Steve Posted September 8, 2020 Share Posted September 8, 2020 Here's a leaked section of the Series S promo vid: - https://twitter.com/_h0x0d_/status/1303165187369832448 The Series S is about a third as powerful as the X and has no disc drive, so it's digital games only. Both consoles will be launching on November 10th. The prices are decent IMO, cos I expected the X to be at least 600. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Deft Posted September 8, 2020 Share Posted September 8, 2020 Series S seems to have been confirmed at £249. I don't love the idea of simultaneously launching different flavours of consoles which actually differ in performance. Not sure why I feel that way though. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steve Posted September 8, 2020 Author Share Posted September 8, 2020 I can see what they're going for. They want to sell Game Pass subscriptions. However, it may hold some games back, and there will almost certainly be games that are Xbox Series X only (on the Xbox side). Official announcement trailer for the Series S: - Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Deft Posted September 9, 2020 Share Posted September 9, 2020 £449 for Series X in UK. Seems alright to me, I can never remember the historical price context. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steve Posted September 9, 2020 Author Share Posted September 9, 2020 I see they've also added EA Play (formerly EA Access) to Game Pass Ultimate, so now an Ultimate subscription gives you: - Game Pass for consoleGame Pass for PCXbox Live GoldEA Play for consoleEA Play for PCProject xCloud accessThe occasional perk/bonus If you already have both Game Pass Ultimate and EA Play, they will automatically cancel your EA Play subscription and extend your Ultimate subscription based on a 3:1 ratio, so, for example, if you have 6 months of EA Play left they will extend your Ultimate subscription by 2 months. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
djdiggla Posted September 10, 2020 Share Posted September 10, 2020 ^^Pretty nuts. I don't like subscription service... "renting" media more or less but that's definitely the future. Pretty decent prices. At this point I feel like they have positioned themselves nicely and it's all going to be about if they can properly promote the system and service. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steve Posted September 10, 2020 Author Share Posted September 10, 2020 Size comparison of, from left to right, Xbox 360 S, Xbox One X, Xbox Series S, and Xbox Series X. The Series S is small. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Deft Posted September 10, 2020 Share Posted September 10, 2020 You can basically lease the console too can't you? Something like £22 a month gets you console and all the subscription stuff. I might have made these numbers up. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steve Posted September 10, 2020 Author Share Posted September 10, 2020 Yeah, it works like a smartphone plan, so when that contract ends you own the console. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Deft Posted September 10, 2020 Share Posted September 10, 2020 If I had more time to play games I'd probably snag an Xbox. My routine these days seems to be a big AAA title every 3-6 months. For that I'll just do digital PS5 and get a handful of games. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steve Posted September 10, 2020 Author Share Posted September 10, 2020 This photo puts the Series S size into better perspective: - Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
djdiggla Posted September 11, 2020 Share Posted September 11, 2020 ^^Holy shit that's way smaller then it looks in the marketing pics. You can basically lease the console too can't you? Something like £22 a month gets you console and all the subscription stuff. I might have made these numbers up.Oh wow that's pretty brilliant. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steve Posted September 11, 2020 Author Share Posted September 11, 2020 Well, the first big downside of the Series S has become apparent. Lots of Xbox One games, as well as backwards compatible Xbox 360 and OG Xbox games, got enhanced for the Xbox One X. In most cases, this meant that they got a boost to 4K resolution, but there were other enhancements as well such as HDR, higher framerates and what have you. MS have confirmed that if you buy a Series S, it will only be able to play the Xbox One S version of backwards compatible games, so you would not get the One X enhanced versions. For someone that has an Xbox One X, that means that a lot of your existing games library will actually look worse on the Series S than they do on the One X. This is because the Series S has less RAM than the One X, but it's also slower RAM too. It's designed to target 1080p and 1440p, so it's not meant for 4K gaming, hence it won't be able to play the One X enhanced games. In some cases the difference will be massive, for example, the original Red Dead Redemption runs at a lowly 864p on the Xbox Series S, but the One X enhanced versions renders at native 4K. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
djdiggla Posted September 11, 2020 Share Posted September 11, 2020 I can see why that would suck for you but you're also the market they are targeting to buy-up... kinda the point of the S right? A budget xbox. Lower the bar for entry... kinda similar to the Switch Lite. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steve Posted September 11, 2020 Author Share Posted September 11, 2020 True, but I think some people will switch from a One X to a Series S, assuming that it'll be an improvement in every way in terms of graphics, only to be shocked by how much worse many of their existing games look. I wonder how much more per unit they'd have had to spend to avoid this problem. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
djdiggla Posted September 15, 2020 Share Posted September 15, 2020 I would think if you dropped the coin on an X then you would know better. Also, it's kinda a nice nod to the consumers that did buy an X... Kinda a dick punch to buy an X and then just a few years later have a cheaper more powerful base model. Is the Series S more powerful than the current S? If not then that would be some bullshit. Feels like it gives people some time to make the jump over... but not feel forced to. I like it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steve Posted September 15, 2020 Author Share Posted September 15, 2020 Is the Series S more powerful than the current S? Oh, for sure. It's hard to accurately compare the two because of the generational differences when it comes to the hardware, but the Series S is probably around 6 times as powerful as the One S. It's just not designed for gaming at higher resolutions, but at 1080p or 1440p it's gonna be miles better than the One S. Pre-orders start on the 22nd. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steve Posted September 15, 2020 Author Share Posted September 15, 2020 These are the trade-in prices that GameStop is offering: - Xbox One X/PS4 Pro = $200Switch/PS4 1TB = $175Switch Lite/Xbox One S/PS4 500GB = $125Xbox One 500GB = $100 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steve Posted September 22, 2020 Author Share Posted September 22, 2020 I managed to grab a Series X before they sold out! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Deft Posted September 22, 2020 Share Posted September 22, 2020 I really hope all the scalpers get burned hard. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TBearOne8III Posted September 22, 2020 Share Posted September 22, 2020 i usually wait a few years before getting the next gen consoles. but that payment plan makes a compelling argument. my biggest gripe is the gamepass subscription. i may get like an hour or 2 a week on gaming. so its just trowing money out the window to do the subscription for me. To put it in perspective.....it took me almost a year and a half to finish the spiderman campaign. so i would rather catch a game on discount or used and own it versus paying a subscription just to play it. But still, $35 a month for 2 years for the series X is not bad at all. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steve Posted September 22, 2020 Author Share Posted September 22, 2020 You get 24 months of Ultimate with the console when you buy it via All Access. Or are you saying you'd have preferred it to not come with that and be a bit cheaper? If so, fair enough. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TBearOne8III Posted September 22, 2020 Share Posted September 22, 2020 i guess, i was just saying i dont need the subscription. it just dosent work for me personally. would be nice if that knocked the price down. i dont really play xbox much anyway. i bought it for the kids. and of course all of the games that im intrested in are rated MA and i cant play them infront of my kids anyway. the payment plan just makes it intresting. especially since we cant afford christmas presents this year. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steve Posted September 28, 2020 Author Share Posted September 28, 2020 A bunch of sites have published hands on impressions of the new Xbox consoles. Some loading time comparisons: - These games haven't been optimised for the Series X, so games designed for the system should load even faster. The Series X has 802GB of free space when new, and it is apparently the quietest Xbox ever made. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steve Posted September 30, 2020 Author Share Posted September 30, 2020 Despite all the bullshit Apple pulled blocking xCloud from iOS, it seems MS and Apple have entered into a partnership to bring an Apple TV app to the Xbox One. It's in testing for insiders now. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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