When it comes to the Xbox One and PlayStation 4 consoles, the debate is right now more intense than ever before. We still see the console wars raging, but now there are fewer choices to battle it out. Old school gamers will remember the console wars in the 80’s and 90’s. It seemed there was a new device out every other month, and most of them flopped…hard.
I recently saw a post on Reddit about this fight. It showed the Xbox One and PlayStation 4 as Voldemort and Harry Potter, tensely glaring at one another with wands drawn. Below then was an image of Luna Lovegood…as the Nintendo Wii. That pretty much sums up the console wars in a nutshell.
But the truth is, PlayStation 4 has managed to reach the top for the moment, as backlash against the Xbox One continues to increase.
The Scandal
Controversy began after it was learned that the Xbox One console would always be connected to the Internet, with no option to turn it to extended offline gaming. Which meant it would always be sending out data, with regular updates. This caused concern with privacy advocates. Concern that has grown to a frenzy after the NSA PRISM story broke. Microsoft is allegedly one of the first companies to have signed on with the surveillance program seven years ago.
It locks out how much time you can use the new Xbox console offline (24 hours on your console, one hour on another console), and monitors your games.
Then came news that they were giving game publishers the option of disallowing any trading or gifting of used games. Microsoft itself heavily restricts game sharing, only letting you give games to people who have been on your list for 30 days, and only once. Once given, a game cannot be regifted. Loaning and borrowing games will not be allowed at all.
Only ten people can be allowed access to your game library from your own console.
None of these restrictions have gone over well with gamers, who are angry at the lack of privacy and control.
PlayStation 4 Prevails
On the other side of things, the PlayStation 4 console is gaining a great deal of support for its lack of restrictions. They have open sharing and trade-ins/selling of games, which are at the owner’s discretion. This is a stark contrast to the blatant lack of freedom given by Microsoft, despite the users paying for the original games.
Hardware wise, it is more graphics based thanks to its 8GB GDDR5 RAM, the same type used in PC’s with high graphics capabilities. But just the fact that it isn’t always online or forcing players to only play the way Microsoft wants will give it the edge over the Xbox One.
Both consoles will be available at the end of this year, Xbox One in November and will cost $499 while PlayStation 4 around holidays and will cost $399(Amazon.com says PlayStation 4 will be shipped on 31 December). Xbox One is a bit pricey because it’s shipped with the new Kinect sensor, while PlayStation 4 only comes in the standard package.
After you compare these consoles and add what we find out from E3 2013, the real winner seems to be Sony and Play Station 4 console. But the situation was similar when PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 were announced and at the end both consoles were pretty much equal in terms of speed and graphics.
