I loved 1-3, but 4 I hated. Everything good in 3 was ruined. I loved 1-3 because you drove your dream cars and raced them stock, against similar cars. The game promoted you to play with a variety of cars, and was just pure fun. FM4 forced you to upgrade every car, and encouraged you to play with 1 manufacterer if you wanted all the achievements. I just gave up on that game, going back to Gran Turismo.

I still haven't beated Dead Rising 1 lol, got frustrated cause I couldn't save all the survivors and I saved at a point where I have 8 of them. The AI is just dumb.

Don't buy any accessories, or non-essential services. MS provides no customer support. I've had problems with Sony too, but they were a lot better about it. Microsoft is the worst by far, worse then any phone company x10.

I've never had a good experience with any first gen console which aren't Nintendo or Sega. So unless it's a Nintendo system, I don't buy anything on release. Plus I have a solid 20 360 games, 15 Wii games, and 25 PS3 games to beat before I go next gen, and nothing on the XB1/PS4 really interest me yet (My PC can play Titanfall and Quantum Break)

When I go next gen, I'm switching back to Sony though. Reliability and Customer Service go a long way with me, I feel very cheaped out with Microsoft. Plus Sony has shown me with the PS3 that not only will they support it late into life (unlike the 360 and MS) that the Japanese will exclusively support the PS4/WiiU, and I love my JRPG's.

It only broke 3 times, but MS refused to fix it 5/6 times. So it was in the mail for a solid 10 months needlessly. MS only properly fixed it once, but since I had an extended warrenty at Best Buy which they ignored (RRoD problems had to be sent to MS), their "help" hurt me more...

I don't know about the others but most of Microsoft's customer support is out-sourced and most agents are work-from-home and very lightly trained. Mainly, most of the training is "follow the prompts in the software." I'm not really exaggerating there, either. They spend a LOT of time, and I mean days, going over all that LIVE offers so you can sell the customer on what they're getting but very little time going over the actual problems. They even had a whole training section about that Call of Duty service.

It's really training on the job, which sucks for both the customer and the agent. They'll throw fresh agents out to the phones 40 at a time with maybe 2-4 trainers in chat-room backup. It's impossible. Just pray that you get an experienced agent. Even then, though, a lot of agents aren't gamers and all they're doing is reading prompts. I listened to a ghost call of a guy on the phone with this kid for like 45 minutes, walking through all these steps that the software suggested, while I'm thinking, "it's a bloody known bug in Borderlands 2, Gearbox has already issued a statement about it."

One tip, though, is that most of the experienced agents quit phones and move to chat support when they can. With chat support, you have to be cleared for everything; with phones, the first person you speak with is usually not cleared for billing or hardware problems. That's where all the new people start.

I like all the badges you can earn in Forza 4 that is one of the main reason I like it better then 3 it has so much more replay value to unlock all the badges will take forever.  The manufactures achievement was actually pretty easy to get took me a little over 30 hours to get using Peugeot's.  Plus on top of that Forza 4 has a better selection of cars then 3 and a better variety of diffent type of races.  The AI in Dead Rising 1 is pretty dumb but it got a lot better in the second game and in the 3rd game the survivors will actually help you out in the game.

Like you I will probably pick up an X1 very late on to play some exclusives. Not much really draws me to the console.

Microsoft, Nintendo, and Sony release crap consoles at the start of their life cycles. Is that new information??? It's just a matter of luck that PS3 worked well from the start...

There will be stuff, Halo should be worth $20 end of life, even if there are 4 or 5 different Halo's. Forza's are pretty good, and I'm sure MS will get more exclusives which aren't also available on PC.

Yea, but there is 1 achievement which requires you to get to lvl 50 with 1 manufacterer, so it kinda forces me to drive Ferrarri's all the time just because there is variety on every performance index.

I just hate upgrading cars, I hate how FM4 makes it mandatory in order to compete. Makes the game feel like an Arcade game instead of a sim.

What I really miss is Project Gotham Racing. I know that was an arcade game, but damn, it was ahead of its time. In car view in 2005, ice and hail which no other game has yet. Plus the selection of cars is great, I don't think GT or Forza have an Ariel Atom yet, but PGR had it in PGR4.

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As for Dead Rising, sounds great, but before I get excited about 3, I want to beat 1 and 2 first. As it stands, I have too many games, DR3 isn't enough to get me excited about a new console. Actually very little makes me want a new console, PS3 is getting more new games then next gen consoles, so I'm not ready to jump ship just yet (Drakengard 3, GTAV, Tales of Xillia 2, New Atelier game, Disgaea D2, Dark Souls II, etc, etc).

Only next gen game to wow me, and push me to get a new console so far is X for Wii U, and when it releases I will get a WiiU.

WOW.... you must be the most cursed MS user I know.... well I'm the opposite I have had 3 XB360 not a single RRoD I got a day one never RRoDed and it was on most of the time even when not playing (mabe keeping it always hot prevented the board to wrap when cooling down :) bought a second like a year after never got a RRoD but it got stolen in a break in :(
and now I have a slim I bought when Kinect launched and still 0 problem....

now with MS customer service (in general, not just for 360) I have had some of the best experience with a cust service all around.... every question I had got answered at most in a few days if not within 24 hours or I go directly with the live chat.... then again I rarely use the phone for cust service...

so yeah I feel you I'd be also pissed probably if I had your bad experience.... but damn you have bad luck...well I wish you good luck with your future purchase, from MS or otherwise....

Ive had RROD twice replaced in 4 days one and a week the other. The guy has to be cursed lol 8x. 15hrs? Lol this seems unreal.
I do hate that there is always a foreigner picking up when I call. So I have to get straight to the point don't ask for my last name just call me K.

The Fat PS2 was better than the Slim...

I know the feel bro, sure you were way more unlucky. My 360 broke down "only" 4 times, right now it's working but from time to time the dvd-player opens up out of nowere resetting the game and naturally, according to MS customer care, my console is perfectly funcional. I think I won't buy any console made by them in the next few years. To be honest tought, also my Ps3 broke down 3 times, and the 3rd time I had to get a new one.

edit:

For this following gen, I've already got a WiiU and a 3DS and I'm planning to buy a Ps4 or a next-gen PC by 2014-2015, depending on exlcusives and price of PC components.