My gaming machines - Then & Now

My first proper gaming console was the Wii and now I am on the Xbox One. There's a gap of 7 years between release dates, the Wii was released on November 19, 2006 while the Xbox One was released on November 22, 2013. As a result, the Xbox One is more advanced than the Wii.

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I got my Wii for Christmas in 2008. Games that came with it included Cars, Mario Kart, Wii Sports and Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games. Over time, I got more and more games for it. I got my favourite game for it after wanting it for just over 2 years for my 11th birthday in 2013, Mario Kart: Double Dash (as you could put GameCube discs into it and play them as normal provided you had a GameCube controller (which was still wired) and a memory card). The Wii was Nintendo's first home console to have game memory stored on the system instead of on a memory card and the first one to have wireless controllers. My favourite proper Wii game was Cars: Race O'Rama, which was so good when it was released in 2009 because they created new towns to explore, not just the main setting of Radiator Springs.

Image result for mario kart double dash screenshotImage result for mario kart wii screenshot

The Wii's graphics are high quality in comparison to earlier consoles, however, looking back, they are quite pixelated by today's standards. Personally, looking at this example, Mario Kart Wii on the right, I think the graphics on Mario Kart: Double Dash on the GameCube on the left were better looking.

On November 18, 2012, the Wii's successor, the Wii U was released and the Wii was discontinued shortly after. I got my Wii U for Christmas in 2013, playing Super Mario 3D World on it until Mario Kart 8 came out and I continued to play on both my Wii and my Wii U until September 2014, when after just under 6 years, the Wii remotes were refusing to work and I decided it was time to pull the plug out on the old Wii. I haven't touched my Wii U since I got my PS3.

The Wii remote was a completely new concept as opposed to traditional game controllers and one could connect them to the Wii U as well.

The Hardware specs for the Wii are as follows:

CPU speed: 729 MHz
GPU speed: 243 MHz
System RAM: 88 MB
Internal ROM: 512 MB
USB: 2 ports

As of May 20, 2014, you can't play Wii games online. The reason for this was because Mario Kart 8 was coming out on the Wii U in 10 days and Nintendo wanted everyone to play that online instead of Mario Kart Wii so the Nintendo WFC network that the Wii used was shut down on that date.

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My Xbox One is an Xbox One S and I got it for Christmas in 2016 so I could play GTA V on next-gen and be able to do everything. I'd been playing it on PS3 since July 2015, just as Rockstar decided to stop updating it on that version along with the Xbox 360. My main reason for wanting to upgrade then was to play on the Director Mode so I could play as a variety of characters.

I have played GTA V or at least had some form of access on every console apart from the PS4: I originally had it on PS3, got in Xbox One now and before I got my original copy, I played it around a mate's house on Xbox 360.

The specs for the Xbox One are a lot higher than the Wii, as shown below:

You can play DVDs and blu-ray on the Xbox One. You couldn't on the Wii.
CPU speed: 1.75 GHz
GPU speed: 853 MHz
System RAM: 8 GB
USB: USB Port 3.0

Unlike the Wii, the wireless controller was not a new thing, it was introduced on the Xbox 360.

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Arriving 7 years later meant that the Xbox One has proper HD graphics, as shown in this example, GTA V, although personally, I think the graphics on Need for Speed: Most Wanted 2012 that I had on the PS3 the year before I got this were better looking. I was looking into getting the 2015 version of Need for Speed but it's always nighttime on it, which I found annoying.

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I currently don't play any other games as I'm still discovering new features on GTA V Online from being a late arrival. At the minute it appears to be all about Fortnite, which I find stupid and it's kind of sad that a Fortnite World has opened...and it's right here in Leicestershire.

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