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PS3 Launch Details Announced
Sony's conference offered up reassurance that a number of their titles will be playable at this year's E3. The controller will sense movement, allowing the player to move an onscreen avatar 'naturally'. They also released the system's launch details. The North American PS3 launch will occur on Nov. 17th, 2006. The 20GB HDD version will retail for $499, and the 60GB HDD version will go for $599. They promise 4 million launch units by December 31st. Update: 05/09 03:57 GMT by Z : Apparently, not only does the $499 system have a smaller harddrive, but it has fewer features as well.
My two cents:
1.) I'm honestly surprised they're this far along with these titles. They may actually make the November launch.
2.) Even through an internet feed, it was obvious the only truly next-gen title there was Heavenly Sword (from the great folks at Ninja Theory). The EyeToy stuff looked cool, but isn't something I'm likely to try out any time soon. Most of the games could have been 360 or even late-lifetime Xbox titles.
3.) I won't be able to review games for this system at the launch price. There's no way I'm dropping $599 for a game console.
4.) The controller orientation thing is ... I don't have the words. Awkward? Cash-in? Cynical? Whatever their intent, it just seems like a bad idea.
My favorite part was when the Sony rep got up on stage and said that Sony isn't interested in Gimmicks.
And then he demoed a card game that you play with a camera.
And then he demoed a karaoke game.
And then they came out and showed that their fancy new controller is going to be based around the same Goddamn "gimmick" Nintendo came up with last fall.
Just... hilarious. Do these people even think about the things they're saying? There was some absolutely fricking awesome stuff in that press conference, Sony Computer Entertainment would be such a great company if they could just somehow get their executives to stop talking in public.
Wow, Sony as ever shows their originality. I mean, a motion-sensing controller? Who in the hell would have thought of that brilliant idea? Wasn't this one of the same companies who wrote off Nintendo's idea as a gimmick? Wow, ironic the innovation that Sony comes up with. Let's hope for their sake that they didn't take too much away from Nintendo's idea... last thing they need is another company suing them over technology theft in their controllers. BTW, I wonder if Immersion could claim this Dual Shock like controller in violation of their patent too.
As much as the patent system needs to go, companies like Sony almost make you want to have it.
Sony, say hello to third place. Consumers, say hello to an emergency price drop scheduled for Spring 2007.
The motion-sensing demo was hilarious. The guy's ship was shaking like crazy, and it was comical seeing him try to keep both hands on the controller while twisting it around. There's a good reason the Wii controller looks like a remote.
The Sony guy also said that they had their hands on the tech for a couple of weeks, suggesting they havn't been working on the feature for a large duration of development. (*hint* *hint*)
Um, what's the point with the 20GB hard drive model. Aren't blue-ray disks supposed to start at 25GB, and feasably scale all the way up to 100GB each? I mean, it'd be like putting a 500MB hard drive in a computer with a CD burner.
Ripping off live was bad enough, but ripping off the tilt and motion sensing capabilities? AFTER calling it a gimmick. Comeon. I hope Nintendo and Microsoft have enough patents to bury Sony, because they really, freakin' deserve it. Failing that I hope people are smart enough to go with the leaders and not the followers, but I have little to no faith in that.
At the $500 launch price I thought it was going to be at, it was dead to me anyway, but now I wouldn't take it was half that. I prefer to vote with my dollars in a way that encourages innovation, not me-too copycatting.
The key to the enjoyment of pop music is to replace any instance of "love" with "C.H.U.D."
That was the most pathetic E3 conference I have seen. I felt embarrassed for them when they announced the controller and they kept smiling and saying it was their "innovation." Then the nerdy guy got up and demoed it and it looked like it didn't work very well. He could barely land the stupid plane.
The games they showed real footage of didn't look any better than the 360 titles that are already out.
Really sad. This press conference removed most of my desire for a PS3. If you didn't watch it, go grab a copy from somewhere.
My first comment is the price. What else can I comment on? $500 FOR THE BASE SYSTEM? You've got to be kidding me! The next step up is $600. And considering you'll probably need a HDTV to get the most out of the system... that is a TON of money.
They got the hard drive right though. MS got that right last time with it built in on the XBox but for some stupid reason they screwed that up with the 360. Now Sony has it right and MS has it backwards.
The games look nice, but nothing revolutionary. The list of titles is all Something 3 and Whatever 4. There wasn't too much new there. Even the new titles were the same old genres.
They "stole" the Wii-mote's features, or at least some of them. It doesn't have the light-gun like positioning. I wonder if they've had this all along or if they did it because of Nintendo. I suspect it was because of Nintendo because I think otherwise we would have heard something about it before, or at least hints. Almost all the demos they showed were the same old control style. I think they just aren't committed to this. And they said they were going to "redesign" the controller from the ugly boomerang thing. They didn't redesign it, they used the PS2 controller with some extra stuff packed in. It looks EXACTLY THE SAME. Don't get me wrong, the PS2 controller was good, but come on. I'm also skeptical about the "it weighs less" part.
I was going to buy a 360 but then they cost too much ($400 for the non-crippled version). Now I'll wait until the redesign. I was going to buy a PS3 but now I'll wait ($500 for the base?). Nintendo has guaranteed that they will launch under $300, with speculation in the $200-$250 range. Nintendo will be able to clean MS and Sony's clocks based on price alone. Not even taking into account all the other great stuff (downloadable library, Wii-mote, great games, etc).
I can't wait for Nintendo's press conference tomorrow.
For the first time since the SNES generation, I won't be buying most of the consoles at launch. I waited a few months on the XBox was I was thrilled to get my PS2. The 360 doesn't excite me that much (mostly a games problem, I'm waiting to see what they show tomorrow). The PS3 doesn't excite me that much (mostly a games problem, we'll see). The Wii has me dreaming. I'll buy 'em all, I'm sure. But you won't see me spend over $300 on the console unless it includes games bundled in.
PS: The Wii is supposed to have a little speaker and some memory in the controller. So when you shoot it like a gun, it makes a gun sound (instead of it coming out of the TV). What a great idea! Your tennis racket makes the sound where your racket is (instead of speakers), your gun too, and anything else. Pure genius.
Comment forecast: Bits of genius surrounded by a sea of mediocrity.
Are you kidding?! This is a revolution in gamepads!
The controller basically has a gyroscope inside that can detect tilt... and an accelerometer that can detect movement in a particular direction.
This is different from the Wii in that it can't determine its location in 3d space. While the functionality is similar, the Wii still has the upper hand in terms of the "unique" functionality of the controller.
It's a smart move on Sony's part, but the Wii will still be able to do things no other system can.
I wonder how many people get the cheaper model and add their own Hard Drive?
Gee, which motion-sensitive controller system do I pick? The $199 Wii or the $499/$599 PS3? What a tough decision. Especially when you consider that a) the PS3 has been repeatedly reported, by developers, no less, as being way under-powered, whereas many devs have expressed enthusiasm for making games for the Wii, b) the Revolution's game lineup is, IMO, looking much better than the PS3's, and c) we've yet to hear the last about cool stuff in the Wii (that announcement should be pretty interesting) Let us further consider that for the price of a PS3, I can easily build myself a computer with many times the hard drive space, reasonable comparability hardware-wise (assuming we don't buy into Sony's hype), and the ability to do everything a computer can do that a PS3 can't (i.e. everything but play games and DVDs). Oh, did I mention I can upgrade the PC if I want to? Also that my PC has a much wider range of games than the PS3? Yeah...
Sony actually did Nintendo a big favor by introducing a (somewhat) similar control style: the extreme difficulty in porting games to the Wii will now be somewhat alleviated. Just one less excuse for the 3rd parties.
The Guide is definitive. Reality is frequently inaccurate.
Considering that at least 5 out of the 10 announced launch titles are games coming out for the 360, there's not much new here. All the online features are straight out of XBOX live. The controller is Wii ripoff. Dev's have already said, that there will be a LOT of overlap in games between PS3 and the 360, since exclusive titles don't make much economic sense when games have similar capabilities. Some very highly respected devs have said that the capabilities of the PS3 is not SO much higher than that of the 360, that it would require them to create a better version for that system, rather than just making ports for each system.
All the EA games will look the same, Band of Brothers trailer looks the same. Sonic looks the same. Stranglehold looks the same. See the trend?
Do I think the PS3 is more powerful than the 360? Yes, but I'm not sure if the margin of capabilities is worth $500 for the smaller of the two, and $600 for the larger one. This is especially true since I'm certain that the 360 premium bundle will drop $100 down to $299. Also those prices don't include accessories. And currently devs are making games on DVDs and don't need the larger capability. Not even the 360 games come even close to maxing out their DVDs. Furthermore, most game devs have reported that they are targetting their games for both systems at 720p, so the 1080p advantage is really not all that substantial.
Well, the Live "rip-off" isn't really much of a rip-off anymore, since Xbox has had it for four years already. At this point if you DON'T have a Live-like service with your console, you're not gonna sell. (Even Nintendo's going that route with the -nameless system-.)
$500 ($550 CDN for me) IS a harsh sting... but compared to the $400 (non-crippled model) Xbox 360, it DOES have a Blu-ray drive, which is a nice bonus. (I may not have an HD set right now, but I will get one eventually.)
But still, I wanna see what Nintendo's gonna offer-up tomorrow.
Does it make you happy you're so strange?
Which suggests - PSWii controller aside - that the biggest (perhaps only) differences in the machines are the price and the logo. Question then is whether the market agrees with Sony's assessment that its console brand is worth $100-$200 more than Microsoft's.
My other sig is a
RIP sony
First off, I think the PS3 is overpriced. However, most consoles are more expensive than the previous generation of consoles, depending on how you define a generation. Demand in a growing market and inflation both affect the price here. RIP for overpricing? How about RIP for only have 4 million consoles in the first month.
"Step 1: Copy Wii's motion tracking and put it in a clunky two-handed dual shock interface"
.. SonEs Evil
They didn't even copy it very well. There's a reason Nintendo has a sensor that goes under the TV. These dimwits probably just hooked up a couple of accellerometers to the controller.
What annoys me about this isn't that they're copying Nintendo (we ALL knew it would happen), but rather that their inferior knock-off of it will probably make people think the Nintendo's version will be worse!
Enos Lives
"I like to lick butts!" by MobileTatsu-NJG (#32700246) (Score:5, Informative)
"Revolution" being the keyword.
I imagine this controller was slapped together in about 3 months, seeing as there were no actual games that supported it, aside from a demo that they openly admitted they modified in the three weeks since they got the new controller.
Not unexpected at all, but still quite shameless.
Does it make you happy you're so strange?
It might be because I missed the start of the presentation, but I don't understand why they were demonstrating Xbox live, xbox360 games and the Wii controller?
Or one Wii for your son, one for your daughter (so they don't fight), and FIVE games to share between them.
Or a Wii ($200), a 360 ($300), and 2-3 games between those two systems. More if the 360 has a price drop (possible to combat the PS3, but not really neccessary with such a high launch point).
Heck, a full 360 (not core) and 3 or 4 games will cost less than the PS3 with one game.
And all this is with the cheaper PS3 price point, no scalping
Comment forecast: Bits of genius surrounded by a sea of mediocrity.
It's probably exclusively to offset the Wii's hype. It won't affect non-fans very much (especially at $499 USD), but it insures that their existing fanbase stays loyal to them.
Oh, come on, guys. You're all missing the amazing way that the PS3 will interact with the game community--BY SQUEEZING OUT THEIR EVERY PENNY. Notice how long the karaoke-game presentation went on about things you can pay to download? "Now, for a fee, you can download levels, weapons and songs!" Kill me. The last thing the gaming world needs is a company encouraging developers to ship incomplete products so that people will rush onto the Sony service and buy useless, overpriced add-on content. That shop idea might've been interesting if Sony had promoted buying, oh, I dunno, GAMES on it.....but as it stands, it's just a money-grubbing version of XBox Live without any of the interesting Arcade games that make the M$ service relatively worthwhile.
Otherwise, ditto on what most everyone else is saying. The games that were presented looked utterly boring. A couple of hack-n-slashers, a camera-dependent card game... are you kidding? Cute as a tech demo, I suppose, but I think we're way past the tech demo stage in May 2006. Watch the Sony vs. M$ debate take its sharpest, quickest turn ever in the next few hours.
The Sony guy also said that they had their hands on the tech for a couple of weeks, suggesting they havn't been working on the feature for a large duration of development.
Yeah, that was very telling. This was an obvious last minute effort to confuse the market. As sparse as the clapping was throughout the rest of the presentation I almost expected them to get booed when they pulled out the controller.
"It won't affect non-fans very much (especially at $499 USD), but it insures that their existing fanbase stays loyal to them."
If the Sony fanboys have any decency what-so-ever, they'll hang their heads in shame the same way we did when Wii was announced.
"I like to lick butts!" by MobileTatsu-NJG (#32700246) (Score:5, Informative)
Coming out with another year's worth of development time, and the cheap version is still $100 more than MicroSoft's expensive model. That should tell you that it probably will pack the most graphical punch. I'm sorry, though, $499 is just too much. If MicroSoft announces a price cut for the holidays, say $350 or $329 or some such, or a bundle with HD-DVD playback still at $399, a lot of people will probably find the 360 "good enough." Hell, it's quite possible you will be able to get a 360 and a Wii-volution for the price of the PS3. I thought the 360 was going to be dead as soon as the PS3's launch info was announced. Now, I'm not so sure. Just flat out, $499 is out of the question for "working class" people, especially with rising gas prices etc. It's also out of the question for most kids and college students. It's going to be the new Neo-Geo: sure, everybody would *like* to have one, but they buy something they can afford instead. Hell, I make professional wages and have plenty of spending money, but the 360 was already more than I'm willing to spend for a console.
I predict:
1) The PS2 continues to outsell both the 360 and the PS3 through 2007.
2) The 360 outsells PS3 in the US during holiday 2006 season.
3) The PS3 outsells the 360 in Japan during holiday 2006 season. Duh.
4) The DS Lite continues to be the top seller overall.
5) The tilt-sensing abilities of the PS3 controller will be seriously under-utilized, especially in first-gen software as developers scramble to handle HD and online capabilities.
I won't make any Wii-volution predictions until the details come out tomorrow. However, while the PS3's controller might make things interesting for hard-core gamers, it will utterly fail to attract non-gamers, which is really the point of the Wii-mote. One final prediction, though:
6) Nintendo continues to make gobs and gobs of profits, while MS and Sony continue to lose money hand-over-fist.
It didn't take long for this pic to surface: http://hood.filefu.com/sonysteals5dq.jpg
Sony needs to be plowed under anyway, since they felt it appropriate to stick a root-kit on people's machines.
If people voted with their pocketbooks and didn't say, "please Sony, beat me a little more," then we wouldn't have these sorts of problems.
The PSWii...
(From the Laws of Japanese Animation) Law of Inherent Combustibility -- Everything explodes. Everything.
They already showed the Canadian price, on-screen during the keynote, right next to the US price.
$499 USD / $549 CND
$599 USD / $659 CND
The exchange rate has gotten much higher lately.
Does it make you happy you're so strange?
Not necessarily a good copy of the Wii
Although the moon is smaller than the earth, it is farther away.
Am I the only one here who really likes what he sees? Great HD graphics, Blu-Ray, hard disk standard on ALL models, online, wireless controllers, PS2 and PS1 full compatibility... this is a nice system. I know it might be expensive for some of you, and you'll have to wait to be able to afford it, but in the long run it'll be nice to have all those features in the baseline system so game authors can design around them. This definitely looks like the best-of-breed for this generation to me.
E pluribus unum
Rumour going around is that MS will drop the premium edition price by $100 to $299 in november. I wouldn't be suprised if the wii retails for $199. So the price of the premium edition ps3, you'll be able to get a wii and a 360 including 1 game for both system. Sony screwed up big time.
Have you ever been to a turkish prison?
Because they didn't focus on propper data compression and procedural rendering. It's funny but if you do some research, the average data footprint of games begins by skyrocketing to blast through any current data storage medium (CD to DVD) and then actually starts to taper off. Given that much space, most companies will waste a large chunk of that space by using it as a reservoire for non-streamlined materials and large chunky textures.
As game engines and other technologies improve, this may change. However, before that time, most games will come out on DVD. Blu-Ray wont be the standard until later.
In Sony's on conference, their rep said for the first year only 20% of the games that came out for the PS2 were on DVD. Then 5 years later that number was up in the mid 90%. Granted that's impressive, however, it appears that the next-gen cycle is now shorter than 5 years. The xbox was not out for 5 years, and I anticipate that the companies will be launching into their next-next-gen console pre-production around 4 years from now, with a release one more year after that.
That being said, if Blu-Ray is not the de facto standard for next-gen data storage by this point, Sony will lose a large chunk of change, even at $499 and $599.
If this comes out at $599, I'm going to upgrade my graphics card and buy a Wii before I even think about a playstation 3. This is ridiculously expensive compared to anything I can readily think of, except maybe an iPod, and that's not exactly a favorable comparison.
"I know it might be expensive for some of you, and you'll have to wait to be able to afford it, but in the long run it'll be nice to have all those features in the baseline system so game authors can design around them. This definitely looks like the best-of-breed for this generation to me."
Yeah? And what games are you most excited about? Extra credit if you'll talk about why those games will be worth the extra $200 or so you'll spend getting them up and running?
"I like to lick butts!" by MobileTatsu-NJG (#32700246) (Score:5, Informative)
"This is a revolution in gamepads!"
What will Sonii think of next?
"When the atomic bomb goes off there's devastation...but when the atomic bong goes off there's celebraaaaation!"
The new PS3 controller not only rips of features from Wii, they droped the rumble support, PS3 gets less and less impressive:
9 be.pdf
"Pursuant to the introduction of this new six-axis sensing system, the vibration feature that is currently available on DUALSHOCK® and DUALSHOCK®2 controllers for PlayStation and PlayStation®2, will be removed from the new PS3 controller as vibration itself interferes with information detected by the sensor."
See: http://www.scei.co.jp/corporate/release/pdf/06050
For those who already own an HDTV, and who plan to purchase HD movies, it would be cheaper than buying the 360 with HD-DVD. It would be much cheaper than buying a 360 and a Blu-Ray player.
Feh. So what.
I've got two HDTVs and I'm not excited by this price point, the featureset, or the games. I can wait for a pricedrop. Also, I'd rather see who wins the HD disc player market, and I'd like to see both Blu-Ray and HD-DVD get spanked in the market. Perhaps a good spanking will teach these manufacturers to cut back on the overly restrictive DRM.
Ha! The Joke's on Sony for taking the bait..
Nintendo folks have been saying for some time now that there is still a big secret to be revealed about the Wii. The controller, on the other hand, has been public for some time. Nintendo execs are no fool. They knew that if the public liked the Wiimote one of the other companies would quickly follow. Sony has just hung themselves with their half-assed knockoff attempt.
Now, Sony is really going to feel the fool when Nintendo reveals the true secret of the Wii tomorrow...
It's a little early into E3 to start prophesizing the downfall of Sony, the revival or Nintendo, or the evil dominion of Microsoft. We've seen a pre-E3 press conference for Sony. This is about equivalent to the first segment of the pre-game show. However bad or good the pre-show conferences are, there'll be plenty within the conferences themselves to sway things one way or another.
That said, the impression I've gotten from Sony's press conference is not a good one. The two reasons are as follows.
1) "Innovation" - Sony's best bet for hurting Nintendo was to give their idea no credence. They wouldn't look bad for writing off Nintendo's ideas as gimmicky. Microsoft already ignored Nintendo, Sony simply had to follow suit. Instead, they've copied Nintendo and called it "Innovation". Now when people go to shop for a next gen console, they won't be able to write Nintendo off as a gimmick. Even if Sony did just as good a job as Nintendo, they're $300-$400 more expensive. While the move covers their bases of Nintendo takes off, they're still the copycats and that hurts them.
2) "At What Cost" - $499 hurts. Because that hurts, Microsoft was kind enough to have a core package that was cheaper, lacked features, but didn't hurt so much unless you intended on using live a lot. Sony has another package too, costing $599. That there is good one two punch to the wallet. To top it off, the difference is a 20gb harddrive versus a 60gb harddrive. Last I checked, the price difference between those sizes was not $100. Is there something I failed to garner from the coverage?
Overall, Sony hasn't started off well, meaning they'll need to work doubletime to impress me this E3. However, it's entirely possible they'll succeed. With Nintendo and Microsoft still to come, there's no telling what will happen.
Thunderclone: ONE MAN ENTERS! TWO MEN LEAVE! ONE MAN ENTERS! TWO MEN LEAVE!
It's not that they took the concept of Live. I wasn't at all upset that 3rd parties and MS hopped on the wireless controller bandwagon after the Wavebird, and I wasn't at all upset about Live clones persay. It's more their history of doing this.
The playstation itself was a joint Nintendo/Sony project for an SNES CD addon. When it fell through they launched their own system.
The original PS controller basically amounted to an SNES controller with extended grips and double the shoulder buttons.
When Nintendo debuted the N64 controller, Sony added in 2 analog sticks, because twice is better. It took until the PS2 for anyone to do anything with it. This is one of their only two contributions, and it wasn't motivated by any gameplay reason. It was motivated by "twice is better."
The PS2 introduced backwards compatibility outside the handheld arena. Score the second thing Sony gave us.
Their first-party titles were all derivative of other dev-houses genre-creations, and had nothing noteworthy until they had the cash and cache to begin absorbing developers like Verant and Polyphony Digital.
The controller they just debutted to try to take the wind out of the Revolution/Wii is a wireless version of a PC gamepad MS debuted years ago, only in a standard dual shock form-factor.
It's not that Sony rips people off, it's that that's pretty much all they do, and if it was up to them we'd never see anything new or evolutionary. They have one success that's not an accidental good side-benny from stealing ideas from the competition, and they've pretty much rode on Nintendo's coattails for the past 14 years.
The playstation brand is a knock-off brand, slightly prettier of course, and they want to charge you a premium for it.
Then you factor in Sony Media, and the fact that they always seem to be calling the shots at big Sony, and torpedoing anything good Sony Electronics comes up with, plus the rootkit fiasco, and it's just not a company I want to financially support. They exemplify everything bad about Japanese corporations. And we're talking about everything percieved as bad about japanese corporations in the 50s.
The key to the enjoyment of pop music is to replace any instance of "love" with "C.H.U.D."
I know it might be expensive for some of you, and you'll have to wait to be able to afford it, but in the long run it'll be nice to have all those features in the baseline system so game authors can design around them.
I think the system looks nice, but the ludicrous price is going to kill it in the real world, meaning there won't be many games produced for it.
Of the current-gen systems (I have all three), I like my PS2 the best. But I think Sony really screwed up here and forgot that the hardcore gamer market is a minuscule fraction of the people out there buying console titles.
I haven't even bought a 360 yet because its price was stupid. The PS3 costs almost as much as my PC - an Athlon 3800+ with 2GB of DDR400 RAM, a 250GB SATA 3.0gb drive, an NForce4 Ultra motherboard, and a Geforce7600GT - which was $650 not including the case. I can do a LOT more with my PC, like development, graphics, and audio. There is not a chance in hell I'm paying over $300 for a game console.
"...always new atoms but always doing the same dance, remembering what the dance was yesterday." -Richard Feynman
Judging by the xbox360, the only real thing we can expect is more detailed graphics,
And Final Fantasy XIII, and Gran Turismo HD, and probably the next Grand Theft Auto, etc...
The PS2 didn't sell 103 million units based on the power of its graphics. It sold all those systems based on the games available for the system, and specifically the games that were available on no other system.
MS is still the odd man out here because they're going to get crushed by both Sony and Nintendo on exclusive titles. Sony's still got Japan behind them and they've got the power of numbers everywhere else (103 million PS2's vs. 25 million Xboxes). Nintendo's got their own first-party games plus with the Wii, almost every third-party game on the system will by definition be a unique experience.
The PS2 had both massive exclusives like the FF and Dragon Quest series, as well as the sheer power of quantity that saw literally thousands of niche titles released for the system. No matter what kind of gamer you are, you could find something to like on the PS2. The PS3 will probably be no different - it's certainly going to have the lion's share of Japanese development devoted to it at the very least. That gives Sony a huge built-in advantage worldwide.
Just remember, man - it's all about the games. People focus way too much on the power of these systems - historically speaking, it's actually been the *least* powerful system that has won out more often than not. (This gen is probably going to be an exception to that, but the point is you should look at the games, not the specs.)
I just found something they didn't bring up in the keynote:
9 ae.pdf
The cheaper version will NOT have WiFi, flash card slots, or HDMI output.
http://www.scei.co.jp/corporate/release/pdf/06050
Does it make you happy you're so strange?
There are other differences between the $500 and $600 versions of the systems. According to Sony, the $500 version lacks HDMI output, which means that once DRM gets implemented, you don't get the full HD resolution that Blu-Ray is capable of. Also, the cheaper system lacks a slots for Memory Sticks, SD cards, and Compact Flash cards. The cheaper one also lacks wifi connectivity. Funny how Sony left all of that out of their presentation.
"Our opponent is an alien starship packed with atomic bombs. We have a protractor."
I'd like to give an alternative view from many posts here.
First, I think Sony is very smart charging for this price. If they don't do this, people would shell out as much on ebay anyway. So, why not make money instead of some ebayers.
Second, this would reduce the number of order from ebay sellers, and give more availability to owners. This gives early adopters chance to buy them. This will reduce the shortage Sony may face giving worldwide release in a same time.
Third, if they sell it cheap, say $400, they cannot fullfill the demand, people would buy from M$ anyway, therefore, they don't loose market share either way.
Forth, after they sense the early adopters have mostly bought the product, they can decrease the price, reduce the lost per unit (as time goes, the unit cost goes down), produce more units and sell more to the average folks.
Fifth, with blue-ray, this thing is dirt cheap for early adopters. Just subtract the price from the average HD-DVD or blue-ray players out there, and see what you get for these 9 cores.
Sixth, complaint about Sony releasing something more (about the remote) makes no sense. It's more that they offer. It's a bonus. If they don't offer that motion sensor, would you complaint less? For those who came and watch the show, they feel bad because of the presentation, like Bill Gates crashes his computer when he demos, but people still shell out billions for XP, and not even know the story. Give more realistic complaint, like less innovative new titles, usability of the controller, etc.
I think Sony would give M$ a huge kick the butt if they release a well function linux (like Suse 10) with all usual apps with it pre-install. Many people would not buy PC because of this and this would hurt M$ revenue. Sony then need to make money on this by putting default pages on the browsers, offers online stores (just own customers like this is big money, seeing how M$ makes money from XP, and dominate the browsers using IE). If they can offense well, they'll have a good defense (this is an old say, I don't remember exact words - best defends is an effective offense?).
M$ will have harder time pouring billions into XBox 360, less discount money, less developers money, etc, and Sony have easier time to survive. I would also recommend Sony to release Linux for these 100 millions PS2. I means official release with a good infra structure for support, sell and marketing. These are big huge opportunities. If they don't take advantage of it, they could disappear.
But I think Sony really screwed up here and forgot that the hardcore gamer market is a minuscule fraction of the people out there buying console titles.
And I think you and others like you forgot that there are almost always huge shortages at console launches, and that prices are not set in stone for the life of a console.
I was one of the guys that waited in line for a PS2 on launch day. I didn't get one. You just saw recently what happened with the Xbox 360 launch and that was at $399. You don't think the PS3 will have at least that much demand attached to it? Of course it will - the PS2 sold four times more systems than the original Xbox, and the PS3 already has more exclusives attached to it than the Xbox 360.
Sony's saying they will have 4 million systems ready in the "launch window", and that's worldwide. So that's less than 2 million per territory in November and December. You will not be able to get one of these at any price.
Once demand slackens, the price will drop. As always happens.
I can do a LOT more with my PC, like development, graphics, and audio.
You cannot play Final Fantasy XIII, Gran Turismo HD or Metal Gear Solid 4.
This is why people buy game consoles - to play the games that they can play nowhere else. All you're saying is that you're not interested in video games. Nobody buys game consoles to do development, graphics and audio.
I know a lot of Nintendo fanboys are outraged that Sony would steal Nintendo's ideas. But this just validates what Nintendo has been saying all along. It's the way it's always been, other companies in this industry innovate, Sony steals, but they steal well. It works in all other art forms, so it works in videogames as well. And the real winners are the consumers in the end.
On the other hand, what the hell is Sony thinking? No, seriously, are they completely stupid? Why did they go to all the trouble of holding their press conference before Nintendo?
They revealed too much. The new controller. Motion sensing technology. A firm pricetag. Specific release dates. This is now Nintendo's E3 to "win". They don't have to hold anything back. Anything they know, but haven't told us, they can go ahead and tell now. Sony's already blown their load.
If I were Sony, I would have taken great pains to arrange my conference after Nintendo's, even if it had to be early morning on Wednesday, right before the expo opened. Nintendo would have played things close to their chest (as they always do). Microsoft's conference would have absorbed some (probably not a lot, but some) of the hype Nintendo generated. Then Sony could have come back with a solid blow in the motion sensing controller.
Or, even better, they could have kept it silent, and not announced it until a few months before the Wii launched. This would have given them more time to perfect the technology, as well as giving them the chance to demo it with, I don't know, actual games? You know, like what Nintendo is going to do tomorrow.
So, in conclusion, a big Bravo to Sony Technical Operations. Those guys are on the ball. But a big WTF to Sony Marketing. For the first time in a long while you guys have totally failed. No cookie for you.
just some guy
wasn't it supposed to support two digital video outputs? Apparently not.
You better check those specs again. The base PS3 isn't "Feature complete"
9 ae.pdf
The $499 base unit does not have HDMI out, does not have memory stick ports, and does not have 802.11b/g wireless.
See:
http://www.scei.co.jp/corporate/release/pdf/06050
-my other sig is your mom
We already know basically what the PS3's graphics chip is: It's an nVidia 7900 (notice that launched when the PS3 was orignally supposed to).
The major graphics players have tons of R&D working overtime to keep cranking out new cards, and they throw everything they can in it. They don't have time to develop a 100% seperate architecture, nor can they afford to not put out their best technology in their cards. Thus, the console graphics cards are just modifications on their then-current technology. The 360 is more or less an ATi X1900, the PS3 will be more or less an nVidia 7900. They aren't directly comparable, since things are changed for console design, like using embedded RAM, different clock speeds, etc, but the basic technology and thus features is the same.
So fire up a PC with a 7900 in it, you get a pretty good idea what you are going to get with a PS3. You can't run benchmarks and expect them to be spot on, but you get an idea of the kind of visual features and pciture quality you can expect. Given that the 7900 and X1900 are performing in the same class, the 360 and PS3 will do so as well graphics wise. I'm sure certian titles will be tweaked a bit for one or the other, but I wouldn't expect to see either pull ahead a significant amount from the other.
but in the long run it'll be nice to have all those features in the baseline system so game authors can design around them.
In the long run... that's what the PS4 is for.
Nice argument at first blush, but crumbles if you look at it, especially since the price-performance curve isn't linear at all; the last few % are also the most expensive. It's possible Nintendo went too far down the curve, but it seems certain to me Sony went too far up. By the time the PS3 comes down to a sane price, it may already be a Microsoft/Nintendo market.
Planning for the long term now is a losing proposition when you can plan for "the long term", which will then be the "short term", later, with all the Moore's law benefits you get just by sitting on your ass and twiddling your thumbs.
Once demand slackens, the price will drop.
Not below retail. Again, there is a hardcore gamer market that will pay $500 for a console, but it's not enough to base a price that will last at least a year on.
This is why people buy game consoles - to play the games that they can play nowhere else.
You don't say. If you read my original post, you may notice the part where I mention that I own all three current-gen systems. I also have a Dreamcast, a Saturn, a Nuon, and an SNES at the moment.
All you're saying is that you're not interested in video games.
No, what I'm saying is that video games alone aren't worth spending $500-$600 on. Not just for me, but for the vast majority of people. That is a considerable chunk of change for nearly everyone in the industrialized world. The only reason I spent that much on my PC is that it actually lets me be productive in addition to playing things like Oblivion and the new Tomb Raider.
"...always new atoms but always doing the same dance, remembering what the dance was yesterday." -Richard Feynman
So let me get this straight:
PS3:Pros
Cons
Anything I've missed? The pros are not all that impressive or unique (and are dependant on other factors). The cons on the other hand are like a punch to the solar plexus.
Are you kidding, you crazy flamebaiter? You *did* see the giraffe simulator right? That's some nice grazing...
First, "engineering gut feature" -> "engineering gut feeling". Oops.
Second, it turns out they cut rumble to support the sensors, for obvious reasons.
So, they're cutting a long-standing feature to trade in for a novel feature that (after reading more about it) shows every sign of being half-assed that I'd expect to see. This has the stench of a management decision made against the recommendation of the engineers, and I bet the engineers about went ballistic when they were informed it had to be ready for E3.
I don't know about Japan, but I'm smelling Microsoft/Nintendo for this next generation, and I'm increasingly wondering if it might not be ~3:1 in Nintendo's favor in three years (which is about the earliest I'd say we can "call" the results of this generation). The opening lineup for the Wii may even best the Dreamcast's opening lineup, which was spectacular for the time (as long as you could get your RPG fix somewhere else...).
I've been gaming for a long, long, LONG time.
I watched the entire presentation. I was underwhelmed. The graphics looked very close to Xbox 360 graphics (which falls in line with what developers were saying). The GT demo in particular had popup. The media store isn't going to be able to compete with iTunes. The controller, while it does have tilt features, doesn't work in a 3d space like Revolution (sorry: Wii -- absolutely hate that fucking name). No one is going to stick a PSP to the side of their TV as a rearview mirror in a racing game. You only get true HD resolution if you pony up $600.
The only thing I found remotely cool about the presentation was the idea of playing emulated PS1 games on my PSP. Then I realized that most PS1 games filled up entire CDs (or more than 1) -- how many are you going to be able to fit on the largest of memory sticks?
I picked up an Xbox 360 when it first came out and aside from a few titles (and the arcade, which is cool) it's been underwhelming. Nintendo is the last one to try to make this year of gaming interesting. Only other thing that can do it is Spore.
For me personally...
HD - Couldn't care less.
Blu-Ray - ditto.
Harddrive standard - Good.
Online - About time, everyone else has it.
Wireless - Same as above, and only in the more expensive model.
Compatibility - Everyone else has this too.
All in all this seems like a system that you would only think is a good deal if you already have an HDTV, or plan to get one soon. And plan to get a Blu-Ray player. Even then it might be a bit of a stretch.
Unfortunately, it's got roll pitch yaw and accelerometers for X Y and Z axis. [Link blatently stolen from earlier post]
--- As to make my comment seem, by comparison, more intelegent... doodie doodie doodie poop poop poop!
HD graphics : I'm not seeing a big improvement. In one case it looks like a step BACKWARD. Just take a look at their own comparison slide http://www.joystiq.com/media/2006/05/DSC_2355.JPG! The PS3 version look like a pasty white guy!
Blu-Ray : One word : Hype. There has yet to be a game that spans more than 1 DVD and I'm not spending $500 for a movie player AND having to re-buy my movie collection.
Hard drive : Xbox did it years ago. The Xbox360 threw the ball away on it but considering the PS3 is priced at $500~$600, Sony just threw the ball back at Microsoft.
Online : Old news and Sony has a poor record of online gameplay. Its SOE division is one of the worst in terms of service and considering they DOMINATED last generation with the PS2, Xbox Live CRUSHED the PS2 in terms of online marketshare.
Wireless controllers : Two words : Nintendo Wavebird. And the Xbox360's controllers are wireless as well. Sony is really the last man out in this case. (And this doesn't count third party controllers.)
PS2 and PS1 full compatibility : Considering a PS1 is dirt cheap and insanely plentiful (I've seenen package deals including 10 games and the system for $50 USD) and the inevitable price drop to the all important $100 mark for the PS2 near/after the PS3's launch, this isn't really important.
Rumble is moderately interesting. But it's not worth paying those fucks at Immersion for it. It never added much to a game anyway.
So I say if it would have added to the cost of the unit, I for one won't miss it.
http://lkml.org/lkml/2005/8/20/95
The Sony guy walked up to the mike and said one thing that got the crowd going: "$299"
Somehow, I think that Sony is opening themselves up to exactly what they took advantage of.
I don't want a 360, and I'll probably buy a Wii-volution on release day (as I did with GameCube), but I'm going to hold off on the PS3 until it significantly goes down in price. At least the stripped down PS3 will be more usable than the stripped down 360. (I don't need HDMI, and I don't need WiFi in the console.)
#naabhaprzrag, #sverubfr-000, #agi-fcbafberq, negvpyr[pynff*=' negvpyr-ary-'] { qvfcynl: abar !vzcbegnag; }
Sept two launch titles on the Wii ARE SE games, one of which Dragon Quest being the #1 all time best seling series in Japan. Final Fantasy is popular, but not nearly as much as Dragon Quest.
"Slashdot, where telling the truth is overrated but lying is insightful."
There has yet to be a game that spans more than 1 DVD
Star Ocean for PS2 - 2 DVDs.
As I suspected, Sony is trying to dilute Nintendo's innovation. I think most of us here are savvy enough to know that the PS3 controller is going to be far inferior to the Nintendo's "Wii-mote". Yet, how many of your regular consumers are going to know the difference?
I don't think Sony's goal was to out-do the Wii controller's feature and functionality. All it needs to do is dumb it down. Same goes for the Xbox Live experience. Let's deliver crap offerings of our competitors' features so that we can say "meeee tooo!". All they have to hope is that enough consumers figure that the PS3 offering is "good enough".
I cringe at the following scenario, which I know is going to happen:
ME - *trying to explain the Nintendo Wii controller to a non-gamer friend*
FRIEND - "Ohh, so it's like the PlayStation controller I've heard about?"
ME - *cries*
-- jchenx
Also Shadow Hearts: Covenant
"Blu-Ray : One word : Hype. There has yet to be a game that spans more than 1 DVD and I'm not spending $500 for a movie player AND having to re-buy my movie collection."
Well it does expand the space available for the next five years of games, and make compilations possible. You could have all four resident evil games on one disk for instance.
I've got some great retro compilations, and having that space available will make it possible to produce compilations of PS2 games.
I used to work for sony in 96-98, and I distinctly remember a prototype controller with an accelerometer being tried out. The tech is not really comparable to the Wii controller and there is a good reason why they never bothered to release it. Which makes you wonder why they suddenly decided to include it now, if not in a feeble attempt to steal Nintendo's thunder.
Doesn't matter, all the console differences aside, you are still dealing with the same class of hardware as the PC chips because it comes from teh same fundimental source. Like with the Xbox (orignal) the chip wasn't a direct copy of any nVidia chip. It was faster than any GeForce 3, and shared memory with the CPU. However, it's performance was in the same general class as a GeForce 3 or 4 and, more importantly, it's features were the same.
Same general thing here. Yes, in the end the console chips work different. If nothing else they don't have a PCI/AGP bus to contend with to talk to the processor, and as noted in the case of the 360 in particular, and even teh orignal Xbox, there are more differences. Heck the RSX may be more different than is currently known as Sony still hasn't given a final spec for it.
However what it boils down to is that you can look at the kind of graphics you can get from a modern, high end PC card and see what you can expect out of the consoles. If you run soimething like 3DMark2006 on a 7900 or X1900, you get the kind of lighting and shading and complexities you can expect to see.
So that's what I mean. I don't mean they are literal 1:1 equivalants. When you are working with a company on a fixed design, you can do things you can't on a PC. In ATi's case I don't think a unified shader architecture plays that well with DirectX 9's design, though it should with DX10 (which is probably the point, really Vista and the 360 will allegedly be easy to port between). However it's not like either ATi or nVidia are going to have some magic ace up their sleeve that they'll put on a console, but not on their cards.
You can rest assured that though you haven't seen an actual RSX, you've seen the generation of nVidia technology on which it's based, so you have a basic idea of what it's capable of. It may end up being faster than a 7900GTX (though probably not), but it's almost certianly not going to have graphics capabilites that the 7900s don't.
I imagine that games will look pretty similar on both platforms in general. Games released on both will probably be close to dead identicle since the less work you do on a port, the happier you are as a developer. However for platform specific games, I don't see any way that one is going to really be able to pull ahead. I'm sure the fanbois will argue until they are blue in teh face about who's got the prettier picture, but in reality they'll probably both look good and be on the same general plane.
You fucking moron - those figures show M$ haemoraging cash while Sony is profitable most quarters. M$ has lost more money over the last three quarters and has never turned a profit ever bar one quarter back in 2004.
Who cares about M$? I was responding to Sony propoganda about UMD sales and Sony profitablity.
Yea, M$ loses money on Xbox, so what? They can afford to bleed cash, Sony cannot. SCE is the only (sometimes) profitable division of Sony while the other divisions are tanking. If SCE fails, Sony goes bye-bye. If M$ Home Entertainment Division fails, M$ moves on like nothing ever happened.
But since you are a shortsighted fool, I will put it to you simply - M$ is prepared to outspend Sony into the grave. The ridiculous over-engineering and the resulting price of PS3 is a result of this. And if M$ wants to, they can lop off another $100 from X360's price tag and it wouldn't even phase them.
Get it through your head - Sony is banking their entire future on PS3. And M$ smells blood. Wait until the second-gen X360 games are shown tomorrow, and the world will see that PS3 is dead on arrival.
Can you say "FUCKING MORON FANBOY"???
Well, I'm not the one flying off the handle and cursing at people simply for delivering factual information.
Second, I don't give a rats ass about M$. I prefer the Wii, as it is the only console that supports next-generation gameplay. Fuck Xbox and fuck PS3.
But I'm not such a dumbass fanboy that I can't see the forest for the trees. M$ is aggressive, mean, and nasty, and they will bury Sony no matter what it costs them. Sony's time at the top is over. Deal with it.
Sure you can pay more than $399 for the full system if you look around enough and really want to, or just head to BestBuy (or really anywhere else) and just pay $399 if you want. Your choice. Then the games range from $40 to $60 so previous poster saying you can buy the full 360 plus 3-4 games for the price of the full PS3 seems spot on to me.
"reality has a well-known liberal bias" - Steven Colbert
Okay. I have to admit that while I had heard about the nunchuck accellerometers, I did not know that they announced a small speaker in the Wiimote.
Now that I know about it, I'm even more excited though... why? Well, hopefully Nintendo will be using the speaker the same way that Logitech did in their "iFeel" mouse. The mouse came and went many years ago, but was still cool though completely unsupported. The speaker in it was used to give tactile feedback as you moused over buttons and desktop items. By modulating low frequency sounds, they were able to generate quite a few physical textures. In my opinion, this feedback scheme produces much more natural feedback than the basic rumbling that console controllers use today.
This technology would also play excellently into the wiimote strategy -- using bits of tech that are not new in themselves, but have never before been brought together and well supported in a single device.
I spent the night thinking about this, and here's what I've come up with.
Sony is really thinking here. I'm serious, they knew exactly what they were getting into, and they priced themselves accordingly. At the end of 2006, how many people have the HD capabilities to really take advantage of this? The people who have dropped $2500 on a television. Its being marketed to them. Sony is in this for the long run, and the approach to the PS3 makes sense if you look at it that way.
The original Playstation was released in 1994. The PS2 was released in 2000. The PS3 is being released in 2006. A six year cycle - while the xbox and xbox 360 was released in 2001 and 2005 respectively - a four year cycle.
In 2006, not too many people have HD. By 2008, a lot more people will have HD. This is where their market starts making a substantial grasp. The full backwards compatibility of the PS3 makes it possible for developers to continue cranking out games for the PS2, and the PS3 users can still take advantage of those games.
In a lot of ways, the PS3 was rushed to market. The blue-ray tech is still very young, and hence very expensive (by some estimates 40% of the cost of the platform), and that will drop -really- fast. I suspect we'll see a price cut on the PS3 in the fall of 2007, which at that point the platform will really start taking off. 2008 will be the PS3's true testing year, since HD will be substantially more prevelent, and Blue-ray will have taken off as well.
The PS3 is probably designed for the same length on the market as the last two - six years. In 2013, most people will have HD, and if Microsoft maintains their cycle, will release another console in 2010. They'll have to, just to keep up.
Sony isnt shooting for market share, they're shooting for platform longevity. They -have- market share, and the PS2 still competes nicely right now. I'm betting that Sony wouldn't have put out a platform for another year if it hadn't been for Microsoft. All the technology that they're stuffing into the PS3 really makes me believe that. Blue-ray, HD, etc, their big costs for the platform are not market ready in a lot of ways yet.
Just some thoughts.
.
Beyond racing games there aren't any situations where this controller is leaping out and attacking me with Perfection, but the truth is that it's a lot more subtle than the Wii, and so probably will result in a more diverse set of games, a few dozen of which will use the tilt to great effect. The tilt is "there if you need it", the Wii-stick is "all you can expect the gamer to have" - barring some sort of original-DualShock controller redesign.
And by "more subtle" you mean "less useful." Look, if you're going to be waving your controller around for whatever reason, it ought to be comfortable to do so. The Wii is, while a Dual Shock by its two-handed nature is not. You're also discounting two things. First, you're not giving developers enough credit. I contend that diversity is much more likely with the Wii interface than with a rehash of the Dual Shock simply because you can do more with it. Second, you're not taking the controller's expansion capabilities into account. Nintendo has already said that GameCube controllers will work with Wii, and the Wiimote has a slot for expansion built in. A DualShock shell would be quite easy to implement, similar to IGN's gamecube cradle mockup, so a redesign isn't necessary.
In the end, personally, the Wii isn't getting my money no matter how cheap it is. $300 for dogshit is still paying money for dogshit.
You are of course welcome to your opinion, but I don't understand why you're so quick to write off Nintendo.
-f
Your brain is not a computer.