got a good airing instead.

Satruday morning, on the phone, they assure me it’ll be fixed “in 2-3 weeks” at no cost.  Strip it of all cables, controllers and harddrives; “send nothing but the base unit” they said.  No charge for postage either, which is nice; didn’t wait for me to arrange a convenient collection time either though, which is slightly stupid.

So I have the big, cardboard-wrapped brick – all ~3.5 kilos of it – on my desk at work now, awaiting a second collection attempt.  Fingers crossed I’ll be furnished with at least a latest-generation DVD drive, if not a completely new main board too.  In some ways I’m quite glad the machine’s carked it, as it was insufferably noisy and should be a lot quieter with the updated hardware.  It’s more than slightly ridiculous when you can’t hear the game you’re quietly trying to play, while your kids sleep upstairs and your wife is watching Katy Price and Peter Andre flap about in the next room, but can’t make out the game’s audio for the turbine under the telly.

The short answer is: no-one.

It’s the danger of over-reliance on one or two key sources of major commercial funding – from a particular manufacturer, product line, whatever – that’s most dangerous. It’s never ever going to 100% transparent that what you’re reading isn’t being influenced by marketing money. But if you can see a publication is being balanced, if their writing is consistent and fair, then you can usually spot the bullshit.

Yes, you have to take the plunge and invest time to build up this trust, but that’s why there are so many publications out there. GameSpot mined a very deep vein of trust over the many years it’s been around, tapping literally dozens of well-respected freelance videogame journalists to write for them explicitly to build up this trust. Which is why this has caused such an outcry — the new management thought it worth setting this huge stockpile of goodwill and respect ablaze just for a few thousand grubby dollars. Everything about it stank and loyal readers immediately put the pieces together and cried foul.