I’m not saying the dust has settled on the decade long skirmish between the PS3 and the Xbox 360, but it is coming to a close. Most of us have moved on to newer consoles, or are wielding beefy PCs. Today I want us to look back. Which did you prefer: the PS3 or the Xbox 360.
I can say, without a doubt, that I spent more time with my Xbox 360. I played almost every multiplatform game on the 360, and more time than I care to remember with Halo 3 multiplayer. That being said, I do think the PS3 had better exclusives by an absolute hair. There’s also the Blu-ray thing to consider. Sure it doesn’t necessarily relate to games, but it sure resulted in me using my PS3 a helluva lot more.
I think on balance, I preferred my 360, but it might have been one of the closest skirmishes in console history.
Which did you prefer?
Comments
45 responses to “The Big Question: 360 or PS3”
I started last gen preferring the 360, but notice all my favourite exclusives are all on PS3. (Naughty Dog/Sucker Punch/Quantic Dream.) My 360 collection seems to be multiplatform games.
I’m the same. Had a 360 first, which was great, then got a PS3 Slim a few years later and ended up loving it for all the great exclusives.
Basically. Prefer everything about the 360 when given a choice. Only turn on the PS3 for the handful of awesome exclusive games, blu-ray playback and Play TV. But those exclusive games… man… I’d take Uncharted over Halo any day, even if it is just a shallow action movie.
When I got the 360, it was early on and had the best exclusives for me, by the end the PS3 had them. I find the 360 controller more comfortable then the DS3.
I agree by the middle, if the XBox Exclusives didn’t matter the PS3 was the way to go.
I picked 360. Xbox Live Arcade rocked my world in the beginning, and my collection of XBLA games is massive and has given me a lot of joy over the years. Also, playing Mass Effect for the first time is one of my greatest gaming memories bar none – same with Skyrim. The PS3 may have had some great exclusives, but the 360 had a bigger impact on me for sure.
I have loved my 360. That said, I really was looking forward to grab a PS 3 on the cheap for their exclusives I’ve been eyeing off.
Think my plans may have changed though. I really need Bayonetta 2 to review poorly. Well, no, I didn’t, but you get the idea. That WiiU is starting to become a tempting prospect.
I expected to prefer the PS3 having been a PS2 fan but by the time last gen launched I had gone cold on the Playstation brand and the games I wanted it for no longer seemed that interesting to me. Plus, the 360 came out first and had a more established library at the time my wife and I made a snap decision to pick one up.
By the time we did pick up a PS3 it was purely with the intent that we’d use it for platform-exclusive titles and imports (at the time erroneously believing that Silent Hill: Homecoming would be refused classification in Australia and all 360 titles were region-locked).
While I guess we bought a PS3 due to an error in judgement I nevertheless enjoyed Uncharted, Heavy Rain and Journey. That said, I much preferred the 360’s dashboard interface over the PS3’s XMB, the asymmetrical layout of the controller was simply more comfortable for intense/extended play sessions, and I simply preferred the quality and reliability of the Xbox Live services (which I had to pay for) over the Playstation Network (which enabled me to play for free). Halo 3 was also a huge tick in the Xbox 360 box, since my wife and I became addicted to it and played little else for years until MW2 because the dominant force.
So 360, without a doubt. Maybe if I’d been more of a Final Fantasy or Metal Gear fan I’d have swung the other way, but there you go.
I gotta be honest and say the 360. I’m still playing it today. I still need to go back and fix up the much shorter backlog of videogames on my PS3.
Although, when it was called for I played games on my PS3 over the 360 when it was obvious which system the game was designed for. Like L.A. Noire, Dark Souls, and unfortunately FF13.
Couldn’t stop thinking that this one had been done before, and I was right.
http://www.kotaku.com.au/2014/03/the-big-question-ps3-vs-360/
These things require constant vigilance, my friend. 😀 ALLIANCES SHIFT! DOUBLE CROSSES ARE INEVITABLE!
Apart from not really liking the design of the PS3 or its controller at all, and then a lot of things seeming to run better on 360, and the PS3 not really having any exclusives that hold any interest over me, I’ve always leaned towards the 360 instead.
Still would never have bought one, but I’m happy to load it up with games I’ll never get around to playing 😛
Xbox 360 for me. Only got the PS3 a few years ago for some exclusives. Though I much prefer the PS3 for media functions. It’s pretty much only been used to watch TV and movies for the past couple of years.
Can I choose both?
Although I finished solely on the PS3 I have just as many fond memories of the early 360 days.
I started the last gen with an XBox 360, and then later bought a PS3. Once I had the PS3, the XBox 360 stopped getting used fairly quickly so I sold it and haven’t looked back. Besides, I have a Vita as well so having the PS3 has been quite useful for game management (Yes, the Vita does have that many games that I can’t fit them on a 32Gb card).
I only got a PS3 this year, so it’s not really a fair comparison since I got my 360 around the time GTA IV came out, and I played a lot more games on the 360 simply because I’ve had it longer.
BUT, that said, I think the exclusives on PS3 are better than those on 360. I mean, if they weren’t I wouldn’t have needed / wanted to pick up an EOL PS3 now, would I? Ok, so I was replacing a BluRay player but it’s still a valid point.
Owned both consoles. The PS3 got the most use – by far – as well as being the main media player in the household. The PS+ free game each month was great value and all the big games of that generation (Ass Creed, Ni No Kuni, Last of Us) all got played to death. Not to mention some classic PS titles through the PSN Store.
In contrast my 360 just ended up gathering dust. I occasionally (VERY occasionally) played a multiplayer game on it (Black Ops/Fifa), but all my attempts at solo gaming ended with me ditching it in favour of the PS3. I had an XBOX Live Gold account for a while and even had Foxtel on the 360 but the streaming was terrible, such bad resolution, ended up giving it the boot in favour of Netflix.
Both machines are still there, but now the PS4 rocks the box.
360. I got gifted a PS3 years after it came out. And I only ever used it for exclusives. Everything else I played on the 360. It had a better interface at the end of the generation and all my friends played on 360.
This gen I have gone with Xbone to start because I know the feature set will improve over time and the UI will get way better. I’ll get a PS4 once there are a few more good exclusives. Right now all I want to play is Infamous.
Like alot of others Xbox 360 first in 2008 then picked up a PS3 Slim after I got a PS4 earlier this year to play through the exclusives, that being said I think I prefer the PS3 mainly for the exclusives (Demon Souls, Uncharted, Ni No Kuni, MGS, GOW etc.)
360 started out strong and held the lead for a very long time, but PS3 nipped in over the finish line past it, gaining ground on the quality library, exclusives, and just nosing ahead with increased functionality.
360 had the better start with the cheaper price, superior online and better ports.
But the PS3 was playing the long game, it got cheaper and the games got better, and PS+ just sealed the deal. Plus it had a lot more exclusives that interested me.
In the end I traded/sold my 360 stuff towards a PS4, but my PS3 is still hooked up to the TV.
I owe a PS3 and a Wii and have disliked Microsoft ever since I was at university. The only thing I was ever jealous of Xbox 360 owners were they got more zombie games.
360 hands down for the first 2-3 years. Then the PS3 for the next few with resulting in what I’d call pretty close to a draw.
360 via the superior controller and the better version of Skyrim.
That said, it’s probably the closest console ‘race’ to objectively determine that I can remember.
Absolutely none of the 360 exclusives float my boat – except for maybe Blue Dragon and Lost Odyssey
The PS3 was flat out terrible, I started as a big Sony fan and the ground they lost to Xbox was a joke and what’s even worse is the amount of dillusional people who bought into the Ps4 because sony plugged it as the console for games?
They couldn’t even keep tomb raider what a joke
oh and how is DriveClub going… Hahaha
I really enjoyed my X360 back then, with all the Halos (barring the last one) and the Gears of War and the GTA4. Actually that’s it really.
I am sad that I missed out on the journey that was Journey though. That game looked like it was something special.
And other PS3 titles, probably.
Again trying to play one off against the other.
Both.
I picked the X360.. I think it was slightly cheaper at the time. I didn’t do my research – didn’t realise I could have gotten free online with PS3 or I might have gone that way. Still, I have played some cool stuff on 360.. I still need to go back and pick up a PS3 for it’s exclusives eventually.. hopefully the games won’t be too $$ by the time I get around to it.
Man I did that and I’ve been shocked by how little I feel like I missed out on.
Only got my PS3 a few months ago to play through the Last of Us.
It’s almost certainly just me, but I feel like a lot of the exclusives in the PS3 library were either very solid (but fairly unremarkable) games that have been superseded or massive RPG’s that I just don’t have time to sink my teeth into.
Killzone for example- as soon as it dated graphically it’s just a generic shooter.
Uncharted looks good but it also looks worse than Last of Us, plus the first two games are showing their age now… do you want to go back and play through them all?
Gran Turismo is huge but also awkwardly underwhelming, plus it looks bad compared to the new-gen racers.
There’s just a lot of games that I got annoyed about missing over the past 7 years that I no longer find appealing in 2014.
I’ve found that in the end the best PS3 games to catch up on really are the smaller indie titles (Journey) and the real timeless classics that are available on the PS Store (Abe’s Odyssey, Final Fantasy VII, Destruction Derby ect).
I guess that’s the issue when playing older games that you missed out on isn’t it? Do you play them and compare them to modern games, or games of their own time? After all it’s hard to spot something that WAS revolutionary when modern games have borrowed so much from them.
Killzone now seems like a pretty generic, sometimes clunky, shooter, but at the time was doing some great and unique stuff with a large scale too. Infamous 1 is the same, although for most it will be too clunky to play now. Games have become so refined and so much less clunky since Killzone 2, resistance 1 or Infamous. It’s easy to forget that now and blame them for handling like crap, even though comparatively, they didn’t really.
Uncharted also seems a little generic now, but in it’s day ‘birthed’ the modern set pieces and in a way the type of story telling that we see littered through out modern games.
So I see your problem, it is always going to be an issue to play older games for the first time, because a lot of what made them great has either aged or made it’s way into other games, which you have already played, so won’t be as impressive any more.
I guess it’s a shame, cause you can’t undo playing the newer games so that you can fully appreciate the older ones. You can’t forget playing Tomb Raider, for example, and now playing Uncharted feels like more of the same (Granted more polish and debatably more refined set-pieces, but it’s nothing ground breaking to you)
I guess you just missed out on that, I kinda feel sorry for you, coming back to some of the games that defined this generation and saying ‘Meh’ because well, they don’t seem revolutionary now, in the way that playing Oblivion would feel if you only played it after Skyrim I guess.
I hope you can at least appreciate that these games were amazing and revolutionary in their day, even if they don’t seem extraordinary now.
I think most of the 360 exclusives appeared on PC down the line. I’ll buy one someday for the exclusives that did not appear on the PC, like the stray JRPGs, Crackdown, and uh, Viva Piñata.
Also that RROD thing is scary.
I only bought my 360 for Mass Effect and Left 4 Dead, and later, Dance Central.
My PS3 (multiple, over the years) was the main console for a long time, and the media centre too. So many great games.
PS3, although I may be a bit biased after only getting it this year. I don’t own a 360 as the only exclusive series that interests me is Halo (half of which I already own on PC) and since all multiplats I play on PC, PS3 had overall better exclusives (I used to be a PS2 fanboy), less discs required for Rockstar games (GTA5, RDR) and free online.
For me, the original Xbox was all about the mutliplayer – Halo 2 multiplayer consumed a huge amount of time – and Halo 3 started to take over on the 360 towards the end of that time. I remembe fondly hooking up numerous 360s into our high speed uni network and playing massive team games of Sandtrap – college v college.
However, the PS2 was all about the single player for me and this carried on to the PS3. A quick scan of the games most people are referencing to support each console seem to back this up. 360 was great for couch co-op/competitive with Gears of War, Halo, Fifa; PS3 ruled the single player experience with Uncharted, MGS, Naughty Dog, etc.
It’s never really been a direct comparision like that. For me it was always: Xbox for multiplayer, PS3, Wii (or any Nintendo, really) for family/party/non-gamers.
That said I love me a meaty single player experience so I voted PS3 haha
as a wise young girl in a taco commercial once told me… “why can’t we have both?”
that “dun dah dun dah dah” tune played in my head instantly. Don’t know if I should laugh or be upset. 🙂
Definitely PS3 for me, mostly because all the niche JRPG’s were on it.
I have to say, I’m genuinely surprised at the poll results so far. I’ve always been in the Sony camp, and remembered a lot of people preferring the 360 over the PS3.
same here man. I thought the 360 would lead but I think on a whole most reasonable people felt the PS3 was better taking into account the whole life span.
There’s a link to the previous time this poll was run in a previous post. It was 60% to the PS3 last time.
I bought a PS3 launch day knowing that it would not roll over and die. Especially considering how poorly made the 360 was as far as sounding like a jet and RROD. I refuse to buy electronics that badly made and so should everyone else.
In hindsight I was right. Much better overall experience in my opinion.
I got my PS3 pretty late in the day with a deal including The Last of Us. Have loved it ever since. Also, Tekken just isn’t right on anything other than a Playstation.
I was a raging PS3 fanboy until PSN was hacked, I had 3 weeks off, and there was no goddamn PSN to play online. Faith waned even harder as I was struck by YLOD, my PlayTV worked like crap with my new slim, and the significant updates and improvements significantly slowed.
Then Microsoft launched their slim with new metro dashboard replacing the old awful card system I hated, and I was converted. XBL was just better, more of my friends on Xbox were active online unlike my single player offline PS3 mates, and I was hooked.
Bought a Day One Xbox One, never regretted it even though a few things were better on the 360. Got a free PS4 with my TV, sold it three days later, as I felt Sony hadn’t really improved where I was unhappy with them last gen, and their “gamers first” mantra was just a cop out for giving less features.
Gotta be that original fat model PS3. Such a great design.
I’m a PC gamer primarily, but I bought a PS3 because it had the best exclusives by far: MGS4, Uncharted, TLoU, Dragon’s Crown, Infamous, Demon’s Souls, Ni No Kuni, etc etc.
As for Xbox exclusives, it was only Halo and Gears that even somewhat interested me, but I hate playing shooters with controllers, and the rest were shared with PC 😀