Broken Xbox, and Consumer Law

Yup, it finally happened to me. I was always expecting it to happen at some point, but after my release day console had proven to be almost invunerable to the other problems in the past, I was hoping it would continue to be so. But alas, it’s finally done it. My Xbox is dead

Unusually though, I’m not getting the usual Red Rings of Death like most people. I’m just getting no display on the screen. I tried two different cables and two different TV’s, and the problem didn’t go away. I was left with the unenviable task of now trying to get it sorted.

Now, we all know that the Xbox 360’s have been very problematic since their release. So many people have had faulty 360’s that it’s pretty obvious that there is some kind of design flaw or inherent problem with the 360. With this in mind, I knew that the Sale of Goods Act in the UK protected me for this. When a good is sold, it has to meet 3 basic criteria…..

• They must be as described
• Fit for it’s purpose
• A satisfactory quality

The 360 I got obviously met the first 2 criteria, but since it died so early in it’s lifespan (to me, a console should last several years, not just over 18 months), it obviously wasn’t of satisfactory quality. I contacted the shop I bought the console from (Gameplay – www.gameplay.com) to see what they had to say. The initial 2 people I spoke to had a very firm stance on the matter. They said that as the console was outside it’s 1 year warranty, they wouldn’t be able to do anything for me, and I should see Microsoft about it. Thankfully I know my consumer law very well, and continued arguing, and also sent them an email outlining the Sale of Goods Act and the parts which were relevant.

The persistence paid off. I got an email back from a nice lady at Gameplay, who sent me a link for a repair shop, and said that if I sent my 360 to them for repair, I could send the receipt on to her, and she’d refund me the costs of the repair. Score one for the guy who knows his rights, and refuses to go away.

To anyone reading this from the UK, take this is an example of how knowing your consumer law can save you time and money if you buy a product which turns out to be faulty. If I didn’t know the law or hadn’t been so persistant, I would certainly have rang MS over it, who would undoubtedly charged me £85 for them to fix it for me. Read the following links and try to ingest the information, it could prove really useful at some point

http://www.dti.gov.uk/consumers/fact-sheets/page38311.html

http://www.dti.gov.uk/consumers/fact-sheets/page38102.html

Hopefully the next time I make a post, I’ll have a working 360 to play with

Game reviewing, Marvel, and more

Yet again it’s been a fair while between updates, so if there’s anyone out there who happens to check this site more than once a month, apologies for the lack of updates.

So, what’s been going on since last time. I managed to score myself a reviewer position on one of my favourite gaming websites. I can’t say who it is yet as the news hasn’t been made public over there, but suffice it to say it’s the biggest site I’ve been involved with. I really enjoy doing game reviews and I think I’m pretty good at them, so hopefully this is something I’ll be able to do with this site for quite some time. More news on that as it comes.

In my own gaming time, I’ve recently been putting a lot of time into Marvel: Ultimate Alliance. I’d already completed it once which had netted me a good number of achievements, but I fancied downloading the new characters and thought it was an ideal time to go achievement hunting through the game. Armed with some time off work, a house to myself, and 4 pads, I was able to get virtually all the achievements. I went through it on Easy as some of the achievements involve spending a good deal of time in the Simulator area going through various missions (almost all of which have to be found during the game as Simulator Disks), and I didn’t want to have to spend any more time in there than I had to (it gets repetitive). Now, after several days of playing, I’m 4 achievements away from completing the game. I just need to finish it on Hard (which should be fairly easy given the levels my characters are now at), and knock off 3 multiplayer achievements (which are best done on my own, though it’ll be time consuming).

Hopefully I can get all that done by the weekend, as I hope to have Forza 2 with me on Thursday (let’s hear it for Gameplay generally getting games to me a day early). When I finally get my grubby little hands on it, I reckon it’ll dominate my gaming time on the 360. I’ve seen people on my friend list playing it already, and none of them have said anything bad about it (though I’ve called them a few choice names for having it before me). One comment was that the demo didn’t do it justice, and considering I really liked the demo, I can only hope he’s right.

In other platform gaming news, I finally, for the first time ever, managed to finish a game of Civilization! I’ve been playing it since Civ 3 (and I’m now on 4), but despite starting several games, I never actually got around to finishing one. I’d always get so far into the game, start playing something else, then when I went back to it 6 months later, forget where I was up to and decide to start again. I finally managed it though, securing a Space Race victory as Japan, with about 45 turns left. I was originally planning on a domination victory (achieved by holding the majority of the map), but after finally destroying 3 other civilizations to take control of the continent I was on, there were still 6 others left on another huge continent, and there wasn’t enough time left in the game to take all of them out (and I probably didn’t have enough troops either, not without leaving myself undefended). Next time I may go for a smaller map against fewer opponents and increase the difficulty, as I ran away with it from fairly early on in this game.

I am thinking of re-installing F.E.A.R on the PC though, so I may spend some time on that. Despite my general enjoyment of FPS games, and my love of horror games, I never played too much of this. I did the first level or so, and did enjoy it, but for some reason never went further with it. I do it far too often. I guess with having so many games on so many systems, some great games get lost in the mix that I never get around to playing. Hopefully I can spend a fair bit of time on this as most people thought it was great.

Anyway, I’m rambling now. Time to get back to work I think.