Important Message to Those Entrusted with Top-Secret Games Consoles
Do not give them to your children to photograph in your absence.
Microsoft is a big company. A lot of people work there, many of them involved with the Xbox 360 project. Some of them are entrusted with Xbox 360 hardware, able to take it home to complete vital elements of pre-production testing. Some might even show it to their stepchildren. What's the point of having a cool videogame job if you don't share it with your loved ones?
Of course, sometimes this all goes wrong. Like in this example for instance. Seemingly, a (presumably) senior tester based in Seattle brought home an Xbox 360 and showed it to his stepson. Then went away on a business trip to Mexico, land of Valium, tequila and kidnapping. He left a pre-production unit in the charge of his cookooboy who promptly took pictures of himself playing Halo 2 on it (giving the world a first glimpse of backwards-compatibility in action) and wrote a sub-dyslexic essay on his thoughts, reproduced below.
At some point his Stepfather tester got wind of this, probably by way of being fired, and the information and images were ripped down from GameSpot's forum. Though, via the magic of browser caching, here they are. We also thought it appropriate to include the boy's impressions, in memory of his fingers which have no doubt now been snapped off:
Of course, sometimes this all goes wrong. Like in this example for instance. Seemingly, a (presumably) senior tester based in Seattle brought home an Xbox 360 and showed it to his stepson. Then went away on a business trip to Mexico, land of Valium, tequila and kidnapping. He left a pre-production unit in the charge of his cookooboy who promptly took pictures of himself playing Halo 2 on it (giving the world a first glimpse of backwards-compatibility in action) and wrote a sub-dyslexic essay on his thoughts, reproduced below.
At some point his Stepfather tester got wind of this, probably by way of being fired, and the information and images were ripped down from GameSpot's forum. Though, via the magic of browser caching, here they are. We also thought it appropriate to include the boy's impressions, in memory of his fingers which have no doubt now been snapped off:
my step dad works here in seattle for xbox hes the forgein tester guy. He had a trip to mexico to test the new xbox so he had to bring it home and he let me play it. There arnt any xbox360 games yet i guess so all i got to play was halo 2. but all the test stuff was on there like dolphin and light shadow stuff, Oh and the XBOX dashboard . I uesto hATE xbox purley a PS fan. but WOW new xbox has some COol stuff. First i tried dolphin witch doesnt have liek GOOD grapics or anything its just a frame test and the xbox was geting 3000+ frames witch was pretty stuinning for me. and the Xbox dashboard is amazing im not aloud to tell everything about it but WOW theres soo much crap on the xbox and some of it is sooO miscelanius. theres xbox arcade were u can Dl like arcade games and crap and u can stream music from ur PC to ur xbox and tons and tons and tons of other crap. I just thought id post about it, ps3 is definatly guna have some compitition. IM SURE all of u have probably read stuff like this on sites but OH one more thing im not supposed tell this, but the power supply conecter thing for the xbox, lets just say its not COMPACT, witch might be why u havnt seen it in any pics. thats all for now post some feedback.
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Comments
Joji 20 Jul 2005 14:03
1/11
That kid must be real brave or real stupid even though it's to our benefit. It has to be said though that we'd be very unlikely to get such honesty in what 360 is like, in the hands of question dodging MS suit reps.
360 does sound good even by his dislexic words and the funny thng s I believe him. But I'll see for myself in November.
Jeez MS must be fuming, or maybe not as this could be just another pr stunt to raise awareness.
360 does sound good even by his dislexic words and the funny thng s I believe him. But I'll see for myself in November.
Jeez MS must be fuming, or maybe not as this could be just another pr stunt to raise awareness.
TwoADay 20 Jul 2005 14:10
2/11
Joji wrote:
That kid must be real brave or real stupid even though it's to our benefit.
Judging by his writing, I'll vote for the latter. (or in his case, I'm sure he would write "ladder.")
Anyway, not only is the kid a fool for appearing in the pictures, the dad is a bigger one for leaving it out for his kid to play while he's off in Mexico.
Just enough information in that for the dad to be found and to loose his job. I would say it's definately deserved.
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jonno394 20 Jul 2005 15:02
3/11
imo, this is a pr stunt.
There just seems to be something about the pics that make me think this. The fact that the room is exceptionally barren; all there is, si a pillow. I would have taken it to my bedroom to play.
the fact he is playing it on a TV on the floor; who does this, it would make more effort to bring a TV to set up on the floor than just throw the 360 into your room.
There just seems to be something about the pics that make me think this. The fact that the room is exceptionally barren; all there is, si a pillow. I would have taken it to my bedroom to play.
the fact he is playing it on a TV on the floor; who does this, it would make more effort to bring a TV to set up on the floor than just throw the 360 into your room.
fluffstardx 20 Jul 2005 16:34
4/11
It does scream PR. Mainly because of that "i'm totally loyal to PS but wow the graphics are awesome" bit. He already said he's playing Halo 2, so he hasn't seen them yet!
Gav 20 Jul 2005 20:59
5/11
So, is there any reason why the light isnt on, on the front of the console?
ash 20 Jul 2005 21:50
6/11
Joji wrote:
Jeez MS must be fuming, or maybe not as this could be just another pr stunt to raise awareness.
This is a total PR setup. Just look at how they wrote the write-up. (No negative and only positive notes written in pseudo-dyslexic to give it flavor.) This is just one of many microsoft tactics to keep getting news hits and generating buzz about 360 before their system goes live.
fluffstardx 20 Jul 2005 22:15
7/11
Gav wrote:
So, is there any reason why the light isnt on, on the front of the console?
...
He's right. It isn't even on. And why are all those wires sticking out of the hard disk?
The pad looks a lot smaller there, too.
jonno394 20 Jul 2005 23:09
8/11
I assume those cables are sticking out because the HDD is not inside the Xbox360, and testing is done through an external HDD, which would require those cables.
LUPOS 20 Jul 2005 23:15
9/11
fluffstardx wrote:
It does scream PR. Mainly because of that "i'm totally loyal to PS but wow the graphics are awesome" bit. He already said he's playing Halo 2, so he hasn't seen them yet!
did he say that? cause all i remeebr reading is... there are no games but i did look at the dolphin thing that doesnt look very good but gets 3000+ FPS... and he said the stuff ont he dashboard is cool
also i do believe that it is a PR thing... its poor writing is very over done and juvinile... plus he made no mention of anythgin we didnt already know... i.e. you can play halo2... and then they drop the little bit aboutth epower suply at the end to add a little needed credit to it... also i hope no one really complains if it does have a big brick on the back... seeing as the game cube is loved for its tinyness but has a 5 lb block hanging off its ass... which is probably the only reason it is smaller than the ps2 which had its converter buitl in.
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PreciousRoi 21 Jul 2005 04:36
10/11
unconfirmed tidbit:
kid's dad is recent MS hire, he's in "Compliance" testing, which I assume deals with various countries electrical/electronic device regulations.
This may explain the wires, and power light, if this box is a compliance testing unit, it might have a few unique modifications, bypassing the power light might have been a side effect.
Given the recent rise of viral marketing and suchlike, suspicion of this as a PR device is natural. The bit that gets me, and this is either pure genius on their part (MS PR) or strongly suggests that this "event" is genuine...He points out a wart by implying that theres a massive PS brick.
Not much I know, but this kid (and his story) seem just dumb enough to be legit...I give it 60/40, which as any good poker player knows are very playable odds...
kid's dad is recent MS hire, he's in "Compliance" testing, which I assume deals with various countries electrical/electronic device regulations.
This may explain the wires, and power light, if this box is a compliance testing unit, it might have a few unique modifications, bypassing the power light might have been a side effect.
Given the recent rise of viral marketing and suchlike, suspicion of this as a PR device is natural. The bit that gets me, and this is either pure genius on their part (MS PR) or strongly suggests that this "event" is genuine...He points out a wart by implying that theres a massive PS brick.
Not much I know, but this kid (and his story) seem just dumb enough to be legit...I give it 60/40, which as any good poker player knows are very playable odds...
BustyKrusty 21 Jul 2005 08:08
11/11
OH God,a senior Microsoft tester's house not having a HDTv and poor kid playing in a corner on a pocket Tv while stepdads on a "3rd class" avion trip. Hehe, i'm not buying this, but i do hope X360 being compatible with more than just best selling games.