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Demo PS3 Units freeze on Purpose
AbsoluteZero writes "A Sony rep has claimed to Destructoid that demo PS3 units in kiosks across the country were built to freeze up on purpose. From the article: "We do that so that people won't play it all day long," he explained. "Specifically during Motorstorm, we made it freeze up a lot.""
"It's not a bug, it's a feature!" Where have I heard that before
Guy asked me for a quarter for a cup of coffee. So I bit him.
"I don't doubt that they might be speaking the truth, but they could've just put in a five minute reset timer or something. having the unit freeze up is just tacky."
You don't doubt that they might be speaking the truth? Are you serious?
What in heavens name has Sony done to instill such deep trust in you?
There's exactly NO chance that they made their demo product unstable and prone to crashing to keep people from playing it for too long.
No one in their right mind would design a kiosk that needs employee attention every 5-10 minutes. I mean, if the WalMart or BestBuy guy has to run over there to restart it constantly, then it's either a massive waste of his time or else there's the serious risk that the game will stay frozen for a long period of time. I did a little test last time I was in Best Buy. We saw that the PS3 was frozen when we walked in. 90 minutes later, we ambled out, and the PS3 was frozen at exactly the same screen.
A kiosk is supposed to be hands-off for employees. Requiring a employee-managed kiosk is a bad idea.
Being that it was a "Sony Rep" rather than a well known Sony executive means that the story could very well be true ...
A retail level representative is essentially just a sales person with little or no technical understanding of what they're selling. When a representative is asked a question they're always supposed to spout the company line when they can, and always make every answer positive for Sony. Being that Sony probably hasn't come up with a company line for why the PS3 keeps freezing a (dumb) representative spouted that "They were designed to do that."
Developer/Publisher level representatives are (usually) far better informed and far more honest.
I understand what you're asking, all I am saying is that there is nothing about this story which could be verified (regardless of whether it is true) and there is very little about this story which would make me doubt that it is true; I have personally seen a frozen PS3 unit on display and I have seen in store Company Representative make remarkably stupid statements.
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Now, as for why this is on Slashdot
The fact is that over the past 18 months Sony has alienated a large portion of their loyal userbase and their potential userbase; personally, Sony lost me before that but that is another story. A year and a half ago the PS3 was the system everyone wanted, the XBox 360 was an overly expensive console produced by an evil coporation, and the Revolution was exciting to Nintendo fans with massive disinterest for everyone else; today the PS3 is an overly expensive console produced by an evil coporation, the XBox 360 is exciting to XBox fans with massive disinterest for everyone else, and the Wii is the system everyone wants.
Basically, Sony burned a lot of bridges and people want to hear negative stories about the PS3 because they hate Sony.