PSP to Launch with Five Online Titles

When the PSP launches in the states, it will be accompanied by five online enabled titles, according to GamesIndustry.biz. Gamers will be able to challenge friends in short range ad-hoc games, but will also be able to compete against other PSP owners via an 'infrastructure' mode. From the article: "What this means, in effect, is that players will be able to connect to wireless hot spots - either at home or in wi-fi enabled public locations - and play games across the net in this manner."

Comments

5 titles = about what you'd expect

[MBraynard]

My guess before RTFA was racing games and sports titles. Then I read the story - confirming my suspicions.

Don't new systems require a killer app at launch?

Re:5 titles = about what you'd expect

[rabbot]

They dont need killer apps anymore. There are so many fanboys for all the systems that it really doesn't matter what they do. These people will love and support them.

Re:5 titles = about what you'd expect

[NanoGator]

"Don't new systems require a killer app at launch?"

That's the big downside to having a company that doesn't make its own games making the system.

Re:5 titles = about what you'd expect

[RogueyWon]

Yeah, and look how it killed the PS2. You have to feel sorry for Sony, with that being such a collossal flop and everything.

Re:5 titles = about what you'd expect

[NanoGator]

"Yeah, and look how it killed the PS2. You have to feel sorry for Sony, with that being such a collossal flop and everything."

I can't say I understand the relevance to this compared to my original post. I said it was a downside, not a downfall. Boy I'm sick of these "They were successful, therefore every single move they made was 100% right." fanatical posts. Never mind that Sony has little reason for its users to stay loyal from generation to generation. No no no, we love our PS2 and don't want to hear a lick of criticism about it.

Re:5 titles = about what you'd expect

[Jerf]

Looks like you got hit by a fan-boy moderator; he hit Nanogator too for posting a perfectly reasonable post (by Slashdot standards) about poor fan-boy logic. (I can't prove it's the same person, but it's a good guess.)

Re:5 titles = about what you'd expect

[Jerf]

I say this with wistful sadness... are you sure those aren't killer apps?

Sports games and racing games sell damned well, thought the majority are, at the very least, not creative by "gamer" standards. (Yes, there are exceptions, especially in the racing section, but if you don't know what I mean, you're being willfully contrary.)

But "gamers" are, despite the name, increasing in the minority of "those who play and buy games".

Are you sure that Sony doesn't know which side of the bread their butter is on?

Re:5 titles = about what you'd expect

[MBraynard]

Well - just do as I do and metamoderate. Don't even bother to read the content that they are moderating - just unfair every negative and fair every positive.

I use to occasionally meta moderate and carefully read each moderation. I did it rarely because it took so long.

With this new method, it works so much faster.

Re:5 titles = about what you'd expect

[-kertrats-]

tell that to Nintendo Gamecube.

Re:5 titles = about what you'd expect

[BigDork1001]

I may be wrong about this but at or right around release time GameCube had Smash Bros. and Star Wars Rogue Squadron. Thinking back PS2 had.... Fantavision?

The key to online is doing it right

[CrazyJim1]

Sure you can play against thousands online, but how does it rate skill to match you in a game. Starcraft did it right with the chess rating system, nothing else comes close. With a chess rating system, you're matched with people of your skill level and you're ranked accordingly. The good rise to the top, while the unskilled strain to get better. Warcraft 3 failed to have a good rating system, but instead had one where you constantly 'leveled' and had less to do with how skilled you are, and more to do with how many games you played. Halo 2 has a leveling system much the same way, but its arguably harder to rate fragfest because you could encourage campers who don't want to die in order to preserve their rating. But with straight up head to head competitive games, I haven't seen anything close to the plain old chess rating system... well tournament systems are good too.

Without a good rating system, random punks think they're the best at a game when they really haven't experienced playing against the best. Strategies don't evolve as fast as they do in a good chess rated system. Some games aren't deep and don't have a lot of strategies so they don't want to see their shallowness come to bare. But games that have deep strategies or try to have deep strategy should use a good rating system. As you advance in your rating, you come to witness new strategies which you can learn to beat or assimilate into your own bag of tricks. When you play an online game that doesn't have a good ladder/tournament mode, you never get to see the fully evolved version of combat. You may see someone do something strong here or there, but you don't get to experience strong play consistantly to know what is competitive and what is plain cheese(cheese being a strategy thats really powerful, but easily countered by a good player).

Re:The key to online is doing it right

[wolfmanXUG]

CrazyJim1, I agree with most everything you said and a good ranking system is best for any game. Though since I have played H2 I just wanted to point out that camping while you may stay alive tends to not do much good, as its not how many times you die but if you win the overall match/game. This is ok but not good if you are playing in a game with random players in a ranked setting. You can be great but no one else is willing to be part of the team.

Re:The key to online is doing it right

[Robmonster]

Unreal Tournaments online stats used an ELO style approach.

You got ranked in three areas, All time, This Month and This Week. AFter any game you could go visit their website and it would compare the number of times you killed and were killed by an opponent, see how your ratings compare and then adjust accordingly. There was a min/max cap on the amount of points that could be adjusted.

While it still encouraged people to play more, the more games you play the better and better you had to be to raise, or even hold position.

RM

too bad

[Fr05t]

I really wanted to see THUG listed :(

Great!

[numbski]

Now people can be caught cursing at cheaters in public.

What??? You know it's true. If any one of you have played a good game online, you know that eventually they all get overrun with cheats and makes it next to impossible to get a good game in. :(

Re:Great!

[CrazyJim1]

On cheats. Do you think console games will be plagued with cheats like PCs are. On a pc, all you need to do is run a background ap. On consoles, a bit more is involved. So I think maybe a few people may cheat on consoles, but it wouldn't become widespread? I thought the same on arcade games. If you made an online game that used an arcade, its less likely to become overridden with cheats because people could report the game.

Re:Great!

[RogueyWon]

Still not encountered a cheater on X-Box Live, after over a year of fairly regular play. Lots of lamers and screaming 13 year olds, but no cheaters.

Re:Great!

[MoriaOrc]

Really? I know of a few cheats for some of the games I've played on XBL. For example, in Sega GT Online there was a way to dupe cars/money with the trading system. Also, there are a few pretty bad ones in Halo 2 (probably are pretty bad one in all/most games, but Halo 2 obviously gets alot more attention) that I have heard of (and one I tried out in a system link game with some friends) that are pretty bad. Just because you can't alter the software (and still play on Live) doesn't mean that you can't still find things the developers didn't notice.

Re:Great!

[Allison Geode]

in my circles, we consider that to be an exploit rather than a cheat. we consider it to be cheating if you use an external device (like gameshark or pro action replay) or if you use a cheat code (though you'd be hard pressed to find a game that didn't disable the cheat codes for multiplayer.)

the nice thing about the xbox is that if an exploit is found in multiplayer, the developers are allowed to fix it.

Re:Great!

[SkyWalk423]

Unfortunately I'm fairly sure you're mistaken. Microsoft has always had a strict "no patching" policy with regard to XBL-enabled games. The Ninja Gaiden team treaded in the gray area with their expansion/patch, but with this sole exception I don't think any game has been "fixed". Lord knows Halo 2 is screaming for a patch to fix all the exploits, but I doubt it's coming.

Which games?

[outsidah]

would anyone mind posting which 5? cant access that site from where I'm at

Re:Which games?

[Anonymous Coward]

"ATV Offroad Fury: Blazin' Trails and Twisted Metal: Head-On are joined by sports titles MLB, NBA and Gretzky NHL from Sony's 989 Studios in the roster of early online-enabled games."

I imagine a world like the N-Gage commercials.

[Mofo196]

Jump!!!

Jump, Jump!!!!

Temptation

[RogueyWon]

The PSP really is looking quite tempting now. Thing is, I know it's expensive and I know I probably wouldn't use it much. I don't really have space in my life for a handheld any more, since I moved and brought my commute down from 90 minutes to less than 30. My GBA was bought 2 years ago on a whim and has probably had less than 24 hours play time since then.

But god damn it if the PSP doesn't look nice. The thought of being able to show off by pulling out what's basically a miniature PS2, with that lovely big screen on the front is far too nice to resist. I'm sure the DS is ok, but it doesn't really grab me at all. Damn you Sony and your sleek, pretty and eminently I-want-to-own-one-able gadgets.

Connecting to hotspots? Does the DS?

[Anonymous Coward]

Does the DS do this?

Re:Connecting to hotspots? Does the DS?

[AlexMax2742]

Too bad Sony's past efforts in producing anything online, ever, have been vastly inferior to their alternatives.

Re:Connecting to hotspots? Does the DS?

[Chess_the_cat]

There's a neat hack here that allows you to do it.

Re:Connecting to hotspots? Does the DS?

[MoriaOrc]

Only if by "their alternatives" you mean "the XBox". Gamecub doesn't have much to brag about when it comes to online play. Of course, we can all be thankful MS isn't in the handheld market .. anything they made "handheld" would probably be about the size of a PS2 or Gamecube, and weigh 2 or 3 pounds.

The PSP sure does online play alot better then the DS (which can't even go online, just local P2P connections).

Re:Connecting to hotspots? Does the DS?

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, the DS supports both 802.11 WiFi and Nintendo's proprietary wireless format, but no games have utilized the WiFi yet. It's entirely possible, though.

Re:Connecting to hotspots? Does the DS?

[Anonymous Coward]

project nitro is a load of vaporware... buncha kids thinking they can do anything.

They claim interoperability with all routers and cards when in reality the ds's nifi can only talk with certain hacked wireless cards.

for a more reputable site go to http://forum.gbadev.org/viewforum.php?f=18

Re:Connecting to hotspots? Does the DS?

[Anonymous Coward]

Scuttlebutt is that Nintendo's unveiling their online strategy for DS (and, by extension, Revolution) before PSP launches.

Whether that's true or not remains to be seen.

Re:Connecting to hotspots? Does the DS?

[AlexMax2742]

Of course, we can all be thankful MS isn't in the handheld market .. anything they made "handheld" would probably be about the size of a PS2 or Gamecube, and weigh 2 or 3 pounds.

Jesus christ, you people just won't quit will you. Welcome to 2001, they want their LOL XBOX IS HUEG joke back.

Re:Connecting to hotspots? Does the DS?

[MoriaOrc]

Ever heard of humor? :P

I own an XBox and a PS2 and the fact that online play for the xbox is built in (unlike in PS2) and is well supported (unlike in GC which has few online games) makes it a way better system then the other two. That doesn't mean it isn't much heavier/bulkier then the other two (especially with the new small version of PS2, though mine is an older one). The weight is something I know all about because I lug it around to play LANed with friends alot.

And anyway, my use of humor doesn't invalidate the point that PSP is going to be better then the DS in online play, since it comes with WiFi based online play out of the box (even if none of the online launch games look like they are going to be spectacular) and the DS doesnt and never will support anything more then close range P2P connections AFAIK.

Re:Connecting to hotspots? Does the DS?

[Anonymous Coward]

Star Wars Galaxies?

Sony Online are a huge name in online games.

XLink Kai

[cipher uk]

xlink kai supports psp lan games over the internet. Need For Speed Underground Rivals Ridge Racer AI Series GO AI Series Mahjong AI Series Shogi Ape Escape Academics Armored Core - Formula Front Darkstalkers Chronicle - The Chaos Tower Dokodemo Issho Lumines Mahjong Fight Club Mahjong Taikai Minna No Golf Puyo Pop Fever Ren-Goku - The Tower of Purgatory and its rather simple to set up. just need windows/linux/mac running the xlink engine and a wireless reciever.

Two Words

[fwitness]

Killer App.

I love my DS, but it's taking quite some time for devs to ramp up development and figure out what to do with all those new controls. The PSP is gorgeous and does standard games well. Add online via wifi, now you've got a hit. All they need is decent support. I'll keep both my PSP and the DS, but I think the PSP is going to be my favorite for the next year or so, provided the battery lasts that long. :)

Re:Two Words

[superpulpsicle]

My little cousin has the DS, I tried this thing out and was terribly disappointed. Don't get me wrong the graphics are insane compared to the earlier gameboys. But that's about it. The games are like lean trim down versions of whatever gamecube has to offer.... and that's not much.

Sony had to do this.

[SetupWeasel]

Since the PSP does not support single disc multiplayer, they had to come out with online play quickly to ensure that a person who bought a game like Twisted Metal would be able to play multiplayer. Otherwise any multiplayer oriented game would be next to worthless as the game library gets larger.

Re:Sony had to do this.

[TechniMyoko]

Since the PSP does not support single disc multiplayer

Actually it does, it's called 'Game Sharing' in the main menu

Re:Sony had to do this.

[Anonymous Coward]

Since the PSP does not support single disc multiplayer

Where'd you hear that? Its right in the things menu.

Check this out for an example of games that use it

Re:Sony had to do this.

[SetupWeasel]

Here is an article on the subject from GamesIndustry.biz. It says that Sony has demonstrated "game sharing" but not single disc multiplayer.

Re:Sony had to do this.

[TechniMyoko]

Game sharing is single disc multiplayer. Its spawning a network copy. Thats exactly the same thing.

PSP?

[webhat]

Is it just me, or does anybody else read PSP as Paint Shop Pro?

Re:PSP?

[Bega]

Jasc has some serious competition coming up.

Too good to be true

[kryogen1x]

After I RTFA...

Last year it emerged that Sony had plans to create a unified PlayStation Portable online service which would allow customers to pay a single subscription fee to access PSP services from any of a wide range of commercial wireless hotspots, but no further details have emerged since.

Yay, a subscription!

Re:Too good to be true

[fwitness]

As long as the subscription is minimal, and you get something for the money, I don't blame them. XBox Live isn't free, but I would say most Live subscribers are quite happy with what they get.

It would be *real nice* if you didn't need a subscription, but I don't think that'll last long.

One strategy systems

[MMaestro]

The only problem with head-to-head competition, which Starcraft had, is unlike Chess each race was different and hence at certain parts/times/maps of the game certain sides were obviously superior Zergling rush vs slow to build and move zealots? 2 zealot hits kills one marine? Seige tanks versus hydralysks? Psychic storm which wreaks havoc on everything? Arbiters? Lockdown? Plague?

I'm not saying Starcraft is bad, I'm just saying that strategy games with different types of units for each side is inheritly flawed due to balance issues. What I'm trying to say is that for a game to be truely a matter of skill is for it to have both sides be carbon copy of one another. Go to any RTS game with 'unique' units for each side and in all of those games a certain side will be preferred and most likely be the side most likely to win.

Course this does not necessarily end up being a good game which is why you do not see this more often. Symmetrical maps? Gamers would NEVER allow it! Few weapons/weapon options? Developers would get flamed! Un-unique sides? PRODUCERS would never let the game see the light of day! The list of opponents goes on. (Course this also means that Counter-Strike is an unfairly competitive game since the defending team generally recieves terrain advantages which can make/break a match.)