GamesIndustry.biz - E3 Opinion: Xbox 360 is outgunned and outclassed by Sony's PS3
E3 Opinion by: Rob Fahey

"Looking at the content of the two conferences today in Los Angeles - and the MTV special last week, in the case of Xbox 360 - 'outclassed' is a word that comes to mind a lot. The bar which was set by Microsoft last week has not only been met, it has been vaulted over. PlayStation 3 is more powerful, more fully featured, more innovative and better supported than Xbox 360. When the Sony conference kicked off, we expected to see something 'a bit better' than Xbox, technologically. We didn't expect to have our most fundamental beliefs about what next-generation games will be capable of changed. That, however, is exactly what happened

I don't want to beat on Microsoft too hard, because ultimately there are still quite a few Xbox 360 games I'm looking forward to; but it's hard not to feel that suddenly, Microsoft's hip lingo and celebrity endorsements seem to ring very hollow. Where Microsoft gave us Elijah Wood babbling through a half hour marketing-led special on MTV, Sony had us watching Phil Harrison show off jaw-dropping interactive tech demos on stage. Harrison is about as far from being a hobbit as you can get - I'm not kidding, the man's a giant - and Ken Kutaragi is unlikely to ever have as many screaming fans as The Killers, but Sony seemed to feel that its new console spoke for itself. It didn't need celebrity endorsements, or senior executives trying to be "down with the kids" - thank god.

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Outclassed? Undoubtedly. Sony's hardware, its software, and even its simple display of confidence in its own product have completely outclassed Microsoft today - but while there can be little doubt about the outcome of this particular battle, it'd be a foolish man who assumed that the war was over yet. What Sony has done unto Microsoft today, Microsoft did unto Sony not so many years ago - and software giant is unlikely to take a defeat at E3 lying down. This tug of war has a long way to go yet."