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PlayStation 3 'Hacker's Paradise', Sales Up
Via Game|Life, a story on The Age site suggests that password crackers are really enjoying their PlayStation 3s ... and not because Ratchet is a great game. An NZ-based security researcher stated at a local security conference that the supercomputing power of the PS3 is being put to more nefarious uses than Folding@home. "Speed is important to "brute force" password cracking, which relies on guessing all possible combinations of the characters that make up the password. The accelerated technique means passwords protecting Office, PDF, ZIP and Lotus Notes ID files can be cracked with breathtaking speed. However, many other password types are handled more securely in software and remain unaffected by Breese's claimed speed increase." Sony does have some good news this week, though. Either the holiday season or a price drop here in the states has led to a massive sales increase.
Sure, the PS3 is the most powerful console of this generation, but it is also the most expensive. The gripe with Sony is about cost and arrogance. Sony thought that gamers would buy the PS3 at whatever price they set -- they were wrong.
Speaking from experience, the controls on Wii Sports Tennis, Mario Strikers Charged, Zelda, Madden, Resident Evil, and Metroid Prime 3 are actually very tight (i.e. not sloppy at all). Using the pointer to shoot in Resident Evil, Metroid Prime 3, and to stop Mega Strikes in Mario Strikers Charged is also very accurate and great fun.
I do want Sony to succeed (but not win) in this generation's console war, but they will need to drop the price of the PS3 to $200-250 with a hard disk to get my $$$. With $200 HD-DVD players being sold, it's also starting to look like this Christmas season will leave blu-ray as the loser in the HD format war as well. I sincerely hope that Sony learns from their PS3 mistakes before they end up in 3rd place in the current home game console generation.