xbox360
March 31st, 2009
Last week I bought an xbox 360. My justification, and believe me, I had to have one, was that we needed a bridge between our home network and the main TV. This has been an obvious gap in our otherwise comprehensively digital lifestyle (CDL™), and of all the options the xbox was just about the cheapest. It just so happens to be a pretty decent console as well, but I can assure you that this is a coincidence. Really though it’s win:win. Lara gets Gossip Girl; I get Halo 3; and the girls get absolutely no copyrighted intellectual property of the Disney corporation, on demand.
Setup has not been straightforward. I think this has been more to do with my veteran wireless network than any intrinsic difficulty in the process, but I spent a good chunk of the weekend climbing the 2 stories between router and desktop, tweaking and checking. It’s working now, although disconcertingly without me having changed anything since it wasn’t. Thus it threatens to drop off at any moment should I so much as think about a new router.
Anyway my real point of writing this is to relate my buying strategy, which I’m smugly pleased with: Kelkoo are currently offering cashback on certain retailers, and GAME offers a generous 5.4%. Next, a quick eBay scout of the resale value of their bundled game alternatives shows Resident Evil 5 (just out, Edge score: 7/10) fetching about £30. Ching!
Decision made: I bought the console Weds for £190. £10 and change rebate will surely take its time to arrive, but it will come. The console arrived Fri and by Sunday morning I’d sold RE5 for £33 on Amazon (my cut: approx. £27). Net outlay: just over £150 for the premium system and 2 controllers. Nice. I still have plenty to play on the Wii right now (the xbox looks amazingly clumsy and huge next to it), but in the mean time all those triple-As (Gears of War, Halo, Orange Box, Bioshock) are depreciating nicely.