There’s been much said in the press over the past 6 months regarding Xbox360. Not all of it favourable. I collected my Premium Pack system on Friday 2nd December… the launch day for the 360. I can tell you this. All those Sony fuelled remarks like it’s really just Xbox 1.5 are totally unfounded. The 360 is without a doubt Next-Gen. It’s stunning. Unbelievably powerful. Definately real competition for the fanboys favourite, the Playstation 3.

So, where to start? I guess with the games. I picked up PGR3, Perfect Dark Zero, Madden 06, Call of Duty 2, and got Condemned for free. I can honestly say that I’m not disappointed in any of them. PGR3, or Project Gotham Racing 3, to give it it’s full title is simply breath-taking. Seriously. And it has absolutely nothing to do with the Caped Crusader. PGR3 drops you in a super car, any one of 85 super cars actually, from a Ferrari 355 to a McLaren F1 LM. It gives you a choice of cities, New York, Tokyo, London, Las Vegas, and the Nurburgring. And you just hammer the car around the track at breakneck speeds against the CPU cars, or upto 8 racers online on Xbox Live. What’s so different in comparison to other racers? Wait till you see the graphics, especially on an HDTV. Never has a racer looked this realistic. The detail of the cities is nothing short of spectacular. The cars, utterly realistic, right down to the dials in the incredibly detailed interiors. The game is wonderous. And it plays superbly well. This is next generation gamings killer app.

Perfect Dark Zero is a game that’s had mixed press pre and post launch. Is it any good? That depends on your point of view. Does it better Halo or Halo 2? Visually, yes. Gameplay? Maybe, it’s a different animal. Perfect Dark Zero plays like Perfect Dark and Golden Eye on the N64. It’s got quite an old school feel. If you liked Perfect Dark and Golden Eye, chances are you’re going to like this. Played on Perfect Agent (Dark Agent won’t come till you beat the game on Perfect Agent) it’s a really tough challenge. It’s got that hardcore toughness that made Perfect Dark on the N64 both joyous and frustrating. It’s also retained the just one more try thing that kept you struggling along with its prequel (or should that be sequel?). It even has online co-op. How cool is that? I’ve not really tried to the multiplayer side of things yet, but I did play in a match with 8 players and 24 bots. Yes, 24 bots. Manic. This is a great FPS game, it has superb graphics, and its a lot of fun to play.

There’s not a whole lot to say about Madden. If you’ve played it on Xbox or PS2 you know pretty much what to expect. Gameplay remains mostly the same, with a few minor tweaks to the camera controls, and excellent play selection screens. However what will take you back is the graphics. Again the visuals are unbelievable. The player models are scarily realistic. The crowds are now fully animated, and made of polygons rather than sprites. It’s a very impressive show piece. And for the first time in the UK, it’s online on Xbox Live. Madden fans will love this.

Call of Duty 2 is ridiculously impressive visually. Very detailed landscapes. Impressive looking character models. Huge numbers of soldiers on both sides create some very impressive WWII battles. There’s just so much going on in this game. It’s definately the definitive WWII FPS game. I had a quick play online in an 8 player game set in a farmyard. Graphics were mind blowing, and a lot of fun was to be had creeping around with a sniper rifle, looking for head shots. Online it feels a lot like Ghost Recon, but with graphics that really wow.

Condemned is a game I’ve barely touched. It’s had very mixed reviews. The general impression I get is that it is visually and aurally stunning. It’s scary. It’s short. And it’s far too simplistic. Time will tell. It was free after all. I expect this to be traded for Kameo over Xmas.

OK. So that’s the games discussed. I’d say that all but Condemned are must buy games. What about the hardware? Well, it’s much more than simply a box for playing games. I’ll not go into the specs of the hardware, you’ll find that all over the net. Imagine taking the most state of the art graphics card available, upping it’s spec still further, then bolting it onto 3 powerful Apple G5 workstations and you’re probably in the ballpark for the consoles next gen power.What impresses the most however is what it does other than just games.

Take the media functionality. It can connect to Windows XP to stream music and pictures for use in the console. So you can listen to your MP3 collection or display a photo album on the TV. It can connect to Windows Media Centre to additionally stream AVI based movies. Music can be streamed whilst playing games, allowing you to choose the backing track for the game, not the developer. You can even stream music from an iPod. And of course you can watch DVD.

You can setup a private chat channel with anyone on your friends list, then talk to them using the Xbox Live Headset whether you’re playing the same game, a different game, or no games at all.You can download classic (and entirely new) arcade games from Xbox Live Arcade (I downloaded Galaxy Wars and Gauntlet) which can be played solo, or with friends online. You can download game demos such as Kameo or NBA Live and try them before you buy.

Enough. There’s just too much to talk about, and I’ve barely scratched the surface. Go buy one, if you can. Find out for yourself.