MANILA, Philippines- Gaming consoles have been around for quite some time. One of the most famous, the Nintendo NES, has been around since the 1980s. Enter the year 2005 and game consoles have surpassed their archaic arcade ancestors. Developers of these consoles use cutting edge technology to give us a gaming experience like no other. Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo have given us the Playstation 3, Xbox 360 and Wii, respectively.

If you had to choose only one among the three, which would it be?

The Playstation 3 carries an incredibly heavy burden on its processors. Having led the modern gaming console wave, Sony pulled all the stops to please its fans. What resulted is something short of perfect. If you are planning to buy a Blu-ray DVD player, get a PS3 instead. Aside from playing these high-definition DVDs, it can also play standard DVDs as well as older PS1 and PS2 games. Plus, it can dock with a PSP so you can play a PS1, PS2 or even a PS3 game on it. Being the most powerful of the three, it undoubtedly has the best graphics which, when coupled with an HD TV, are just pure eye candy. Sony stuck to the old controllers, but added a few tweaks such as the motion-sensing feature called Sixaxis and wireless connectivity. The memory card has also been scrapped and replaced with built-in hard drives.

For all its powerful features, the PS3 does have a few problems. First would be its size; it?s not the most portable of the three. Not only is it difficult to lug around, it also occupies a lot of space. Then there?s the price; the PS3 tends to be the most expensive of the three. Its biggest problem, however are its games. Aside from having a poor selection of launch games and games that fully utilize the PS3 power, it has also lost some of its exclusive games which used to be the bread and butter of both the PS1 and PS2.

What of the Microsoft Xbox 360? This American Playstation is similar to the PS3 in many ways. Although not as powerful as the PS3, it also has incredible graphics. It would take a keen eye and an HDTV to actually tell the difference between the two. The Xbox also has a similar controller and uses DVD for its games, albeit with no Blu-ray.

The 360 is a lot more compact than its Japanese counterpart, and sleeker to look at too. As prices go, it?s priced almost the same as the PS3. Its biggest advantage over the Sony is its massive library of games. Having acquired games that were once exclusive to Sony, such as ?Devil May Cry,? ?Grand Theft Auto,? and more recently, ?Final Fantasy,? the 360 did seem to be a good alternative?until it became a Microsoft product.

Just like any PC that runs on Windows, the 360 tends to have problems with reliability. Windows users fear the ?blue screen of death? just as much as 360 owners fear the ?red ring of death.? I have been told that a systems failure for the 360 isn?t a question of if, but when. There have also been reports of 360s scratching the game disc due to a design flaw.

The odd-man-out here would be the innovative Nintendo Wii. Whereas the 360 and PS3 remain pretty much similar to their predecessors, Nintendo decided to start from scratch with the Wii. In contrast to the other two, the design and concept of the Wii is very different.

Design wise, the Wii is as minimalist as a Zen garden. A small frame makes it very portable and its rounded sides give it a pseudo-iPod look. Even its performance is not over-the-top. Being the least powerful of the three, its graphics are nowhere near as good as the others, but what it lacks in brute strength it makes up for in cleverness and fun factor.

Unlike other game consoles, the Wii doesn?t use a standard all-button controller but rather a remote-style controller that uses movement as input rather than buttons. This added level of interactivity brings a whole new dimension to playing games. An example would be the Wii exclusive game, ?Wii Sports,? where you can play sports like table tennis by actually moving your hand as if you?re playing the game in real life. Though it takes a lot of practice to master, it does provide a lot of fun.

Admittedly, I?m not a big fan of this system, although it did grow on me after a few tries. All of the Wii exclusive games make full use of the Wii controller, which means you?ll be playing ?Metroid? and ?Mario? in a whole new way. The Wii tends to be the cheapest in most places and it doesn?t seem to suffer from reliability issues.

So maybe the appropriate question isn?t ?which is the best?? but rather ?which best suits me?? If you?re a hardcore gamer with big bucks, the PS3 is the one for you. If your budget is more limited, the 360 is just right, although you?ll have to be mindful of its reliability or lack thereof. If, however, you want a completely different take on the console and want to share playing games with others, you have to get the Wii.