If they shipped 200,000 in North America (80,000 in Japan) they are so far off of their targets that it isn't even funny anymore...
You're right, its not funny. Its hilarious!
In seriousness, this was not a launch. The PS3 did not launch. Its a fucking open beta, or something. If the rocket fails to lift off but instead rolls off the pad, I don't think you can use that word. 200k units is nothing.
(But lets watch. As a long time Sony observer, I do have to admit that historically they do great when their back is against the wall. This bad PR storm might be the best thing for the company, strain off some of that irritating hubris and get back to core competencies.)
Nintendo pulled a strange about-face... relevant links to be found in the original post:
It's not every day that a major video game company tells you not to listen to what it says, but that's just what Nintendo did today. Yesterday, the company issued a press release trumpeting NPD sales figures that showed healthy Wii and DS sales. The release also promised "well more than a million" Wii systems would be on U.S. store shelves by the end of the year, despite what the release called "spot shortages in some locations."
Today, Nintendo issued a correction asking everyone to disregard the line about the million systems and the spot shortages. The company didn't offer any new projections for end-of-year domestic shipments, they just want us to know that the million unit target should go down the memory hole.
Given Nintendo's previous promise to ship four million systems worldwide by year's end, we find it hard to believe that not even a million of those system's would go to the world's largest video game market. So we have to wonder, does this retraction point to some Wii production problems that are slowing the planned deployment of the system?
Maybe Nintendo is just reapportioning it's limited supplies in light of crippling shortages in Europe, leaving the U.S. in the cold. Maybe the company just didn't want to tip its hand about regional distribution plans (although we think the damage has already been done if this is the case). Maybe Nintendo is scaling back Wii chatter in preparation for a planned merger with Apple (highly unlikely, but hey, anything is possible).
youre right in that HDTV adoption has taken years to reach this point. however, since the release of this new generation of video games, HDTV sales have skyrocketed. now is the first time crappy HDTVs have been available below the magical $500US mark. the magical line that heralds widespread consumer adoption. the future is now.
This is a good point and I am optimistic as well - the only thing I might add is that the most popular new console is 480p only (the Wii), but who knows how that horse race will end up.
within the next year or two, game consoles alone are going to drive HDTV sales more. there will be [guesstimating here] probably 40 million next generation consoles sold in the next year, even if only half of those owners have hdtvs, youre still looking at ~20 million hdtv owners.
That strikes me as very hopeful; I doubt that half of people buying a game console will buy a 1080-capable HDTV. I do agree that they (consoles) are better drivers for sales of these things than the wasteland of heavily-compressed digital cable or satellite. But you could say the same thing about HD optical video players (blu-ray and hd-dvd).
as of today, the xbox360 can kinda sorta upscale to 1080p [only via vga if your TV accepts vga, and the content isnt 1080p native so there will obviously be issues],
... oh is that how they did it. That's lame. I guess they had no choice...
about half of the launch ps3 games support 1080p resolutions. as developers gain more confidence in the ps3 and learn its secrets, do you think the number of titles supporting 1080p will decrease?
Yes, I do.
First off - are you sure that half the games are 1080p? Have you got a reference? Please correct me if I am wrong. I can't find a good list.
720p is the sweet spot for the next while. Resistance on the PS3 is a good example of this; they started with a 1080 spec and ended up shipping a 720p game, because it just wasn't worth the processing cost relative to the game. In other words, when given a choice between 30 soldiers on-screen at 720p and 15 in 1080p, the developer will pretty much always go for the 720p. It just makes sense. EVERY user will see the 30 soldiers, whether SD, ED or HD; if you went the other way you'd be offering crystal clear graphics to the lucky ones who have 1080p (very, very small %, but growing) and everyone (including the lucky ones) only get 15 men on-screen. If the game can easily handle the signal without degrading the game itself then they will support the highest rez. This will change in 2-3 years but thats a long way away and I doubt 1080p penetration will be anything really significant... of course I could be wrong. Its just taken so long to get where we are.
will the library of bluray/HDDVD titles decrease? of course not. 1080p will eventually be the de facto standard at least for a foreseeable while; its the resolution most new content is being released.
Well, sure; but thats only because everything is already out on DVD. 1080p is just not there until these players ship. And they cost quite a bit. A year from now, maybe. Believe me, I'm hopeful; I have an HDTV myself.
last week i went to best buy and 30-40% of the tvs on display were 1080p. why the 1080p explosion? every store i visit, at least two hdtv showroom displays have a console connected. a year ago, there were no game consoles in/any/ showroom.
Well like I said in the original response, that is a huge difference from what I've experienced. I see the vast majority of new $3000+ sets supporting 1080p, but practically everything under that price point (Canadian) is 1080i at most, and there are a hell of a lot of EDTVs and 720p-only sets out there as well for much cheaper. And the only HD consoles I see are Xbox and PS3 kiosks with dedicated sets built into them.
While the footage is rendered CGI, all of the assets used in the video are from the game itself (or more likely, the high-resolution models and textures that the lower-poly in-game models and lower-res in-game textures will be generated from). That's not to say that there aren't more effects in the rendered video that can't or won't be done in-game, but I'd expect it to be relatively close by the time the game is done.
To be fair, this is exactly what Evolution (Motorstorm) and Guerilla (Killzone) said they were doing. (And lets be fair; if 'Bungie' is being fair, lets name the Sony developers too - they are not all just 'Sony'.)
I actually don't have a big problem with this. These games have gotten so big that pre-viz is a big part of making the thing happen. There is a 'spec' they will render to, as you said, ensuring that the visuals don't get to far afield of what the console is supposed to be capable of.
What happens in reality is that the animators will always have an extra slew of tricks they will employ to make the trailer shine, not the least of which is editing. Which a lot of people simply don't think about. Of course the live version won't cut like that because it would be unplayable as an interactive game. But you lose some drama, to be sure. Other things like 'perfect' motion blurs, perfect seamless mocap on Master Chief, won't be quite as fluid in the final game, and in some cases it will be pretty different. From the Halo trailer, for instance, the kids lying in the grass at the beginning are way beyond what in game models will do. The grass is probably a touch optimistic as well. It will all be there, just not quite as sharp and perfect as what we saw.
Check out the MotorStorm examples of the 'spec' rendered movie vs the actual game (i believe that is available on GameTrailers). The final game is close to the spec movie, but there are some noticeable differences (editing aside). This is only a single example, but I do think it illustrates the point. There are always compromises developers have to make from the spec in real life. Its sort of like expecting a full 54Mbps out of your 802.11g wireless, because it says to right on the box, and its theoretically capable of doing that if the tides and moons are in alignment, etc.
That ensures that EVERYTHING you watch will be scaled, so you couldn't even have the clarity of watching 720p on a 1280x720 set.
It makes absolutely no difference either way to picture quality.
Really. I looked into this and its a nonstarter. Go look at a 720p panel next to a '768p' panel (like the Samsung, there are a few out there) with same source. They look pretty much identical.
Almost everything you watch for the next while will be upconverted in some manner. All DVDs, for example.
Considering all of the above, how is 1080p "science fiction?" The answer, of course, is that it's not.
*blinks*
Classic kneejerk reaction. You completely misunderstood what I was trying to say. I know what 1080p is (but gosh, thanks for the lesson.)
I didn't say it didn't exist. What I meant was, there is practically no content for that signal, and probably won't be very much for some time. Thats it. And your 2-year estimate is pretty funny. Its taken a decade just to get the paltry HD adoption that is happening now.
One might think that you don't know what you're talking about from that statement.
One might be a flaming idiot. Go read my post again.
At another one, everyone was crowded around the one "good looking" TV, because it was the only one displaying an HD image. All the other TVs had been tuned to an analog channel, and looked like crap by comparison.
I ran into this very same dilemma (Future Shop in Canada, akin to Best Buy - and I believe owned by them). Here' s what I did - I took a Powerbook to the store with a DVD in it, along with the various video cables.
I knew that any HDTV I bought would have to hook up thru at least VGA and preferably DVI (the right DVI, not 'analog' DVI - still shake my head at that), and I also knew that their in-store video system would not show me a damn thing other than how crappy their distribution amplifier is.
Most sales drones won't throw a fit when you say you want to hook up the laptop, and you have a consistent source reference that is better for direct comparisons. Only problem with this is, you can't do side-by-side, but its still a lot better than the alternative.
If I were to offer advice, having just bought the Samsung model mentioned in the article (LCD) for exactly this primary purpose (gaming), here's what I would say:
make damn sure there isn't a sync issue
1080p is nice but hardly necessary; that rez is basically science fiction (content wise) for the next 4 years
viewing angle is key
make sure your inputs don't screw you; DVI is great, VGA is great, HDMI is nice in theory but a little ahead of the curve (mine has 2 HDMI and 1 component. Of course everything I have right now wants to talk component)
forget the speakers, they make no difference
the signal processor quality in the unit (upconverting, noise reduction) is VERY important. Samsung's DNIe is pretty impressive in this regard
If you are buying a flatscreen just for a Wii - and only that - you could go for a much cheaper EDTV. Its only 480p but thats all you're ever going to get out of the Nintendo anyhow. Probably make a nice bedroom wall tv later on. I wouldn't buy a 1080p TV right now unless the money really meant nothing to me. 720p basically IS 'HD' for the foreseeable future (for a lot of reasons).
I actually welcome this new method of interviewing. In Vino Veritas. Favourite part:
Sony Markedroid:
"We're going to continue the story of God of War across multiple platforms culminating in a classic battle-rama on the Playstation 3."
The thing that's really hurting is that, depite all the hype and the astronomical price, it's not substantially different or better than what the XBox 360 is offering. At least the Wii can claim lower price + novel controller; all Sony has is their brand, and the market is showing that there are some $600+ pills it won't swallow.
Its funny you should say that - I sort of agree - but I think it cuts both ways. For instance I can't help but think that Nintendo could have released the Wiimote for GameCube and saved us all a lot of trouble.
Also, I think the PS3 will start to look a lot different than the X360 in a year or two once they get a grip on the hardware, but only time will tell really.
Nobody knows how many units Sony will make before they kill off the PS3, nobody knows the component price cuts that will happen before then, nobody knows the unit price drops they will make, and only Sony know the margins, the R&D cost and the deals they have with all games manufacturers. Factor in cross-subsidising of the profit or loss on sales and develpment of Cell and Blu-Ray plus blue-ray movie sales, random numbers for advertising budgets, devkit profits or losses, online service profits or losses and currency fluctuation profits or losses, and you end up with a pretty indefinable number to divide by the analyst's guess at an average profit per game.
Master,
Your Flying Wheel Of Reasonable Discourse Technique... is Astonishing.
Graphics for the high-definition games cost about 1 billion yen ($8.6 million) to create, more than double that for Nintendo Co.'s Wii titles, Takasu said in a Tokyo interview Nov. 28.
What does this even mean? We have a blu-ray disc that holds lots of data, sure, and accordingly scaled up textures; but in any sort of process like this you are continually downscaling from practically any 'artistic' original source to begin with. Why does this cost more to downscale less than you were originally? Is it just harddrive space? That seems historically low.
And this doesn't even seem to take into account the idea that some games have different budgets? Why can he not make a game for both the Wii and PS3 that uses basic motion sensing? I think its a good idea if multiplatform games look as uniform as possible, and after all, "its not about the graphics anymore", right?
Seriously, I'm asking, if any one can credibly enlighten me as to why Namco would say this? (I am a graphic designer by trade but I do not work in the game sector.)
Third place by what metric? Units sold? If they're netting the most, doesn't that make them #1?
If they are going by total sales of consoles then they still aren't #1; if you figure in PS2 sales the whole thing slides dramatically in Sony's favour (even with the DS).
You are completely correct. I was under the mistaken idea that propaganda was strictly government-related. Perhaps this used to be the case, but certainly is not now.
So, really, by definition, propaganda is any deliberate attempt at advocacy. The format and genre of "An Inconvenient Truth" may be that of a documentary, but it is definitely a piece of propaganda.
Again, I cannot argue, although it begs the question; what use is the term 'propaganda' anymore if it means nothing more than to espouse an opinion or advance an agenda? This runs the gamut from advertising to art.
Really. And here I was thinking that the latest dishonest meme is that anyone who questions the veracity of the global warming claims must be some Bible thumping redneck from one of those ignorant red states.
By what name would you prefer we called you? I'm open to new suggestions.
Instead of college-prep chemistry, most of the textbook was filled with text and pictures (rather than equations and homework problems) about protecting the environment. The quality of the actual chemistry education provided in that book was so low that I suspected that many students would have insufficient background for their freshman-level chemistry classes they'd be taking next year.
In other words, Big Oil isn't the only lobbying group that attempts to influence high school education.
I'd like to believe you, but this really doesn't pass the smell test. Are you sure the class didn't turn into Environmental Science? What would be the purpose of lobbying a school to insert more pictures rather than equations? To what end? (Particularly if they just flunk out of College next year?)
You keep using that word - I do not think it means what you think it means.
Propaganda is by definition produced by a government, not individuals. So no, its not propaganda. Its a documentary, free to express an opinion on an issue (unlike say, reporting).
I do think that Crichton has a point insofar that a number of people take on the mantle of environmentalism and use it as a cudgel for furthering pet issues. Where he is wrong is in thinking that this is not a vanishingly small number of people. Christian fundamentalists, on the other hand, number in the tens of millions, and they are not shy about 'going to war with science' (see: Discovery Institute)
That's my point -- you don't need their approval. You make predictions routinely. They are correct routinely. You apply these predictions to perform something useful routinely, that maybe this zealot actually uses routinely! What does it matter if he does or doesn't endorse it?
-To answer the question: yes, science can remain apolitical, as long as it rigidly adheres to the scientfic principles of reproducibility and transparency. That's what makes science science: Even if someone refuses to believe you, it doesn't matter. Other people can perform their own corroborating experiments. Even if someone believes it to be all voodoo, you can then go out and continue to make valid predictions that result in useful services. And then anyone is free to propose alternate theories that match the data better.
So what happens when the other party refuses or is incapable of 'performing their own corroborating experiments'? What if they tell you that God has decreed that this science is wrong? What are you supposed to do with that?
*If* the remote could get it's protocol reverse engineered (technically only need button presses), and *if* you could boot off of the SD card with little more than a Bootloader DVD inserted into the drive, then you could basically have a media player on an SD card, complete with remote. Linux would take up like 100-150M or so of the drive, so just put the movies on the rest of the 2G card, put it in, boot it up, and watch the movies.
Its worth noting however that the PS3 seems to have the leg up for linux so far - they provide an officially sanctioned bootloader for instance. (Having a harddrive helps, as well). There's no reason the Xbox360 could not do this as well but so far MS is acting like it typically acts towards free software. Of the three new consoles, the Wii is the last one I expect to see with a truly functional linux environment.
... still lays golden eggs. Seriously, go look at the sales figures. I was somewhat astonished.
Beginning to thing that the PS2 is a missing part of the conversation about the PS3; perhaps the reason Sony aimed so damn high with the spec is that they already have a low-end console with a massive library that sells like crazy. They can probably take the brunt of the parts shortages and bad vibes up front by riding on the PS2's shoulders for at least another two years.
The Wii is the only one of the new systems that is made for adults. Single men under thirty don't count as adults. I don't know one man who wants to come home from work and play adolescent games where you shoot other people. Those games are still pushing the same formula that they did a decade ago when most of us adults got tired of them. I'd rather play a golf or baseball game than Gears of War for the same reason I'd rather spend Saturday playing real golf than I would hanging out with friends.
Way to take a not-bad point and stretch it all to hell.
We know Nintendo games go beyond sheer kiddie value for elegant gameplay reasons, but don't kid yourself, its a game with characters that have names like Princess Peach, Luigi, and Toad, and its coloured like an angry fruit salad. The fact that one can look past the PlaySkool elements to see the interesting game design beneath does not somehow elevate the entire enterprise into the realm of what most adults would call... adult.
A console is not made for any range group ("make no mistake" - i love that phrase. end of debate!) Get a grip. There is no 'adult game'. There are only games we sometimes don't like small kids to play. That's it.
Well, that and the fact that nobody gives a flip about HD movies anyway. With the video tape->DVD transition, the biggest draw for normal people (i.e., not audiophiles) was simply not having to rewind the stupid thing, not the better A/V quality. Blu-ray has no similar tangible advantage, so people don't care.
I disagree, but only in terms of speed-of-adoption. I think it is a better analogy to use Surround Sound. That was never really a 'must have' feature for many people, but 'sure is nice' for a lot, and it eventually creeped its way into much lower-end setups than when it appeared. Saying no one gives a flip is not accurate, the HD adoption curve is steepening, not flattening.
Because poor dev environments caused the downfall of several historic game consoles. See: Sega Saturn.
You make a fine case, but there seems to be a gigantic hole in your argument... shaped like a PS2. Everybody said exactly the same things about how hard it was to develop for, and we all know how that turned out.
So while I agree that this can be an issue, from the consumer's point of view I really don't see people wondering about Insomnia's toolchain while standing there considering a console. Frankly, the colour of the unit has a bigger impact.
And about your point about the 'top ten xmas gifts': The kids polled are probably very young. While this is one of the targets of the Wii, I can definitely see how the PS3 came on the list, and the DS as well - without the Wii. You have to look at where the youngin's are getting their information, and keep in fact that they're more impressionable by the media than your typical teenage/adult gamer. They hear 'blazingly fast' and 'not much faster than the gamecube' and they go apeshit.
Slashdot Mirror
So you're the one who bought the PSX! Neat!
Just out of curiosity, how are you ever going to find out if you've decided not to buy Sony stuff?
You're right, its not funny. Its hilarious!
In seriousness, this was not a launch. The PS3 did not launch. Its a fucking open beta, or something. If the rocket fails to lift off but instead rolls off the pad, I don't think you can use that word. 200k units is nothing.
(But lets watch. As a long time Sony observer, I do have to admit that historically they do great when their back is against the wall. This bad PR storm might be the best thing for the company, strain off some of that irritating hubris and get back to core competencies.)
It's not every day that a major video game company tells you not to listen to what it says, but that's just what Nintendo did today. Yesterday, the company issued a press release trumpeting NPD sales figures that showed healthy Wii and DS sales. The release also promised "well more than a million" Wii systems would be on U.S. store shelves by the end of the year, despite what the release called "spot shortages in some locations."
Today, Nintendo issued a correction asking everyone to disregard the line about the million systems and the spot shortages. The company didn't offer any new projections for end-of-year domestic shipments, they just want us to know that the million unit target should go down the memory hole.
Given Nintendo's previous promise to ship four million systems worldwide by year's end, we find it hard to believe that not even a million of those system's would go to the world's largest video game market. So we have to wonder, does this retraction point to some Wii production problems that are slowing the planned deployment of the system?
Maybe Nintendo is just reapportioning it's limited supplies in light of crippling shortages in Europe, leaving the U.S. in the cold. Maybe the company just didn't want to tip its hand about regional distribution plans (although we think the damage has already been done if this is the case). Maybe Nintendo is scaling back Wii chatter in preparation for a planned merger with Apple (highly unlikely, but hey, anything is possible).
This is a good point and I am optimistic as well - the only thing I might add is that the most popular new console is 480p only (the Wii), but who knows how that horse race will end up.
That strikes me as very hopeful; I doubt that half of people buying a game console will buy a 1080-capable HDTV. I do agree that they (consoles) are better drivers for sales of these things than the wasteland of heavily-compressed digital cable or satellite. But you could say the same thing about HD optical video players (blu-ray and hd-dvd).
Yes, I do.
First off - are you sure that half the games are 1080p? Have you got a reference? Please correct me if I am wrong. I can't find a good list.
720p is the sweet spot for the next while. Resistance on the PS3 is a good example of this; they started with a 1080 spec and ended up shipping a 720p game, because it just wasn't worth the processing cost relative to the game. In other words, when given a choice between 30 soldiers on-screen at 720p and 15 in 1080p, the developer will pretty much always go for the 720p. It just makes sense. EVERY user will see the 30 soldiers, whether SD, ED or HD; if you went the other way you'd be offering crystal clear graphics to the lucky ones who have 1080p (very, very small %, but growing) and everyone (including the lucky ones) only get 15 men on-screen. If the game can easily handle the signal without degrading the game itself then they will support the highest rez. This will change in 2-3 years but thats a long way away and I doubt 1080p penetration will be anything really significant... of course I could be wrong. Its just taken so long to get where we are.
Well, sure; but thats only because everything is already out on DVD. 1080p is just not there until these players ship. And they cost quite a bit. A year from now, maybe. Believe me, I'm hopeful; I have an HDTV myself.
Well like I said in the original response, that is a huge difference from what I've experienced. I see the vast majority of new $3000+ sets supporting 1080p, but practically everything under that price point (Canadian) is 1080i at most, and there are a hell of a lot of EDTVs and 720p-only sets out there as well for much cheaper. And the only HD consoles I see are Xbox and PS3 kiosks with dedicated sets built into them.
To be fair, this is exactly what Evolution (Motorstorm) and Guerilla (Killzone) said they were doing. (And lets be fair; if 'Bungie' is being fair, lets name the Sony developers too - they are not all just 'Sony'.)
I actually don't have a big problem with this. These games have gotten so big that pre-viz is a big part of making the thing happen. There is a 'spec' they will render to, as you said, ensuring that the visuals don't get to far afield of what the console is supposed to be capable of.
What happens in reality is that the animators will always have an extra slew of tricks they will employ to make the trailer shine, not the least of which is editing. Which a lot of people simply don't think about. Of course the live version won't cut like that because it would be unplayable as an interactive game. But you lose some drama, to be sure. Other things like 'perfect' motion blurs, perfect seamless mocap on Master Chief, won't be quite as fluid in the final game, and in some cases it will be pretty different. From the Halo trailer, for instance, the kids lying in the grass at the beginning are way beyond what in game models will do. The grass is probably a touch optimistic as well. It will all be there, just not quite as sharp and perfect as what we saw.
Check out the MotorStorm examples of the 'spec' rendered movie vs the actual game (i believe that is available on GameTrailers). The final game is close to the spec movie, but there are some noticeable differences (editing aside). This is only a single example, but I do think it illustrates the point. There are always compromises developers have to make from the spec in real life. Its sort of like expecting a full 54Mbps out of your 802.11g wireless, because it says to right on the box, and its theoretically capable of doing that if the tides and moons are in alignment, etc.
It makes absolutely no difference either way to picture quality.
Really. I looked into this and its a nonstarter. Go look at a 720p panel next to a '768p' panel (like the Samsung, there are a few out there) with same source. They look pretty much identical.
Almost everything you watch for the next while will be upconverted in some manner. All DVDs, for example.
*blinks*
Classic kneejerk reaction. You completely misunderstood what I was trying to say. I know what 1080p is (but gosh, thanks for the lesson.)
I didn't say it didn't exist. What I meant was, there is practically no content for that signal, and probably won't be very much for some time. Thats it. And your 2-year estimate is pretty funny. Its taken a decade just to get the paltry HD adoption that is happening now.
One might think that you don't know what you're talking about from that statement.
One might be a flaming idiot. Go read my post again.
I ran into this very same dilemma (Future Shop in Canada, akin to Best Buy - and I believe owned by them). Here' s what I did - I took a Powerbook to the store with a DVD in it, along with the various video cables.
I knew that any HDTV I bought would have to hook up thru at least VGA and preferably DVI (the right DVI, not 'analog' DVI - still shake my head at that), and I also knew that their in-store video system would not show me a damn thing other than how crappy their distribution amplifier is.
Most sales drones won't throw a fit when you say you want to hook up the laptop, and you have a consistent source reference that is better for direct comparisons. Only problem with this is, you can't do side-by-side, but its still a lot better than the alternative.
If I were to offer advice, having just bought the Samsung model mentioned in the article (LCD) for exactly this primary purpose (gaming), here's what I would say:
make damn sure there isn't a sync issue
1080p is nice but hardly necessary; that rez is basically science fiction (content wise) for the next 4 years
viewing angle is key
make sure your inputs don't screw you; DVI is great, VGA is great, HDMI is nice in theory but a little ahead of the curve (mine has 2 HDMI and 1 component. Of course everything I have right now wants to talk component)
forget the speakers, they make no difference
the signal processor quality in the unit (upconverting, noise reduction) is VERY important. Samsung's DNIe is pretty impressive in this regard
If you are buying a flatscreen just for a Wii - and only that - you could go for a much cheaper EDTV. Its only 480p but thats all you're ever going to get out of the Nintendo anyhow. Probably make a nice bedroom wall tv later on. I wouldn't buy a 1080p TV right now unless the money really meant nothing to me. 720p basically IS 'HD' for the foreseeable future (for a lot of reasons).
Sony Markedroid:
"We're going to continue the story of God of War across multiple platforms culminating in a classic battle-rama on the Playstation 3."
Jaffe:
"I don't know what you just said."
God of War took me something like 13-14 hours. And that was good.
Final Fantasy XII, I'm somewhere around 100 hours, and the game is clearly far too short. :)
Its funny you should say that - I sort of agree - but I think it cuts both ways. For instance I can't help but think that Nintendo could have released the Wiimote for GameCube and saved us all a lot of trouble.
Also, I think the PS3 will start to look a lot different than the X360 in a year or two once they get a grip on the hardware, but only time will tell really.
Master,
Your Flying Wheel Of Reasonable Discourse Technique... is Astonishing.
Hai!
What does this even mean? We have a blu-ray disc that holds lots of data, sure, and accordingly scaled up textures; but in any sort of process like this you are continually downscaling from practically any 'artistic' original source to begin with. Why does this cost more to downscale less than you were originally? Is it just harddrive space? That seems historically low.
And this doesn't even seem to take into account the idea that some games have different budgets? Why can he not make a game for both the Wii and PS3 that uses basic motion sensing? I think its a good idea if multiplatform games look as uniform as possible, and after all, "its not about the graphics anymore", right? Seriously, I'm asking, if any one can credibly enlighten me as to why Namco would say this? (I am a graphic designer by trade but I do not work in the game sector.)
If they are going by total sales of consoles then they still aren't #1; if you figure in PS2 sales the whole thing slides dramatically in Sony's favour (even with the DS).
Again, I cannot argue, although it begs the question; what use is the term 'propaganda' anymore if it means nothing more than to espouse an opinion or advance an agenda? This runs the gamut from advertising to art.
By what name would you prefer we called you? I'm open to new suggestions.
I'd like to believe you, but this really doesn't pass the smell test. Are you sure the class didn't turn into Environmental Science? What would be the purpose of lobbying a school to insert more pictures rather than equations? To what end? (Particularly if they just flunk out of College next year?)
You keep using that word - I do not think it means what you think it means.
Propaganda is by definition produced by a government, not individuals. So no, its not propaganda. Its a documentary, free to express an opinion on an issue (unlike say, reporting).
I do think that Crichton has a point insofar that a number of people take on the mantle of environmentalism and use it as a cudgel for furthering pet issues. Where he is wrong is in thinking that this is not a vanishingly small number of people. Christian fundamentalists, on the other hand, number in the tens of millions, and they are not shy about 'going to war with science' (see: Discovery Institute)
I'm not really articulating myself properly.
Perhaps this is a better example of what I am talking about.
(I might add, the fact that someone modded my fairly innocent question down sort of makes my point.)
So what happens when the other party refuses or is incapable of 'performing their own corroborating experiments'? What if they tell you that God has decreed that this science is wrong? What are you supposed to do with that?
Its worth noting however that the PS3 seems to have the leg up for linux so far - they provide an officially sanctioned bootloader for instance. (Having a harddrive helps, as well). There's no reason the Xbox360 could not do this as well but so far MS is acting like it typically acts towards free software. Of the three new consoles, the Wii is the last one I expect to see with a truly functional linux environment.
Beginning to thing that the PS2 is a missing part of the conversation about the PS3; perhaps the reason Sony aimed so damn high with the spec is that they already have a low-end console with a massive library that sells like crazy. They can probably take the brunt of the parts shortages and bad vibes up front by riding on the PS2's shoulders for at least another two years.
Way to take a not-bad point and stretch it all to hell.
We know Nintendo games go beyond sheer kiddie value for elegant gameplay reasons, but don't kid yourself, its a game with characters that have names like Princess Peach, Luigi, and Toad, and its coloured like an angry fruit salad. The fact that one can look past the PlaySkool elements to see the interesting game design beneath does not somehow elevate the entire enterprise into the realm of what most adults would call ... adult.
A console is not made for any range group ("make no mistake" - i love that phrase. end of debate!) Get a grip. There is no 'adult game'. There are only games we sometimes don't like small kids to play. That's it.
I disagree, but only in terms of speed-of-adoption. I think it is a better analogy to use Surround Sound. That was never really a 'must have' feature for many people, but 'sure is nice' for a lot, and it eventually creeped its way into much lower-end setups than when it appeared. Saying no one gives a flip is not accurate, the HD adoption curve is steepening, not flattening.
You make a fine case, but there seems to be a gigantic hole in your argument... shaped like a PS2. Everybody said exactly the same things about how hard it was to develop for, and we all know how that turned out.
So while I agree that this can be an issue, from the consumer's point of view I really don't see people wondering about Insomnia's toolchain while standing there considering a console. Frankly, the colour of the unit has a bigger impact.
Umm... didn't you just make my argument for me? :)