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Since Shigeru Miyamoto created the very first videogame with a battery backup memory system included into it's cartridge, The Legend of Zelda, the size and length of games has been able to increase dramatically. Now, instead of playing til your eyes itch and burn like someone's poured some Hydrochloric acid in your eyes, everyone was able to save their progress, turn the power off and return to the game whenever they felt like it.
Ever since then, new ideas have been very slowly incorporated into the save features of games. Scores could now be recorded, and those arcade high-score tables would actually display your highest score instead of some stupid pre-programmed score that the developers didn't really get. PC games could use the PC's own hard disk drive providing there's enough memory left to save in the videogame's directory.
However, when disc based games came along, the battery-backup save features just disappeared and it was back to square one. No more did each game have it's own memory limited to exactly how much it needed. No, people using the disc based systems had to switch to using external memory chips in the form of Memory Cards. Even third party Nintendo games on Nintendos last cartridge based home-tv console system, the Nintendo 64, used memory cards, or as they called them, Memory Paks, to save games on.
The save features went from more than just high scores to actually saving extra characters, vehicles and in some cases saved the code to keep secret tracks, levels and courses depending on the game. Having external memory also meant you didn't have to carry the whole cartridges to a friend's house if they had the same game and you wanted to carry on with the game.
It seems, however, that the Microsoft X-box has de-evolved the way we save games and the fact the storage medium was portable, by including a hard disk drive. Sure, they're the first console to make itself more like a PC with this type of hardware, but Sony have previously announced plans for their own Hard Disk Drive in the Playstation 2 and the Nintendo GameCube has a third expansion port which they could possibly use with a hard drive.
So what opportunities does the X-box hard disk drive open up for Microsoft and the X-box? After all, it's just a storage medium. It doesn't improve any more of the console's specs or anything.
Some people claim it will speed up loading times, but that all depends on the speed of the hard disk drive and it's own readers, and then it all depends on what files are copied off the original X-box game discs in the first place.
Others say that they'll be downloading game updates, like what was possible with the Dreamcast, but to their hard drive so that they can play better versions of their favourite games, and have any extras that become available. However, chances are that Microsoft will add a charge to downloading updates, or will sell them on seperate discs in the shops to try and get as much money out of gamers as possible. Sure, we'd like to hope not, but with a reputation like Microsofts, you can't rule that possibility out.
Many will most likely stick to using it as a storage medium to save their games. After all, gamers like to be able to keep things simple. Just turn on and play. Sure, we've got online gaming working it's way into the picture when it comes to consoles, but still, the gamers have to pay extra costs to use the phone lines, to use the ISPs and the parents of most gamers (the majority being teenage-unemployed-students with no or little income at all), are going to have to fork out for it all. Sure, we've got the internet on our PCs, but most ISPs offer a flatrate and you have free access 24/7, however, whether the games companies are going to do the same is yet to be seen or heard of.
Is the Hard Drive the way forward for console storage?
Ever since then, new ideas have been very slowly incorporated into the save features of games. Scores could now be recorded, and those arcade high-score tables would actually display your highest score instead of some stupid pre-programmed score that the developers didn't really get. PC games could use the PC's own hard disk drive providing there's enough memory left to save in the videogame's directory.
However, when disc based games came along, the battery-backup save features just disappeared and it was back to square one. No more did each game have it's own memory limited to exactly how much it needed. No, people using the disc based systems had to switch to using external memory chips in the form of Memory Cards. Even third party Nintendo games on Nintendos last cartridge based home-tv console system, the Nintendo 64, used memory cards, or as they called them, Memory Paks, to save games on.
The save features went from more than just high scores to actually saving extra characters, vehicles and in some cases saved the code to keep secret tracks, levels and courses depending on the game. Having external memory also meant you didn't have to carry the whole cartridges to a friend's house if they had the same game and you wanted to carry on with the game.
It seems, however, that the Microsoft X-box
So what opportunities does the X-box hard disk drive open up for Microsoft and the X-box? After all, it's just a storage medium. It doesn't improve any more of the console's specs or anything.
Some people claim it will speed up loading times, but that all depends on the speed of the hard disk drive and it's own readers, and then it all depends on what files are copied off the original X-box game discs in the first place.
Others say that they'll be downloading game updates, like what was possible with the Dreamcast, but to their hard drive so that they can play better versions of their favourite games, and have any extras that become available. However, chances are that Microsoft will add a charge to downloading updates, or will sell them on seperate discs in the shops to try and get as much money out of gamers as possible. Sure, we'd like to hope not, but with a reputation like Microsofts, you can't rule that possibility out.
Many will most likely stick to using it as a storage medium to save their games. After all, gamers like to be able to keep things simple. Just turn on and play. Sure, we've got online gaming working it's way into the picture when it comes to consoles, but still, the gamers have to pay extra costs to use the phone lines, to use the ISPs and the parents of most gamers (the majority being teenage-unemployed-students with no or little income at all), are going to have to fork out for it all. Sure, we've got the internet on our PCs, but most ISPs offer a flatrate and you have free access 24/7, however, whether the games companies are going to do the same is yet to be seen or heard of.
Is the Hard Drive the way forward for console storage?
Anothre major disadvantage I can see is what happens when you run out of Hard Drive space? If you do use the hard disk for things like patches, upgrades, and also your save files what happens if it gets full? You have to buy a whole new hard drive? Unless you want to delete a load of your old saves then it seems like you would...
Also, on the PC many games are released with bugs. These can be fixed with the release of patches, but will the Hard Drive on Xbox make developers a little more sloppy in thinking, 'oh, if there's a bug we can get a patch for people to download later' rather than ensuring there are no bugs before release. And then what happens to those without internet access on their Xbox? They have a game with a bug in it.
For consoles I still see small memory cards for use with DVD games as a better way than a hard drive. The new SD digital cards (which are used with things like digital cameras and I think MP3 players too?) have a huge capacity for videogames, and as they go down in price it will mean we can easily transport all our saves, our character information, the levels we've built, etc. on one card (assuming we don't have 100s of games to dave anyway... :D) and we can use them at our friends house, or with some of these new ideas of linking together as many forms of gaming as possible, we could use our saves at the arcade, or maybe even on other consoles with the same game (assuming at some point all consoles use a similar memory card such as the SD cards I mentioned earlier).
A harddrive may be necessary for the internet, but for those of us who won't be able to afford internet gaming on our consoles anytime soon, small, portable memory cards seem much more preferable.
Also, on the PC many games are released with bugs. These can be fixed with the release of patches, but will the Hard Drive on Xbox make developers a little more sloppy in thinking, 'oh, if there's a bug we can get a patch for people to download later' rather than ensuring there are no bugs before release. And then what happens to those without internet access on their Xbox? They have a game with a bug in it.
For consoles I still see small memory cards for use with DVD games as a better way than a hard drive. The new SD digital cards (which are used with things like digital cameras and I think MP3 players too?) have a huge capacity for videogames, and as they go down in price it will mean we can easily transport all our saves, our character information, the levels we've built, etc. on one card (assuming we don't have 100s of games to dave anyway... :D) and we can use them at our friends house, or with some of these new ideas of linking together as many forms of gaming as possible, we could use our saves at the arcade, or maybe even on other consoles with the same game (assuming at some point all consoles use a similar memory card such as the SD cards I mentioned earlier).
A harddrive may be necessary for the internet, but for those of us who won't be able to afford internet gaming on our consoles anytime soon, small, portable memory cards seem much more preferable.
Since Shigeru Miyamoto created the very first videogame with a battery backup memory system included into it's cartridge, The Legend of Zelda, the size and length of games has been able to increase dramatically. Now, instead of playing til your eyes itch and burn like someone's poured some Hydrochloric acid in your eyes, everyone was able to save their progress, turn the power off and return to the game whenever they felt like it.
Ever since then, new ideas have been very slowly incorporated into the save features of games. Scores could now be recorded, and those arcade high-score tables would actually display your highest score instead of some stupid pre-programmed score that the developers didn't really get. PC games could use the PC's own hard disk drive providing there's enough memory left to save in the videogame's directory.
However, when disc based games came along, the battery-backup save features just disappeared and it was back to square one. No more did each game have it's own memory limited to exactly how much it needed. No, people using the disc based systems had to switch to using external memory chips in the form of Memory Cards. Even third party Nintendo games on Nintendos last cartridge based home-tv console system, the Nintendo 64, used memory cards, or as they called them, Memory Paks, to save games on.
The save features went from more than just high scores to actually saving extra characters, vehicles and in some cases saved the code to keep secret tracks, levels and courses depending on the game. Having external memory also meant you didn't have to carry the whole cartridges to a friend's house if they had the same game and you wanted to carry on with the game.
It seems, however, that the Microsoft X-box has de-evolved the way we save games and the fact the storage medium was portable, by including a hard disk drive. Sure, they're the first console to make itself more like a PC with this type of hardware, but Sony have previously announced plans for their own Hard Disk Drive in the Playstation 2 and the Nintendo GameCube has a third expansion port which they could possibly use with a hard drive.
So what opportunities does the X-box hard disk drive open up for Microsoft and the X-box? After all, it's just a storage medium. It doesn't improve any more of the console's specs or anything.
Some people claim it will speed up loading times, but that all depends on the speed of the hard disk drive and it's own readers, and then it all depends on what files are copied off the original X-box game discs in the first place.
Others say that they'll be downloading game updates, like what was possible with the Dreamcast, but to their hard drive so that they can play better versions of their favourite games, and have any extras that become available. However, chances are that Microsoft will add a charge to downloading updates, or will sell them on seperate discs in the shops to try and get as much money out of gamers as possible. Sure, we'd like to hope not, but with a reputation like Microsofts, you can't rule that possibility out.
Many will most likely stick to using it as a storage medium to save their games. After all, gamers like to be able to keep things simple. Just turn on and play. Sure, we've got online gaming working it's way into the picture when it comes to consoles, but still, the gamers have to pay extra costs to use the phone lines, to use the ISPs and the parents of most gamers (the majority being teenage-unemployed-students with no or little income at all), are going to have to fork out for it all. Sure, we've got the internet on our PCs, but most ISPs offer a flatrate and you have free access 24/7, however, whether the games companies are going to do the same is yet to be seen or heard of.
Is the Hard Drive the way forward for console storage?
Ever since then, new ideas have been very slowly incorporated into the save features of games. Scores could now be recorded, and those arcade high-score tables would actually display your highest score instead of some stupid pre-programmed score that the developers didn't really get. PC games could use the PC's own hard disk drive providing there's enough memory left to save in the videogame's directory.
However, when disc based games came along, the battery-backup save features just disappeared and it was back to square one. No more did each game have it's own memory limited to exactly how much it needed. No, people using the disc based systems had to switch to using external memory chips in the form of Memory Cards. Even third party Nintendo games on Nintendos last cartridge based home-tv console system, the Nintendo 64, used memory cards, or as they called them, Memory Paks, to save games on.
The save features went from more than just high scores to actually saving extra characters, vehicles and in some cases saved the code to keep secret tracks, levels and courses depending on the game. Having external memory also meant you didn't have to carry the whole cartridges to a friend's house if they had the same game and you wanted to carry on with the game.
It seems, however, that the Microsoft X-box
So what opportunities does the X-box hard disk drive open up for Microsoft and the X-box? After all, it's just a storage medium. It doesn't improve any more of the console's specs or anything.
Some people claim it will speed up loading times, but that all depends on the speed of the hard disk drive and it's own readers, and then it all depends on what files are copied off the original X-box game discs in the first place.
Others say that they'll be downloading game updates, like what was possible with the Dreamcast, but to their hard drive so that they can play better versions of their favourite games, and have any extras that become available. However, chances are that Microsoft will add a charge to downloading updates, or will sell them on seperate discs in the shops to try and get as much money out of gamers as possible. Sure, we'd like to hope not, but with a reputation like Microsofts, you can't rule that possibility out.
Many will most likely stick to using it as a storage medium to save their games. After all, gamers like to be able to keep things simple. Just turn on and play. Sure, we've got online gaming working it's way into the picture when it comes to consoles, but still, the gamers have to pay extra costs to use the phone lines, to use the ISPs and the parents of most gamers (the majority being teenage-unemployed-students with no or little income at all), are going to have to fork out for it all. Sure, we've got the internet on our PCs, but most ISPs offer a flatrate and you have free access 24/7, however, whether the games companies are going to do the same is yet to be seen or heard of.
Is the Hard Drive the way forward for console storage?