Hello all, my son (9) wants an XBox 360 for Christmas. He has one at his dad’s house but he wants one at mine too. I am thinking about getting one for him but I am confused by all the different packages.
He is 9 but he likes to play first-person shooter games like Assassins Creed (yes, yes, I know he is young for mature titles but I have given up that battle and moved on). He does play “fun” games on our Wii like Mario, too.
Do I need to get a Kinect with the 360 console? Do a lot of games require it? What is the difference between all these different bundles I’m seeing? What is this downloadable content I see, too? Do I have to hook this up to the cable so he can play with other kids or is it wireless? Is there anything else I HAVE to buy besides the console and controllers? Any help would be greatly appreciated.
The only thing you HAVE to have is the console and controllers. The consoles now have built in wireless, so it can be connected to a wireless internet network.
The downloadable content (or DLC) is additons to games that you can download. These add things like new levels, characters, outfits or weapons.
The Kinect is required for certain games and works with some more, but is not needed for most games. It also requires a HUGE amount of room to use properly. The MINIMUM distance for it work is 8 feet from the Kinect to the person and even then you will want more to work it properly. anything less than that and it is less than useless.
There are two types of bundles: the first tie the system and a controller(and sometimes a Kinect) to a specific game. These come with bigger hard drives (320GB now), often a color scheme or design on the box and controller that relates to that game, and a copy of the game usually for less then buying them separately. The second is a starter pack that comes with the box , controller 4GB hard drive and a basic starter game. There is also one that adds a Kinect and changes the starter game to a Kinect game.
Assuming he already has a hard drive with all his stuff on it with the other Xbox, he can use the same one with new one (as long as it’s connected to Xbox Live so they can verify ownership). Just make sure you buy the same model type as the other one (there’s the older, bigger one, and the new “slim” model; their HDD’s are not interchangeable).
This is a thoroughly valid point. It may actually prove a little bit easier (though identifying exactly which power brick you need might be a nuisance if his Xbox is older.) in terms of gamer profile and nonsense, and it’s certainly much cheaper. Buy him some games instead?
Go to bfads.net, they have Target’s Black Friday ad up already. It shows that the Xbox bundle is going for 199, includes the motion thingy and a couple of games.
The power brick is the power supply, the brick-like thing in the power cord between the wall and the Xbox. They generally aren’t interchangeable between the different versions of the Xbox, since they have different power requirements.
This exactly, but to elaborate on why I even brought them up, it was in response to Kinthalis’ suggestion that you just buy the ‘wires’. Getting the appropriate console-to-TV cable is pretty easy and inexpensive (From like $5 to $20 or so, depending on the type you need) but if you want the power cable as well, you’ll need to find out exactly which Xbox model he has. x.x