Xbox One Review

Xbox One Review – Games and Conclusion

While the PS4 may have fairly categorically won the hardware war (Kinect aside) the Xbox One, at least on paper, has the gaming side of things wrapped up at launch. Its list of exclusive launch titles is much greater than that of its rival, and more importantly a couple of its AAA titles really deliver the goods.

The most standout exclusive launch of both consoles if Forza 5. It may have fewer cars and tracks than previous incarnations but the overall execution is superb, with improved AI and particularly clever use of the Xbox One's new force-feedback triggers. It certainly helps that it's one of the few Xbox One titles that actually runs at 1080p too.



Dead Rising 3 is also mostly a hit. Battling to safety through the streets of Los Perdidos (a made-up Southern Californian city) and the thousands of zombies therein is great fun, and visually very impressive. The sheer scale of the place and the mass of zombies is quite the perfect demonstration of the power of 'next gen'. It isn't perfect - the controls aren't precise enough for when the going gets tough and the writing is atrociously junvenile - but it's generally a lot of fun.



Of course it hasn’t all been rosy for Microsoft. The spectacular-looking Roman hack and slash, Ryse, simply failed to deliver on the gameplay front. It's a real shame because the technology behind the game and the visuals are stunning. Being based on the Crytek engine, perhaps we should've always expected it to be style over substance.



Nonetheless, Sony’s AAA exclusives fell much further short. Killzone: Shadow Fall is okay but feels altogether too generic to get worked up about – especially in the face of both the latest Call of Duty and Battefield titles arriving at the same time. Meanwhile, Knack is a pile of rubbish.

Further extending this lead is the Xbox One's raft of decent download-only titles, such as Zoo Tycoon, Powerstar Golf and Killer Instinct. Here there are some slip ups too – most notably the game that some are already calling the worst Xbox One game ever – but generally it’s a more substantial list than its rival.


However, on the flipside, when it comes to cross-platform titles the PS4 is the clear winner thanks to being able to run these games at higher resolutions. For all that developers can pull impressive amounts of performance from consoles throughout there lifetime, that advantage is likely to always be noticeable for cross-platform titles.

Looking to the future, the Xbox One has the only really major exclusive in the short term, with it waiting for Titanfall to arrive in Spring 2014. However, the PS4 will be getting the likes of the next Uncharted, the impressive looking DriveClub and Infamous: Second Son at some point. Meanwhile both consoles can look forward to the other two most anticipated games of next year which are Destiny and Watch Dogs, both of which are coming to PC too. All told, both platforms will have plenty going for them.

Xbox One Review – Conclusion

The battle between the PS4 and Xbox One may seem to be one of streamlined performance versus expensive gimmicks but what our time with the Xbox One has shown us is that the Xbox One's extras really do go some way to justifying its price. Moreover the whole Microsoft vision of having a games console as the centre of your living room does actually work.

Using the powerful new Kinect to navigate between Blu-rays, TV, games and the likes of Netflix really does feel like a step into a future way of controlling your multimedia. Heck, even if all you ever use Kinect for is avoiding having to manually login, it's still darn useful.

That's why it really is a shame the TV integration isn't more powerful and, well, less fundamentally broken, here in the UK as we definitely found being able to watch the telly while engaging in everything else the console had to offer a quite compelling experience.

Still, with such a high asking price and a noticeably lower level of graphical fidelity the Xbox One does seem slightly poor value compared to the PS4, especially if you really just don't care for TV integration and Kinect. After all £80 could buy you a couple of new games or, if you want to treat your PC, there are plenty of small hardware upgrades you could get for that money.

Nonetheless, Microsoft has gambled, taken the flak and can largely come out of it with its head held high. The Xbox One may be the bigger, uglier and slower brother to the PS4 but it definitely has plenty of hidden talents.